CHAPTER V 

 EVOLUTION AND TELEOLOGY 



i. IF our analysis is just, the causal process may be reduced 

 to one or other of two fundamentally distinct types. On 

 the one hand we have the mechanical sequence conceived 

 as a continuous flow in which each phase proceeds uni- 

 formly out of the preceding, unaffected either by any 

 concomitant changes in the whole of nature or by the result 

 to which it contributes. On the other hand, we have the 

 organic or teleological for we have seen that these two 

 conceptions come down to one in which the process is 

 itself conditioned by its tendency to produce a given result, 

 and in which consequently the elements in any complex 

 whole are mutually determined by their interactions, out 

 of which the resulting phase of the organism is to issue. 

 We have now to enquire into the part played by these two 

 processes in Reality as a whole. In this enquiry we obtain 

 some light from specific experience, which undoubtedly 

 shows us mechanical processes everywhere at work, but 

 also, as we have seen reason to think, shows us teleological 

 processes, which in the course of terrestrial evolution 

 develop and expand their scope. Our synthesis, however, 

 being too narrow to enable us to judge of the relative 

 importance of the two elements in Reality as a whole, we 

 have to look for some other instrument of enquiry. 



But apart from the interrogation of experience, what 

 instrument have we ? If the term interrogation be taken 

 in the widest sense, we may safely reply none at all. But 

 for this purpose interrogation must be taken to include not 

 only the results which experience demonstrates, but any 



