314 DEVELOPMENT AND PURPOSE CHAP. 



refer it to a cause which cannot be mechanical but may 

 be a purpose, either operating upon it from without, or 

 operating within and pervading all its parts. In either case 

 the explanation in this sense is teleological. 



9. But we have now to take account of two objections 

 which may be raised against this conception of an organic 

 whole and of teleological explanation in general. 



It may be said, first, that this determination of a process 

 by a relation to its result is utterly impossible, and, secondly, 

 that every apparent case of such determination may be 

 explained by the structure which has come into existence 

 adapted, in accordance with mechanical laws, to yield the 

 required result. On the last point we may remark that 

 the question is not how an organic structure comes into 

 existence, but what it is and how it acts, and if a thing so 

 acts as to be determined by the relation of its function to 

 its effect, it is acting ideologically. The question then is 

 whether such action is possible. If not, then every 

 apparent case of it must be resolved into a mechanical 

 adjustment which simulates teleology. If yes, then we 

 may approach any case without prejudice and decide 

 whether it is one of genuine teleology by an inductive 

 determination of the actual causation at work within it. 

 We have then, first, to ask whether there is any possible 

 sense in which a process can be conceived as determined 

 by relation to its result. As a mode of speech we all 

 understand what it means. If I hail a cab to take me to 

 the station, catch the down train and get home in good 

 time for dinner, the dinner and all that appertains thereto 

 and the hour for which it is fixed, may be spoken of as the 

 determining or governing fact in my whole procedure. 

 But can this for a moment be regarded as an ultimate 

 analysis? At the time when I hailed the cab the 

 dinner is non-existent. Does the non-existent cause 

 the existent? It may be that in the eternal scheme of 

 things the dinner is fixed, and I might, though by a some- 

 what desperate device, take what is to be as equally real 

 for causal purposes with what is now. But even granting 

 so much, how could we deal with the purpose which is not 



