NO MECHANICAL ACTIVITY 79 



out in the forest. And blind physical and chemidal 

 processes could by themselves — by themselves alone 

 — never produce the novelties, the entirely new and 

 unique things, and things higher and higher in the 

 scale of being, which we see in the forest. Only a 

 man impervious to the teaching of common sense 

 could suppose that the care which plant, beast, and 

 man alike show for their offspring could be the 

 result of bare physical and chemical processes with- 

 out the inclusion with these processes of any other 

 agency whatsoever. 



Nor, on the other hand, do \ve see any signs of 

 the forest being the result of a preconceived plan 

 gradually being worked out — as a bridge is 

 gradually built up according to the previously 

 thought out plan of the engineer. The carrying 

 out of a plan means that in course of time the plan 

 will be completed, and that each stage is a step 

 towards its completion. But in the forest life there 

 is no sign of any beginning of an approach towards 

 the completion of a plan. There is no tendency 

 to a closing in. There is a reaching upward, it is 

 true. But there is also a splaying outward. One 

 line leads up to man. But others splay out to 

 insects, birds, and elephants. 



Another noticeable fact is that nowhere is per- 

 fection reached. If a plan were being .worked we 

 should expect to see the lower stages — ^like the 

 foundations of the bridge — well and truly laid, 

 incapable of improvement. But no living being — 

 neither the lowliest nor the highest— is itself as a 

 whole or in any one particular absolutely perfect. 

 There is room for improvement everywhere. Most 



