134 THE LESSON OF EVOLUTION 



adapted we mean that the plants have been made 

 suitable to withstand the climate, while the rocks 

 are not protected in any way. Now, how could the 

 physical agents have brought about this adaptation ? 

 Could wind, or rain, or cold, have thickened fche 

 leaves or curled up their margins? Certainly not. 

 Their action has been indirect only. They have 

 caused the protoplasm to do these things. It is the 

 real agent, and not the physical forces. We might 

 as well say that a house was built by the rain and 

 wind, or that snow formed a great coat, as that these 

 leaves were produced by physiogenesis. In fact 

 physical energies cannot act indirectly. It is the 

 response of the protoplasm to these energies that 

 is. accommodation or adaptation which is meant, 

 and this is identical with psychogenesis. Clearly 

 all adaptations must be primarily due to psycho- 

 genesis, and only indirectly to the action of external 

 agencies. 



It would be easy to multiply examples almost ad 

 infinitum, but no object would be gained by doing- 

 so. If it can be shew r n that mental effort is not 

 necessary in the cases I have produced, then all 

 would fail. But if they are not due to physico- 

 chemical causes, they must be due to mind directing 

 the movements of the protoplasm. I therefore call 

 the process psychogenesis. It includes all varia- 

 tions w r hich are due to the initiative of the 

 protoplasm. 



Whatever mind may be, it is not passive. It is as 

 energetic as the physical forces, and it must, in 

 some way, originate changes in the protoplasm, 



