OF KNOWLEDGE. 



397 



to be the necessary consequence of overcrowding and the 

 cause of the survival of the fittest. But this idea of the 

 increase of population, which was applied by Darwin to 

 the whole of the organic world on its physical side, can 

 in the same way be applied to the growth of ideas and 

 of ideal interests and values on the mental side of the 

 organic world. In fact, in the whole extent of animated 

 nature, we cannot leave out the question regarding the 

 ultimate ground or sufficient reason as we do in the 

 inanimate world, for the principles of the conservation 

 of mass and energy do not suffice to explain the evident 

 increase of that something which permeates all living 

 things, from the lowest to the highest examples. 



Now here we have to record another change in 

 modern terminology and the striving after a clearer 

 definition of ambiguous terms. As the word Force 

 received, in the exact sciences, a purely mathematical 

 definition, being supplanted by the word Energy, so 

 likewise the terms Cause and Effect have undergone a defined. 



Jas. Ward, in his " Gifford Lectures" 

 on 'The Realm of Ends' (1911), re- 

 ferring to Wundt's conception of a 

 creative synthesis, says : : ' The so- 

 called conservation of mass and 

 energy might be regarded as sym- 

 bolising the initial state of the 

 pluralistic world, and as symbolising 

 too the mere permanence and 

 abstract being of its many units. 

 But it is notorious that these 

 concepts are the result of ignoring 

 those differences of quality which 

 alone convert units into individuals. 

 Without these we may have Er- 

 haltung but not Entfaltung, as a 

 German would say ; we may have 

 conservation and indefinite com- 

 position, but not development and 

 definite organisation. In short, 



the concrete integration of ex- 

 perience is the diametrical opposite 

 to the mechanical resultant of a 

 composition of abstract units : it 

 is a creative resultant or synthesis, 

 to use Wundt's happy and striking 

 phrase." To this Ward adds the 

 note that to Lotze belongs the 

 credit of first signalising the fact 

 to which Wundt has given the 

 name ; and Lotze even gets so far 

 as to apply the term creation to 

 this " relating activity," as he calls 

 it (p. 103 sqq.) This "relating 

 activity " spoken of by Lotze in his 

 ' Metaphysik ' ( 268 and 271) is 

 really identical with the synoptic 

 view, or the esprit d'ensemble, of 

 Comte. 



