102 HOLISM AND EVOLUTION chap. 



purpose of a preliminary survey in this chapter we need not 

 consider these characters more closely. But it is necessary 

 that we should form a clearer conception of the differences 

 which distinguish a whole in the above sense from something 

 which is not a whole. 



In the first place, I wish to emphasise that a whole accord- 

 ing to the view here presented is not simple, but composite 

 and consists of parts. Natural wholes such as organisms 

 are not simple but complex or composite, consisting of many 

 parts in active relation and interaction of one kind or 

 another, and the parts may be themselves lesser wholes, 

 such as cells in an organism. Wholes are composites 

 and not simples. The idea of a whole as a simple unique 

 individual entity is a metaphysical view which we have 

 to guard against. Philosophy has elaborated the concept 

 of a unique whole which is really an absolute, indestruc- 

 tible and unchangeable. Plato in the Phcedo, for instance, 

 presented the human soul as such a whole, and from its 

 indivisibility derived an argument in favour of its im- 

 mortality. What is simple, indivisible and ultimate must 

 necessarily also be indestructible. Natural wholes accord- 

 ing to my view, however, are not such simple indivisible 

 entities, which are really philosophic abstractions. 



Then, again, the philosophic conception leaves no room 

 for change, movement or development of a whole. The 

 whole or absolute of philosophy is necessarily static. The 

 simple unique ultimate whole cannot change or develop. 

 It is what it is unchangeably. It negatives the idea of 

 Evolution which is essential to the conception of wholes as 

 here presented. The view of the universe as a whole or an 

 absolute in the philosophic sense leaves no room for progress 

 or development, and is in conflict with all the teachings of 

 experience and all the most significant results of science. 

 The parts indeed may move and change, their relations 

 inter se may show a flux to which the name of development 

 may be given. But it will not be real creative development. 

 The absolute whole of philosophy is immutable, withdrawn 

 in itself, and unlike anything of which we have experience 



