396 



PHILOSOPHICAL THOUGHT. 



Already before Darwin, Malthus had pointed out that 

 the main characteristic of social development consists in 

 the growth of population. This idea put Darwin on the 

 track of his theory of natural selection,^ which appeared 



synoptic, not to the analytic, view, 

 forms really the fundamental and 

 characteristic principle of the 

 whole of the living, as differen- 

 tiated from the non-living, world. 

 Though the idea of order and 

 arrangement as distinguished from 

 mere quantity is a mathematical, 

 or, if we like to call it so, a mechani- 

 cal conception, this would not 

 necessarily lead to the simpler or 

 more complicated phenomena of 

 living matter and of the animated 

 world, were it not for the further 

 characteristic that where certain 

 forms of order and arrangement, of 

 matter and motion exist, they have 

 a tendency to spread in space 

 like a vortex which draws sur- 

 rounding things into its action. 

 Through this property living things 

 are not only, to a certain extent, 

 self - centred and self - contained ; 

 they are also mutually exclusive, 

 as in a world in which the sum of 

 matter and of motion are constant 

 quantities, an increasing absorption 

 of these constituents in certain 

 piaces must mean a diminution in 

 other places. This leads to the 

 phenomenon of crowding out, to 

 unconscious or conscious selection, 

 and underlies all the phenomena of 

 physical and mental life. In the 

 whole of this process there are 

 involved two principles which 

 among recent thinkers, as it seems 

 to me, Prof. AVundt has the merit 

 of having most prominently put 

 forward in his analysis of mental 

 life, namely, the principle of cre- 

 ative synthesis and the principle 

 of the growth of spiritual values. 

 But what is created in the process 

 of creative synthesis exists only for 

 the synoptic intellect, and this had 



been pointed out in various ways 

 by other thinkers before Wundt. 

 Allowing, however, that he has 

 more clearly recognised the supreme 

 importance and the connection of 

 those two principles, it must be 

 regretted that he has not devoted 

 himself more exclusivelj' to explain- 

 ing and illustrating them. As it 

 is, they are rather hidden away 

 in the enormous bulk of his volu- 

 minous writings, and have hardly 

 in recent histories of philosophical 

 thought been duly appreciated. 



^ A remarkable passage is to 

 be found in Lotze's early Tract 

 entitled ' Leben Lebenskraft,' pub- 

 lished in 1843 and reprinted in 

 ' Kleine Schrif ten ' (vol. i. p. 139 

 sqq. ) Referring to the importance 

 of Metabolism (Stoffwechsel) in 

 plants, he says : " With reference 

 to this point, we must admit that 

 wherever a successive development 

 of a form is to take place assimi- 

 lation of matter is necessary ; but 

 that likewise rejection of matter, 

 i.e., metabolism, should take place 

 can only have its reason in this, 

 that the elements which are neces- 

 sary for growth are not supplied 

 in the suitable form, but in a con- 

 nection which has to be dissolved, 

 and of which only one part is uti- 

 lised, whereas the other is rejected 

 as a bye - product. Metabolism 

 would, in plants, appear almost 

 inconceivable if it consisted in 

 anything else than in a rejection 

 of that which is unsuitable, so 

 that in this case it is not some- 

 thing unused by the organism, 

 but something unsuitable tliat is 

 rejected " (p. 206). This recog- 

 nition of the connection of growth 

 and selection is significant. Prof. 



