DOMAIN OF EVOLUTIONAKY HYPOTHESIS 93 



of the matter exhausted by the organism itself, in the 

 increase and diminution of the functions proper to the 

 whole or to the parts, with the consequent morpho- 

 logical changes of form the so-called ' adaptations/ 



A result or an object that under certain circum- 

 stances may be enforced through adaptations, is 

 obviously one striven for, one with a purpose : the 

 preservation of the organism is thus the peculiar 

 purpose of life ; or in other words, the organism is at 

 once the bearer and the purpose of life. 1 It is the 

 bearer because the possibility of life depends upon 

 its organization ; and it is the purpose because 

 nothing else is attained and striven for than its 

 preservation of its individual self for a period, 

 and of its species, so far as in it lies, for ever. 



That, likewise, must be conceded by biologists and 

 physiologists, since it is never a question of another 

 result or purpose when the subject treated of in 

 the textbooks is the vital properties of organisms 3 

 (or the cell, which is regarded as the simplest form of 

 organism). 



3. It is granted by investigators that all material 

 products of labour which are observed in an organism 

 result from utilization of purely inorganic energies. 

 It is, however, equally certain that all material activity 

 is directed to a single end the preservation of the whole. 



1 Here it is a question of the so-called ' inner ' (i.e. inherent) purpose in 

 things which is striven for by them directly (finis internus}. The question, 

 Why organisms exist ? would be one concerning their external purpose 

 (finis externus). 



2 See, for instance, Bl O. Hertwig : Allgemeine Biologic, p. 65. 



