CONCEPTS OF &quot;REASON&quot; AND &quot;CAUSE&quot; 69 



Most of these &quot;laws&quot; are merely formulae descriptive of con 

 stant connexions which have been discovered to exist between 

 phenomena, and of the conditions and circumstances in which 

 such connexions are found to obtain. But those uniform happen 

 ings must, after the analogy of the uniform conduct of a com 

 munity subject to the law of a superior, be themselves due to 

 fixed principles of action inherent in the constitution of the natural 

 agencies which manifest those uniform activities. Now, if we 

 bring to light the agencies which are operative and co-operative 

 in producing those regular coexistences and sequences, the 

 mode of action and interaction of the efficient causes that are 

 at work, the inner constitution or nature of those agencies, i.e. 

 their material and formal causes, and the scope or purpose of 

 those activities, we can formulate explanatory or causal laws, i.e. 

 laws which will not merely express the existence of uniformities, 

 but which, furthermore, will give us an insight into the &quot;how&quot; 

 and the &quot;why&quot; of such uniformities (222). 



The Aristotelean conception and classification of causes, and the Scholastic 

 view of physical nature as a &quot; cosmos,&quot; revealing purpose, design, intelligence, 

 and subject to &quot; law &quot; in the sense just explained, have been almost completely 

 ignored by modern exponents of the logic of induction. 1 Some of these 

 latter have substituted a purely mechanical view of the universe, eliminating 

 the notions of &quot; design &quot; and &quot; efficiency &quot; as superfluous, and retaining merely 

 the notions of &quot; invariable &quot; or &quot; necessary &quot; &quot; sequences &quot; and &quot; coexistences &quot; 

 of material phenomena, as the ultimate factors of a rational explanation of the 

 universe. These writers have been induced by a rather superficial materialism 

 to abandon, and even to ridicule, the r61e of final causes in philosophical 

 research. Yielding too hastily to the natural craving for a simple solution of 

 the problems raised by the universe, they have thought to satisfy themselves 

 and others by proclaiming the sufficiency of physical efficient causality, i.e. 

 of invariable connexions between masses of matter in motion, for the adequate 

 explanation of all things. The attempt was necessarily futile, and is nowadays 

 generally recognized as such. &quot; The mechanical theory of the universe,&quot; 

 writes Professor Welton, 2 &quot; is simple, but inadequate even in inorganic nature ; 

 in organic nature it must be supplemented by the principle of development, 

 and finally by the conception of rational purpose.&quot; To which we may add 

 Mr. Joseph s testimony, 3 that &quot; to a physical theory of the world consciousness 

 remains unaccountable ; such a theory therefore cannot be complete or final &quot;. 



We shall see later (219, 224) that the &quot;necessity&quot; of those &quot;uniform con 

 nexions &quot; or &quot; laws &quot; can have no rational basis in the &quot; mechanical &quot; view of 

 nature. Neither, however, does it receive a satisfactory explanation on the 

 Hegelian, idealist view, that nature is merely a system of thought-relations ; and 

 that its &quot;necessities&quot; are identical with the necessities of thought (215). 



1 Cf. VENN, Empirical Logic, pp. 47-52. 



8 Logic, ii., pp. 206, 210; cf. p. 30 (italics ours). s op. cit., p. 384. 



