VI FUNCTIONS AND CATEGORIES 141 



various organs and activities, and the same delicacy and 

 ingenuity of adjustment to novel situations. Any one of 

 the functional elements involved would be a wonder in 

 itself; but when the co-ordinated combination of all is 

 studied; when, moreover, the great variety of adjustments 

 of this combination to unusual situations is considered, the 

 marvel becomes baffling to our human intelligence. The 

 most delicate processes, involving vast numbers of co- 

 operating factors, happen not clumsily or slowly, but most 

 finely and as it were in less than the twinkling of an eye. 



What guides and controls such a complex physiological 

 process? Intelligence such as we know it is clearly not 

 equal to the task; nor have we any reason to ascribe intelli- 

 gence to organic processes. The assumption of a vital force 

 explains nothing, as our problem concerns something far 

 more subtle and directive than force. Again, to look upon 

 it as a marvellous self-working mechanism does not meet 

 the real situation, which is more than one of mechanism, 

 however marvellous. The theory of Evolution presupposes 

 an original start from simple beginnings, which have multi- . 

 plied, evolved and become complex in the course of Evolu- ^ 

 tion. The pure chance presupposed by Mechanists has; 

 never ruled the world. There has never been a blind sort- 

 ing out of possibilities according to the laws of probability; 

 and if there had been, the chances against the present 

 organic situation in the world would have been infinite. Not 

 thus has the new arisen and gone forward. The new has 

 always arisen in the bosom of the old, and under its aegis 

 and influence. Not blind chance or contingency but the 

 existing state of affairs has always shaped the course and 

 direction of Evolution. The new arises from the old and 

 largely at its prompting, and thus in harmony with it. Its 

 novelty is very small compared to its essential conservatism. 

 Variation is infinitesimal compared to Heredity. It is this 

 fundamental character of unity, unitariness and wholeness 

 as distinct from mechanical aggregation of parts, which 

 seems to me to explain the phenomena of organic regula- 

 tion and co-ordination. Organisms, of course, contain a 



