REPAIRS AND REGENERATION 175 



same process, that is each of them will first of 

 Jill return to the indifferent condition and then 

 from that re-constitute itself into a new small 

 ascidian. 



Here then is a series of events which, if they 

 <3ould be imagined to take place in connection 

 with a machine, could only be described in the 

 way attempted above by supposing that the 

 machine had resolved itself into its constituent 

 metals and from these metals rebuilt itself into 

 A new machine. 



Assuredly these phenomena seem to point 

 to the existence of some special energy or force 

 mtimately present throughout the entire living 

 organism, unifying its various parts, dominating 

 their activities, directing the evolution of the 

 being as a whole towards a definite prefixed 

 end, which, according to the old view was just 

 the function of the "Vital Principle "in | 

 other words, the "Form"* of the Scholastic 

 Philosophy. 



It is extremely difficult to imagine any 

 theory which will account for the phenomena 

 }f regeneration on purely chemico-physical 

 lines, since they, like the phenomena which we 

 studied in connection with the developing 

 ovum, so clearly point to the existence of a 



* Life viewed as a principle was forma vel causa formalin ; 

 viewed as activity or operatio it was causa finalis of the 

 Being. 



