OBJECT AND LIVING ORGANISM 105 



as the organic. Sun, moon, planets and the heaven of the 

 fixed stars united in a vast work of art expressing plan, in 

 which every substance occupied its appointed place. The 

 water flowed on the earth and gave life to it, just as the blood 

 does in the body. There was no such thing as dead 

 matter. 



This must be obvious to any naturalist who passes 

 through the museum at Athens, and looks critically at the 

 ancient water- jars, which differ so essentially from our own 

 water- vessels. While our own, when they are good, reproduce 

 in every detail of their form man's preoccupation with his 

 own affairs, in the ancient jars these signs recede into the back- 

 ground, and the vessels come to represent as completely as 

 possible a clothing of the water itself. 



■ They are strikingly reminiscent of certain rhizopod shells, 

 with which the fluid protoplasm of these wonderful organisms 

 invests itself. And thus we get the impression that, in those 

 old Grecian jars, the water created for itself the only envelope 

 that would exactly fit it, and that this was subsequently 

 made use of by man. In their perfection, these ancient 

 vessels are true forms of Nature in art. 



In its claim of conformity with plan, the Greek view of the 

 world far transcends the boldest dreams of biology. The 

 confidence and consistency of this way of looking at things, 

 however, makes us wonder whether, by sacrificing the in- 

 organic world to physics, we did not relinquish far too much 

 ground to the enemy without shC)wing fight — ground which 

 occasionally we have to win back. 



There are a number of facts that can be used in support of 

 this view. It is certainly no proof of the lack of plan in 

 Nature that water is heaviest at 4° C., for this prevents the 

 inland lakes from being frozen up, and so animal life is pre- 

 served. Neither does the formation of snow-flakes suggest 

 that there is no plan, for if in winter the water poured down on 



