102 SYMBIOSIS 



indispensable bio-economic part to play ; and, in so far as this 

 is the case, they have a special viability much the same as 

 good ideas have. Useful species are thus resistant to corroding 

 influences. Their resistance is based on physical strength and 

 on the strength of the idea for which they stand a double- 

 barrelled strength. The indiscriminate " assimilation," however, 

 of one organism by another is " abhorred by Nature." The 

 common prejudice, shared by Butler, that the " assimilation " 

 of one organism by another represents the norm of life is, in 

 my opinion, one of the most monstrous aberrations of the human 

 mind. Instead of saying that " nothing can assimilate living 

 organism," I should say that living organism exists not to be 

 " assimilated," but, on the contrary, to be spared and supported 

 au fur et a me sure as it is useful and its presence is desirable. 

 That organisms must not allow themselves under various 

 penalties to be caught napping, follows, therefore, far more 

 rationally and consistently from a practical than from an abstract 

 pan-psychic view. The merely abstract pan-psychic view 

 fails to take into account the responsibilites and the " rights " 

 of organisms, which must be fully considered in all questions of 

 permanence. Clearly, in an evolutionary sense, " not to 

 remember antecedents " can only mean that the organism has 

 become untrue to an erstwhile useful bio-economic function, 

 that it has violated the " contrat bio-social," that it must con- 

 sequently suffer retrogression loss of symbiotic support with 

 resulting loss of health and of status. The term " familiarity," 

 used by Butler, cannot be meant to apply to trifling matters, 

 but must concern the most important relations of life. To 

 cease being " familiar " with work, that is the besetting sin. 

 We saw that the plant which fails to draw mineral salts from the 

 earth is unable to form regular fibrous tissue of any value. It has 

 evidently lost vital " antecedents " whilst indulging in new 

 and non-symbiotic feeding habits. We may conclude that it 

 is for the same reason that it will forget other important ante- 

 cedents. It will gradually lose the power, for instance, of 

 stimulating the animal for healthy work and healthy " thought," 

 rendering confusion worse confounded. We have seen in the 

 case of certain wind-fertilised weeds how actual and real is the 

 damage arising from bio-economic inferiority to the strenuous 

 biological community. That " temptations " are a great cause 

 of the " dislodgment " of organisms from an erstwhile high 



