Affective Tendencies 



399 



of its action seems to be present in some way at the be- 

 ginning, determining what the action shall be. In this 

 the action of living things appears to contrast with that 

 of inorganic things." 50 



Now this "final result of its action" exists really from 

 the beginning in the form of mnemonic accumulation. 

 For that environment or those special environmental con- 

 ditions to which the animal is gravitating operate now as 

 vis a fronte in so far as they were formerly vis a tergo and 

 in so far as the physiological activities then determined 

 by them in the organism have left behind a mnemonic 

 accumulation which now itself constitutes the real and 

 true vis a tergo moving the living, being. 51 



Thus it is clear that one and the same explanation 

 applies to all the "finalism" of life. For from the onto- 

 genetic development which creates organs that cannot per- 

 form their functions until the adult state, to the tendency 

 of all physiological states determined by certain environ- 

 mental conditions to remanifest themselves at the first ap- 

 pearance of phenomena usually preceding these conditions, 

 but in no wise constituting them; from the perfect way 

 in which the organism in its entirety is morphologically 

 adapted to its environment before the latter can exercise 

 its formative influence, to all the wonderful formations 

 and special structures so exactly adapted to all the most 

 probable conditions to which this organism might later be 

 exposed ; from the simplest reflex motions that are directed 

 so perfectly toward the preservation and welfare of the 

 individual to the most complex instincts by means of 



50 Jennings, Behavior of Lower Organisms, p. 338. 



51 E. Mach, Die Analyse der Empfindungen, 5th ed., pp. 79, 78, 

 Jena, Fischer; English edition: Chicago, Open Court Publishing 

 Company, 1897. 



