i BAD DEFINITIONS 35 



be carefully excluded. Life is certain 

 "interdependent processes." Yes, cer- 

 tainly. But so is death. And so is 

 everything else that we know of or 

 can conceive. The words devised by 

 Mr. Herbert Spencer to represent the 

 " purely physical " view of life and death 

 are words which present no view at all. 

 They are simply a thick fog in which 

 nothing can be seen. Except in virtue 

 of this character of general opacity, they 

 are wholly useless for Mr. Spencer's 

 own purpose as well as for every other. 

 He seeks to exclude mind. But he fails 

 to do so. He seems to think that when 

 he has found a collocation of words 

 which do not expressly convey some 

 particular idea, he has therein found 

 words in which that idea is excluded. 

 This is not so. Words may be so vague 

 and abstract as to signify anything or 

 nothing. If under the word "fitness" 



