ioo CREATIVE EVOLUTION CHAP, 



coordinated in a certain definite form, to wit, that of the 

 hand that is stopped and of a part of the arm. Now, 

 suppose that the hand and arm are invisible. Lookers- 

 on will seek the reason of the arrangement in the filings 

 themselves and in forces within the mass. Some will 

 account for the position of each filing by the action 

 exerted upon it by the neighbouring filings : these are 

 the mechanists. Others will prefer to think that a plan 

 of the whole has presided over the detail of these ele 

 mentary actions : they are the finalists. But the truth 

 is that there has been merely one indivisible act, that of 

 the hand passing through the filings : the inexhaustible 

 detail of the movement of the grains, as well as the order 

 of their final arrangement, expresses negatively, in a way, 

 this undivided movement, being the unitary form of a 

 resistance, and not a synthesis of positive elementary 

 actions. For this reason, if the arrangement of the 

 grains is termed an &quot; effect &quot; and the movement of the 

 hand a &quot; cause,&quot; it may indeed be said that the whole 

 of the effect is explained by the whole of the cause, but 

 to parts of the cause parts of the effect will in no wise 

 correspond. In other words, neither mechanism nor 

 finalism will here be in place, and we must resort to an 

 explanation of a different kind. Now, in the hypothesis 

 we propose, the relation of vision to the visual appar 

 atus would be very nearly that of the hand to the iron 

 filings that follow, canalize and limit its motion. 



The greater the effort of the hand, the farther it will 

 go into the filings. But at whatever point it stops, 

 instantaneously and automatically the filings coordinate 

 and find their equilibrium. So with vision and its 

 organ. According as the undivided act constituting 

 vision advances more or less, the materiality of the 

 organ is made of a more or less considerable number of 



