VALUES AND FINAL CAUSES 87 



tells us that we select the facts which constitute our know 

 ledge, and, on the other, Darwin demonstrates that our 

 knowledge, as a necessary integral of our whole constitution, 

 is the result of natural selection. 



Though, however, explanation by purpose cannot properly 

 be employed for any two events both of which are members 

 of the same objective series, it does not follow that our 

 reasoned knowledge of the objective world is completely 

 independent of it. We are compelled to have recourse to 

 it, if we desire to give an intelligible account of the connexion 

 between the facts of the external world and our needs by 

 which those facts, as they appear to us, are conditioned. 

 The law of uniform sequence fails to explain why human 

 needs are what they are, and why we are constituted as 

 we are, instead of being, for instance, like a dog, with more 

 than half our experience conditioned by our sense of smell 

 or something still more widely different. 



Again, the law of uniform sequence does not explain its 

 own existence, or how it comes that external nature con 

 forms to it. For all we know, any other arrangement was 

 possible, and may come into force at some future time. 

 That we have the power of predicting events in an external 

 series with a fair approach to certainty, whereas we have no 

 such power in the case of a subjective series, is a fact which 

 is only explicable, if it can be explained at all, by purpose. 

 Though, however, the law itself, and the needs by which 

 both the law, and the facts to which it applies, are conditioned, 

 are only explicable by design, when once the order of the 

 facts has been established, we feel that that order and suc 

 cession cannot be other than it is, and the idea of purpose 

 ceases to be applicable. 



This is, perhaps, what Prof. James means when he says 

 a thoroughgoing explanation of the universe in terms of 

 mechanical sequence is compatible with its being inter 

 preted teleologically, for the mechanism itself may be 

 designed . l But should this be admitted, it must be remem 

 bered that the mechanical explanation, if it embraced the 

 1 Witt to Believe, p. 76. 



