98 HOLISM AND EVOLUTION chap. 



case of matter and life has a far more general application 

 and points to something fundamental in the universe, funda- 

 mental in the sense that it is practically universal, that it 

 is a real operative factor, and that its shaping influence is 

 felt ever more deeply and widely with the advance of 

 Evolution. Holism is the term here coined (from 6\os = 

 whole) to designate this fundamental factor operative 

 towards the making or creation of wholes in the universe. 

 Let us first try to get some general idea of what Holism 

 is and what 'Vholes" are; thereafter I shall try to define 

 these terms more closely. 



We are all familiar in the domain of life with what is here 

 called wholes. Every organism, every plant or animal, is a 

 whole, with a certain internal organisation and a measure 

 of self-direction, and an individual specific character of its 

 own. This is true of the lowest micro-organism no less than 

 of the most highly developed and complex human per- 

 sonality. What is not generally recognised is that the con- 

 ception of wholes covers a much wider field than that of 

 life, that its beginnings are traceable already in the inorganic 

 order of Nature, and that beyond the ordinary domain 

 of biology it applies in a sense to human associations like 

 the State, and to the creations of the human spirit in 

 all its greatest and most significant activities. Not only are 

 plants and animals wholes, but in a certain limited sense the 

 natural collocations of matter in the universe are wholes; 

 atoms, molecules and chemical compounds are limited 

 wholes; while in another closely related sense human 

 characters, works of art and the great ideals of the higher 

 life are or partake of the character of wholes. In popular 

 use the word '^whole" is often made to cover some of these 

 higher creations. A poem or a picture, for instance, is 

 praised because it is a "whole," because it is not a mere' 

 artificial construction, but an organic whole, in which all the 

 parts appear in a subtle indefinable way to subserve and 

 carry out the main purpose or idea. Artistic creations are, in 

 fact, mainly judged and appraised by the extent to which 

 they realise the character of wholes. But there is much 



