HIT-AND-MISS METHOD OF NATURE 



I wonder if the life of the world, as we behold it, 

 has reached this stage of development, not by direc- 

 tion, but by a conflict of forces? Was it determined 

 by intrinsic necessity, or is it simply the result of 

 extrinsic conditions and forces, like the course of 

 the stream to the river and of the river to the 

 sea? 



The streams flow in all directions, yet sooner or 

 later they reach the great reservoirs of lakes or seas. 

 The rivulet has no eyes, no legs, no chart, no wit, but 

 it will surely reach its goal not by its own efforts 

 or will, but by the law of mechanical forces acting 

 upon its own fluidity or aquosity. Without gravita- 

 tion working with variations of the earth's surface, 

 it would never get there. 



It seems to me that evolution, too, must work all 

 around the circle; and had there not been some uni- 

 versal, underlying force analogous to gravity, and 

 some modifying conditions in the environment, it 

 would never have got anywhere. 



Gravity gives to water the impulse to flow, or to 

 seek a lower level; the conditions exterior to it de- 

 termine where it shall flow. 



It is the nature of life to flow, to seek new direc- 

 tions, to reach higher forms; the environment, the 

 action, the reaction, and the interaction do the 

 rest. 



No extrinsic conditions could have made a man 

 out of a worm, the man-scheme must have been in- 

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