ON THE VITALISTIC VIEW OF NATURE. 407 



In order to enable my readers to comprehend clearly 

 the great change which has come over biological thought 

 through Darwin's writings and reasonings, I must now 

 introduce an idea which I have so far intentionally 

 avoided in discussing the various scientific views of 

 nature. This is the idea of final causes, the apparent 

 existence of a purpose (in German Zweck), or an end 



(in German Ziel) in all processes of nature, but pre- 



t 



eminently in those of the living portion of creation. In 

 all writings prior to Darwin a great deal is made of 

 final causes in nature, of the teleology of living processes. 

 The phenomena of life seemed safely intrenched in the 

 citadel of final causes : no mechanism could explain 

 them away. The very fact that organisms were com- 

 pared with machines, admitted the existence of a definite 

 end and purpose ; for it is the peculiarity of every 

 humanly constructed machine or instrument that it 

 serves a definite purpose which, in the mind of the 

 inventor or maker, suggested the peculiar arrangement or 

 organisation which we behold. The criticisms of Lotze x 



ches,' &c. : " Les esprits seVeres et i say that Lotze, though ceasing to 



amis des progres des sciences ... be a vitalist, remained an animist. 



ont regrette" que 1'auteur opposat j Discarding vital force, he retained 



sans cesse la vie aux lois physiques, the conception of a soul in a 



comme si les etres vivans n'dtaient manner which drew upon him the 



pas de corps, avant d'etre des ve'ge'- ridicule of those whom, like Carl 



taux ou des animaux " ("avertisse- i Vogt, he had converted to pure 



ment " to the 4th ed. of Bichat's materialism. This has had the 



' Recherches,' &c., 1822). ] consequence, that in more recent 



1 The lengthy discussions of Lotze times his whole philosophy has 



contained in the writings quoted \ been stigmatised as dualistic, and 



above are not easy to understand, | that he has been accused of having 



and it is not surprising that, be- halted halfway. His real meaning 



yond the elimination of the con- j can be gathered more easily from 



ception of vital force as useless to his later and more mature writ- 



the purely scientific student, his ings : for his contemporaries it 



real meaning was at the time not must have remained to a great 



grasped at all. In fact, we may extent enigmatical. See Kauf- 



