312 DEVELOPMENT AND PURPOSE CHAP. 



concrete case it may be so. That is a question of evidence 

 bearing on the history and behaviour of the particular 

 structure. But we are here concerned with the concept of 

 the organic and are asking ourselves what it is that we 

 arrive at, if we imagine the action of one part corrected 

 or modified by the reaction of others upon that action, and 

 if we imagine the time of this reaction shortened till it 

 becomes zero. The answer then is that we must now 

 imagine the action of the part to be itself determined by 

 the reactions which it will produce. That is to say, that 

 if we conceive an organism as a structure whose parts are 

 determined in their actions by their relation to the whole, 

 we have to conceive it as one whose actions are determined 

 by their results. 



Further, what is true of one part of an organic whole 

 qua organic is true of all the rest. This implies that the 

 process which each part follows in accordance with its 

 intrinsic conditions is so correlated with the processes of the 

 other parts as to maintain them and carry them through, 

 while if the conditions of any part are such as to maintain 

 it unchanged, wholly or in certain respects, the action of 

 other parts is similarly conditioned by their effect in main- 

 taining that part unchanged wholly or in those respects. 

 A system of parts so related that each is thus conditioned 

 in its action by its effect in maintaining a residue is a 

 harmonious system. An organic unity then is harmonic 

 and teleological. 



If that is so, the organic process proper rests on a causa- 

 tion that differs in kind from the mechanical. By perfection 

 of predetermined arrangement the mechanical may acquire 

 more and more of organic and purposive character, but in 

 the limit, where the correlation is complete, it passes over 

 into the region at once of organicity and of purpose. 



That is to say, if we start with a system of mutually 

 determining processes which yield a certain result, and if 

 we press the mutual determination closer and closer to the 

 point at which it becomes Harmony, our conception of the 

 process must undergo a parallel change, and from being 

 the mechanical effect of a contrivance arranged to secure 

 the result, must be regarded as a process guided by the 



