i86 GRAND STRATEGY OF EVOLUTION 



The plant, in the main, is nerveless, senseless, and 

 stationary; enclosed in wooden chambers and fed by 

 a cosmic circulation which delivers its products at the 

 tiny doors of expanding leaves and groping roots. The 

 plant is essentially inert because it is impervious to 

 the more complex events in the world outside itself. It 

 cannot quickly move into the pathways of profit nor 

 away from destruction. The tree cannot respond to the 

 inviting valley, the threatening axe, nor the oncoming 

 fire because it does not possess the architectural res- 

 onators requisite to these ends, nor the other internal 

 machinery requisite for the purposeful application of 

 its own power. It cannot, therefore, receive the warn- 

 ing messengers from the outer world, nor answer their 

 invitations in self-benefitting, or purposeful move- 

 ments. It can only drift with the currents and eddies 

 of the outer world; a passenger of the winds, the 

 waters, and the bees; or cling to the stable shores of re- 

 current cosmic events, dependent on their flotsam 

 bounty. 



But the animal in the main is nervous, sensitive, and 

 active. Moving from place to place, it seeks out its 

 own salvation, largely impelled by its own internal 

 powers, guided by its own instruments. Its inner life 

 and structure is upbuilt in exact conformity with par- 

 ticular external acts of a very complex and subtle na- 

 ture, or with the dimensions and energy of a multi- 

 tude of specific vibrations and forces. Its distribution 

 in time and space tends to follow the distribution of 

 these agents. Its coming in and going out is in profit- 

 able response to the source, and the line of propaga- 

 tion, of a particular perfume, a cry, a flash of color, a 

 song, a sign, a word, or an idea. 



