l8o THE METAPHYSICS OF EVOLUTION. 



works out the universal law of Evolution. The 

 different sections of the world's history must be 

 consistently interpreted with a reference to the 

 universal law which they illustrate, i.e., interpreted 

 as parts of the world-process. 



And here we come upon the first distinct trace of 

 the teleology which is inseparable from all evol- 

 utionism.^ For when the phenomena of the world's 

 evolution are subordinated to the general law of 

 Evolution, their relation inevitably tends to become 

 that of means to an end. All things happen as 

 illustrations of, or in order to illustrate the general 

 law of Evolution. But it is still possible to disavow 

 the teleology at this point in the development of 

 evolutionism, although it admits of little doubt that 

 the success of evolutionism in combating other kinds 

 of teleologlcal explanation is due to its own tele- 

 ology. 



For the attraction which teleology has for the 

 human mind is indestructible ; an ineradicable in- 

 stinct forbids us to renounce the hope of finding in 

 the rest of nature that action for the sake of rational 

 ends which is so prominent in that section of nature 

 represented by intelligence. And, as we saw 

 (ch. V. § 6), all knowledge is based on the anthropo- 

 morphic assumption that the course of nature cor- 

 responds to the operation of our minds. If, then, it 

 must correspond to some extent for knowledge to be 

 possible at all, the completer the correspondence, 

 the more knowable will the world be, and tb 

 teleologlcal explanation of things, which asserts thii 



1 For even biological evolutionism is not free from teleology o 

 a sort. It explains structure as arising by natural selection ;« 

 order to survival in the struggle for existence, and thereby pu 

 it in the position of a means to an end. 



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