THE VITAL ORDER 



refuse to see any other factors at work is the es- 

 sence of materialism. 



ii 



Any contrivance which shows an interdepend- 

 ence of parts, that results in unity of action, is 

 super- mechanical. The solar system may be re- 

 garded as a unit, but it has not the purposive unity 

 of a living body. It is one only in the sense that its 

 separate bodies are all made of one stuff, and obey 

 the same laws and move together in the same di- 

 rection, but a living body is a unit because all its 

 parts are in the service of one purposive end. An 

 army is a unit, a flock of gregarious birds, a colony 

 of ants or bees, is a unit because the spirit and pur- 

 pose of one is the spirit and purpose of all; the unity 

 is psychological. 



Only living bodies are adaptive. Adaptation, of 

 course, has its physics or its chemistry, because it 

 is a physical phenomenon; but there is no adapta- 

 tion of a rock or a clay-bank to its environment; 

 there is only mechanical and chemical adjustment. 

 The influence of the environment may bring about 

 chemical and physical changes in a non-living body, 

 but they are not purposive as in a living body. The 

 fat in the seeds of plants in northern countries is 

 liquid and solid at a lower temperature than in 

 tropical climates. Living organisms alone react in 

 a formative or deformative way to external stimuli. 



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