XII THE HOLISTIC UNIVERSE 329 



chapters, I now proceed to compare the world-view to which 

 Holism leads with those which resemble or touch it at various 

 points and yet are essentially different from it. 



The Holistic view agrees with the Naturalistic con- 

 ception of physical science in giving the fullest importance 

 to the physical aspect of the universe. It does full justice 

 to the structural and mechanistic characters of Nature, and 

 indeed it considers Mechanism simply an earlier phase of 

 Holism, and therefore perfectly legitimate up to a point. 

 It affirms the validity of the fundamental laws and principles 

 of physics not only for inorganic bodies but also for 

 organisms, in so far as they are material. It represents 

 the organic order as arising from and inside the inorganic 

 or physical order without in any way derogating from 

 it. If in the end it erects on the physical a super- 

 structure which is more and more ideal and spiritual, that 

 does not mean a denial of the physical. The idealism of 

 Holism does not deny matter, but affirms and welcomes 

 and affectionately embraces it. If Holism begins as real- 

 ism and ends as idealism, it does not spurn or deny its 

 own past; in Holism both realism and idealism have 

 their proper place and function and indeed find their justi- 

 fication and reconciliation. It breaks with Naturalism only 

 at the point where Naturalism becomes purely materialistic, 

 and in effect denies the creative plasticity of Nature, presents 

 Nature as an anatomical museum, as a collection of dead and 

 dried disjecta membra, instead of the interwoven body of 

 living, creative, progressive unities and syntheses which she 

 essentially is. Naturalism represents the universe as a vast 

 reservoir of energy, unalterable in amount but steadily 

 deteriorating in character, subject to immutable laws and 

 fixed equations which prevent anything essentially new from 

 ever arising or having arisen. It thus negatives the concept 

 of creative Evolution except as a mere figure of speech. 

 It presents life and mind as mere wandering insubstantial 

 shadows on the shores of this ocean of energy; the great 

 Mirage of Evolution broods over the waters; and Man 

 himself, so far from being a creative factor in reality as a 



