598 DISHARMONIES AND OTHER SHADOWS 



sequences. It would be an intolerable world if there were 

 loopholes for individuals even when the number of lives 

 lost is tragic beyond any words. Many speak, rightly we 

 believe, of the unity of ^ purpose ' working in Nature and 

 its evolution, but do not the tragedies show us plainly that 

 this word Purpose, though the best we have, must be used in 

 this connection in a symbolic way, being Purpose with a 

 plan larger than we can understand? 



If our view of Animate Nature presented no difficulties, 

 it would be justly regarded with suspicion. Truly, it pre- 

 sents difficulties. There is often lack of plasticity ; there are 

 imperfect adaptations; there are taxes on progress; there 

 are many parasites; there is some suffering and many a 

 domestic tragedy; there is the astonishing spectacle of the 

 demolition of masterpieces that millions of years have gone 

 to fashion; and there is often a note of wildness that startles 

 us. No one can shut his eyes to the difficulties, our protest 

 is against allowing them to blot out the sun. The plasticity, 

 the adaptations, the progress, the inter-linkages, the joy, 

 the happiness, the masterpieces, the note of gentleness, how 

 they make the shadows shrink! Our thesis stands that the 

 facts of an accurate Natural History are not incongruent 

 with an interpretation of Nature in higher terms. 



We have, moreover, to bear in mind that the evolution is 

 still in progress, that organisms are still subduing the inor- 

 ganic unto themselves, that the mind-body is still continuing 

 its arduous task of subordinating the body-mind to its pur- 

 pose, that we in facing and mastering difficulties are sharing 

 in working out a better future for our successors. The 

 ladder of evolution is often very steep and organisms may 

 slip down into disintegrative phases, but the bigger fact is 

 that the main trend of evolution is essentially integrative. 



