The Psychological and the Biological 9 



arises also to confront the biologist. The term * bionomic ' ^ 

 has already gained currency in biology ; it is the science 

 of the relations of organisms to their environment, includ- 

 ing other organisms. It was, indeed, by way of general- 

 izing this important distinction of the biologist that the 

 general point of view now under discussion was arrived at. 

 If we bring out what is really the meaning of such a dis- 

 tinction in biology, we are led to distinguish the bionomic 

 forces and conditions, those of the environment in all its 

 varied aspects, from the truly biological or vital. Bio- 

 logical forces, properly speaking, are only those which 

 reveal themselves in vital changes. The forces of the 

 environment serve to condition, to limit, to direct, the 

 operation of what is truly vital, but they cannot them- 

 selves be called vital. They are 'bionomic' 



This distinction on the side of biology is, in the writer's 

 opinion, of considerable importance. Only by recognizing 

 it can general biology develop as an independent science. 

 Vital antecedents of vital changes, — always phenomena of 

 vitality, — these are the matters of biology. Other phe- 

 nomena may intrude upon the vital, and the morphological 

 changes which become vital may be due in the first instance 

 to such intrusion ; but it is only as thus directing vital 

 processes, not as themselves having a claim to be called 

 vital, that these things have significance for the science of 

 life.2 



While it is true of the enviroment, yet it is not necessary, 

 as has been intimated, to treat the psychological as being 

 bionomic with reference to life, although for the biologist, 



1 Suggested, I believe, by Eimer. 



2 Cf. the remarks on Natural Selection, Chap. VIII. § 7. And see the further 

 discussion in the chapter already referred to (Chap. XIX.). 



