vn MECHANISM AND HOLISM 177 



thus to rearrange and readjust and interchange elements 

 of structure and function so as to constitute its new balance 

 of structure and function, and to preserve it as a whole. 

 The selective regulative nature, character and activity of 

 life arise from the very nature and process of the equili- 

 brium in the new structures which we associate with life. 

 The conception of Entelechy is therefore not necessary. 

 The regulative equilibrium of the new structures which v/e 

 call organisms is sufficient. This equilibrium oscillates 

 between certain limits, and within these limits the structure 

 maintains its balance of parts and activities inside the 

 physical system of Nature. Beyond those limits it is, of 

 course, destroyed, and the structure of life is therefore 

 most closely and intimately associated with the conditions 

 and properties of its material medium. It is not an inde- 

 pendent entity, self-created and free from the trammels 

 of matter. It is a complex structure of the simpler struc- 

 tures of matter, and therefore dependent on those structures 

 and their laws. But within certain limits it creates internally 

 its own adjustments as a structure and is to that extent 

 free from matter. It is more of a whole, it has a measure 

 of freedom, and in its self-maintenance and dynamic stability 

 it shows a power of internal regulation and co-ordination 

 which is quite beyond the range of the lower physical 

 structures. Take, for instance, the manner in which the 

 bodily temperature is maintained under all sorts of con- 

 ditions through a most minute and delicate co-operation 

 of a vast number of physiological factors and mechanisms. 

 Professor Haldane has very ably dealt with this aspect of 

 the matter and has shown with great force that Physiology 

 demands imperatively new categories of explanation, and 

 can no longer rest content with the crude conceptions of 

 mechanism which have so far been prevalent. But, on the 

 other hand, his argument must not blind us to the funda- 

 mental similarities between inorganic and organic structures. 

 Organic structures do but repeat on a higher plane of organ- 

 isation and with an added element of newness, inherent 

 in Holism, that process of self-adjusted, self-regulated 



