136 HOLISM AND EVOLUTION chap. 



as yet. The inorganic becomes organic, the alien stuff of 

 the environment is recreated into the stuff of the living 

 organism. The organic changes which take place are 

 assumed to have their physical and chemical equivalents; 

 but even if that is so, they are much more than the mere 

 physico-chemical tale they tell. The stimulus has been 

 transformed and absorbed and become a series of states 

 of the organism; the organism has made the stimulus its 

 own, as it were. And as a result the response is not the 

 mere passive effect of the stimulus, but is the free and 

 spontaneous movement of the organism itself under the 

 influence of the appropriate stimulus. The passive external 

 stimulus has been recreated into an active, free response 

 of the organism. Anything passing through the organic 

 whole thereby becomes completely changed. Any action 

 issuing from it has the stamp of the whole upon it. The 

 procedure is transformative, synthetic, recreative, holistic, 

 and the result is "new" in one degree or another. 

 I From this it will be seen that if the concept of causation 

 I is to be retained in connection with organic or psychical 

 ' activities, it will have to be substantially recast. The re- 

 sultant activity of an organism under a stimulus is never 

 j the effect of that stimulus, as it would be in the case of 

 1 mechanical action, but always of the stimulus as trans- 

 i formed by the organism; the organism appears as the 

 dominant element in the causal concept, and the stimulus 

 appears in a minor role. The more active the state of the 

 organism, and the more thorough its reaction to the stimulus, 

 the less is the influence of the stimulus on the response, 

 which appears as the free and almost original action of the 

 organism. The organic response is often so great compared 

 to the stimulus, it is so out of all proportion to it and so 

 transcends it in every way, that the organism appears clearly 

 as the real cause, and the stimulus merely as a minor condi- 

 tion or excitation. 



It is thus seen that organism is a new system, with its 

 own activities and laws and categories of action and descrip- 

 tion. It is a new centre, with a large measure of inde- 



