UNDER THE APPLE-TREES 



where it listeth, the success of the organic forces, so 

 far as they draw upon these things, is fortuitous also. 

 Aristotle seems to think that organisms are under 

 the same rule of necessity as prevails in the inor- 

 ganic world. The rain, he says, does not fall in order 

 to make the corn grow any more than it falls to spoil 

 the corn when it is threshed out in the field. This is 

 the modern scientific view. The weather-system is 

 indifferent to crops; the rain falls by reason of the 

 laws of physics, which always acts the same under 

 the same conditions. The rain is not designed for 

 the corn, but the corn avails itself of the rain be- 

 cause it has organic needs. The rain has no needs; 

 inert matter has no needs; it is ruled by necessity, 

 but living things are ruled by a different order of 

 necessity — the necessity arising from their internal 

 spontaneity, of which Aristotle speaks. Aristotle 

 thinks that the teeth and other organs of an animal 

 have a merely accidental relation to its body, and to 

 all the parts to which we attribute design; they con- 

 tinue, and are perfected because they are useful. 

 This is natural selection before Darwin. But it is 

 more in agreement with the thought of to-day to 

 regard all the parts of a living body as the result of 

 an inherent demand of the organism — the "inter- 

 nal spontaneity" which Aristotle had in mind. All 

 parts of living bodies are appropriately constituted, 

 but the word "appropriate" does not apply in the 

 same sense to winds and clouds. 



248 



