356 Organic Nature's Riddle 



indeed no true concept, for it is incapable not only of being 

 imagined but also of being really conceived of. It resembles 

 such unmeaning expressions as ' a square pentagon ' or a 

 ' pitch-dark luminosity.' 



Nevertheless, our experience is in favour of the exist- 

 ence of an intelligence Avhich can implant in and elicit from 

 unconscious bodies activities which are intelligent in appear- 

 ance and result. Thus we can construct calculating machines 

 and train animals to perform many actions which have a 

 delusive semblance of rationality. 



' Truly intelligent action ' we know as being intelligent 

 and rational in its foresight, and therefore as necessarily 

 conscious in the very principle of its being. 



' Unconsciously intelhgent action,' improperly called ' in- 

 telligent ' or ' wise,' is that which is intelligent and wise only 

 as to its results, and not in the innermost principle of the 

 creatures (whether living or mere machines) which perform 

 such action. To speak technically, we have 'formal' and 

 ' material ' intelligence,^ as we have ' formal ' and ' material ' 

 vice and virtue.^ We have already distinguished between 

 the ' formal ' and the merely ' material ' discoverer of a new 

 fossil, and this distinction is one which it is most important 

 to bear in mind. It is the failure to apprehend this dis- 

 tinction which is the root of a vast number of modem 

 philosophical errors, and the error which consists in asserting 

 the reality of ' unconscious intelligence ' is one of them. 



In fact ' intelligence ' exists very truly, in a certain sense,. 

 in the admirably directed actions blindly performed by 

 Hving beings. It is not, however, 'formally' in them, but 



^ See also ante, vol. i. p. 328. 



■^ Thus a man wishing to aid another, but who by miscalculation causes 

 his death, does an action which is ' materially ' homicidal, though ' formally ' 

 his action is a virtuous one. Similarly a man may be ' materially ' a bigamist 

 but not 'formally,' as when he has married a second wife being honestly 

 convinced that his first wife was dead. 



