THE METAPHYSICS OF SCIENCE. 377 



VIII. Besides mutual adjustment of structural parts, 

 we may consider the meaning of adjustments to a gen- 

 eral concept. All that we know of fundamental plans 

 of structure in the organic world is but a body of facts 

 exemplifying adjustment of parts, not alone to each other, 

 but to an archetypal conception, an intelligential stand- 

 ard. It is frequently suggested that fundamental rela- 

 tionships have resulted from the law of heredity, with 

 progressive divergence. That, probably, is a valid scien- 

 tific account to give of what have been styled plans of 

 organization; and every one is free to rest in the finality 

 of science. But if our minds are so constituted that we 

 irresistibly conclude design from coordination, regardless 

 of the instrumentality or means by which the coordina- 

 tion becomes expressed in matter, then heredity with di- 

 vergence is not an ultimate explanation, and every man 

 is at liberty, without reproach, to pass beyond the pale 

 of science, and recognize heredity as a thoughtful deter- 

 mination fixed for the purpose of introducing order and 

 method into the organic world as we find them. So the 

 mathematical order of the solar system is explicable in 

 scientific terms by ascribing it to the cooling of a primi- 

 tive nebula; but the forces engaged in the evolution of a 

 planetary system must be rationally conceived as merely 

 the instruments which work out symmetrical results co- 

 ordinated to a general concept or plan. If, finally, the 

 deepest law of nature is the law of evolution, we may 

 recognize that as the all-embracing principle under which 

 events emerge into being; but reason can never be di- 

 vested of the simple conviction that events coordinated 

 on so comprehensive a scale, and coordinated to so vast 

 a scheme, give expression to purpose equally vast and 



