466 THE POPULAR SCIENCE MONTHLY 



ment of inorganic events; biology, therefore, is not applied physics and chem- 

 istry: life is something apart, and biology is an independent science. 20 



By giving to this elemental directive factor the name " entelechy " 

 and by applying to it in its formative aspect the further name " psy- 

 choid," Driesch implies and indeed repeatedly affirms not only its real- 

 ity, but its analogy with what we call the psychical. 



Nageli's " Vervollkomnungsprinzip," or inherent factor tending 

 towards progress in evolution, Noll's " Morphsesthesia," or feeling for 

 form which plants are said to possess, Korschinsky's " special tendency 

 to advance," Cope's " archsesthetism," " the inherent driving force," 

 " the inner law of development," " the inner directive force," of other 

 biologists, 21 all have a strangely psychological sound. It is of course 

 true that these positions are vigorously contested by biologists of the 

 orthodox schools, who speak of the " recrudescence " of vitalism. But 

 protests such as the above against the sufficiency of mechanical laws to 

 account for progress in evolution are becoming so many and from such 

 high sources that no psychologist who would postulate a psychic factor 

 of progress, constituting, it may be, the soul of plants, animals and man, 

 need any longer hesitate for fear of censure from the biological camp. 



But if vitalism is objectionable, it should be remembered that the 

 choice is by no means between that and the sufficiency of the Darwinian 

 theory of chance variation and natural selection. The number of biol- 

 ogists who accept neither of these solutions of the evolutionary problem 

 is of course very great. If one accepts, for instance, the mutation 

 theory of de Vries, it should be remembered that the difficulties of ex- 

 plaining the cause of the adaptive variations upon which Darwinism 

 depends are greatly increased in explaining the cause of the sudden and 

 rapid mutations in the system of de Vries. In general one may say 

 that the belief in orthogenesis, or development in certain definite direc- 

 tions, has to a considerable extent superseded Darwin's theory of de- 

 velopment, and with the increasing belief in orthogenesis comes an in- 

 creasing demand for some yet unknown factor determining the 

 direction of development, and while there are many theories proposed 

 to account for such development without the introduction of any 

 teleological or psychic factor, nevertheless it appears that those who 

 wish to renew the time-honored hypothesis of some such factor are now 

 heard with increasing respect. 



From facts such as these we see not only that many workers in 

 science are busily engaged in the search for the soul, but also that the 

 prospects are reasonably good that they will find it. 



But let us return to the psychologists. Another aspect of the tend- 



20 Driesch, "The Science and Philosophy of the Organism," 1907, p. 142. 

 Compare G. Wolff, " Beitrage zur Kritik der Darwin'schen Lehre." 



21 See Kellogg, " Darwinism To-day," pp. 277, 278. 



