ACCEPTING THE UNIVERSE 



in the planting of many oaks and chestnuts and 

 beeches. 



The inherent tendency to variation in organic 

 life, together with Nature's hit-and-miss method, 

 account for her endless variety on the same plane, 

 as it were, as that of her many devices for dissemi- 

 nating her seeds. One plan of hook or barb serves as 

 well as another, — that of bidens as well as that of 

 hound's- tongue, — yet each has a pattern of its 

 own. The same may be said of the leaves of the 

 trees : their function is to expose the juices of the 

 tree to the chemical action of light and air; yet 

 behold what an endless variety in their shape, 

 size, and structure! This is the way of the Infi- 

 nite — to multiply endlessly, to give a free rein to 

 the physical forces and let them struggle with one 

 another for the stable equilibrium to which they 

 never, as a whole, attain; to give the same free rein 

 to the organic forces and let their various forms 

 struggle with one another for the unstable equilib- 

 rium which is the secret of their life. 



The many contingencies that wait upon the cir- 

 cuit of the physical forces and determine the various 

 forms of organic matter — rocks, sand, soil, gravel, 

 mountain, plain — all shifting and changing end- 

 lessly — wait upon the circuit of the organic forces 

 and turn the life impulse into myriad channels, and 

 people the earth with myriads of living forms, each 

 accidental from our limited point of view, while all 



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