196 GRAND STRATEGY OF EVOLUTION 



profitable for it, and away from what is evil, or de- 

 structive to it. 



The evolution, or enlargement, of this neuro-mus- 

 cular mechanism of animal life cannot take place, how- 

 ever, without a corresponding increase in all those other 

 instruments which minister to them, such as the sup- 

 porting, protecting, alimentary, respiratory, circula- 

 tory, and excretory organs. Provisions must further be 

 made for a sinking fund, or for organs of reproduction, 

 by means of which the whole system may be rebuilt 

 when the old one has become too rigid, or has ex- 

 hausted its power of profitable adjustment. 



The basic problem in the evolution of animal archi- 

 tecture, therefore, is to find a method, or plan, of growth 

 and repair which may be continued indefinitely. That 

 plan must provide the maximum number of different 

 bodily sites, or locations, for the necessary organs, and 

 at the same time permit unlimited alterations and im- 

 provements in the position and size of these organs, 

 as occasion may favor or demand. All this must be 

 accomplished without serious interruption of vital proc- 

 esses, and must always yield a sufficient margin of 

 profits to be invested in new adventures and new con- 

 struction. As we shall presently show there is but one 

 method of growth, the triaxial system, which meets all 

 these requirements. That system is utilized through- 

 out The Great Highway of Organic Evolution which 

 leads from the lower forms of animal life up to man. 



IV. The Architecture of Inorganic Growth 



There are many different methods of growth in in- 

 organic, as well as in organic, or living things. We 



