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Cornell University Library 
 BD542 .J33 1883 
 Final CM»e»i.,By;,.Paul„Janet,,,^^^^^^^^ 
 
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 3 1924 028 936 644 
 
The original of tiiis book is in 
 tine Cornell University Library. 
 
 There are no known copyright restrictions in 
 the United States on the use of the text. 
 
 http://www.archive.org/details/cu31924028936644 
 
FINAL CAUSES. 
 
PRINTED BY MOEMSON AND GIBB, 
 FOB 
 
 T. & T. CLAEK, EDINBUEGH. 
 
 LONDON, .... HAMILTON, ADAMS, AND 00. 
 
 DTTBLIN, .... GEO. HERBERT. 
 
 NEW YORK, . SCEIBNER AND WELFORD. 
 
FINAL CAUSES. 
 
 BY 
 
 PAUL JAKET, 
 
 MEMBER OF THE INSTITUTE, PR0PE3S0B AT THE PACULTE DBS LETTKES OF PARIS. 
 
 STransIatet) from tje Szcant <Siitian of tfje Jftencfj 
 
 BY 
 
 WILLIAM AFFLECK, B.D. 
 
 IJSitti Preface bg 
 ROBERT FLINT, D.B. LL.D., 
 
 PROFESSOR OF DIVINITY, UNIVERSITY OF EDINBURGH. 
 
 SECOND EDITION. 
 
 EDINBUEGH: 
 T. & T. CLAEK, 38 GEOEGE STEEET. 
 
 18 8 3. 
 
 [This Translation is Copyright, by arrangement with the Author.^ 
 
|\gzx'&(So 
 
AUTHOE'S PEEFACE TO THE ENGLISH EDITION. 
 
 TT is with joy and gratitude that I see my book on Fiiml 
 -*- Causes presented to the English public by a scholarly 
 writer, to whom I here present my best thanks for the care 
 and talent with which he has applied himself to translate it. 
 It has given me particular pleasure to be introduced in Eng- 
 land by way of Scotland, that country of profound reason, 
 where wisdom has always been mingled with a certain 
 agreeableness and good grace commanding sympathy. The 
 philosophers of that country — Adam Smith, Hutchison, Fer- 
 guson, Thomas Eeid, Dugald Stewart, and even David Hume 
 — have all, under different forms, that charm that comes from 
 naturalness, candour, and mild and serious sentiments. In 
 these authors there is entire scientific and intellectual 
 liberty ; and yet the soul is in security. They never wound 
 it by insolence, hauteur, irony, or systematic intolerance. 
 They always respect the instinctive beliefs. Their very doubt 
 is amiable and respectful. In another order of ideas, the 
 celebrated Sir Walter Scott, a great favourite in France, also 
 represents that agreeable mixture of excellent and always 
 strong sense with a sweet, varied, and cheerful imagination, 
 whose graceful pictures have something very sober, clear, and 
 penetrating. I think I find in that inimitable novelist the 
 same qualities as in the historians and philosophers of Scot- 
 land. To be introduced into this noble country, into the 
 midst of this family of amiable and respected minds, for whom 
 I have always had so much sympathy, is an honour of which 
 I keenly feel the value. 
 
vi author's PEEFACE to the ENGLISH EDITION. 
 
 t 
 For the rest, I do not conceal from myself that it is mainly to 
 ] the subject of my book that I owe this honour. Great Britain 
 I has always been the classic land of final causes. It is there 
 that natural theology originated, has been developed, and has 
 held its ground with honour down to our days. In our own 
 age a great publicist and a great physiologist, Lord Brougham 
 and Sir Charles Bell (both Scotchmen), counted it an honour to 
 annotate the excellent work of Paley. Dugald Stewart, in his 
 Elements of the Philosophy of the Human ilfrnt^, vindicated against 
 Bacon the utility of final causes as a means of research, at 
 least in the sphere of the natural sciences. What are called the 
 Bridgewater Treatises have rendered popular, by a succession 
 of scholarly studies, the argument drawn from design in nature; 
 and recently, again, these remarkable works — the Duke of 
 Argyll's Beign of Lavj and Professor Flint's Theism — have anew 
 recalled attention to this famous and indestructible argument. 
 The present work is not altogether of the same kind as 
 those of which I have just spoken. It is not a treatise of 
 natural theology, but an analytical and critical treatise on the 
 principle of final causes itself. Different times require dif- 
 ferent efforts. Philosophy has in our days assumed a new 
 aspect. On the one hand, the development of the sciences of 
 nature, which more and more tends to subject the phenomena 
 of the universe to a mechanical concatenation ; on the other 
 hand, the development of the critical and idealist philosophy 
 that had its centre in Germany at the commencement of this 
 century, and which has had its counterpart even in Scotland 
 with Hamilton and Perrier ; and, in fine, the progress of the 
 spirit of inquiry in all departments, have rendered necessary 
 a revision of the problem. The principles themselves must be 
 subjected to criticism. At the present day the mere adding 
 of facts to facts no longer suffices to prove the existence of a 
 design in nature, however useful for the rest that work may 
 still be. The real difficulty is in the interpretation of these 
 facts; the question is regarding the principle itself. This 
 principle I have endeavoured to criticise. I have sought its 
 
AUTHOR S PKEFACE TO THE ENGLISH EDITION. Vll 
 
 foundations, authority, limits, and signification, by confronting 
 it with the data and the conditions of modern science, as well 
 as with the doctrines of the boldest and most recent meta- 
 physics. If n\y book has any interest, it is in having set 
 forth the problem in all its complexity, under all its aspects, 
 without dissembling any difficulty, and in presenting all the 
 interpretations. Apart from every conclusion, I think I can 
 present it to philosophers of all schools as a complete treatise 
 on the subject. Considered in this point of view, it wQl at 
 least have, in default of other merit, that of utility. 
 
 Some modifications and, as I hope, improvements have been 
 introduced into the English edition. The Appendix, some- 
 what too extensive in the first edition, has been relieved of 
 certain portions of less useful erudition. Also two pieces, 
 which likewise formed part of the Appendix in the French 
 edition, have been introduced into the text itself, notably the 
 last chapter of the second part (The Supreme End of Nature). 
 By this transference the work has seemed to me to gain in 
 force and interest. 
 
 Paul Janet. 
 
 Fokges-les-Ba7ns (Seine et Oisb), 
 10th Octoler 1878. 
 
PREFATORY NOTE BY THE TRANSLATOR. 
 
 THIS translation has been undertaken on the recommendation 
 of Professor Flint and others, who regard M. Janet's work 
 as by far the ablest on the subject of Final Causes, and as 
 well fitted to supply a lack in our literature. By an inter- 
 esting coincidence, while our version was passing through the 
 press, the following statement appeared in an influential 
 newspaper of August 29 th, in a letter from its French corre- 
 spondent, the writer being in all probability unaware that an 
 English edition was in progress : 
 
 'Will there not be found in British science a man of 
 eminence to fight the battle of good sense and of the facts, 
 against the monstrous imaginations of Darwin? If such a 
 man comes out, he will find powerful assistants in our Quatre- 
 fages, our Blanslmrd, and our Janet. The book of this last 
 one, on the Causes Finales, is really an event in science, and 
 ought to have a large circulation among the educated classes 
 abroad.' 
 
 The only change that has been made on the original is 
 tteit, with the author's approval, two notes in the Appendix 
 (x. and xii.) have been omitted. 
 
 This translation has now been compared with the author's 
 second edition, and the numerous additional notes and other 
 changes and transpositions have all been embodied in their 
 proper places. The translator would gratefully acknowledge 
 the kindness and justice of the criticisms on his effort to pre- 
 sent this admirable work in fit English. He has not been 
 unmindful of them in this revisal. 
 
 W. A. 
 
PEEFACE BY PROFESSOE FLINT. 
 
 FTIHE publishers of this work having requested me to preface 
 -*- it with a few words of recommendation, I willingly 
 comply with their desire, although convinced that scarcely any 
 book has recently appeared which less needs extrinsic testimony 
 in its favour. 
 
 The French original, which was published only in 1876, 
 has abeady attracted to itself much attention, and all candid 
 judges, whether accepting or not its conclusions, have warmly 
 acknowledged its great ability and value. Although not an 
 absolutely exhaustive treatise on final causes, seeing that it 
 does not attempt to trace their /)resence in the regions of 
 intellect and emotion, morality and history, it is the most 
 comprehensive work which has been written on the subject ; 
 while the omission indicated, whether intentional or not, is 
 perhaps one which could be amply justified. It is also a 
 truly philosophical treatise, alike in conception, spirit, and 
 execution. Truth alone is sought, reason alone is appealed 
 to, and diEBculties are neither evaded nor represented as less 
 formidable than they really are ; but, on the contrary, every 
 serious objection, either to the existence of final causes in 
 nature, or to the interpretation which the author would assign 
 to them, is stated in its full force. Certainly no disposition is 
 shown to exaggerate the weight or worth of the answers 
 which are given to these objections. The general plan of the 
 work is so simple, and the manner in which its argument is 
 gradually unfolded is so clear and natural, that the reader is 
 never left in uncertainty as to where he is or whither he is 
 going. M. Janet possesses in a high degree the expository 
 talent for which French writers are so distinguished. At the 
 
X PREFACE BY PEOFESSOK FLINT. 
 
 same time, his earnestness and thoroughness as a thinker 
 prevent his making any sacrifices to mere external graces, and 
 hence he always writes as one who, having done everything to 
 make himself intelligible to his readers, expects from them in 
 return their whole attention. 
 
 The first of the two parts into which the treatise is divided 
 deals with the problem. Are there ends in nature ? In order 
 to discuss this problem in a satisfactory manner at the present 
 day, a man need not be a specialist in mechanical and biological 
 science, but he must have an extensive and accurate general 
 knowledge of such science, and an acquaintance with, and 
 insight into, its history, methods, limits, and tendencies, which 
 few specialists display. M. Janet possesses these qualifications 
 in an eminent degree, and was well known to possess them 
 before he wrote this work, in which they are so conspicuous. 
 The possession of them had enabled him to intervene in 
 the Materialistic controversy on the side of a spiritualistic 
 philosophy more effectively perhaps than any other French 
 thinker. The present work is the natural sequel of two 
 admirable snialler writings, Ze Cerveau et la Pensie (1867) and 
 Ze MatMalisme Oontemporain {18'75, 2d ed.). The latter has 
 heen translated into English and German. The second part of 
 the present treatise deals with the problem, What is the ultimate 
 cause or explanation of ends in nature ? For its discussion 
 speculative talent and an intimate acquaintance with modern 
 metaphysics are demanded. The demand is, of course, met 
 in M. Janet, whose life has been assiduously devoted to the 
 cultivation of- philosophy, and who is the author of works of 
 acknowledged value in almost all its departments. French 
 spiritualism has at present no abler or more influential repre- 
 sentative in the Institute, the University, or the Press ; and 
 French spiritualism, although attacked from all sides, — by 
 positivists, experimentalists, criticists, idealists, and mystics, — is 
 still well able to hold its own, and at least as strong in men, 
 principles, and services as any other school of French 
 thought. 
 
PREFACE BY PROFESSOR FLINT. XI 
 
 On a few points my views do not entirely coincide with 
 those maintained by M. Janet in the present volume. It 
 would be useless and ungracious, however, merely to indicate 
 these differences, and it is impossible to discuss them within 
 the limits of a preface. The argumentation as a whole com- 
 mands my full assent; and while I should welcome any 
 adequate attempt to refute it as not less valuable than itself, 
 I have little expectation of seeing any refutation of the kind. 
 There seems to be small hope of a work as comprehensive and 
 thorough as that of M. Janet's being written from the opposite 
 point of view, when even a critic of the talent of Mr. Sully 
 can fancy that there is relevancy in such reasoning as the 
 following : — ' One or two observations on M. Janet's line of 
 reasoning must suffice. We hardly think he will secure the 
 support of men of science in limiting the action of physical 
 or mechanical causation where he does. To say, for example, 
 that mechanical principles cannot account for the symmetrical 
 arrangement of the lines of a crystal, is surely to betray a 
 rather superficial acquaintance with the mechanical mode of 
 explanation. It seems much too soon, in view of Mr. 
 Darwin's reduction of so many adaptations to a strictly 
 mechanical process, to affirm that physical causation is in- 
 adequate to account for the orderly arrangements of living 
 structures. We are, no doubt, still a long way from a 
 mechanical theory of organic growth, but it may be said to 
 be the qucesitum of modern science, and no one can say that it is 
 a chimera. Should it ever be reached, one suspects, in spite 
 of M. Janet's assurances, that ideas of final causes will soon 
 wax very faint. For such a theory, while admitting that 
 there is a close relation between organ and function, would 
 be able to furnish another explanation of the relation ; and M. 
 Janet's argument, that what resembles the result of internal 
 volition cannot be due to another cause, will hardly convince 
 those who are familiar with the doctrine of the plurality of 
 causes. The author seems to us to argue most weakly when 
 he seeks to assimilate our knowledge of design in nature to 
 
XU PKEFACE BY PEOFESSOE FLINT. 
 
 that of others' conscious thoughts and volitions. The inde- 
 pendent chains of reasoning by which we are able to establish 
 the existence of another mind, whether in one of our fellow- 
 men or of the lower animals, serve as a mode of mutual 
 verification, and to this there corresponds nothing in the 
 teieological argument.' — Mind, No. 5, Jan. 1877, pp. 246-7. 
 Now, the central idea of M. Janet's book is that final 
 causes are not inconsistent with physical causation. This 
 idea he endeavours to confirm by an elaborate process of 
 cautious reasoning, which extends through both parts of his 
 work. In other words, the general aim of his whole treatise 
 is to show that Mr. Sully's objection is irrelevant and in- 
 admissible. This being the case, Mr. SuUy was obviously 
 bound in logical fairness to refute M. Janet's argumentation 
 before urging an objection which takes no account of it what- 
 ever. It would ' betray a rather superficial acquaintance with 
 the mechanical mode of explanation to say that mechanical 
 principles cannot account for the symmetrical arrangement of 
 the lines of a crystal;' but to attribute to M. Janet any 
 saying of the kind is to show a wonderful capacity for mis- 
 apprehending what he really says, which is, ' that the produc- 
 tion of the crystalline forms of minerals can be Tnechanically 
 explained by an agglomeration of molecules, of which each one 
 has precisely the same geometric form as the whole,' but that 
 the need of belief in thought or design is not thereby dispensed 
 with, being still demanded by the very forms of the molecules 
 and the co-ordinated action of the mechanical laws. M. 
 Janet has taken great pains to show that those who are 
 truly familiar with the doctrine of the plurality of causes 
 will not oppose mechanical causes to final causes, or to a 
 primary intelligent cause, and those who dissent from him 
 must display their familiarity with the doctrine by proving 
 that he is mistaken in this respect, and has not made good his 
 conclusion. I do not wonder that Mr. Sully should think 
 that M. Janet ' argues most weakly when he seeks to assimilate 
 our knowledge of design in nature to that of others' conscious 
 
PREFACE BY PROFESSOR FLINT. XUl 
 
 thoughts and volitions,' for he clearly does not understand 
 his argument. No man who does will fancy that there are 
 any independent chains of reasoning by which we establish 
 the existence of another mind, human or animal, to which 
 nothing corresponds in the teleological argument. The 
 evidences of design are our only evidences for the existence 
 of other human minds. The use of spoken and written 
 language, the production of machinery, the association of 
 efforts, the co-ordination of actions, etc., are not independent 
 chains of reasoning, but simply links in the one chain of 
 inference from the evidences of design to intelligence, which 
 is the only proof we possess that other men have minds. 
 
 Mr. Affleck has, it seems to me, done good service by his 
 excellent translation of M. Janet's very able and important 
 work. 
 
 E. Flint. 
 
 The University of Edinburgh, 
 October 29, 1878. 
 
PREFACE TO THE SECOND EDITION. 
 
 TTrE reprint this book on Final Causes with notable modi- 
 ' ' fications, bearing, if not on the things themselves, at 
 least on the order and arrangement of the materials. We 
 have relegated to the Appendix a certain number of develop- 
 ments that were in the text, and which retarded the discussion 
 and interrupted its sequence and connection ; and, reciprocally, 
 we have introduced into the text important pieces which have 
 seemed to us to form an integral part of our subject.^ 
 
 This book is not, as has been said (for the rest, with good 
 will) in some reviews, a work of polemic : it is a work of 
 criticism, which is very different. Polemic is a method of 
 combat ; criticism is a method of research. Polemic only 
 sees the feebleness of the adversary and the strength of the 
 thesis that is defended ; criticism sees the weakness and the 
 strength of both sides. Polemic is engaged beforehand, and 
 pursues a determined aim ; criticism is disinterested, and lets 
 itself be led to the result by analysis and examination. 
 Criticism is methodical doubt ; it is therefore the philosophic 
 method par excellence. In a science in which one has not at 
 his disposal the methods of rigorous verification possessed bj' 
 the other sciences, namely, experiment and calculation, in a 
 science in which one has only reasoning at his disposal, if one 
 is content with a one-sided reasoning that only presents things 
 under one aspect, one will doubtless be able to think what 
 one pleases, and each one, thinking for his part, will have the 
 same right ; but there wiU then be as many philosophies as 
 individuals, and no common, no objective philosophy. Philo- 
 
 ' See in the sequel of the Preface the note whei'e we explain more in detail 
 the changes made in this edition. 
 
PKEFACE TO THE SECOND EDITION. XV 
 
 sopliic reasoning, it seems to us, to compensate for what it 
 lacks on the side of rigorous verification, ought therefore to con- 
 trol itself, to be two-sided, to examine at once the pro and the 
 contra, — in fine, to be what the English call cross-examination. 
 
 This method we have sought to apply to the principle of 
 final causes. Our aim then was much less the criticism of 
 the adversaries of this principle, than the criticism of this 
 principle itself: for the more we have it at heart, the more 
 ought we to desire that it should withstand all trials ; the 
 more ought we to assure ourselves of its solidity. To found 
 a doctrine only on the negation of the opposite doctrine is a 
 frail foundation ; for, because others are wrong, it does not 
 follow that we are right ; and because our objections are 
 strong, it does not follow that the objections of the 
 opponents are weak. This account taken of the objection 
 is sometimes regarded as a complaisant concession, inspired 
 by the exaggerated desire of peace. An absolute error ! 
 It is, on the contrary, a method of verification, which 
 replaces, very imperfectly no doubt, but in a certain 
 measure, the verification of experiment and calculation. 
 The objection in metaphysic is the part of the forgotten and 
 unknown facts. To suppress the objection, or to express 
 it softly, is to suppress one side of the facts ; it is to present 
 the part of the things that suits us, and to dissemble that 
 which does not suit us; it is to take more care of our 
 opinion than of the truth itself. If, by this cross-examination, 
 the truth appears much more difficult to discover, it is not 
 our fault, but that of the nature of things ; but an incomplete 
 truth, expressed in a modest way, is worth more than a pre- 
 tentious error or an emphatic prejudice. 
 
 After this rule the doctrine of final causes, precisely 
 because it is ours, has been subjected by us to the most 
 severe criticism ; we have made it pass through all trials ; 
 we have pushed the affairs of mechanism as far as we could, 
 for causes must not be multiplied without necessity. So far 
 as mechanism suffices, we have no need of final causes ; if it 
 
XVI PREFACE TO THE SECOND EDITION. 
 
 (sufficed everywhere, there would be no need of them at all. 
 But however great a part be assigned to it, there always 
 comes a moment when it runs aground and breaks down, 
 were it only for example before the final causes in man. It 
 is then that by way of regression the territory in appearance 
 abandoned can be retaken little by little: we can ascend 
 from psychological finality to physiological and organic 
 finality, and from that still higher, till we finish by recognising 
 that mechanism not only does not suffice everywhere, but 
 that it suffices nowhere, that it only explains the appearance, 
 and not the foundation and reality. The true, the really 
 manly method, is, then, that which places itself in the veiy 
 heart of the difficulties, and which, from these very difficulties, 
 elicits the necessity of an ultra - mechanical principle — a 
 principle of finality and of thought. 
 
 Such is our method ; and now here are our conclusions. 
 They are reducible to three fundamental propositions : 
 
 I. The first is that there is no d 'priori principle of final 
 causes. The final cause is an induction, a hypothesis, whose 
 probability depends on the number and characters of observed 
 phenomena. 
 
 II. The second is that the final cause is proved by the 
 existence in fact of certain combinations, such that the accord 
 of these combinations with a final phenomenon independent of 
 them would be a mere chance, and that nature altogether 
 must be explained by an accident. 
 
 III. The third, in fine, is that the relation of finality 
 being once admitted as a law of the universe, the only 
 hypothesis appropriate to our understanding that can account 
 for this law, is that it is derived from an intelligent 
 cause. 
 
 I. As regards the first point, we are certainly of those who 
 would wish that the principle of final causes were self- 
 evident, or that at least, subjected to reflection, it appeared 
 to us with the characters of necessity and universality that 
 Leibnitz and Kant have signalized as the marks of notions 
 
PREFACE TO THE SECOND EDITION, XVU 
 
 d, priori. But it is impossible for us to find in it this double 
 
 character. It is necessary that all that is produced have a 
 
 cause ; it is not necessary that all that is produced have an 
 
 end. If there were in nature only physical and chemical 
 
 facts, an intelligence that should contemplate them apart from 
 
 itself would be sufficiently satisfied by an explanation that 
 
 would attach each phenomenon to its anterior cause, without 
 
 pre-occupying itself with the future effect. It is said that 
 
 nothing is made without reason, and that reason is always a 
 
 motive, an aim. This is to equivocate with the word reason. 
 
 which may sometimes signify the determining reason, namely, 
 
 that which precedes, and sometimes the consecutive or final 
 
 reason, that is to say, that which follows. But, in many cases, ..^^ 
 
 the first reason suffices.* A billiard ball struck by another is^^ ^ .v.w^^<^»2i- 
 
 moved in such a direction ; that direction is explained by the ^r^ '-^^3~^''^'^- 
 
 stroke alone, and by the direction of the stroke, without it '•*'*'**"-' x«'/. 
 
 being necessary to suppose in the striking ball a sort of 
 
 presentiment or foretaste of the effect produced. 
 
 If one, then, must recognise final causes, it is only for this 
 reason, that in certain cases the anterior reason does not 
 suffice ; it is that, between that reason and the fact produced i 
 
 there is a void, a gap, an abyss, in a word, a chance. The final 
 cause, then, is only the application of the more general principle 
 of sufficient reason. So far as the anterior causes suffice, we 
 must abide by them ; for we must not multiply causes with- 
 out necessity; but are there not cases where the anterior 
 causes do not suffice, and where we must bring in the ulterior 
 or final causes ? That is the question. 
 
 So truly is that the question, that even those who, in the 
 most decided manner, lay down the principle of finality as a 
 self-evident principle, only lay it down after all in giving 
 precisely the reason which we have «just given, that is, in 
 signalizing the facts where the mechanical cause does not 
 suffice; for instance, organisms, genera, and species. But 
 then, if such facts did not exist, and if nature were reduced 
 to physical and chemical facts, the hypothesis would become 
 
 & 
 
XViU PREFACE TO THE SECOND EDITION. 
 
 useless. It is not then an d, priori principle, applicable every- 
 where in a necessary and universal manner. 
 
 II. Now, what is the distinctive character of these facts in 
 which we recognise the necessity of an entirely new order of 
 things, namely, of the final cause ? That character is adapta- 
 tion to thefutwe. This is the object of our second proposi- 
 tion. It is here that our analysis ought to have all the 
 precision possible to render evident the truth we defend ; for 
 equivocation is very difficult to avoid. It is said in effect, 
 and it is the fundamental argument of all the anti-finalists, 
 that every effect, simply because it is an eifect, must find in 
 the cause that produces it a sufficient reason of its production, 
 and that there is no room for wonder that the causes are fit 
 to produce that effect, since otherwise they would not pro- 
 duce it. Adaptation to the future, then, being the character 
 of all causality without exception, could not suffice in any 
 fashion as a criterion to characterise finality and serve as its 
 proof. That is the difficulty : here is the solution. Without 
 doubt, given a certain number of causes that act together, 
 they must produce a certain effect, and it is no way astonish- 
 ing that they be appropriate to that effect ; but that effect, so 
 far as it is only a result, can only be an effect whatsoever, having 
 no relation to the interest of the being that is the subject of 
 it, supposing that there are beings that have interest in such 
 phenomena rather than in others ; but that is the property of 
 living beings. Suppose, now, that such an interest exists, it 
 is then evident that we no longer have to do with whatsoever 
 effects, but with determined effects, having a precise relation 
 to the conservation of the being. The unlimited field of 
 undetermined effects is restrained ; an infinitude of effects are 
 found to be set aside as indifferent or contrary to the con- 
 servation of the being ; those only must be produced that are 
 in harmony with life ; but these phenomena are still in the 
 future when the organization is formed : that organization, in 
 place of being called to produce whatsoever effects, is circum- 
 scribed in its work by the necessity to produce such a given 
 
PREFACE TO THE SECOND EDITION. xix 
 
 effect and not another : this is what we call adaptation to the 
 future. For that there must be an arrangement of causes, 
 not merely a confused and any rencounter, but a precise and 
 limited rencounter. It is this precision, limitation, and cir- 
 cumscription in the arrangement of causes that is not 
 explained, and that consequently in the mechanist hypothesis 
 is without cause. The proof of finality, then, is made by the 
 principle of causality. 
 
 IIL As to the third proposition, namely, that the finality 
 of nature is not possible without an intelligent cause, we 
 recognise with most of the critics who have been so good as 
 occupy themselves with our book, that this is the most delicate 
 point of the demonstration. For it is said, if it is true that 
 one can explain finality by intelligence, by what shall we 
 explain intelligence, which is itself a finality ? And if there 
 may be a finality by itself, and without cause (as is implicitly 
 admitted in recognising an intelligence that is self-existent), 
 why should it not be so with the finality of nature as well as 
 of intelligence itself ? — But it is a law of science, applicable 
 as well to philosophy as to the other sciences, that we must 
 push an explanation as far as possible, but stop if we can- 
 not push it further. The scientist is warranted to explain 
 the world by universal attraction, even if that attraction itself 
 should not be explained. Now, there can only be three 
 modes of explaining the facts of adaptation in nature, namely, 
 mechanism, instinct, and intelligence ; but mechanism is 
 excluded by all that precedes ; there remain instinct and 
 intelligence. As to instinct, it is first exposed to all the 
 objections that can be directed against intelligence itself, 
 namely, that it is itself a finality, that it is a fact pertaining 
 to finite nature, that it supposes the organism, etc. But, 
 moreover, to these objections, equal on both sides, there is to 
 be added one against instinct that suffices to set it aside as 
 primary cause, namely, that it is an occult faculty, a nescio qiM 
 that, very far from explaining anything, is itself incompre- 
 hensible. On the other hand, mechanism and intelligence 
 
XX PEEFACE TO THE SECOND EDITION. 
 
 are two known causes, of which we can form clear and 
 distinct ideas; whence it follows that if mechanism is set 
 aside, as it ought to be, there only remains intelligence as a 
 precise cause of which we could have any idea. In truth, if 
 we are thus led by way of exclusion to admit intelligence as 
 supreme cause, we recognise at the same time that the mode 
 of intelligence whence finality might be derived is to us incom- . 
 prehensible ; for foresight, which is the mode whereby finite 
 beings attain ends, appears incompatible with the nature of 
 the absolute being, since it supposes, on the one hand, the 
 idea of time (pre-vision) ; on the other, the idea of difficulties 
 or obstacles to conquer, or of certain pre-existing properties 
 of matter to be employed to attain this or that end, notions 
 all excluded by the very nature of the absolute. It will be 
 seen in the course of this work how we have endeavoured to 
 solve these difiEiculties ; we have endeavoured to show that 
 there is even in man a mode of intelligence that is superior 
 to foresight and to calculation, namely, inspiration ; but 
 this mode of intelligence, although having analogies with 
 instinct, is not to be confounded with it, for instinct is routine^ 
 and inspiration is creative. If, then, there is something in us 
 that can give some idea of creation itself, it is thence that one 
 can derive it. Let us add, that even under this supreme form 
 intelligence is yet only the most approximate symbol by which 
 we can endeavour to comprehend the production by the 
 creator of means and ends. We believe that without pretend- 
 ing to comprehend the incomprehensible, we must be allowed 
 to seek in what we know the most elevated type possible 
 in order to conceive what we do not know. Without doubt, 
 ^uu. u:^^.^ '~^ what we call by the name of divine intelligence is something 
 ia^a. A^jcL^a^fi^'^ very different from what we think in employing that word; 
 •.Ay^-^ofy^.^"""^ I'ut we mean to say thereby, that there is in God a cause of 
 ~^ a, \:.^^ oZj finality which is at least intelligence, and which, if it is some- 
 r~*^ "■ °^' thing more, that something must be capable of translation into 
 finite language by the word intelligence. Believing besides, 
 like Descartes, in the veracity of our intelligence, without 
 
PREFACE TO THE SECOND EDITION. XXI 
 
 therefore believing in its equivalence to the absolute, we 
 believe ourselves warranted to represent the divine perfections 
 to ourselves by the attributes to which our reason conducts us 
 when we consider them in the point of view of our finite 
 spirit. The attributes of God are only, as Pension has said, 
 the names by wliich we disting'uish the different faces of the 
 divine unity when we consider it in its relation with the 
 world. It is thus we call Him ivise, when we see the 
 marvellous accommodation of means and ends ; good, when we 
 think of the abundance of His gifts ; just, when we compare 
 our merits and demerits with our actual or future destinies. 
 Wisdom is the most visible of these attributes, and it is that 
 to which the contemplation of final causes conducts us. 
 Doubtless the word is improper, like all that we borrow from 
 human language to express the divinity ; but if by a trans- 
 formation of intelligence we could anew translate the same 
 thought from human language into divine, we would doubt- 
 less see that we were as near the truth as a iinite spirit can 
 be. It is in these terms, and under these reservations, that 
 we maintain the doctrine of an intelligent cause of finality. 
 We do not think that one can go farther ; but we think that 
 one can and ought to go so far. 
 
 Note. — The following are the most important modifications 
 made on this new edition, and which were already partly to be 
 found in the English translation of this work (by William Affleck, 
 Edinburgh 1878, with a Preface by Professor Flint): 
 
 1. Chapter vi (Book I.) of the first edition, entitled 
 Objections and Difficulties, interrupted, by too long, special, and 
 more historical than actual discussions, the current of the 
 general discussion. Of this chapter we have preserved, 
 under the title of Contrary Facts (chap, v.), all that could be 
 attached to the general discussion, and have relegated the 
 rest to the Appendix under these different titles : V. Final 
 Causes and the Positivist Objection; VII. Lucretius, Bacon^ 
 Descartes, and Spinoza ; VIII. Ahise of Final Causes. 
 
XXll PREFACE TO THE SECOND EDITION". 
 
 2. We have introduced into the text 'So. 8 of the first 
 Appendix, entitled Herbert Spencer and Evolutionism; that 
 discussion has seemed to us altogether essential, and to he 
 closely connected with the question of evolution in general, 
 and in particular with the system of Darwin. 
 
 3. We have likewise removed from the Appendix into the 
 text, in quality of final chapter, the last piece of the first 
 Appendix, entitled Of the Supreme End of Nature. This 
 piece has seemed to us to terminate the work in a more 
 interesting and less abstract manner than the first conclusion. 
 It presents, besides, the advantage of opening a prospect for a 
 second work, which we will not do, but which others will 
 be able to do in our stead, namely, finality in the moral 
 order, a gap which has been with reason remarked in our 
 book, but which we could only have fiUed up by doubling the 
 work, — already too voluminous, — and which would, besides, 
 exceed our actual strength. 
 
 Let us add, that independently of these notable changes 
 of composition, there are also many changes of detail, and, 
 especially in the notes, additions that are not without 
 importance. 
 
 Paris, lUh February 1882. 
 
CONTENTS. 
 
 PREFACES, .... 
 PEELIMINART CHAPTER — THE PROBLEM, 
 
 PAGE 
 
 r-xiv 
 
 B K I. 
 
 THE LAW OP FINALITY, ...... 
 
 CHAPTER I. THE PRINCIPLE, ..... 
 
 II. THE FACTS, ..... 
 
 IIL THE INDUSTRY OF MAN AND THE INDUSTRY OF NATURE, 
 IV. ORGAN AND FUNCTION, .... 
 
 V. THE CONTRARY FACTS, .... 
 
 VI. MECHANISM AND FINALITY, 
 VII. THE DOCTRINE OF EVOLUTION IN GENERAL, 
 VIII. THE DOCTRINE OF EVOLUTION; — LAMARCK AND DARWIN, 
 IX. THE DOCTRINE OF EVOLUTION — HERBERT SPENCER, 
 
 15 
 
 17 
 62 
 92 
 117 
 146 
 172 
 215 
 232 
 264 
 
 BOOK II. 
 
 THE FIRST CAUSE OF FINALITY, . . . . 
 
 CHAPTER I. THE PHYSICO-THEOLOGICAL PROOF, 
 
 II. SUBJECTIVE AND IMMANENT FINALITY, 
 
 III. INSTINCTIVE AND INTENTIONAL FINALITY, 
 
 IV. THE PURE IDEA AND CREATIVE ACTIVIIT, . 
 V. THE SUPREME END OF NATURE, 
 
 287 
 291 
 
 314 
 346 
 387 
 414 
 
 APPENDIX. 
 
 I. THE PROBLEM OF INDUCTION, .... 
 
 II. cuvier's law, ...... 
 
 III. LESAGB OF GENEVA AND FINAL CAUSES, 
 
 IV. GEOFFROY ST. HILAIRE AND THE DOCTRINE OF FINAL CAUSES, 
 V. FINAL CAUSES AND THE POSITIVIST OBJECTION, 
 
 VI. OPTIMISM — VOLTAIRE AND ROUSSEAU, 
 VII. OBJECTIONS AND DIFFICULTIES — LUCRETIUS, BACON, DESCARTES, 
 AND SPINOZA, ...... 
 
 VIII. ABUSE OF FINAL CAUSES, ..... 
 
 IX. FINAL CAUSES IN THE SANKHYA PHILOSOPHY, 
 X. THE PHYSICO-THEOLOGICAL PROOF, .... 
 
 427 
 
 435 
 439 
 446 
 454 
 460 
 
 474 
 491 
 604 
 510 
 
FINAL CAUSES. 
 
 PEELIMIKAEY CHAPTER 
 
 THE PEOBLEM. 
 
 rpHE term final cause {causa finalis) was introduced into the 
 -■- language of phHosophy by scholasticism.-' It signifies 
 the end {finis) for which one acts, or towards which one 
 tends, and which- may consequently be considered as a cause 
 of action or of motion. Aristotle explains it thus : ' Another 
 sort of cause is the end, that is to say, that on account of which 
 (to ov evexa) the action is done ; for example, in this sense, 
 health is the cause of walking exercise. Why does such a 
 one take exercise ? We say it is in order to have good 
 health ; and, in speaking thus, we mean to name the cause.' ^ 
 
 Let us -examine closely the proper and singular character 
 of this kind of cause. What characterises it is, that, according 
 to the point of view which one occupies, the same fact can be 
 taken either as cause or as effect. Health is without doubt 
 the cause of walking, but it is also the effect of it. On the 
 one hand, health only comes after walking, and by it. It is 
 because my will, and, by its orders, my members, have exe- 
 cuted a certain movement, that health has followed. ^ But, on 
 the other hand, in another sense, it is in order to obtain this 
 
 ' Aristotle never employs it. He says, the end {to riXos), that on accoimt of 
 wMcli (to aS iiisxx), but never the final cause [xWla nXixri). It is the same with 
 other causes, which he always designates by substantives (oX>i, s'/Sos, afxh "ivi- 
 diuf). The scholastics transformed these substantives into adjectives : causa 
 materialis, ejffieiens, formalis, finalis. 
 
 2 Phye. lib. ii. c. 3. 
 
 A 
 
2 PKELIMINAEY CHAPTER. 
 
 good health that I have walked ; because, without the hope, 
 the desire, the preconceived idea of the benefit of health, 
 perhaps I would not have gone out, and my members would 
 have remained in repose. A man kills another : in a sense 
 the death of the latter had as a cause the action of killing, 
 that is to say, the action of plunging a poniard into a living 
 body, a mechanical cause without which there would have 
 been no death ; but reciprocally this action of killing had as 
 a determining cause the wiU to kOl, and the death of the 
 victim, foreseen and willed beforehand by the criminal, was 
 the determining cause of the crime. Thus a final cause is a 
 fact which may be in some sort considered as the cause of Us 
 ovyfb cause ; but as it is impossible for it to be a cause before 
 it exists, the true cause is not the fact itself, but its idea. 
 In other words, it is a foreseen effect, which could not have 
 taken place without this foresight.^ 
 
 It is true it would be affirming a great deal, and perhaps 
 transgressing the limits of experience, to .require for every 
 species of end an express foresight in the agent that pursues 
 that end. We will take, for example, the phenomenon of 
 instinct, where all evidence shows that the animal pursues 
 an end, but without knowing that it does so, and without 
 having previously conceived it in its imagination, nor yet the 
 means, infallible although they be, by which it can attain it. 
 Generalizing this difficulty, perhaps it will be said that even 
 in rising to the first cause of the universe, one has no more 
 reason to imagine it as an intelligence which foresees an 
 effect, than as an instinct which surely but blindly tends to it 
 by an intrinsic necessity. 
 
 We do not yet require to occupy ourselves with these pre- 
 
 ' By carrying the analysis farther one can distinguish, with Hartmanu 
 (Philosophie des Unbevmssten, Introd. chap, ii.), four elements in the final cause, 
 — 1st, the conception of the end ; 2d, the conception of the means ; 3d, the 
 realization of the means ; 4th, the realization of the end. Whence it follows 
 that the order of execution reproduces inversely the order of conception • whence 
 it follows, again, that what is last in execution (the end) is the first in concep- 
 tion (the idea of the end). This is expressed by the scholastic axiom : Quod 
 privs est in intentione ultimum est in ezecutione. 
 
THE PEOBLEM. 6 
 
 mature difficulties ; let us merely say that to give a clear idea 
 of the final cause, we must first represent it to ourselves in 
 the most striking and most attainable case — that is to say, 
 in the human consciousness. Diminish now progressively in 
 imagination the degree of express foresight which controls the 
 search for the effect, and you will by degrees arrive at that 
 obscure and dull perception of which Leibnitz speaks, and 
 which is nothing else than instinct itself, — at that sort of innate 
 somnambulism, as Cuvier calls it, which presides infallibly 
 over the actions of the animal. At a still inferior stage you 
 wUl find the tendency of all organized matter to co-ordinate 
 itself conformably to the idea of a living whole. The reflect- 
 ing consciousness, then, does not exist, in fact, wherever we 
 meet or think we meet with ends in nature ; but only wher- 
 ever we suppose such ends, we cannot prevent ourselves from 
 conceiving the final effect as imaged beforehand, if not under 
 an idealized and express form, at least in some manner in 
 the agent that produces it. In order that an act may be 
 called a final cause, all the series of phenomena required to 
 produce it must be subordinated to it. That phenomenon 
 which is not yet produced governs and commands the whole 
 series, which would be evidently incomprehensible and con- 
 trary to every law of causality, if it did not pre-exist in some 
 fashion and in an ideal manner before the combination of 
 which it is at once the cause and the result. Eesuming and 
 correcting the definition given above, we may say, then, that 
 the final cause, as given us in experience, is an effect if not 
 foreseen at least predetermined,^ and which, by reason of this 
 predetermination, conditions and dominates the series of 
 phenomena of which it is in appearance the result. Thus it 
 is yet once more an act which may be considered as the cause 
 of its own cause. Thus, in one sense, the eye is the cause of 
 
 ' Hegel himself thus defines finality: das Vorherbestimmte. — PAU. de la Nat. 
 § 366. [The word finality — in French finaliti — is used here and thrpnghout 
 this work not in its ordinary English sense, but to denote the fact, belief, or 
 principle of final causes. — Note by Translator.] 
 
4 PRELIMINARY CHAPTER. 
 
 sight ; in another sense, sight is the cause of the eye. We 
 
 I shall have to conceive, then, as Kant has said, the series of 
 final causes as a reversal of the series of efficient causes. The 
 latter proceeds by descent, the former by ascent. The two 
 series are identical (at least it is permitted to suppose so 
 a priori), but the one is the inversion of the other. The 
 mechanical point of view consists in descending the first of 
 these two series (from the cause to the effect) ; the ideological 
 point of view, or that of final causes, consists in ascending it 
 again (from the end to the means). The question is. Whereon 
 rests the legitimacy of this regressive operation ? 
 
 It is known that all schools agree in admitting certain 
 maxims or truths, called primary truths, primary or funda- 
 mental principles, which, according to some, are implanted 
 a priori in the human mind, and, according to others, are the 
 fruit of an experience so universal as to be practically equiva- 
 lent to the innate, but which on all hands are recognised as 
 so evident and so imperious that thought is absolutely im- 
 possible without them. These are such as the principle of 
 identity, the principle of causality, and the principle of sub- 
 stance, the principle of space, and the principle of time. The 
 simplest and clearest formulas which serve to express them 
 are these: 'Nothing is at the same time, and considered 
 under the same point of view, both itself and its contrary ; ' 
 • no phenomenon without cause, no mode without substance ; ' 
 ' every body is in space, every event takes place in time.' 
 
 The question we have to resolve is this : Among these 
 primary traths or fundamental principles, must we also reckon, 
 as is often done, another principle called the principle of final 
 causes ? Is there a principle of final causes ? What is it ? 
 What is its formula ? Does it form one of those necessary 
 and universal principles without which it is impossible to 
 think ? Or may it only be a particular case of one of them ? 
 
 Let us remark, first, that men are not well agreed even 
 upon the formula of what they call the principle of final 
 
THE PEOBLEM. 5 
 
 causes. For the principle of causality there is no difficulty : 
 ' No phenomenon without cause.' By analogy we should 
 have to formulate the principle of final causes in this manner : 
 'JSTothing is produced without design ; every being has an end.'^ 
 Aristotle expressed it thus : ' Nature makes nothing in vain.' 
 We only need to express in these terms the principle of final 
 causes to see at once that it is not of the same kind as the 
 principle of causality. Th. Jouffroy, when examining, in his 
 Course of Natural Right, the truths on which moral order 
 reposes, says : ' The first of these truths is the principle that 
 every being has an end. Equal to the principle of causality, 
 it has all its evidence, all its universality, all its necessity, and 
 our reason conceives no more exception to the one than to the 
 other.' Despite the high authority of Jouffroy, we are obliged 
 to declare that the principle here set forth, namely, that ' every 
 being has an end,' appears to us to have neither the evidence 
 nor the necessity of the principle of causality, namely, that 
 ' all that is produced has a cause.' If by end is meant a cer- 
 tain effect resulting necessarily from a certain given nature, in 
 this sense every being has an end, for every being necessarily 
 produces what is conformable to its nature ; but if by end is 
 meant an aim, for which a thing has been made, or towards 
 which it tends, it is not self-evident that the stone has an 
 end, that the mineral has one. Doubtless, for him who regards 
 nature as the work of a providence, it will be certain that all 
 has been created for an end, and even the pebble will not 
 have been made in vain ; but then the principle of final 
 causes is no more than a corollary of the doctrine of provi- 
 dence — it is not a principle a priori, a necessary, universal, 
 first principle. The doctrine of a universal end of things, 
 flowing from the doctrine of providence, cannot, then, be given 
 as self-evident. 
 
 We must insist on this difference between the principle of 
 causality and the principle of final causes. If I contemplate 
 
 ' To say, as is sometimes said, ' Every means supposes an end,' would be a pure 
 tautology. 
 
b PRELIMINAEY CHAPTEK. 
 
 the chain of the Alps, and the innumerable strange and com- 
 plicated forms •which the peaks composing that chain have 
 taken, the law of causality forces me to admit that each of 
 them, however accidental it may appear, has its detemunate 
 and precise cause ; but I am in no way forced to admit that 
 each of those forms, here pointed, there sloped, there rounded, 
 has an end and an object. Take an eruption of a volcano : 
 each stream of lava, each exhalation, each noise, each flash 
 has its own cause, and the most passing of these phenomena 
 could be determined a ^priori by him who knew accurately all 
 the causes and all the conditions which have brought about 
 the eruption ; but to think to attribute to each of these 
 phenomena in particular a precise end is absolutely impossible. 
 For what end is such a stone thrown to the right rather than 
 to the left ? Why such an emanation rather than such 
 another ? These are questions which, in fact, no one asks. 
 One might cite a thousand other examples : Why, to what end 
 do the clouds driven by the wind take such a form rather than 
 such another ? Why, to what end does the malady called 
 madness produce suph a delusion rather than such another ? 
 To what end has one monster two heads and another none at 
 all ? There are a thousand such cases, in which the human 
 mind seeks causes withoiit concerning itself about ends. I do 
 not merely say that it ignores them, I say it does not thiak 
 of them, and is not forced to suppose them ; while as to the 
 causes, even when it "is ignorant of them, it yet knows that 
 they exist, and it believes in them invincibly. 
 
 Doubtless the human mind can apply the idea of finality 
 even to the preceding cases, and, for example, believe that it 
 is for an unknown end that there are mountains, volcanoes, 
 monsters, and so on. I do not deny that it can, I say only 
 that it is not forced to it, as it is in the case of causality 
 properly so called. Finality in these different cases is for it 
 only a means of conceiving things, a hypothesis which pleases 
 and satisfies it, a subjective point of view, to which it can 
 abandon itself, as it can refuse to do so ; or else the con- 
 
THE PEOBLEM. 7 
 
 sequence of a doctrine which is believed true. On the other 
 hand, causality is a necessary law of the mind, an objective 
 law of all phenomena without exception, a law necessary, 
 and everywhere verified by the constant reproduction of the 
 phenomena under the same conditions ; in a word, to employ 
 the expression of Kant, finality in the examples cited is 
 only a regulative principle, causality is always a constitutive 
 principle. 
 
 Besides, even when we suppose that all the great pheno- 
 mena of nature have their final causes, we only admit it for 
 the phenomenon taken as a whole, but not for each of its 
 details. For example, granting that there must be volcanoes, 
 and that that is good, there will necessarily follow eruptions, 
 which wiU bring about a thousand particular accidents ; but 
 has each of these accidents therefore its final cause ? It is 
 difficult to believe it. The general phenomenon being supposed 
 useful, the causes which produce it must be endlessly reflected 
 in a million little special facts, which only have worth and 
 signification in so far as they make part of the whole, but 
 which taken in themselves are only effects, and not ends. 
 
 To borrow a comparison from human experience : when by 
 means of an explosive mixture we blow up masses of rock for 
 the purpose of making our roads and railways, evidently the 
 only thing which can be called an end is' the general pheno- 
 menon of the explosion ; but whether this explosion break 
 the rock into a thousand pieces or into two thousand, whether 
 those pieces are round, square, or pointed, whether they be 
 hurled to the left or to the right, all that matters little to the 
 engineer. These details only interest him in so far as they 
 might affect the general phenomenon, or bring about this or 
 that misfortune ; but, his precautions once taken, no one can 
 say that such an effect, taken by itself, is an end or an aim ; 
 and yet, once more, each of these accidents, however minute 
 it may be, has a cause. 
 
 If there are in the universe a great number of phenomena 
 which do not suggest in any manner the idea of an end, to 
 
8 PKELIMINAEY CHAPTER. 
 
 compensate for this there are others which rightly or wrongly 
 call, forth this idea imperiously and infallibly ; such are the 
 organs of living beings, and above all of the superior animals. 
 "Why this difference ? What more is there in this case than 
 in the previous one ? If the principle of finality were 
 universal and necessary, like the principle of causality, would 
 we not apply it everywhere like the latter, and with the same 
 certainty? There are none of these differences as regards 
 efficient causes. In all cases we affirm that they exist, and ■ 
 we affirm it equally. There are no phenomena which are 
 more evidently effects than others. We know the cause of 
 them, or do not know it ; but, known or unknown, it is ; and 
 it is not more probable in this case than in that. On the 
 other hand, even those who affirm that there is finality every- 
 where, acknowledge that it is more manifested in the animal 
 and vegetable kingdoms than in the mineral ; and if one were 
 reduced to the latter kingdom, and man were to forget him- 
 self, the idea of finality would not, perhaps, present itself to 
 the mind. One may see from this how much finality differs 
 from causality ; the latter is a principle, the former is probably 
 merely the consequence of an induction. 
 
 A contemporary philosopher thinks, like Jouffroy, that the 
 principle of finality has the same evidence as that of causality ; 
 he comprehends both together in one and the same formula. 
 ' All that happens,' says he, ' not only comes from somewhere, 
 but also goes somewhither.' ^ This proposition is doubtless in- 
 disputable, only, in so far as is evident, it does not necessarily 
 imply finality ; and reciprocally, in so far as it might be 
 understood in the sense of finality, it would no longer be 
 evident. It is certain that a body in motion goes somewhere, 
 but is the terminus of that motion a result or an end ? That 
 is the question. Is it as impelled or as attracted that the 
 body goes somewhere 1 Or if it be impelled, is it by another 
 
 ' Eavaisson, Report on the Philosophy of the Nineteenth Century, p. 239. 
 This principle appears to be translated from Plotinus : ■rim tS xi^aviiiw S=r n 
 Clint Ttfli S xmTrxi [Ennead, v. 1. 6). 
 
THE PROBLEM. 9 
 
 body, or by a will which has an aim ? All that remains in 
 suspense, and that precisely is the problem. 'We conceive 
 as necessary,' says the same author, ' that the cause includes, 
 with the reason of the commencement, the reason also of the 
 end to which the direction tends.' Again, nothing is more 
 true than this proposition, but one can understand it as well 
 in the sense of Spinoza as in the sense of Aristotle ; the 
 question always remains, whether the limit of the direction 
 is contained in the cause as a consequence or as an aim, 
 whether it is a logical development or a willfed foreordination. 
 And to say that the direction tends towards an end, is to beg 
 the question. 
 
 For our part, we admit, with Aristotle, that ' nature does 
 nothing in vain ;' with Jouffroy, that ' every being has an end ;' 
 with M. Ravaisson, ' that every motion goes somewhere.' But 
 these are only, as it seems to us, inductive truths, generaliza- 
 tions from experience. Seeing, as we do, in certain definite 
 cases, very evident relations of means and ends, or which 
 appear such to us, we proceed by extension to others which 
 are less so, and thence to all the facts of nature, in virtue of 
 our natural tendency to generalize. It is thus Aristotle formed 
 the maxim : ovhev fidrTjv ; natural history having shown him 
 a considerable number of facts where nature has evidently 
 an end, he believed himself warranted to formulate that 
 general maxim of which nature had furnished him with such 
 frequent proofs. 
 
 Finality is not, then, in our estimation a first principle ; it is I 
 a law of nature, obtained by observation and induction.^ Just j 
 as the naturalists admit general laws, which are, as they say, 
 
 1 It will be objected that it is the same, according to the empiric school, with 
 causality. But even supposing, with that school, that the principle of causality 
 is itself a last generalization of experience, there would still remain a very great 
 difference between the two principles — namely, that as regards causality every 
 trace of the primitive induction has disappeared, and now there remains only a 
 necessary law of the mind ; while the principle of finality has not succeeded in 
 incorporating itself in so complete a manner in the substance of thought ; it 
 remains matter of discussion, which is not the case with the law of causality, at 
 least in its application, if not in its metaphysical sense. 
 
10 PEELIMINAEY CHAPTEE. 
 
 rather tendencies than strict laws ^ (for they are always more 
 or less mixed with exceptions), — the law of economy, law of 
 division of labour, law of connection, law of correlation, — so 
 there is a law of finality which appears to embrace all the 
 preceding laws, a tendency to finality, a tendency evident in 
 organized beings, and which we suppose by analogy in those 
 that are not. 
 
 In considering finality as a law of nature, and not as a 
 rational law of the mind, we have the advantage, if we do 
 not deceive ourselves, of averting the general prejudice of men 
 of science against final causes. Why is it that men of science 
 show themselves so opposed to final causes 1 It is because 
 during long ages the principle of final causes has been made 
 an d, priori principle, which it has been sought to impose upon 
 science as much as the principle of causality. Eegarding 
 everything, the man of science was required not only to state 
 its cause, but also its end, as if he were bound to know it ; 
 by imposing on him the investigation of ends, he was turned 
 [aside from the investigation of causes. This is the yoke 
 which the man of science cannot bear, because it deprives 
 him of the liberty of inquiry. But if finality, in place of 
 beiug an a priori law of the, mind, is simply a tendency of 
 nature, what prevents men of science from admitting such a 
 tendency, since they admit others not less incomprehensible ? 
 And even, as we have seen, does not every idea of tendency 
 in general already imply finality more or less ? 
 
 If this proposition, 'Everything has an end,' is only an 
 empirical generalization, more or less legitimate, it is evident 
 it win not avail as a principle. From this point the question 
 changes its aspect. Not knowing beforehand that everything 
 has an end, how can we know in particular that such a thiTig 
 is an end ? By what sign do we recognise that anything is 
 an end ? If there is. then, a principle of final causes, it is not 
 that which consists in saying that there are ends, but that 
 which would teach us how to recognise an end, and how 
 ' Milne-Edwards, Introduction to Ocneral Zoology, preface. 
 
THE PROBLEM. 11 
 
 an end is distinguished from a result. This is the true 
 problem. To affirm an end is to affirm a certain species of 
 cause : in what conditions are we entitled to affirm this kind 
 of cause rather than another ? This is what we have to seek. 
 The affirmation d, priori of finality is a snare of the slothful 
 reason (ignava ratio). The problem is more delicate, and 
 demands more deliberate inc[uiries. It will be the object of 
 this treatise. 
 
 Before taking in hand the problem in the terms which we 
 have just stated, let us again mention, in order to show their 
 iusufficiency, and to determine with precision the meaning of 
 the question, certain formulas which have been given of the 
 principle of finality. 
 
 Here is, for instance, how Eeid expresses and formulates 
 the principle of final causes : ' The evident marks of intel- 
 ligence and of design in the effect, prove a design and an 
 intelligence in the cause.' It is easy to see that there is not 
 here a first principle, but a consequence of the principle of 
 causality; it is a particular application of that scholastic 
 axiom: 'AH that is contained in the effect is contained in 
 the cause,' — a principle which is not itself free from all diffi- 
 culty. Besides, Eeid's principle is expressed in a form which 
 might be accused of tautology ; for if there are in the effect^ 
 marks of intelligence, it is a matter of course that this is 
 the effect of an intelligence. But those who deny the conse- 
 quence deny precisely that those marks from which intelli- 
 gence is concluded are marks of intelligence ; and it is this 
 that has to be proved. 
 
 But the most important observation to be made on Eeid's 
 principle is, that the affirmation of intelligence is only a 
 corollary of the principle of final causes, hut is not that 
 principle itself. When I shall have established that there 
 are ends in nature, I shall thence be enabled to conclude 
 that nature has an intelligent cause (yet there are philo- 
 sophers, like Aristotle, Hegel, and Schopenhauer, who separate 
 design from intelligence) ; but the true question is whether 
 
12 PKEL1MINA.EY CHAPTER. 
 
 there are ends, and in what consist those marks of design 
 which shall entitle us to infer, iirst, finality in nature, and 
 then an intelligent cause of that finality. All these so 
 distinct views, and which yet it is necessary to separate, are 
 confounded in the axiom of Eeid. 
 
 These distinctions, on the other hand, are clearly indicated 
 in this formula of Bossuet, the hest and most philosophical 
 of all we know: 'AH,' says he, 'that shows order, propor- 
 tions well chosen, and means fit to produce certain effects, 
 shows also an express end, consequently a formed design, a 
 regulated intelligence, and a perfect art.' ^ It is evident that, 
 in Bossuet's view, the principle contains two parts and two 
 distinct affirmations: 1st, The existence of an express end, 
 whose signs or marks are well-chosen proportions; 2d, The 
 affirmation of an intelligence, of which the proof is derived 
 from the existence of ends. Design, intelligence, art, are only 
 affirmed as corollaries of finality. If there are ends, is there 
 an intelligence ? This question has to be debated with the 
 advocates of an unconscious finality. If there are ends, 
 by what are they recognised? This question has to be 
 debated with the partisans of the blind mechanism of nature. 
 Now, those two questions are very well distinguished by 
 Bossuet. Besides, he sees clearly that the difficulty is pre- 
 cisely to know what is the sign of finality. He does not 
 vaguely say, like Jouffroy, ' Every being has an end ; ' for that 
 is what is in question. He does not advance a tautology, like 
 Eeid, ' If there are marks of intelligence, there is intelligence.' 
 But he says, ' If there are proportions well chosen, proper for 
 certain effects, there are ends ; ' and further, ' If there are 
 ends, there is intelligence.' The formula, then, is excellent, and 
 very solid. However, one might criticise some of its words. 
 Is it true, for instance, that order always implies an end? 
 That will depend on the sense given to the word order. What 
 is better regulated than chemical combinations ? Have they 
 an end 1 That is what we do not know. There is no order 
 ' Bossuet, Knowledge of Ood and of Oneself, chap. iv. 1. 
 
THE PROBLEM. 13 
 
 more rigorous than the order of mechanics ; yet it is a 
 question whether mechanics belongs to the domain of final 
 causes. I do not wish to say that by pressing the idea of 
 order one would not finish by eliciting from it the idea of 
 finality, but these two notions are not equivalent in the first 
 instance. Bossuet says, again, that all that shows means 
 proper to produce certain effects, thereby shows an express 
 end. One might accuse him here of tautology, for it is very 
 true that the means suppose the end ; but why ? Because 
 the means by definition is that which serves for an end, so 
 that the question whether there are ends is the same as this, 
 whether there are means. But if by means Bossuet simply 
 intends, as is often the case, causes proper to produce an 
 effect, then the principle is false, for such causes do not at 
 all prove the existence of ends. For instance, the combina- 
 tion of oxygen and hydrogen is quite fit to produce water : it 
 does not follow that nature in these combinations has had for 
 its end the production of water : that remains to be proved. 
 
 Suipming up, the final cause cannot be laid down ci priori 
 as a necessary condition of thought ; it must be sought and 
 established by analysis and discussion. That will be the 
 object of this work. 
 
 This inquiry divides itself into two problems : 1st, Is 
 finality a law of nature ? 2d, What is the first cause of 
 that law 1 
 
 These two questions are quite distinct, and much obscurity 
 arises from having confounded them. We will treat them 
 separately in two different books. 
 
BOOK FIRST. 
 
 THE LAW OF FINALITY. 
 
CHAPTEE I. 
 
 THE PKINCIPLE. 
 
 TF the principle of final causes were a first principle, and 
 -'- d, priori, like the principle of causality, we would apply it 
 everywhere and in all circumstances; but it is not so. In a very 
 great number of cases phenomena appear to us to be without 
 an end, or at least do not call forth the notion of an end ; in 
 other cases, again, this notion is produced with an imperious and 
 irresistible force. Whence comes this difference ? In what does 
 the second case differ from the first ? By what do we recognise 
 that certain phenomena have, or appear to have, an end ? Who 
 warrants us to qualify them in this manner ? To reply to this 
 question will be to demonstrate the principle of finality. 
 
 It is a law of our mind, into the origin and metaphysical 
 signification of which we do not inquire, that as often as a 
 phenomenon appears to us in experience, we suppose for it an 
 anterior condition, which we call its cause or its reason} In 
 whatever manner we understand the cause, — whether with 
 some we see in it a power to act, or with others a simple 
 phenomenon which precedes another, — in both cases, in all 
 cases, it is an invincible law of the human mind to affirm that 
 a phenomenon which appears in time supposes something 
 without which it would not have existed. All the phenomena 
 of nature, then, are linked by the bond of cause and effect. 
 
 However, we are not to believe that all these phenomena 
 form a single indefinite 'chain, in which each phenomenon 
 
 1 The distinction has been made, and should be made, between the ca«se and 
 reason of a phenomenon (see A. Fouill^e, Philosophy of Plato, t. ii. p. 469) ; 
 but this distinction is useless here. It suffices us to understand the idea of 
 cause as it is understood in the sciences — namely, that which is req^uired for 
 the explanation of a phenomenon. 
 
 B 
 
18 BOOK I. CHAPTER I. 
 
 would come to occupy a place in its turn, and where there 
 would only be room for a single phenomenon at a time. No ; 
 at one and the same moment there is an infinite number of 
 phenomenal series, which take place at all points of the globe 
 and of the universe. While we are here, at Paris, and the 
 innumerable actions which constitute the life of a great city 
 take place, at the same time there occur at London, at New 
 York, and at the antipodes corresponding series of analogous 
 actions. In one single town, each house, each street, each 
 man is the theatre of particular scenes, infinitely diversified. 
 These simultaneous phenomenal series are sometimes parallel, 
 without immediate mixture with each other, and sometimes 
 oblique, intersecting and traversing each other, and mingling 
 their waves. Eepresenting these phenomenal series by lines, 
 we shall call the points where they meet points of coincidence, 
 and the phenomena which result from their combination we 
 shall call complex. 
 
 In certain cases it may happen that this meeting of serial 
 lines is determined beforehand by the nature of things. For 
 example, the flux and reflux of the sea, and the changes of the 
 tides, coincide in a constant manner with the movements of 
 the moon and the changes of the earth in relation to the sun; 
 but it is not always so. 
 
 It sometimes occurs — often, even — that two series of 
 phenomena happen to meet together, yet without our being 
 able to say that they have any action upon each other ; and 
 it is even a pleasure to our mind to flnd out what wOl 
 happen in this case.^ For instance, if, in the game of rouge- 
 et-noir, I bet that the black wiU win, and it wins accordingly, 
 it is .clear that my desire and my word could not have had 
 any influence on the winning of one colour or the other, and 
 likewise that the arrangement of the cards, which I did not 
 know, could not have had any influence on the choice I have 
 made. In this case two series of facts, absolutely independent 
 of each other, have happened to coincide with each other, and 
 
 ' The game of cross purposes corresponds to this disposition of the mind. 
 
THE PRINCIPLE. 19 
 
 to harmonize, without any mutual influence. This kind of 
 coincidence is what is called chance ; and it is upon the very 
 uncertainty of this coincidence that the pleasure, and, at the 
 same time, the terrible temptation, of games of hazard rests. 
 
 It is right, in a sense, to say that there is no chance — that 
 chance is a word void of sense, invented by our ignorance. 
 Doubtless, if chance be considered as an actual entity, — as a 
 sort of mysterious and jealous divinity, which, hidden behind 
 I know not what cloud, blindly controls the threads of our 
 destinies, — such a cause does not exist. No ; chance is not 
 a cause, but it is the coincidence of causes,'- — it is an entirely 
 external relation, but one none the less real, between inde- 
 pendent phenomena. At every moment we employ chance to 
 explain mysterious phenomena. Without wishing here to solve 
 the so delicate question of presentiments, we may be permitted 
 to suppose that in many cases the success of a presentiment 
 is only the fortuitous coincidence of two series of independent 
 phenomena. How many a time has one had presentiments 
 which have led to nothing ! but does a single one happen to 
 coincide with the fact, the imagination is struck for the whole 
 life. These are fortuitous coincidences, external, and without 
 necessary connection, which one expresses by saying that they 
 are the effect of chance. Again, without wishing to trench 
 
 ^ See Coumot, Diet, des sciences philosophiques, art. ' Hazard : ' ' Chance is the 
 combination of several systems of causes which are developed each in its own 
 series independently of the others.' The views developed hy M. Cournot on 
 chance, whether in this article or in his other writings, have been very useful to- 
 ns. — M. Ch. Thurot has objected (Sevue critique) that, according to Aristotle, 
 there was no hazard but in relation to man ; but that there is none in nature. 
 I believe that what Aristotle means to say is, that there is no chance {■tix,'^) but 
 in relation to man, but I do not believe that he denies that there may be the 
 spontaneous and fortuitous in nature. This is what he means by to iui<riii,ii'tn, 
 ri irti/ilii^iixis, to aW irii/itrTii/iXTos ; and he shows precisely as we do ourselves 
 that all that is constant cannot be the product of chance. Besides, that 
 Aristotle admits on occasion the possibility of chance, for nature as for man, 
 appears from the following text : "Eitti 5' 'inxd too Sra n a*i immns xv ^fx^' 
 Sun xa.) offa aVB ipvi/ius. Ta Ss TstitZra orav Kara /fv/£^e(ifixos yivtirai, a«*o ru^vis 
 ipx/isv Umi (Berlin ed. 296, p. 21) ; and farther on : 'It is not a chance, nor a 
 fortuitous coincidence, if it rains in winter, but if it rains when the sun is in 
 the constellation of the Dog. It is not a chance that there is great heat in the 
 dog days, but that there is in winter.' 
 
20 BOOK I. CHAPTER I. 
 
 upon the so difficult question of magnetic clairvoyance, we 
 may be allowed to think that in many cases chance has some- 
 thing to do with it, — the talent of the somnambulist seeks to 
 limit that part, by trying to divine through some indications, 
 or by resting on vague generalities. To have enabled certain 
 false sciences — for example, judicial astrology or other deeply- 
 rooted prejudices — to subsist so long, it is evident that some 
 fortunate coincidences must have authorized in a certain 
 measure those arbitrary inductions which have encumbered 
 at all periods the imagination of men. 
 
 Thus, in the case which we call chance or coincidence of 
 causes, the product which is the effect of it needs no other 
 explanation than that two series of phenomena have met and 
 have concurred to produce it.^ It suffices that each of the 
 phenomena of which this result is composed is explained by 
 its respective causes ; the principle of causality is sufficiently 
 satisfied by this double or multiplied explanation. Suppose, 
 on the one hand, that a carriage is dragged along with the 
 utmost rapidity by a horse which has run off; suppose that, 
 on the other, a man, preoccupied by his thoughts, and called 
 to an appointment by an affair of urgency, hurries on without 
 thinking, and is overthrown by the carriage : evidently I have no 
 need of any particular cause to explain, his fall, although clearly 
 that fall was not necessarily connected with the blind rush of 
 the horse. But, on the one hand that running off, on the other 
 the preoccupation, are the two causes which, without meaning 
 it, have produced that complex, unexpected effect. Doubtless 
 by occupying a very elevated point of view, one may think that 
 that event has been prepared and foreseen by the will of Provi- 
 dence, and that is usually what one supposes when it concerns 
 
 ^ I find the same view in an estimable but little known philosopher of the 
 18th century (Boullier, Discours sur lea causes finales, Amsterdam 1759, p. 
 28): ' The word c/iance designates less the ignorance of causes than it marks 
 that one ought not to seek a special cause for certain concourses of effects, which 
 have each apart their particular causes. It is chance that makes two faces 
 resemble and two minds agree ; that is to say, that each of the two effects has 
 its cause, and that there is no need of a third to put between them the resemblance 
 or the equality we observe in them. ' 
 
THE PRINCIPLE. 21 
 
 the great ones of this world ; as for the others, one is readily 
 satisfied with proximate causes. But without in any manner 
 contesting the idea of a particular providence, I will say that 
 that is a very complex and altogether derivative idea, which 
 ought not to appear in the analysis in which we are engaged. 
 Let us say, then, that with regard to coincidences that are 
 rare and not numerous, whose component parts themselves are 
 not numerous, and the coincidence of whose parts is the result 
 of daily experience (like the meeting of two carriages rushing 
 against each other^), in all these cases we have nothing to 
 ask except, what are the causes which have acted on each side ? 
 But when those coincidences are repeated (as if it happened 
 that a coachman had often the misfortune to crush a passer-by), 
 when they become more numerous or more complicated, and 
 require a greater number of causes, it no longer suffices to 
 refer each of the elementary phenomena to its respective cause ; 
 it becomes necessary, further, to explain the coincidence itself, 
 or the multiplicity of coincidences. The more frequent the 
 coincidences, the more numerous their component elements, 
 the more our astonishment increases, and the less satisfied are 
 we to see the coincidences explained by chance. If, for 
 instance, in passing along a street I see a stone loosen and 
 fall at my side, I will not be astonished, and the phenomenon 
 will sufficiently explain itself in my eyes by the law of gravi- 
 tation, — a law the effect of which has here coincided with the 
 effect of a psychological law which has made me pass that 
 way. But if every day, at the same hour, the same phenomenon 
 is reproduced, or if at one and the same moment it takes place 
 from different sides at once, — if stones are thrown against me 
 from several different directions, — it will no longer suffice me 
 to say that the stones fall in virtue of the laws of gravitation, 
 but I will seek some other cause to explain the coincidence 
 of their fall. 
 
 1 One must still further suppose a town where there are many carriages and 
 much-frecLuented streets, which will greatly diminish the element of chance. It 
 will, for instance, be much greater in a collision of two vessels on the sea 
 
22 BOOK I. CHAPTER I. 
 
 Not only common sense, but science also continually makes 
 use of .this principle — namely, that the repetition or the 
 multiplicity of coincidences among phenomena is itself a 
 phenomenon which must have its own cause. I shall give 
 some examples of this. It is known that shells have been 
 found on the tops of mountains, and Voltaire is known to 
 have explained the presence of those shells by the passage of 
 pilgrims going to Jerusalem; who used to carry shells in their 
 hats. On this hypothesis, the presence of those shells on 
 the Alps would be purely fortuitous. On the one hand, the 
 pilgrims proceeding to Jerusalem, on the other, the Alps being 
 their natural road, it is not astonishing that these two causes 
 coincided ; and one of the accidental effects of this coincidence 
 might have been the dropping and leaving of some shells. 
 This explanation would sufiBce if there had only been a small 
 number of them. But the number of them is so great that 
 the explanation proposed by Voltaire does not suf&ce; for 
 what is to be done is not to explain how one shell came to be 
 found on the Alps, but how heaps of shells are met with there. 
 It is the number of the coincidences which science ought here 
 to explain, and this she does by saying that it is not by chance 
 that those shells are found on the mountains, but by a deter- 
 minate cause, which is the presence of the sea in elevated 
 regions. For a like reason the presence of the elephants 
 found amid the ices of the north is a proof, according to 
 Buffon, of the revolutions of climate which have taken place 
 in those countries. ' The vast quantity of them that has been 
 already found in those almost desert lands, where no one seeks 
 them, suffices to demonstrate that it is neither iy a single or 
 several accidents, hot: at one and the same time, that several 
 individuals of this species have been found in those countries 
 of the north, but that it is a case of absolute necessity that 
 that species existed there at one time, subsisted and multi- 
 plied, as it does at the present time in tropical countries.'^ 
 Example second. In recent times the phenomenon of shoot- 
 
 1 Natural History : 'Epochs of Nature.' 
 
THE PRINCIPLE. 23 
 
 ing- stars has been much studied. Now, observation has 
 established that this especially takes place at certain periods 
 of the year, in August and November. At these periods the 
 falling stars are so numerous that they have been compared 
 to rain, and are called heavy showers. The natural philo- 
 sophers and astronomers have not regarded as an indifferent 
 circumstance this specially abundant production of the 
 phenomenon at a determinate period. They have therefore 
 imagined that at this period of the year the earth, crosses 
 a vast ring composed of asteroids, which, drawn into the 
 terrestrial orbit by attraction, are precipitated towards the 
 earth. Besides, numerous showers having coincided in these 
 recent times with the absence of an expected comet, the 
 comet of Bi^la, it has been supposed that they were the 
 fragments of it. Whatever be the worth of these hypotheses, 
 it is evident that they have their reason in that law of our 
 mind which requires of us not only a cause for each par- 
 ticular phenomenon, but also for the agreement and coincidence 
 of phenomena.^ 
 
 Considerations of the same kind have brought astronomers 
 to think that the stars are not cast by chance over the extent 
 of the firmament, but that they form groups and systems, and 
 are in a reciprocal dependence. Arago, in his Popular 
 Astronomy, explains to us this mode of reasoning : 
 
 ' Every one will understand,' says he, ' that in examining 
 the probability that stars scattered through the firmament 
 without any rule will appear in groups of two, — that this 
 probability, we say, will be so much the less as the groups in 
 question are to have the less dimensions. It is, in fact, as if 
 one calculated the chance that in throwing a certain number 
 of grains of wheat on a chess-board, they shall be found 
 united in the squares by groups of two ; the chances must 
 
 ' Another familiar example is that furnished in arithmetic hy the proof of 
 addition. This proof consists in recommencing the operation iu the opposite 
 direction, that is, from top to bottom. It rests then on the small probability 
 of a coincidence of error in the inversion of the data. 
 
24 BOOK r. CHAPTER I. 
 
 evidently diminish along with the dimensions of these squares 
 in the proposed problem. The grains of wheat are stars, the 
 chess-board is the firmament. The squares for Herschel's 
 first class are spaces of at most four seconds in diameter ; for 
 the fourth class, the dimensions of the squares ascend to 
 thirty-two seconds. On the hypothesis of an absolute inde- 
 pendence between all the stars which are scattered like seed 
 over the heavens, the first class of double stars would be 
 much less numerous than the second, the third, and, above all, 
 the fourth. But the case is exactly the contrary. Thus, then, 
 we are brought by simple considerations of probabilities to 
 recognise that the stars, which are neighbours to each other, 
 are not so merely in appearance, that is to say, by an effect 
 of optics or of perspective, but that they indeed form 
 systems.'* 
 
 The same principle, the same need of the mind, conducted 
 Laplace to his celebrated hypothesis on the origin of our solar 
 system. Starting from this consideration, which, besides, had 
 already struck Newton, Kant, and Buffon, — nalnely, that all the 
 stars which compose that system have their motion, whether 
 of rotation or of revolution, in the same direction (from east 
 to west), which yields, Arago tells us, forty-three motions co- 
 ordinated in the same direction; and that, besides, all those stars 
 are found placed nearly in the plane of the ecliptic, — Laplace 
 thought that such an arrangement could not be the effect of 
 chance, and must have a determinate cause. Buffon had 
 already thought so, and had tried to explain our system by the 
 hypothesis of a comet having fallen on the sun, and whose 
 pieces, becoming planets, had been drawn by the solar attrac- 
 tion. Kant, in his Natural History of the Heavens, likewise 
 proposed a^hypothesis to explain the same phenomena ; and 
 this hypothesis is analogous to that of Laplace. The latter, as 
 is known, thought he solved the problem by supposing that the 
 planets originally made part along with the sun of one and 
 the same ndnda, actuated by a rotatory motion, which, being 
 ' Arago, Popular Astronomy, Book X.'chap. xix. 
 
THE PRINCIPLE. 25 
 
 broken in consequence of refrigeration (a circumstance which has 
 become doubtful since the new theories on heat), would thus 
 have given birth to distinct bodies, actuated by the same motion 
 as the primitive nebula. And thus the prodigy of forty-three 
 motions co-ordinated in the same direction would be explained 
 in the most natural manner by the partition of the primitive 
 motion. Whatever may be the intrinsic value of this expla- 
 nation, the essential lines of which still endure even now, the 
 chief point to notice is that in this case, as in those preceding, 
 every co-ordination, every repeated coincidence, is always con- 
 sidered by men of science as calling for a special explanation. 
 Supposing that we do not admit this principle, namely, that 
 the frequency of coincidences between phenomena is itself a 
 phenomenon which must have its cause, none of the preceding 
 discoveries or hypotheses would have been made. Given to 
 explain the presence of shells on a mountain, the chance 
 passage of a pilgrim suffices for it ; given the fall of a shooting- 
 star, the chance meeting of the earth with an asteroid is 
 enough ; given any arrangement whatever of stars in the 
 heavens, of planets in our system, the same general unknown 
 cause, called the initial cause by men of science, can explain 
 that distribution. It is, on the other hand, because it has 
 not been believed that a regular arrangement could be the 
 effect of chance, that men have been led to these discoveries 
 or hypotheses — namely, the presence of the sea on high 
 mountains, the periodic meeting with a ring of asteroids, the 
 arrangement of the stars in groups and systems, the division 
 of a primitive nebula, and so on. What is explained by these 
 hypotheses is not a certain special phenornenon, but a con- 
 cordance or repetition of phenomena. 
 
 Let us add, that induction itself, which has so much 
 embarrassed logicians, has no other principle than that which 
 we have just enounced : any constant repetition of phenomena 
 must have a constant and determinate cause, and cannot be the 
 effect of chance ; which we translate by saying, it is a law 
 of nature. What is the difference between this certain pro- 
 
26 BOOK I. CHAPTER I. 
 
 position : Water boils at a hundred degrees ^ [centigrade] ; 
 and this other proposition : An eclipse is a presage of public 
 calamities ? The difference is, that in the first case the 
 coincidence of the two phenomena is constant and without 
 exception ; and that, in the second case, the coincidence does 
 not always occur. Now, chance may well bring about some- 
 times, and even often, a coincidence between an eclipse and 
 an event so frequent as public misfortunes are ; but reason 
 refuses to admit that chance brings about a coincidence that 
 is constant and without exception. That coincidence itself 
 must have its raison d'itre ; the reason is, that the one of 
 those phenomena is the cause of the other, or else that the 
 two phenomena have a common cause.^ 
 
 However important the principle which we have just 
 established may be for the solution of the problem which we 
 have proposed to ourselves, yet we must not believe it is the 
 very solution which we are seeking. 
 
 In effect, in the examples cited, we see a certain co-ordi- 
 nation indeed, a harmony, a frequency of coincidences; but 
 we do not yet see final causes. One is too much disposed to 
 believe in general that there is no medium between chance 
 and finality, and yet it is there precisely that the nodus and 
 difficulty of the problem is found. It is certainly not by 
 chance that there are shells on the Alps ; but for what end 
 are they there ? what purpose do they serve ? That is what is 
 not apparent. We shall, therefore, have sufficiently explained 
 their existence by determining the physical cause which has 
 brought them there, and this cause is the presence of the sea. 
 It is not by chance that the meteoric stones fall at a certain 
 period of the year ; but why and to what end do they fall ? 
 This is what no one could tell, and no one thinks of it. It 
 suffices to have explained the frequency of the falls by the 
 
 ' That is to say, in the case of water boiling, the thermometric column wUl 
 always rise to a certain level, called by definition 100 degrees. We make this 
 remark because the example cited has been accused, wrongly we think, of 
 tautology. 
 
 2 See the appendix. Dissertation I., The Problem of Induction. 
 
THE PEINCIPLE. 27 
 
 presumed meeting with a chain of little stars. ■ It is not by 
 chance that the stars are concentrated in certain points of the 
 sky more than in others, or that the planets revolve in the 
 same direction as the sun, or in the same plane as the 
 ecliptic ; but to what end is that so, and has it an end at all ? 
 This is what is not asked, or at least it is permitted not to 
 ask it. If there has been found a sufficient physical cause to 
 explain these remarkable arrangements, it seems as if there 
 were nothing more to seek. Such is at least the first appear- 
 ance of things, and perhaps we will find later that it is only 
 an appearance ; ^ meanwhile nothing hitherto shows us a 
 finality, and if there were not other facts in nature, perhaps 
 one would not go farther. 
 
 Still, while quite recognising that the preceding principle is 
 not yet the principle of final causes, let us not think that we 
 have not made an important step towards the solution of our 
 problem. We have, in fact, obtained and established this 
 result, that the human mind requires a cause not only in order 
 to explain phenomena, that is to say, that which strikes the 
 sense.s, but also in order to explain what does not strike the 
 senses, namely, the order of the phenomena. When it is 
 said, ' No phenomenon without cause,' one does not exhaust 
 the force of the principle of causality ; for the order of the 
 phenomena is not a phenomenon. That order is only grasped 
 by the mind ; ■ it is an intelligible relation between the pheno- 
 mena, of which, however, we seek the explanation quite as 
 much as of the phenomena themselves. Take the fall of a 
 stone, it is explained by. the law of gravitation; let there be 
 a second fall, it is explained by the same law. But let there 
 be a hundred falls occurring at the same moment from 
 opposite directions in space, although there is in this case 
 only a hundred phenomena of the same order, and nothing 
 more, for the senses, yet these hundred falls will no longer 
 admit of being explained by the repetition a hundred times 
 over of one and the same cause ; and a mind which should 
 
 ■■ See in the sequel, chap. vi. , Mechanism and Finality, 
 
28 BOOK I. CHAPTER I. 
 
 not be capable of remarking tbis agreement of phenomena, 
 and which should continue to explain them indefinitely by the 
 same cause, would on that very account appear to us struck 
 with imbecility .'^ But yet one more ; what is there here more 
 than in a hundred separate falls ? Nothing but their conver- 
 gence or simultaneity — that is to say, something intellectual. 
 
 Thus the invisible agreement of the phenomena behoves 
 itself to be explained like each visible phenomenon taken 
 separately ; this co-ordination is an effect which must have 
 its cause. Por example, the geometrical form which minerals 
 take in crystallizing may not, indeed, reveal any final cause ; 
 but no one will venture to say that this geometric arrange- 
 ment is an indifferent fact of which it is useless to seek the 
 cause, arid that it is by chance and by a simple coincidence 
 that the molecules of such a mineral always happen to arrange 
 themselves under the form of a hexahedron, of a dodecahedron, 
 for that which happens in a constant manner cannot be the 
 effect of a mere accident. 
 
 However, in order to advance farther, and from the 
 mechanical to pass to the teleological combination, we must 
 invoke new considerations. 
 
 Among the phenomena of nature which come under ex- 
 perience, there are those which only urge the mind to the 
 investigation of their efficient causes — that is to say, which 
 invite us to trace backwards the series of the phenomena until 
 one meets the decisive circumstance called cause, whence the 
 whole series proceeds (except we ascend from this circumstance 
 itself to other anterior circumstances). As to the last pheno- 
 menon, it seems itself to be the termination of a series, and 
 the mind feels no need to seek the consequence of it. A stone 
 falls, for example ; a volcano makes an eruption ; thunder 
 
 ^ It would be with it as with that man of whom Gassendi speaks, who, half- 
 asleep, and hearing four o'clock strike, said, This clock is mad; lo, four times in 
 succession it has struck one o'clock. The man had not force of mind enough to 
 reflect that four times one o'clock make four o'clock. Those who explain the 
 world by a fortuitous concourse of atoms give evidence of a power of synthesis 
 about equal to this. 
 
THE PRINCIPLE. 29 
 
 bursts, and ravages. When once the phenomenon has taken 
 place, with its immediate consequences, it seems that all is 
 finished ; we ask ourselves how it haS been produced. But 
 the cause found, the mind declares itself satisfied, and the 
 phenomenon which has just passed before us, though it were 
 complicated like the eruption of a volcano, a storm, a deluge, 
 has not any precise and determinate bond with the future ; it 
 seems to be in itself entirely finished, and only to have relation 
 with the past of which it is the effect. 
 
 Without doubt there is here, I acknowledge, a certain 
 illusion, for no phenomenon of the universe is without some 
 relation to the future as well as to the past ; and Leibnitz has 
 rightly said that the future can be read in the past, and that 
 the present is big with the future. In this sense it is certain 
 that no phenomenon is absolutely finished. The waves which 
 happen to beat upon a steep shore produce a fall of rocks, 
 which, broken at length by the effect of these same waves, 
 become, little by little, sand fit for certain forms of vegetation, 
 and so on ad infinitum. Each phenoinenon, whatever it 
 be, is therefore not only the end of one series, it is also the 
 beginning of another. We allow all that; but it remains 
 true, that what characterises the phenomena of which we are 
 speaking is, that in order to" comprehend and give an account 
 of them, we have no need to view them in relation to their 
 future consequences. The wave is explained by the movement 
 of the ocean, which is explained by the combined attraction 
 of the moon and of the sun ; the fall of rocks is explained by 
 the beating of the wave against the cliff, and so on; each 
 phenomenon is sufficiently and clearly explained by that pre- 
 ceding, without any necessary relation to that which follows. 
 If, at the moment when the wind causes the fall of a stone, a 
 fiat of divine power were to annihilate the universe, the last 
 phenomenon produced, although interrupted in its conse- 
 quences, would not be the less complete and explained in 
 itself, and nothing would be wanting to make it entirely what 
 it must be, namely, the fall of a stone. 
 
30 BOOK I. CHAPTER I. 
 
 But it is not the same in all cases, and here we touch the 
 knot of the question. 
 
 To make our meaning well understood, let us take an 
 example in a case where the finality is incontestahle, namely, 
 in the works of human industry : we shall see later how far 
 one is warranted to employ this kind of examples.^ Let us 
 consider, say, a machine. I say that what distinguishes this ' 
 kind of object is that it is doubly conditioned, — on the side 
 of ,the past, on the one hand, by its relation to efficient causes, 
 and on the side of the future, on the other hand, by its relation 
 to final causes. For example, a locomotive is conditioned on 
 the one side by physical laws, — by the solidity of iron, by its 
 malleability, by the elasticity of steam, etc., in a word, by all 
 the physical properties which have rendered possible the con- 
 struction of this machine and its action; for nothing can be 
 produced except conformably to the properties of matter. In 
 the second place, this machine is conditioned by the end to 
 which it is destined, for according as it has to raise stones, to 
 put in motion a railway train, to weave, to full, to dig, etc., 
 it takes forms endlessly varied. Thus, although these forms 
 can only be produced in the field rendered possible by the 
 properties and the general laws of nature, these properties and 
 laws would of themselves be insufficient to circumscribe 
 matter into this or that form, and for this or that precise 
 effect. That general and indeterminate causes, Kke the 
 malleability of iron, gravity, elasticity, etc., should be able; 
 among the endless variety of combinations of which matter is 
 susceptible, to find one precisely corresponding to a determinate 
 effect, is what is contrary to every law of causality ; and when 
 such a coincidence meets us, we explain it by supposing that 
 this effect already pre-existed in the cause in a certain manner, 
 and that it has directed and circumscribed its action. Whence 
 it comes that, in presence of a machine, a tool, or any frag- 
 ment of human industry, we say: This is not a freak of 
 nature, it is the work of man. 
 
 ' See chap. iii. 
 
THE PRINCIPLE. 31 
 
 ' If one were to find on a desert island/ says F^n^lon, ' a 
 beautiful marble statue, he would doubtless at once say : 
 There have formerly been men here ; I recognise the hand of 
 a talented sculptor.' These words have had in recent times a 
 curious justification. What has been found, not in a desert 
 island, but in antediluvian deposits, is not marble statues, 
 nor magnificent palaces, but tools, and the rudest possible ; 
 hatchets, as at least is supposed, stones cut in an awkward 
 manner, such as can sometimes be met with when rocks are 
 broken. And yet, however rude this work may be, the fact 
 that such stones have been met with in great number has 
 sufiBced to lead to the conclusion that they cannot be a freak 
 of nature. That mass of objects collected in the same place, 
 cut in the same manner, indicates a relation of finality ; they 
 are no longer stones, they are instruments — that is to say, 
 objects destined to cut, to pierce, to strike, to produce this or 
 that effect. This induction does not raise the shadow of 
 a doubt; and yet, if a coincidence of unknown causes has 
 been able to produce the wing of the bird so marvellously 
 adapted for flying, why should not another coincidence of 
 unknown causes have been able to produce this heap of rude 
 stones, so imperfectly adapted to their object ? On what, 
 then, in this case, is the universally admitted induction founded? 
 On this : that the objects which present themselves to us 
 have not only relation to the past, but also to the future, and 
 appear to us conditioned not only by their causes, but also 
 by their effects. Here, for instance, the hatchets found by 
 M. Boucher de Perthes do not appear to us only as fragments 
 of rock, but they present certain forms, dimensions, and com- 
 binations of hollows and projections which can only be ex- 
 plained by a certain relation to the action of cutting. That 
 action of cutting, which results from the structure of the 
 hatchet, and which in this sense is an effect, has been at the 
 same time one of the determining causes of the form which 
 has been given to the stone; it is therefore a sort of cause, 
 but a cause which acts in some fashion before existing ; it is 
 
32 BOOK I. CHAPXEK 1. 
 
 an effect which, foreseen or predetermined by the efficient 
 cause, has obliged it to take one direction rather than another ; 
 it is an end ; it is a final cause. 
 
 We have seen, by the first principle laid down above, that 
 wherever there is a combination or harmony of phenomena, 
 there must be a precise cause to explain this combination or 
 harmony. But now we require something more. When this 
 combination (already remarkable in itself as a complex and 
 precise coincidence of heterogeneous phenomena) has, besides, 
 the character of being determined relatively to a future 
 phenomenon more or less remote, the principle of causality 
 demands that we explain not only the complexity of the com- 
 bination, but also that relation to a future effect which, among 
 an infinitude of possible combinations, seems to have circum- 
 scribed the action of the efficient cause, and to have deter- 
 mined it to that given form. This correlation to the future 
 cannot be comprehended excepting that future phenomenon 
 already pre-exists in a certain fashion in the efficient cause, 
 and directs its action. It is in this sense that a cause is said 
 to tend to an end. 
 
 Thus, when a combination of phenomena, in order to be 
 comprehended, only requires to be referred to its antecedent 
 conditions, there is in this case nothing else than the relation 
 of cause and effect; but when the combination, in order to 
 become inteUigible, must be referred not only to its anterior 
 causes, but to its future effects, the simple relation of cause to 
 effect no longer suffices, and is transformed into a relation of 
 means to end. 
 
 Let us consider now the following example, say a stomach 
 fit to digest flesh. Let us first suppose, for the sake of argu- 
 ment, that this is a simple consequence, and not an end. Here, 
 now, is the problem which the physiologist sets himself, and 
 which nature before him must have set herself. How does 
 not the stomach, which digests meat, digest itself ? How does 
 not the gastric juice, which attacks and dissolves all sorts of 
 food, dissolve the stomach, which is precisely of the same 
 
THE PKINCIPLE. 33 
 
 nature as the other foods 1 Well, now, it appears that nature, 
 answering the objection beforehand, has endued the internal 
 ■walls of the organ with a special varnish, which renders them 
 unassailable by the action of the gastric juice/ How can one 
 refuse to admit that the production of this varnish has a 
 determinate and rigorously calculated relation to the future 
 phenomenon which the stomach had to produce ? To say 
 that such a relation does not exist, and is the result of a pure 
 coincidence, is to admit that while certain physical causes 
 produced the substance called stomach, other causes, without 
 any accord with the preceding, produced the substance called 
 epithelium, which is found to be precisely the condition sine 
 qud non of the digestive function. These two series of causes, 
 working in the dark, without any relation between them or 
 with the future, yet end by harmonizing, and by their accord 
 render possible the future phenomenon, which would not be so 
 without it. Is it not renouncing the principle of causality 
 merely to see in this a fortnitous coincidence, and the result 
 of certain happy chances ? Is it not as if one said that two 
 persons, of whom the one speaks Euss and the other English, 
 and who are ignorant of each other's language, can yet talk 
 together, in virtue of fortunate circumstances which caused 
 that the discourse of the one was found to be exactly the 
 reply to the question of the other ? 
 
 Let us take another example. All the animals called 
 mammalia are at the same time viviparous. Let us study 
 this remarkable coincidence. Here are a certain number of 
 causes, themselves already very complicated, which together 
 concur to the function called parturition, whence there results 
 the production of a young one. This young one is as yet 
 
 1 ' If the gastric juice does i)Ot digest the walls of the living stomach, it is 
 because during life the pepsine cannot be absorbed. The presence of epithelium 
 on the mucous members in general, on the stomachic mucous membrane 
 especially, opposes a complete obstacle to absorption. . . . The epithelium, a 
 species of glutinous mucous, which lines the inner wall of this organ, . . . 
 encloses then the gastric juice as in a vase, impermeable as if it were of por- 
 celain.'— CI. Bernard, Le^om de physiologie , t. ii, p. 408. 
 
 G 
 
34 BOOK I. CHAPTER I. 
 
 incapable of itself seeking its food ; and of all nourishment fit 
 for its age, the best, if not the only one, is milk. Now it is 
 found that another series of causes has produced in the mother 
 other organs called breasts, adapted to a secretive function, the 
 product of which is precisely that which best, if not exclusively, 
 suits the young. It is found, besides, that these organs remain 
 inactive during all one portion of life ; that they only perform 
 their functions at certain intervals and at certain periods, and 
 that these periods are precisely those of parturition. If it be 
 admitted that lactation is not all determined by the future 
 phenomenon of the food of the young one, one must in this 
 case also suppose that two series of causes, acting separately 
 without knowing each other, without communication, have 
 coincided by happy and fortuitous circumstances in this strange 
 final result, which implies a strict suitableness and an extra- 
 ordinary adaptation. We say, according to our principle, that 
 it is to be false to the laws of causality to leave unexplained 
 this strange accord of the past with the future. 
 
 The learned lawgiver of the inductive logic, J. Stuart Mill, 
 has acknowledged that the preceding reasoning is one of the 
 most striking applications of the Tules of induction. When 
 a great number of phenomena, very different in every other 
 point of view, yet present one common and constant circum- 
 stance, this circumstance may be given as the cause. This 
 is what is called the method of concordance. Now, in the 
 present case (say, for example, the adaptation of the eye to 
 the light), there are an infinite number of phenomena which 
 have aU coincided in this single circumstance, namely, to 
 promote vision. Vision is thus the circumstance common to 
 all, in which alone they coincide. It is, therefore, the cause 
 of their coincidence ; but as, on the other hand, it is their 
 effect, and cannot act before existing, it is not vision itself, 
 but the idea of vision that is here the true cause, which 
 is expressed by saying that the eye is made for seeing.^ 
 
 1 This remarkable analysis of tlie argument of final causes is given by Mill in 
 his posthumous work, for the rest so bold, entitled Essays on Religion, pp. 170- 
 
THE PRINCIPLE. 35 
 
 After what has been said, it is evident how just is the 
 ingenious approximation which has been naade between the 
 method of final causes and the analysis of geometricians.'^ It 
 appears, in short, that nature, when she proceeds by efficient 
 causes, acts like the geometrician who follows the synthetic 
 method ; who sets out, that is to say, from a principle, and 
 who deduces consequences from it, whatever they may be. 
 On the other hand, when she proceeds by final causes, she 
 resembles a geometrician who sets himself a problem, and 
 who, by the analysis of the data of the question, finds the 
 very elements of the solution. To employ the distinction of 
 a philosophical geometrician, the one process is a deduction, 
 the other a reduction. The one consists in deriving a truth 
 from a given truth ; the other, more fertile, consists in seeking 
 from what truth one could start in order to solve any given 
 problem. It consists, therefore, in ' reducing the knowledge 
 of a thing to that of others of which it must be the conse- 
 quence.'^ The analogy of the two processes is strikingly 
 evident : here it is a consequence which serves to discover the 
 principle, which, consequently, is in some sort the principle of 
 its principle ; there, it is an effect which explains the cause, 
 and which is in some sort the cause of its own cause. But 
 let us illustrate these analogies more in detail. 
 
 According to the geometrician quoted, the application of 
 the analytic method, or of reduction, is not only of use in 
 science, but in practical Hfe. Every question resolved, in the 
 one case as in the other, can only be so by this procedure : 
 ' Whatever one proposes to oneself,' says he, ' one necessarily 
 asks oneself what is that which must be done beforehand, 
 and which wiU conduce to the end proposed. If this new 
 thing cannot be done immediately, one inquires on what 
 other it depends, and so on till one has found that with 
 
 172. I ought to add, in order to be quite exact, that, according to Mill, the argu- 
 ment had lost much force since the rise of the theory of Darwin. But none the 
 less he concludes that the hypothesis of a plan is still by far the most probable. 
 
 • Trendelenburg, Logisclie Unteriuchungen, chap. ix. 
 
 ' Duhamel, De la m6thode dcma les sciences et raieonnements, p. 24. 
 
36 BOOK I. CHAPTEK I. 
 
 which one must commence. Knowing now the point of 
 departure, one has only further to do successively all those 
 things in the inverse order to that in which they have been 
 discovered. In this manner one first makes analysis, and 
 then synthesis.'^ The latter, therefore, is the reciprocal of 
 analysis; it is so in the same manner that the series of 
 efficient causes is the reciprocal of the series of final causes. 
 Nature executes synthetically what the author of nature has 
 iD.Ye,nt&A analytically? The same geometrician adopts him- 
 self the, very analogy we employ, and which is so striking, 
 when he says : ' The method wiU always consist in setting 
 out, whether from the result or from the thing which one 
 requires — ^in a word,/rom, the end we set hefore us, and in 
 substituting for it a more easy one, and which will lead to 
 the latter by known means.' ^ 
 
 Let us meanwhile compare with this method that which 
 nature follows in producing organs. Here is, for instance, how 
 a naturalist expounds the theory of the flight of birds. He 
 attributes to the author of nature an analytic reasoning, per- 
 fectly similar to that which has just been described. ' If one 
 admitted,' says Strauss Durckeim, ' that a man of superior 
 genius had the power to create at wUl, by mere thought, what- 
 ever can be conceived, and that he wished to transform the 
 type of mammalia into that of a flying animal, a perfect 
 aerial sailor, capable of long sustaining a rapid flight, he would 
 be led, from consequence to consequence, to form a bird such as 
 we know them, even if these animals had not been known to 
 him, so entirely, even to the most minute details, is every- 
 thing strictly combined and calculated in the structure of 
 their body for the faculty of flight.'* In order to solve this 
 
 ^ Diihamel, De la wAthode dans lea sciences et raisonnememls, p. 56. 
 
 " It is important to point out that we employ these two words in the sense 
 of geometricians, and in particular, of the Greek geometricians ; for in another 
 sense it would be more correct to say that it is the order of efficient causes 
 which is analytic, and that of final causes which is synthetic. 
 
 ' Duhamel, De la mMuode, dans les sciences et raisonnements, p. 50i 
 
 * TUologie de la nature, t. i. p. 267. This remarkable work is one of those 
 in which the argument of final causes has been developed with the utmost 
 
THE PRINCIPLE. 37 
 
 problem, ' it is not enough to convert the anterior members in 
 any fashion into a large blade, whose alternate movements 
 upwards and downwards have to effect the translation of the 
 body in the air from behind forwards, but these wings must 
 also be placed according to certain mechanical principles, to 
 render this movement possible ; besides, this new function 
 must in no respect disturb the others, and when it requires 
 any change in the form and arrangement of any other organ, 
 the latter must equally be modified in consequence of this 
 function of flying. Above all, the new being or bird must be 
 able to hold itself in position, and to walk on its hind limbs, 
 and to make, besides, all other movements in more or less 
 eminent degrees, according to the purpose which each organ 
 is to serve. Now it is in these numerous modifications de- 
 pending on each other, and all on the principal function or on 
 flying, that one finds, as in every other case, the application of 
 the most transcendent science and the most sublime wisdom.' 
 We clearly see from these words that the given problem is one 
 01 analysis — namely, how to transform a mammifer into a 
 bird, given the laws of mechanics and the physical and physio- 
 logical conditions of life. It is also evident that the solution 
 of this problem requires that the supposed author of this 
 production has ascended step by step, the series of conditions 
 which that solution required, until he arrived at the point 
 from which it was necessary to start, whether from the mam- 
 miferous type by way of transformation, or from the vertebrate 
 type by way of differentiation. The author develops, in the 
 greatest detaU and in an entirely technical manner, which we 
 cannot here analyze, these learned mechanics. Among the 
 precautions and measures taken by nature for the solution of 
 the problem, let us rest content with mentioning some of 
 those most easily understood without special knowledge ; for 
 
 science and precision. The author, besides, was a distinguished scientist ; he 
 is known specially by a theory of the flight of insects, which M. Marey has 
 since perfected. The latter has justly described his work by calling it ' a chaos 
 of ingenious, profound, and puerile ideas. ' (See Revue des cours scientijiqnes, 
 Ire s^rie, t. vi.) ^ 
 
38 BOOK I. CHAPTER I. 
 
 example, the invention of feathers, and that of the varnish 
 which covers them. The first of these two inventions meets 
 this difaculty : how to cover the body of the bird without too 
 much increasing its weight, and without rendering its flight 
 too difficult. The second meets this other difficulty : how to 
 prevent the feathers from becoming too heavy from rain. 
 
 As regards the first problem, nature, employing here again 
 the analysis of the geometrician, has reasoned according to 
 our naturalist in the following manner : ' Light hair would not 
 have sufficed to preserve to those animals a nearly equal 
 temperature, and thick wool, like that of sheep, would have 
 rendered flight impossible.' How solve this delicate problem? 
 In this manner : ' By modifying the clothing of these animals, 
 that is to say, by transforming hair into feathers, and by 
 giving to these organs the great dimensions which they have 
 in the great feathers,' so as ' to increase the surface of the 
 wings without sensibly increasing the weight of the body.'^ 
 As regards the solution of the second problem, this is the 
 series of ideas which must have been gone through : ' If the 
 feathers were liable to be easily moistened, the rain would 
 make them stick together, which would considerably impede 
 flight, and even render it impossible, as is seen in the case of 
 animals forcibly wetted. But divine benevolence has guarded 
 against this inconvenience by giving to those animals a special 
 organ secreting an oily substance, with which the bird covers 
 its feathers in order to overlay them with a dry varnish, which 
 renders them so entirely impermeable to water that these 
 animals are never wetted with it."* 
 
 This comparison of the analytic method with the procedure 
 of final causes may serve to explain one of the terms of which 
 Aristotle sometimes made use to express the end, namely, to 
 
 ' ThAohgie de la nature, t. i. p. 302. 
 
 ' Thiologie de la nature, p. 324. See likewise, in the sequel of the preceding 
 passage, the analysis of the prohlem of the colouring of feathers. — In the same 
 order of ideas there wiU he found in Ch. Blanc ( Voyage de la Saute Egypte, 
 p. 100) a smart conversation between the learned critic and Doctor Broca on 
 the creation of the camel, ' the ship of the desert.' 
 
THE PRINCIPLE. 39 
 
 6^ V7ro0eaeo}<; avajKalov, the Tiypothetically necessary. In effect 
 the end is what I wish to attain ; it is only, therefore, some- 
 thing necessary for me by hypothesis. For example, the end 
 of gaining money is only a hypothetical necessity, for I can 
 always wiU not to gain it. It is not the same with this 
 other necessity, for instance, that I must die ; that is abso- 
 lutely necessary. The result is therefore an absolute necessity, 
 the end is only relatively necessary. Thus, to solve a pro- 
 blem is only necessary by hypothesis. It is I who choose it, 
 while I do not choose the consequences of a principle : they 
 are imposed upon me with an absolute necessity. 
 
 From all the foregoing, it follows that the sought for cri- 
 terion of the final cause is the agreement of the present with 
 the future, the determination of the one by the other. Still, 
 notwithstanding all the reasons given, might it not yet be 
 asked if this criterion would not assume exactly what is in 
 question ? For this agreement to which we appeal is only 
 surprising if we imagine beforehand the future phenomenon 
 as fixed d, priori, and as a goal which nature ought to reach, 
 as a problem which it has taken in hand to solve. In this 
 case it is true that nature, blind and without an end, can- 
 not accidentally hit upon the best possible combination in 
 relation to such an end. For instance, if a target is set 
 before a blind man, and a point in that target, it is extremely 
 improbable that, shooting at random, without even knowing 
 that there is an end, he should attain it. But this is sup- 
 posing beforehand there is an end. Let us suppose, on the 
 other hand, that without proposing to himself any end, and 
 shooting at random, he yet hits some place, there is nothing 
 astonishing in that. The same is the case with nature. If, 
 by a gratuitous hypothesis, we begin by supposing that there 
 ought to be flying, walking, self-nourishing animals, it is very 
 surprising that in effect nature has precisely realized these 
 prodigies. But it will be said : this is precisely what is in 
 question. If it is admitted, on the contrary, that nature had 
 not in reality any problem to solve, any end to attain, that 
 
40 BOOK I. CHAPTER I. 
 
 she obeyed her own laws, and that from those laws have 
 resulted an infinite number of diverse phenomena, which are 
 only the results of these properties ; what, then, is there sur- 
 prising in that there should be agreement and harmony 
 between the causes and the effects? To wonder at this 
 agreement is to conceive beforehand the effect as a fixed 
 point which nature behoved to have in view — that is to say, 
 to conceive it as an end, which is therefore an evident circle. 
 
 We maintain, on the other hand, that what occurs first as an 
 effect, takes thereupon the character of an end, by reason of the 
 number and the complexity of the combinations which have 
 rendered it possible. We do not set out from the idea of an 
 end, to conclude from it that the combinations which conduct 
 to it are means, but, on the contrary, those combinations only 
 appear intelligible to us when viewed as means ; and this is 
 why the effect becomes an end. We set out, in short, from a 
 fimd point, which is given us in experience as an effect ; but 
 this effect only being possible by an incalculable mass of coin- 
 cidences, it is this agreement between so many coincidences and 
 a certain effect which constitutes precisely the proof of finality.^ 
 In order to render evident the force of this doctrine, let us 
 choose a very complex combination — for instance, the human 
 eye, with its final result, sight. Let us consider one of the 
 factors which enter into this combination, the retina or nervous 
 material, sensitive to the light, and susceptible of receiving an 
 image like a photographic plate. Let us suppose that this 
 relation of the retina to the light is a simple relation of caiTse 
 to effect. This effect is, therefore, given to us by experience 
 as resulting from such an organic property. This is what I 
 call our fixed point, which will not be an end fixed before- 
 
 ^ Hartmann (Philosophie des Unbevmssten, Introd. chap. ii. ) has attempted to 
 suhmit to calculation the probability that an organic product is the result of an 
 intelligent, and not of a physical cause. For instance, for the production of the 
 eye, this probability would be according to him '99999, that is to say, almost 
 equivalent to unity or certainty. But those mathematical calculations are pure 
 fictions, which perniciously give a false appearance of strictness to that which 
 cannot have it, and translate pure and simple into abstract signs a convic- 
 tion which we have already in the mind. 
 
THE PRINCIPLE. 41 
 
 hand and arbitrarily by ourselves, but a positive and experi- 
 mental datum. But now, in order that this result, contained 
 potentially in the properties of the retina, may be realized, 
 a thousand million combinations are needed, each more sur- 
 prising than the others, and one might bet an infinity against 
 one that these combinations will never occur ; for, in order 
 that the retina may be able to manifest this property, unknown 
 causes must have constructed a machine to concentrate the 
 luminous rays on the sensible point, where they are susceptible 
 of being painted and of producing an impression. An infinite 
 number of causes, working blindly and without mutual under- 
 standing, must therefore have happened to light upon the 
 favourable combination which permits the retina to receive 
 an image. Now we maintain that such a coincidence will 
 be fortuitous, that is to say, without cause, if it is not granted 
 that it has taken place precisely in order that this manifesta- 
 tion might take place; thus, what was till then merely an 
 effect will for us become an end. It is evident we do not 
 start at all from the hypothesis that sight is an end, for that 
 is what we wish to demonstrate ; no. more do we set out from 
 the adaptation of the means to the end, for if there is no end 
 there is no adaptation, and there would be here again a vicious 
 circle. We set out from an effect as effect ; then remarking 
 that such an effect has only been possible if millions of causes 
 have agreed to produce it, we see in this agreement the 
 criterion which transforms the effect into an end, and the 
 causes into means. 
 
 It is to be understood that, in order that the preceding 
 reasoning may be valid, we may choose in the combination 
 which we are studying whatever factor we may please. In 
 place of the retina, let us take the crystalline humour. Let 
 us adtait that nature, without any end, has created the 
 crystalline, that is to say, a lens adapted to concentrate the 
 luminous rays, and which, consequently, renders possible the 
 formation of an image. That will be, if you will, a simple 
 relation of cause to effect. But that is yet a property which 
 
42 BOOK I. CHAPTER I. 
 
 only exists potentially in the crystalline, and, in order that 
 it may be realized in a manner which may have any meaning, 
 this concentration of rays must take place upon a point sen- 
 sible to light. This lens must be placed in a camera ohscura; 
 it must be in communication with the exterior by an appro- 
 priate opening. There must be,, in a word, the agreement 
 of so many circumstances that this agreement with a final 
 phenomenon will appear without cause, and purely arbitrary, 
 if the phenomenon is not considered as an end. 
 
 From these examples it is clear what we mean by the de- 
 termination of the present by the future. We will choose in 
 each function its essential and characteristic phenomenon (for 
 instance, in nutrition, assimilation ; in respiration, the oxygena- 
 tion of the blood, etc.). We will commence by considering this 
 phenomenon as a simple result of the properties of organized 
 matter ; that is what we call the future phenomenon. Mean- 
 while, in studying the conditions of the production of this 
 phenomenon, we shall find that there must be, in order to 
 produce it, an enormous mass of coincidences, all landing in 
 precisely the same result. This we call the harmony of the 
 phenomena with the future. Now, how would so many 
 diverse causes happen to converge to the selfsame point if 
 there were not some cause which directed them towards that 
 point ? Such is the succession of ideas in virtue of which the 
 result becomes an end. 
 
 If we could imagine, on the one hand, an entire and 
 complete combination, independently of the final phenomenon 
 to which it is appropriated, and, on the other, that phenomenon 
 considered as a result of the combination ; if between this 
 combination and this result there were an interval, a separa- 
 tion, or limit, were it only for an instant, but yet sufficiently 
 marked for these two terms of the relation to be plainly dis- 
 tinguished by the mind, — the agreement of the combination 
 with the final phenomenon would appear so much the more 
 striking, and would the more surprise the imagination. Now, 
 this is what actually takes place. In effect, in the mystery 
 
THE PRINCIPLE. 43 
 
 and the night of the act of incubation — in the obscure sanc- 
 tuary of the maternal womb in the case of viviparous, in the 
 envelope of the egg in the case of oviparous animals — is formed 
 and fabricated by the collaboration of an incredible number 
 of causes, a living machine, absolutely separated from the 
 external world, yet in agreement with it, all whose parts 
 correspond to certain physical conditions of this external 
 world. The external physical world and the internal labora- 
 tory of the living being are separated from each other by 
 impenetrable veils, and yet they are united to each other by 
 an incredible pre-established harmony. On the outside there 
 is a physical agent called light ; within, there is fabricated 
 an optical machine adapted to the light : outside, there is an 
 agent called sound ; inside, an acoustic machine adapted to 
 sound : outside, vegetables and animals ; inside, stills and 
 alembics adapted to the assimilation of these substances : out- 
 side, a medium, solid, liquid, or gaseous ; inside, a thousand 
 means of locomotion, adapted to the air, the earth, or the water. 
 Thus, on the one hand, there are the final phenomena called 
 sight, hearing, nutrition, flying, walking, swimming, etc. ; on 
 the other, the eyes, the ears, the stomach, the wings, the fins, 
 the motive members of every sort. We see clearly in these 
 examples the two terms of the relation, — on the one hand, 
 a system ; on the other, the final phenomenon in which it ends. 
 Were there only system and combination, as in crystals, stiU, 
 as we have seen, there must have been a special cause to 
 explain that system and that combination. But there is more 
 here ; there is the agreement of a system with a phenomenon 
 which will only be produced long after and in new conditions, 
 — consequently a correspondence which cannot be fortuitous, 
 and which would necessarily be so if we do not admit that 
 the final and future phenomenon is precisely the bond of the 
 system and the circumstance which, in whatever manner, has 
 predetermined the combination. 
 
 Imagine a blind workman, hidden in a cellar, and destitute 
 of aU intelligence, who, merely yielding to the simple need 
 
44 BOOK I. CHAPTEE I. 
 
 of moving his limbs and his hands, should be found to have 
 forged, without knowing it, a key adapted to the most com- 
 plicated lock which can possibly be imagined. This is what 
 nature does in the fabrication of the living being.^ 
 
 Nowhere is this pre-established harmony, to which we 
 have just drawn attention, displayed in a more astonishing 
 manner than between the eye and the light. ' In the con- 
 struction of this organ,' says Trendelenburg, ' we must either 
 admit that light has triumphed over matter and has fashioned 
 it, or else it is the matter itself which has become the master 
 of the light. This is at least what should result from the law 
 of efficient causes, but neither the one nor the other of these 
 two hypotheses takes place in reality. No ray of light faUs 
 within the sacred depths of the maternal womb, where the eye 
 is formed. Still less could inert matter, which is nothing with- 
 out the energy of light, be capable of comprehending it. Yet 
 the light and the eye are made the one for the other, and in 
 the miracle of the eye resides the latent consciousness of the 
 light. The moving cause, with its necessary development, is 
 here employed for a higher service. The end commands the 
 whole, and watches over the execution of the parts ; and it is 
 with the aid of the end that the eye becomes " the light of the 
 body."' 
 
 As the planetary perturbations have chiefly contributed to 
 
 ^ One of the most penetrating minds of our time, the commentator of Pascal, 
 M. Ernest Havet, has been so good as write to us in regard to this discussion, 
 that it was 'as clear as compact ;' but he adds : 'How is it that I still resist 
 it ? It is because, as it seems to me, it is only irresistible for those who regard 
 things as the work of chance and of rencontres, and I am not of them. I regard, 
 for example, the first eye (if there has ever been a, first eye), not as a result 
 of chance, but as a system, a necessary development of another system that had 
 immediately preceded it. I ascend thus from cause to cause to infinitude.' AU 
 that I have to say to this objection is, that the critic, in granting that the eye is 
 a system, thereby grants aU that we ask. For in every system the parts are 
 subordinated to the whole ; and as regards things subject to generation and 
 change, they must be co-ordinated in relation to the idea of the whole. They are 
 therefore commanded by that idea ; it is the future that determines the present. 
 But that is just what is called final cause. As to the first cause of this co-ordi- 
 nation, it is not in question here, and we remit it to the second book of this 
 work. 
 
 ' Trendelenburg, Logische Untersuchungen, t. ii. chap. ix. p. 4. 
 
THE PRINCIPLE. 45 
 
 set in the clearest light the truth of the law of Newton, in the 
 same way the apparent exceptions to the law of iinality may 
 serve to render it more striking and manifest. Thus a clever 
 gymnast, in his most perilous feats, makes a feint of falling, 
 to disquiet for a moment and gain more admiration for his 
 skill. I win mention two examples of it. 
 
 Miiller informs us that in the structure of the organs of 
 motion the laws of mechanics are not well observed. ' The 
 essence of locomotion,' says he, ' notwithstanding the diversity 
 of forms of motion by swimming, creeping, flying, and walking, 
 consists in this, that certain parts of the body describe arcs, 
 the branches of which extend, after being propped on a fixed 
 point. . . . The laws of the lever play a great part in this.' 
 Now we find, in observing the structure of animals, that these 
 laws have not been applied by nature in the most favourable 
 and economical manner — that is to say, so as to obtain the most 
 motion with the least possible labour. ' In effect,' says Miiller, 
 ' however diversely the levers are placed on the animals pro- 
 vided with paws, they are so almost always in a disadvantageous 
 manner, for the muscles generally exert upon them a very 
 oblique action ; besides that, the insertion is frequently too 
 near the fulcrum.' Here we have, then, apparently an error 
 of nature. 
 
 But Miiller immediately gives the explanation of it, which, 
 in the end, is foimd quite agreeable to the principle : ' Con- 
 siderations of a greater order,' says he, 'have ordained this 
 arrangement, of which the beauty of the forms is not the only 
 end. If nature had placed the levers of aU the members in 
 the most favourable manner, the result would have been that 
 the body would have had a complex, angular, troublesome 
 form, and that, despite the precautions apparently taken to 
 utilize force, the expense in this regard would have been 
 more considerable in the final analysis, because of the mul- 
 tiplied obstacles to the harmonious concurrence of actions.' 
 Thus, in this case, the apparent violation of the rule is in 
 reality only its confirmation. 
 
46 BOOK I. CHAPTER I. 
 
 It is the same in another case not less remarkable. Every 
 one knows how much value for their argument the friends of 
 final causes have attached to the marvellous structure of the 
 eye ; it is the classical argument in this matter, and we our- 
 selves have just been indicating it. Yet it is found that the 
 structure of this organ is very far from having all the per- 
 fection which was supposed, and Herr Helmholtz has shown 
 that it is filled with imperfections and defects. From this 
 occasion a critic expresses himself as follows : ' The friends of 
 final causes,' says M. Laugel, ' who are in ecstasies over the 
 adaptation of organs to functions, will perhaps have some 
 difficulty in reconciling their theoretical views with the facts 
 which have just been set forth. There is no maker of optical 
 instruments who might not succeed in rendering his apparatus 
 much more perfect than this eye of which we are so proud. . . . 
 The eye has, on the other hand, this remarkable character, 
 that it combines aU the known defects of these instruments. 
 . . . There is nothing perfect, nothing finished, in nature. 
 . . . Our organs are instruments at once admirable and 
 rude.' ' 
 
 However, it is found that here again the exception is only 
 a just application of the rule, as is very well explained by this 
 very savant, from whom this difficulty is borrowed. In fact, 
 what Herr Helmholtz has demonstrated is simply that the 
 human eye is not an instrument of precision, and also that it 
 ought not to .be so. Doubtless the eye may have numerous 
 defects compared with our optical instruments, defects which 
 our industry is able to avoid ; but these defects do not at aU 
 impair its veritable use, for its function is not to make delicate 
 experiments, like those which we make with our instruments, 
 but simply to serve us in practical life. Moreover, the scientist 
 in question expresses himself thus: 'The appropriateness of 
 the eye to its end exists in the most perfect manner,- and is 
 revealed even in the limit given to its defects. A reasonaUe 
 man will not take a razor to cleave Mocks; in like manner 
 ^ L'optique et lea arts, p. 27. 
 
THE PEINOIPLE. 47 
 
 every useless refinement in the optical use of the eye would 
 have rendered that organ more delicate and slower in its 
 application.'^ It is evident one must not be in a hurry in the 
 desire to catch nature in a fault, for one is caught in the trap 
 oneself. 
 
 The mode of reasoning which we have developed at present, 
 and which we consider as the proof of final causes, is applic- 
 able in a much more striking manner still, when we pass 
 from the adaptation of organs to their correlation. What, in 
 short, did we say ? That we must take in each function a 
 fixed point, which is the essential act of the function, and 
 consider this act simply as a result. It is soon evident that, 
 in order to render this result possible, so great a number of 
 coincidences have been required, that these coincidences cannot 
 be explained if that result is not an end. How much more 
 evident stiU is this argument when one compares, not the 
 different factors of one organ or of one function, but the con- 
 cordance of different organs or of different functions ! Indeed, 
 it then suffices to take one of those organs with its function, 
 and to consider that function as a simple result — for instance, 
 the lungs and respiration. We shall then ask ourselves how 
 this function is possible, and we shall see that it necessarily 
 supposes another organ and another function — for instance, the 
 heart and the circulation. N"ow, that these two organs and 
 these two functions (hypotheticaJly necessary to each other) 
 should have met together, is what is impossible without a 
 miracle, except a common cause, capable of grasping the rela- 
 tion of the two things, has bound them to each other — that is 
 to say, has made them for each other. 
 
 Every one knows that celebrated law, called the law of 
 organic correlations, which Cuvier summed up in these terms : 
 ' Every organized being forms a whole, a close system, whose 
 parts mutually correspond and concur in one and the same 
 definitive action by a reciprocal reaction.' It is the same 
 idea that Kant expressed, for his part, by that beautiful defini- 
 
 1 Helinholtz, Beime des cours publics sckntifiques, Ire serie, t. vi. p. 219. 
 
48 BOOK I. CHAPTER I. 
 
 tion : ' The organized being/ said he, ' is the being in which all 
 is reciprocally end and means.' ^ 
 
 "We have no need to enter here into the details of this law, 
 which has served as the basis of comparative anatomy. Let 
 us be satisfied with indicating some of the most general facts 
 mentioned by Cuvier, in that passage so well known and so 
 often quoted, but which is too apposite to our subject not to 
 be quoted here yet once more : ' A tooth,' says he, ' that is 
 sharp and adapted to tear flesh, will never co-exist in the same 
 species with a foot enveloped in horn, which can only bear the 
 animal, and with which it cannot seize its prey. Whence 
 the rule, that every hoofed animal .is herbivorous, and the still 
 more detailed rules, which are only corollaries of the first, that 
 hoofs on the feet indicate molar teeth with flat crowns, a very 
 long alimentary canal, a large or multiplied stomach, and a 
 great number of relations of the same kind.'^ . . . 'Thus 
 the intestines are in relation to the jaws, the jaws to the claws, 
 the claws to the teeth, the organs of motion, and the organ of 
 intelligence.'^ Cuvier affirms, again, that the same law even 
 regulates each particular system of organs. Thus, in the 
 alimentary system, ' the form of the teeth, the length, the 
 
 ' Mr. Huxley, Revite sdentifique (2e s^rie, t. xii. p. 769), draws an otjeotion to 
 the definition of Kant from the cellular theory of Schwann. ' Kant,' says he, 
 'defines the mode of existence of living beings by this, that aU their parts 
 co-exist on account of the whole, and that the whole itself exists on account of 
 the parts. But since Turpin and Schwann have decomposed the living body 
 into an aggregation of almost independent cells, having each their special laws 
 of development and of growth, the view of Kant has ceased to be tenable. 
 Each cell lives for itself as well as for the whole organism ; the cells which float 
 in the blood live at their own expense, and are organisms as independent as the 
 torulce which float in the wort of beer. ' We do not see in what respect the 
 cellular theory contradicts the definition of Kant. The ceU can have an inde- 
 pendent life, and have equally a collective and correlative life. The cell lives 
 for itself. Be it so ; but it is added, that it 'lives also for the entire organism,' 
 and reciprocally it lives by the organism at the same time as for it. There is no 
 contradiction in this, that an independent being should be at the same time a 
 member of a system : it lives at once by and for it ; it is, therefore, as Kant 
 said, both means and end. Add, finally, that in the cell itself, considered as 
 nucleus of life, all the parts are correlatives to the whole, and the whole to 
 the parts. 
 
 ^ Cuvier, Lemons d'anatomie comparie, t. i. Ire lejon, art. iv. 
 
 ' Cuvier, Discours sur les rivolutions du globe. 
 
THE PRINCIPLE. 49 
 
 folds, and the dilatation of the alimentary canal, the number 
 and abundance of the dissolving juices which are poured into 
 it, are always in an admirable relation between themselves, 
 and with the nature, hardness, and solubility of the substances 
 which the animal eats.'^ . . . The general relations engender 
 others which are more particular. ' In order that the jaw 
 may seize,' says he, ' it needs a certain projecting form, a 
 certain relation between the position of the resistance and that 
 of the power to the fulcrum, a certain size of the crotaphite 
 muscle, which requires a certain extent in the hole that 
 receives it, and a certain convexity of the zygomatic arcade 
 under which it passes,' etc.'' 
 
 . . . ' In order that the claws may be able to seize, a certain 
 mobility in the toes wiU be necessary, a certain strength in 
 the nails, whence there will result determinate forms in all 
 the phalanges, and necessary distributions of muscles and of 
 tendons. It will be necessary that the fore-arm have a certain 
 ease in turning, from whence, again, will result determinate 
 forms in the bones which compose it. But the bones of the fore- 
 arm, being articulated on the humerus, cannot change their forms 
 without involving changes in the latter. . . . The play of aU 
 these parts will require certain proportions in aU their muscles, 
 and the impressions of these muscles, thus proportioned, wiU. 
 again determine more particularly the form of the bones.'* 
 
 The same is the case with functions as with organs; they 
 are indissolubly bound to each other, and responsible for each 
 other. ' Eespiration,' says Flourens,* ' when it takes place in 
 a circumscribed respiratory organ, cannot dispense with the 
 circulation, for the blood must arrive in the respiratory organ, 
 in the organ which receives the air, and it is the circulation 
 which conducts it thither; the circulation cannot dispense 
 with irritability, for it is irritability which determines the 
 contractions of the heart, and consequently the movements of 
 
 ' Lei;ona d'anaiomie compwrie. Ire lejon. 
 
 * Revolutions du globe. ' Ibid. 
 
 * Flourens, Travaux de Cuvier, p. 87. 
 
 D 
 
50 BOOK I. CHAPTEE I. 
 
 the blood ; muscular irritability cannot, in its turn, dispense 
 with nervous action. And if one of these things change, all 
 the others must change. If the circulation fail, the respiration 
 can no longer be circumscribed ; it must become general, as in 
 insects. The blood no longer coming to seek the air, the air 
 must go in search of the blood. There are, therefore, organic 
 conditions which require each other; there are those which 
 are incompatible. A circumscribed respiration requires of 
 necessity a pulmonary circulation ; a general respiration ren- 
 ders a pulmonary circulation useless, and excludes it. The 
 strength of motions is in a constant dependence on the extent 
 of respiration, for it is respiration which restores to muscular 
 fibre its exhausted irritability. There are four kinds, of 
 movements, which correspond to the four degrees of respira- 
 tion : the flight of the bird, which corresponds to the double 
 respiration; the walking, leaping, or running of mammalia, 
 which correspond to complete but simple respiration; the 
 crawling of the reptile, a motion by which the animal only 
 drags itself upon the ground ; and the swimming of the fish, 
 a motion for which the animal requires to be sustained in a 
 liquid whose specific gravity is almost equal to its own.' 
 
 In order to explain without a final cause these innumerable 
 correlations, we must suppose that while physical causes are at 
 work on the one hand to produce certain organs, other causes 
 are found to produce at the same time other organs in neces- 
 sary correlation with the first. How have two systems of 
 laws, acting thus separately and blindly, been able to coincide 
 in a manner so astonishing in their common action ? I under- 
 stand, strictly, that physical nature, left to itself, may come to 
 create cutting teeth ; but I cannot comprehend why the same 
 nature produces at the same time claws and not hoofs. 
 Neighbouring organs can doubtless modify themselves recip- 
 rocally, and adapt themselves to each other ; but how shall 
 the action of the heart put itself in harmony with that of the 
 lungs ? How shall the organs of respiration put themselves 
 in harmony with the organs of motion? If, in place of 
 
THE PRINCIPLE. 51 
 
 admitting distinct causes which converge towards each other, 
 we admit only one, we must recognise that the things occur 
 exactly as if that cause had determined to act by a sort of 
 anticipating idea of the effect ; and till there be proof to the 
 contrary, the presumption is in favour of this hypothesis. The 
 organic correlations remarkably verify the principle to which 
 Kant reduces finality — namely, the predetermination of the 
 parts by the idea of the whole. This foreordination of the 
 parts to the whole — this anticipated government of parts by 
 the whole, and the agreement of that whole itself with that 
 general phenomenon which is called life — seems, indeed, to 
 indicate that the whole is not a simple effect, but also a cause, 
 and that the parts would not have affected that arrangement 
 if the whole had not beforehand commanded it. 
 
 This predisposition and foreordination of the present by the 
 future is again particularly visible in the formation of the 
 organized beiug. 
 
 All the germs of animals, without exception, at the first 
 moment when the eye of the observer can seize them, present 
 an appearance absolutely similar. At this first stage the germ 
 does not permit the future being which it contains in any 
 manner to appear. More than this, the first transformations 
 of the germ appear alike identical in all animals without 
 exception, until the moment when the exterior layers of the 
 germ commence to take the form of an organized tissue or 
 blastoderm. The germ then becomes an embryo, and begins 
 to be divided between the different essential forms of the 
 animal kingdom, the form of the vertebrates and the form of 
 the invertebrates. This development continues, always pro- 
 ceeding from the general to the particular, from the indeter- 
 minate to the determinate, from the chief division to the class, 
 from the class to the tribe, from the tribe to the genus, from 
 the genus to the species. In a word, its development is a pro- 
 gressive differentiation. But it is not indifferently that such 
 a germ takes such a form ; it is not free, quite indeterminate 
 though it be, either to be vertebrate or invertebrate ; if verte- 
 
52 BOOK I. CHAPTER I. 
 
 brate, to be mammifer, bird, reptile, or fish ; if mammifer, to 
 belong to this or that species. No; it can only take the 
 determinate form of the being from which it proceeds, and it 
 is necessarily like its parents, save the remarkable cases of 
 alternate generation, which themselves revert to the rule, 
 since the same forms recur periodically, though alternately. 
 Formerly, on the theory of the junction of gernls, the growth 
 of the germ was explained in an entirely physical manner, — 
 the embryo was nothing else than the animal in miniature ; 
 its development was only enlargement. But according to the 
 theory now universally accepted, the animal is formed piece 
 by piece, and successively creates all its organs by assimi- 
 lating little by little the exterior parts, and arranging them 
 according to the type to which it belongs, in proceeding, as 
 we have said, from the general to the particular. How can 
 we imagine this labour without a kind of previous conception 
 of all that these successive additions had to form, and which 
 is the reason of each of these accretions ? ^ Thus the embryo 
 completes itself little by little, as if it had a model before it. 
 We have here, indeed, the X070? o-TrepfiaTiKoi} of the Stoics — 
 that secret and active reason placed in the seeds of things, 
 and which, conscious or unconscious, is the spring of life in 
 the universe. 
 
 In fine, of. all the facts of co-ordination, there is none more 
 remarkable, complex, and troublesome, for the exclusive 
 partisans of physical causes, than the existence of the sexes 
 — ^that is to say, of the means employed by nature for the 
 perpetuation of species. Here there are several things to 
 remark. 
 
 In fact, the question is no longer merely as hitherto con- 
 cerning the appropriateness of an organ to a function, but, 
 what is still more striking, of an organ to another organ. In 
 
 1 'When the question is ahout an organic evolution which is in the future,' 
 says CI. Bernard, ' we no longer comprehend this property of matter at long 
 range. The egg is to become something ; but how conceive that matter should 
 have as a property to include operations of mechanism which do not yet exist ? ' 
 — Rapport sur la physiologie girUrak, p. 110. 
 
THE PKINCIPLE, 53 
 
 the first case, the function being nothing but the aggregate of 
 the acts executed by the organ, one might say in utmost strict- 
 ness that it is not astonishing that the organ is fitted to pro- 
 duce the acts it performs, for otherwise it would not perform 
 them ; that it is not astonishing that a cause which produces 
 certain effects is fitted to produce those effects. But in the 
 case now before us such a difficulty cannot even be raised, for 
 it is not the appropriateness of a cause to its effect that we here 
 admire, it is the appropriateness of an organ to another organ; 
 it is an entirely mechanical adaptation of two apparatus, 
 distinct, yet so bound together that the form of the one is 
 determined by the form of the other ; a reciprocal determina- 
 tion which evidently supposes a relation in the future in 
 inverse direction to the ordinary relation of cause and effect. 
 These two organic apparatus, sometimes united, but most 
 frequently separated into two distinct individuals, are both 
 and reciprocally in a relation of means to ends ; for we could 
 not explain to ourselves the extraordinary coincidence of 
 their reciprocal adaptation, if we did not suppose that the 
 very possibility of this adaptation has been the determining 
 reason which has made them take this double form. Here it 
 can no longer be said that we are taking a simple effect for 
 an end, a result for an intention. The organs of the sexes 
 are not the effects of each other j the male organ is not the 
 cause of the female organ, nor reciprocally. Those two organs 
 are two distinct and independent effects, and yet they can 
 only be explained the one by the other, which is precisely 
 the relation of finality. The shift which explains the relation 
 of agent to function by a simple relation of cause to effect is 
 therefore not available here, for there is manifest appropriate- 
 ness without causality. 
 
 Let us consider, besides, that the appropriateness in question 
 is not merely a correlation of organs, a harmonious concurrence 
 of functions, as in the law of Cuvier. It is something still 
 more palpable ; it is a mechanical and material adaptation, a 
 relation of form to form, of structure to structure. Without 
 
54 BOOK I. CHAPTER I. 
 
 doubt, in the organism all the parts, as we have seen, are in 
 relation to the others — the heart concurs with the lungs, the 
 brain with the members, in a common action. But this is 
 only a co-operation, a work in common; and although the 
 end is already clearly and evidently manifest in that case, it is 
 always merely a quite intelligible unity of action. In the case 
 of which we are speaking, the co-operation is of a much more 
 palpable nature, for it supposes the application of one organ 
 to another, and a momentary junction which blends them into 
 one, a phenomenon which could not take place without a per- 
 fect coincidence of form and structure.^ For this reason Plato 
 could say, in a celebrated fable, that the two sexes are the two 
 halves of one whole — halves which seek to be joined in order 
 to reconstruct the primitive whole. This marvellous reciprocal 
 adaptation cannot be considered as a simple result of habit and 
 meeting, as if it were said, for instance, that the just form of 
 the articulations of the bones simply arises from the play of 
 the organs upon each other; for here the habit and meeting, 
 so far from explaining it, suppose precisely the formation of 
 the organs. In order that there may be a meeting, there must 
 already have been adaptation and reciprocity of convenience ; 
 and it cannot be said that this adaptation has been made in 
 course of time, for as the species could not subsist without it, 
 it would have perished before it had been formed. 
 
 In fine, if there were Only between the organs of sex a 
 simple conformity of structure and a material adaptation, but 
 without useful effect, one could still admire this coincidence 
 without being absolutely forced to see in it a relation of 
 finality. For instance, the hand of a man is very fit to be 
 applied to the hand of another man ; it would, however, 
 hardly seem probable to say that nature has given men this 
 organ in order that they might be able to shake hands. This 
 quite external adaptation which results from the structure of 
 the hand does not imply a reciprocal predisposition. But in 
 
 ' The difference of the sexes may occur without copujation, but we instance 
 here the most remarkable case. 
 
THE PRINCIPLE. 55 
 
 the sexes, besides the appropriateness of organ to organ, there 
 is further that of organ to function ; and it is the meeting of 
 these two adaptations which causes in this case finality to be 
 imposed on the mind in a manner so imperious and so over- 
 powering. In fine, this unique function, performed by two 
 organs, is precisely that by which the individual secures the 
 perpetuity of the species, and that without knowing and with- 
 out wiUing it, at least in the inferior species. Thus in all the 
 degrees of the phenomenon, we see the determination of the 
 present by the future : the structure of the two organs is only 
 explained by the fact of their meeting ; their meeting, by the 
 function which results from it; the function, in fine, by its effect, 
 which is the production of a new being, itself called in its 
 turn to perpetuate and to immortalize the species. Here the 
 order of causes is manifestly reversed, and whatever Lucretius 
 and Spinoza may say, it is the effects that are the causes. 
 
 To all the preceding considerations it will no doubt be 
 objected that if matters are so, it is because , they could not 
 subsist otherwise. Without the sexes the species could not 
 be reproduced, and would cease to exist after one generation ; 
 without adaptation to the medium, without the concordance 
 of the organs, the individual itself would not endure, or would 
 not even exist : there would be no life in the universe. Conse- 
 quently it win be said, with Maupertuis, that ' in the fortuitous 
 combination of the productions of nature, as it was only those 
 in which certain relations of convenience were found that 
 could subsist, it is not wonderful that this convenience is 
 found in all the species that actually exist. Chance, it might 
 be said, had produced an innumerable multitude of individuals : 
 a smaU number were found constructed so that the parts of 
 the animal could satisfy their wants ; in an infinitely greater 
 number there was neither convenience nor order ; all these 
 last have perished. Animals without a mouth could not live ; 
 others without organs for generation could not be perpetuated. 
 The only ones that have remained are those in which order 
 and convenience were found, and those species which we now 
 
56 BOOK I. CHAPTER I. 
 
 see are only the smaller part of what a blind destiny had 
 produced.'^ 
 
 This hypothesis of a groping of nature, and of a period of 
 disordered parturition, said to have preceded rational produc- 
 tions such as we see them now, is contrary to all that we 
 know of the processes of nature. ]^o trace subsists of this 
 period of chaos, and everything leads to the belief that, if 
 nature had begun by chaos, it would never have come out 
 of it. 
 
 Doubtless it would be wrong to wonder that works are not 
 met with in nature which are i;pso facto impossible — for 
 instance, animals without organs of nutrition or generation 
 (although, indeed, it is not evident why nature in its freaks, 
 and in the countless arrangements of its elements, should not 
 produce even now rough draughts of organisms, loose members, 
 and, as Empedocles said, heads without bodies, bodies without 
 heads, etc.). But without inquiring how far such rough 
 draughts would be possible, on the hypothesis of a blind nature, 
 I wUl grant, if you please, that there is no room for wonder 
 that such specimens are not met with around us. But what 
 gives cause for wonder is, not that beings incapable of living 
 have not lived, but that beings capable of living are met with ; 
 for such beings might not have existed at all. No doubt, 
 given organized beings, it is a thing of course that they should 
 have appropriate organs, but that such beings should be given 
 (which require such conditions), herein lies the difficulty. It 
 is not enough to show that absurd arrangements are impossible ; 
 it would be necessary to prove that such reasonable arrange- 
 ments (namely, those which exist) are necessary. This is by 
 no means evident ; for nature was able long to dispense with 
 organized beings, and there was no reason why it should not 
 dispense with them always. It still remains, then, to explain 
 how a conflict of forces can at a given moment have brought 
 about a result so complicated, and reqxiiring so appropriate a 
 mechanism, as life. 
 
 ^ Cosmologie, Works, t. i. p. 11. 
 
THE PRINCIPLE. 57 
 
 It is said that chance was quite able to produce all sorts of 
 heings, and that among those beings they alone have survived 
 that could survive. But it has never been explained how it 
 is that beings are only produced at present where relations of 
 convenience exist. They get out of this by explanations 
 addressed to the imagination rather than the mind. The 
 great matrix, it is said, was in its first state more malleable, 
 flexible, and fit to take all sorts of forms ; at present it is 
 fixed, and in its sterility can now only reproduce types already 
 produced. Is not this to say that nothing, absolutely nothing 
 in experience warrants us to suppose that such things have 
 ever happened ? The very limitation of the number of actual 
 species is a fact hard to explain, for it is strange that nature 
 is found to have exactly attained and exhausted all its 
 fecundity ; and even when it had produced all that can 
 reasonably subsist, one does not see why it should not con- 
 tinue to produce unformed draughts, and why it should have 
 stopped in the course of its freaks and aberrations. 
 
 But it win be said, do we not see such aberrations daily 
 produced, namely monsters ? Nature clearly proves in such 
 productions that it creates things as they happen, sometimes 
 good, sometimes bad, sometimes fair, sometimes hideous, some- 
 times reasonable, sometimes absurd. In our view, the exist- 
 ence of monsters in no way proves the hypothesis of a groping 
 of nature and of a primitive chaotic state having preceded 
 the period of regular organization. In fact, monsters them- 
 selves suppose well-regulated organisms ; they are only pro- 
 duced by generation, and none have ever been seen that were 
 the immediate products of nature : there is no example of the 
 spontaneous generation of monsters. Even those that are 
 artificially produced always have, as the point of departure, 
 the succession of normal beings. Hence it follows that 
 monsters suppose normal beings ; they are only the deviation 
 from the ordinary laws of generation, therefore they are but 
 an accident. The rule and the law here precede the excep- 
 tion. It cannot, consequently, be supposed that it was in 
 
58 BOOK I. CHAPTER I. 
 
 consequence of an infinite number of accidents of this kind 
 that the normal state at length one day was established. No 
 doubt, this normal state once given, one can understand that 
 by a conflict of causes deviations are produced, that is, con- 
 genital deformities ; for deformities, as well as infirmities, 
 maladies, and death, are only the results of the rencounter 
 and conflict of physical and vital laws. But it would be to 
 reverse the terms, and to make order of disorder, according to 
 a famous expression, to consider monsters as the types of the 
 primitive state, and normal beings as happy accidents. 
 
 I am no more impressed with the argument drawn from 
 fossil species, which, it is said, would give us the example of 
 these gropings by which nature had progressively been raised, 
 fossils being only in some sort the embryos of actual species.-^ 
 
 I have not to discuss this last theory ; I leave that to the 
 naturalists. Good sense, however, suggests at once an objec- 
 tion so natural, that I cannot believe that the theory in ques- 
 tion is anything but a hyperbolical expression, and in some 
 sort a metaphor. In effect, embryos do not reproduce them- 
 selves, but the fossil species reproduced themselves like our 
 own. They had, therefore, an entire system of organs and of 
 functions, that are awanting in actual embryos ; hence a differ- 
 ence which is not small, and which must involve others. I 
 leave aside the fact of intra-uterine life, or of incubation, to 
 which actual embryos are subject, while in the fossil species 
 individuals attained as in ours to an independent life. It 
 seems, then, to be only by metaphor that fossil animals are 
 considered as the embryos of actual species. I will say as 
 much of the theory, strongly opposed by Cuvier, according tc 
 which all animals would be, as it were, arrests of development 
 in relation to the typical, that is, the human form. Aristotle 
 had already expressed the same thought in this famous 
 aphorism : ' The animal is an unfinished man.'^ As a meta- 
 
 ' We know that Agassiz has strongly insisted on the analogies of the fossils 
 with actual embryos. 
 
 * Z)fi POjTt, Anim, IV. X. : ndvra yAp Xffrt ra. Zua. vecvtvSfi ToiXXa. 'jrapa. tov av6paivar. 
 
THE PRINCIPLE. 59 
 
 phorical and hyperbolical expression, this is an admirable 
 thought ; as an exact theory, it is very disputable. 
 
 Whatever else may be in it, the scale of nature, in what- 
 ever manner understood, has nothing that lends itself to the 
 interpretation they would wish to give it. No doubt the 
 inferior species have imperfect forms in relation to the superior 
 — it is better to have the wings of the bird than the flaps of 
 reptiles, the brain of man than that of the oyster ; and one 
 can also believe that the fossil species were less endowed 
 than those of the present ; but more or less in the distribution 
 of advantages and of forms does not at all imply an elabora- 
 tion of chance in the formation of living beings. Every being 
 that lives, being even thereby organized to live, be that life 
 humble or powerful, contains relations of finality and design ; 
 between this being, however humble, and a purely fortuitous 
 product, a freak of nature, there is already an abyss, and the 
 latter can never have served as a transition to the former. 
 In the polyp I see finality as well as in the vertebrates, and 
 the tentacles by which it seizes its prey are as appropriate to 
 their use as the claws of the tiger or the hand of man. 
 
 The progressive development of forms, far from being 
 opposed to the theory of finality, is eminently favourable to it. 
 What more simple and more rational law could have presided 
 over creation than that of a progressive evolution, in virtue 
 of which the world must have seen forms, more and more 
 finished, successively appear ? Will it be said that nature 
 could have spared itself imperfect and coarse forms, and con- 
 fined itself to perfect and finished ones ? But to which wiU 
 this quality be accorded ? The highest of the animals are 
 still inferior to man. Man alone, therefore, should have been 
 created. But could he subsist if he were alone ? And could 
 the superior animals also without the inferior, and so on to the 
 lowest steps of the scale ? And besides, since all these creatures 
 could be, why refuse them existence ? The animal called the 
 sloth appears to us to have sad enough conditions of existence ; 
 but if it can live under these conditions, why should it not 
 
60 BOOK I. CHAPTER I. 
 
 take advantage of them ? Poverty of organization is a thing 
 entirely relative ; and perhaps it was worth more that all the 
 forms capable of enduring have heen created, in order that 
 there might be beings of all kinds/ than if nature had con- 
 fined itself to the most perfect, even supposing that that were 
 possible. 
 
 To sum up : If it be agreed to apply the term -principle, of 
 concordance to the principle in virtue of which the human 
 mind requires that we explain not only each phenomenon in 
 particular, but also the order and agreement of phenomena, 
 that principle will assume two forms, or wiU be divided into 
 two distinct principles. 
 
 The first will be applicable to the physical and mechanical 
 order, and may be called the principle of mechanical concord- 
 ance ;^ the second will be applicable to the biological order, 
 and may be called the principle of teleological concordance, or 
 principle of final causes. 
 
 I. First principle. — ^When a certain coincidence of pheno- 
 mena is remarked constantly, it does not suffice to attach 
 each phenomenon in particular to its antecedent causes; it 
 is necessary also to give a precise reason for the coincidence 
 itself. 
 
 In other words. — The agreement of phenomena supposes a 
 precise cause, with a probability which is in proportion to the 
 number and the diversity of the concordant phenomena. 
 
 ^ Bossuet has expressed this admirably : ' It is a beautiful design to have been 
 pleased to make all sorts of beings, — beings that had only extension, with all 
 belonging to it, figure, motion, rest, all that depends on the proportion or 
 disproportion of these things ; beings that had only intellect, and aU that is 
 akin to so noble an operation, wisdom, reason, foresight, will, liberty, virtue ; 
 in fine, beings where all was united, and where an intelligent soul was found 
 joined to a body.' — Connaissance de Dieu, iv. 1. 
 
 ■ * Perhaps it will be thought that it is granting too much to give up thus to 
 material causes all the physical and mechanical world, to recognise a principle of 
 order which is not finality. Suffice it to reply, that that is only a provisional 
 view, required by the necessity of method and clearness of exposition (J/SarxaX/es 
 X"^f'At but upon which there may be opportunity to come back. (See under 
 chap, v.. Mechanism and Finality.) 
 
THE PRINCIPLE. 61 
 
 II. Second principle. — When a certain coincidence of phe- 
 nomena is determined, not only by its relation to the past, 
 but also by its relation to the future, we •will not have done 
 justice to the principle of causality if, in supposing a cause 
 for this coincidence, we neglect to explain, besides, its precise 
 relation to the future phenomenon. 
 
 In other words. — The agreement of several phenomena, bound 
 together with a future determinate phenomenon, supposes a 
 cause in which that future phenomenon is ideally represented, 
 and the probability of this presumption increases with the 
 complexity of the concordant phenomena and the number of 
 the relations which unite them to the final phenomenoa 
 
CHAPTEE II. 
 
 THE FACTS. 
 
 /^UE intention is not to reproduce here the innumerable 
 ^^ facts, so usefully enumerated elsewhere in treatises of 
 physical theology,' which bear in favour of finality. We 
 shall rest content with mentioning a certain number of them, 
 and those the chief, by way of examples and to fix our ideas. 
 
 The operations of living nature, in which we can recognise 
 in a striking manner the character of finality, are of two 
 'kin.ds, functions and instincts. The former can be defined as 
 the interior actions of the organs ; the latter as the exterior 
 actions of these organs, and in particular of the organs of 
 relation. As regards the functions, we will chiefly instance 
 
 ' The treatises of physical theology, especially of the 18th century, are in- 
 numerable, and would hy themselves form quite a library. The principal works 
 of this kind are the following : — Derham, Physico-tJieology (London 1714) ; 
 Astro-theology (1715). John Eay, Wisdom of Ood in the Works of Creation 
 (1714). Swammerdam, Bibel der Natur (1738). Eeimarus, La religion 
 naturelle (1754). Ch. Bonnet, Contemplation de la natnre (1764). Paley, 
 Natural Theology (the last edition is accompanied with notes by Lord Brougham 
 and Ch. Bell) ; a theology was at last derived from all the objects of nature. 
 The naturalist Lesser is above all remarkable for his works of this kind. We 
 have by him : Hilio-th€ologie (1744) ; Litho-thiologie (1757) ; Testaceo-th^ologie 
 (1744) ; Insecto-thiohgie, etc. Let us cite further the Thiologie de I'eau, by 
 Fabricius (1741). In France the works of this kind have been much less 
 numerous. We will mention the TraiU de I'existence de Dieu, by Fenflon ; 
 the Spectacle de la nature, by the Abbe Pluche ; the Etudes and the Harmonies 
 de la nature, by Bernardin de Saint-Pierre (a work in which imagination abounds 
 more than severe science and good logic ; and finally, of our own time, the 
 Thiologie de la nMure, by Strauss Durckeim (Paris 1852) ; and the Harmonies 
 ProvidentieUes oiM. Ch. L6v6que (Paris 1872). As to the philosophical and 
 logical analysis of the principle of final causes in itself, it was rare in the 17th 
 century before Kant. Let us mention only the little work, unhappily unfinished, 
 of Lesage of Geneva, inserted in the Notice sur la vie et les travaux de Lesage, 
 by Prevost (see our appendix, Dissertation III., Lesage and Final Causes) ; 
 and Boullier, Discours pMlosophiques sur les causes finales et I'inertie de la 
 maiifre, Amsterdam 1759. 
 
THE FACTS. 63 
 
 the agreement of the organic mechanism with the function ; 
 as regards the instincts, the agreement of the functional 
 mechanism with the effect to be produced. That which is 
 most striking from our point of view, in function, is the 
 structure of the organ, and in instinct, is the operation itself. 
 
 I. Organs and Functions} — Of all the facts of adaptation, 
 the most striking is the structure of the eye in its relation to 
 the act of vision. It is, we may say, the classical argument 
 in this matter. It would be a vain scruple to deprive our- 
 selves of so arresting and marvellous an instance merely 
 because it is so well known, and become common by use. 
 What occurs in its own place is never common. Let us try, 
 then, to set before ourselves the difficulties of the problem, 
 and the innumerable conditions which its solution requires.^ 
 
 The first condition in order that vision may be performed 
 is the existence of a nerve sensible to the light. That is a 
 primordial fact, which it is not possible to explain, and beyond 
 which, till now, analysis is unable to proceed. There must 
 therefore be a nerve endowed with a specific sensibility, which 
 cannot in any way be confounded with tactile sensibility. 
 But a nerve simply sensible to the light would only serve to 
 distinguish day from night; but to discern objects, to see 
 veritably, something more is necessary, namely, an optical 
 apparatus more or less resembling those which human industry 
 can fabricate. Observe what the illustrious German physio- 
 logist Miiller says on this subject : 
 
 ^ It is needless to otserve that what we here set forth are the facts favourable 
 to the doctrine of finality. As to the facts unfavourable or contrary, we will 
 examine them afterwards. (See chap. viii. Objections and Difficulties.) Let it 
 suffice to say that, the fact of existence, of the development and the duration of 
 life in the universe, sufficiently proves the preponderance of favourahle cases over 
 the opposite, for if the latter prevailed in number, it is evident that life could 
 not exist. 
 
 2 See on the same question not only the treatises we have just named, but a 
 work written in an altogether different spirit, the Philosophy of the Unconscious, 
 by Hartmann. The author (Introd. chap, ii.) enumerates fourteen distinct 
 conditions necessary to vision, and reduces to an infinitely small fraction (which 
 may be regarded as nothing) the probability that all these conditions would be 
 found together in virtue of a physical law. 
 
64 BOOK I. CHAPTEE II. 
 
 ' In order that the light may project upon the retina the 
 image of the objects from which it proceeds, that which comes 
 from certain definite parts of the external bodies, whether 
 immediately or by reflection, must not put in action more 
 than corresponding parts of the retina, a thing which requires 
 certain physical conditions. The light which emanates from 
 a luminous body diffuses itself by radiating in all directions 
 where it meets no obstacle to its passage ; a luminous point 
 will therefore lighten a whole surface, not a single point of 
 that surface. If the surface which receives the Hght radiating 
 from a point is the united surface of the retina, the light 
 of that point causes the sensation of light in the whole, and 
 not merely in a part of the nervous membrane ; and it is the 
 same with all other luminous points which may by radiation 
 illuminate the retina.' 
 
 One easily understands that in this case there would not 
 be vision properly so called. The entire retina without 
 optical apparatus would see nothing definite ; it would perceive 
 light, but not images. ' Consequently,' to continue our quota- 
 tion from Miiller, ' in order that the external light may pro- 
 duce in the eye an image corresponding to the bodies, it is 
 indispensable that there should be arrangements to cause the 
 light given forth from the points a b c . . n,to act only on 
 isolated points of the retina arranged in the same order, and 
 which prevent one point of that membrane from being illumi- 
 nated at once by several points of the external world.' ^ 
 
 It is evident that distinct vision is a problem altogether of 
 the same order as those which the mechanician or geometrician 
 may have to solve. For the solution of problems, geometry 
 employs the analytic method, which supposes the problem 
 solved. In the same way, as we have said above,* it seems 
 that nature had to employ here an analogous method. Start- 
 ing from the hypothesis of a being that needs for its guidance 
 or use to distinguish objects from each other, it had to ask 
 
 ' Miiller, Manuel de physiologie. French translation by Jourdan, t. ii. p. 275. 
 ' See the preceding chapter, p. 40. 
 
THE FACTS. 65 
 
 itself what conditions such a result previously supposes. 
 Between the diffuse vision, which consists simply in distin- 
 guishing day from night, and the distinct vision, which per- 
 ceives images, there is an abyss ; and an infinite number of 
 precautions and conditions is necessary, without which it would 
 be impossible to pass from one of these phenomena to the 
 other. If we admit that distinct vision is only a result and 
 not an end, the coincidence of these innumerable precautions 
 and conditions must be purely fortuitous — that is to say, have 
 taken place by chance, or, in other words, without cause. In 
 short, even if a physical cause suf&ced to account for the 
 material structure of the organ, the agreement of that struc- 
 ture, fashioned beforehand, with a remote phenomenon which 
 itself is of the highest importance for the preservation of the 
 living being, would be quite an external coincidence, absolutely 
 without a cause. Let us enter into detail. 
 
 In order to attain the result which we have just indicated, 
 nature might employ, and has in fact employed, two different 
 systems. It has created two kinds of apparatus, the isolating 
 and the convergent. The first are those which are seen in 
 the eyes of insects and crustaceans, and which are called com- 
 posite eyes, or eyes with facets ; the others are met with partly 
 in certain insects and crustaceans, partly and specially in the 
 vertebrate animals. ' The first of these systems,' to quote 
 Mtiller again, ' consists in placing before the retina, and per- 
 pendicularly to it, an innumerable quantity of transparent 
 cones, which allow to reach the nervous membrane only the 
 light following the direction of their axis, and absorb by means 
 of the pigment with which their walls are lined all that strikes 
 them obliquely.^ We see that in this first system nature 
 has proceeded exactly as do the physicist and the chemist in 
 their laboratory, when, in order to study a phenomenon, they 
 find means to produce it and to isolate it at the same time, by 
 taking certain precautions, that the concomitant circumstances 
 may not come in to disturb the effect of it. This combination 
 
 ' Mliller's Manuel, p. 277. 
 E 
 
66 BOOK I. CHAPTER II. 
 
 of transparent cones with dbsorhing walls, this care to make 
 the light come in one direction and to absorb it in all others, 
 recall the precautions of the physicist, who excludes the air 
 to make bodies fall with equal rapidity, who dries them in 
 order to have pure electricity, who, in a word, removes obstacles 
 on the one hand by preventive means, while on the other, by 
 active means, he evokes the phenomenon he wishes to study. 
 Add to this the amazing quantity of combinations which such 
 a system supposes (for they reckon 12,000 and even 20,000 
 cones in a single eye), and that to these cones there must 
 correspond in the cornea as many little geometrical divisions 
 called facets, and that without this agreement nothing would 
 result. To set aside in this case every final cause, we must 
 admit that while certain physical and blind causes produced 
 transparent cones, other physical causes, equally blind, prepared 
 walls fitted to absorb the light ; that some made the cones, 
 and others the corresponding facets ; that other blind causes 
 brought both into harmony, forced them to coincide in that 
 combination — itself so wondrously in harmony with a final 
 act, agreeing in its turn with the interests of the animaL If 
 so amazing an assemblage of agreements and conveniences can 
 be produced by a simple coincidence, there is no longer a 
 principle of causality. 
 
 But the highest degree of skill and perfection in the art of 
 nature is manifested above all in the second system of which 
 we , have spoken, namely, in the system of convergent appa- 
 ratus, or of eyes with lenses, such as we meet with in the 
 superior animals. 
 
 In the previous system, ' the procedure which nature em- 
 ployed to isolate on different points of the organ the light 
 emanating from different points, consists in excluding the 
 rays which would prevent the effect from being produced. It 
 obtains the same result with much more precision still, and 
 especially with a greater intensity of light, by causing to meet 
 anew upon one point the divergent rays which emanate from 
 another point.' The bodies which have thus the power to 
 
THE FACTS. 67 
 
 focus the light are transparent and refracting media : the most 
 perfect form is that of a lens. Such is the principle of 
 lenticular eyes, or those with crystalline humour, of which the 
 most complete model is the human eye. 
 
 The eye is an organ so well known that it is needless to 
 insist on the details of its structure. Let us merely recall 
 that this apparatus is absolutely like the artificial apparatus 
 called the camera ohscura. Given a box closed on all sides, 
 and only affording entrance to the Mght by a small opening, if 
 we place behind this opening in the interior of the box a con- 
 verging lens, the luminous rays proceeding from any object, 
 and forced to pass through this lens, will be found to meet at 
 the end of the box on the surface opposite the opening, and 
 will there reproduce the image of the external object, but 
 turned upside down. This apparatus has become popular 
 since the discovery of photography. We know that the eye 
 is an apparatus of this kind : it is a camera, and all the con- 
 ditions of the phenomena we have just described are found 
 there realized as far as necessary. Let us mention the com- 
 bined precautions which have rendered vision possible in this 
 remarkable apparatus.^ 
 
 It is necessary, first of all, that the solid membrane which 
 constitutes the globe of the eye, and which is called the 
 sclerotic, should become transparent in a point of its surface, 
 to permit the luminous rays to traverse it ; and this trans- 
 parent part, which is called the cornea, must be found to 
 correspond exactly with the opening of the orbit of the eye, 
 for if the sclerotic were opaque in the very place where the 
 eye is in connection with the light, and transparent where it 
 is hidden in the ocular orbit, there would be a contradiction. 
 Such is the first precaution that nature has taken. In the 
 second place, there must be behind the transparent opening 
 
 ' As to the imperfections which have been pointed out in the structure of 
 the eye, we have replied above (p. 45), with the help of the testimony of M. 
 Helmholtz himself, to the objection which has been drawn from the alleged 
 defects of that organ. 
 
68 BOOK I. CHAPTER U. 
 
 which permits the light to enter, convergent media, to unite 
 the luminous rays ; for if such media did not occur, the retina 
 situated at the back of this apparatus would not receive the 
 images of objects, but simply the diffused light, and it would 
 be in vain that nature had constructed a camera. Simple 
 ocular points, such as one sees in worms or inferior animals, 
 would have sufficed for distinguishing day from night. And 
 thirdly, there must be found at the extremity of this camera, 
 and opposite the entrance, the retina, or diffusion of the 
 optic nerve — ^the nerve sensible to the light, and which can 
 only see on condition of receiving the image of the object. 
 Suppose that the retina were not placed in the very axis of 
 the transparent cornea and of the crystalline humour, sup- 
 pose that it were in another part of the eye, it would receive 
 nothing and consequently would see nothing, and the images, 
 projecting themselves on an insensible surface, would not be 
 perceived. The transparent media would then be entjrely 
 useless, and it would have been better to dispense with 
 them. 
 
 Thus an eye or camera not having a transparent part 
 corresponding to the opening of its orbit, convergent media 
 corresponding to that transparent cornea, and a retina cor- 
 responding to these convergent media, — an eye in which 
 these diverse elements, opening of the eye, transparent cornea, 
 convergent medium, retina, were not all placed in the same 
 axis, so that the light could pass through them in succession, 
 — such an eye would imply a contradiction. 
 
 But notice that this contradiction would only exist from 
 the point of view of final causes, and not of efficient causes. 
 There would only be contradiction if the eye is an eye, that 
 Is, an apparatus destined to see ; for if it is only a mechanical 
 combination, found by chance to be fitted for vision, there is 
 no contradiction if the conditions of vision are not realized. 
 Physically speaking, one does not see why there should not be an 
 eye in which the retina did not correspond with the crystalline 
 humour, the crystalline humour with the transparent cornea, the 
 
THE FACTS. 69 
 
 transparent cornea with the opening of the orbit, and, in fine, 
 why an eye perfectly formed should not be hidden in a closed 
 orbit. For, that causes which do not propose to themselves 
 an end should only realize what is quite conformable to that 
 end, is what does not appear probable.^ 
 
 To those who admire the structure of the eye, there has 
 been objected the uselessness of the crystalline humour, since 
 the blind operated on for cataract can do without it:^ First, that 
 the crystalline is not absolutely necessary one easily compre- 
 hends, since there are in the eye three refracting media, — 
 the vitreous humour, the aqueous humour, and the crystalline 
 itself. If one of these three media disappear, the others can 
 still, strictly speaking, exercise their function, and render 
 vision possible. One does not see well, but still one sees, 
 which is better than absolute blindness. Besides, it is for- 
 gotten that after the operation for cataract the crystalline 
 becomes useless under the condition that it is replaced by a 
 double convex lens, which is nothing else than a double 
 artificial crystalline. Eeasoning in this manner, one might 
 just as well say that the legs are useless, since, strictly speak- 
 ing, one can walk with crutches. Indeed, there are cases in 
 which those affected by cataract see without spectacles ; the 
 oculists even advise to exercise the eye as much as possible. 
 
 ^ The objection will here he brought against us of the blind species, of which 
 recently a considerable number has been found. (See the Gomptes rendua de VAc. 
 des Sciences, session of 16th "Soy. 1874. ) This touches the question of rudiment- 
 ary organs, which we will examine farther on (chap. yi. ). Let us merely remark at 
 present that a rudimentary organ is not a contradictory organ. Besides, we do 
 not deny that there may be some exceptions ; for instance, in the genus of the 
 Ifereides. (See Miiller, t. ii. p. 301. ) l:\ies& pertv/rhations are explained, accord- 
 ing to our own view, by the inevitable conflict of efficient and final causes. 
 (See under chap, vi.) 
 
 2 ' One may on this subject indicate as a striking example of this absurd dis- 
 position, the puerile aifectation of certain philosophers to boast of the pretended 
 wisdom of nature in the structure of the eye,. particularly in that which con- 
 cerns the function of the crystalline humour, of which they have gone the length 
 of admiring the fundamental uselessness, as if there could be much wisdom in 
 introducing so inopportunely a part which is not necessary to the phenomenon, 
 and which nevertheless becomes, in certain cases, capable of preventing it alto- 
 gether.' — Comte, PhUosophie positive, t. iii. p. 442, note. 
 
70 BOOK I. CHAPTER II. 
 
 in order to attain this result. But this result usually occurs 
 in the case of myopia, that is, the case in which the media of 
 the eye are endued with an excessive refracting property. In 
 this case the abolition of the crystalline may simply have the 
 effect of restoring the eye to the normal state of refraction; 
 it is a sort of accidental corrective of myopia. Besides, the 
 crystalline can also be supplied to a certain extent in another 
 manner. Every one knows that the pupil is contractile, — that 
 it contracts or dilates according to the intensity of the light, 
 by an effort of the will Now, the contraction of the pupil 
 results in increasing the degree of refraction of the lumi- 
 nous rays ; for in a camera one can dispense with a con- 
 verging lens behind the opening which receives the pencil of 
 light, provided the opening be extremely small. In this case 
 the rays can converge and design the image of the object on 
 a screen appointed for that purpose without needing to pass 
 through refracting media. We imagine, then, that the person 
 affected by cataract may acquire the habit of giving to the 
 pupil a degree of contraction greater than in the normal state, 
 and may thus in some cases succeed to a certain extent in 
 dispensing with the crystalline, and even with spectacles. 
 But nothing has been gained by that ; for this contractility 
 of the pupil is itself one of the most remarkable properties, 
 which has to be added to all those which we have already 
 admired in the structure of the eye. 
 
 Yet again, the crystalline furnishes us with one of the most 
 interesting and most striking examples of the law of finality — 
 namely, the relation which exists between the degree of its 
 curvature and the density of the media in which the animal 
 is called to live. ' This lens,' says MiiUer, ' ought evidently 
 to be so much the more dense and convex as there is less 
 difference of density between the aqueous humour and the 
 medium in which the animal lives.' This law is only evident 
 if we admit that the crystalline has an end ; for if it has none, 
 there is no physical necessity that its convexity should be in 
 inverse ratio to the difference of the density of the aqueous 
 
THE FACTS. Vl 
 
 humour and the medium. Because an animal lives in the air 
 or in the water, it does not at all follow physically that the 
 crystalline ought to be denser and more convex ; for I do not 
 believe that it could be said that the moist media, acting 
 mechanically on the crystalline, determine by their pressure 
 the precise degree of curvature which in this state of things 
 is necessary for vision. There is, therefore, here only a 
 relation of foresight and not of necessity. Now the law 
 mentioned by Miiller is verified by this fact : ' In the case of 
 fishes, where the difference of density between the aqueous 
 humour and the water in which they swim is very slight, the 
 crystalline is spherical, and the cornea flat ; with animals that 
 live in the air, the cornea is more convex, and the crystalline 
 more depressed.' 
 
 While playing the part of a converging lens, it has also 
 another action, recently discovered, and which again exhibits 
 the marvellous industry of nature. ' If we were limited to 
 consider the eye as a camera, all whose parts were invariable, 
 and invariably situated at the same distance from an external 
 object, it is clear that there would only be one particular dis- 
 tance at which an object would be perfectly visible. But 
 every one knows from experience that sight is far from being 
 so imperfect. If the eye rest on an object placed at fifteen 
 centimetres distance, — for instance, on a very brilliant metallic 
 thread, — it sees it perfectly defined, quite as well as if it were 
 at the distance of thirty centimetres. Let us put the same 
 thread at the distance of forty, fifty centimetres, or even much 
 farther, the clearness continues perfect for good eyes. The 
 eye possesses, therefore, a faculty of accommodation, and, 
 moreover, each of us is conscious of it. If we place two 
 luminous points at very different distances from the eye, we 
 feel the effort exerted in order to see successively that which 
 is nearer and that which is more distant.' ^ 
 
 This faculty of accommodation in the eye has greatly 
 
 ' Physique, by MM. Boutan and D'Almdida, vol. ii. p. 415, 2d edition. See 
 the same work, Book VI. chap, vi., for the following facts. 
 
72 BOOK I. CHAPTER II. 
 
 embarrassed physiologists and physicists, and various explana- 
 tions of it have been proposed. It appears to be now proved 
 that this property resides in the crystalline. Very exact 
 experiments have shown that the crystalline is capable of 
 varying the curvature of the surfaces which bound it. The 
 will, acting on it by means not yet well known, can cause it 
 to sweU, and consequently to vary the degrees of convexity 
 which determine the refraction of the luminous ray. These 
 changes of curvature have been measured nearly to the 
 hundredth of a millimetre, and they exactly correspond with 
 those which theory requires in order that images at a varied 
 distance may be depicted on the retina. These beautiful 
 results are again confirmed by the case of those affected with 
 cataract, with whom the perception of varied distance is very 
 imperfect.^ 
 
 I shaU not insist on another remarkable property of the 
 eye, not yet weU explained, but which is indubitable — namely, 
 what is called the achromatism of the eye. This property 
 consists in correcting the defect of lenses, called in optics the 
 aberration of refrangibility. When two very bright colours 
 are beside each other, there is drawn between them a line, 
 more or less long, coloured with the hues of the rainbow ; at 
 least, this is what happens to images perceived by means of 
 these lenses. Newton believed it impossible to remedy this 
 defect of our optical instruments. Yet this has been attained 
 to a certain extent. Lenses free from this defect are what are 
 called achromatic lenses. But human art is unable to obtain 
 a perfect achromatism. Now the human eye is achromatic : 
 what proves it is that, looking at . a white object on a black 
 ground, we perceive no intermediary line. Perhaps this 
 achromatism is not itself perfect, but in every case it is quite 
 sufficient for practical use. Let us add, moreover, that this 
 condition has not exactly the same value as the preceding 
 
 ^ It is not altogether gone, for, as I have said just now, we obtain by the con- 
 traction or dilatation of the pupil a result analogous to that which results from 
 the curvature of the crystalline ; but that result is very insufficient. 
 
THE FACTS. "73 
 
 conditions ; for after all, if the eye were not achromatic, it 
 ■would merely follow that it would see objects otherwise than 
 it sees them, but yet it may be denied that this property 
 renders easier the discernment of objects. 
 
 Again, let us instance the part which the external organs 
 play in the act of vision. Without forming part of the eye, 
 they are in some sort its protectors — tutamina oculi, as they 
 are called ; for example, the eyelids and eyelashes. It has 
 long been remarked that these organs serve to prevent 
 certain hurtful matters from entering the eye ; but they were 
 far from being suspected of playing another part, important in 
 a very different way — namely, the property of partly arresting 
 what are called the ultraviolet rays, that is to say, the luminous 
 rays which are beyond the violet rays in the solar spectrum, 
 — rays which certainly exist, since they exercise a chemical 
 action on a photographic plate. Now it appears proved that 
 these rays act in a very injurious manner on the retina. In 
 the second place, M. Janssen has proved by numerous and 
 precise experiments that these protecting inedia have the 
 power of arresting almost the whole of the obscure radiating 
 heat which always accompanies the light in considerable pro- 
 portion. Now these caloric rays might alter the very delicate 
 tissue of the retina, and thus, thanks to those organs which 
 appear accessory, the only radiations which are transmitted to 
 the nerve are those which are capable of producing vision 
 without altering the organ. These last facts suffice to show 
 what combinations have been needed to render the eye fit 
 for the eminent function it fulfils in the organism. 
 
 We have naturally insisted on the organ of sight, as being 
 of all others that which presents the greatest number of 
 adaptations, and in the most notable conditions. We can, 
 however, make analogous observations on the organ of hear- 
 ing, although it presents circumstances less favourable and 
 less salient. 
 
 Now, it required a special apparatus to secure the repro- 
 duction of images, and to pass from diffuse to distinct vision ; 
 
74 BOOK I. CHAPTER II. 
 
 but for hearing, the point is merely to have apparatus con- 
 ducting sound; and as every kind of matter conducts the 
 waves of sound, hearing is already possible, whatever be the 
 structure of the auditory organ. However, there are in this 
 case also precautions to be taken, and the most important 
 relate to the difference of the media in which the animal 
 lives. Let us hear Mliller again on this point :. 
 
 ' With the animals which live in the air, the sound-waves 
 of the air reach first the solid parts of the animal and the 
 auditory organ, and thence they pass to the lymph of the 
 labyrinth. The power of hearing of an animal which lives 
 and hears in the air ought,^therefore, to depend on the degree 
 in which the solid parts of its auditory organ are fitted to 
 receive aerial waves, on the diminution which the movements 
 of vibrating molecules experience at the moment when the 
 vibrations pass from the air into the external parts of the 
 auditory organ, and on the degree of fitness of the labyrinthine 
 lymph to receive vibrations from the external parts of the 
 auditory organ. The vjhole external part of the organ, of 
 hearing is calculated with a view to render easier the vibrations 
 of the air on solid parts, a transmission which in itself presents 
 difficulties' 
 
 'With the animals that live and hear in the water, the 
 problem is quite different. The medium which transmits the 
 vibrations of sound is the water; it brings them to the solid 
 parts of the animal's body, whence they come once again into 
 water, into the lymph of the labyrinth. Here the acuteness 
 of hearing depends on the degree of aptitude possessed by the 
 solid parts of the auditory organ, which the waves of sound 
 require, in the first place, to traverse to receive waves from 
 the ambient water, in order to transmit them anew to the 
 water, and on the diminution which the vibrating molecules 
 undergo during this passage. We will perceive here again that 
 the whole external part of the auditory organ is calculated to the 
 end of facilitating this transmission' ^ 
 
 ^ Miiller, French translation, vol. ii. p. 404. 
 
THE FACTS. 75 
 
 It is evident that the conditions of hearing are perfectly- 
 appropriate to the two media in which the animal behoves to 
 live. Let it be explained, then, how a purely physical cause, 
 which had had no regard to the nature of the media, should 
 have coincided so justly with the nature of the organ ; how, 
 for example, it does not happen that the two systems are 
 interchanged, and how they do not meet by chance, whether 
 in the air or in the water ; how, on the other hand, the 
 system suitable for the air is only met with in the air-, 
 and reciprocally. But, it will be said, animals with which 
 this mistake had occurred, being thereby deprived of that 
 means of preservation or of defence, would necessarily perish ; 
 and this is why we see no trace of them. But I do not at 
 aU see why animals should perish because deprived of hearing, 
 for great numbers of them are in this condition. Besides, 
 this disadvantage might be compensated by other means of 
 defence and preservation. And consequently there is still 
 room to ask why the structure of the ear is found so perfectly 
 fitted for its use. A cause entirely physical and mechanical 
 gives no account of so exact a coincidence. 
 
 I fear I would fatigue the reader were I to review with 
 such detaU all parts of the organism : there are few of them 
 regarding which one could not make observations of the same 
 kind. I shall only mention the most striking and decisive 
 facts. 
 
 1. The shape of the teeth, so apt for cutting, tearing, and 
 grinding, and which are so appropriate to the diet of the 
 animal that Cuvier thought them one of the most decisive 
 and characteristic signs of the animal ; the mode of their 
 insertion and the solidity of their base, so agreeable to the 
 laws of mechanics, and so well proportioned to their use ; 
 the protecting enamel which covers them, and which takes 
 the place of the membrane called periosteum, which covers 
 the other bones, but which would not have been here fit for 
 the purpose of the teeth, because of its sensitiveness and 
 delicacy. 
 
76 BOOK I. CHAPTER II. 
 
 2. The epiglottis, whicli serves in some sort as a door to 
 the trachea, which shuts like a kind of bridge when food 
 enters the oesophagus, and opens of itself as if by a spring 
 when the food has passed, in order that the respiratory function 
 be not interrupted. Magendie thought that the removal of 
 the epiglottis did not hinder the function of deglutition. 
 M. Longet has qualified this assertion. He observed after the 
 excision of the epiglottis in dogs, that if solid food continues 
 to pass easily, it is not the same with liquids, the swallowing 
 of which is followed by a convulsive cough. He states a 
 great number of pathological facts in support of this assertion, 
 and concludes that they were mistaken who regarded the 
 epiglottis as not necessary to the integrity of deglutition. 
 ' That organ serves,' he says, ' to direct the drops of liquid into 
 the two channels of the larynx, which after deglutition flow 
 along the inclined plane from the base of the tongue, and to 
 prevent their falling into the subglottic vestibule.' ^ 
 
 3.' The circular and longitudinal fibres of the oesophagus, 
 which, by their peristaltic motion, determine the descent of the 
 food, an effect which gravity itself would not suffice to produce, 
 especially in the case of other animals than man : thanks to 
 this mechanical combination, oesophagic- deglutition is possible, 
 despite the horizontal situation of the oesophagus.^ 
 
 4. The valves of the veins and of the chyle-bearing vessels, 
 all opening Mke sluices towards the heart, allow the chyle or 
 the blood to ascend when pressed by the contractions of these 
 vessels, but by closing after they have passed prevent reflux, 
 
 1 Longet, Train de physiologie {2i eiiHon), t. i. 2d part, 'Deglutition.' 
 ^ Not only the structure of the organism, but even the history of the functions 
 has its adaptations and skill, which imply a certain finality. ' As Berzelius 
 remarks, nature has taJeen care to alternate the reactions in the successive parts 
 of the digestive tube, in order thus to bring about at the right time the produc- 
 tion of the different juices necessary for digestion. The reaction is alkaline in 
 the mouth, and the food, on being impregnated with saliva, carries the same 
 reaction into the stomach, where it thus evokes the secretion of the gastric juice. 
 There the food becomes acid under the influence of the same gastric juice . . . 
 and on reaching the end of the duodenum, it immediately occasions a consider- 
 able secretion of bile, which once more changes its reaction, and makes it become 
 alkaline.' — CI. Bernard, Lemons sur les propriitdi des tissus vivants, p. 235. 
 
THE FACTS. 77 
 
 ■which would otherwise necessarily take place in virtue of the 
 law of gravitation. We know it was the sight of these valves 
 which led Harvey to the discovery of the circulation of the 
 blood. Besides, these valves have the function of dividing 
 into spaces the column of blood, that it may not press with 
 all its weight on the lower parts. 
 
 5. The structure of the heart, so admirably adapted to the 
 great function it fulfils in the organism : its division into two 
 great cavities, the right and the left, without communication 
 with each other, as the blood must not pass from the one to 
 the other; the subdivision of these two cavities into two 
 others, auricles and ventricles, whose motions alternately 
 correspond — the contraction of the auricles corresponding to 
 the dilatation of the ventricles, and reciprocally ; the con- 
 centric and radiating fibres of which the membranes of the 
 heart are composed, fibres whose action, indeed, is not per- 
 fectly known, but which contribute without any doubt to the 
 double motion of systole and diastole, which is the principal 
 motive power of the circulation ; the tricuspid valve, which 
 prevents the blood from returning from the right ventricle into 
 the right auricle, and the sigmoid valves, which prevent it 
 from returning from the pulmonary artery into the same 
 ventricle ; and in like manner, for the other side, the mitral 
 valve, which prevents the blood from returning from the left 
 ventricle to the left auricle ; and the sigmoid valves, which 
 permit it to enter the aorta without coming back. 
 
 To explain without a final cause a mechanism so compli- 
 cated, and at the same time so simple, — simple in principle, 
 complicated by the number of parts in operation, — one must 
 suppose that a physical cause, acting according to given 
 laws, has hit upon, without having sought, the system of all 
 others the fittest to perrdit the circulation of the blood, while 
 other causes, equally blind, determine the production of the 
 blood, and make it flow, in virtue of other laws, in channels 
 so well placed; and then that this blood, flowing in these 
 channels, was again found, from other circumstances, and by 
 
78 BOOK I. CHAPTER II. 
 
 an unforeseen coincidence, useful and indispensable for the 
 preservation of the living being. How is it conceivable that 
 so many diverse causes, acting without an end, should 
 coincide so well in their common action with that end ? 
 Eemember we have the right to say here, as men of science 
 do in similar circumstances, that all takes place as if the 
 cause of these phenomena had foreseen the effect which they 
 behoved to produce: would it not be strange that a blind 
 cause should act precisely in the same manner as one not 
 blind would do ? Consequently, until it be proved that such 
 facts have not been foreseen, the presumption is that they 
 have been. It lies with those that deny it to furnish the 
 contrary proof : Neganti incumUt prdbatio. 
 
 6. The structure of the respiratory apparatus, where there 
 meet, on the one hand, the vessels which bring the blood, and, 
 on the other, the vessels which bring the air, each pulmonary 
 cell receiving both at once ; the arrangement of the ribs, of 
 the sternum, of the collar bones, and the diaphragm, suscep- 
 tible of a double motion, corresponding to inspiration and 
 expiration ; the complicated network of nerves and muscles 
 which serve to determine that double motion. Add to this, 
 the admirable adaptation of the respiratory system to the 
 medium in which the animal is called to live : for the air, 
 the pulmonary apparatus ; for the water, the apparatus of gUls. 
 It is quite certain that an animal which lives in the water 
 could only breathe air on condition of having its head con- 
 stantly out of the water, which would be contrary to its 
 preservation, supposing it could only find its food in the 
 water itself. There would thus be an incompatibility between 
 its nourishment and respiration. Yet this system is met 
 with in some animals — whales, for instance — which only need 
 to breathe at certain intervals. But the simplest plan was 
 that the animals should breathe in the same element in which 
 they are called to live. This is the problem which is solved 
 by the second system, ' a combination of plates, of giUs, combs, 
 bunches, cUia, feathery excrescences — in a word, forms so 
 
THE FACTS. 79 
 
 vaxied, that nature seems to have determined here to solve the 
 problem of realizing all imaginable ways of augmenting the 
 surface by external projections.' ^ The water passes between 
 these plates, and the absorption of oxygen takes place by a 
 sort of endosmose through the membranes which cover the 
 blood-vessels. 
 
 7. The structure of the organs of motion, — a structure 
 capable, indeed, of the most varied forms, but of which ' the 
 essence consists,' according to Miiller, ' in almost aU animals, 
 and despite the diversity of the forms of displacement by 
 swimming, creeping, flying, or walking, in this, that certain 
 parts of their bodies describe arcs, whose branches extend 
 after being stayed on a fixed point. Sometimes these arcs 
 are produced by the body itself, which is vermiform, as in 
 creeping and swimming ; sometimes the extension and flexion 
 resnlt from the approach and removal of the two sides of an 
 angle, in which case one of the two sides forms, by means of 
 the resistance which the solid or liquid bodies oppose to it, 
 the fixed point starting from which the other parts are carried 
 forward by the opening of the angle. To this are reducible 
 the motions in the water, the air, or on the earth, of animals 
 provided with members, fins, wings, or flaps. For the air 
 and water also oppose resistance to bodies that seek to dis- 
 place them, and the force which tends to resist them reacts 
 in proportion to that obstacle on the body of the animal to 
 which it imparts an impulse in a definite direction.'^ Thus, 
 whatever be the species of motion which animals have to 
 execute, they must always obey the laws of mechanics ; and 
 consequently the combination of forces by which their organs 
 are impelled, and the form of these organs, behove to be in 
 accordance with the kind of motions they accomplish, which, 
 in its turn, is adapted in a great measure to the medium 
 which they inhabit and to the species of sustenance which 
 they use. As to the exceptions to this law which may have 
 
 ' Miiller, t. i. 1. ii. § i. chap. ii. 
 
 ' Miiller, t. ii. 1. iv. § ii. chap. iii. p. 105, in French translation. 
 
80 BOOK I. CHAPTER 11. 
 
 been adduced, we have seen that they were reducible to the 
 rule.^ 
 
 8. The apparatus of the voice in man. ' In studying the 
 voice of man/ says Miiller, ' one is struck with the infinite art 
 with which the organ that produces it is constructed. No 
 instrument of music is quite comparable to this ; for organs 
 and pianos, despite aU their resources, are imperfect in other 
 respects. Some of these instruments, like mouth-pipes, do 
 not permit us to pass from piano to forte ; in others, as in all 
 those which are played by percussion, there are no means of 
 maintaining the sound. The organ has two registers — that 
 of the mouth-pipes, and that of the reed-pipes ; in this point 
 of view resembling the human voice, with its chest register 
 and falsetto. But none of these instruments combines all 
 advantages like the human voice. The vocal organ has, above 
 them all, the advantage of being able to give all the sounds 
 of the musical scale, and all their shades, with a single mouth- 
 pipe, while the most perfect of reed-instruments requires a 
 separate pipe for each sound.'^ 
 
 In fine, to these precious advantages of the vocal organ of 
 man, we must add another much more considerable stiU, — the 
 faculty of articulation, so marvellously adapted to the expres- 
 sion of thought that it has been said that thought is impos- 
 sible without speech, — a union, moreover, which is not only 
 philosophical but physiological, paralysis of the brain having, 
 as a consequence, the suppression or embarrassment of speech. 
 
 9. The sexual organs, on which we need not insist after the 
 exposition of this point given in the previous chapter.' 
 
 10. Finally, the admirable harmony of the whole system, 
 and the correlation of the parts, a fact for which we also refer 
 to considerations already stated.* 
 
 ' See above, p. 44. 
 
 2 Miiller, t. ii. 1. ill. § iv. chap. ii. p. 197. ' See p. 52. 
 
 * See also the previous chapter, p. 49. Similar examples may be derived 
 from botany (see, for instance, Ch. Bonnet, De I'usage desfeuiUes, Leyden 1734, 
 and Cuvier, article ' Bonnet ' in the BiograpMe universdle). ' It seems,' says the 
 latter, 'that the plant acts for its preservation with sensibility and discernment. 
 
THE FACTS. 81 
 
 II. The Instincts. 
 
 Another system of facts, on which is founded the theory 
 of finality, is instinct in animals, as well as the different 
 species of instincts. This kind of facts it is so much the more 
 important for us to establish, that the principal presumption 
 on which we shall have to depend, in order to establish the 
 finality of the organism, will be the analogy of function with 
 instinct. This is not the place to unfold a theory of instinct ; 
 we shall content ourselves with borrowing from the naturalists 
 what can be most certainly or most probably known, whether 
 of the nature of that force or of its different species. 
 
 ' The character which, above aU, distinguishes instinctive 
 actions,' says Milne-Edwards, ' from those which may be called 
 intelligent or rational, is that they are not the result of imita- 
 tion and experience ; that they are always executed in the 
 same manner, and, to all appearance, without being preceded 
 by the foresight either of their result or of their utility. 
 Eeason supposes a judgment and a choice ; instinct, on the 
 contrary, is a blind impulse which naturally impels the animal 
 to act in a determinate manner : its effects Tnay sometimes he 
 modified hy acperience, hut they never depend on it.'^ 
 
 Indeed, if there is a theory manifestly contrary to the facts, 
 it is that which would explain instinct by the individual 
 experience of the animal. Let us hear Reaumur : 
 
 ' Hardly are all the parts of the young bee dried, hardly are 
 its wings in a state to be moved, when it knows all it will 
 have to do during the rest of its life. Let us not be astonished 
 that it is so soon so well instructed : it has been so by Him 
 who formed it. It seems to know that it is born for society. 
 Like the others, it leaves the common habitation, and goes, 
 like them, in search of flowers. It goes to them alone, and is 
 not embarrassed to find its way back to the hive, even when 
 
 The roots turn, are prolonged to seek better nourisliment ; the leaves turn 
 aside when moisture is presented to them in a different direction to that in which 
 they ordinarily receive it ; the branches rise or bend to find more abundant or 
 purer air ; all the parts of the plant extend towards the light,' etc. 
 1 Milne-Edwards, Zoologie, § 319, p. 228. 
 
 F 
 
82 BOOK I. CHAPTER II. 
 
 it seeks to return to it for the first time. If, then, it goes to 
 draw honey from the heart of open flowers, it is less to feed 
 itself than to commence to work for the common weal ; for, 
 from its first journey, it sometimes makes a collection of bees- 
 wax. M. Maraldi assures us that he has seen bees return to 
 the hive loaded with two large balls of this substance the 
 same day they were born." 
 
 The same author says again, regarding wasps : ' I have seen 
 these flies, from the very day they were transformed, going 
 to the country, arid bringing food back from it, which they 
 divided among the grubs.' 
 
 Take the testimony of another naturalist :" 
 
 ' How does the moth act on quitting its egg quite naked ? 
 Hardly is it born when it feels at once the inconvenience of 
 its nakedness, and an internal sensation excites it to industry 
 to clothe itself. It makes itseK a coat, and when it becomes 
 too smaU, it has the art of cutting it above and below, and 
 enlarging it by adding two pieces. The moth's mother took 
 the precaution to deposit this egg in a place where the newly- 
 born moth could find stuff from which to make a coat and 
 derive its food. . . . The spider and the ant-eater have not 
 yet seen, much less tasted, the insects which have to serve 
 for their food, when they already hasten to lay snares for them, 
 by weaving webs and digging pits. . . . How could a worm, 
 only a few days in existence, and which from the moment of 
 its birth has been buried in some subterranean cavern, have 
 invented such an industry (that of spinning cocoons), or how 
 could it have acquired it by instruction or example ? The 
 same is the case with animals the incubation of which is 
 effected in the sand by the rays of the sun. Hardly are they 
 hatched, when they go without a leader and cast themselves 
 into the waters. . . . The celebrated Swammerdam made 
 this experiment on the water-snail, which he took quite formed 
 from the matrix. Hardly was this little animal thrown into 
 
 ' Reaumur, Hist, des innectef, t. v. mem. xi. 
 ' Eeimar, Instincts des cmimaux, t. i. § 54 sqq. 
 
THE FACTS. 83 
 
 the water, when it began to swim and to move in all directions, 
 and to make use of all its organs as well as its mother. It 
 showed quite as much dexterity as she, alike in withdrawing 
 into its shell in order to go to the bottom, or in coming out of 
 it in order to ascend to the surface of the water.' 
 
 These testimonies and experiments decidedly attest that 
 the instincts are innate capacities, and, consequently, that 
 nature receives from nature either a hidden force or an 
 unknown mechanism, which spontaneously, without imitation, 
 habit, or experience, accomplishes a series of acts adapted to 
 the interests of the animal. Instinct is therefore an art, but 
 every art is a system and chain of acts adapted to a deter- 
 minate future effect. The distinctive character of finality is 
 therefore found here in an eminent degree. 
 
 Let us proceed to the analysis and enumeration of the 
 principal instincts. We may divide them into three classes : 
 1st, Those which relate to the preservation of the individual ; 
 2d, Those which relate to the preservation of the species ; 
 3d, Those which refer to the mutual relations .of animals. 
 In other words, individual instincts, domestic instincts, social 
 instincts. Such are the three chief classes to which all 
 instincts may be reduced.-' 
 
 Instincts relating to the preservation of the individual. 
 
 1. Inclinations to feed on certain definite substances. 
 ' Smell and taste are the instruments which direct them in 
 their choice ; but we can only attribute to a particular instinct 
 the cause which determines them only to eat substances which 
 act on their senses in this or that manner. And what is 
 remarkable, it sometimes happens that this instinct changes 
 its direction all at once, when the animal attains a certain 
 period of its development, and causes it to abandon its 
 original diet. For example, certain insects, carnivorous in 
 their state of larvse, become herbivorous in the perfect state, 
 and reciprocally.' 
 
 1 Mflne-Edwards, Zoologie, % 320, p. 229. See the same work for the facts 
 which follow. 
 
84 BOOK I. CHAPTER II. 
 
 It will be observed regarding this first species of instincts, 
 that even if they could be explained by smell (each species 
 being thus guided by the sensations which please it), we would 
 still have to understand how the smell is found agreeing with 
 the interest of the animal, and how it does not incline to 
 injurious and deleterious substances ; for there is no necessary 
 relation between the pleasure of an external sense and the 
 needs of the internal organization. This exact adaptation 
 appears, therefore, to be the result of a pre-established harmony. 
 
 2. Means employed by carnivorous animals to secure their 
 prey. Some of the best-known examples are as follows : — 
 
 ' The ant-eater moves slowly, and with difficulty. More- 
 over, its instinct inclines it to dig in fine sand a little pit in 
 the shape of a funnel, then to hide at the bottom of this trap, 
 and to wait patiently till an insect falls over the little pre- 
 cipice it has thus made ; and if its victim seek to escape or 
 stop in its fall, it stuns it and rolls it to the bottom of the 
 hole, throwing over it, by means of its head and its mandibles, 
 a quantity of sand.' ' Certain spiders prepare snares stUl more 
 singular. . . . The arrangement of the web varies according 
 to the species, and sometimes presents no regularity; but at 
 other times it is of the utmost elegance, and one is astonished 
 to see such little creatures construct with such perfection so 
 extensive a web as that of the spider of our gardens. There 
 are spiders that.make use of their web to swathe their victims.' 
 * Certain fishes have the art of throwing drops of water on the 
 insects which are upon aquatic herbs, in order to make them 
 fall.' One might cite a thousand instances besides of ruses of 
 animals, the same in the whple species, and employed by the 
 young prior to any imitation and experience. 
 
 3. Instinct of accumulation. 
 
 ' During summer, squirrels collect stores of filberts, acorns, 
 or almonds, and make use of a hollow tree as a magazine. 
 They are accustomed to make several deposits in several 
 different hiding-places, and can always find them in winter, 
 despite the snow.' 
 
THE FACTS. 85 
 
 ' Another rodent (Siberia), the lagomys pica, gathers in 
 autumn the grass it will need during the long winter of 
 that country, like our farmers. Having cut the strongest and 
 most succulent herhs, it spreads them out to dry iu the sun. 
 It then collects them in ricks, which it shelters from rain and 
 snow. It then digs underneath each of these magazines a 
 subterranean passage, terminating in its hole, and so arranged 
 as to allow it from time to time to visit its store of pro- 
 visions.' 
 
 4. Instinct of construction. 
 
 ' The silkworm constructs a cocoon for its metamorphosis ; 
 the rabbit, a burrow ; the beaver, its huts.' ' The German 
 mole constructs an abode affording two exits, — the one oblique, 
 to cast out the loose earth ; the other perpendicular, to go in 
 and out. These passages conduct to a certain number of cir- 
 cular excavations, which mutually communicate by horizontal 
 conduits. One is the abode of the mole, the others its 
 magazines.' 
 
 ' Some spiders (mygales) construct a habitation the opening 
 of which they skilfully close by means of a veritable door, 
 furnished with its hinge. For this end they dig, in a clayey 
 soil, a sort of cyliudrical well of about eight or ten centimetres 
 long, and plaster its walls with a kind of very stiff mortar. 
 They then make, with alternate layers of miry earth and 
 woven threads, a covering which exactly fits the orifice of the 
 hole, and which can only open outwards. The hinge which 
 holds this door is formed by a continuation of filamentary 
 layers, which extend from a point of its surface to the walls 
 of the tube situated beneath, and there form a pad answering 
 the purpose of a frame. The external surface of this cover- 
 ing is wrinkled, and scarcely to be distinguished from the 
 surrounding earth, but the inner surface is smooth ; and one 
 may notice on the side opposite the hinge a range of little 
 holes, into which the animal puts its claws to keep it shut 
 when some enemy seeks to open it by force.' 
 
 Among the instincts of construction one of the most remark- 
 
86 BOOK I. CHAPTEK II. 
 
 able is that of bees. ' It is a very curious problem of mathe- 
 matics to determine at what precise angle the three planes 
 ■which compose the bottom of a cell ought to meet, to afford 
 the greatest economy or the least possible expense of materials 
 and work. This problem belongs to the transcendental part 
 of mathematics, and is one of those called problems of maxima 
 and minima. It has been solved by some mathematicians, 
 particularly by the able Maclaurin, by the infinitesimal cal- 
 culus, and this solution is to be found in the Transactions of 
 the Eoyal Society of London. This scientist has fixed pre- 
 cisely the required angle, and he found, after the most exact 
 measurement which the subject admitted of, that it is the very 
 angle at which the three planes of the bottom of the cell in 
 reality meet.' 
 
 ' Shall we ask here who taught the bee the properties of 
 solids, and to resolve problems of maxima and minima ? We 
 need not say that bees know none of these things. They 
 work most geometrically without any knowledge of geometry ; 
 somewhat like a child, who, by turning the handle of a barrel- 
 organ, makes good music without any knowledge of music' ^ 
 
 5. Instinct of clothing. 
 
 ' In insects we likewise see a great number of curious 
 methods instinctively employed for the construction of a 
 dwelling. Many caterpillars can make themselves a covering 
 by rolling leaves together > and fastening them by means of 
 threads. In our gardens we wUl constantly meet nests of 
 this sort on lilacs, gooseberry bushes, etc. ; and of this kind 
 also is formed that which is found on the oak, and which 
 belongs to the caterpillar of a little nocturnal butterfly, the 
 tortrix viridissima. Other insects construct nests with frag- 
 ments of leaves, bits of stuff or some other substance, which 
 they have skill to adjust artistically. Such is the common 
 
 ^ Works of Eeid (by Hamilton, ii. 546). A Swiss geometrician has tried to 
 show that this calculation was not exact, and that the geometry of the bees was 
 imperfect. Lord Brougham resumed the problem, and has shown that the bees 
 'were right.' 
 
THE FACTS. 87 
 
 moth, a little grey silvered butterfly, which, when in the state 
 of caterpillar, cuts passages in the thickness of woollen stuffs, 
 rapidly gnawing them. With the bits thus detached the ■ 
 caterpillar makes a pipe, which it continually lengthens at the 
 base ; and, what is singular, when it becomes too large to be 
 at ease in its dwelling, it breaks this sort of sheath, and 
 enlarges it by adding a piece.' 
 
 Instincts relating to the preservation of the species} 
 
 1. Precautions for laying eggs. 
 
 ' One of the phenomena fittest to give a clear idea of what 
 ought to be understood by instinct is that which is presented 
 to us by certain insects when they lay their eggs. Those 
 animals will never see their progeny, and can have no acquired 
 notion of what their eggs will become ; and yet they have the 
 singular habit of placing beside each of those eggs a supply of 
 elementary matter fit for nourishing the larva it will produce, 
 and that even when that food differs entirely from their own, 
 and the food they deposit would thus be useless for them- 
 selves. No sort of reasoning can guide them in doing this, 
 for if they had the faculty of reason, facts would be awant- 
 ing them to arrive at such conclusions, and they must needs 
 act blindly.' 
 
 Necraphores. ' When the female is going to lay, she always 
 takes care to bury the body of a mole or of some other 
 small quadruped, and to place her eggs in it, so that the 
 young find themselves from their birth in the midst of matter 
 best fitted for their food.' 
 
 Pompiles. ' At the fuU age they live on flowers ; but their 
 larvse are carnivorous, and their mothers always provide for 
 their nourishment by placing beside their eggs, in a nest pre- 
 pared for this purpose, the bodies of some spiders or caterpillars.' 
 
 Xylocopes. 'This insect lays its eggs in pieces of wood. 
 It makes on the free parts of pieces of wood — a vine pole, for 
 instance — a vertical hole, which becomes the entrance of a 
 passage, which the xylocopes digs to a great depth. When 
 
 1 Milne-Edwards, § 327. 
 
88 BOOK I. CHAPTER II. 
 
 this channel is of the required depth, the insect deposits in 
 the lower part a first egg and a certain quantity of alimentary 
 matter. It fixes above this egg a, transverse partition with 
 saliva and the powder of wood ; then above this partition it 
 lays a second egg, makes a new partition, and so on to the 
 entrance of this kind of well In fine, we may mention that 
 the xylocopes has taken care to pierce at the level of each 
 cell a passage perpendicular to the vertical direction of the 
 cells, and leading from the interior of the cell to the outer 
 surface of the piece of wood. In this manner the insect, when 
 once its metamorphoses are finished, can easily emerge from 
 its cell.'^ 
 
 2. Construction of nests. — It were needless to insist on the 
 marvels of the construction of nests ; let it suf&ce to cite some 
 examples^ 
 
 ' One of the most remarkable nests is that of the saya, 
 a little Indian bird near akin to our bullfinches. Its form 
 is nearly that of a bottle, and it is suspended on branches 
 so flexible, that apes, serpents, and even squirrels cannot 
 approach it ; but to render it more inaccessible to its numerous 
 enemies, the bird places the entrance to it underneath, so that 
 it can only itself enter it flying. Inside there are found two 
 chambers, one of which serves the female to hatch her eggs ; 
 the other is occupied by the male, who, while his companion 
 fulfils her maternal duties, cheers her with his songs.' ^ 
 
 ' The Sylvia sutoria, a charming tom-tit, takes two very 
 long lanceolated leaves of a tree, and sews their edges care- 
 fully together by overcasting, by means of a piece of flexible 
 grass in place of a thread. After this the female fills with 
 cotton the species of little sac thus formed, and places her 
 progeny in this soft bed.' 
 
 ' The loriot of our climes performs a similar act. . . . But 
 it is remarkable that it does not fasten its nest with grass, but 
 with ends of twine or cotton thread which it has stolen from 
 
 ^ Vnlpian (after E&unmr), Physiohgie du sysUme nerveux, p. 897. 
 ' Milne-Edwards, p. 240. 
 
THE FACTS. 89 
 
 a neighbouring house ; and the question is, how it did before 
 industry invented pack-thread or spinning.'^ 
 
 ' The crested grebe hatches its young in a veritable raft which 
 floats on the surface of our ponds. It is a mass of large 
 stalks of aquatic herbs ; and as these contain a very consider- 
 able quantity of air, and disengage besides in decaying various 
 gases, these gases, being confined by the plants, render the 
 nest lighter than the water. It is found floating on the 
 sxirface in solitary places, fiUed with tall rushes and great 
 reeds. There, in this improvised ship, the female on her 
 moist bed warms her young ; but if some disturber comes to 
 discover her, if anything threatens her security, the wild bird 
 plunges one of its feet into the water, and uses it as an oar 
 to remove its dwelling to a distance. The little boatman 
 conducts his frail skiff where he pleases. ... It is a little 
 floating isle.'^ 
 
 3. ViUa architecture. — Independently of nests, those useful 
 and necessary structures, actual pleasure-gardens are found 
 among birds. 
 
 'The cleverest of these hedge-makers, these Lenotres of 
 ornithology, is the speckled chlamydere, which much resembles 
 our partridge. The couple proceed with order in constructing 
 their grove. It is usually in a bare locality they place it, for 
 the sake of the sun and light. Their first care is to make a 
 causeway of rounded pebbles, nearly equal in size. AVhen the 
 size and thickness of this appear to them sufficient, they com- 
 mence by planting there a little avenue of branches. They are 
 seen bringing from the fields, with this view, smaU shoots of 
 trees about the same size, which they thrust firmly by the 
 thick end into the interstices of the pebbles. These birds 
 arrange the branches in two parallel rows, making them all 
 converge towards each other, so as to represent a hedge in 
 miniature. This improvised plantation is almost a metre in 
 length, and its size is such that the two birds can play or 
 walk abreast under the protection of its shade. 
 
 ' Pouchet, I'Univers, p. 143. " Ibid. p. 153. 
 
90 BOOK I. CHAPTER II. 
 
 ' The grove once finished, the loving couple begin to think 
 of embellishing it. Tor this end they wander aU round the 
 country, and steal every shining object they meet with, in 
 order to ornament its entrance. Shells with shining mother- 
 of-pearl are above aU the object of their desire. 
 
 ' If these collection-makers find in the country pretty birds' 
 feathers, they gather them and hang them instead of flowers 
 on the faded branches of their dwellings. It is even certain 
 that in their neighbourhood every brightly-coloured object 
 with which the soil is artificially strewed is immediately 
 removed by them. Gould (who discovered these groves) 
 informed me that if a traveller loses his watch, knife, or seal, 
 they are foimd in the nearest promenade of chlamyderes of 
 that district.'^ 
 
 III. Instincts . of society. 
 
 We shall not much insist on this third class of instincts, it 
 being less significant from our point of view, which is not to 
 find impulses in animals which should astonish ub, but to find 
 impulses which of themselves, spontaneously, and without 
 study, light upon the surest means for their satisfaction. This 
 innate finding of means, which cannot be attributed even to 
 the imitation of animals, for they are bom with it, ought 
 therefore to be put to the account of nature. In this sense 
 the social instincts have perhaps less value than the preceding 
 facts. Let it suffice us to distinguish two sorts of societies 
 among animals, the one accidental, the other permanent. ' In 
 the first class wUl be ranked the companies of hyenas and 
 wolves, which collect to hunt and then separate; those of 
 migratory animals (swaUows, pigeons, locusts, herrings), which 
 only unite for the journey, and separate at the end of it ; the 
 pleasure parties of paroquets, that assemble to bathe or playin the 
 water and then separate. In the other class wiU be reckoned 
 the well-known colonies of the beavers, wasps, bees, and ants.'^ 
 
 ' Pouohet, V Univers, p. 153. One of these groves has heen brought by Gould 
 to the British Museum. 
 2 Milne-Edwards, p. 244. 
 
THE FACTS. 91 
 
 The enumeration of facts contained in this chapter is far 
 from being so complete as would be necessary in a dogmatic 
 work, but it suffices for an essay of critical teleology such as 
 we have attempted here. The philosophical and critical 
 analysis of finality ought not to be swamped in the descrip- 
 tion of facts ; but, on the other hand, it might appear too dry 
 and abstract if we too much neglected this help. Between 
 these two extremes of excess and defect we have sought, and 
 we hope we have found, the just medium. We can now 
 resume the series of our inductions and, reasonings. 
 
CHAPTEE III 
 
 THE INDUSTRY Of MAN AND THE INDUSTRY OF NATURE. 
 
 "ITTE have in a previous chapter (chap, i.) founded the 
 ' ' existence of the final cause on this principle, that when 
 a complex combination of heterogeneous phenomena is found 
 to agree with the possibility of a future act, which was not 
 contained beforehand in any of these phenomena in particular, 
 this agreement can only be comprehended by the human 
 mind by a kind of pre-existence, in an ideal form, of the 
 future act itself, which transforms it from a result into an 
 end — ^that is to say, into a final cause. 
 
 Perhaps this conclusion will be found premature ; for, it 
 will be said, the agreement in question doubtless demands an 
 explanation, and no one pretends that adaptation is a pheno- 
 menon without cause, but to aflEirm that the cause of the 
 adaptation is precisely the future effect itself, in the form of 
 ideal anticipation, and that a complex combination cannot be 
 found in agreement with an ulterior phenomenon, without this 
 phenomenon being considered as itself the cause of that com- 
 bination, is precisely what is in question. On what do you 
 rely, we shall be asked, to give to this future phenomenon, 
 which only appears to us an effect, the privilege of a cause ? 
 Granted there is a cause ; but why should it be a final rather 
 than an efiBcient cause ? Whence do you derive this right to 
 seek the cause in the future rather than in the past ? 
 
 It must be confessed that, if experience had not given us 
 beforehand somewhere the type of the final cause, to all 
 appearance we never could have invented this notion. We 
 do not know beforehand and d, priori that every agreement 
 of a phenomenon with the future supposes an end ; but this 
 
THE INDUSTEY OF MAN AND THE INDUSTRY OF NATURE. 93 
 
 agreement requiring to be explained, we explain it after 
 the model which we find in ourselves, when we make some 
 combination with a view to the future. The foundation of 
 this conclusion, accordingly, as has always been thought, is 
 analogy. 
 
 Bacon recommends, when we wish to prove the existence 
 of a certain cause, to seek some fact in which this cause is 
 manifested in a very visible and entirely incontestable manner. 
 Those facts in which the cause sought is more salient than in 
 all others, Bacon calls dear or frerogative facts ; there are 
 numerous examples of them in the sciences. Now, for the 
 final cause we have before our eyes a fact which truly deserves 
 the name of a clear and po'erogative fact, namely, the fact of 
 human art. It is from this fact that we pass by way of 
 analogy to other facts, less evident, but similar. This trans- 
 ition common sense has effected from the earliest times with- 
 out the least scruple ; philosophy on this point has followed 
 common sense. Do strict reason and a sound logic authorize, 
 do they justify, such a procedure ? 
 
 It is objected that it is not allowable to pass by way of 
 analogy from the industry of man to that of nature ; that we 
 have no reason to think that nature acts in the production of 
 her works as man acts in the production of those proper to 
 him. Such is the objection of the Epicureans and of David 
 Hume, adopted later by Kant and by aU the Hegelian school. 
 
 It is important to remark, first, that this objection may 
 have two senses, and serve to establish two very different 
 conclusions. It can bear either against finality or against 
 intentionality. In the former case it would mean, as the 
 adherents of absolute mechanism maintain, that there is no 
 final cause at aU in nature, but only consequences and results. 
 In the latter case it would signify that there may be final 
 causes in nature, but that one is not bound to refer them, as 
 one does in the case of human works, to an intelligent cause ; 
 and that it is not proved that an acting cause cannot pursue 
 ends unconsciously. The first sense is that of Epicurus, and of 
 
94 BOOK I. CHAPTER III. 
 
 modern Positivism ; the second is that of Kant, Hegel, Scho- 
 penhauer, and all German philosophy. We have above, very 
 carefully distinguished these two problems. The question at 
 present is only about the first sense : it is about finality, not 
 intentionality ; it is not how the first cause acts, but whether 
 the second causes, as they are given to us in experience, act 
 for ends or not. Within these limits, is the analogy between 
 the industry of man and that of nature legitimate ? This is 
 at present the only question before us. 
 
 Either the preceding objection signifies nothing, or it con- 
 sists in placing in opposition to each other nature and man, 
 as two terms heterogeneous and without analogy. It consists . 
 in opposing as two worlds, the world of mind and the world 
 of nature, and in affirming that there is no passing from the 
 one to the other. In fine, this objection taken strictly would 
 mean that there are two creative causes, man and nature ; 
 that man has productions which are proper to him, and that 
 nature has them as well; that there are two industries 
 opposed to each other; and that, not knowing how nature 
 acts, we cannot attribute to it the mode of action of human 
 industry. 
 
 Eeduced to these terms, this objection evidently falls before 
 this very simple consideration, namely, that man is not out- 
 side of nature, opposed to nature, but that he himself forms 
 part of nature, — that he is a member, an organ, and in a 
 certain measure a product of it. His organism is adapted to 
 the external medium in which he lives. He undergoes and 
 accepts all the conditions of the physico-chemical laws ; these 
 laws are fulfilled in the organism itself as well as outside it. 
 Moreover, all the laws of life in general common to vegetables 
 and animals, and all the laws proper to animals, are fulfiDed 
 in him as in all the beings of nature. His soul is not inde- 
 pendent of his body: by perception and imagination he 
 plunges into purely organic life; reasoning and art are con- 
 nected with imagination, with memory, and with perception. 
 The pure reason itself is connected with all the rest ; and if 
 
THE INDUSTRY OF MAN AND THE INDUSTRY OF NATURE. 95 
 
 by the most elevated part of his being he belongs to a higher 
 world, by his roots he clings to the world where he lives. 
 
 Not only is man within nature, but his acts and works are 
 within nature, and thus human industry itself is within 
 nature. One is astonished to see nature and art constantly 
 opposed in the 18th century, as if art were not itself some- 
 thing natural.^ Wherein are the towns built by man less 
 within nature than the huts of beavers and the cells of bees ? 
 In what respect should our cradles be less natural than the 
 nests of birds ? In what respect are our clothes less natural 
 than the cocoons of the silkworms ? In what respect are the 
 songs of our artistes less natural than the song of birds ? 
 That man is superior to nature not only in the moral and 
 religious sphere, but also in the very sphere of industry and 
 art, is not doubtful ; it is not less true that on this last field, 
 save in degree, man comports himself entirely as a natural 
 agent. 
 
 This point well established, we have reduced to its proper 
 terms the induction which warrants us to transfer the final 
 cause from ourselves to nature. Experience, we shall say, 
 presents to us conspicuously in a given ^ case a real and 
 certain cause, which we call final cause ; is it not legitimate 
 to suppose the same cause in analogous cases, with a degree of 
 probability increasing and decreasing with the analogy itself ? 
 We do not, then, pass from one genus to another ; but in the 
 same genus, namely, nature, a certain number of homogeneous 
 facts being given, we follow the course of the analogy as far 
 as it can conduct us, and up to the point where it leaves us. 
 Such is, in truth, the inductive method which the human 
 mind foUows in affirming final causes outside of us.^ The 
 
 ' 'What else is art than the embellishment of nature? Thou canst add 
 some colours to adorn this admirable picture, but how couldst thou move ever 
 so little a machine, so strong and so delicate, if there were not in thyself, 
 and in some part of thy being, some art derived from that first art, some 
 resemblance, some outflow, some portion of that operative spirit that has made 
 the world ? ' — Bossuet, Sermons sur la mort. 
 
 ' M. Caro has objected to us {Journal dee savants), that there was no need to 
 
96 BOOK I. CHAPTER III. 
 
 detailed analysis of this method will enable us better to 
 understand its range and exactness. 
 
 We have said we must set out from the principle of human 
 industry, but, strictly speaking, we must go back farther still. 
 What we call human industry is not, properly speaking, a 
 fact, but is itself a mediate conclusion obtained by way of 
 analogy. Indeed, what passes in the soul of our fellow-men is 
 absolutely unknown and inaccessible to us, at least by way of 
 direct observation. We see only their acts and the external 
 manifestations of their feelings and thoughts. In calling 
 certain of these actions by the names of industry and art, we 
 mean that these actions are collected co-ordinations towards 
 an end, — that is to say, phenomena determined by the idea of 
 the future, and in which the consequent is the 'determining 
 reason of the antecedent. But this is only a supposition ; for, 
 not having any direct experience of the efficient cause of these 
 phenomena, we cannot absolutely affirm that that cause has 
 proposed to itself the end which it seems to pursue, nor even 
 that it has purposed any end. Sometimes we even err in 
 thinking that we see an end where there is only blind 
 mechanism. For instance, I have somewhere^ quoted the 
 case of an old curate who had become insane, and who used 
 to recite with the utmost eloquence the famous exordium of 
 Father Bridaine. To hear him, it would have been impossible 
 not to suppose that he knew what he was doing, and that his 
 object was to move his auditors. And yet with him it was 
 
 set out from the fact of human industry to establish the final cause outside of 
 us, that we affirmed that cause directly and immediately in view of organized 
 beings. ' But then an d, priori principle of final causes must be admitted, 
 which we have refuted (preUminaiy chap.). Otherwise, if the final cause is an 
 induction, we must start from a fact in which the fact of foresight and pre- 
 ordination is given us immediately in experience ; but that only takes place in 
 the human consciousness. Externally and objectively we only see phenomena 
 that ^succeed each other, and nothing warrants us to say that that which pre- 
 cedes is preordained by that which follows. However, human industry is only 
 the first thread of the induction that makes us pass irom ourselves to that 
 which is not we. And supposing that men do not always pass by this inter- 
 mediary, we have the right to make use of it for the complete strictness of the 
 reasoning. 
 
 ' Le cerveau et la pensie, chap. vii. p. 140. 
 
THE INDUSTKY OF MAN AND THE INDUSTRY OF NATURE. 97 
 
 an act entirely automatic, for not only was he insane, but had 
 reached the last stage of what is called senile dementia, which 
 is entire imbecility ; he was unable to say two sensible words, 
 and even to utter them, and yet the old mechanism still went, 
 and seemed still to have the same adaptation to an end. We 
 see from this instance how true it is that our belief in the 
 intelligence of our fellows is an induction, and even a simple 
 belief founded on analogy, so much so that in some cases this 
 belief is contradicted by facts. 
 
 How, then, do we come to suppose intelligence and finality 
 in our fellow-men ? Evidently by comparison with ourselves. 
 As the only really efficient cause which we know is ourselves, 
 so the only final cause that is immediately perceptible to us 
 is in ourselves. In certain cases, indeed, — for instance, in 
 voluntary actions, — we are conscious not only of an active force 
 that displays itself in us, but of a certain idea that serves to 
 regulate that active force, and in virtue of which we co-ordi- 
 nate the internal and subjective phenomena of our mind, and 
 consequently the corresponding motions of our organism. We 
 give the name of end to the last phenomenon of the series, in 
 reference to which all the others are co-ordinated : and this 
 co-ordination of phenomena and of actions is explained for us 
 in the simplest manner by the supposition of an anterior idea 
 of the end. I know very well, for instance, that if I had not 
 beforehand the idea of a house, I could not co-ordinate all 
 the phenomena whose conjunction is necessary to construct a 
 house. I know very well that it has never happened to me 
 to succeed in making a phrase by taking words at random 
 from a dictionary; I know that I have never succeeded in 
 composing an air by touching at random the keys of a piano ; 
 I know that even to succeed in forming a thought I must 
 collect divergent phenomena in a common idea ; I know that 
 I cannot co-ordinate the elements of matter in a whole, without 
 having previously formed an idea of that whole. In a word, I 
 know that with me every induction, and every art, supposes 
 a certain end, a certain finality, or, as we have expressed 
 
 G 
 
98 BOOK I. CHAPTEK III. 
 
 ourselves, a certain determination of the present by the 
 future. 
 
 In truth, there occur in me — more rarely, doubtless, than in 
 the animals, but yet often enough — phenomena which present 
 co-ordinations similar to the preceding, without me being 
 conscious of the end which determines them. These actions, 
 which are called instinctive, have, therefore, as it seems, the 
 same character as voluntary acts, and yet nothing warrants us 
 to affirm that they are determined by the anterior idea of the 
 end, nor even that they are determined with reference to an 
 end ; for that is precisely what has to be demonstrated. 
 
 We reply that, just because these instinctive acts of human 
 nature are analogous to the phenomena of nature in general, 
 whose explanation we are seeking, it is not from them we 
 can set out to explain the others ; for that would be to ex- 
 plain obscurum per ohscurum. But apart from these instincts, 
 we find in ourselves, in a notorious and striking case, the 
 existence of a real cause, which is finality, and whose criterion 
 is the co-ordination of the present to the future in respect 
 of an anticipated idea: such is the character of voluntary 
 activity. 
 
 There is, therefore, at least one case in which the final cause 
 is established by experience, namely, the case of our personal 
 and voluntary activity. From this centre we can radiate 
 around ourselves ; and the first certain step which we take 
 beyond ourselves is to affirm intelligence, causality, desire, 
 and, finally, finality, in our fellows. 
 
 In fact, when we see in other men a succession of acts 
 co-ordinated as our own are in the case of voluntary activity, — 
 for instance, when we see a man walking in the street, speak- 
 ing, moving his limbs in a regular manner, bringing bodies 
 together with order and method, putting stones upon each 
 other, planks between the stones, iron between the planks, or 
 tracing characters on the sand or upon paper, marks upon 
 canvas, covering these marks with colour, cutting stone, giving 
 it this or that form, etc., — when we see, I say, all these actions. 
 
THE INDUSTRY OF MAN AND THE INDUSTRY OF NATURE. 99 
 
 although we were not present at the internal scene which 
 passes in the mind of these agents like ourselves, and although 
 by way of exception we might be mistaken, yet in the immense 
 majority of cases we are warranted to suppose — and we do 
 suppose with absolute certainty — that actions like all those we 
 have just mentioned, and which are themselves like our volurl- 
 tary actions, are actions determined by an end. We suppose, 
 therefore, in the case of other men the final cause as with 
 ourselves ; and this is a first and certain extension of the idea 
 of finality. 
 
 That is not all : we do not even need to witness the series 
 of actions of our fellows to conclude that there is an end ; 
 and, with time and habit, it suffices us to see the result of 
 them, to assume in the very product of hunian activity means 
 and ends. This is, in fact, one of the characteristics of human 
 activity, that it does not shut itself up within itself, that it 
 acts beyond itself on nature and on bodies. It is a fact that 
 bodies are susceptible of motion ; they can therefore be 
 brought together and separated ; they can be separated from 
 the combinations into which they naturally enter, in order to 
 enter into new combinations. And it is a very remarkable 
 fact, and of the highest importance for our subject, that these 
 bodies, although blindly obedient to the laws of nature, can at 
 the same time, without any violation of these laws, be co-ordi- 
 nated according to the ideas of our mind. Thus the stones 
 which form a house certainly obey the laws of gravity and.aU 
 the laws of mechanics, and yet they are capable of entering 
 into a thousand relations, all compatible with the laws of 
 mechanics, and which are yet predetermined by the mind. 
 
 But, we say, it is not necessary for us to witness the active 
 operation by which the intelligence and the wiU of our fellows 
 have given this or that form to matter. Experience soon 
 teaches us to recognise among the bodies which surround us 
 those that are the product of nature and those that result from 
 human art; and knowing that, as regards ourselves, it has 
 always been impossible to realize such products without having 
 
100 BOOK I. CHAPTER III, 
 
 willed them, — that is to say, without having' had an end, — we 
 accustom ourselves to regard them immediately as means for 
 ends. Thus, as writing is for us only a means of expressing 
 thought, we suppose, when we see unknown characters, — for 
 instance, the cuneiform, — that they must have been means of 
 expression, graphic signs to express thought. As we do not 
 rear buildings by chance and without knowing why, we sup- 
 pose, when we see buildings such as the Pyramids or the 
 Celtic menhirs, that they have been constructed for an end ; 
 and we inquire what it can have been. In a word, in all the 
 works of human industry we see means and ends ; and even 
 when we cannot discover what the end is, we are persuaded 
 that there is one. 
 
 We regard it, therefore, as certain that, whether we consider 
 in others the course of their actions, or consider the products 
 of these actions, we see between these actions and our own 
 such a similarity, that we do not hesitate to conclude in 
 their case, as in our own, that every combination directed 
 towards the future implies an end. 
 
 If now we descend a step, we will see in the animals a 
 multitude of actions so like those of man that it is impossible 
 for us not to attribute them to like causes. Wherein does 
 the action by which an animal watches and pursues its prey, 
 lays snares for it, surprises and devours it, differ from the 
 action by which the hunter pursues and seizes that animal 
 itself? Wherein does the action by which the animal hides 
 itself, avoids the snares laid for it, invents ruses for its defence, 
 differ from the action by which the savage seeks to escape his 
 enemies, and the more complicated but analogous action by 
 which the general of an army retreats before the enemy ? It 
 is the same with the most of the animal actions by which the 
 beasts seek the satisfaction of their wants. These wants 
 being the same as with man, although simpler, the means 
 which satisfy them must be also the same. Hence those 
 analogies which have struck all observers. We are therefore 
 authorized to argue from man to the animal ; and since we 
 
THE INDUSTRY OF MAN AND THE INDUSTRY OF NATURE. 101 
 
 have seen that men act for an end, we are equally entitled 
 to conclude that the animals act for an end. 
 
 'Now, among the actions of animals we generally distinguish 
 two kinds. In the one, the animal seems to act like man by 
 a kind of reflection and foresight, having voluntarily arranged 
 beforehand the means for a desired end. What characterises 
 this sort of actions is that the animal does not perform them 
 at first with the perfection which it will attain later. It 
 learns, it becomes more and more skilful ; experience, habit, 
 comparison, seem to have a share in the formation of its 
 judgments. Such, at least, is the case according to observers 
 favourable to animals. This first sort of actions would there- 
 fore be, except in degree, analogous to the deliberate and 
 voluntary actions of the human race. 
 
 But there are other actions, which it is said differ essen- 
 tially from the preceding, although as complicated and pre- 
 senting exactly the same character, namely, the adaptation of 
 certain means to the satisfaction of a want. Here there is no ' 
 education, at least apparently nothing to indicate the successive 
 efforts of a mind which is being formed and is learning, — 
 nothing that is peTsonal to the individual. The animal seems 
 from the first to act as it will act all its life ; it knows things 
 without having learned them; it performs very complicated 
 and precise operations with perfect correctness, almost infal- 
 libly and immutably. 
 
 Thus in the second kind of actions, called instinctive, all 
 that we are accustomed to regard as characteristic of intel- 
 ligence is awanting, — ^progress, fallibility, individuality, hesita- 
 tion-^in a word, liberty. May there be, then, a kind of 
 intelligence of which we have no idea ? Have the animals 
 a kind of innate knowledge, and, as it were, a reminiscence 
 analogous to that of which Plato dreamed 1 Have they innate 
 habits ? We do not know, and in our ignorance of the real cause 
 of these astonishing actions, we do not seek to form any idea of 
 it, and call that hidden cause instinct, whatever it may be. 
 But if, in their origin, in their cause, these actions differ from 
 
102 BOOK I. CHA.PTEE III. 
 
 human actions, in their intrinsic and essential nature they do 
 not differ. On the contrary, among animal actions it is just 
 these which most resemble the most complicated actions of 
 human industry. Indeed, they are not merely actions, they 
 are also productions ; not only does the animal walk, fly, 
 sing, draw near or flee, take or bring, but besides, like a 
 veritable workman, it makes the forces and elements of nature 
 subserve its wants. Like man, it builds ; like man, it weaves 
 and lays snares ; like man, it gathers and makes storehouses ; 
 like man, it prepares an abode for its young ; like man, it 
 makes itself pleasure-houses, it makes itself clothes ; in a 
 word, it exercises all the industries. Thus these instinctive 
 actions are at once very different from the actions of man as 
 to their origin, and very similar as to the matter of them. 
 Now what characterises the actions of man is to act know- 
 ingly for an end. As to the actions of which we are speak- 
 ing, everything leads to the belief that they are not done 
 knowingly. But apart from this difference, the similarity is 
 entire. It therefore remains to be said that, without knowing 
 it, these animals act for an end. Thus the end which we 
 had already recognised in the intelligent actions of animals 
 cannot disappear merely because we here meet with a new and 
 unexpected condition, namely unconsciousness. Instinct, then, 
 will reveal to us an unconscious finality, but still a finality. 
 
 True, we may be stopped here by some one who might say 
 to us, that as soon as we, by hypothesis, remove every previous 
 idea of the end, with all foresight, and consequently all 
 intelligence, the word finality no longer represents anything 
 whatever, and there is nothing else than the effect of a given 
 mechanism ; that, consequently, the sequence of our induc- 
 tions and analogies necessarily stops where intelligence stops ; 
 that, of course, intelligence proposes an end to itself, but that, 
 apart from intelligence, nothing remains but causes and effects. 
 On this supposition it would be granted that man acts for an 
 end ; that the animal itself, when it is guided by intelligence 
 and appetite, acts for an end ; but when it acts instinctively, 
 
THE INDUSTRY OF MAN AND THE INDUSTRY OF NATURE. 103 
 
 it would be maintained that it no longer has an end, and that 
 then its actions are developed exclusively according to the 
 law of causality. 
 
 But who does not see that the difficulty raised would only 
 decidedly avail against those who should believe themselves 
 obliged to admit an unconscious finality at the origin of 
 things, but not against those who admit an ordaining intel- 
 ligence ? For, in order that an object may appear to us as a 
 collection of means and ends> that is, as a work of art, it is 
 not at all necessary that the intelligence reside in it ; it is 
 enough if it be apart from it in the cause that has produced 
 it. Thus, in an automaton we do not fail to recognise means 
 and ends, although the automaton, properly speaking, acts 
 without an end ; for we know that the intelligence which is 
 not in it is without it, and that what it cannot foresee of 
 itself has been foreseen by another. In the same way, sup- 
 posing that in the animal there is not a certain occult force 
 virtually containing the power to act for an end, — supposing^ 
 with Descartes, that the animal, so far as it acts instinctively, 
 is a mere machine, and is destitute of all internal activity, — 
 even in this case we would not have to conclude that its 
 actions are not co-ordinated with reference to an end, since 
 the intelligence which was not in it might very well be outside 
 of it, in the first cause that had made it. 
 
 But we have no need here to raise these questions ; we 
 have not to interrogate ourselves on the nature and the cause 
 of instinct, and, in general, on the primary cause of finality. 
 We do not yet inquire whence it comes that there are ends in 
 nature ; we inquire whether there are any — whether such a 
 fact, such an act, and such an operation, ought to be called by 
 this name. Now why should the same fact, exactly the same, 
 produced by means strictly similar (although the operation be 
 instinctive, in place of being voluntary), be called in this case 
 an evd, in that a result ? Why should the web of the work- 
 man be an end, the web of the spider a result ? Why should 
 men's granaries be an end, and the granaries of animals a 
 
104 BOOK I. CHAPTEE III. 
 
 result ? the houses of men an end, the cabins of beavers a 
 result ? We therefore believe ourselves warranted to say that 
 if intelligent actions are directed towards an end, the same 
 actions, when they are instinctive, are equally directed towards 
 an end. 
 
 It may be urged that it is not true that the same action 
 which has an end when it is voluntary, must equally have 
 one when it is involuntary ; for it is precisely so far as it is 
 voluntary that it has an end. We begin by moving our limbs 
 without an end, before moving them voluntarily for an end : 
 the infant cries without an end, before crying voluntarily for 
 an end. To act for an end is to transform a natural action 
 into a voluntary one — no volition, no end. But, considering 
 matters more closely, it would seem that these first motions 
 or first cries are considered fortuitous and without an end, not 
 because they are involuntary, but because they are unre- 
 gulated, spontaneous, without direction, while the voluntary 
 motions have an order, rule, and direction. Now this is 
 precisely what instinctive motions have in common with 
 voluntary, — they are not irregular movements, like those of 
 the infant which moves in its cradle ; they are combined 
 motions, and, rigorously calculated, absolutely similar (except 
 as to origin, which we ignore) to voluntary motions. Thus 
 the motions of the ant, which goes for food and returns laden 
 to the storehouse, are quite similar to the movements of the 
 peasants, who go to make their hay and reap their harvests, 
 and bring them to their barns ; and the motions of the animal 
 which swims without having learned, are exactly the same as 
 those of man, who only learns to swim slowly and with many 
 efforts. 
 
 Thus instinct supposes an end. But let us advance a step. 
 We have passed from our personal finality to finality in 
 other men, from finality in the industrious actions of other 
 men to finality in the industrious actions of animals, whether 
 these actions present the appearance of some foresight and 
 reflection, or appear to us absolutely automatic. We have 
 
THE INDUSTRY OF MAN AND THE INDUSTRY OF NATURE. 105 
 
 now to pass from the external actions of the animal, which 
 are called its instincts, to its internal operations, which are 
 called its functions. This is the kernel of our whole deduction. 
 
 On reflection, it will appear that these two kinds of opera- 
 tions, instincts and functions, are not essentially distinct from 
 each other ; and it is as difi&cult to separate instinct from 
 function properly so called, as it is to distinguish intelligence 
 from instinct in the animal. The name of instinct is applied 
 more particularly to certain acts of the organs of relation, that 
 is to say, of the locomotive organs ; and so far as these acts 
 are constituted by a series of phenomena always the same in 
 all the individuals of the same species, we give the name of 
 instinct to that chain of automatic acts forming a determinate 
 whole. But wherein does this special chain differ from that 
 other chain of acts which is called a function ? Wherein 
 does the art of weaving a spider's web differ from that of the 
 singing of birds ? and wherein does the art of singing differ 
 from the art of seizing, of swallowing, and of distribution, 
 ■which constitute the art of self - nutrition ? Is there not 
 visible in both cases a series of phenomena connected in a 
 constant manner and following a systematic order ? and is not 
 this systematic connection in both cases a co-ordination of 
 phenomena with reference to a future phenomenon, which is 
 the preservation of the animal ? Whether the animal take 
 its prey in a snare, like the spider, or take it by means of its 
 talons, and then tear and swallow it, like the lion, each of these 
 phenomena is of the same order as the preceding ; and if it 
 were correct to say that instinctive operations have an end, it 
 win be equally correct to say that all the functions, which are 
 themselves only instinctive operations, have one as well. 
 
 German philosophy has thought to establish a great dif- 
 ference between the industry of man and vital industry in 
 this, that in the works of man^ the agent is outside his work, 
 
 ' "We will have occasion to revert to this question farther on (see Book ii. 
 chap. ii. 0/ Unconscious Finality) ; we only handle it here in its relation to our 
 present investigation. 
 
106 BOOK I. CHAPTEE III. 
 
 which cannot modify itself; while, in the works of nature, 
 the agent is hidden in the very midst of the organism, and 
 transforms it from within and not from without. This dif- 
 ference, long ago specified by Aristotle, is perhaps more 
 apparent than real, and does not concern our present question. 
 Many functions that are internal in certain animals are 
 external in others, and it would be very difficult to say where 
 function commences, where industry. Incubation, which is 
 internal in the viviparous, is external in-the oviparous animals. 
 Does the hen which hatches its eggs exercise a function or an 
 industry ? To hatch its eggs or promote the hatching of them 
 by the heat of its body, like the hen, or to hatch the eggs and 
 afterwards to promote the development of the young by the 
 heat of the nest, are these essentially different phenomena ? 
 Are not the internal incubation of the viviparous, the external 
 incubation of the oviparous, and artificial incubation by nidi- 
 fication, the same degrees of one and the same instinctive 
 function ? In fine, what is even human industry but a 
 development of function ? What is a function but an internal 
 industry ? What do the teeth perform but a process of grind- 
 ing, the heart but a work of pumping, the stomach but a 
 chemical labour ? And reciprocally, what do we do when we 
 wear spectacles, when we apply a trumpet to our ear, when 
 we employ the cesophagic sound, or even when we take a 
 stick, but prolong externally the internal function ? And 
 wherein do these external means differ, except in coarseness, 
 from the instruments created by nature itself ? 
 
 Since we can reproduce each of these operations by 
 artificial mechanical agents, why should not each of these 
 operations be a mechanical industrial operation ? Hence it 
 follows that function being identical with instinct, instinct 
 with the industry of man, it will be strictly true to say of 
 function what is true of the industry of man — namely, that 
 it is a series of phenomena determined beforehand by a last 
 phenomenon which is the reason of it ; in other words, that it 
 is a chain of means adapted to an end. 
 
THE INDUSTRY OF MAN AND THE INDUSTRY OF NATURE. 107 
 
 There remains, however, a profound difference between 
 functional industry and human — namely, that artificial in- 
 dustry constructs the machines it has need of to perform its 
 operations, while the animal functions are only the operations 
 of machines already constructed. Thus man makes pumps, 
 but the animal has received from nature a natural pump, 
 the heart, to cause the blood to circulate; man makes 
 spectacles, but the animal has received ready made from 
 nature the eyes, which are veritable spectacles, etc. This 
 difference is considerable. But let us ascend to the origin 
 of these natural machines. "Whatever be the cause that has 
 constructed them— be it the soul itself, as the Animists will 
 have it, the vital force of the Vitalists, the nature of the 
 Pantheists, the immediate act of a creator God, or even 
 matter with its primordial properties — is of little conse- 
 quence ; in any case this cause, in constructing these machines, 
 has performed a series of operations entirely resembling 
 those of a workman constructing analogous machines. What 
 difference is there between the act by which nature has 
 created a crystalline, and the act by which man constructs 
 lenses ? What difference between the act by which nature 
 creates molar teeth, and the act by which man makes mill- 
 stones ? What difference between the act by which nature 
 makes fins, and the act by which man creates instruments 
 of natation ? 
 
 There are two differences : the first is that nature does not 
 know what it is doing, while man does ; the second, that in the 
 one case the implements are internal, in the other external. 
 But these differences do not destroy the profound analogies of 
 the two kinds of action ; and there still remains in both cases 
 a creation of machines. Now, how could the same machine 
 be considered here as a collection of means and ends, there 
 as a simple coincidence of causes and effects ? How should 
 the construction of an apparatus for flying infer in the case 
 of man, if it were discovered, a miracle of genius and 
 invention, so complicated is the problem, so difficult in this 
 
108 BOOK I. CHAPTER III. 
 
 case to adapt the means to the end ; and yet the solution 
 of the same problem, found by nature itself, be the simple 
 effect of a coincidence of causes 1 Can we thus assign two 
 absolutely opposite causes to two absolutely identical actions ? 
 
 As regards the two differences mentioned, let us notice 
 first, that, between the unconscious industry which creates the 
 organs and the human industry which creates the machines, 
 there is placed an intermediate phenomenon, the instinctive 
 industry of the animals. This industry is unconscious like 
 the first, and it is external like the second. Like human 
 industry, instinct creates for the animal supplementary 
 apparatus, which are appendices of organs ; like the vital 
 force, instinct is unconscious, and does not know what it is 
 doing. Is not the vital force (and I mean by that the 
 unknown cause, whatever it be, that creates the organs) 
 itself an instinct that assimilates the elements of external 
 matter, to make of them the apparatus necessary to the 
 execution of its functions 1 And what does it matter 
 whether these apparatus be internal or external ? Do they 
 change their character by being inseparable from the animal 
 itself, that is, by being entirely bound to the organic machine, 
 so as at once to profit and to suffer from all that happens 
 to the whole system ? 
 
 Yet once again, then, I do not ignore the differences 
 between nature and art, and I will have occasion to revert to 
 them later, but they do not signify here. Doubtless human 
 works have not in themselves the principle of their motion, 
 while nature, as Aristotle rightly says, and above all living 
 nature, has in itself the principle of its motion and its rest. 
 But the question, To what point is a being endowed with 
 internal and spontaneous activity ? is of a different order 
 from this. Whether are there in that being means and ends ? 
 Now in both cases, in the works of art as well as in those of 
 nature, there is a twofold common character : 1st, The relation 
 of the parts to the whole ; 2d, The relation of the whole to 
 the external medium, or the objects on which it behoves to 
 
THE INDUSTRY OF MAN AND THE INDUSTRY OF NATURE. 109 
 
 act. In a machine, as well as in a living being, each of the 
 parts has meaning and value only by its relation to the 
 general idea of the machine. There is no part which has not 
 its reason in the whole. As Aristotle has said, the whole is 
 anterior to the part ; and Kant himself has recognised in this 
 respect the identity of nature and art. Now, is not that the 
 essential and distinctive character of finality ? It is not, then, 
 the more or less of internal activity or of spontaneity that is 
 here in question ; it is that pre-established harmony of the 
 part and the whole, which, common at once to the works of 
 art and to the works of nature, confers upon them, on the 
 one as on the other, an incontestable character of finalitj'. 
 Besides, they both suppose external conditions which are 
 prearranged for them. If we invoke vitality^ with the 
 Germans, in order to explain the phenomena o^ life, it may be 
 found that such a cause greatly resembles the occult qualities 
 of the Middle Ages ; but whatever may be the worth of this 
 cause otherwise, it does not exclude the existence of mecha- 
 nism in the living organism, and does not destroy any of the 
 analogies we have instanced above. Doubtless there is in the 
 eye something vital, without which it would not exercise its 
 functions : an artificial eye could not see ; but, vital or not, 
 the eye is none the less an optical instrument, a camera 
 obscura, exactly constructed according to the laws of physics ; 
 the crystalline, all living as it is, is none the less a lens ; and 
 all our organs, without ceasing for a moment to be living, are 
 none the less at the same time mechanical agents strictly 
 appropriated. Be it vitality ; still it is the case that this 
 vitality acts like a clever artist, that it prearranges all the 
 
 ^ 'There is a wonderful agreement between the functions of the different 
 organs. . . . But when we imderstand the essence of the organiam, we find 
 that this industrious harmony is a necessary sequel of vitality.' — Hegel, Phil, 
 de la nature, % 246. — Encydopcedie dee sciences physiques, p. 350. It will be 
 noticed, besides, that it is not in order to deny the final cause that Hegel here 
 introduces the vital principle, but in order to place within, and not without the 
 living being, the cause of the finality therein manifested — a question which we 
 do not here discuss. (See below, on Immanent Finality, the second chapter of 
 Bopkii.) 
 
110 BOOK I. CHAPTER III. 
 
 parts conformably to the idea of the whole — in other words, 
 that it obeys the law of finality, which is for us at present 
 the only subject of discussion. 
 
 By a course of analogical inductions, we have tried to prove : 
 1st, That our fellow-men act for an end; 2d, That the animals, 
 when they obey intelligence and feeling, act for an end ; 3d, 
 That instinctive actions are directed towards an end; 4th, 
 That the functions themselves, so analogous to the instincts, 
 are equally directed towards an end. What remains to be 
 proved in order to exhaust the series of our inductions is, 
 that not only the operations of the organs, but even the 
 formation of these organs, again supposes the idea of an 
 end. Now, to achieve this last step, we need only call atten- 
 tion to the identity of function with the creative act of the 
 organism. It may be said of the animal what has been said 
 of the world, that conservation is only continued creation. 
 In effect, what difference is there between the nutritive 
 act whereby the animal continually repairs the waste of its 
 organs, and the creative act whereby it produces these organs 
 themselves ? Between these two acts, and uniting them to 
 each other, is found the phenomenon of regeneration in 
 mutilated organs. Every one knows the fact of the regenera- 
 tion of nerves, the reproduction of the feet of the salamander, 
 and the still more astonishing reproduction of the half of the 
 body in the planaria. What are these phenomena but the 
 development of that repairing force which is manifested in 
 nutrition, which during a part of life is at the same time an 
 extensive force, for the animal grows in proportion as it 
 repairs itself ? Now, between the phenomena of regeneration 
 and the phenomena of formation, is there anything but a 
 difference of degree ? The force which for the first time 
 produced the foot of the salamander, must have acted in the 
 same manner as the same force when it reproduced that 
 same amputated foot. And, in fine, the nutritive function 
 itself is only this same force of reparation applied to pre- 
 serve the organ once formed. In fine, if conservation is here 
 
THE INDUSTRY OF MAN AND THE INDUSTRY OF NATURE. Ill 
 
 only a continued creation, we may say that all the forms 
 which the act of conservation takes in the animal — function, 
 instinct, reflecting industry, science, and art — are only degrees 
 of one and the same force; and consequently, such as it 
 shows itself in its most elevated state, that is, proportioning 
 means to an end, such is it in its origin. Finality is there- 
 fore its essence, its true definition. 
 
 It is not necessary to pass beyond humanity in order to 
 find all the degrees through which this force passes before 
 arriving at its highest degree, which is voluntary and reflecting 
 finality. In the voluntary act — for instance, the act of an 
 engineer who invents a machine — we have the consciousness 
 both of the end to be reached and of the means which con- 
 duct to it ; in the act of passion, like that of the soldier who 
 mounts to the assault, we have consciousness of the end 
 without consciousness of the means ; in the instinctive act, 
 4ike that of the child pressing the breast of the nurse, there 
 may be consciousness of the act, that is, pleasure, but there is 
 consciousness neither of the end nor of the means. In the 
 organic act, like the nutritive act, it is the same ; but there 
 is, none the less, co-ordination to^^ards an end : in repro- 
 duction the mother works, without knowing what she is 
 doing, at an image like the parents. Thus ascending from 
 function to function, from art to art, we always find ourselves 
 guided by the thread of analogy to the first formation of 
 organized beings, which (in whatever fashion we may imagine 
 it) can only have been, like the actual formation, a certain 
 choice of means adapted to an end. 
 
 Thus, then, human industry is not an exceptional phenomenon 
 in nature; it is the last degree of a series of analogous 
 phenomena, which one after another, with a growing and 
 decreasing consciousness, present themselves to us with a 
 character essentially identical, namely, the co-ordination of 
 the present to the future. This character, grasped by our 
 consciousness, attests to us the existence of finality : finality, 
 therefore, co-exists everywhere with it, 
 
112' BOOK I. CHAPTER III. 
 
 A single point is left us to examine to complete the 
 demonstration. Our whole reasoning rests upon analogy. 
 But what is the logical worth of reasoning by analogy ? We 
 have not here to examine in an abstract and general manner 
 the theory of analogy.. It will suffice us to find in experience 
 a striking and decisive proof of the force of this mode of 
 reasoning. This proof we find in the certitude which the 
 belief in the intelligence of our fellow-men gives us. On the 
 one hand, it is certain that it is by an analogical reasoning 
 that we affirm intelligence in our fellow-men ; on the other 
 hand, it is undeniable that this belief equals in certitude any 
 other of our affirmations. Analogy may therefore have a 
 force of proof equal to that which any of our faculties of 
 knowledge can give. 
 
 When we pass from ourselves to our feUow-men by way of 
 induction, it is certain that this induction is only an ana- 
 logical induction, for, however like us other men may be, they 
 ■yet differ sufficiently to constitute each one a different indi- 
 viduality ; and what renders still more remarkable the incom- 
 parable certitude of this induction is, that a single case suffices 
 us to conclude regarding all : ab uno disce omnes. We only 
 know ourselves ; we therefore only know a single individual, 
 and we conclude without exception regarding all the indivi- 
 duals like us. Thus, before affirming that all the individuals 
 of a species have this or that organization, anatomists dissect 
 a very great number of them ; here, on the other hand, we 
 can never directly observe more than a single being, and that 
 alone suffices.^ This, then, is a conclusion obtained by way 
 of analogy, equal in certitude to our most warranted affirma- 
 tions. It is even a very remarkable fact that no sceptic to 
 my knowledge has ever explicitly called in question the intel- 
 
 ^ If it he said that this combination is not a reasoning by analogy, but a 
 veritable induction, since we go from the same to the same, I reply that other 
 men are not precisely the same beings as I, and that the distinctive characters 
 of the individuality are so salient in humanity that they constitute truly notable 
 differences : likeness prevails, but it is mixed with many differences. Besides, 
 to conclude from the likeness of apparent qiialities to the likeness of hidden 
 
THE INDUSTRY OF MAN AND THE INDUSTRY OF NATURE. 113 
 
 ligence of other men. If Descartes could say that there is 
 at least one certain truth, — namely, I think, therefore I exist, 
 — we may likewise say that it is about as certain that other 
 men think and that they exist. 
 
 Now, if we ask ourselves why we suppose that other men 
 think, we shall see that it is in virtue of the principle of final 
 causes. In effect, what is it that experience shows us in the 
 actions of other men, but a certain number of phenomena co- 
 ordinated in a certain manner, and bound not only together, 
 but also to a future phenomenon more or less remote ? Thus, 
 when we see a man prepare his food by means of fire, we 
 know that this assemblage of phenomena is connected with 
 the act of taking food ; when we see a painter drawing lines 
 on a canvas, we know that these apparently arbitrary acts are 
 connected with the execution of a picture ; when we see a 
 deaf mute making signs which we do not understand, we 
 believe that these gestures are connected with a final effect, 
 which is to be understood by him to whom he makes them ; 
 in fine, when men speak, we see that the articulations of 
 which a phrase is composed are co-ordinated to each other so 
 as to produce a certain final effect, which is to awaken in us 
 a certain thought and sentiment. Now we cannot see such 
 co-ordinations, whether actual or future, without supposing a 
 special cause for them ; and as we know by internal experience 
 that with ourselves such co-ordinations only take place under 
 the condition that the final effect is previously represented in 
 our consciousness, we suppose the same thing in the case of 
 other men ; in a word, we suppose for them the consciousness 
 of an end, a consciousness reflecting more or less, according as 
 the circumstances more or less resemble those that accompany 
 in ourselves the reflecting consciousness. 
 
 qualities is precisely what is called analogy. In fine, when we hear a strange 
 tongae spoken, or find characters of unknown writing, we do not the less cer- 
 tainly conclude from them the intelligence of the men who have spoken those 
 languages or traced those characters. Now, here it is evident that the reasoning 
 is analogical, since the data are neither languages nor signs that we know and 
 use ourselves, but only analogous signs. 
 
 H 
 
114 BOOK I. CHAPTER III. 
 
 Thus, when we affirm the intelligence of other men, we 
 affirm a truth of indisputable certitude ; and yet we only 
 affirm it on the ground of analogy, and of analogy guided by 
 the principle of final causes. 
 
 When we pass from our personal intelligence to that of 
 other men, it might still be said, strictly speaking, that that is 
 a veritable induction, and not an analogy, the limit between 
 these two processes being besides vague and undecided ; but 
 it is not the same when we pass from' man to the animals. 
 Here the reasoning is incontestably analogical, and yet it 
 gives results which are still of a sufficient certitude to leave 
 no doubt in practice. It is thus that men are entirely per- 
 suaded that there is feeling in animals, and even in a certain 
 measure intelligence ; and it is those who know them best 
 who have the firmest conviction on this point. The paradox 
 of Descartes on animal machines has not found acceptance 
 with any philosophical school, and those that reject it most of 
 all are precisely those most opposed to final causes. Now it 
 is only by analogy that we pass from man to the animal ; 
 analogy is therefore capable of giving a very high degree of 
 certainty and of conviction. 
 
 But if analogy has guided us hitherto with a degree of 
 exactness which no one disputes, why should it cease to have 
 the same demonstrative force when we pass to kindred pheno- 
 mena, very like those that have authorized our first inductions — 
 namely, from intelligence to instinct, from instinct to function, 
 from function to the very construction of the living machine ? 
 We need not go back upon the series of phenomena we have 
 set forth above. It is enough for us to have shown the 
 certainty of the analogical method in the two first degrees of 
 this descending induction ; the same certainty must apply to 
 the cases following. 
 
 In a word, if, notwithstanding the divergence of the forms, 
 we are warranted to say that the polyp is an animal as well 
 as man, whatever be the abyss that separates the one from 
 
THE INDUSTRY OF MAN AND THE INDUSTRY OF NATURE. 115 
 
 the other, we are not less warranted to say that the crystalline, 
 a natural lens, is a work of art, by the same right as the 
 artificial lens made by the optician. Be this art conscious or 
 unconscious, external or internal, it matters little ; the same 
 object, identically the same, cannot be here a machine, there 
 a freak of nature. And if we admit, what can hardly be 
 denied, that it is a machine, we admit at the same time that it 
 is a means adapted to an end ; we admit the existence of the 
 final cause. 
 
 "We have tried to reproduce with some exactitude the argu- 
 ment of common sense, which consists in inferring from the 
 industry of man the industry of nature. This argument can 
 be reduced to this well-known principle : the same effects are 
 explained by the same causes ; eorundem effectuum ecedem 
 sunt causcB. Experience shows us in a certain and precise 
 case the existence of a real cause, namely, the final cause ; in 
 all similar or analogous cases we infer the same cause, at 
 least so far as the differences noticed between the facts do 
 not warrant us to call in question the existence of such a 
 cause. Now there is not any difference between the facts 
 noticed which warrants this doubt, for the only two that we 
 have noticed is that human art is on the one hand conscious, 
 and on the other external to its products, whUe the art of 
 nature is unconscious, and within its products. But this 
 second difference rather implies a superiority than an inferiority, 
 it implies more perfect machines and a more profound art; 
 and as to the first, it would only be an argument against the 
 final cause if we affirmed that the art of nature has not an 
 intelligent cause, which we do not do. It would only, there- 
 fore, avail against those who admit an instinctive finality at 
 the origin of things, and not against us, who by no means take 
 in hand to defend this hypothesis, and who have only left 
 it provisionally in suspense by a simple concession, and in 
 order not to complicate the CLuestion. 
 
 Thus the two differences which exist between human art 
 
116 BOOK I, CHAPTER III. 
 
 and the art of nature do not weaken in any way the force of 
 the principle laid down, namely, that the same effects are 
 explained by the same causes. The final cause is therefore a 
 real cause, attested hy internal experience, and residing object- 
 ively in all organized productions, as well as in the works of 
 human art. 
 
CHAPTEE IV. 
 
 ORGAN AND FUNCTION. 
 
 rriHE whole series of preceding inductions rests on the pre- 
 -*- sumed analogy of the industry of nature and human 
 industry. Is this analogy, justified by theory, justified also 
 by science ? This the course of these studies now leads us to 
 examine. 
 
 The ancient physiology, following the footsteps of Galen, 
 was chiefly occupied with what was called the lise of parts, 
 that is, the appropriation of organs to functions. Impressed 
 above all by the admirable agreement manifest between the 
 form of a given organ — for instance, the heart — and its use, 
 it followed this preconceived idea, that in every organ the 
 structure reveals the use, just as in human industry the 
 structure of a machine can a priori reveal its destination. In 
 this view, anatomy was the true key of physiology, and the 
 latter was only its handmaid. By means of the scalpel, the 
 true form and structure of organs was discovered, and from 
 thence the uses of these organs were deduced. Sometimes 
 this method led to great discoveries, as happened to Harvey 
 in regard to the circulation of the blood. At other times it 
 led to error. Most frequently men thought they divined what 
 in reality they did nothing but observe. But we may con- 
 ceive what a considerable part the principle of final causes 
 played in this way of regarding physiology. 
 
 If we are to believe the present masters of physiological 
 science, this method, which subordinates physiology to anatomy, 
 which deduces the uses and functions of structure from the 
 organs, and which is consequently more or less inspired by the 
 principle of final causes, is exhausted ; it has become barren. 
 
118 BOOK I. CHAPTER IV. 
 
 and a more philosophic and profounder method has had to be 
 substituted for it. It is said to be contrary to observation to 
 affirm that the structure of an organ reveals its function. 
 Even did one thoroughly know the structure of the liver, it 
 were impossible to infer the use of it, or at least one of its 
 uses, namely, the secretion of sugar. The structure of the 
 nerves would never show that these organs were destined to 
 transmit either motion or sensation. Besides, the same func- 
 tions may be exercised by organs the most diverse in structure. 
 Eespiration, for instance, is performed in one case by lungs, in 
 another by gills ; among certain animals it is effected by the 
 skin ; among plants, by the leaves. EeciprocaUy, the same 
 organs serve in different animals to accomplish the most 
 diverse functions. Thus the sound, which in fishes is the 
 true analogue of the lungs of the mammalia, scarcely, if at all, 
 serves for respiration, and is only an organ of support and 
 equilibrium. In fine, in the lowest animals the organs are in 
 no way differentiated. One and the same homogeneous and 
 amorphous structure virtually contains the aptitude to produce 
 all the vital functions — digestion, respiration, reproduction, 
 locomotion, and so on. 
 
 From these considerations M. CI. Bernard^ concludes that 
 the structure of organs is only a secondary element in 
 physiology, and still more, that the organ itself is again only 
 a secondary object, and that we must go farther, more in 
 advance, penetrate deeper, in order to discover the laws of 
 life. Organ, as well as function, is only a result. Just as 
 bodies in inorganic nature are always more or less composite 
 bodies, ■which chemistry reduces to simple elements, so the 
 organs of living beings ought to be reduced to their elements ; 
 and just as chemistry only became a science when it learned 
 thus to distinguish the simple from the composite, so physiology 
 has only begun to be a science since it has tried to reach the 
 elementary principles of the organs. This revolution was 
 effected by the immortal Bichat. He first conceived the idea 
 1 CI. Bernard, Lei tissue vivants. 
 
ORGAN AND FUNCTION. 119 
 
 of seeking for the elements of the organism, M'hich he calls the 
 tissues. The tissues are not organs : a single organ may be 
 composed of several tissues ; a single tissue may serve for 
 several organs. The tissues are endowed with elementary 
 properties, which are in them inherent, immanent, and specific : 
 it is no more possible to deduce d, priori the properties of the 
 tissues, than it is possible to deduce those of oxygen ; observa- 
 tion and experience can alone discover them. The sole object, 
 accordingly, of philosophical physiology is to determine the 
 elementary properties of the living tissues. It is for descrip- 
 tive physiology to explain how the tissues are combined in 
 different organs according to the different species of animals, 
 and to infer the functions from those elementary properties of 
 living nature of which they are only the results. Wherever 
 such a tissue occurs, it occurs with such a property : muscular 
 tissue will always be endowed with the property of con- 
 tractility ; nervous tissue will always be endowed with the 
 property of transmitting sensations and motions. However, 
 even the tissues, again, are not the ultimate elements of the 
 organism. Beyond the tissue there is the cell, which is the 
 true organic element; and thus the functions of the organs 
 are found to be nothing more than the diverse actions of the 
 cells composing them. Hence it is evident that the form and 
 structure of the organ, however important it may be from 
 the point of view of descriptive physiology, plays merely a 
 secondary part in philosophical or in general physiology. 
 
 Another physiologist, M. Ch. Eobin,^ likewise puts forth 
 ideas on this matter analogous to those of M. CI. Bernard, 
 but he carries them much farther. The former, in fact, 
 beyond the physical explanation, permits the metaphysical 
 explanation to remain, and even more than once calls atten- 
 tion to the necessity of it ; the latter absolutely suppresses 
 all metaphysical explanation, and reduces all to the physical. 
 He especially contests the assimilating of the organism to a 
 machine. This was the idea which was formed regarding it 
 1 Seirue des cours scientijiques. Ire serie, t. i. 
 
120 BOOK I. CHAPTER IV. 
 
 in the school of Descartes ; such was also the definition given 
 of it by a celebrated English physician, Hunter, who said : 
 'The organism is reducible to the idea of the mechanical 
 association of parts.' This theory, according to M. Kobin, 
 cannot be maintained in the present state of science. It 
 leads, in fact, to the admission that there can be organism 
 without life. Thus, according to Hunter, a corpse, so long 
 as its elements are not dissociated, would be organized as 
 well as a living body. This is an entirely false view. The 
 organism cannot exist without its essential properties ; and it 
 is the combination of these properties in action that is called 
 life. It is, besides, easy to show that mechanical structure is 
 only one of the consequences of the organism, but is not the 
 organism itself. The case of fossils sufficiently proves it, for 
 in fossils, fonn and structure remain even when the immediate 
 substances which composed them have been destroyed and 
 replaced, molecule by molecule, by fossilization. There 
 remains no trace of the very matter of the animal or plant 
 which once lived, although the structure be mathematically 
 preserved to the smallest details. We touch a being which 
 we believe has lived — which is still organized — and we have 
 only dead matter before our eyes. Not only, according to 
 M. Eobin, can structure or mechanical combination subsist 
 without there being any organism, but reciprocally, the 
 organism can exist before there is any mechanical arrange- 
 ment. He sets up, in fact, a scale which shows us the 
 different degrees of the growing complication of organisms. 
 In the lowest degree are the anatomical elements, above are 
 the tissues, then the organs, then the systems of organs, and, 
 finally, the complete organism. An organism — for instance, 
 an animal of the higher order — is composed of different 
 systems of organs, whose acts are called functions; these 
 systems are composed of organs, which, in virtue of their 
 conformation, have this or that use; these organs, in their 
 turn, are composed of tissues, of which the arrangement is 
 called nature or structure, and which have properties ; these 
 
ORGAN AND FUNCTION. 121 
 
 tissues are reducible to organic elements, called cells, which 
 are sometimes found with a certain structure, that is, are 
 composed of different parts, such as the body of the cell, the 
 kernel, the nucleus, etc., and take the name of figv/rative 
 organic elements ; sometimes they are found without any 
 structure, as an amorphous, homogeneous substance, such as, 
 for instance, the marrow of bones, the grey matter of the 
 brain, and so on. 
 
 According to M. Eobin, that which essentially characterises 
 the organism is a certain mode of molecular association between 
 the immediate principles} Whenever this mode of molecular 
 association exists, the organized substance, with or without 
 structure, homogeneous or amorphous, is endued with the 
 essential properties of life. These properties are five in 
 number, — nutrition, growth, reproduction, contraction, inner- 
 vation. These five vital or essential properties of the living 
 being are not found in all living beings, but they may be met 
 with in any, independently of every mechanical structure. 
 The study of organs and of their functions is, therefore, only 
 the study of the different combinations of the organic elements 
 and of their properties. 
 
 Thus, yet once more, mechanical structure is not an essen- 
 tial element of the organism. If we consider at present the 
 vital properties, and the first of all, nutrition, we will see still 
 more clearly the essential difference existing between the 
 organism and a machine. For in a machine each of the 
 molecules remains fixed and immoveable, molecularly, without 
 evolution ; if any change of this kind be manifested, it brings 
 about the destruction of the mechanism. But, on the other 
 hand, this molecular mutation is the very condition of 
 existence of the organism. The mode of molecular associa- 
 tion of the immediate principles in the organism permits 
 the incessant renovation of the materials without causing 
 the destruction of the organs ; nay, more, what precisely 
 characterises the organism is the idea of evolution, of trans- 
 ' Chemical compounds, almost exclusively proper to organized beings. 
 
122 BOOK I. CHAPTEK IV, 
 
 formation and development — ideas which are all incompatible 
 and inconsistent with the conception of a mechanical structure. 
 If we sum up the general sense of the physiological theories 
 which we have just set forth, and which appear most to 
 correspond with the actual state of science, it will be seen 
 that not only is physiology freeing itself more and more in its 
 methods from the principle of final causes, but also that in 
 its doctrines it is tending to occupy itself less and less with 
 the form and structure of organs, and with their mechanical, 
 adaptation to function. These would now only be a sort of 
 literary considerations; science now only sees in organized 
 bodies, in the systems which compose these bodies, in the 
 organs which compose these systems, results and complica- 
 tions of certain simple elements or cells, the fundamental 
 properties of which are investigated as chemists study the 
 properties of simple bodies. The physiological problem is 
 therefore no longer, as in the time of Galen, the use or utility 
 of parts, but the mode of action of each element, as well as 
 the physical and chemical conditions which determine that 
 mode of action. According to ancient ideas, the object which 
 the scientist pursued in his researches was the animal, the 
 man, or the plant ; now, it is the nerve cell, the motor cell, 
 the glandular cell, each being viewed as endued with a 
 proper, individual, independent life. The animal is no longer 
 a living being — ^it is an assemblage of living beings ; it is a 
 colony : when the animal dies, each element dies one after the 
 other; it is an assemblage of little egos, to which some even 
 go so far as to attribute a sort of dim consciousness, analogous 
 to the obscure perceptions of the Leibnitzian monads. Occu- 
 pying this point of view, it appears that the celebrated 
 comparison of the philosophers between organs and the instru- 
 ments of human industry was only an old superficial idea, 
 which is of no use in the present state of science, and that 
 finality, so long abandoned in the physical and chemical 
 region, was destined also to become in physiology a secondary 
 and unimportant phenomenon. For if an amorphous sub- 
 
ORGAN AND FUNCTION. 123 
 
 stance is capable of self-nourishment, of self-reproduction, of 
 self-motion, — if, on the other hand, as in the nerves, one cannot 
 discover any possible relation between structure and function, 
 — what remains but to prove that in a given condition a given 
 substance has the property of self-nourishment, in another the 
 property of feeling, just as in chemistry it is proved that 
 oxygen has the property of burning, chloride the property of 
 disinfecting, etc. ? In a word, there now only remain causes 
 and effects, and nothing resembling means and ends. 
 
 While modern physiology, following the footsteps of Bichat, 
 neglects the structure and use of organs to consider physiological 
 elements and their properties, comparative anatomy, following 
 Geoffrey Saint Hilaire, in like manner turned from the forms of 
 organs to consider especially the anatomical elements^ and their 
 connections. Both seek the simple in the composite. Both 
 seek to determine these simple elements by relations of space 
 and of time, whether by describing their fixed place in the 
 organism, or by describing the consecutive phenomena which 
 are constantly connected with them. We recognise here the 
 rigorous method of modern science, whose endeavour is to 
 disengage itself more and more from every preconceived idea, 
 and which confines itself to proving determinate relations 
 between the facts and their constant conditions. 
 
 It does not pertain to philosophy to contest with science 
 its methods and principles ; and, besides, it is most true that 
 the object of science is to discover in the complex facts of 
 nature the simple facts that serve to compose it. In every 
 
 ' "We must distinguish the physiological or even anatomical elements, recog- 
 nised by modem histology, from what are called anatomical elements in the 
 school of G. St. Hilaire. The first case concerns the ultimate elements of tissues, 
 that is, the cells, spheroidal molecules which are in some sort the atoms of the 
 organized being. According to G. St. Hilaire, occupying the point of view of 
 zoology, the anatomical element is the elementary type of a given organ, as it is 
 fixed by its place in the organism. Be it, for instance, the fourth section of the 
 anterior member, it will become a hand, a, paw, a wing, or a fin, according to 
 circumstances, but is itself none of these organs, and is only characterised by its 
 connections. It is, therefore, a purely abstract and ideal element, while the cell 
 is a veritable element, concrete and evident to the senses. See in the appendix. 
 Dissertation IV, on G. St. Hilaire and Final Cannes. 
 
124 BOOK I. CHAPTER IV. 
 
 point of view, therefore, we cannot but encourage science in 
 the investigation of the simple elements of the organized 
 machine. But the question at issue is whether, because 
 science is self-interdicted from all investigations other than- 
 those that trace effects to their proximate causes, philosophy, 
 and in general the human mind, ought to limit themselves to 
 that research ; whether thought must be precluded from inves- 
 tigating the meaning of the spectacle it has before its eyes ; 
 and in particular, what the thought is that presided at the 
 composition of organized beings, or at least whether thought 
 really presided thereat. It is easy to show that this inquiry 
 is in no way excluded by the preceding considerations. We 
 have only, in fact, to suppose that the organism is, as we 
 think, a prepared work, arranged with art, and in which the 
 means have been prearranged for ends. Even on this hypo- 
 thesis it would still be true to say that science ought to 
 penetrate beyond the forms and uses of organs, to investigate 
 the elements of which they ai-e composed, and to endeavour 
 to determine their nature, whether from their anatomical 
 situation or from their chemical composition ; and it will be 
 the duty of science to show what are the essential properties 
 inherent in these elements. The investigation of ends does 
 not, then, exclude that of properties, and even supposes it ; 
 and the investigation of the mechanical adaptation of organs 
 no more excludes the study of their connections. If there be, 
 as we believe, a thought in nature (whether conscious or 
 unconscious, immanent or transcendent thought, matters little 
 at present), that thought could only manifest itself by material 
 means, linked according to relations of space and time ; and 
 science would have even then no other object than to show 
 the connection of these material means according to the 
 laws of co-existence or succession. Experiment, even aided 
 by calculation, can do no more, and all that goes beyond is 
 no longer positive science, but philosophy. It is no longer 
 science properly speaking ; it is thought and reilection, which 
 are quite different things. Doubtless philosophic thought 
 
OEGAN AND FUNCTION. 125 
 
 mingles always more or less with science, especially in the 
 sphere of organized beings ; but science rightly strives to dis- 
 engage itself more and more from it, and to reduce the problem 
 to relations capable of being determined by experience. It 
 does not follow from this that thought ought to abstain from 
 the investigation of the meaning of the complex things that 
 are before our eyes ; and if it find there something analogous 
 to itself, it should not be prohibited from recognising and 
 proclaiming it, because science, in its rigorous and legitimate 
 severity, prohibits itself from such considerations. 
 
 Seek, in short, some means to subject to experiment and to 
 calculation (the sole rigorous methods of science) the thought 
 of the universe, in case such a thought presided over it. 
 When intelligence has for its manifestation signs analogous to 
 ours, it can evidence itself by such signs.* But a work of 
 art, which by itself is not intelligent, and which is only the 
 work of an intelligence (or of something analogous), — this work 
 of art has no sign, no word to inform us that it is a work of 
 art, and not the simple result of complex blind causes. A 
 man speaks, and thereby we have the means of knowing that 
 he is a man ; but an automaton does not speak, and it can 
 only be by analogy, comparison, and inductive interpretation 
 that we can know that this automaton is not a freak of nature. 
 So is it with the works of nature : if they be the works of a 
 foreseeing thought, or, if you please, of a latent and hidden art 
 analogous to instinct, these works of nature have no means 
 of informing us that they are works of art, and it can only 
 be by comparison with our own that we judge them to be so. 
 
 Accordingly, thought in the universe, supposing that it 
 manifests itself in some manner, could never be recognised 
 otherwise than in the way in which we claim to reach it, that 
 is, by analogical induction. It can never be an object of 
 
 ^ Berkeley goes so far as to maintain in Akyphron that nature is in the proper 
 sense of the word a language of God ; our sensations are the signs of the 
 mathematical properties of things to which they have no resemblance. But 
 this is a somewhat mystical conception, which could not be accepted without 
 many modifications and reservations. 
 
126 BOOK I. CHAPTER lY. 
 
 experiment and calculation, consequently science can always 
 place it out of account if it please ; but, because it may have 
 placed it out of account, and, in place of seeking the rational 
 signification of things, contents itself with showing their 
 physical connection, can it, without an inexplicable illusion, 
 believe -that it has scattered and refuted every teleological 
 supposition ? 
 
 To show, as it does, that these apparent machines are 
 reducible to elements endued with certain properties, is by no 
 means to prove that these machines are not the work of an 
 industry, or of an art directed towards an end. For that 
 industry (blind or not) on any hypothesis can only construct 
 machines by making use of elements whose properties are 
 such that, when combined, they produce the desired effects. 
 Final causes are not miracles ; they are not effects without 
 cause. It is, therefore, not astonishing that, in-a18cfending from 
 organs to their elements, one finds the elementary properties 
 whose combination or distribution will produce those com- 
 plex effects which are called animal functions. The most 
 subtle and learned art, even were it the divine art, will never 
 produce a whole, except by employing elements endued with 
 properties rendering possible that whole. But the problem 
 for the thinker is to explain how these elements can have been 
 co-ordinated and distributed so as to produce that final 
 phenomenon which we call a plant, an animal, a man. 
 
 Since we maintain as legitimate the old comparison of 
 human art and the industry of nature, let us show by an 
 example how the physiological theory of the vital elements in 
 no way excludes the hypothesis of finality. Suppose an 
 instrument of music, the use of which we do not know, and 
 which nothing tells us to be the work of human art, — could 
 not one say to those who supposed that it is a machine 
 adapted to serve the musician's art, that that is a superficial 
 and quite popular explanation ; that the form and use of the 
 instrument mean little ; that analysis, on reducing it to its 
 anatomical elements, sees nothing in it but a collection of 
 
OEGAN AND FUNCTION. 127 
 
 strings, wood, ivory, etc. ; that each of these elements has 
 essential and immanent properties ; the strings, for instance, 
 have those of vibration, and that in their smallest parts (their 
 cells) ; the wood has the property of resonance ; the keys in 
 motion have the property of striking, and of determining the 
 sound hy percussion ? What is there wonderful in this, it 
 would be said — that this machine should produce such an effect, 
 for example, as the production of a succession of harmonious 
 sounds, since it is certain that the elements composing it 
 have the properties necessary to produce that effect ? As 
 to the combination of these elements, it must be attributed 
 to fortunate circumstances which have brought about this 
 result, so analogous to a preconceived work. Who does not 
 see, on the contrary, that in thus reducing the complex whole 
 to its elements and their essential properties, nothing has been 
 proved against the finality that resides in the instrument, 
 because it really resides in it, and because this finality just 
 requires, in order that the whole may be fit to produce the 
 desired effect, that the elements should have the properties 
 they are seen to have. 
 
 The error of savants ^ is in believing that they have removed 
 final causes from nature, when they have shown how certain 
 effects result from certain given causes ; the discovery of e£B- 
 cient causes appears to them a decisive argument against final 
 causes. According to them we must not say ' that the bird 
 has wings to fly, but that it flies because it has wings.' But 
 wherein, I ask you, are these two propositions contradictory ? 
 Supposing that the bird has wings to fly, must not its flight 
 result from the structure of these wings ? Consequently, 
 because that flight is a result, has one the right to conclude 
 that it is not at the same time an end ? Would it then be 
 
 ' By this I mean the savants who deny final causes, in which there is far from 
 being tinanimity among them. When we can quote authorities such as Cuvier, 
 Blainville, Miiller, Agassiz, and so many others, it is permissible to say that 
 science is very far from proscribing final causes. According to M. Kchte, the 
 celebrated embryologist Baer was also very firmly decided for the teleological 
 conception. (See Ribot's Revue pldloaophique, t. iv. p. 549.) 
 
128 BOOK I. CHAPTEE IV. 
 
 necessary, in order to recognise final causes, that you should 
 see in nature effects without cause, or effects disproportioned 
 to their causes ? Pinal causes are not miracles.^ In order 
 that there be final cause, the first cause must have chosen 
 second causes precisely proper for the willed effect. Conse- 
 quently, what wonder that in studying these causes, you should 
 deduce mechanically from them the effects ? The contrary 
 would be impossible and absurd. Thus, explain to us as 
 much as you will, that, the wings being given, the bird must 
 fly ; that does not at all prove that it has not wings in order to 
 fly ; for I ask you in good faith, if the author of nature wished 
 that birds should fly, what better could he do than give them 
 wings? 
 
 Men of science are in general too much inclined to con- 
 found the doctrine of the final cause with the hypothesis 
 of a hidden force, acting without physical means as a Deus ex 
 macMnd. These two hypotheses, so far from coinciding, for- 
 mally contradict each other ; for he who says end, at the same 
 time says means — that is, a cause fit to produce such an 
 effect. To discover this cause is in no way to destroy the 
 idea of the end ; it is, on the contrary, to display the condition 
 sine qua non of the production of the end. 
 
 Final causes do not exclude, on the contrary, they require 
 physical causes ; reciprocally, physical causes do not exclude, 
 but appeal to final causes. Leibnitz has expressed this in 
 terms of remarkable precision. ' It is good,' he says, ' to con- 
 ciliate those who hope to explain mechanically the formation 
 of the first texture of an animal and of the entire mechanism 
 of the parts, with those who give an account of the same 
 structure by final causes. Both are good, and the authors who 
 follow these different ways ought not to abuse each other; 
 for I see that those who apply themselves to explain the 
 beauty of the divine anatomy, ridicule those others who 
 believe that a motion of certain liquids which seems fortuitous 
 
 ^ Positivism often confounds jmal causes with supernatural interpositions. 
 See in the appendix the discussion of this prejudice. 
 
ORGAN ANB FUNCTION. 129 
 
 can have made so beautiful a variety of members, and regard 
 those people as rash and- profane. And these, again, regard 
 the former as simple and superstitious, like those ancients 
 who regarded the natural philosophers as impious when they 
 maintained that it is not Jupiter who thunders, but some 
 matter found in the clouds. It would be best to conjoin both 
 considerations.^ 
 
 Nothing, then, has been proved against final causes, 
 when organic effects have been reduced to their proximate 
 causes and to their determining conditions. It will be said, 
 for instance, that it is not wonderful that the heart contracts, 
 since it is a muscle, and contractility is a;n essential property 
 of muscles. But is it not evident that if nature wished to 
 make a heart that contracts, it behoved to employ for this a 
 contractile tissue, and would it not be very astonishing were 
 it otherwise ? Have we thereby explained the skilful struc- 
 ture of the heart and the skilful mechanism shown in it ? 
 Muscular contractility explains the contraction of the heart ; 
 but this general property, which is common to all muscles, does 
 not suflBce to explain how or why the heart contracts in one 
 way rather than another, why it has taken such a form and 
 not such another. ' The peculiarity presented by the heart,' 
 says M. CI. Bernard, ' is that the muscular fibres are 
 arranged in it so as to form a sort of bag, within which is 
 found the liquid blood. The contraction of these fibres causes 
 a diminution of the size of this bag, and consequently an 
 expulsion, at least in part, of the liquid it contains. The 
 arrangement of the valves gives to the expelled liquid the 
 suitable direction.' Now the precise question which here 
 occupies the thinker is, how it happens that nature, employing 
 a contractile tissue, has given it the suitable structure and 
 arrangement, and how it rendered it fit for the special 
 and capital function of the circulation. The elementary 
 properties of the tissues are the necessary conditions of which 
 nature makes use to solve the problem, but they in no way 
 
 ^ Leibnitz, Ducours de mitaphynque (Opuscules inMits, 1857), p. 353. 
 
 I 
 
130 BOOK I. CHAPTER IV. 
 
 explain how it has succeeded ia solving it. Moreover, M. 
 CI. Bernard does not decline the inevitable comparison of 
 • the organism with the works of human industry, and even 
 ofte,n recurs to it, as, for instance, when he says : ' The heart 
 is essentially a living motor machine, a force-pump, destined to 
 send into all the organs a liquid to nourish them. ... At all 
 degrees of the animal scale, the heart fulfils this function of 
 mMhanical irrigation.' ^ 
 
 Moreover, we must, with the learned physiologist just 
 quoted, distinguish physiology and zoology. 'Por the physio- 
 logist, it is not the animal that lives and dies, hut only the 
 organic materials that constitute it. Just as an architect, with 
 materials all possessing the same physical properties, can 
 construct buildings very different from each other in their ex- 
 ternal forms, so also nature, with organic elements possessing 
 identically the same organic properties, has been able to make 
 animals whose organs are prodigiously varied.' In other 
 words, physiology studies the abstract, zoology the concrete; 
 physiology considers the elements of life,, and zoology living 
 beings such as they are realized, with their innumerable and 
 varied forms. Now, who constructs these forms ? Do the 
 materials of themselves unite and coagulate to give birth to 
 apparatus so complicated and skilful ? CI. Bernard here 
 again recurs to the old comparison drawn from architecture. 
 
 ^ Uo physiologist has more insisted on this comparison than M. Moleschott, 
 one of the chiefs of the new materialism. ' Like the steam engine, the human 
 machine only works if there be introduced into it combustibles, which, in burn- 
 ing, produce caloric, a part of which is converted into work. But this work is 
 not executed without resistance, which absorbs a considerable part of it. In 
 this respect the human machine surpasses all mechanisms hitherto produced by 
 industry. In fact, the work of this machine can, rise to the fifth of the mechanical 
 equivalent of the caloric produced, while other machines hardly obtain the half 
 of these results. — The human body is constantly in use, but the retort, which 
 they call the stomach, dissolves and prepares. ... It pours them into a very 
 long tube. . . . The blood, by means of a suction and force pump, waters all its 
 tuckers, its springs, its pistons, its wheels. . . . The combustibles behove to be 
 cut by scissors, crushed by millstones. ... To these mechanical processes of 
 division fall to be added the action of eight or ten chemical re-agents. ... A 
 chimney is not awanting to the human machine. . . . The circulation of the 
 blood is a problem of hydraulics. , . . The nerves serve as reins and spurs. ..." 
 etc. (See Sevue scientijique, 2e partie, t. i. pp. 487, 488). 
 
OEGAM AND FUNCTION. 131 
 
 ' We may compare,' he says, ' the histological elements to the 
 materials man employs to raise a monument.' In this case 
 we recall, with FiJnelon, the fable of Amphion, whose lyre 
 attracted the stones, and brought them together so as to form 
 of themselves the walls of Thebes. Thus it is that in the 
 system of materialism organized atoms unite to form plants 
 and animals. No doubt, in order that a house may exist, the 
 stones composing it must have the property of gravitation ; 
 but does this property explain how the stones form a 
 house ? 
 
 Not only must we distinguish physiology and zoology, but 
 in physiology itself we have still to distinguish, according to 
 the same author, descriptive and geTieral physiology. General 
 physiology investigates organic elements and their properties; 
 descriptive physiology must just take the organs as they are, 
 that is, as results formed by the union of organic elements. 
 Now these are results which will always call forth the wonder 
 of men, and which have not been explained by a reduction to 
 the elements. No doubt, so long as the anatomical or organic 
 elements are only in the state of elements, we do not perceive 
 in them the secret of the combinations which render them fit 
 to produce this or that effect ; and it is perhaps the same as 
 regards the tissues. But when the tissues are transformed 
 into organs, and the organs unite to form living individualities, 
 these combinations are something else than complications. 
 They are veritable constructions ; and the more complicated 
 the organism, the more it resembles skilful combinations, the 
 products of art and industry. The problem, therefore, remains 
 quite entire, whatever idea may be formed of the organism, 
 whether it be regarded as a mechanical or as a chemical com- 
 bination. Por in this last case it stiU remains to inquire how 
 this chemical combination succeeds in passing from that 
 amorphous state in which it is said to commence, to that 
 complicated and skilfully adapted structure which is seen in 
 all the degrees of the scale of living beings. 
 
 We admit that the structure or form of organs does not 
 
132 BOOK I. CHAPTER IT. 
 
 always reveal their functions. For instance, it has been found 
 possible by exact labour to determine the geometrical form of 
 the nerve-cells, composing as well the sensory as the motor 
 nerves ; but there is no relation between the shape of these 
 cells and their functions. What relation, for instance, can 
 there be between the triangular form and sensation, between 
 the quadrangular form and the motive influence ? These 
 relations are not even constant ; because in birds, for instance, 
 they present an arrangement precisely the reverse : there the 
 motor cells are triangular, and the sensory cells quadrangular. 
 Thus it appears that these forms have really little importance, 
 and that the function of the structure is not to be deduced 
 from them. That is evident ; but, on the one hand, the geo- 
 metric form ought not to be confounded with the mechanical 
 arrangement, and on the other, the structure itself ought to be 
 distinguished from the fact of adaptation.^ Thus, whatever 
 be the meaning of the shape of the nerve-cells, though it 
 had no relation to a given function, it is stOl the case that 
 the nerves must be so arranged as to put the centre in com- 
 munication with the organs, and these with the external 
 medium. This arrangement of convergence and divergence 
 from the parts to the centre, and from the centre to the organs, 
 has an evident relation to sensation and locomotion, which, 
 again, have a not less evident relation to the preservation of 
 the animal. Besides, even when the structure may not have 
 any meaning, the fact of adaptation remains none the less. 
 For example, 1 do not know whether the structure of the 
 salivary and mammary glands has any relation to the special 
 secretions produced by these two kinds of organs ; but were 
 there nothing of the kind, the fact of the salivary secretion 
 is none the less in a remarkable relation of adaptation and 
 agreement with the nutritive function ; and the secretion of 
 milk, which only appears at the moment when it is useful, 
 
 1 In fact, there may te chemical, physical, and dynamical adaptation, as well 
 as mechanical. For instance, the chemical combination which takes place in 
 the lungs, so suited to the support of life, is as much a phenomenon of adapta- 
 tion and_of finality as the structure of the valves of the heart. 
 
ORGAN AND FUNCTION. 133 
 
 and by a happy coincidence with the act of parturition, pre- 
 sents no less the most striking adaptation, the most startling 
 agreement with the telic result, which is the preservation of 
 the offspring. 
 
 We are far from maintaining that life is nothing but a 
 mechanical aggregate ; on the contrary, it is one of our 
 principles that life is superior to mechanism. But without 
 being itself a mechanical combination, it constructs for itself 
 mechanical means of action, so much the more delicate as the 
 difficulties are more numerous and complex. 'Life,' says 
 M. CL Bernard, ' resides exclusively in the organic elements of 
 the body: all the rest is only mechanism. The organs are 
 only apparatus, constructed with a view to the preservation of 
 the elementary properties. . . . These collections of organs, 
 which are called anatomical systems, are indispensable to the 
 play of the organism, but not to life itself. They only 
 represent simple mechanisms of precision, rendered necessary 
 by the complication of the mass of anatomical elements 
 which constitute the life of an organism more or less 
 superior. These systems are useful, but not indispensable to 
 the life of the cells. In fact, cells are known and observed 
 living absolutely in the external medium — for instance, the 
 monocellular animals. . . . But as soon as we pass from a 
 simple cell to a composite organism, we perceive that a 
 nervous system and a circulatory system become necessary ; 
 for how else could the elements placed in the interior, far 
 from the external medium, receive impressions from it ? ' ^ 
 
 Thus life creates and distributes into systems the organs of 
 which it has need, in proportion as it becomes complicated. 
 Who could give any name but that of art and industry 
 to this interior work of living nature ? And what else is this 
 work itself than a progressive adaptation ? The last word, 
 then, is always the same, and that word is finality. 
 
 Thus it signifies little to our point of view, it does not 
 even matter to it in any way, that the organism is essentially, 
 ' CI. Bernard, Revv,e dea corns scientifiques, 13 f^vrier 1875. 
 
134 BOOK I. CHAPTER IV. 
 
 and by definition, a mechanical combination. It is enough 
 for us to know that in most cases, and in proportion as it 
 becomes perfect, the organized substance creates for itself 
 mechanical agents in order to realize its functions. No doubt 
 the organized substance of which the eye, the heart, or the 
 wing is composed is not in itself a mechanical body; but 
 it is capable, by a virtuality which is in it, of forming for 
 itself instruments of action in which the utmost mechanical 
 skill is manifested; and this suffices for the philosophical 
 doctrine of finality. 
 
 It is not at random that the organized substance passes 
 from that homogeneous, amorphous, indeterminate first state, 
 which appears to be its beginning, to that state of skilful 
 ' complication in which it is seen in the superior animals. It 
 is according to a law, the law of the progressive perfecting 
 of functions at the rate of the progressive differentiation of 
 the organs. This is the law which M. Milne-Edwards has 
 ingeniously called the law of the division of labour} and to the 
 high importance of which, in the development of animals, he 
 has rightly drawn attention; but in the very expression of 
 this happy formula, who does not see how difiicult it is for 
 science to avoid this comparison of human labour and the 
 labour of nature, so evident is it that those two sorts of 
 labour are only degrees of one and the same thing ? In the 
 first instance, in humanity, as in the living organism, all the 
 wants, all the functions, are in some sort confounded ; the 
 diversity of functions commences with the diversity of organs 
 and of wants : the first division of labour is that which 
 nature has instituted. But in proportion as the wants mul- 
 tiply, the actions and functions of individuals separate, and 
 the means of performing these actions with more conveni- 
 ence and utility for man multiply in their turn ; human 
 industry, therefore, is nothing else than the prolongation and 
 development of the labour of nature. Thus nature makes 
 
 ^ Introduction de zoologie givArah (chap. iii.). See also Dktionnaire 
 classique d'histoire naturelie (1827), art. 'Organization des animaux.' 
 
OEGAN AND FUNCTION. 135 
 
 prehensile organs, the arms and the hands : industry lengthens 
 them by means of stones, sticks, bags, pails, and of all tools for 
 felling, digging, picking, trenching, etc. Nature creates organs 
 for the mechanical trituration of food : industry prolongs them 
 by its instruments, which serve to cut, to tear, and dissolve 
 that food beforehand, by fire, water, and all sorts of salts ; and 
 thus the culinary art becomes, as it were, the succedaneum of 
 the art of digestion. Nature gives us organs of motion 
 which are themselves mechanical marvels compared with 
 the rudimentary organs of molluscs and zoophytes ; human 
 industry prolongs and multiplies these means of locomotion 
 by means of the different motor machines, and of animals 
 employed as machines. Nature gives us protective organs ; 
 we add to them by means of the skins of animals, and by 
 all the machines which serve to prepare them. Nature, in 
 fine, gives us organs of sense : human industry adds to them 
 by innumerable instruments constructed after the same prin- 
 ciples as the organs themselves, and which are the means 
 both of remedying the failure and infirmities of our organs, of 
 increasing their range, and of perfecting their use. 
 
 It appears that the comparison that has always been made 
 between the industry of nature and human industry is not at 
 all superficial and metaphorical. This comparison is founded 
 on the certain fact, demonstrated by science, that human industiy 
 is only the prolongation, the continuation, of the industry of 
 nature, man doing intelligently^ what nature has done till 
 then by instinct. Eeciprocally, one can therefore say that 
 nature, in passing from the rudimentary state in which all 
 organized matter at first appears, to the highest degree of the 
 division of physiological labour, has proceeded exactly like 
 human art, inventing means more and more complicated in 
 proportion as new difficulties presented themselves for solution. 
 Take a gas — for instance, steam — endued with an elastic 
 
 ' Here again we must make a distinction : the first arts were only discovered 
 empirically, and the first inventions, without being absolutely instinctive, are 
 not the result of wise reflection ; it is only pretty late that inventions become 
 scientific. 
 
136 BOOK I. CHAPTER IV. 
 
 property ; to utilize this property for the performance of any 
 labour — this is the problem of the steam-engine. Or let it 
 be a liquid, called blood, and endued with a certain nutritive 
 and reparative property; to utilize this property by iinding 
 means to put this liquid in communication with the organs — 
 such is the problem of the circulatory system. In both 
 cases, nature and art begin with the most simple means ; in 
 both cases, nature and art rise to the most skilful, profound, 
 and thoughtful combinations. 
 
 To sum up. The doctrine of physiological mechanism or 
 determinism, taken in however strict a sense (and science 
 could not take it too strictly), does not exclude, and even 
 requires the hypothesis of thought and art as having super- 
 intended the development of living nature. The learned 
 physiologist, M. 01. Bernard, whose ideas we have just 
 been discussing, far from rejecting these conclusions, himself 
 admits them, and expresses them with still more authority than 
 we could have done, when he recognises a directive and organ- 
 izing idea} which rules and controls what he calls ' the mor- 
 phological evolution ' of the animal ; when he admits a vital 
 design^ which serves as type and plan for the formation and 
 development of the organized being; when he distinguishes 
 the material conditions that are the object of science, from 
 the veritable causes, entirely intellectual, which belong to 
 metaphysics : a profound distinction, which the author, without 
 perhaps knowing it, rediscovers after Plato,^ and which is the 
 knot of the problem of final causes. 
 
 But this theory of an organic idea, even taking from it 
 the government of particular phenomena, and only leaving it 
 the direction of the whole, has stiU appeared to M. Oh. Eobiu 
 too metaphysical an idea; and this savant has endeavoured 
 to push the mechanical explanation to its last consequences. 
 
 ■* CI. Bernard, Introduction d la medicine expirimentale, p. 162. 
 ^ Revue des Deux Mondes, 1875. 
 
 ' ' The cause is one thing ; tJiat vnthout which the cause would he no cause is 
 another* — -aXXa /zh ri iffrt TO a^riov, aXka S* Ixitvo avw ov to a^nav oiix, av u'v) 
 
 a'/nav. — Plato, Phcedo, ed. H. Etienne, 99. 
 
ORGAN AND FUNCTION. 137 
 
 Prom the views above expounded on the organism, M. Eobin 
 has thought he could derive a theory of the adaptation of 
 organs to functions ^ which would absolutely exclude all idea 
 of plan, induction, and art, and leave nothing remaining but 
 the principle of the conditions of existence.^ Adaptation, accord- 
 ing to him, is only one of those general phenomena of 
 organized matter which one may call, with Blainville, remlt- 
 phenomena. Of this sort are, for instance, vegetable or 
 animal calorification, heredity, the conservation of species, etc. 
 These phenomena are not the acts of a determinate and 
 particular apparatus ; they are results which sum up the 
 aggregate of the phenomena of living matter, and which 
 depend on the totality of the conditions of the organized 
 being. According to M. Kobin, physiology has become 
 able exactly to determine the conditions of this adaptation, 
 which has thereby become a positive fact ; and every hypo- 
 thesis regarding the finality of the organs is absolutely 
 useless. 
 
 He first discards a doctrine which he calls 'Aristotelian,' 
 which is that of the contemporary German physiology of 
 Burdach and of Mliller, and which M. CI. Bernard would 
 not repudiate — namely, that the egg or the germ is the 
 organism potentially.^ This doctrine does not perceptibly 
 differ, according to M. Eobin, from that of the ^preformation of 
 organs, or encasement of germs, developed in the 1 8 th century by 
 Bonnet, and which was already to be found in Leibnitz and 
 Malebranche. According to these philosophers, the germ 
 already contained the entire animal in miniature, and the 
 development could only be growth and enlargement. But to 
 
 ' De, V appropriation des organes aux fonctions. 
 
 ^ The Positivist school substitutes for the principle of ^final causes that of the 
 conditions of existence : no being can subsist without the conditions that render 
 it possible ; given these conditions, it will be ; in their absence, it wiU not be. 
 Nothing simpler ; but who is it that causes such conditions to be given ? 
 
 ' ' The germ is the whole in potentid; when it develops, the integral parts 
 appear im actu. In observing the egg in hatching, we see appear before our 
 eyes 'that centralization of parts emanating from a potential whole.' — Miiller, 
 Manud de physiol., trad. fran9. t. i. prol%. p. 20. 
 
138 BOOK I. CHAPTEK IV. 
 
 say that the egg is the animal potentially, is it not almost 
 saying the same thing in another form ? And how could it 
 be virtually the entire, animal, if it did not already contain 
 a certain preformation of it ? But experience appears abso- 
 lutely contrary to all these hypotheses. The germ, seen by 
 the most powerful microscope, presents no appearance of a 
 formed organism ; rather, in the first stage of their evolution, 
 all germs are identical, and there is no difference between 
 that of man and that of the animals placed lowest in the 
 zoological scale. In fine, on the hypothesis of preformation, 
 or the potential organism, all the organs ought to appear at 
 the same time, while experience shows us the organs forming 
 piece by piece by external addition, and coming into being 
 one after the other. Such is the doctrine of epigenesis, adopted 
 at present by embryology, and which has effectually banished 
 that of preformation. If this be so, it is not the whole that 
 precedes the parts, but the parts that precede the whole : the 
 whole, or the organism, is not a cause, it is only an effect. 
 What becomes of the hypothesis of Kant, Cuvier, Miiller, and 
 Burdach, who all agree in supposing that in the organism 
 the elements are commanded, conditioned, determined by the 
 whole ? What becomes of the creative, directive idea of 
 M. CI. Bernard ? This hypothesis is again refuted by the 
 fact that the deviations of the germ, whence monstrosities, 
 deformities, and congenital maladies are produced, are almost 
 as numerous as the normal formations; and according to the 
 energetic expression of M. Ch. Eobin, 'the germ oscillates 
 between life and death.' In fine, monstrosities themselves are 
 vital productions, which originate, develop, and live quite as 
 well as normal beings ; so that if final causes be admitted, 
 it must be admitted ' that the germ potentially contains as 
 strictly the monster as the most perfect being.' 
 
 These are powerful considerations, but they are not decisive. 
 To be able to say, in effect, that a house is a work of art, it 
 is in no way necessary that the first stone, the foundation- 
 stone, be itself a house in miniature, that the edifice be pre- 
 
ORGAN AND FUNCTION. 139 
 
 formed in the first of its parts. E"o more is it necessary that 
 that stone potentially contain the whole house — that is, that 
 it be inhabited by a sort of invisible architect, who, from this 
 first point oCappui, should direct all the rest. One may there- 
 fore renounce the theory of preformation without at the same 
 time renouncing finality. Eather it appears that the doctrine 
 of preformation would be still more favourable to the exclu- 
 sion of finality. For, given an organism in miniature, I 
 could easily comprehend that the growth and enlargement 
 should take place by purely mechanical laws. But what I do 
 not comprehend is that a juxtaposition or addition of parts, 
 which only represents external relations between the elements, 
 should be found, little by little, to have produced a work 
 which I would call a work of art if a Vaucauson had made it, 
 but which is much more complicated and delicate than one of 
 Vaucauson's automata. No doubt, even on the hypothesis of 
 preformation, it would still be necessary to explain the type 
 contained in the germ ; but for the same reason, it is needful 
 to be able to explain the type realized by the entire organism ; 
 and whether the animal be preformed or not, the problem 
 stiU remains the same. In the hypothesis of preformation, 
 the type appears formed all at once ; in that of epigenesis, 
 it is formed piece by piece. But from a work of art being 
 formed piece by piece, which depends on the law of time, 
 — the law of all temporal and perishable things, — it in no 
 way follows that it is not a work of art; and gradual evolu- 
 tion does not less require a directing and creative idea than 
 the sudden hatching of the whole, supposing that such a 
 hatching were possible. Thus, to be permitted to say with 
 M. CI. Bernard that a directing and creative idea governs 
 the organism, with MiiUerand Kant that the whole commands 
 and conditions the parts, it is not necessary that that idea 
 be designed beforehand to the bodily eyes in the primitive 
 nucleus of the future being. From my not seeing before- 
 hand the plan of the house, it does not follow that there is 
 none. In a picture done by a painter, the first lineaments or 
 
140 BOOK I. CHAPTER IV. 
 
 touches do not contain the whole picture, and are not its pre- 
 formation ; and yet here it is no doubt the idea of the whole 
 that determines the appearance of these first parts. So, too, 
 the idea may be immanent in the entire organism without 
 being exclusively present in the egg or the germ, as if the 
 initial point of the organism must have been in this respect 
 more privileged than the other parts of the living being. 
 
 As to the difficulty caused by deviations of the germ, it 
 would only be decisive against finality if the organism were 
 presented as an absolute whole, without any relation to the rest 
 of the universe, — as an empire within an empire, the imperium 
 in imperio of Spinoza. Only in this case could it be denied 
 that the actions and reactions of the medium have brought 
 about deviations in the whole. The organism is only a relative 
 whole. What proves it is that it is not self-sufficient, and that 
 it is necessarily bound to an external medium ; consec[uently 
 the modifications of this medium cannot but act upon it ; and 
 if they can act in the course of growth, there is no reason why 
 they should not likewise act when it is still in the state of 
 germ. There result, then, primordial deviations, while the 
 alterations taking place later are only secondary; and if 
 monstrosities continue to develop as well as normal beings, 
 it is because the laws of organized matter continue their 
 action when turned aside from their end, as a stone thrown, 
 and meeting an obstacle, changes its direction and yet pursues 
 its course in virtue of its acquired velocity. 
 
 The true problem for the thinker is not that there are 
 monsters, but that there are living beings ; just as what 
 astonishes me is not that there are madmen, but that all men 
 are not born mad, the work of constructing a thinking brain 
 being abandoned to matter which does not think. They would 
 not live, it will be said, were they born mad. I will also 
 say : How is it that there are men, and men who think ? 
 The germ oscillates, we are told, between life and death. Let 
 it oscillate as much as it wUl, still it becomes fixed, since the 
 species last; and from oscillation to oscillation nature has 
 
OEGAN AND FUNCTION. 141 
 
 come to create the human machine, which, in its turn, creates 
 so many other machines. Can the groping of a blind nature, 
 whatever it may do, go so far ? Even in humanity, groping 
 only succeeds in producing definite effects, and in profiting by 
 happy chances, on condition of being guided. It is thus, for 
 example, that empiricism, not science, has in preceding ages 
 discovered the most of our industrial processes. That is a 
 succession of happy chances if you please, and not an art 
 reflected on and systematically conducted; but at least it 
 needed some one to remark these happy chances and to repro- 
 duce them at will. It is stated that one of the most curious 
 improvements of the steam-engine is due to the thoughtless- 
 ness of a young child, who, wishing to go to play, invented I 
 kbow not what combination of pack-thread, which was after- 
 wards made use of. This was no doubt an accident : be it 
 so ; yet it is evident that it needed an intelligence to invent 
 this artifice, and it needed one also to notice and to imitate 
 it. Throw at random into a crucible all the elements of 
 which a machine is composed, and let them oscillate indefinitely 
 ' between monstrosities and death,' that is to say between 
 useless forms and chaos, they will oscillate thus to eternity 
 without ever assuming any precise form, and without even 
 producing the appearance of a machine. 
 
 M. Eobin attempts from his point of view the explanation 
 of the phenomenon, and appeals to the following facts : the 
 subdivision and individualization of the anatomical elements 
 engendered by each other, and their configuration, whence is 
 derived the situation they occupy beside each other ; the evolu- 
 tion to which they are subjected, no organ being at first what 
 it win be later, hence the successive appearance of cells, tissues, 
 organs, collections of organs, and systems; the primordial 
 consubstantiality of all the vital properties, which, being im- 
 manent in all organized matter, are found again in all the 
 metamorphoses of that matter; the molecular renovation by 
 way of nutrition, and the action of the internal or external 
 medium, whence by inevitable destiny results an accommoda- 
 
142 BOOK I. CHAPTER IV. 
 
 tion with that double medium ; in fine, the contiguity and con- 
 tinuity of the living tissues, whence originates the marvelloils 
 consensus which is remarked in the normal organism. Such 
 are the principal causes that explain, according to M. Eobin, 
 the adaptation of organs to functions, — causes, for the rest, 
 which we have gathered here and there from his work, for he 
 invokes sometimes the one, sometimes the other, without co- 
 ordinating them in a systematic and regular manner.^ 
 
 All these causes may be reduced to two principal : on the 
 one hand, the individualization or specification of the anatomic 
 elements, with distribution forcibly determined by their 
 structure, which explains the diversity of the organs, and 
 thereby the diversity of the functions ; on the other hand, the 
 contiguity of the living tissues, whence originates the con- 
 sensus or harmony of the living being in general. The other 
 causes are there to increase the number ; some explain nothing, 
 others are only the very thing to be explained. Indeed, the 
 molecular or nutritive renovation only serves for preserving 
 the organs, but does not explain their formation and adaptation; 
 as the action of the medium, internal or external, only serves 
 to limit and circumscribe the organic possibilities, and in no 
 way gives account of the determinate combinations. As to 
 the evolution of the organs, which are never at first ' what 
 they will be later,' as to the successive appearance of the 
 elements, tissues, organs, collections of organs and systems, 
 this is the very thing that has to be explained. We know 
 
 ^ An analogous explanation seems to have been given by Heckel, the chief 
 representative of transformism in Germany : ' The processes by which these three 
 layers of cells give birth to the most complicated organs reduce themselves in all 
 to — 1st, Segmentations, that is, the augmentation of the number of cells ; 2d, The 
 division of labour, or the differentiation of these cells ; 3d, The combination of 
 these cells differently developed. . . , All the final adaptations ought to be 
 considered as the natural and necessary consequence of co-operation, of the 
 differentiation and perfecting of the ceUs.' — Heckel et la doct. de Vivolution en 
 Allemagne, par Leon Dumont, p. 71. These words signify at bottom that 
 adaptation is explained by adaptation. For if all these operations are done by 
 causes purely physical, to which the existence and preservation of living beings 
 are absolutely indifferent, how is it that differentiation causes co-operation ? 
 Why should not the cells oppose each other, and by the conflict of their attri- 
 butes render life impossible ? 
 
ORGAN AND FUNCTION. 143 
 
 ■well that the organism in developing proceeds from the simple 
 to the compound, but how that compound, in place of be- 
 coming a chaos, is distributed into regular, co-ordinated, and 
 adapted systems, is precisely what we want to know. In fine, 
 the consubstantiality and the immanence of vital properties 
 (supposing that these words present a clear sense to the mind) 
 would explain, if you will, that all the organs are endued with 
 life, and all virtually possess these properties, but not how 
 they are divided and combined into special organs. There 
 remain, then, I repeat, the two causes we have mentioned. 
 
 If, meanwhile, we seek philosophically to give account to 
 ourselves of the nature of these two causes, we shall see that 
 they amount to saying that the succession explains the adapta- 
 tion, and the contiguity the harmony. Ever to substitute 
 relations of space and time for intelligible and harmonious 
 relations is the character of positive science, for these are the 
 sole conditions that can be determined by experiment and 
 calculation. That is a very legitimate work, but becomes a 
 usurpation when it pretends so to limit the range of human 
 thought. It is in the nature of the human mind, endued 
 with sensibility, only to conceive things by representing them 
 to itself by symbols of space and time. These are the 
 material conditions of thought ; but the question is, whether 
 thought is not quite another thing, and whether its proper 
 object is not precisely what is not represented by space and 
 time. 
 
 Thus the learned anatomist, whose ideas we are analyzing, 
 shows us the anatomical elements originating one from the 
 other with such a particular configuration, and, as they originate, 
 grouping in a certain way by reason of their structure. From 
 such a structure there must proceed, he says, a succession of 
 determinate acts. Now it is very true that the formation of 
 an organ cannot be comprehended without the successive 
 appearance of special elements formed after a certain fashion ; 
 but definite does not mean adapted, and the question still 
 remains, why these adapted acts are those which exist, and 
 
144 BOOK I. CHAPTER IV. 
 
 not others — why, for instance, the glands secrete licLuids useful 
 to the economy, and not poisons. The difficulty is not solved 
 by saying that if these acts were not quite compatible with 
 life, the animal would not live. For there is nothing con- 
 tradictory in the animal not living, that is, in its entire non- 
 existence ; the strange thing just is that it exists. The 
 history of embryological evolution, then, however interest- 
 ing, in no way destroys the inductions we have made from the 
 profound analogies of human art and vital art; for on both 
 sides there are special elements, formed in a definite manner, 
 and rendering possible the production of such and such acts. 
 In human art some one makes his choice between possibilities. 
 Why, then, in the vital art should the material substratum be 
 freed from the necessity of choice, and spontaneously find the 
 useful combination which is demanded by the interest of the 
 whole? In human works the material conditions are re- 
 cognised as impotent to co-ordinate themselves in relation to 
 a precise effect ; why should the material conditions in the 
 organism be endued with so marvellous a privilege ? To say 
 that, given the elements, it is a thing of course that they form 
 into tissues, and that, given the tissues, it is a thing of course 
 that they form into organs, is to say that, given silk threads, 
 they wiU arrange themselves into pieces of silk stuff, and that 
 when one has a piece of cloth, it is as if one had a coat. Now, 
 although cloth is fit to form a coat, and the threads of the 
 silkworm to form silk stuff, this fitness for a determinate act 
 is not equivalent to the production of the act, and something 
 more is needed. In human industry this motive cause is in 
 us ; in the industry of nature we do not see it, but it is as 
 necessary in this case as in the other. 
 
 I will say as much of the explanation which consists in 
 accounting for the vital consensus by the contiguity of the 
 organic parts : this is still to reduce an intellectual relation to 
 one external and material. To say that the harmony of the 
 living body is explained because the parts touch, is to say 
 that a coat is whole because it has no holes. The fit of the 
 
ORGAN AND FUNCTION. 145 
 
 coat to the body, and the correspondence of the parts, have no 
 relation to the continuity of the piece of stuff, for that con- 
 tinuity existed in the piece before it was made into a garment. 
 Continuity can explain, if you will, the sympathy of the 
 organs and the communication of impressions, but not the 
 correspondence and co-operation. In fine, contiguity again 
 could, in strictness, account for the adaptation of neighbouring 
 parts, — for instance, the articulation of the bones, — but not for 
 the common action of remote parts both at the same and at 
 different times. 
 
 To sum up. There is no contradiction between our prin- 
 ciples and the most recent scientific conceptions. No fact, no 
 law of nature warrants us to eliminate the final cause from 
 the human mind. Science, so far as it is science, is mute on 
 this problem. It remains to inquire whether the facts will 
 not admit of another interpretation than that which we have 
 given. 
 
CHAPTEE V. 
 
 THE CONTEAET FACTS. 
 
 A FTER having set forth the facts favourable to the 
 -^-^ doctrine of final causes, we must also examine the 
 contrary facts. 
 
 Natural history furnishes most of the reasons by which the 
 theory of final causes is supported ; but it equally furnishes 
 the objections. If the generality of the facts appears to 
 agree with the law, the exceptions are numerous enough to 
 deserve examination. 
 
 The theory rests on the strict adaptation of organ to func- 
 tion. But we have already seen that this adaptation, this 
 absolute correspondence, fails in many cases. In effect, it 
 often happens that the same organ fulfils several functions, 
 and, reciprocally, that the same function is accomplished by 
 different organs. 
 
 ' Numerous cases could be given amongst the lower animals 
 of the same organ performing at the same time wholly distinct 
 functions. Thus the alimentary canal respires, digests, and 
 excretes in the larva of the dragon-fly and in the fish cobitis. 
 In the hydra, the animal may be turned inside out, like a 
 glove, and the exterior surface will then digest and the 
 stomach respire. . . . Again, in the animal kingdom, two 
 distinct organs in the same individual may simultaneously 
 perform the same function. To give one instance, — there are 
 fish with gills or branchiae, that breathe the air dissolved in 
 the water at the. same time that they breathe free air in their 
 swim-bladders, this latter organ being divided by highly vas- 
 cular partitions, and having a ductus pneumaticus for the 
 supply of air. . . . The illustration of the swim-bladder in 
 
THE CONTRARY FACTS. 147 
 
 fishes is a good one, because it shows us clearly the highly 
 important fact that an organ originally constructed for one 
 purpose, namely flotation, may be converted into one for a 
 widely different purpose, namely respiration.'^ 
 
 ' The tail, a nullity in man and in the anthropomorphoid 
 apes, becomes prehensile and fulfils the office of a fifth hand 
 in the American monkeys, the sarigua, and the chameleon, 
 while it serves as basis, support, nay, as a foot, to the kangaroo 
 and the jerboa. An organ is not, therefore, characterised by 
 its use; for the same organ fulfils the most diverse parts, 
 and, reciprocally, the same function can be fulfilled by very 
 different organs. Thus, the nose and the tail may fulfil the 
 office of the hand ; the latter, in its turn, becomes a wing, an 
 oar, or a fin. . . . The ostrich has wings that could not 
 sustain it in the air, but which accelerate its pace ; those of 
 the penguin are fins ; those of the cassowary and of the 
 apteryx of New Zealand are so undeveloped that they are of 
 no use whatever.'^ 
 
 We willingly admit that there is not an absolute and neces- 
 sary correlation between organ and function. It is by starting 
 from this false hypothesis, says Milne-Edwards,^ that the 
 mistake has been made of denying to certain animals certain 
 properties, in default of finding in them the organs that one 
 is accustomed to see correspond to these properties. For 
 instance, Lamark denies sensation to polyps, infusoria, and 
 worms, and intelligence to insects, because in none of them 
 is found a brain, an organ necessary for these two functions 
 in the superior animals. The circulation in insects has also 
 been denied, in default of finding veins and arteries in them ; 
 but a profounder study of facts shows us that the function 
 does not always disappear with the organ destined to accom- 
 plish it, ' Nature arrives at the desired result in several 
 ways.' 
 
 1 Darwin, Origin of Spedea, 5th ed., pp. 227, 228. 
 
 * Oh. Martins, De Vuniti organique (Hev. dm Deux Mondes, 15th June 1862). 
 
 ' Introduction d la zoologie ginirale, chap. iy. 
 
148 BOOK I. CHAPTER V. 
 
 But we have seen'' that it is not at all hy chance that 
 these various adaptations are made, whether of a single organ 
 to several functions, or of several different organs to one an^ 
 the same function. It is in virtue, of a law or tendency, a 
 law perfectly rational and quite similar to that which directs 
 human art, and which Milne-Edwards has called the law of 
 economy. He expresses himself thus on this subject : ' When 
 a physiological property , , . begins to be realized in a series 
 of animals more and more perfect, it is at first exercised with 
 the help of a part that already existed in the organism of the 
 inferior species, and which is only modified in its structure 
 to be adapted to its special functions. Sometimes it is, so to 
 say, a common fund that furnishes to the different faculties 
 their first special instruments ; at other times it is a system 
 already destined to special uses from which the new function 
 borrows its organs ; and it is only after having exhausted fhe 
 resources of this kind that the creative power introduces into 
 the constitution of beings with organization still more perfect 
 a new element.' ^ 
 
 One can perfectly understand, in the light of these facts, 
 how the relation of organ and function is not the absolute, 
 strict relation that one is at first inclined to suppose. So 
 long as one and the same means may suffice, with certain 
 modifications, it is quite natural that nature should employ 
 it, and no industry would act otherwise. On the other hand, 
 when new conditions complicate the difficulty of a function, 
 it is no wonder that different means are employed for one and 
 the same act. Thus, the gills are in no way the analogue of 
 the lungs, although they fulfil the same functions, just as 
 horses are not the analogue of ships, although they fulfil 
 similar functions. In fine, . we can thus understand even 
 organs without function, For that certain pieces of the 
 organism have ceased to serve is no reason why they should 
 entirely disappear. The law of economy is only a particular 
 
 ' See chap. iii. 
 
 ^ Milne-Edwards, Introduction a la zoologie ginirale, chap, iv. 
 
THE CONTEARY FACTS. 149 
 
 application of the metaphysical principle of the simplicity of 
 ways, appealed to by Malebranche, or of the mathematical 
 principle of the least action, defended by Euler and 
 Maupertuis. 
 
 We have just spoken of organs without function. This is 
 a matter on which it is important to insist, for it is one of 
 those that have been most appealed to against final causes. 
 
 The organs that are useless, whether really or apparently, 
 are of two kinds. Some are complete organs, entirely like 
 the others, with this difference, that they seem of no use. 
 The others are incomplete organs, incapable of acting from 
 their very insufficiency, and which, for this reason, are called 
 rudimentary. 
 
 A. Useless Organs. — The first are few in number in the 
 present state of science. Almost all known organs have their 
 proper functions ; only a few oppose this law. The chief 
 of these organs in the higher animals is the spleen. It seems, 
 in effect, that this organ does not play a very important 
 part in the animal economy, for numerous experiments prove 
 that it can be extirpated without seriously endangering the 
 life of the animal. We must not, however, conclude from 
 this that the spleen has no functions ; and physiologists do 
 not draw this conclusion from it, for they are seeking them, 
 and are not without hope of finding them.^ An organ may 
 be of service without being absolutely necessary to life. 
 Everything leads to the belief that the spleen is only a 
 secondary organ ; but the existence of subordinate, auxiliary, 
 or subsidiary organs involves nothing contrary to the doctrine 
 of finality.^ 
 
 Darwin, on this point, comes to our aid, for in his system 
 it is as necessary to prove the utility of the smallest organs 
 
 ^ See Secherches awr les fonctions de la rate, by MM. Malarret and Picard 
 {Comptes rendus de VAc. des Sciences, 21st Dec. 1874 and 22d Nov. 1875). 
 For the development, see the lesson of M. Picard on the /unctions of the spleen 
 (Revue seientifique, 15th Nov. 1879, p. 468). 
 
 ' We must also add to the organs whose function is not known, the suprarenal 
 capsules, the thyroid, and the thymus. In the case of these different organs we 
 
130 BOOK I. CHAPTER V, 
 
 as in the teleologic system. ' "We are much too ignorant,' he 
 says, ' regarding the whole economy of any one organic being 
 to say what slight modifications would be of importance or 
 not. . . . The tail of the giraffe, for instance, looks like an 
 artificially-constructed fly-flapper, and it seems at first incred- 
 ible that it has been adapted for its present purpose for so 
 trifling an object as to drive away flies. Yet we should 
 pause before being too positive even in this case ; for we 
 know that in South America the geographical distribution and 
 existence of cattle and other animals absolutely depend on 
 their greater or less power to resist the attacks of insects, 
 so that individuals which could by any means defend them-i 
 selves from these small enemies might spread into new 
 pastures, and thus gain a perpetual advantage over rival 
 varieties. It is not that our present gi'eat quadrupeds are 
 actually destroyed by flies, but they are constantly harassed 
 and exhausted, so that they become more subject to disease, or 
 less capable, in case of dearth, of seeking their food and of 
 escaping beasts of prey.'^ 
 
 The same is the case with characteristics the most super- 
 ficial in appearance — colour, for instance. 'When we see,' 
 says Darwin, 'leaf-eating insects affecting a green colour, 
 others which feed on bark a dappled grey, the Alpine ptar- 
 migan (snow partridge) white in winter, the red grouse the 
 colour of heather, and the black landrail the colour of peat, 
 we must believe that these particular shades are useful to 
 these species, protecting them against certain dangers.'^ 
 
 If characteristics so superficial as colour may be of great use 
 to the animal, we need be in no haste to afiBrm that this or that 
 organ is absolutely useless. Thus, in all the preceding cases 
 the explanation derived from our ignorance appeared suffi- 
 
 ean reply, as in that of the spleen, that because we do not know their function, 
 we must not conclude that they have none. As to the last of these organs, every- 
 thing leads to the belief that it is a fcetal organ, or, at least, relates to the func- 
 tions of early infancy, for it usually disappears at the period of puberty. 
 
 i Darwin, chap. vi. § 6, pp. 239, 240. 
 
 = Jbid. chap. iv. § 2, p. 97. 
 
THE CONTKAEY FACTS. 151 
 
 cieut ; and we may have recourse to it as well, for example, 
 as astronomers might, for the apparent exceptions that con- 
 tradicted Newton's law. The law of the utility of organs 
 and of their adaptation being verified in an infinite number 
 of cases, it would be far from reasonable to call it in question 
 because it failed in some particular instances, for it seems 
 probable that it is rather our science than nature that is 
 at fault. 
 
 B. Budimentary Orgam. — However, if it may be maintained 
 with advantage that in many cases the uselessness of organs 
 is only apparent, and is. explained by our ignorance, it is not 
 so when the organs, by their very structure, evidently mani- 
 fest their own uselessness. This is the case in the organs, 
 called rudimentary, the number of which is considerable, and 
 which seem to be the stumbling-stone of finality. 
 
 Here are examples : ' The woman bears on her bosom the 
 two breasts destined to nourish the new-born chUd; in the 
 man the breasts are not developed, but the two nipples exist. 
 Many mammifers, horses especially, can shake their skin, and 
 thus drive away the flies that trouble them. There is a 
 membranous muscle attached to the skin that shakes it 
 thus. This muscle is not awanting in man, — ^it extends along 
 the neck, — ^but is without use ; we have not even the power to 
 contract it voluntarily, and it is therefore useless as a muscle. 
 The mammifers called marsupials, such as the kafigaroos, the 
 sariguas, the thylacines, — in a word, all the quadrupeds of 
 Australia, — are furnished with a pouch, situated before the 
 abdomen, where the young live during the period of lactation : 
 this pouch is supported by two bones and closed by muscles. 
 Although placed at the other extremity of the scale of mam- 
 mifers, man bears, and behoved to bear, the trace of this 
 arrangement, which, with him, is of no use. The processes 
 of the pvMs represent the marsupial bones, and the pyramidal 
 muscles those which close the pouch of the kangaroo and 
 sarigua. In us they are evidently without use. Another 
 example: The calf of the leg is formed by two powerful 
 
152 BOOK I. CHAPTER V. 
 
 muscles, called the twins, which are inserted in the heel by 
 means of the Undo AchiLlis ; by the side of them is found 
 another long, slender muscle, incapable of energetic action, 
 called by anatomists the slender plantary. This muscle, 
 having the same attachments as the twins, produces exactly 
 the effect of a fine thread of cotton if joined to a thick ship's 
 cable. In man, then, this muscle is useless ; but in the cat, 
 and other animals of the same kind, the tiger, the panther, 
 and the leopard, this muscle is as strong as the twibs, and 
 helps to enable these animals to execute the prodigious leaps 
 which they make to seize their prey. Useless to man, this 
 muscle is thus very useful to the animals of which we 
 speak.' 
 
 ' Here is an example still more significant. In the herbi- 
 vorous animals, the horse, the ox, and certain rodents, the 
 great intestine presents a vast fold in the form of a cul-de-sac, 
 called the ccecum. In man this fold does not exist, but is 
 represented by a little appendix, which, from its shape and 
 length, has been called the vermiform appendix. Digested food 
 cannot penetrate into this narrow appendix, which is therefore 
 useless ; but if, unhappily, a hard body, such as a fruit-stone or 
 a fragment of bone, finds its way into it, there results at first 
 an inflammation, then the perfoTation of the intestinal canal, 
 accidents followed by almost certain death. Thus we are the 
 bearers of an organ not only without use, but which may 
 become a serious danger. Indifferent to individuals, nature 
 abandons them to aU the chances of destruction; its solici- 
 tude does not extend beyond the species, the perpetuity of 
 which it has otherwise secured.' * 
 
 Darwin, again, mentions the following examples : — 
 ' I presume we may consider the " bastard-wing " of some 
 birds as a digit in the rudimentary state; in a great number 
 of serpents one of the lobes of the lungs is rudimentary, in 
 others there exist rudiments of the pelvis and of the posterior 
 members. We may mention the teeth observed in the foetus 
 1 Ch. Martins, De Vwniti organique (Rev. des Deux Mondes, 15th June 1861). 
 
THE CONTEAEY FACTS. 153 
 
 of whales, and those whose existence is proved in young calves 
 before their birth, and which even pierce the gums. I have 
 even been assured, on weighty testimony, that rudiments 
 of teeth might be discovered in the embryos of certain birds. 
 Nothing seems simpler than that wings are formed for flight, 
 and yet many insects have their wings so atrophied that they 
 are incapable of acting, a!nd not rarely they are enclosed under 
 sheaths firmly fastened together.' ^ 
 
 The facts we have just mentioned are incontestible ; many 
 others might probably be mentioned. But what is the signi- 
 fication of these facts ? That is the question. 
 
 There are only two known explanations of the rudimentary 
 organs : either the theory of the unity of type of Geoffroy 
 Saint Hilaire, or the theory of the atrophy of the organs by 
 default of habit of Lamarck and Darwin. But neither of these 
 two explanations contradicts the theory of finality. We have 
 seen, in fact, that there are two sorts of finality, — that of use, 
 and that of plan. It is by no means implied in the theory 
 that the second should necessarily be sacrificed or even sub- 
 ordinated to the first. The type remaining the same, one can 
 understand that nature, whether by amplifying it, by inverting 
 it, or by changing its proportions, variously adapts it according 
 to different circumstances, and that the organs, in these 
 circumstances rendered useless, are now only a souvenir of 
 the primitive plan, — not certainly that nature expressly creates 
 useless organs, as an architect makes false windows from love 
 of symmetry, but, the type being given, and being modified 
 according to predetermined laws, it is not wonderful that some 
 vestiges of it remain intractable to finality. 
 
 As regards the second explanation, it can equally be recon- 
 ciled with our doctrine ; for if the organs have ceased to 
 
 ' Darwin, chap. xiii. § 10, p. 535. See also for the useless organs, Buffon 
 (art. Caelum). He cites ihe fingers of the pig, which are of no use to it, the 
 allantois memhrane in the foetus. He refutes the opinion of those who say that 
 the number of paps is proportional to the number of the young. For the rest, 
 this whole article is a plea against final causes, which must be added to all those 
 of the same kind. 
 
154 BOOK I. CHAPTEK V, 
 
 serve, and have thereby been reduced to a minimum, which is 
 now only the remains of a previous state, it does not follow 
 that they cannot have been of use at a former time, and 
 nothing conforms more to the theory of finality than the 
 gradual disappearance of useless complications. 
 
 C. A2>parent and Hurtful Adaptations} — The uselessuess, 
 real or apparent, of organs, may thus be explained, — some- 
 times by our ignorance, sometimes by laws of structure that 
 escape us. But is it so when we encounter in beings adapta- 
 tions perfectly distinct, and which yet serve for nothing, or 
 even, what is still graver, adaptations hurtful to the very 
 being furnished with them 1 Here are some examples : — 
 
 ' A trailing palm tree, of the Malay Archipelago, creeps to 
 the summit of the highest trees by means of hooks admirably 
 made, which are arranged round the ends of the branches. 
 This peculiarity of organization is doubtless of the greatest 
 use to the plant ; but as very similar hooks are observed in 
 several plants, which are not at all creepers, those that are 
 observed in this species may have been produced in virtue of 
 laws of growth as yet unknown, and have only afterwards 
 proved useful to its representatives.' 
 
 ' Does it not seem quite natural that the long feet of the 
 waders have been given to them to inhabit the marshes, and 
 to walk on islets of floating plants ? Yet the moor-hen is 
 almost as aquatic as the coot, and the water-rat almost as 
 terrestrial as the quail or the partridge. In such cases — and 
 many others analogous could have been found — the habits have 
 changed without cori'esponding changes in the organism. We 
 may consider the webbed feet of the Magellan goose as having 
 become rudimentary in function and not in structure ; and 
 the deeply crescent-shaped membrane extending between the 
 four toes of the frigate-bird shows that that organ is in process 
 of being modified.' 
 
 ' No more striking and complete adaptation of structure 
 to habits could be found than in the woodpecker, so well 
 ■■ The following facts are borrowed from Darwin, chap. yi. 
 
THE CONTKARY FACTS. 153 
 
 fashioned for creeping around trees and seizing insects in the 
 chinks of their bark. Yet in North America woodpeckers are 
 found living eiitirely on fruits, and others, provided with long 
 wings, which pursue insects by flight. In the plains of La 
 Plata, where not a single tree grows, there Hves a wood- 
 pecker which, like the others, has two toes before and two 
 behind, the tongue prolonged and pointed, and the tail feathers 
 sharp and stiff. ... In fine, its beak is straight and strong, 
 and can enable it to perforate wood. 
 
 ' So with regard to the water merle, the most acute observer 
 could not suspect, by examining its body, its sub-aquatic 
 habits. Yet this abnormal member of the wholly terrestrial 
 family of the merles only feeds by diving, catching at the 
 stones with its feet, and using its wings under water. 
 
 ' What more simple than that the webbed feet of geese 
 and ducks have been formed for swimming ? And yet there 
 are several species of geese which have webbed feet like the 
 others, but which only go rarely or never at all into the water. 
 
 ' Can we consider the sting of the wasp or bee perfect, 
 when, thanks to the barbs with which it is armed, these 
 insects cannot withdraw it from the body of their enemy, so 
 that they can only escape by tearing their viscera, thus inevit- 
 ably causing their own death ? 
 
 ' Can we admire the creation of thousands of drones, 
 entirely useless to the community of bees, and which, in the 
 end, only seem to have been born to be fed by their laborious 
 but sterile sisters ? Can we admire the savage and instinctive 
 hatred which impels the queen bee to destroy the young 
 queens, her daughters, as soon as they are born, or to perish 
 herself in the combat ? ... In fine, can we regard it as 
 an ingenious and perfect combination, that our firs yearly 
 elaborate clouds of useless pollen, merely in order that some 
 of its granules may be borne at the pleasure of the breeze 
 upon the seeds which they fertilize V 
 
 It is the same among vegetables. ' It is affirmed that the 
 calyx and the corolla are the protecting organs of the stamens 
 
156 BOOK I. CHAPTBE V. 
 
 and the pistil; that they secure fecundation, because the rain 
 bursts the grains of pollen as far as they escape from the 
 anther, and thus produces the abortion of the fruit and grain. 
 But, in the first place, a great number of plants are deprived 
 of the corolla and even of the calyx. These envelopes, when 
 they exist, do not always effectually protect the stamens and 
 pistil against the rain. I may mention roses, lilies, tulips, 
 the ranunculus, cistus, etc. This protection is really effica- 
 cious only in the campanulas, where fecundation takes place 
 before the corolla expands. This genus only embraces useless 
 plants, and, by an antithesis difficult to understand, the 
 vegetables most necessary for man — those on which, so to say, 
 the existence of the human race depends, namely, the cereals, 
 rice, maize, the vine, the fruit trees — have flowers whose 
 stamens are in no way protected against the weather. In 
 fine, the calyx and corolla can be cut off before the expansion 
 of the flower, and fecundation stUl takes place.' ^ 
 
 As regards this third class of facts, we will not dissemble 
 the embarrassment one may be in to explain them from the 
 point of view of the theory of final causes, if they are con- 
 sidered separately and one after the other. However, before 
 appealing to a general theory which may embrace the whole 
 of these facts and all those preceding, let us invoke some 
 extenuating considerations. First, some of them are imperfect 
 final causes, if you will, but not none at all. For instance, 
 the convoluted horns of rams are less favourable defences than 
 the straight horns of bulls, but they are still defences. The 
 sting of the bee may bring about its death ;^ but it is a 
 
 ' Martins — article quoted. 
 
 ^ Is this fact quite proved for every case ? I am assured that when the bee 
 does not remove too precipitately, it can ily without leaving its sting in the 
 wound of its enemy. In general, each of the alleged facts would need to be 
 separately studied by naturalists. The sad condition of the shtJi, for instance, 
 has been much lamented ; but ' it is now known that this sluggish animal (the 
 slotJi), whose lot appeared to Buffpn so deserving of compassion, leads a life no 
 more unhappy than the stag of our forests. True, its limbs are not adapted 
 for running ; but they serve conveniently to carry it over the branches where it 
 finds its food, and to support it there as long as is necessary. ' — Mag. pittoresque, 
 1834, p. 477. 
 
THE CONTEAKY FACTS. 157 
 
 defence for the community : in this respect it is not absolutely 
 useless. In other cases the utility is evident, only the circum- 
 stances may have changed. The woodpecker, we are told, is 
 made to climb trees, and that in a country where there are no 
 trees. But it is not proved that there never have been any 
 there. Here, then, there would be an adaptation that had 
 become useless by a change of circumstances — it would not 
 be absolutely none. The corolla and calyx imperfectly protect 
 flowers, but still they protect them in a measure, and in 
 certain cases in a very satisfactory manner. There are certain 
 aquatic animals that have not webbed feet : it does not follow 
 that what they lack is not very useful to those that have 
 them ; the others have other means that supply them. The 
 faculty of articulation in parrots is not, I admit, of much use 
 to them; yet it is related to what may be called the domestic 
 faculties of animals, which render them fit to become the com- 
 panions of man ; and it cannot be denied that one of the 
 ends of nature (not the only end) is to put man in immediate 
 relation to certain species of them. In fine, the abundance of 
 lost seed clearly proves, if you wiU, the indifference of nature 
 for the individual in the lower species, but does not prove that 
 it is indifferent to life in general. 'Nature is prodigal,' a 
 great writer has said, 'because it is rich, not because it is 
 foolish.' 1 
 
 However, instead of these explanations of detail, which may 
 still leave many doubts in the mind, there is a more philo- 
 sophical and general reply, embracing not only the cases we 
 have mentioned, but also all analogous facts, and all that can 
 be called the disorders of nature. 
 
 Those who maintain that there are final causes in nature 
 are not thereby bound to maintain that there are only such, and 
 that they must always and everywhere prevail over efficient 
 causes. Organized beings are not the only ones that exist ; 
 and they only exist on condition of being co-ordinated to 
 certain media, of submitting to certain forces, which, considered 
 1 G. Sand, Lettrea sur la botmique (Revue des Deux Mondea, 1868). 
 
158 BOOK I. CHAPTEK V. 
 
 generally, are in harmony with the destination of these beings, 
 but which may sometimes be less favourable to them and to 
 a certain extent contrary. Not only is nature in itself not 
 bound to accommodate itself in all things, and for all circum- 
 stances, to the private convenience or utility of living beings, 
 but even the structure of living beings is not founded only 
 and exclusively on the idea of finality. There are efScient 
 causes there too, acting conformably to their nature when 
 nothing useful to the living being would result, or even when 
 some particular inconvenience would result; there, too, there 
 are general laws that may accidentally oppose what the law 
 of finality, understood as an exclusive and absolute rule, would 
 seem to require. The organization may be considered as a 
 mean taken between the interest of the organized being, 
 which would have such a structure, and the general laws of 
 causes and effects that render that structure possible — a result 
 of mechanism and finality. But it is impossible for the 
 spectator who cannot have witnessed the interior elaboration 
 of the universe — he cannot, I say, absolutely determine wherein 
 this result, this mean, must consist in every particular case. 
 To follow thus the detail of ends in their relation to causes, 
 we would have had to be in the secret of creation; there 
 are cases where we can, but we cannot do so always. 
 
 There is nothing in this conflict of final and efficient 
 causes that should surprise us, if we reflect that nothing can 
 exist, neither creature nor creator, without having a deter- 
 minate essence, and that the essence of each thing only 
 allows of a certain number of possible phenomena. No doubt 
 the series of phenomena that results from a determinate 
 essence is not an iron chain that can only be developed in 
 a certain given direction, as we have already said, and as is 
 proved by the diverse forms we can give to natural things ; 
 but although a certain deviation is possible in the development 
 of phenomena, that deviation is necessarily confined within 
 .certain limits, but for which we would have to say that from 
 any cause any phenomenon may result. But a cause that 
 
THE CONTKAEY FACTS. 159 
 
 did not by its nature exclude any phenomenon, could only be 
 an absolutely indeterminate cause — that is to say, a mere 
 chance, a mere nothing; it would thus be no cause at all. 
 No cause is a cause except on condition of being something, 
 of being a •jtowv ti ; whence the consequence is inevitable that 
 it cannot lend itself to every possible combination, and that 
 every system of ends must necessarily be co-ordinated to the 
 necessities and limits which will result from the employment 
 of such efficient causes. And this consequence is not to be 
 avoided by saying that other causes — that is, other means — 
 should have been employed ; for what we have said is true 
 of all causes without exception. None of them can contribute 
 to a combination of ends but within the limit of their con- 
 stitution and their essence ; all of them, consequently, might 
 always oppose some resistance to the accomplishment of this 
 or that aim; and to affirm that the means that have been 
 employed are not the best possible^ — ^that is, those best adapted 
 to the ends, — we would need to compare what is with what 
 might have been, a thing for us absolutely impossible. 
 
 One is generally tempted to consider life as a kind of 
 miracle subsisting in the midst of a foreign nature, by the 
 supernatural act of a personal will that maintains it while it 
 pleases, and abandons it at pleasure, as, jn an absolute govern- 
 ment, the prince raises from nothing or casts down to it 
 the object of his favours. This kind of anthropomorphism 
 has the inconvenience of accumulating on Providence a 
 responsibility for every moment, and would force us to 
 attribute to a precise act of foresight all accidents that dis- 
 turb order in the physical and the moral world. But, relatively 
 to the organized being, this conception is quite arbitrary ; it 
 is not at aU, according to Spinoza's expression, an imperium 
 in imperio: it is bound in every way to external causes. 
 All the laws of the physical and mechanical world are 
 accomplished in it, as well as outside of it : it is by a just 
 and marvellous combination of these laws with the organized 
 being that life is possible. If this agreement cease, it is 
 
160 BOOK I. CHAPTEK V. 
 
 quite natural that life should cease, or be trouhled at its 
 source. 
 
 I do not require here to examine the possibility of miracles ; 
 but it is evident that one has no right to require that nature 
 should be continually occupied in working them. That 
 Providence intervenes in a special manner when it judges 
 proper is possible, — and we will neither af&rm nor deny it, — 
 but it is certain that it is more suitable to the Author of 
 things to act according to general laws, than to intervene in 
 each particular case. To suppose that each fact is the result 
 of an immediate volition of God, is simply to suppress all 
 second causes. If there are second causes, they act according 
 to their nature, and always in the same way in the same 
 circumstances, which is what we call laws. "When the action 
 of these laws becomes prejudicial or useless to the organized 
 being, must God personally intervene to divert its causes, and 
 to substitute for them an immediate personal action ? One is 
 surprised that certain phonomena, which have an end in the 
 normal state, continue to be performed in other circumstances 
 with evil effect, although they have become aimless.' For 
 
 ^ "Vulpian, Phys. du syst. nerveux, ley. xiv. : ' The tendency to restoration 
 is manifested in the separated parts of the whole, as well as when they are in 
 their normal relations. . . ■ You transplant a shred of the periosteum. There 
 occurs, as M. Oilier has shown, not a mere calcification, but a true ossification, 
 with all its characteristics. What useful end is gained by this ossification ? 
 Would it not have been more for the good of the individual that this trans- 
 planted shred should disappear by molecular resorbtion? You transplant a 
 nerve. After deteriorating it recovers. What end can be served by this frag- 
 ment of nerve, henceforth deprived of all relation to the nervous centre 2 
 Why does it anew acquire an excitability that can no longer be put in opera- 
 tion ? . . . Why do grafts succeed, such as the engrafting of a cook's spur in 
 its own comb or in that of another of the same species, or of the tail or paw 
 of a rat under the skin of another rat ? Why does the growth of that paw or 
 tail take place in so regular a manner and stop at a predetermined period? 
 Who does not see that here there is no foresight of an end to be attained, and 
 that the phenomena only require, in order to be manifested, and that hurtfully, 
 in following a necessary course, the conditions which render life possible ? These 
 conditions are furnished by grafting in certain cases ; and in other cases, of 
 nerves restored upon the spot, they have only been momentarily disturbed.' 
 These objections of M. Vulpian are rather directed against the doctrine of the 
 vital principk than against final causes. How far they avail in the first case we 
 do not inquire. For us it suf&ces that they do not touch the principle of finality. 
 
THE CONTRARY FACTS. 161 
 
 instance, the law of growth of organized beings, which applies 
 to all the organs, continues to apply when these organs are 
 transplanted to the body of another animal, which is called 
 animal engrafting. But was it needful, then, that God should 
 take precautions for the case that an ingenious physiologist 
 might think fit to transplant the tail of one rat under the 
 skin of another ? 
 
 The existence of monsters appears one of the gravest con- 
 tradictions given by nature to the theory of final causes. Do 
 not those beings, made in an extravagant way, in opposition 
 to their end, and which are either unfit to live or called to 
 a life the most incomplete, most abnormal, and most opposed 
 to the essence of their species — do they not seem the product 
 of a blind nature, acting by chance, and for which disorder is 
 as natural as order ? Are not these beings, of a structure so 
 far from reasonable, still just like the regular beings, arranged 
 in classes, genera, species, forming a sort of teratological order 
 by the side of the normal order, and by the same right ? 
 Does it not seem, as Empedocles said, that nature has made 
 all sorts of beings, — 'oxen with human heads, and men with 
 heads of oxen,' fiovyevi] av^poirpwpa, avhpo(^vr) 0ovKpava, — 
 and that the only beings that have survived are those that 
 have been found capable of living ? 
 
 However striking and startling to the imagination monstrous 
 births may be, we do not believe that we have here a fact dif- 
 fering in nature from all the accidental deviations that external 
 causes may produce in their conflict with vital laws. Granted 
 that organized beings are called to live in a medium consti- 
 tuted by agents purely physical, it cannot be required that 
 these physical agents should suspend at every instant the 
 action of the laws that rule them, to subserve the particular 
 interest of each moment of the organized beings of the 
 universe. This would be to demand that there should be no 
 laws of nature, and no theory of finality is committed to that. 
 This posited, all the rest foUows ; and congenital deformities 
 are no more extraordinary than those that are acquired. No one 
 
 L 
 
162 BOOK I. CHAPTER V. 
 
 wonders that a man falls and breaks his leg, and that that leg, 
 hadly set, becoming shorter than the other, the man should be 
 lame. Why should it not be the same in the mother's womb ? 
 Why should not some unknown physical or physiological 
 action accidentally produce internal disorders — for instance, 
 some disarrangement of the parts, some suppression of organs — 
 that will render life impossible or incomplete ? The pheno- 
 menon only appears extraordinary to us, because for us the 
 being only commences to live when it comes forth ; but it was 
 living before, and hence it may have been infirm or sick before 
 its birth. If an infant, newly born, may have convulsions, 
 why should it not have them before birth 1 and if it can be 
 born dead, why should it not be born sick or deformed ? On 
 this ground, monsters no more afford an objection to final 
 causes than all the other anomalies which we have dis- 
 cussed. They are all solved by a general principle — namely, 
 that finality is only a mean or a compromise between the 
 proper interest of each living being and the general con- 
 ditions of stability which the preservation of the universe 
 demands. 
 
 As to the pretended parity existing between monsters and 
 normal beings, — as if nature, at haphazard, cast both upon the 
 surface of the globe, — it has already been refuted above, and 
 is contradicted by aU the facts. Monsters, in effect, are of a 
 rarity not to be explained on the hypothesis of a nature abso- 
 lutely indifferent between order and disorder. Besides, even 
 if an equality of cases existed, it would be inexplicable, for 
 in the domain of chance, order ought to be an accident and a 
 rarity, and disorder the law. What proves that the production 
 of monstrosities is owing in a great measure to the action of 
 the medium, is the very means employed to produce them arti- 
 ficially. To obtain anomalies, and often monstrosities, says the 
 learned teratologist, M. CamiUe Dareste,^ four processes may be 
 employed : 'A vertical position of the eggs ; the diminution of 
 the porosity of the shell by applications more or less imper- 
 ' MimOire mr la Uratologie expMmentale, chap. i. 
 
THE CONTiaAEY FACTS. 163 
 
 meable to the air ; the contact of the egg with a source of beat 
 at a point near the cicatricule, hut not coinciding with it ; in 
 fine, the employment of temperatures a little lower or higher 
 than that of normal incubation. By means of the first two 
 processes the evolutictn is often modified ; it is so always.' We 
 thus §ee how small a thing suffices to disturb the regular 
 evolution of the germ, and how the organizing and conservative 
 force must prevail over the contrary force, in order to triumph 
 in the majority of cases over so many disturbing causes. 
 
 In fine, as to the teratological classifications, which seem to 
 establish a certain order in the domain of disorder, they in no 
 way prove that monsters exist by the same right as normal 
 beings, and that they might be considered as forming a world 
 co-ordinated thereto. They are only, in reality, deviated indi- 
 viduals, and not a kingdom apart ; and if they afford room for 
 classifications, it is still the normal state that here serves as 
 criterion and type, for it is by starting from the normal organs 
 of the species, and from their natural situation, that we succeed 
 in classifying all the species of disorders that can be pro- 
 duced. 
 
 It will be asked, whether there is anything that can be, 
 strictly speaking, called the normal state, — whether there is a 
 class embracing those beings born capable of living, and that 
 might he called natural, and another class contrary to nature, 
 and embracing the monsters ? Aristotle has rightly said that 
 ' monsters are not against nature in general, but against what 
 occurs oftenest.' Montaigne expresses the same idea in mag- 
 nificent terms: ' Do not what we call monsters belong to God ? 
 ... By all His wisdom He produces nothing but what is 
 good and regulated, but we do not see their assortment and 
 relation. . . . We call what happens contrary to custom, 
 contrary to nature. There is nothing but what is according 
 to it, whatever it be.'^ It is only in appearance, then, that 
 
 1 Essays, lib. ii. chap. 30. The learned teratologist, M. Camille Dareste, writes 
 to the same effect : ' In reality, there are no monsters. This result I derive from 
 all thfe labours of the teratologists, and particularly of the two MM. GeofFroy Saint 
 
164 BOOK I. CHAPTER V. 
 
 monsters are contrary to nature ; and nothing exists, strictly 
 speaking, that is not natural. 
 
 A more profound examination of this new difficulty would 
 carry us wide of our subject, and would draw us into researches 
 that seem to us useless ; in effect, we here touch the great 
 question of the Middle Ages, which is also the great question 
 of contemporary zoological philosophy — namely, the reality of 
 genera and species. Are there really absolute types consti- 
 tuting for each species what can be called nature, and beyond 
 which all that might be produced could be called contrary to 
 nature ? Or, rather, are there only groups of phenomena, more 
 or less stable, whereof none in particular can be called more 
 natural than the others, since all that is is in nature ? The 
 only difference would be that some are produced more fre- 
 quently, and have a greater vitality ; the others more rarely, 
 and are more dissoluble, that is, liable to perish ; but there 
 would be no absolute separation between the one class and the 
 other. 
 
 We do not require to engage in this debate. What we call 
 nature in speaking of living beings, what constitutes for us 
 the normal or natural state, is the mean of the phenomena 
 tending to the greatest preservation of the species and of the 
 individual. All that shaU. deviate but little from this mean, 
 on this side or that, will be considered conformable to nature; 
 aU that deviates much wiU be called contrary, not to nature 
 in general, since nothing can happen contrary to its laws, 
 but to the nature of a certain living species, which, in order 
 to exist, has need of a certain combination of conditions. All 
 that departs from these conditions is, in a certain degree, 
 
 Hilaire, as well as from all my own studies. I have seen formed almost all the 
 types described by teratology, and I can see in monstrosity nothing but a modifi- 
 cation of development, most frequently an arrest produced by an accidental cause. 
 In these new conditions the development continues so far as the anomaly is 
 compatible with life. "When a period arrives in which it ceases to be compatible 
 with life, the monster dies, but only for this reason. ' These views are very good, 
 and appear to us quite sound. "We will only venture to ask. Why must there, 
 then, be monsters ? And what idea could one form of monstrosity but that of an 
 anomaly generally incompatible with life ? 
 
THE CONTRARY FACTS. 165 
 
 monstrous, which is the name given when the deviation is 
 very great. Thus, whether genera and species are absolute 
 and fixed types, of which monsters are the contradiction and 
 the confusion, or whether they are simple means, the constant 
 parts among supple and flexible phenomena, and then that 
 monsters are only particular cases, rare and less solid com- 
 binations, matters little to us;' in either case the rule is the 
 agreement of the phenomena with the preservation of the 
 animal. In both cases monstrosity is an accident, caused by 
 the predominance of the laws of nature in general over the 
 interests of living nature, or of the nature of a certain being 
 in particular. Whatever cause usually produces the agreement 
 of phenomena has not been able in a given case to produce 
 all its effect, and has found itself limited in its action by 
 the action of external causes : the form has not entirely 
 triumphed over matter. This is the sense in which monsters 
 may be called errors of nature. 
 
 This point made clear, what we maintain is, that accidental 
 and degenerate forms cannot be considered as the primordial 
 causes of the regular and constant forms. No doubt, given 
 the types, in the more or less wide sense attributed to this 
 word, one can understand that, as a result of the conflict with 
 the general laws of nature, accidental deviations could be 
 produced, but not that by the multiplied reproduction of such 
 accidents, and by the competition established between these 
 freaks of nature, the agreement and uniformity of the pheno- 
 mena have been established. Order might, indeed, by accident 
 support some disorder, but disorder cannot be the principle of 
 order. Again, in what we now call monsters there is some 
 remainder of the agreement and order which secure the 
 preservation of the normal beings from which they have 
 
 ^ That the theory of finality is not subordinate to that of the reality of 
 genera and species is manifestly proved by the products of human activity, 
 which are evidently works where finality rules, and which yet only consti- 
 tute genera and species artificially, — ^for instance, beds, tables, etc. No one, 
 despite Plato, will maintain that there exist absolute ideas of these kinds of 
 objects, and yet they evidently imply means and ends. 
 
166 BOOK I. CHAPTER V. 
 
 proceeded ; but this principle of order being suppressed, since 
 it, again, is due to heredity, there would only remain the 
 mere conflict of blind forces. 
 
 This principle of the conflict of final and ef&cient causes 
 has been recognised by many great philosophers. Plato was 
 conscious of it when he made two sorts of causes concur in 
 the creation, — on the one hand, the idea of the good, the prin- 
 ciple of order, harmony, and wisdom ; and, on the other, the 
 necessary causes, the conditions of the production of pheno- 
 mena.^ Aristotle explained evil in the same manner ; Leibnitz 
 also approves the doctrine. He recognises a sort of ideal 
 necessity residing in matter, and which is the cause of dis- 
 order and of what we call evil. This opinion, indeed, in the 
 thought of Plato and Aristotle, implied a veritable dualism, 
 and a blind power forming a counterpoise and obstacle to the 
 divine power. But this may be also understood in a good 
 sense, even without admitting matter to be eternal. It is the 
 necessity inherent in the creation itself and in the subordinate 
 causes, which only give themselves to a certain extent to the 
 realization of a design. Even if the absolute unity of the 
 supreme cause be admitted, that cause could only realize its 
 designs by means of laws or properties of nature ; and from 
 these natural properties there might always accidentally pro- 
 ceed some injurious effect as a necessary consequence. 
 
 Besides, the rencounter and complication of ends, and their 
 necessary subordination, may also accidentally bring about 
 effects apparently injurious, and which are only, as they say, 
 the condition of wellbeing. The Stoics had marked well the 
 origin of such disorders, which are only consecutive, and not 
 essential. They called them to, KaroL irapaKokovdrjcnv, per 
 sequelas. Chrysippus gave an ingenious example of them : 
 ' The general convenience of the body,' said he, ' required that 
 the head should be composed of light and fine bones ; but the 
 head has thereby been rendered feebly protected, and exposed 
 to blows.' So the membrane of the eye, to be transparent, 
 
 ' Twuxus, 29, 30, 48. 
 
THE CONTRARY FACTS. 167 
 
 must be very light, and thereby easily put out. But nature 
 ■was satisfied with the adoption of the most general pre- 
 cautions. 
 
 To those who say that nature, having taken certain pre- 
 cautions, ought to have taken still more, I will answer : How 
 far is this reasoning to be pressed ? Ought nature to have 
 taken so many precautions that the organized machine should 
 not be subject to death, and should never perish ? But 
 what right have we to require that an organized being should 
 last for ever ? And why should it not enter into the plan of 
 a wise being that some should give place to others ? This 
 being so, it sufiBces that there are precautions enough to 
 secure the general continuance of life in the universe, without 
 needing to secure each individual against aU possible acci- 
 dents arising from the rencounter of causes. 
 
 We are told : You only see one side of the picture. You 
 see nature beneficent ; you refuse to see it doing evil and 
 opposing; in short, you explain the good, but you do not 
 explain the evil. To this we, in our turn, can answer the 
 opponents of final causes : You explain the evil, but you do 
 not explain the good. There would thus, at least, be equality 
 on both sides. But if we wish to consider matters impar- 
 tially, it win be seen that this equality does not exist. 
 
 In effect, he who admits at once final and efficient causes, 
 has more opportunity to explain matters than he who only 
 admits efScient but not final causes. The idea of end in no 
 way contradicts the idea of effect and result ; there may very 
 well be at once both ends and results in nature. It is not 
 even necessary that every result be an end, or even a means ; 
 it may simply be an inevitable consequence of the employ- 
 ment of certain means with reference to certain ends. Finality 
 and necessity do not exclude each other. The order of 
 things may be at once an intentional and a logical order, 
 without it being possible to say absolutely which of these 
 orders is subordinate to the other ; and we are in no way bound 
 to reconcile them to the last detail, which would require 
 
&■ 
 
 168 BOOK I. CHAPTEK V. 
 
 absolute knowledge. It is enough for us to conceive d priori 
 an explanation of evil that in no way excludes the foresight 
 that has produced good. 
 
 Is the situation as favourable for those who are content 
 with af&rming efficient, and who deny final causes ? Certainly 
 not ; for they are obliged to allege that the conflict of efficient 
 causes suffices to produce an apparent co-ordination to an 
 end, but that is what we never see in our experience. 
 Never do we see efficient causes, left to themselves and 
 given up unhindered to grope in the dark, produce some effect 
 similar to a foreseen end ; never do we see them co-ordinate 
 their actions in reference to a definite future effect. It is, 
 then, entirely arbitrary to attribute to blind necessity the 
 power of attaining the lest. Our mind cannot conceive how 
 winds let loose, raging waves, a volcano in eruption — ^how 
 such a conflict of natural forces should produce a reasonable 
 effect. Yet this is what we must suppose on the hypothesis 
 of a blind mechanism, or, at the very least, attribute to nature 
 a certain instinctive and blind power of intention, which 
 would be itself to recognise in some degree the hypothesis 
 of final causes. 
 
 Evil, then, like all the imperfections we have mentioned 
 above, is only the accidental consequence of the conflict of 
 efficient and final causes, and of the conflict of final causes 
 with each other. Those imperfections have given occasion to 
 certain philosophers to suppose that God did not directly 
 put His hand to the work of creating the universe, but that 
 He employed some intermediary, who, being himself an imper- 
 fect creature, behoved to commit mistakes, and often to be 
 at fault. Thus Plato, in the Timceus, shows us God calling 
 the gods to labour subordinately, and giving them the general 
 plan of His work which they are thereupon charged to execute. 
 So Cudworth, a Platonic philosopher, imagines a certain plastic 
 nature, which instinctively and blindly produces and organizes 
 the universe after the order of God, and which is alone 
 responsible for the disorders and defects of the work. This 
 
THE CONTRARY FACTS. 169 
 
 singular theory, which seems to apply to the divine rule the 
 principles of parliamentary government, inventing responsible 
 ministers to cover an infallible and impeccable sovereign, is 
 evidently an insufi&cient palliative ; for God would be quite 
 as reprehensible in having chosen inefficient ministers as 
 if He had Himself committed the faults with which they are 
 reproached ; and if these faults could have been avoided by 
 putting His own hand to the work, one cannot see why He has 
 not done it. It is hardly generous to cast on inferiors the 
 faults of the great, and to exculpate the sovereign at the 
 expense of the ministers. This is an arrangement which may 
 be wise, in a political point of view, in the government of the 
 state, and is known to every one to be only conventional. 
 But in the government of Providence it is not so ; and as it 
 is the sole absolute cause, all action is derived from it, and all 
 responsibility ascends to it. 
 
 There is no other issue of the problem of evil than what 
 we are indicating. Whatever world God creates will always 
 be composed of substances and causes having a certain deter- 
 minate nature, which, consequently, wiU only be able to enter 
 into a given combination. But that combination, whatever it 
 be, in virtue of the very necessities implied in the nature of 
 things, must needs contain defects and disorders analogous 
 to what we observe in our world. As long as there are 
 beings in time and space distinct from each other, limited 
 by each other, they will necessarily be subordinate to each 
 other. Some wiH serve as conditions and limits to others ; no 
 one will admit of being considered separately as a whole, — it 
 must always reckon with the others, and aU with the whole. 
 Hence follow relations without end, which no finite intelli- 
 gence can possibly follow in aU their details ; hence apparent 
 or real anomalies, required by the general conditions of the 
 whole; hence the inability of each thing in particular to 
 attain all the ideal perfection of which it is capable. Hence, 
 in short, it follows that the idea of perfection is incompatible 
 with the idea of a finite thing, for a finite thing is only 
 
170 BOOK I. CHAPTER V. 
 
 such because it has need of other things to exist. It is thus 
 conditioned by these things, and, in using, depends on them ; 
 for these things, having themselves their own nature and their 
 particular end, cannot be absolutely sacrificed even to superior 
 ends. Thus masters make use of the services of their do- 
 mestics, but must bear their faults and leave them some 
 personality ; for experience teaches us that he who wiU have 
 too much does not obtain enough. Free produces more than 
 slave labour. So in the universe there will be a greater sum 
 of labour effected if each being knows how to limit itself, and 
 accepts those limits, than if the superior beings had obtained 
 that all the rest should be sacrificed to them; which, besides, has 
 no sense, for as long as there are conditions, these conditions 
 will be a limit, and, consequently, a cause of imperfection. 
 
 This is what we may call, with Leibnitz, the matter or necessity/ 
 inherent in the essence of the finite thing ; and here, with 
 him, we must place the cause of evil. Hence that profound 
 conception, according to which the world would only have 
 been for the creator a problem of maxima and minima, — to 
 find the greatest sum possible of good, produced with the least 
 possible loss, — a problem analogous to that of the mechanician, 
 who endeavours, in constructing a machine, to obtain the 
 greatest amount of useful work with the least quantity of loss. 
 But there will always be a part of the work employed in 
 moving the machine itself, and consequently perpetual motion 
 is impossible. So in the universe there will always be a 
 part of action or of good which will be lost by the conflict 
 and friction of things upon each other : consequently, absolute 
 good is not possible. What is possible in both cases is a 
 maximum or an optimum ; but to know whether this optimum 
 has really been obtained, we would need, on the one hand, to 
 know the divine integral calculus, and the theorems in virtue 
 of which the operation has been made, and, on the other, the 
 data and the condition of the operation itself, both of which 
 are absolutely impossible. 
 
 Besides, this were to advance much farther than is neces- 
 
THE CONTRARY FACTS. l7l 
 
 sary here into the domain of the Theodicy. Our problem 
 does not extend so far, and even our method ought to forbid 
 these rash excursions. We have not yet to affirm anything 
 regarding the primary cause of natural finality, and the 
 existence only of that finality has as yet been the object of 
 our studies. We have had no other aim in this chapter than 
 to explain the contradiction which, in certain cases, experience 
 seems to give to the theory of final causes, without being 
 bound to justify the primary cause of these apparent contra- 
 dictions. It suffices for our point of view that the exceptions 
 mentioned have nothing inexplicable ; as to the justification 
 of Providence, that belongs to another domain.^ 
 
 ' Oa the question of evil and of optimism, see the appendix. 
 
CHAPTEE VI. 
 
 MECHANISM AND FINALITY. 
 
 rriHE animal kingdom is like a tourney-ground, where there 
 -*- come to fight, on the one side the physicists, accus- 
 tomed to explain all by efficient causes, and on the other 
 the psychologists, accustomed to explain phenomena by the 
 final cause. The latter, starting from man, are chiefly struck 
 ■with the analogies which the industry of nature presents 
 to human industry. The former, starting from matter, are 
 struck with the analogies which the properties of living 
 matter present to the properties of matter in general. On 
 the one side, it is sought to explain life by psychological 
 views ; on the other, by physical and mechanical considera- 
 tions. We have followed the thread of analogies by starting 
 from one of these two principles. It is only just now to 
 attempt the opposite method, in order to weigh fairly the 
 advantage of both.' 
 
 One of the most striking examples of the purely physical 
 explanation of a marvellous concord of phenomena is the 
 example already cited of the cosmogonic hypothesis of Laplace. 
 If the problem presented be considered, it appears that we 
 cannot explain by any physical cause so many coincidences 
 presented by the solar system : 1st, The coincidence of forty- 
 three motions all in one direction ; 2d, The similar arrange- 
 
 ' In order not to complicate and retard the discussion, we remit to the 
 appendix the discussion of the particular ohjections, under their historic form, 
 set forth by Lucretius, Bacon, Descartes, Spinoza, against final causes. But the 
 spirit and sense of these ohjections come to he concentrated in the doctrine of 
 mechanism. We therefore sum them up here in their totality, and give them 
 a systematic form, by presenting, with aU its advantages, the hypothesis of 
 mechanism. For the detail, see the appendix, Objections and DifficvUies. 
 
MECHANISM AND FINALITY. 173 
 
 merit of all the stars in the same plane ; 3d, The central 
 position of the sun, whence there incessantly proceed to all 
 the stars that surround it rays of heat and light. Yet all 
 these coincidences, all these wonderful agreements, are ex- 
 plained without difficulty on the hypothesis of a primitive 
 nebula rotating in whatever direction, and progressively trans- 
 formed. Now the existence of rotating nebulae is matter of 
 experience. The existence of nebulae with nuclei variously 
 condensed is equally matter of observation. Besides, ex- 
 perience proves that a rotating fluid mass gives birth to a 
 central nucleus surrounded by a ring, an arrangement like that 
 presented by Saturn at present. In fine, the theory teaches 
 us that this ring behoves to break and give birth to secondary 
 stars, always involved in the motion of the central star. Thus 
 nothing is more probable, nothing more rational, than this 
 hypothesis, into which there enters no consideration of finality. 
 Will it be said that here the facts to be explained present, 
 it is true, a remarkable concord and co-ordination of pheno- 
 mena, a systerti, but that that system does not present the 
 essential character to which we have reduced finality, namely, 
 agreement with a future determinate phenomenon ? Advantage 
 could not be taken even of this means of escape; for all 
 this evolution ends in a final phenomenon of high importance, 
 namely, the central position of the sun, which is the condition 
 of life in the various planets. Now it could be and has been 
 maintained, that this central position of a warm and luminous 
 star was the best possible for the whole system. ' It would 
 require more astronomical knowledge than I can here display,' 
 says the judicious Paley, ' to explain in detail what would be 
 the effects of a system in which the central body should be 
 opaque and cold, while one of the planets was luminous and 
 warm. I believe, however, it will easily be perceived — 1st, 
 That, taking for granted the necessary proportion in the re- 
 spective masses of the bodies in repose and those in motion, 
 the burning planet would not sufBce to light and heat all the 
 system ; 2d, That the heat and light would be imparted to the 
 
174 BOOK I. CHAPTER VI. 
 
 other planets in a much less regular manner than they are by 
 the sun.' ' Thus, according to Paley, the central position of 
 the sun is the best possible as regards the distribution of heat 
 and light. It may be said, then, that the planetary system 
 is co-ordinated in relation to this best possible distribution, 
 and there would be room to apply even here the criterion we 
 have given of finality. And yet we have just seen that this 
 remarkable concord and arrangement of phenomena is explained 
 mechanically in the most simple way. Why should not this 
 mode of explanation, which here finds so happy an application, 
 equally apply to the combinations, no doubt more complex, 
 but not essentially different, which organized beings present ? 
 The phenomena of crystallization, again, are phenomena in 
 which there are manifested a systematic, indisputable order 
 and arrangement, without it seeming necessary to invoke any 
 finality. No doubt chemistry has only as yet hypotheses to 
 explain those different geometric forms that the different bodies 
 take in crystallizing ; but these hypotheses, whatever they be, 
 only appeal to the properties of matter subject to geometric 
 laws. No one wUl say that the molecules of the different 
 bodies come together mutually with the view of forming 
 prisms, cones, and pyramids ; and yet they take such forms. 
 Why might it not be said that, in virtue of like properties, 
 the living molecules are co-ordinated according to the type of 
 the vertebrata, the articulata, or the radiata ? What difference 
 is there, indeed, between the zoological and the chemical 
 types, except that the former are more complicated ? And if 
 it be admitted that the molecules, in virtue of causes unknown 
 to us, may have taken this or that form, why might it not be 
 admitted that they may have fallen upon forms more or less 
 like those that human art gives to its inventions, — here the 
 form of a bag, there of a pump ; here of forceps, there of a 
 millstone ; elsewhere that of a canal, a sucker or lens, an ear- 
 trumpet, cords, levers, etc. ? These innumerable forms might 
 only be the result of the arrangement of the molecules after 
 1 Paley, Natural Theology, chap, xviii. 
 
MECHANISM AND FINALITY. 175 
 
 certain laws ; but such forms once produced in living matter, 
 what, wonder that they should act conformably to their struc- 
 ture ? What wonder that the bones, being hard, should support 
 the body ; that the muscles, endued with the property of con- 
 tracting, should be capable of putting the bones in motion ; that 
 the courses of the veins and arteries being hollow, the blood 
 should be able to flow in them ; that the heart, being a muscle, 
 should be possessed of an impelling power; that the teeth, 
 being broad, pointed, or sharp, should be apt to grind, tear, or 
 cut ; that claws, being curved, should be fit for plunging into 
 an animal's flesh; that the eye, being composed of humours 
 of different densities, should refract the light, and make its 
 rays converge towards a central point; that sonorous cords 
 should be apt to vibrate ; that the male and female organs, 
 having hit upon forms at once analogous and opposite, should 
 be fit to answer each other ; and so of all the organs ? 
 
 In a word, the adaptation of organs to functions is a 
 metaphor; there is no adaptation, but simply manifestation of 
 properties inherent in the organ itself. Given a living sub- 
 stance, it is natural it should act, and should act according to 
 its structure. Function is nothing else than the organ acting. 
 What wonder that it should be apt to produce it ? As well 
 wonder that the concave surface should be so marvellously 
 adapted to the convex ; as if the concave and the convex were 
 not the same thing considered from two different points of 
 view. So of organ and function ; they are two points of view 
 of one and the same thing — living matter. It is at once 
 active and organized, and its activity is evidently modified by 
 its organization ; such organ, such action ; if the organ be 
 modified, the action is equally modified. Be the organ, for 
 instance, the fourth section of the anterior member, in man it 
 wiU. be a prehensile agent ; in the horse, an agent of support ; 
 in the bird, an agent of flight ; in the fish, an agent of nata- 
 tion, etc. Thus the form determines the action, but nothing 
 warrants you to afSrm that the action predetermines the form. 
 For why should there necessarily be in nature beings called 
 
176 BOOK I. CHAPTER VI. 
 
 to fly, swim, or .creep ? And as to the organic forms whose 
 action would either be injurious or useless to the animal, they 
 would either probably bring about their destruction, — and 
 no wonder if we do not meet with such, — or else they would 
 disappear in default of use, in virtue of that well-established 
 law that organs are developed by exercise and atrophied by 
 inaction. 
 
 Thus function is only a result of the organ when once 
 formed. Meanwhile it remains to explain the formation of 
 the organ. But if the planetary system, which shows us the 
 regular arrangement of a multitude of stars all revolving in 
 the same direction according to an elliptic curve, and nearly 
 in the same plane, around a central star; if the different 
 systems of chemical crystallization, which enable us to witness 
 varied groupings of molecules according to geometrical laws, — 
 if these different systems can be explained by the sole prin- 
 ciple of the properties of matter, without in any way bringing 
 in the idea of the end, why should it not be the same with 
 organic systems, which only differ from the preceding in the 
 complication of their forms and the marvellous variety of their 
 structures ? But who can measure the productive fecundity 
 of nature ? More or less complexity in its works does not, 
 then, imply the necessary intervention of a new cause which 
 had hitherto been dispensed with. 
 
 Thus, leaving entirely aside the question of the nature of life, 
 and without at all prejudging the question of the existence or 
 non-existence of a vital agent, it may be said that the finality 
 of living beings is a pure appearance, and is reducible to the 
 general laws of mechanism, that is, to the chain of phenomena 
 according to laws. In other words, the series of phenomena 
 is unilateral. There is only a descending series, that which 
 proceeds from causes to effects, from antecedents to conse- 
 quents. There is no inverse series, that which proceeds from 
 means to ends, and which, therefore, places the cause in the 
 effect, and determines the antecedent by the consequent. This 
 inversion, already mentioned by Aristotle, then by Lucretius, 
 
MECHANISM AND FINALITY. 177 
 
 then by Spinoza, then by G. St. Hilaire, and by the modern 
 naturalists, which changes the effect into the cause and the 
 cause into efiFect, is contrary to the scientific method, and is 
 in no way justified nor necessitated by the facts, however 
 seemingly marvellous, of the animal or vegetable kingdom. 
 Analogies are relied on in order to discover designs and ends 
 in living nature, but other analogies may serve to explain 
 these wonderful facts without design and without an end. 
 Causes no more than beings ought to be multiplied without 
 necessity. What need is there to recur to the final cause 
 when one can be satisfied by the efficient ? 
 
 Thus, while on the one hand, by a continued declension, 
 we have been able to descend from analogy to analogy, from 
 the express foresight manifested in human intelligence to an 
 unconscious foresight manifested in the living organism, reci- 
 procally, in ascending by a continued complication from the 
 most simple geometric to the most skilful organic forms, it 
 has been possible to explain, by a coincidence of mechanical 
 causes, the same phenomena which we have referred to the 
 final cause. 
 
 Let the problem be well understood. On the one hand, the 
 final cause is incontestably manifested in the psychological 
 sphere ; the question is whether it is manifested lower down. 
 On the other hand, the mechanical cause is evidently mani- 
 fested, and reigns alone (at least as far as appears) in the 
 inorganic sphere ; the question is whether this kind of cause 
 suf&ces higher up. 
 
 Between the psychological and the inorganic domains 
 extends the domain of the living organism — that is, yet once 
 more, the toumey-ground of the two causalities, the two 
 modes of explanation. Can all that is below and outside the 
 subjective and psychological domain admit of teleological 
 explanations ? Eeciprocally, can all that is above geometric 
 forms and laws be explained by mechanism alone ? 
 
 Let us admit, with the previous hypothesis, that mechanism 
 sufiSces to explain the production of organs — that is, let us 
 
 M 
 
178 BOOK L CHAPTER VL 
 
 consider the functions as the results of the organs, and the 
 formation of the organs as the result of the laws of living 
 nature, modified by external causes. Let us suppose, in a 
 word, that there is no end, either general or partial, in the 
 organism. If this mode of explanation is sufficient, it should 
 be able to mount higher. Now, we must not forget that we 
 have shown the continuous and gradual analogy which exists 
 between the formation of the organs and function in general, 
 between function and instinct, between instinct and intel- 
 ligence, between animal intelligence and human intelligence ; 
 in fine, between the intelligence of other men and that of each 
 one of us. In virtue of this series of analogies, the same 
 kind of causes explaining the formation of organs ought to be 
 able to explain all the other subsequent phenomena, up to and 
 including human intelligence. If this analogical reasoning 
 be disputed with us, let us not forget that mechanism itself 
 has no other mode of reasoning ; for between crystallization 
 and organization there is only, after aU, a remote analogy. 
 
 We shall say, then, and we ought to say, that instinct has 
 no end any more than any other function, — that instinctive 
 industry, quite as well as organic industry, is only a chain of 
 phenomena, issuing from each other by way of consequence, 
 without any of them having ever been foreseen either by the 
 animal or by the cause, whatever it be, that has formed the 
 animal. We shall say that instinct, as well as all the other 
 functions, is a simple result of organization, and that the 
 organization itself which has produced this or that instinct 
 is only the effect of the meeting of certain causes and of 
 the unconscious reaction of physical agents. And, in fact, if 
 it can be admitted that agents not directed, not co-ordinated, 
 can have met, in obedience to physical and chemical laws, in 
 a way so fortunate as to produce the circulatory system of the 
 vertebrate animals, why should it not be admitted that a 
 similar meeting, or a succession of fortunate coiucidences, may 
 have produced certain automatic combinations from whence 
 might result the instinctive actions that astonish us ? For it 
 
MECHANISM AND FINALITY. 179 
 
 is not more difficult for a blind nature to produce organs 
 resulting in the act of weaving or building, than to construct 
 those resulting in the act of flying, swimming, or running, or 
 those, in fine, resulting in the act of breathing or digesting. 
 
 Thus all, even unconscious finality, will have to be ex- 
 cluded by hypothesis from instinct as well as from every 
 other organic function. Let us well understand ourselves. 
 The question here is of an absolute exclusion, and not an 
 apparent exclusion, as too often happens. Often, in fact, 
 after having nominally excluded final causes, one resumes 
 them without perceiving it, by attributing to living nature 
 a spontaneous property of accommodation and adaptation, 
 which is nothing else than finality itself under another 
 name. For to say that it is a law of organized matter spon- 
 taneously to find the best combination for its preservation 
 and growth, is precisely to attribute to it an essential innate 
 instinct, which implies an obscure foresight of the end, and 
 an unconscious yet precise choice of the means. That that 
 is an incomprehensible hypothesis I do not deny. It is the 
 hypothesis of those who, whether expressly or by implication, 
 preserve finality, while suppressing every intelligent cause. 
 But, incomprehensible or not, this hypothesis preserves and 
 recognises the only thing that we have to defend at present, 
 namely, the existence of ends in nature. Yet once more, it is 
 necessary that men understand themselves. The hypothesis 
 of pure mechanism, if it knows what it means to say, 
 excludes every species of finality, and that quite as well in 
 the explanation of instincts as in that of functions. Men 
 must needs be ready to say that an unknown physical cause 
 has produced this happy combination, whence results the 
 bee's art or the bird's song. 
 
 But if men hope to elude the difficulty in explaining 
 instinct by habit, hereditary or not, a hypothesis we will meet 
 again elsewhere, they lay themselves open to this question : 
 Is habit itself anything else than an instinct ? Habit, in 
 fact, is a faculty proper to organized nature ; it is not met 
 
180 BOOK I. CHAPTEE TI, 
 
 with in inorganic beings. ' In vain one throws a stone/ says 
 Aristotle ; ' it does not assume the habit of remaining sus- 
 pended.' If, in fine, habit in its turn admits of being 
 mechanically explained, we return precisely to what we said, 
 namely, that there may be such a fortunate mechanical cause 
 as whether immediately or by degrees, and by a series of 
 favourable modifications, produces' at last what so resembles 
 an art or industry as to be mistaken for it, but which is only 
 in reality a purely automatic combination. 
 
 If, however, such an automatic combination may suffice to 
 explain the instinctive actions of animals, why should it not 
 suffice to explain the actions of their intellect or passions ? 
 And what right should we have to suppose, by analogy with our- 
 selves, that the animals are endued with intellect and passion ? 
 If the analogy we have mentioned between the industry of 
 nature in the construction of living organs, and human 
 industry in the construction of inert machines, be contested, 
 why should the very remote analogy subsisting between 
 animal and human actions be appealed to ? There is 
 decidedly more diiference between the supposed intelligence 
 of a dog and that of Newton, than there is between a lens 
 and the crystalline, a camera obscura and the eye, a pump 
 and the heart in vertebrates. For here, if there is a difference 
 from the point of view of art, it is in favour of the living 
 machine, and yet men will not see any art in it ; and, on 
 the contrary, when a dog barks, they wiU have this barking 
 to be the analogue of the articulate voice, and to correspond, 
 like the latter, with some internal sense ; as if nature, in those 
 happy freaks which are constantly invoked, could not have 
 created by chance a barking machine — a surprising toy, as 
 Descartes regarded it, having only a very superficial resem- 
 blance to a sentient and intelligent creature. 
 
 In order to combat the Cartesian automatism, the actions 
 of animals are instanced, so like, it is said, to those of man, 
 and the intelligence of the animals • is inferred. But this is 
 to see only one side of things. The intelligent actions of 
 
MECHANISM AND FINALITY. 181 
 
 animals very remotely resemble those of man, but they much 
 more resemble the instinctive actions of these animals them- 
 selves ; and nothing is more difficult than to separate exactly 
 these two domains — that of intelligence and that of instinct. 
 Now we have seen that the operations of instinct themselves 
 differ in nothing essential from the functional operations of 
 the living machine, and, in particular, from that essential 
 operation of the living being which consists in the construc- 
 tion of its organs. If, then, a simple agency of physical 
 causes, without any foresight, express or implicit, can explain 
 how living nature succeeds in accomplishing the series of 
 delicate and complicated operations which terminate in the 
 structure of an organ, why should not the same mechanical 
 agencies produce a freak, no doubt more complicated, but not 
 essentially different — that of an animal that has the air of 
 feeling, thinking, and willing, without possessing any of these 
 faculties ? And if one is warranted to urge against the hypo- 
 thesis of Descartes, that that would be a very strange freak 
 on the part of a creator sovereignly wise, who would seem to 
 wish to amuse himself thus at our expense, this is not an 
 objection against a blind nature that knows not what it is 
 doing, and that can by chance produce toys quite as well as 
 volcanoes and rocks. And if, protesting against this material- 
 istic automatism, a vital agent is invoked, — vital properties, 
 and I know not what besides, more or less vital, — I reply that 
 men don't know what they say, or they ought to understand 
 that what would precisely distinguish any vital from everj' 
 inert agent would just be to be fit to co-ordinate organic 
 materials after a plan, which would be to relapse into the 
 very hypothesis which it is wished to set aside. 
 
 I say, then, that mechanism cannot urge any serious objec- 
 tion against the automatism of the beasts ; but the same 
 mechanism ought to go much farther still, and ought not to 
 recoil even from the automatism of men — I mean automatism 
 in the strict sense, namely, a mechanism purely material, 
 without intelligence, passion, or will. If the animal is only 
 
182 BOOK I. CHAPTER VI. 
 
 a machine, why should other men be anything for us but 
 machines? And here the question is not about the man- 
 machine of Lamettrie, which thinks and feels like us, but 
 about a man-machine which, like Vaucauson's automaton, 
 could neither think nor feel in any way. After all, what 
 proof have we that other men are intelligent like our- 
 selves ? None positively exact. For we only know ourselves 
 immediately — we have never directly discovered intelli- 
 gence in other men. It is only, then, by induction, and 
 without any direct experience, that we assume in other men a 
 mind and an intelligence as well as in ourselves. There is, 
 no doubt, a wonderful resemblance between other men and 
 ourselves ; but there is also a wonderful resemblance between 
 the industry of nature and human industry. Now, if a 
 combination of causes can have produced, without any art, 
 what so closely resembles art, why could it not have produced, 
 equally without any intelligence, what would as closely 
 resemble intelligence ? The hypothesis is not so absurd, 
 since there really are cases in which men act automatically 
 and unconsciously, as if they really were intelligent — for 
 instance, cases of somnambulism or of dementia. The theory 
 of reflex actions also shows us that the same things may be 
 done at one time under the influence of the will, at another 
 under the influence of purely mechanical actions. Conse- 
 quently it is not absurd to generalize the hypothesis ; and 
 one cannot see why the theory of happy chances should stop 
 half-way. On this theory, accident — that is, the product of 
 all the favourable chances — has been quite able to produce an 
 organ suited for singing ; why should it not produce an organ 
 fitted for speech ? Arid why could not this organ be modi- 
 fied by exercise and imitation, like that of the parrot ? Why 
 should it not become fitted to vary the production of sounds ? 
 Why should not this reproduction of spunds, determined by 
 external circumstances, come to imitate certain intelligent 
 combinations ? as, for instance, it is the case that one can teach 
 an idiot in certain circumstances a phrase whose meaning he 
 
MECHANISM AND FINALITY. 183 
 
 does not understand. Multiply the happy circumstances, and 
 the chances of combination, and see whether it is impossible 
 to refer to chance the formation of an organism resembling 
 ours so as to be taken for it, manifesting entirely similar 
 action, but which would only be a fiction — an automaton in 
 which not a single phenomenon could be discovered having 
 an end, and which would consequently be destitute of aU 
 intelligence. Let a point be fixed where, theoretically, the 
 hypothesis of pure automatism would become strictly impos- 
 sible.'' No doubt such a hypothesis shocks common sense, 
 but they protest against the competency of common sense in 
 these matters — the right is refused it of interfering in natural 
 philosophy ; the analogies are found ridiculous which common 
 sense has always recognised between human art and the art 
 of nature. And yet let the attempt be made to find in 
 support of the intelligence of our fellow-men other reasons 
 than those of common sense. It is agreed that there comes a 
 moment when the combinations become so complicated that 
 it is impossible, without too shocking absurdity, not to 
 suppose a co-ordination towards an end. How many com- 
 binations, then, of this kind are needed to make such an 
 induction valid ? 
 
 If, on the other hand, appealing to the extreme resem- 
 blance of man to man, the right be assumed to conclude from 
 one's own intelligence to intelligence in other men, and from 
 human intelligence to the intelligence of the animals, let them 
 tell us at what precise moment this argument, drawn from 
 
 ' We can find authority for this apparently extreme hypothesis in the testi- 
 mony of Leibnitz {Ripligue aux reflexions de Bayle : Opera philosophica, pp. 
 183, 184, ed. Erdmann) : 'There is no doubt that a man oould make a machine 
 capable of walking for some time throTigh a town, and of correctly turning at 
 the comers of certain streets. . . . There Is only a more or less, which signify 
 nothing in the region of possibilities. . , . Those who show the Cartesians that 
 their way of proving that the brutes are automata would justify him who 
 should say that all other men except himself are simple automata also, have 
 justly and precisely said what I mean. ' Descartes has foreseen the objection in 
 the Discours de la miihode (part v.) ; but his answer precisely proves that there 
 ia^only a difference of less or more. See also Diderot, Peneies philosophiques, xx. , 
 and Keid, (Euvres, t. iv. trad, franj. p. 177. 
 
184 BOOK I. CHAPTEB VI. 
 
 analogy, will become ineffectual and impotent. If I have the 
 right to suppose that the animal pursues an end when it 
 combines the means of self-preservation and of self-defence, 
 why might I not suppose, with the same right, that living 
 nature has also pursued an end, when, as wise as the animal, 
 she has prepared for it the organs which are for it the fittest 
 means to attain that end ? 
 
 I add that, even were this striking analogy disputed, and 
 all finality in living nature denied, not much progress would 
 thus be made from the moment the existence of intelligent 
 beings had been granted, — and one is indeed forced to admit 
 at least one, namely, myself, — ^for each one, as Descartes has 
 said, only knows that he exists because he knows that he 
 thinks. Now, doubtless, the intelligent being, at least, is 
 capable of acting for ends, of setting an end before him, 
 consequently of self-determination by the final cause. The 
 question is this. How, in a nature without an end, does there 
 appear all at once a being capable of pursuing an end ? This 
 capacity, it is said, is the product of his organization. But 
 how should an organization, which by hypothesis would only be 
 a result of physical causes happily introduced, give birth to a 
 product such that the being thus formed could divine, foresee, 
 calculate, prepare means for ends ? To this point the series 
 of phenomena has only followed the descending course, that 
 which goes from cause to effect; all that is produced is 
 produced by the past, without being in any way determined, 
 modified, or regulated by the necessities of the future. AH' 
 at once, in this mechanical series, is produced a being that 
 changes all, that transports into the future the cause of the 
 present — that is capable, for instance, having beforehand the 
 idea of a town, to collect stones conformably to mechanical 
 laws, yet so that at a given moment they may form a town. 
 He is able to dig the earth, so as to guide the course of 
 rivers ; to replace forests by crops of grain ; to bend iron to his 
 use — in a word, to regulate the evolution of natural pheno- 
 mena in such a way that the series of these phenomena may 
 
MECHANISM AND FINALITY. 185 
 
 be dominated by a future predetermined phenomenon. This 
 is indeed, it must be confessed, a final cause. Well, then, can 
 it be conceived that the agent thus endowed with the power 
 of co-ordinating nature for ends, is himself a simple result 
 that nature has realized without proposing to itself an end ? 
 Is it not a sort of miracle to admit into the mechanical series 
 of phenomena a link which suddenly should have the power 
 to reverse, in some sort, the order of the series, and which, 
 being itself only a consequent resulting from an infinite 
 number of antecedents, should henceforth impose on the 
 series this new and unforeseen law, which makes of the 
 consequent the law and rule of the antecedent ? 
 
 Here is the place to say, with Bossuet : ' One cannot com- 
 prehend, in this whole that does not understand, this part 
 that does, for intelligence cannot originate from a brute and 
 insensate thing! ^ 
 
 I do not know whether the mechanical philosophy has ever 
 taken account of the difficulty of this problem. It finds it 
 quite natural that the brain thinks, for experience shows it 
 thought everywhere associated with a brain. But leaving 
 aside the speculative question whether matter can think (a 
 problem which does not belong to our subject), is it not 
 evident that for a brain to think, it behoves to be organized 
 in the wisest manner, and that the more complicated this 
 organization, the more probable is it that the result of the 
 combinations of matter will be disordered and consequently 
 unfit for thought ? 
 
 Thought, in whatever manner explained, is an order, a 
 system, a regular and harmonious combination ; it is a system 
 all the elements of which behove to be co-ordinated in order 
 to form a whole. Without this co-ordination the accumula- 
 tion of ideas or sensations forms no thought. Wherever there 
 is not a subject and an attribute ; wherever the conclusions 
 are not contained in the premises ; wherever the induction is 
 not founded on similar well-observed facts ; wherever the fore- 
 1 ConnaUionce de Dku et de aoi-mime, chap. iv. 
 
186 BOOK I. CHAPTER VI. 
 
 sight of the future is not connected with a solid experience of 
 the past, there is only the shadow of thought, but thought 
 itself is ahsent. This is what occurs in madness, dreaming, 
 delirium, and aU similar states. Thus, even by admitting the 
 brain as substratum of thought, the difficulty of the problem 
 has not been diminished ; for the question always is, how 
 blind matter, without plan and without end, can have co- 
 ordinated its diverse parts so as to form an organ so delicate 
 that the least disorder suffices to interrupt its functions. If 
 matter, submissive alone to physical laws, had formed the 
 organ of thought, it seems that madness ought to have been 
 the rule, and reason the exception ; for what a miracle it is that 
 all these sentient and vibrating cells, of which the cerebral organ 
 is said to be composed, should so accord with each other and 
 with the external world that the result of all these move- 
 ments is a thought agreeing with itself and with the external 
 world ! 
 
 The old argument upon the chance throw of the twenty- 
 four letters of the alphabet, which never could have produced 
 the Iliad, is considered frivolous and popular,^ but it cannot 
 be dissembled that this hypothesis is strictly that which 
 dogmatic materialists ought to accept and defend. In fact, 
 the Iliad is, nothing else than a particular act of the human 
 intellect, which has accomplished thousands of others not less 
 astonishing, were it only the discovery of the system of the 
 world and its laws. Thus art, science, industry, aU human 
 works, are only, in short, the applications of intellect. That 
 these innumerable applications might become possible, it has 
 been necessary that millions of living and sentient cells, only 
 obeying, like printers' types, physical and chemical laws, 
 without any relation or resemblance to what we call intellect, 
 should be assembled in such an order that not only the Miad, 
 but aU the miracles of the human intellect should become 
 
 '■ On the worth of this argument see farther on, Book II. chap, i., and 
 Charpentier, Mimoire sur la logique du probable {' Comptes-rendus de I'Acad. 
 dea So. Morales, avril-mai 1875 '). 
 
MECHANISM AND FINALITY. 187 
 
 possible. For if these cells, in their blind dance, had taken 
 some other direction, some other motion, — if, in place of moving 
 in unison, their rhythm had occurred alternately, if the least 
 derangement had taken place in their situations or respective 
 reactions, — not reason, but madness, as experience shows, would 
 have been the result; for it is known that the least blow 
 given to the equilibrium of the brain suffices to undo its 
 springs and arrest its play. 
 
 We Jinow nothing, absolutely nothing, of the cerebral 
 mechanism which presides over the development of thought, 
 nor of the play of that mechanism. But what we know for 
 certain is that that mechanism must be extremely complicated, 
 or, at least, that if it is simple, it can only be a wise simplicity, 
 the result of profound art. "Whether this very art be the act 
 of an intelligence similar to that, the mystery of which we are 
 investigating, we wOl not now inquire here. All that we wish 
 to establish is, that without a predestination (whatever be its 
 cause) ; without a sort of foresight, instinctive or reflective, 
 immanent or transcendent ; without a certain hidden cause 
 (which we purposely leave undetermined for the present), but 
 of which it is the essential character to be induced to act by 
 the effect to be attained, and not merely by predetermining 
 causes, — without such a cause, in a word, the structure of the 
 brain, of which it can be said, as Aristotle {De Animd, 1. iii. 
 c. 8) said of the hand, that it is the instrument of instruments, 
 would be absolutely incomprehensible. 
 
 It is impossible to dissemble the blunt intervention of 
 chance in this evolution of natural phenomena, which, hitherto 
 governed by the blind laws of physics and of chemistry, the 
 laws of gravity, of electricity, of affinities, — which are all, or 
 appear to be, reducible to the laws of motion, — is suddenly co- 
 ordained into thoughts, reasonings, poems, systems, inventions, 
 and scientific discoveries. If the elements of things be con- 
 ceived as mobile atoms, moving in all possible directions, and 
 ending by lighting on such a happy combination as results in 
 a planetary globe, a solar system, or an organized body, it 
 
188 BOOK I. CHAPTER VI. 
 
 will have to be said as well that it is ia virtue of a happy- 
 combination that the atoms have ended by taking the form of 
 a human brain, which, by the mere fact of that combination, 
 becomes fit for thought. N"ow what is this but to say that 
 letters thrown haphazard might form the Iliad in their suc- 
 cessive throws, since the Iliad itself is only one of the pheno- 
 mena produced by the thinking activity ? But the humaii 
 mind, whether in the arts or in the sciences, has produced, 
 and will produce, similar phenomena without end. It would 
 not then be a single verse, a single poem, it would be all 
 thought, with all its poems and all its inventions, which would 
 be the result of a happy throw. 
 
 If, in order to escape this brute divinity of chance, and the 
 extravagant consequences of blind mechanism, vital or chemical 
 activity, the forces of nature, the laws of nature were appealed 
 to, this would simply be to grant, under a vague and uncon- 
 scious, that is, unphilosophical form, precisely what we ask. 
 For either these activities, forces, and laws are nothing but 
 brute mechanism, or they are distinct from it. In the first 
 case, nothing has been done but to cover with equivocal words 
 the pure doctrine of chance which we oppose. In the second 
 case, these causes, whatever they be, whatever be their 
 essence, are only to be clearly distinguished from bnite 
 mechanism by a sort of blind instinct like an art, which makes 
 them find at once and without hesitation the combination best 
 fitted to produce a given efiect. If something of this kind be 
 not thrown into the scale to aid the action of the natural forces, 
 if there be not attributed to them, as has been said, a tendency, 
 an internal spring, the same abyss will always present itself 
 — namely, blind forces, which, combining under the control of 
 blind laws, give birth to intelligent action ; as if, for instance, 
 madmen and idiots, brought into contact and excited or calmed 
 by this rencounter, should be found suddenly to produce by 
 their very meeting a harmonious and reasonable whole. And 
 yet within those madmen and idiots there is a secret reason, 
 which contact or sympathy might conceivably awaken for 
 
MECHANISM AND FINALITY. 189 
 
 a moment ; but among chemical molecules there is, by 
 hypothesis, no hidden reason. And this would be yet once 
 more a true miracle, and a miracle without an author, that 
 thought should suddenly originate from what is not thought. 
 
 In order to diminish the horror of such a prodigy, it will 
 be supposed that the molecules of which organized beings are 
 composed are perhaps themselves endued with a dull sensi- 
 bility, and are capable, as Leibnitz believed, of certain obscure 
 perceptions, of which the sensibility of living beings is only 
 the growth and development. I shaU answer that this 
 hypothesis, besides being entirely gratuitous and conjectural, 
 after aU grants more than we ask ; for, sensation being only 
 the first degree of thought, to say that all things are endued 
 with sensation is to say that all is, to a certain extent, endued 
 with thought. ' All is fuU of God,' said Thales. All nature 
 becomes living and sensible. Neither sensation nor thought 
 is any longer the result of mechanism. Sensation being 
 inseparable from desire, desire itself implying a certain vague 
 consciousness of its end, a certain tendency towards an end is 
 thus attributed even to the elements of matter, and a certain 
 perception of the means which lead to it. In a word, the 
 hypothesis of an original and innate sensibility, inherent in 
 matter, is nothing else than the hypothesis of finality itself. 
 And stUl, in this hypothesis, the rencounter and combination 
 of these sentient molecules would need to be explained, the 
 resulting harmony, the agreement of these various sensibilities ; 
 for it is not enough that two instruments be sonorous in order 
 to produce a concert : left to themselves, and tried by an 
 inexperienced hand, they wUl never yield anything but a 
 discord. 
 
 To sum up. It foUows from the preceding discussion, that 
 the mechanical hypothesis fuUy carried out leads — 1st, To the 
 violation of aU the laws of analogical reasoning, by forcing us 
 even to call in question the existence of intelligence in other 
 men ; 2d, To a violation of aU the laws of science, by forcing 
 us to acknowledge an absolute hiatus between all the pheno- 
 
190 BOOK I. CHAPTER VI. 
 
 mena of nature and the intelligence of man ; 3d, To a con- 
 tradiction, because it is forcibly arrested in presence of a last 
 case, the human intelligence, and consequently it is con- 
 strained, at least in this case, to recognise finality, which 
 should suffice for the demonstration. Such are the dis- 
 advantages of the mechanical hypothesis when it would rise 
 above purely physical phenomena. 
 
 Let us now see whether the teleological hypothesis would 
 have the same disadvantages if it should desire to redescend 
 beneath its natural limit. 
 
 We have said that the battlefield of the two theories is the 
 domain of the organism. All that is above, that is to say, 
 the world of intelligence, belongs of right to teleology ; what- 
 ever is beneath, namely, the world of brute matter, naturally 
 belongs, so far as appears, to mechanism ; the middle space is 
 the object of debate. This middle space apart, let us ask what 
 is the position of each hypothesis when, clearing this contested 
 territory, they endeavour to invade their respective domains. 
 
 Below organic phenomena, explanation by final cause ceases 
 perhaps to be necessary, that is, to be required by the habi- 
 tudes of the miud ; but, on the other hand, it is never absurd, 
 never contrary to the laws of reasoning, logical or analogical. 
 I am not, perhaps, obliged to explain the motions of the stars 
 by the final cause, but there is nothing irrational in doing 
 so ; for, although order does not perhaps always imply finality, 
 it is also true that it never excludes it. 
 
 On the other hand, whatever department of the universe we 
 contemplate, it may be said that the mechanical explanation is 
 always necessary, in this sense, that the chain of efficient 
 causes is never broken (the problem of liberty apart) ; even 
 in the intelligence, there are always causes and effects. On 
 the other hand, if this hypothesis is always necessary, it is 
 insufficient beyond its own limits ; and this insufficiency goes 
 the length of absurdity when it pretends to reign alone, to the 
 exclusion of the rival hypothesis, in the domain proper to the 
 latter. 
 
MECHANISM AND FINALITY. 191 
 
 Here, then, is a hypothesis which remains necessary at all 
 stages, but which beyond a certain limit becomes absurd when 
 it is exclusive ; on the, other hand we have a hypothesis which 
 below a certain Kmit is not perhaps necessary, but which is 
 never absurd. 
 
 If, now, you consider that the first excludes the second, 
 while the second does not exclude the first, it is evident that 
 the second will have a very great advantage. 
 
 Thus while it is ti-uly absurd to say that other men are 
 without intelligence, — a strict consequence of pure mechanism, 
 — it is, on the other hand, in no way absurd to say that the 
 physical and inorganic world has been subjected to the laws 
 which govern it in order to render possible the presence of 
 life, and life itself in order to render possible the presence of 
 humanity, and, in fine, to conceive the whole universe as a 
 vast system subject to a plan. 
 
 Let us take up, then, from this point of view, the physical 
 and mechanical sphere, which we have hitherto left outside 
 the range of our studies. 
 
 The reason why final causes will always be sought by 
 preference in the sphere of living beings is, that there alone 
 a fact is met with which may be considered as having a 
 veritable interest, and which may consequently be an end — 
 namely, sensibility. There only, where the possession, the 
 preservation of being is felt, can existence be considered as 
 a good, and consequently as an end to which a system of 
 means is subordinated. "What does it really matter to a 
 crystal to be or not to be ? What does it matter to it 
 whether it have eight angles in place of twelve, or be organ- 
 ized geometrically rather than in any other way ? Existence 
 having no value for it, why should nature have taken means 
 to secure it ? Why should it have been at the expense 
 of a plan and a system of combinations to produce a result 
 without value for any one, at least in the absence of living 
 beings ? So, again, however beautiful the sidereal and plane- 
 tary order may be, what matters this beauty, this order, to 
 
192 BOOK I. CHAPTER VI. 
 
 the stars tliemselves that know nothing of it ? And if you 
 say that this fair order was constructed to be admired by 
 men, or that God might therein contemplate His glory, it is 
 evident that an end can only be given to these objects by 
 going out of themselves, by passing them by, and rising 
 above their proper system. No doubt it is the same as 
 regards living beings, if one would rise to the absolute end, 
 the final and last end ; but in themselves and for themselves 
 they have already a sufficient though relative end, namely, to 
 exist and to feel it : this is for them a g09d, and one can 
 understand that nature has taken precautions to assure it to 
 them. It is not the same with inorganic beings. 
 
 But if inorganic beings have not an end in themselves, it 
 is not at aU improbable that they may have one outside of 
 them. ' "Why do bodies exist ? ' said Ampfere. ' In order 
 to furnish thoughts to minds.' ^ The Indian philosophers 
 expressed the same thought in a charming and original 
 form : ' N"ature,' said they, ' resembles a dancer who only 
 asks to be seen, and who disappears immediately after the 
 applause.'^ In fine, living beings are bodies, and these 
 bodies need other bodies in order to subsist. Mechanical 
 and physical nature, which has not its end in itself, may 
 therefore be made dependent on living nature as an end. We 
 are thus brought to the notion of external or relative finality, 
 too much sacrificed by Kant to internal finality.^ 
 
 It is strange that it did not strike Kant from this poiat 
 of view that internal finality is in reality inseparable from 
 external, and cannot be understood without it. The organized 
 being, in fact, is not self-sufficient, and it only exists by 
 means of the medium in which it lives. Nature, then, woidd 
 
 1 Philosophk d'Ampire, Paris 1866, p. 184. 
 
 ' B. St. Hilaire, Mimoires sur la Sanhhya, Mimoires de I'Acadimie des Sc. 
 Morales et Polit. t. viii. p. 332. See appendix, Dissertation IX. 
 
 ' External or relative finality is the utility of a thing for another thing ; 
 internal finality is the respective and reciprocal utility of the various parts of 
 one and the same being for each other, and of all for the whole being. It is in 
 this sense that in the organized being all is at once ' end and means.' 
 
MECHANISM AND FINALITY. 193 
 
 have done an absurd thing, if, in preparing an organism, it had 
 not, at the same time, prepared besides the means necessary 
 for that organism to subsist. Kant characterises internal 
 finality by saying that a production of organized nature is at 
 once the cause and effect of itself ; but it cannot be its own 
 cause by itself, it must assimilate external objects which are 
 proper for this purpose. It is not strictly true to say, as 
 Cuvier does, that the organized being is ' a closed system.' 
 If it were so, nothing would enter, nothing would come out ; 
 but that is not life, it is death, for death takes place precisely 
 at the moment when all exchange between the interior and 
 the exterior ceases. 
 
 If these considerations are just, how could internal finality 
 be maintained, without admitting at the same time an external 
 finality which is its counterpart 1 How could it be said that 
 nature has made the herbivora to eat grass, without admitting 
 that the same nature has made the grass to be eaten by the 
 herbivora ? Cuvier has said : ' Wherever there are spiders, 
 there are flies : wherever there are swallows, there are insects.' 
 A nature that should make herbivora without having made 
 grass would be an absurd nature. But nature has not com- 
 mitted this absurdity. Having made herbivora, it has made 
 grass ; having made eyes, it has made light ; ears, it has made 
 sound. If one of these objects has been made to enjoy the 
 other, why might it not be said that the other has been made, 
 at least in part to serve or refresh the first ? It is only the 
 difference of the active and passive. In place of saying : the 
 lamb has been made m order to be eaten by the wolf, it will 
 be said : the wolf has been made in order to eat the lamb, l^fo 
 doubt, as regards the lamb, to be eaten is, according to the 
 scholastic expression, an external denomination ; it is not for it 
 a necessary part of its essence ; it can accomplish its destiny 
 without that : it is then, as regards it, only an accident, and it 
 is in this sense that external finality is only relative. But 
 this accident, in so far as it forms part of the internal finality 
 of another being, becomes in its turn an end of nature ; and 
 
 N 
 
194 BOOK I. CHAPTEE VI. 
 
 it may be said that it is one of the views that it has had in 
 creating the lamb. It is the same with the use of external 
 things for human industry. No doubt, strictly speaking, it 
 will not be said that stones have been made in order to build 
 houses, wood to make furniture, and the cork-tree corks. But 
 it will be very correct to say inversely that man, being an 
 industrious animal, animal instnimentificum, endued with in- 
 telligence, and furnished with a hand, this industrious aptitude 
 has been given to him in order to turn to his use the things 
 of nature ; whence it follows reciprocally that the things of 
 nature have been made in order to be turned to his use. And 
 it is certain that the industrial aptitude of man would be a 
 contradiction and an absurdity, if nothing outside had been 
 prepared in order to be utilized by him ; and to say, in fine, 
 that this is a pure rencounter, would now be not merely to 
 sacrifice external to internal finality, it would be to return to the 
 theory of chance, which absolutely suppresses every final cause. 
 
 To sum up. External finality is the counterpart of internal, 
 and the one is as necessary as the other. No doubt, external 
 finality, just because it is external, is not written, like the 
 other, on the object itself; and in considering an object of 
 nature, one can hardly discover in it d priori what end it 
 can subserve : they have also been much abused.' It is in 
 this sense that it may be rash, as Descartes says, to seek to 
 sound the intentions of Providence. But physical and mechani- 
 cal things being in a general manner connected with finality 
 by their relation to living beings, we conceive that there may 
 thus be in the inorganic world a general interest of order and 
 stability, conditions of security for the living being. 
 
 It is true, the hypothesis which connects external with 
 internal finality, and the inorganic with the living world, 
 seems in check in presence of this dif&culty, that Life has 
 not always existed, at least on our globe, and that the 
 number of ages during which inorganic matter has been 
 prepared for life has considerably surpassed, according to all 
 '■ On the aiusee of final causes, see the appendix. 
 
MECHANISM AND FINALITY. 195 
 
 appearance, the number of ages in which life can have been 
 produced and preserved. If living beings have been the only- 
 real end of creation, why have they not been created at the 
 very first, and why has not the earth from the very first 
 moment been found fit to receive them ? Besides, it seems 
 clear that life in its turn is not indestructible. We see in 
 the universe a globe — ^the moon, for instance — in which life 
 appears to have ceased to exist, if it has ever had a place 
 there. To say that the whole universe has been created that 
 life might appear for a moment on the humblest of its globes, 
 this is a very great disproportion between means and end. 
 The prologue and epilogue of the drama appear very long in 
 relation to the drama itself. Besides, even among living 
 beings, at least the half, namely the vegetable kingdom, 
 appears as insensible as the mineral ; and if it enjoys life, it is 
 without knowing it. In fine, the dull and diffused sensibility 
 of the lower animals is hardly worth more than absolute 
 insensibility. What matters it to the oyster whether it exist 
 or not ? 
 
 It is absolutely impossible for us to know what is the 
 proportion in the universe of living and sentient matter to 
 matter not living and not sentient; it is not by the extent 
 of space or time that the value of things ought to be 
 measured. Pascal has rightly said : ' We depend on thought, 
 not on space and duration.' But if life exists throughout the 
 whole universe, which is not at all impossible, it matters little 
 that there are vast amounts of time or space that are deprived 
 of it. It is no more astonishing that there are no animals 
 in the moon, than among the ices of the North or in the 
 deserts of Africa. These vast spaces may be magazines, 
 stores of material which shall serve afterwards to sustain the 
 great movement of circulation necessary to life in the uni- 
 verse.^ The world may have need of a skeleton of dead 
 
 ' We need to be very reserved in the supposition of final causes in the case 
 of the inorganic world, but we need not systematically discard any of them. 
 'Just as the force of the sun,' says an eminent savant, M. Grove, ' after having 
 
196 BOOK I. CHAPTEK VI. 
 
 matter, as the vertebrates have need of a scaffold to support 
 
 the tissues. It is absolutely impossible for us to specify 
 
 anything regarding the relations of the two orders ; it is 
 
 enough for us to show their necessary connection, which 
 
 affords us a glimpse of this, that the one, being the base of the 
 
 other, may thus possess by communication and anticipation a 
 
 finality which it would not have in itself. 
 
 There is set before us at the present day, as a necessary 
 
 consequence of the mechanical theory of heat, the prospect 
 
 of a final state in which, all the motion of the universe being 
 
 converted into heat, things would fall into an absolute and 
 
 eternal equilibrium, which would render all life impossible. 
 
 The illustrious Clausins has called this constant transformation 
 
 of motion into heait, entropy, and has formulated this law in 
 
 these terms : ' The entropy of the universe tends towards a 
 
 maximum state ; the more the universe approaches this 
 
 boundary state, the more do the occasions of new changes 
 
 disappear ; and if this state were at last attained, no further 
 
 change would take place, and the universe would come to be 
 
 in a state of persistent death.' But this hypothesis has been 
 
 disputed by one of the very authors of the mechanical 
 
 theory of heat, by Mayer.^ Such remote consequences of a 
 
 been exercised very long ago, is now rendered to us by the earbon formed under 
 the influence of that luminary, and of that heat, so the rays of the sun, vainly 
 lost to-day in the sandy deserts of Africa, will one day serve, by means of 
 chemistry and mechanics, to lighten and warm the habitations of the coldest 
 regions. ' — Eevut des cours scientifiques. Ire serie, t. iii. p. 689. ' From the 
 mouths of those volcanoes whose convulsions so often, agitate the crust of the 
 globe, incessantly escapes the chief nourishment of plants, carbonic acid ; from 
 the atmosphere enflamed by lightning, and even from the bosom of the tempest, 
 that other nomishment descends on the earth which is as indispensable to 
 plants, that from which comes almost all their azote, the nitrate of ammonia, 
 which the rains of the storm contain.' — Dumas et Boussingault, Essai de 
 statigue. cliimique, 1844. 
 
 ' RewA des cours scientijlques. Ire serie, t. v. p. 159. See also the memoir of 
 Mr. Tolver Preston on the possibility of giving an account of the continuation of 
 periodic cha/nges in the universe, conformably to (lie tendency to the equilibrium of 
 temperature, Philosophical Magazine, vol. viii. p. 152, 1879 (see the analysis of 
 this memoir in the Journal de Physique of d'Alameida, 1880, p. 65) ; finally, Of 
 the commencement and of the end of (lie world after the mechanical theory of 
 lieat, by F. Folie {Bulletins de I'Acadimie royale de Belgique, 2e s^rie, t. xxxvi. 
 No. 12, 1873). 
 
MECHANISM AND FINALITY. 197 
 
 theory so new and so delicate may legitimately be called in 
 question. Newton believed that the data of his system of 
 the world necessarily led to the admission that the equilibrium 
 of the world would be deranged, and that it would need the 
 hand of the Creator to re-establish it ; but it has since been' 
 proved that he was mistaken, and that the laws of the 
 planetary system are themselves sufiBcient to guarantee its 
 stability. Thus the greatest scientists may be mistaken 
 regarding the consequences of their own discoveries. Besides, 
 if a state of things like what is foretold us should come to 
 pass, it would warrant us to say that nature, having nothing 
 more to do, had^ only to vanish entirely, like the Indian 
 dancer; and as some scientists think at present that science 
 necessarily leads to the idea of a beginning,^ perhaps they 
 will also find that' it leads to the idea of an end. But this 
 is to push inductions and hypotheses very far, and perhaps 
 far beyond what we are permitted to conjecture. Let us be 
 content to consider the world such as it is. 
 
 We have just seen that from its relation to the organic 
 world, the physical and mechanical world may be considered 
 as having a relative finality, which suffices to explain its , 
 existence. Besides, this relative finality once admitted, there 
 will be found in this world, considered in itself, examples of 
 internal finality less striking than in the organic world, but 
 which have also their significance. This is a vague finality, 
 the pathway to finality. 
 
 This is the place to recall to mind that we have above 
 established a primary law, which we had provisionally distin- 
 guished from the law of finality, and which we have called 
 the law of mechanical agreement? We have granted as a 
 provisional hypothesis, that a simple agreement or internal 
 accord of phenomena, without visible relation to an ulterior 
 
 ^ Revue des cours scientifiques, t. Tii. p. 124; Maxwell, Rapports des sc. 
 phys. et des sc. maihim. (Revue Sclent. 2e serie, t. i. p. 236). See also Caro, 
 Le matiricdisme et la science, note B, p. 287. 
 
 ' See above, chap. i. p. 60. 
 
198 BOOK I. CHAPTEB TI. 
 
 phenomenon, did not & priori appear irreconcilable with a 
 mechanical cause. But if it be considered more closely, it 
 will appear that this was to concede far too much. 
 
 We said that the constancy of the coincidences must have 
 a special cause ; but may it be a physical cause 1 We must 
 now examine this more closely. We have here to make a 
 new distinction. These coincidences may be of two sorts, 
 namely : 1st, The simple repetition, or the great number of 
 the phenomena; 2d, The concordance properly so called be- 
 tween divergent phenomena. Now the first case presents 
 nothing incompatible with the physical cause, but that is far 
 from being so evident as regards the second. For instance, 
 the freq^uency of storms in a given season or country certainly 
 demands a special explanation, but nothing lying outside the 
 domain of physical causes, for the number or the repetition is 
 not beyond the powers of a physical agent. On the other hand, 
 a convergence, a common direction given to elements by 
 hypothesis independent, can only be attributed to a physical 
 cause by supposing in this cause an internal law, which 
 determines in a certain way the motion and direction of the 
 elements — in other words, by attributing to matter an instinct 
 of order and combination, which is precisely what we call the 
 law of finality. If we do not suppose something like this, 
 there only remains the fortuitous concourse of the elements, and 
 consequently the absence of cause. Setting out from this prin- 
 ciple, let us see if an exclusively mechanical explanation can 
 be given of all that is presented to us under the form of system 
 and plan — in a word, under a regular and co-ordinated form. 
 Let us consider the two most striking examples of this kind of 
 explanation, namely, the explanation of the form of crystals 
 in crystallization, and the cosmogonic hypothesis of Laplace. 
 
 The production of the crystalline forms of minerals is 
 explained by an agglomeration of molecules, of which each one 
 has precisely the same geometric form as the whole. Thus-, a 
 tetrahedron will be composed of little tetrahedra, a dodecahedron 
 of little dodecahedra. Very well ; the last perceptible appear- 
 
MECHANISM AND FINALITY. 199 
 
 ance which these bodies present is sufficiently explained by 
 that. But it is clear that, as regards philosophy, the problem 
 is not solved. For one thing, in effect, it must be admitted 
 that the integral molecules, directed by a vague geometry, 
 know of themselves how to find the mode of juxtaposition 
 which permits them in uniting to reproduce the figure of the 
 elements ; for pyramids, joined by their bases or their sum- 
 mits, or by their angles, do not make pyramids. What is the 
 physical law in virtue of which such a junction takes place ? 
 Must it not be supposed that whatever force produces -these 
 forms has in itself some reason or motive which determines 
 it to avoid all the irregular forms, and to confine itself to that 
 one alone which will form a regular geometric figure ? In 
 the second place, in explaining the geometric form of the 
 mineral by the superposition or juxtaposition of molecules of the 
 same form, the only thing done is to throw back the question ; 
 for whence comes the figure of the integral molecules them- 
 selves ? WOl it be explained by the form of the elementary 
 atoms, or by their mode of distribution in space ? But why 
 should the atoms have regular geometric forms ? If every 
 rational idea be excluded in order to keep to the conception 
 of mere matter, there is no reason why the elementary particles 
 should have one form rather than another, and the number of 
 irregular forms behoved greatly to exceed that of the regular 
 or geometric forms. As to their mode of distribution, there 
 were no reason why it should be rather this than that, and 
 consequently no reason that any order whatever could pro- 
 ceed from it. The consequence is the same, if, in place of 
 admitting atoms, geometric points, centres of force, or even 
 divisibility without end be admitted ; in any case, the geo- 
 metric form will not be a primitive fact, and will always, have 
 to be resolved into an anterior processus of component particles, 
 implying a sort of preference or choice for such a form rather 
 than another.^ Chance cannot here be appealed to, for such 
 
 ' ' Corpus eamdem figuram habet cum spatio quod implet. Sed restat 
 dubium cur tantum potius et tale spatium impleat quam aliud, et ita our, 
 
200 BOOK I. CHAPTER VI. 
 
 constancy cannot be fortuitous. There is needed, then, a 
 reason to direct the motion towards this form ; in some sort, 
 it needs to pre-exist before existing. Here we again come 
 upon what we have drawn attention to in the living being, 
 namely, the determination of the parts by the whole, and of 
 the present by the future. The only difference is that the 
 crystal seeks this form without having any interest in it ; but 
 it is possible that that matters to other beings than itself, 
 and that the precise and regular form of each substance is a 
 condition of order and stability indispensable to the general 
 security. 
 
 We could, then,^ carry still farther than we have done this 
 descending scale, which, starting from the fact of human 
 industry, had brought us step by step to the organizing force. 
 We discover some traces of the same principle even in the 
 architecture of the atoms, as it has been called, — an inferior 
 art to that shown in the vegetables and animals, but still 
 an art, for it is not the necessary result of mechanical 
 laws. 
 
 It is a very widespread error to believe that wherever we 
 meet with geometry, the final cause must be absent, under the 
 pretext that there is a contradiction between geometry, which 
 is the domain of inflexible fate, and finality, which is that of 
 contingency and liberty. But what is absolutely necessary in 
 geometry is simply the notion of space and the laws of logic; all 
 the rest proceeds from the freedom of the mind. Space in itself 
 is void and naked ; it contains potentially all forms, but none 
 actually ; no line crosses it, no point sets bounds to it, no 
 figure, no solid of itself delineates itself in it. It is the mind 
 alone which creates geometric figures, whether by deriving 
 them from itself or by borrowing their elements from experi- 
 ence. It is it that, by the motion of a point, engenders the 
 
 exempli caus&, sit potius tripedale quam bipedale, et our quadratum potius 
 quam rotundum. Hujus rei ratio ex corporum naturS. reddi non possit ; eadem 
 enim materia ad quamcunque flguram indeterminata est.' — Leibnitz, Opera 
 Philosophica, ed. Erdmann, 'Confessio contra Atheistas,' pp. 41-46. 
 
MECHANISM AND FINALITY. 201 
 
 line, whether straight or curved; by that of the line, surfaces; 
 by that of surfaces, solids : it is it that engenders all the 
 figures of different species, and which consequently constructs, 
 by a sort of architecture, all the geometric world. No doubt, 
 such figures being given, logic wiU have it that such conse- 
 quences are necessarily derived from them ; but it is in no 
 way necessary that the figures be given. 
 
 If, then, we see in nature regular geometric forms, we ought 
 not to think that these forms necessarily result from the 
 nature of extension, which is of itself indifferent to all forms. 
 Among all the figures, infinite in number, regular or irregular, 
 which things could have taken, there is needed a precise 
 reason to explain the formation of the regular figures. At 
 the very most, it might have been imagined that by friction, 
 during an immensity of time, aU angular forms would have 
 disappeared, and all elementary bodies been reduced to the 
 rounded form ; but it is found that this is precisely the only 
 form excluded by chemical combinations, and that nature only 
 rises to the rounded form in living beings by a sort of 
 geometry superior to that of the inert bodies. On the other 
 hand, all the crystalline forms are angular, without ceasing to 
 be regular. Wo natural selection can give a reason for this 
 singular fact. We must admit a geometric nature as well 
 as an artistic, an industrious nature, ' and thus we find 
 again in nature all the modes of the intellectual activity of 
 man. As M. CL Bernard admits in the organized being a 
 vital design, so there is in some sort a crystallic design, a 
 mineral architecture, a directive idea of chemical evolution. 
 The physical element as such contains absolutely nothing to 
 explain this faculty of obeying a plan. 
 
 Let us meanwhile pass from the small to the great, and 
 from the architecture of the molecule to the architecture of 
 the world ; let us see whether the hypothesis of Laplace 
 excludes finaKty or renders it useless. 
 
 The solar world forms a system of which the sun is the 
 centre, and around which revolve in the same direction a 
 
202 BOOK I. CHAPTEB 71. 
 
 certaiu number of planets, and of which some have satellites 
 which equally revolve in the same direction. Now it is found, 
 as we have seen above, that this is precisely the most favour- 
 able arrangement for the existence of life, at least on the 
 earth; as to the other planets, their habitability no longer 
 appears to form a question. But setting aside the utility 
 of such an arrangement, there still remain agreement, order, 
 symmetry, and plan. Now it is this accord and plan that 
 Laplace explains in an entirely physical manner by the 
 nebular hypothesis. This explanation appears to be nearly 
 the reverse of that which is given of crystallization : in this 
 case the form of the whole is explained as an addition or 
 composition of homogeneous parts ; in the former, on the 
 contrary, the form of the world was explained as the result of 
 a division or dismemberment of a homogeneous whole. It is, 
 in fact, the dismemberment or division of the nebula which 
 has given birth to the different stars, at present separated, 
 which are only in reality its debris. The primitive nebula 
 was, then, already the actual world potentially ; it was the 
 confused germ, which, by the internal labour of the elements, 
 was to become a system. But let it be well observed, the 
 nebula is not a chaos ; it is a definite form, whence there is 
 to issue later, in virtue of the laws of motion, an ordered 
 world. The question, as above, is only thrown back ; for it 
 recurs when we inquire how matter can have found precisely the 
 form which behoved to lead afterguards to the system of the 
 world. How can actions and reactions purely external, and 
 without any relation to any plan whatever, even with the 
 help of an endless friction, have resulted in a plan ? How 
 should order have issued from disorder ? The nebula is order 
 already ; it is already separated by an abyss from mere chaos. 
 Now there is no need to deceive oneself, the absolute negation 
 of finality is the doctrine of chaos. If you do not admit 
 anything that guides and directs phenomena, you at the same 
 time admit that they are absolutely undetermined, that is to 
 say, disordered : now how are you to pass from this absolute 
 
MECHANISM AND FINALITY. 203 
 
 disorder to any order whatever ? And where is there found 
 a trace of this primitive chaos ? ' It is not enough,' says a 
 philosopher who is at the same time a savant, M. Cournot, 
 ' to establish the possibility of the passage from one regular 
 state to another; it would be necessary to lay hold of 
 the first trace of the passage from the chaotic to the 
 regular state, before insolently daring to banish God from 
 the explanation of the physical world as a useless hypo- 
 thesis.'^ 
 
 No doubt the system of the world manifests a certain num- 
 ber of accidents which cannot in any manner be explained by 
 the final cause, and which we need not seek to trace to it. 
 ' Why is Saturn provided with a ring, while the other planets 
 have none ? Why has the same planet seven moons, Jupiter 
 four, and the earth only one, while Mars and Venus have none 
 at all ? These are as much accidents as cosmical facts.'' But 
 we will afterwards see that the theory of final causes is not 
 committed to the denial of the existence of accident in nature. 
 It may even be said that it is accident that calls forth the 
 theory of finality, for it is because we find the fortuitous in 
 nature that we ask ourselves, Why is the whole not for- 
 tuitous ? But if the detail appears fortuitous, the whole is 
 not, and has, indeed, all the character of a plan. 
 
 It is known that it was by a reason drawn from the sim- 
 plicity of the plan of the universe that Copernicus rose to 
 the conception of the true system of the world. Alphonso 
 the Wise, king of Castile, offended by the complications which 
 the system of Ptolemy assumed, said : ' If God had called me 
 to His councils, things would have been in better order.' 
 Well, it turned out that he was right. It was not the order 
 of the universe that was at fault, but the system. It was to 
 avoid the complications of the system of Ptolemy that Coper- 
 nicus sought a simple arrangement, which is precisely that 
 which exists. ' He had the satisfaction,' says Laplace, ' to see 
 
 ' Coumot, Essai eur lea idies/ondamentales, 1. ii. c. xii. 
 ' Coumot, Mat&ialiame, vitalisme, rationalisme, p. 70. 
 
204 BOOK I. CHAPTER VI. 
 
 the observations of astronomers fit in with his theory. . . . 
 Everything in this system told of that fair simplicity which 
 charms us in nature's means, when we are happy enough to 
 know them.'^ Thus Laplace perceived that the simplest laws 
 are the most likely to be true. But I do not see why it should 
 he so on the supposition of an absolutely blind cause ; for, 
 after all, the inconceivable swiftness which the system of 
 Ptolemy supposed in the celestial system has nothing physi- 
 cally impossible in it, and the complication of movements 
 has nothing incompatible with the idea of a mechanical cause. 
 Why, then, do we expect to find simple movements in nature, 
 and speed in proportion, except because we instinctively 
 attribute a sort of intelligence and choice to the first cause ? 
 Now experience justifies this hypothesis ; at least it did so 
 with Copernicus and Galileo. It also did so, according to 
 Laplace, in the debate between Clairaut and Buffon, the latter 
 maintaining against the former that the law of attraction 
 remained the . same at all distances. ' This time,' says 
 Laplace, 'the metaphysician was right as against the geo- 
 metrician.' ^ 
 
 Above all, when one considers the stability of the solar 
 system, one is astonished to see how near this stability came 
 to having been for ever impossible, and especially how con- 
 stantly it was in peril. ' In the midst of the maze of aug- 
 mentations and diminutions of swiftness,' says Arago, ' of 
 variations of forms in the orbits, of changes of distances and 
 inclinations which these forces must evidently have produced, 
 the most skilful geometry itself could not have succeeded in 
 finding a strong and reliable clue. This extreme complication 
 
 ^ Laplace, Exposition de la michaniqae eileste, t. v. c. iv. 
 
 ^ Laplace, Exposition de la michanigue eileste : — ' Clairaut maintained that tlie 
 law of Newton, reciprocal to tlie square of distances, is only perceptible at great 
 distances, but that attraction increases in a greater ratio than the distance 
 diminishes. Buffon assailed this conclusion, founding on this, that the laws of 
 nature must be simple, that they can only depend on a single model, and that 
 the expression of them can only embrace a single term. But Clairaut found 
 that on carrying the calculation farther, the law exactly expressed the result 
 of the observations.' 
 
MECHANISM AND FINALITY. 205 
 
 gave birth to a discouraging thought. Forces so numerous, 
 so variable in position, so different in intensity, could seem- 
 ingly only be maintained perpetually in balance by a sort of 
 miracle. Newton went so far as to suppose that the planetary 
 system did not contain in itself elements of indefinite preser- 
 vation ; he believed that a powerful hand must have inter- 
 vened from time to time to repair the disorder. Euler, 
 although more advanced than Newton in the knowledge of 
 planetary perturbations, no more admitted that the solar 
 system was constituted so as to last for ever.' ^ 
 
 And yet ' universal gravitation suffices to conserve the solar 
 system ; it maintains the forms and inclinations of the orbits 
 in a mediate state, around which the variations are slight : 
 variety does not involve disorder; the world presents har- 
 monies and perfections of which even Newton doubted. This 
 depends on circumstances, which arithmetic revealed to Laplace, 
 and which, on vague observation, did not seem to exercise so 
 great an influence. For planets all moving in the same 
 direction, in orbits slightly elliptical, and in planes but little 
 inclined to each other, substitute different conditions, and the 
 stability of the world will be anew imperilled, and in all 
 probability there will result a frightful chaos. The author of 
 the Michanigue cdleste brought out clearly the laws of these great 
 phenomena : the variations in the speed of Jupiter, Saturn, 
 and the moon had, it was found, evident physical causes, and 
 belonged to the category of common and periodical perturbations 
 dependent on gravity; the vast differences in the dimen- 
 sions of the orbits became a simple oscillation contained within 
 narrow limits ; in fine, by the omnipotence of a mathematical 
 force, the material world is found established on its founda- 
 tions.'^ 
 
 Thus it is in virtue of a mathematical law that the world 
 subsists ; but a mathematical law is absolutely indifferent to 
 this or that result. What does it signify to universal attrac- 
 
 1 Arago, Notices scientifiques, t. iii. ; Laplace, p. 475. 
 " Arago, Notices acientifiques, t. iii. ; Laplace, p. 475. 
 
206 BOOK I. CHAPTER VI. 
 
 tion that the world does or does not subsist ? But it is the 
 case that that force which begets the solar system has in itself 
 that wherewith to conserve it. It happens that particles of 
 matter, in themselves indifferent to the formation of this or 
 that order, and obeying a law as deaf and dumb as they, have 
 hit upon an equilibrium and a state of stability which seems, 
 according to Arago, the effect of a miracle. To grant that 
 such a stability and such an order is the result of a happy 
 accident, which at some remote time made order arise out of 
 chaos, and found this point of equilibrium between so many 
 diverse and divergent forces, is neither more nor less than the 
 doctrine of mere chance. 
 
 I know that the laws and forces of nature are perpetually 
 appealed to, and that to nature itself a sort of divinity is 
 attributed. Be it so ; but then this is to suppose that these 
 laws, these forces, this nature, though destitute of conscious- 
 ness and reflection, have yet a sort of obscure and instinctive 
 foresight, and are guided in their action, without knowing it, 
 by the general interest of the whole. But this, again, is 
 finality. Only once admit that the effect to be produced has 
 been one of the factors, one of the co-operating elements of a 
 system, and you thereby admit final causes. On the other 
 hand, rob nature, its forces and its laws, of all clear or obscure 
 foresight of the future, of all instinct, of all interest ; reduce 
 these words to precise notions, namely, nature, to the whole 
 of things, that is, of bodies ; the forces of nature to the pro- 
 perties of these bodies ; the laws of nature to the relations 
 arising from these properties ; and it follows that it is only by 
 fortuitous rencounters and external relations that the world can 
 have been formed. In a word, either the order of the world 
 is a result, that is, an accident, and is the effect of chance, or 
 else there must be in nature a principle of order, that is, a 
 principle which reduces multiplicity to unity, which directs 
 the present towards the future, and which, consequently, obeys 
 (whether it knows it or not) the law of finality. 
 
 The series of preceding inductions might be pushed stiU 
 
MECHANISM AND FINALITY. 207 
 
 farther, by inquiring whether the very existence of laws in 
 nature is not itself a fact of finality. No doubt nature cannot 
 be imagined as without a cause, but it can be imagined as 
 without laws. John Stuart Mill confused this when he 
 affirmed in his Inductive Zogic^ that it is possible to conceive 
 a world freed from the law of causality. He expressed him- 
 seK badly here, for no effort of our mind permits us to con- 
 ceive a phenomenon spontaneously originating from nothing, 
 without being called forth by something previous ; but what 
 we can conceive are phenomena without order, bond, or any 
 regularity, of which all the combinations should appear for- 
 tuitous, and which should not permit any certain foresight 
 for the future. Thus it is, in appearance at least, with the 
 ravings of madness ; the words, no longer expressing ideas, 
 are united to each other in a purely fortuitous manner, with- 
 out any constant and regular mode, and as if they were taken 
 by chance from a dictionary. There is no reason why the 
 phenomena of the universe should not be produced in the 
 same manner, if there be supposed at the beginning elements 
 purely material, in which there pre-existed no principle of 
 order and harmony. 
 
 ' To consider only the laws of motion,' says a philosopher, 
 ' there is no reason why the small or elementary bodies con- 
 tinue to group themselves in the same order rather than to 
 form new combinations, or even no longer to form any. In 
 fine, the very existence of these small bodies would be as pre- 
 carious as that of the great, for they have no doubt parts, since 
 they have extension ; and the cohesion of these parts can only 
 be explained by a concourse of motions impelling them inces- 
 santly towards each other. They are thus in their turn 
 nothing but systems of motions, which the mechanical laws 
 are of themselves careless to preserve or to destroy. The 
 world of Epicurus, before the concourse of the atoms, presents 
 us with but a feeble idea of the degree of dissolution into 
 which the universe, in virtue of its own mechanism, might be 
 ^ Stuart Mill, System of Logic, 1. iii. chap. xxi. § 4. 
 
208 BOOK I. CHAPTER VI. 
 
 reduced from one moment to another. "We can still imagine 
 cubes or spheres falling in the void, but we cannot imagine 
 that sort of infinitesimal powder, without shape, colour, or 
 property, appreciable by any sense. Such a hypothesis to us 
 appears monstrous, and we are persuaded that even when this 
 or that law shall come to be disproved, there will always 
 remain a certain harmony between the elements of the 
 universe. But how should we know this, did we not admit 
 d, priori that this harmony is in some sort the supreme 
 interest of nature, and that the causes of which it seems 
 the necessary result are only the means wisely concerted to 
 establish it ? ' ^ 
 
 We do not, with the author of this passage, consider it 
 necessary here to appeal to a belief d, priori ; but the mere 
 fact of the existence of any order whatever appears to us to 
 testify to 'the existence of another than the mechanical cause. 
 The latter, in effect, as he says, cares not to produce any 
 regular combination. If, however, such combinations exist, 
 and have lasted for a vast time, without the primordial chaotic 
 state having ever been met with at any time or in any place, 
 it is because matter has been directed, or has directed itself, 
 with a view to produce these systems, plans, and combinations, 
 whence results the order of the world ; which amounts to say- 
 ing that matter has obeyed another cause than the mechanical. 
 If it has been directed, there must be outside of it an intel- 
 ligent and spiritual cause ; if it has directed itself, itself must 
 be an inteUigent and spiritual cause. In both these cases the 
 order of finality rises above the mechanical order. If, mean- 
 while, we ask what are the laws of nature, we shall see that 
 they are only, as Montesquieu has said, the constant relations 
 which result from the nature of things. That these constant 
 relations may exist, the nature of things must itself be con- 
 stant, which supposes that a certain order exists even in the 
 formation of these primary systems of motions which compose 
 the elementary bodies ; and if we consequently discover finality 
 • Lachelier, Dv, fondemevi de Vinduction, pp. 79, 80. 
 
MECHANISM AND FINALITY. 209 
 
 even in the origin of these elementary bodies, we must find it 
 in the laws which are only the result of them. As to the 
 belief we have that the order of nature will always continue 
 (under one form or another), and that there will always be 
 laws, we explain it by the axiom that ' the same causes always 
 produce the same effects.' If an unknown wisdom is the 
 cause of the order which we admire in the universe, that same 
 wisdom could not let this order perish without becoming folly ; 
 and to say that it might cease to be, would be to say that it 
 is accidental and contingent in its nature — that is, that it 
 depended on matter, which is contrary to the hypothesis. 
 If, finally, it were supposed that it would one day become 
 impotent, it would be supposed without proof; for having 
 hitherto been powerful enough to govern nature, why should 
 it cease to be so 1 Our confidence in it has no reason, then, 
 to vanish before a gratuitous doubt. 
 
 Without doubt, on any hypothesis, there will always remain, 
 in order to constitute nature and to give it a rule, the laws of 
 motion. ' But the part of these laws,' as the author qLuoted 
 again says, 'is limited to subordinating each motion to the 
 preceding, and does not extend to mutually co-ordinating 
 several series of motions. It is true that if we knew at a 
 given moment the direction and the rapidity of all the motions 
 which are executed in the universe, we could exactly deduce 
 therefrom all the combinations which must result ; but indue 
 tion precisely consists in reversing the problem, by supposing, 
 on the other hand, that the whole of these directions and of 
 these rates of speed must be such as to reproduce at a given 
 point the same combinations. But to say that a complex 
 phenomenon contains the reason of the simple phenomena 
 which concur to produce it, is to say that it is their final 
 cause.' ^ 
 
 ' Lachelier, Du fondement de I'induction, p. 78. We agree at 'bottom with 
 the author we quote. Perhaps, however, we differ in the manner of presenting 
 the same argument. M. Lachelier appears to helieve that we know heforehand 
 that the series of phenomena will produce at a given point the same combinations 
 (for instance, the motion of the stars, the perpetuity of species), and this belief, 
 
 
 
210 BOOK I. CHAPTER VI. 
 
 Who knows, meanwhile, whether one might not ascend 
 still higher, and maintain that the laws of motion themselves 
 are not laws purely mechanical and mathematical ? Leibnitz 
 believed it ; he thought that these laws are contingent — ^that 
 they are laws of beauty and convenience, not of necessity — 
 that they are derived from the divine goodness and wisdom, 
 not from the essence of matter. The authority of so great a 
 name, one of the founders of modern dynamics, should impress 
 those who believe it so easy to explain all by brute matter. 
 Unhappily, we would need more mathematical and physical 
 knowledge than we have in order to pursue this discussion to 
 its limit. 
 
 However it may be as to this last point, let it suffice us to 
 have shown : 1st, That the physical and mechanical order is 
 not exclusive of finality ; 2d, That all order in general, even 
 physical and mechanical, already implies a certain finality. 
 
 If this be so, then the principle of mechanical concordance 
 is not essentially distinguished, as we had at first thought, 
 from the principle of teleological concordance. The first is only 
 the primary form, the rudimentary and obscure form of the 
 second, and is only explained by the latter. It was, then, on 
 our part, quite a provisional concession, and in order to avoid 
 a premature discussion, that we admitted at the commence- 
 ment of these studies a mode of combination foreign to finality. 
 We now see that finality penetrates everywhere, even where it 
 seems the least visible, and we can say, in a more general 
 manner than we have yet done, all order supposes an end, and 
 the very principle of order is the end. 
 
 Only we think we must distinguish two kinds of finality, — 
 the finality of use or of adaptation, and the finality of plan. 
 
 which appears to him the foundation of induction, is the principle of final causes. 
 For us, on the other hand, the periodic reproduction of phenomena is a simple 
 fact ; whatever it may be as to the future, this fact has existed in the past, and 
 it exists still in the present, and it lasts long enough not to be the effect of 
 chance : therefore it has a cause, but this cause is, for the reasons given, other 
 than the mechanical laws. "We rise, then, to the final cause by the principle of 
 causality, which embraces at once both the mechanical and the final causes. 
 (See chap. i. ) 
 
MECHANISM AND FINALITY. 211 
 
 In both there is system, and all system implies co-ordination ; 
 but in the one the co-ordination results in a final effect which 
 takes the character of an end, in the other the co-ordination 
 has not this effect. In both cases there is finality, because 
 the most simple co-ordination already impUes that the idea of 
 the whole precedes that of the parts — that is, that the succes- 
 sive arrangement of the parts is regulated for the arrangenient 
 which behoves to be ultimately attained. Only in the finality, 
 of plan, when order is realized, it seems that all is finished ; 
 while in the finality of use, this order itself is co-ordinate to 
 something else, which is the interest of the living being. Let 
 us repeat that the finality of plan may have an end, but an 
 external end (for instance, the arrangement of the sun which 
 heats and illuminates the earth) ; while in the finality of use 
 the end is internal to the being itself, as in the animal The 
 finality of plan is, then, an internal finality, in so far as one 
 only considers the plan itself — for instance, the solar system ; 
 it is external, if it is found to have some relation to the use 
 of other beings. 
 
 Although the finality of plan reigns especially in inorganic 
 nature, and that of use in living beings, yet we find both at 
 once in the latter, the plan beside the adaptation, and the one 
 is not always in harmony with the other ; in every case the 
 one is different from the other. The adaptation of the organs 
 to the functions, and the functional co-operation of the organs, 
 is one thing; the correspondence of the parts, their propor- 
 tions, their symmetry, is another. There is a sort of geometry 
 of living beings, independent of mechanics, and which does 
 not seem to have a useful result as an end. Symmetry, for 
 instance, is certainly one of the needs of living nature. Four: 
 kinds of it are to be distinguished : 1st, The radiated sym- 
 metrical type, as in the radiata, where the homogeneous parts 
 are grouped round a common centre ; 2d, The branched sym- 
 metrical type, as in the vegetables and the polyps ; 3d, The 
 serial type, in the succession from head to tail, as in the 
 articulata; 4th, The bilateral type, or repetition of the like 
 
212 BOOK I. CHAPTER vr. 
 
 parts of the two sides of the body, as in the higher animals 
 and man. These facts show us that living nature has also its 
 geometric forms, only much more free and more rounded 
 than those of the crystals. 
 
 Independently of the geometric forms, the proportions 
 and symmetries which are remarked in animated beings, there 
 are arrangements of parts which allow us to classify all the 
 animals in four very distinct compartments, whether these 
 compartments be absolutely separated, as Cuvier believed, or 
 there be passages from one to the other, as G. St. Hilaire 
 thought. If the principle of adaptation alone ruled in the 
 structure of the animals, it seems that the most natural classi- 
 fication would be that which at first occurred to men's minds, 
 namely, that which originates in the diversity of habitable 
 media. Now there are three habitable media — ^water, air, 
 and earth ; hence three great classes of animals — aquatic, 
 flying, and terrestrial. From these three great divisions should 
 result all the zoological divisions and subdivisions. However, 
 it is found that this classification is superficial, and that which 
 has prevailed is founded not on the use of the parts, but on 
 the design of the animal. The types, not the functions, serve 
 as the basis of all zoological nomenclature. It is evident 
 ■what importance is attached in the zoological sciences to the 
 finality of plan. 
 
 This finality appeared so important to a famous naturalist, 
 M. Agassiz, that he thought the proof of the existence of God 
 ought to be sought much more in the plan of the animals than 
 in the adaptation of the organs, which is, in our opinion, a 
 great exaggeration. Nevertheless, it is certain that the creation 
 of a type (apart even from all adaptation) is inseparable from 
 the idea of plan and end, and consequently supposes art.^ 
 Agassiz especially mentions the following facts, so unlike the 
 blind combinations of a purely physical nature : on the one 
 hand, the simultaneous existence of the most diverse types in 
 the midst of identical circumstances ; on the other, the repe- 
 
 ^ Agassiz, De la classification en zoologie, p. 214 et seq. 
 
MECHANISM AND FINALITY. 213 
 
 tition of similar types in circumstances the most diverse, the 
 unity of plan in the most diverse beings, etc. These facts, 
 and all those which Agassiz accumulates with the profoundest 
 knowledge of the question, always bring us back to this : 
 how could blind elements, not having in themselves any 
 principle of direction, have been able to find stable and con- 
 stant combinations, and that indefinitely ? All design supposes 
 a designer. The figures of nature, whatever they be, have 
 precise and distinct contours. Can the play of the elements 
 have designed the human figure ? 
 
 The finality of plan which we remark in the whole of 
 nature brings us to esthetical finality, which is a form of it. 
 This is not the place to handle the question of the beautiful ; 
 but whatever be the intimate essence of the beautiful, all the 
 schools are agreed in recognising that it implies a certain 
 accord between the parts and the whole — unitas in varietate. 
 Must there not then be, in order that nature may be beautiful, 
 some principle which reduces diversity to unity? It will 
 not suf&ce to meet this difficulty to derive everything, with 
 Spinoza, from a single substance ; for the question is not of a 
 unity of origin, but of a unity of agreement, proportion, and 
 harmony. The question is not of an abstract and vague iden- 
 tity, but of a moral and intelligible unity, resulting from the 
 diversity itself. The unity of action in the tragedy does 
 not consist in presenting a unique personage or a unique 
 situation, but in uniting, as in a centre, on a given point the 
 divergent passions and the contrary interests of several dis- 
 tinct personages. A unity which should send forth from its 
 womb series of phenomena to infinitude would not suffice to 
 produce the sentiment of the beautiful; it must distribute 
 them, group them, bind them together, consequently watch 
 their evolution, conduct them where it will, impose upon them 
 a measure and a rule — in a word, a type and a plan. The 
 same law which has made us recognise finality in every 
 regular composition, compels us to recognise it in the beautiful. 
 Nature is no more an artist by chance than a geometrician ; 
 
214 , BOOK I. CHAPTER TI. 
 
 its esthetic is no more fortuitous than its 'industry. It is 
 because there is an industry of nature, a geometry, an esthetic 
 of nature, that man is capable of industry, of geometry, and 
 esthetic. Nature is all that we are, and all that we are we 
 hold from nature. The creative genius which the artist feels 
 in himself is to him the revelation and the symbol of the 
 creative genius of nature. 
 
CHAPTEE VII. 
 
 THE DOCTRINE OF EVOLUTION IN GENERAL. 
 
 THE mechanical philosophy, which we have examined in a 
 previous chapter under its abstract and general form, 
 has anew gained favour under a recent theory, and may have 
 thought that it has at last found the means of eluding the 
 overwhelming difficulties that at all times have weighed on it. 
 It is, as Plato says in the Republic, ' a new wave ' that is 
 rising against us, and which we must yet once more repel, 
 if we wish that the preceding results, so laboriously reared, 
 should remain deiinitely established. 
 
 This new theory is the English doctrine called ' evolution,' a 
 theory whose culminating point is Darwinism. In what does 
 this doctrine consist 1 This is it in two words : that nothing 
 in nature is produced all at once in a complete or finished 
 form — nothing begins in the adult state ; on the contrary, 
 everything commences in the infant or rudimentary state, and 
 passes, by a succession of degrees, through an immensity of 
 phenomena infinitely little, until it at last appears under its 
 precise and determinate form, which, in its turn, is itself dis- 
 solved in the same manner by a regression of phenomena 
 analogous to the progress that produced it, which is called 
 the law of integration and dissolution. The universe as a 
 whole, as well as in all its parts, is subject to this law ; and, 
 in particular, the origin and development of living beings, 
 and the succession of organic species, are explained in the 
 same manner. Borrowed at first from physiology, this theory 
 has by degrees been applied to geology, astronomy, zoology, 
 history, and politics. On every hand men have seen, in 
 
216 BOOK I. CHAPTER VII. 
 
 place of sudden appearances, insensible progress, slow and 
 continued developments. By means of this secret and inces- 
 sant labour of nature, in virtue of which everything always 
 ends by accommodating itself to its medium, men have 
 thought themselves able to explain appropriations and adapta- 
 tions, which the friends of final causes had always opposed as 
 an insuperable barrier to the encroachments of mechanical 
 philosophy. The examination of this doctrine is, therefore, 
 imperatively required of us here, at least in its relation to the 
 question that engages us ; for to study and discuss it in itself 
 would be to leave the sphere of our subject. We will confine 
 ourselves to examining the two following questions : — 1st, Does 
 the theory of evolution exclude final causes, and render them 
 impossible ? 2d, Does this theory supersede final causes, and 
 render them useless ? If we succeed in proving that the 
 doctrine of evolution neither renders final causes impossible 
 nor useless, we shall have sufficiently proved what concerns 
 us, and shall not have to inquire whether this doctrine is 
 itself true or false. 
 
 That the doctrine of evolution does not exclude final causes 
 is quite manifest from the very facts presented by the human 
 mind. In humanity, indeed, the existence of the final cause 
 cannot be denied, and yet it quite harmonizes with the law of 
 evolution. Every sort of project, plan, or combination for 
 the future supposes the final cause, and yet it can only be 
 executed by degrees. A merchant who undertakes a great 
 affair sets before himself an end, which, perhaps, may only be 
 attained several years afterwards ; yet to attain this end,^ he 
 must take a thousand intermediate steps, and, starting from 
 the point where he is, add day by day, and in some sort piece 
 by piece, each of the operations of which the whole must be 
 composed. , So with an author composing a book, with a great 
 captain making a plan of battle. It is just the impatience 
 caused by these necessary intermediate steps that explains 
 the pleasure of fairy tales, in which we see the desired thing 
 suddenly produced by the fiat of an enchanter. But this 
 
THE DOCTEINE OF EVOLUTION IN GENERAL. 217 
 
 only happens in fairy tales ; in real life, gradation, evolution 
 is the law ; and yet this evolution leads to the end. 
 
 Human industry, as well as that of nature, only proceeds 
 by degrees, and by a law of evolution. Behold this sheet of 
 paper, it may be said, which appears so suitable for writing, 
 and which seems to have been prepared for that purpose. 
 WeU, it is only requisite that some old rags be brought 
 together by some happy circumstance, and encounter a liquid 
 that moistens and washes them, external forces that tear and 
 pound them, so as to make a pulp ; it suffices that in course 
 of time, and by happy coincidence, this pulp, rendered quite 
 liquid, be brought into contact with a machine (the origin of 
 which can be afterwards explained in the same way) ; pass- 
 ing under certain rollers and through a continued succession 
 of degrees of temperature, being gradually heated and dried, it 
 finally becomes a paste, which, in the end, is just what we call 
 paper. Is it not evident that there is here an evolution of 
 phenomena which, from the raw state of the primary matter 
 to the final state of the manufactured article, leaves no void, 
 no rupture ? And might not one who did not see the hand 
 of man interposing at each of these operations, or at the origin 
 of them all, believe that he had eliminated all finality, because 
 he could describe, with the utmost exactness, all the elements 
 of the operation, and the insensible transition from each of 
 these degrees to the other ? And yet we know well that in 
 this case the whole chain of the phenomena has been pre- 
 pared and directed to attain the final aim. And if it be 
 objected that the hand of man is obliged several times to 
 interpose, and that, consequently, there is not a perfect evolu- 
 tion, we reply that at least the last operation is developed 
 quite alone, and that, save the initial impulse (which must 
 always be supposed in nature as well as in machines), all takes 
 place by degrees. Whoever, in short, has seen a paper- 
 machine, knows that the liquid paste that passes under the 
 first roller emerges at the end as paper fit for printing, with- 
 out any other action than that of the machine interposing in 
 
218 BOOK I. CHAPTER VII. 
 
 the interval. Besides, our industry being very imperfect, it is 
 very true that we are obliged to perform several different acts 
 of personal intervention before the mechanism spontaneously 
 develops. But the more clever an^ skilled our industry 
 becomes, the greater is the number of phenomena we can com- 
 bine with a less number of preparatory acts ; so that, supposing 
 wisdom and power become infinite, it is easy to conceive that 
 a single preparatory act, a single initial intervention, should 
 suffice for endless combinations. In this case, consequently, as 
 in that of human industry, the phenomena are developed 
 regularly, conformably to their laws, without any of them in 
 particular supposing any miraculous action ; and yet the whole 
 will present a skilled combination, from which we shall be 
 able to conclude that the first stroke has been given by an 
 industrious hand.* 
 
 Not only does the idea of evolution not exclude the idea of 
 final causes, it even seems, on the contrary, naturally to imply it. 
 Evolution is nothing but development, but the word develop- 
 ment seems to imply a substance that tends towards an end. 
 The type of this phenomenon is the seed of organized beings 
 — the acorn that becomes an oak. But what impels it to that 
 change but a secret force, tending to realize what is potentially 
 •in the acorn — that is, the essence of the oak ? Without such 
 a force, why should not the acorn remain an acorn ? It is, then, 
 in order to become an oak that it is modified. In this manner, 
 in Aristotle's view, the formal cause is identical with the final 
 cause. If we admit at all that a being has a tendency towards 
 the future, aspires to something, we thereby admit some finality, 
 
 1 M. Littre objects to the doctrine of final causes that it requires an incessant 
 intervention of the supreme cause in the universe, and consequently that it is an 
 appeal to the supernatural, and that it is therein contrary to what he calls the 
 positive mode of thinking {Bevue des Deux Mondes, 15th August 1866). Mr. 
 Stuart Mill refutes him en this point (Aug. Comte and Positivimi, p. 15). He 
 even quotes the authority of Aug. Comte, who, in his last work {Politique 
 positive, vol. i. p. 47 of the 1st edition, and vol. ii. pp. 57 and 58), affirms 
 that the hypothesis of design in nature is more probable than that of a blind 
 mechanism. Cabanis has equally returned to the same view in his Lettre d 
 Fauriel sur les causes premieres, p. 41. 
 
THE DOCTRINE OF EVOLUTION IN GENERAL. 219 
 
 Besides, history is ready to teach us that the theory of 
 evolution is not at all irreconcilable with the principle of 
 final causes. It would be, in effect, a great error to consider the 
 doctrine of evolution as of recent invention, and exclusively 
 due to English philosophy. The true founder of this doctrine 
 was Leibnitz. He it was who, by the law of continuity, by 
 his theory of insensible perceptions, by his principle of the in- 
 finitely little, first set up this theory in a learned and profound 
 manner. It was he who said : ' The present is big with the 
 future.' But he never separated his theory of evolution and 
 progress from the theory of final causes. In his view, the 
 principle of the development of monads, and, consequently, 
 of the universe, is what he calls the appetitus or tendency 
 to pass from one state to another, all internal change of 
 substances being governed by the principle of the end, while 
 the external changes are only produced by external and 
 mechanical causes. 
 
 Previous to the last form that the doctrine of evolution has 
 assumed in the English school, it was not usual to oppose it 
 to finality, but to mechanism. The one was the theory of 
 internal development, the other the theory of external com- 
 binations, produced by the approach or separation of the parts. 
 It was hylozoism, in opposition to the geometrical mechanism 
 that excludes all life from nature. Thus the evolutionism of 
 Leibnitz opposed the mechanism of Descartes and Spinoza ; 
 or, again, the evolutionism of Schelling and Hegel opposed 
 the atheistic mechanism of the 18 th century. But in all 
 these evolutionary doctrines, it was the final cause that ruled 
 and even characterised them. 
 
 There is, then, no implicit contradiction, ipso facto, between 
 evolution and the final cause. The only question is, how 
 evolution is understood. Is it meant as a simple development 
 of mechanical forces ? Why, then, we revert to the old 
 doctrine of fortuitous combinations, an inevitable consequence 
 of mere mechanism. Is evolution meant in the sense of the 
 intrinsic development of the essence ? Why, then, we revert 
 
220 BOOK I. CHAPTER VH. 
 
 to the final cause ; for the essence being the law of the de- 
 velopment of the being, is thereby its end, since each of 
 the elements of that development is only a step to arrive at 
 the complete realization of the essence, which only serves as 
 the mainspring. While it is at the same time the limit of the 
 action. 
 
 But if, meanwhile (without inquiring whether this develop- 
 ment is external or internal, mechanical or dynamical), we con- 
 sider in evolution only the genetic point of view, — that is to say, 
 that which shows us things in their origin, in their progress 
 and growth, and which causes their gradual production before 
 us, — ^in place of considering them as all made, which, in a 
 word, according to the expression of Leibnitz, shows us their 
 possMlity, in this sense the theory of evolution may well be 
 contrary in geology and zoology to what are called special or 
 local creations ; but it has nothing to allege against an intel- 
 ligent cause of the universe, and, above all (apart from any 
 question as to the first cause), against the existence of finality 
 in nature. Tor instance, when Mr. Herbert Spencer thinks 
 to oppose the doctrine of final causes and of a creative intelli- 
 gence by opposing the doctrine of special creations, he mixes 
 up very different questions.^ Special creations are one manner 
 of conceiving the creative action, evolution is another. The 
 history of philosophy can teach us that the problem in its 
 generality and in all its depth has not been stated by 
 Darwinism. It was so in the l7th century, with the most 
 profound knowledge of the conditions of the problem, both by 
 Descartes and Leibnitz. No doubt, at that period, the mind 
 did not dare to grapple the rugged problem of the origin of 
 man and of life, but at bottom, when Descartes conceived the 
 origin of the world by whirlwinds, it is clear that he did not 
 view it as having been immediately created such as it is ; and 
 in that admirable passage of the Discours de la wAthode, he 
 expressly says : ' I would never wish to infer from all these 
 
 ^ Biology, Part III. chap. ii. Mr. Spencer especially opposes the doctrine of 
 final causes from the objection of evil. See on this point our previous chapter. 
 
THE DOCTEINE OF EVOLUTION IN GENEKAL. 221 
 
 things that this world has been created in the fashion I stated, 
 for it is much more probable that from the beginning God 
 made it such as it behoved to be. But it is certain, and is an 
 opinion commonly received among theologians, that the action 
 by which at present He preserves it is quite the same as that 
 by which He created it, so that, even if He had given it, at the 
 beginning, no other form than that of chaos, provided that, 
 having established the laws of nature. He gave it His concur- 
 rence to act as it is wont, one may believe, without prejudice 
 to the miracle of creation, that by this alone things purely 
 material would in time have been able to become such as we 
 see them at present ; and their nature is much more easy to 
 conceive when they are seen origiTiating by degrees in this way, 
 than when they are considered as entirely made.'^ 
 
 It is clear that Descartes here states the principle of the 
 doctrine of evolution. Did he, therefore, suppress an intel- 
 ligent cause of the universe ? Certainly not ; and although 
 Pascal reproached him with having reduced the action of God 
 to ' a fillip,' this accusation does not apply, because he admitted 
 that creation and preservation are one and the same thing, 
 and that the act by which He creates the universe is also 
 that by which He sustains it. Will it be said that Descartes 
 excluded final causes from physics ? We may reply that this 
 is more in appearance than in reality; for when he declares 
 that he has sought the laws of nature without resting on any 
 principle but the ' infinite perfections of God,' was not this to 
 revert in reality to the principle of ends, perfection being the 
 supreme end ? 
 
 But above all, the philosophical question has been debated 
 between Leibnitz and Clarke, of which question special 
 
 1 Discows de la mithode. 'God has so wondrously established these laws,' 
 says he elsewhere, ' that even if we swppoBe that He creates nothing more than I 
 have said (matter and motion), and even if He puts into this no order nor pro- 
 portion, but makes of it a chaos as confused and perplexed as the poets could 
 describe, they are sufficient to cause the parts of this chaos to unravel iJiemselvei, 
 and arrange themselves in so good an order that they shall have the form of a 
 very perfect world.' — Le Monde, chap, vi., ed. Cousin, torn. iv. p. 249. 
 
222 BOOK I. CIIAPTEE VII. 
 
 creations are only a particular case. Yet once more : no 
 one in the I7th century would have dared to apply the 
 question to the origin of living beings, so much did super- 
 naturalism impose its authority in that domain ; but without 
 application to such a question in particular, the general dis- 
 cussion was raised none the less. Leibnitz maintained in 
 effect, in all his philosophy, that the highest idea one can 
 form of the Creator is to suppose Him creating a world 
 capable of developing itself by its own laws, without causing 
 Him incessantly to interpose in it by miracles. In truth, 
 the dispute of Clarke and Leibnitz bore on a more parti- 
 cular question — namely, whether the world needs to be wound 
 up and adjusted from time to time. We know that, accord- 
 ing to Newton, the actual laws do not guarantee the existence 
 of our world, and that God must interpose from time to time 
 to put it right. The question was, then, of a readjustment 
 of the universe, rather than of special and new creations. 
 However, the principles of Leibnitz can be applied to both 
 cases. When he says, for instance : ' In my opinion, the same 
 force aTid vigour always exists, and only passes from mutter to 
 matter, according to the law of nature ;' when he says again : 
 ' Why should it be contrary to reason that the word fiat 
 having left something behind it, — ^namely, the thing itself, — 
 the not less admirable word benediction has also left behind it 
 in things, to produce their acts, a certain fecundity or acting 
 virtue ? ' — in these various passages, Leibnitz, like Descartes, 
 immediately appeals to the very principles of the doctrine of 
 evolution, and, in setting aside the Deus ex machind, he furnishes 
 the principles that can, rightly or wrongly, be employed against 
 special creations; but by these principles Leibnitz did not think, 
 and certainly did not wish, to weaken the part of the divine 
 action in nature. He believed that God had at the beginning 
 imprinted in each creature the law of its development, and 
 that the universe was only the manifestation of that law. In 
 fine, he believed that that law was nothing else than the 
 principle of the lest — in other words, the principle of final 
 
THE DOCTRINE OF EVOLUTION IN GENERAL. 223 
 
 causes. There was, therefore, in his view, no contradiction 
 between evolution and finality. 
 
 Thus the question of special and local creations is one 
 thing, with which we are not at all concerned ; the question 
 of a cause superior to nature, producing and preserving it by 
 an act essentially wise, is another; and, still more so, the 
 existence of a law of finality in nature itself. That the 
 doctrine of evolution is gaining ground over the doctrine of 
 special creations we will not deny, but the much more general 
 doctrine of a finality in things is not at all impugned thereby. 
 
 For the rest, the learned and acute defender of evolution under 
 its most recent form, Mr. H. Spencer, seems himself to recognise 
 the truth of this, when he tells us : 'The genesis of an atom is 
 no easier to conceive than that of a planet. Indeed, far from 
 rendering the universe lesa mysterious than before, it makes 
 a much greater mystery of it. Creation by fabrication is much 
 lower than creation by evolution. A man can bring a machine 
 together; he cannot make a machine that develops itself. 
 That our harmonious universe should formerly have existed 
 potentially in the state of diffused matter, without form, and 
 that it should gradually have attained its present organiza- 
 tion, is much more wonderful than its formation according to 
 the artificial method supposed by the vulgar would be. Those 
 who consider it legitimate to argue from phenomena to noumena, 
 have good right to maintain that the nebular hypothesis im- 
 plies a primary cause as superior to the mechanical God of 
 Paley as that is to the fetish of the savage.' ^ 
 
 Let us endeavour to show how the hypothesis of evolution 
 may lead in effect to a conception of finality which only differs 
 from that commonly formed by being grander. 
 
 ^ Essays, vol. i. p. 298. See Eibot, Psychologic Anglaise, 2d ed. p. 192. Let 
 us remark, in passing, that the God of Paley is not a mechanical God. As 
 it is impossible to speak without a metaphor, it is certain that when one com- 
 pares the machines of nature to those of man, we are apt to speak of God as 
 a mechanician. So, at other times, one talks of the divine poet, the great 
 geometrician, the great lawgiver, the sovereign judge, etc. These are modes of 
 expression, and if they are forbidden, we must cease to speak of these things. 
 
224 BOOK I. CHAPTER Til. 
 
 Let the old argument of final causes be applied to the 
 formation of the eye. We ask, How could such a machine 
 have made itself? The answer is, that it did not make 
 itself, but has been gradually produced in virtue of organizing 
 forces which weave and fashion the materials of the organs, 
 muscles, nerves, vessels, and combine them as heart, brain, 
 stomach, lungs, etc. Be it so ; but in place of a single machine 
 to explain, you will have thousands combined together and 
 reduced to one, which is called an organism, a living being. 
 The problem is, therefore, much more complicated than pre- 
 viously, and a much more powerful creative cause is needed. 
 We want to know who has made this complex machine com- 
 posed of machines. Has it made itself ? No, we are told ; 
 it existed in virtue of generation — that is, a law inherent in the 
 species, and which makes of the whole species one and the 
 same being, one and the same individual, constantly rising 
 again from its ashes. Be it so. But here again, in place of 
 having to explain one organism, you will have thousands ; in 
 place of having a single machine, you will have machines 
 of machines without end, with an ever new force of reproduc- 
 tion. Does it not need, to create those machines of machines, 
 a power and art much greater than to create one by itself ? I 
 now ask. Whence comes that general organism, that series of 
 homogeneous machines, called a species ? Did it make itself ? 
 No, we shall be told ; it had its origin in a higher and more 
 general law, the law of transformation. Each species is only a 
 part of an infinite whole, which, multiplying in time and space, 
 nnder a thousand and thousand forms, gives birth to all animal 
 and vegetable species. Be it so again ; but then, in place of 
 a single race, you will have thousands of races, all endued with 
 vitality, and with artistic or industrial properties infinitelv 
 rich. The living (to ^S)ov), taken in its most general sense 
 as one and the same thing — this is what you have now before 
 you, in place of the small machine from which we started just 
 now. It is no longer a question of explaining an eye or a 
 tooth, but this vast unbounded organism, peopling air, earth. 
 
THE DOCTRINE OF EVOLUTION IN GENERAL. 225 
 
 and water, of beings visible and invisible, all moved and 
 guided in every direction for self-preservation and perpetua- 
 tion, — a world visible and invisible, and whose invisible part is 
 perhaps thousands of times richer and more varied than what 
 is visible. Has this being made itself ? No, it will be said ; 
 it is itself only the product of the laws of matter, of a 
 single fundamental law, if you will — that of the conservation of 
 force. Be it so ; but then what must be explained is the whole 
 world — that is, an infinite machine, constructing, destroying, 
 reproducing machines without end. Would not the force, 
 whatever it be, that produced this whole by one single act, 
 be infinitely superior to that which would only be needed 
 to explain each of the parts ? "Wherein should the act of 
 creating everything separately by a special volition be superior 
 to the act of creating all at once by a single volition, — always 
 reserving, besides, the part of individual intervention that the 
 creative cause may have reserved for itself, and which does 
 not belong to our subject ? 
 
 Let us not forget, meanwhile, that in this first part of our 
 work, in this first book, we have set aside the question of the 
 first cause, and have only undertaken to establish as a law the 
 existence of finality in nature, whatever may be the cause of 
 that finality* Manifold and special creations, single creation, 
 spontaneous development of nature, instinct, will, intelligence, 
 genius, secret incomprehensible law, final identity of all things, 
 — all these hypotheses are outside of our present inquiries. 
 Our only question hitheito is this : Is there in the universe a 
 tendency in phenomena to direct themselves towards an end ? 
 As to the cause of this tendency we will inquire afterwards. 
 It is, then, evident that the affirmation or negation of special 
 creations has no bearing on our inquiry, since finality may 
 exist equally on either hypothesis, and would still exist even 
 if the idea of creation were set aside, and that of a spon- 
 taneous and interior development of nature substituted for 
 it;' or even if, in fine, while asserting that the final cause 
 is among the number of second causes, every hypothesis 
 
 p 
 
226 BOOK I. CHAPTEK VII. 
 
 on the essence and mode of action of the first cause were 
 refused. 
 
 From all these considerations it follows — 1st, That the ex- 
 clusion of special creations does not contradict the hypothesis 
 of a sole and general creation, dominated by the principle of 
 the best ; 2d, That even the exclusion of an external creation 
 would not contradict the hypothesis of an internal evolution 
 directed by the same principle. Consequently the principle 
 of evolution, taken in itself, is not essentially opposed to the 
 principle of finality. 
 
 But if the theory of evolution does not exclude finality, 
 is it not still a means of dispensing with it ? If it does not 
 render final causes impossible, does it not render them useless ? 
 This is the real dif&culty. The more that is allowed to nature, 
 the grander will the divine action, once admitted, appear ; for 
 it is more divine to make a great and powerful machine than 
 children's toys. But then, the more that is allowed to nature, 
 the more a divine action (internal or external) seems rendered 
 useless. The more the phenomena are bound together, the 
 more does the part of contingency seem to diminish ; the more 
 uncertain and problematic, consequently, does the relation to 
 an end appear. In the case of aU being bound together, and, 
 consequently, all explained, the intervention of the end would 
 seem supererogatory, and would only exist in quality of a 
 gratuitous hypothesis of the reason, or of an act of faith, agree- 
 able to our imagination, but not at all necessary to our reason. 
 In a word, the doctrine of finality, which can neither be de- 
 monstrated by experiment nor by calculation, must, it seems, 
 be the more imperiously imposed upon our mind the more 
 disproportion there is between causes and effects; and it is 
 this very disproportion that suggests the conception of finality. 
 Science, on the other hand, tends more and more to establish 
 the proportion of causes to effects, and seems thereby to in- 
 validate the finalist hypothesis, and to render it more and 
 more haphazard and subjective. 
 
 In order precisely to mark the difficulty, let us for a moment 
 
THE DOCTEINE OF EVOLUTION IN GENERAL. 227 
 
 suppose the hypothesis of special creations. Here is an un- 
 known island in which we land : the earth is there in labour ; 
 the air and the water are ia motion ; then this labour ceases, 
 and an organized species — a horse, an elephant, or a man — 
 appears suddenly before us. The causes are, by the hypothesis, 
 physical and chemical ; the result is a miracle of mechanism. 
 How can we comprehend such a miracle, such a disproportion 
 between causes and effects, without supposing a rational inter- 
 vention and a supreme power that has directed these forces of 
 nature conformably to a plan ? Suppose, on the other hand, 
 that this animal is nothing but a new form given to a pre- 
 existing animal, in virtue of a law of transformation of which 
 we have examples in nature, since it is in virtue of this law 
 that species furnish races and varieties, the disproportion 
 between the cause and the effect has disappeared ; the cause 
 suffices to explain the effect. If it suffices, why should I seek 
 another ? I will thus ascend from the second animal to a 
 third, from a third to a fourth, and so on ; each abyss that we 
 see at present being filled, we shall always find a cause pro- 
 portioned to the effect, and the opposite hypothesis will always 
 be losing probability, no longer existing except in quality of 
 free hypothesis, but not of necessary explanation. Proceeding 
 thus nearer and nearer to the minimwm of life, we shall only 
 find ourselves stopped by an experimental difficulty. Could 
 this minimum of life ever have originated from inert matter ? 
 But if the experiment were once made, vital action would be 
 explained by physical causes as well as chemical action ; all 
 causes would correspond to the effects. If, in fine, we ascend 
 to the origin of our world, which appeared to Newton without 
 any proportion to any physical cause whatever, the nebular 
 hypothesis will remove this last difficulty, and will give, in the 
 rotation of a single primitive nebula, a cause sufficient and 
 adequate for the effect produced. No doubt there still remains 
 to be explained the cause of all the universal antecedent, as 
 Mill says ; but does not this absolute cause escape our grasp ? 
 Is it not purely and simply the unknown ? And, besides, we 
 
228 BOOK I. CHAPTER VII. 
 
 have hitherto left this first cause beyond our inquiries : what we 
 were pursuing was finality in nature. But does not this finality 
 appear to flee before us in proportion as, extending the domain 
 of physical explanations, we render, as it seems, explanations 
 of another kind more and more useless. Such is the for- 
 midable doubt that the doctrine of evolution may raise in the 
 mind. 
 
 However, looking at it more closely, it will appear that the 
 preceding difiiculty is more formidable in appearance than in 
 reality. In effect, the disproportion of causes and effects, far 
 from being favourable to finality, would, on the contrary, be 
 the negation of it. The words means and end just mean a 
 cause perfectly proportioned to its effect. What constitutes 
 the prodigy of the eye is that it is just exactly what it ought 
 to be in order to be the cause of sight. Wherever, on the 
 other hand, the cause is not proportioned to the effect, there 
 is nothing that could make us suppose a means, nor, conse- 
 quently, an end. We must well distinguish between the 
 wonder produced in us by a phenomenon without cause — or 
 at least without apparent cause, whence originates the belief 
 of miracles — and the wonder, on the other hand, which the 
 marvellous proportion of causes and effects produces in us, 
 whence arises the belief in final causes. In the first case 
 what subjugates and dominates us is the idea of power, in the 
 second the idea of wisdom. Let us suppose, for instance, that 
 we were present at a resurrection from the dead ; not perceiving 
 the means, we wiU not be impelled to suppose an end (except, 
 at least, we have before obtained that idea in another way). 
 Again, the first idea that men formed of the Deity is that of a 
 destiny which, by a blind volition, creates or overthrows, pro- 
 duces life or death {avar/Krj) ; and it was only later that an 
 Anaxagoras or a Socrates, perceiving the proportion of causes 
 and effects, advanced to Providence. From this it follows that 
 the proof of the final cause exactly follows the progress made 
 in the knowledge of the efficient cause. If it were not known 
 how light is produced, and, on the other hand, how we see. 
 
THE DOCTRINE OF EVOLUTION IN GENERAL. 229 
 
 we should only have a vague and obscure notion of the finality 
 of the organ of vision. The same is the case with the lungs 
 and respiration, with the heart and the circulation, digestion and 
 the stomach. We must, then, have already found, physically, 
 a sufi&cient cause to be warranted ideally and morally to con- 
 ceive a final cause. If the physical cause were not sufficient, 
 it would not be a good means, or, rather, it would not be a 
 means at all, and consequently it would not imply an end. It 
 must not be said, then, that the discovery of physical causes 
 renders final causes useless, for without these physical causes 
 the final cause would be doubtful, or even a nullity. An 
 objection against this kind of cause cannot be derived from 
 what is precisely its necessary condition. 
 
 No doubt, strictly speaking, it is very true that if we sup- 
 pose final causes, it is because the efficient or physical causes 
 are not sufficient ; otherwise we would rest content with them. 
 But, at the same time, they need to be physically sufficient, else 
 they would not produce their efi'ect, and would not be true 
 means. If I strike iron with a hammer, the hammer, strictly 
 speaking, does not of itself suffice to strike the iron, since it 
 must be directed, but, physically speaking, it must be suffi- 
 cient to produce the effect, else it would not produce it ; so 
 that one who only saw the hammer moving might believe that 
 it was absolutely sufficient, while it is so only relatively, which 
 would be a profound mistake. 
 
 The question, then, is this : How do we pass from the purely 
 relative sufficiency of physical agents to the affirmation of 
 their absolute insufficiency ? The fundamental reason we have 
 given, and which the theory of evolution does not shake, is 
 the agreement of a whole formed by divergent and hetero- 
 geneous causes, with a future phenomenon which can only be 
 produced on condition of this agreement. The farther one 
 removes from a particular group (namely, from this or that 
 organ, organism, organized species, etc.), the farther we ascend 
 from cause to cause, reducing, step by step, the number of the 
 physical agents, it will become the more difficult to explain 
 
230 BOOK I. CHAPTER VII, 
 
 the multiplicity of agreements and the infinite complication of 
 the results. If I take from a bag five letters which I know- 
 form a word, it will even be a great chance if, letting them fall 
 one after the other, I succeed in forming that word ; and a 
 much greater still, if, taking them haphazard from an alphabet, 
 I were to make a verse or a poem. What, then, would it be 
 if I made a machine capable of producing without end poems 
 and treatises of science and philosophy ? But a brain is such 
 a machine. If, now, this machine were itself the product of 
 another machine called an organism, and this organism the 
 product of that still vaster organism called a species, and the 
 species the product of that superior organism called the animal 
 kingdom, and so on, it is evident that, in proportion as we 
 simplify causes in a physica,l point of view, the more we 
 increase, in a moral point of view, the abyss that existed 
 before between a physical cause and a regulated effect. 
 
 There is, then, in reality a disproportion between cause and 
 effect. But this disproportion is not physical, but intellectual. 
 The physical cause is a possibility of producing the effect, ab 
 actu ad posse. It implies only one thing — namely, that there 
 is no contradiction between the properties of matter and the 
 effect produced. But this possibility would not sufiBce ; there 
 must be, besides, an activity or power that determines these 
 properties of matter to a precise effect, and circumscribes the 
 endless deviation of its possible effects within a field prescribed 
 by reason. Hence it comes that matter attains to the realiza- 
 tion of something intelligible, to which it has no tendency in 
 its own nature.' 
 
 > This difference between the physical conditions of phenomena, the proper 
 object of science, and their inteUectual' conditions, the object of metaphysics, is 
 allowed by the scientists. ' In saying that life is the directive idea or the 
 evolutive force of being,' says CI. Bernard, ' we simply express the idea of a 
 unity in the succession .... Our mind lays hold of this unity as a concep- 
 tion imposed upon it, and it explains it by a force. The mistake would be to 
 believe that that metaphysical force is active after the fashion of a physical force. 
 This conception does not pass beyond the intellectual domain. We rmtst here, 
 then, separate the metaphysical world from the physical phenomejial world, which 
 serves as its basis.' — Definition de la vie, Mevue des Deux Mondes, 15th May 
 1876. 
 
THE DOOTEINE OF EVOLUTION IN GENERAL. 231 
 
 Thus the hypothesis of evolution does not give in the end 
 one reason more than every other mechanical system, to 
 explain by agents purely physical the order of the universe. 
 It does not explain better how from a primitive chaos a 
 regular system should have emerged. Its ideal would be to 
 reduce all to the laws of motion; but the laws of motion, 
 taken in themselves, as we have seen, would not produce one 
 form rather than another, and do not at all contain the idea 
 of a formation of system.^ Matter remains matter — namely, 
 the substratum or condition of the development of phenomena ; 
 force equally remains what it is — the cause of motion. In 
 neither of these two elements is contained the principle of a 
 rational development. At the least, a third principle would need 
 to be added — namely, the idea which will serve for directive 
 cause ; and this would be to revert to the doctrine of finality. 
 ' See above, chap. vi. p. 176. 
 
CHAPTEE VIII. 
 
 THE DOCTEINE OF EVOLUTION : LAMAECE AND DARWIN. 
 
 T71E0M the theory of evolution in general, let us pass to one 
 -*- of its most remarkable applications, — that which has 
 most struck the scientific and philosophical world, and which 
 by many is confounded with evolutionism itself, — namely, the 
 doctrine of transformism. 
 
 We here have not to study transformism in itself, — that is 
 the task of zoologists ; we have not to take sides, whether ^ro 
 or contra, in this debate ; and no more have we to choose be- 
 tween the different transformist hypotheses. The question for 
 us always presents itself under the same form — namely. Can 
 transformism, supposing it established and demonstrated, dis- 
 pense with the principle of finality ? 
 
 Lamarck is known to have been the founder of trans- 
 formism.* We must, therefore, begin with the examination of 
 his system. 
 
 Lamarck employs three principles to explain organic 
 adaptations and the progressive development of animals. These 
 principles are, the medium, habit, and need. 
 
 That the physical medium — that is, the combination of 
 external circumstances in which the animal is plunged — 
 exercises a certain iniluence on the strength and even the 
 
 ^ The pages which foUow on Lamarck and Darwin were partly published for 
 the first time in 1863, four years after the first edition of Darwin (1859). The 
 ideas, such as they are, that I here put forth cannot, then, have been borrowed 
 from the numerous works afterwards published on the same subject. We desire 
 especially to remark, what had not been well understood in our first publication, 
 although we had said it in express terms, that it is not the transformist 
 doctrine in itself that we discuss (a question for which we declare ourselves 
 incompetent), but the interpretation of that doctrine in the mechanical sense — 
 that is, in the sense of the system of fortuitous combinations. 
 
THE DOCTEINE OF EVOLUTION: LAMAECK AND DAEWIN. 233 
 
 appearance of its organs, is an incontestable fact. But how 
 far this action and influence may go is not yet precisely 
 known, and we do not intend to take part in this controversy.^ 
 As yet it does not appear that the actions of the medium, so 
 far as we can know and observe them, penetrate very deeply 
 into the organization. What would seem easiest to explain 
 would be the colour of the skin, and yet it is still matter of 
 dispute among anthropologists. The most important of these 
 external actions are those which we obtain by domestication ; 
 but have we ever created a single organ ? However great 
 may be the part played by these external agents, and were 
 we to make of the animal a sort of soft paste, as Cuvier said, 
 where would we find a mould capable of producing the com- 
 plex organs, so skilfully arranged, which the higher animals 
 present? For instance, certain animals breathe by means 
 of lungs, and others by gills, and these two kinds of organs 
 are perfectly appropriate to the two media of the air and the 
 water. Can we conceive that these two media have been 
 able to produce apparatus so complicated and so well adapted ? 
 Of all the facts established by science, is there a single one 
 which could justify so great an extension of the action of 
 media ? If it be said that by medium we must not merely 
 understand the element in which the animal lives, but every 
 sort of external circumstance, I want to be told what is pre- 
 cisely the circumstance that has made one organ take the 
 form of lungs, another the form of gills ? what is the precise 
 cause that has made the heart, that powerful and easy 
 hydraulic machine, the motions of which are so industriously 
 combined, to receive the blood that comes from all the organs 
 of the body, and to send it back to them ? what, in fine, is 
 the cause that has bound all these organs together, and has 
 made of the living being, according to Cuvier's expression, ' a 
 closed system, all whose parts concur in a common action by 
 a reciprocal reaction ' ? What wiU it be if we proceed to 
 
 ' See on this point, Faivre, La variabilis des espices, chap. ii. {Biblioth. 
 philoaoph. conteTwpor. , Paris 1868). 
 
234 BOOK I. CHAPTEE VIII. 
 
 the organs of sense, — to the most wonderful, the eye of man 
 or of the eagle ? Darwin himself stops a moment, almost 
 frightened by this problem. The spirit of the system which 
 animates him makes him pass over it ; but among scientists 
 who have no system, is there one who would venture to 
 maintain that he in any way perceives how the light could 
 have by its action produced the organ that is appropriate to 
 it, or even, if it is not the light, what external agent is 
 powerful, clever, ingenious enough, a sufficiently good geo- 
 metrician, to construct that marvellous apparatus which caused 
 Newton to say : ' Could he who made the eye have been 
 ignorant of the laws of optics ? ' 
 
 For the rest, what proves better than any reasoning the 
 insufficiency of the principle of media, is that those naturalists 
 most favourable to that principle have not been satisfied with 
 it, and have employed others concurrently with it. Just 
 here there is an important remark to be made — namely, that 
 the naturalist who is held to have attached the greatest 
 importance to media, Lamarck, understands that action in 
 a very different sense than what might be expected from the 
 received opinion, for he attributes to the medium rather a 
 perturbing than a plastic action. 
 
 The fundamental law, according to Lamarck, is the pro- 
 gressive complication of organisms. But it is not the medium 
 that produces this progression. The medium, or modifying 
 cause, on the contrary, does nothing but disturb it ; it is it 
 that produces interruptions, hiatus, veritable disorders, and 
 which prevents the animal series from presenting that gradual 
 and continuous scale that Bonnet had defended, according to 
 that celebrated principle : non datur saltus in natura. "What, 
 then, is the true formative principle of the animals, according 
 to Lamarck ? It is a principle distinct from and independent 
 of the medium, — a principle which, left to itself. Would pro- 
 duce an uninterrupted series in a perfectly graduated order — ■ 
 namely, what he calls the power of life. ' All here rests,' he 
 says, ■ on two essential and regulative bases of observed facts 
 
THE DOCTEINE OF EVOLUTION: LAMAECK AND DARWIN. 235 
 
 and true zoological principles — namely, 1 st, On the ;power of life, 
 the results of which are the increasing complication of the 
 organism, and, consequently, the progress mentioned ; 2d, On 
 the modifying cause, the products of which are interruptions, 
 various and irregular deviations in the power of life. It 
 follows from these two essential bases — first, that there exists 
 a real progression in the composition of the organization of 
 animals, which the modifying cause has not been able to pre- 
 vent; then, that there is no sustained and regiilar progression 
 in the distribution of the races of animals, because the modify- 
 ing cause has almost everywhere varied what nature would 
 have formed regularly, if that modifying cause had not acted.'^ 
 
 This distinction between the perturbing action of the 
 medium and its plastic action is of the utmost importance 
 for the question that occupies us ; for the appropriation of 
 organs to functions being no longer the effect of the medium, 
 but of life, the problem remains entire, and the question still 
 remains how life, a blind and unconscious cause, can adapt 
 all the parts of the animal to their respective uses, and bind 
 them together in a common action. According to this 
 doctrine, the medium can no more be employed as cause, 
 since it is only an obstacle, and without it the organic forms 
 would be much more regular and more harmonious than they are. 
 
 The medium being, then, by the confession even of Lamarck, 
 a principle insufScient to explain the production of organic 
 forms, and, consequently, their adaptation, wiU what he calls 
 the power of life be more fortunate, and by what means will 
 it obtain this effect ? 
 
 Here Lamarck appeals to two new agents which we have 
 already mentioned, habit and need. He lays down two laws, 
 — first, that need produces organs ; second, that habit develops 
 and strengthens them. 
 
 ' Lamarck, Hisioire des animaux acms vertSbreS, t. i. This important dis- 
 tinction between the modifying and the plastic power does not seem to have 
 been remarked by any naturalist. Yet it entirely changes the meaning of 
 Lamarck's philosophy, since the true agent becomes the internal, not the 
 external agent. 
 
236 BOOK I. CHAPTER VIII. 
 
 Let the difference of these principles from the preceding be 
 well remarked. In the hypothesis of the medium the modify- 
 ing cause is entirely external ; nothing proceeds from the 
 transformed object. It is like soft wax in relation to the hand 
 that models and kneads it. So is it with those rocks that 
 under the action of water are hollowed out and become 
 grottoes, temples, or palaces. Everything proves that here 
 there is no premeditated adaptation. Is it the same when 
 you employ the power of habit or of need ? Certainly not, 
 for these are not external but internal causes ; although 
 determined by external circumstances, yet they act from 
 within : they are co-operating causes with the medium. It 
 is they, and not the media, that accommodate the living being 
 to its conditions of existence. Well, supposing that these 
 causes could give account of all organic adaptations (which is 
 more than doubtful), I say that nothing would yet have been 
 gained thereby, for this power of accommodation is itself a 
 marvellous adaptation. Here it is no longer merely, as before, 
 a physical cause, modelling the animal or vegetable from with- 
 out : it is an internal power co-operating with the external 
 action, and accommodating itself to the needs of the living 
 being. What ! there is in the living being a power such that 
 if the medium be modified, the living being is equally modified, 
 -to be able to live in that new medium. There is a power 
 of accommodation to external circumstances to take advantage 
 of them, to apply them to its needs. How should we fail 
 to see finality in such a power! Imagine that the living 
 being had the hard and inflexible nature of a stone or metal, 
 such change of medium would become for it a cause of 
 destruction and death; but nature has made it supple and 
 flexible. But in such a flexibility I cannot help recognising 
 a thought, preservative of life in the universe. 
 
 It will become more evident if we examine the thing more 
 closely. We must here admit two cases : either the animal 
 is conscious of its need, or it is unconscious ; for the lower 
 animals, according to Lamarck, are devoid of perception as 
 
THE DOCTRINE OF EVOLUTION: LAMAECK AND DARWIN. 23 V 
 
 "well as the vegetables. In this second case Lamarck main- 
 tains that the production of an organ has an entirely- 
 mechanical cause ; for instance, * a new motion produced in 
 the fluids of the animal.' But then, if the organ is only 
 the result of a mechanical cause, of a motion of fluids, without 
 any feeling, and therefore without any effort, how is it found 
 to have some adaptation to the needs of the animal ? How 
 shall the fluids converge precisely towards the point where 
 the production of an organ would be necessary ? And how 
 should they produce an organ appropriate to the medium in 
 which the animal lives ? To say that every species of organs 
 is produced, — some useful, others useless, others injurious, — 
 and that the animal only exists when the number of use- 
 ful organs prevails, is not this simply to revert to the 
 hypothesis of Epicurus, and to attribute all to chance, which 
 we would avoid ? Besides, do the facts afford reason for this 
 hypothesis ? If the combinations of organs are fortuitous, the 
 number of useless or injurious organs should be infinitely 
 greater than it is (supposing even that there is a single one of 
 this kind, which is not proved) ; for these two conditions do 
 not absolutely exclude life. And to say that that has been 
 so formerly is to plunge into the unknown, not to men- 
 tion that palseontological discoveries do not warrant us to 
 think that the fossil animals had been worse made than 
 those of the present. 
 
 If, on the other hand, it is a felt need that should itself 
 determine the direction of the fluidsf, how shall the fluids be 
 directed exactly to where the need exists, and produce pre- 
 cisely the kind of organs necessary for the satisfaction of the 
 need ? An animal feels the need of flying to escape danger- 
 ous enemies ; it makes an effort to move its members in the 
 direction in which it would most easily escape from their 
 pursuit. How shall this effort and need combined succeed 
 in making the anterior members take the form of the wing, 
 that machine so delicate and so wisely combined that all the 
 acutest mechanism of man can hardly guess how it can be 
 
238 BOOK I. CHAPTER VIII. 
 
 imitated? That the inotion of fluids should bring about 
 such difficult combinations, there is needed something else 
 than a vague need and an uncertain eflbrt. 
 
 Lamarck owns ' that it is very difficult to prove by obser- 
 vation ' that need produces the organ ; but he maintains that 
 the truth of this primary law is deduced logically from the 
 second law, attested by experience, according to which the 
 organ is developed by experience and habit. Thus, according 
 to him, because habit develops organs, it follows that need can 
 create them. Is there not an abyss between these two pro- 
 positions ? What ! because an organ being given, grows or 
 develops by exercise, it shall therefore be inferred that need 
 can produce an organ that does not exist ! Can the pro- 
 duction of an organ that does not exist be assimilated to 
 the development of an organ that does exist ? We see, 
 indeed, that exercise increases the size, the strength, the 
 facility of action of an organ, but not that it multiplies it 
 and changes its essential conditions. The mountebank has 
 suppler muscles than other men. Has he others ? — ^has he 
 more ? — are they arranged differently ? However great the 
 power of habit may be supposed, can it, in good faith, go ' 
 the length of creating ? ^ 
 
 I know that the theory of the unity of composition may be 
 appealed to, and it may be maintained, with the partisans of 
 Geoffrey Saint Hilaire, that all organs are at bottom only one 
 and the same organ diversely developed ; that, consequently, 
 exercise and habit have been able to produce successively, 
 though slowly, those diversities of form which are only dif- 
 ferences of development. But is not the doctrine of organic 
 unity, carried so far, a hypothesis itself? Have the great 
 
 1 'Is there not room to distinguish,' says M. Cournot, 'between the per- 
 fections and the abasements of the organism, between the enlargement and the 
 reduction of parts of a type already constituted, and the increase of organic 
 composition, approaching the constitution of a new type ? ' ' We must not 
 confound, ' the same author again rightly remarks, ' the merit of inventing 
 with that which consists of arranging and developing. ' — Cournot, Matirialisme, 
 vitaUsme, rationaliamc, p. 167. 
 
THE DOCTRINE OF EVOLUTION: LAMARCK AND DARWIN. 239 
 
 objections of Cuvier to this hypothesis been all set aside 
 by modern science ? Would not the unity of type and com- 
 position in the animal series be an ideal and an abstraction, 
 rather than the exact and positive expression of the reality ? 
 And, besides, would it suffice to show that two different organs 
 are analogous to each other, — that is, according to Geoffroy 
 Saint HUaire, situated in the same place, and bound by the 
 same relations to the neighbouring organs, — in order thence 
 to conclude that one of these organs can have taken the 
 form of the other ? No ; we would need to see that organ 
 itself pass from one form to another, otherwise the analogj' 
 does not prove the transition. Thus, for instance, because 
 the trunk of the elephant is the analogue of the human nose, 
 it does not follow that the nose can be changed into a trunk, 
 and the trunk into a nose. Besides, Geoffroy Saint Hilaire 
 has taken care himself to separate his hypothesis from that 
 of Lamarck, and wittily said that . we may indeed maintain 
 that a palace and a cottage answer to the same fundamental 
 type, without thereby affirming that the palace had begun by 
 being a cottage, or that the cottage will become a palace. 
 
 For some years this law of Lamarck has been studied 
 more closely and experimentally, according to which organs 
 are modified by exercise. M. Marey mentions precise and 
 proving facts which show us how function makes the organ, 
 especially in the muscular and osseous systems.' But these 
 facts seem to prove nothing but the plasticity and suppleness 
 of living forms, attributes which themselves imply finality, as 
 we said just now, and which form' part of the marvellous con- 
 ditions of adaptation the organized being enjoys. Whatever 
 be the origin of organized forms, a certain plasticity of forms 
 is necessary ; and there is nothing in its existence to contra- 
 dict the law of finality, since it is itself implicitly contained 
 in that law. The plasticity of organic forms proves that the 
 animal can exert a sort of industry upon itself, can treat itself 
 
 ^ R. Marey, Le transformiume et la physiologic experimentale (Clours du 
 ColUge de France, Revue scientijique, 2e s^rie, t. ir. p. 818). 
 
240 BOOK I. CHAPTEE VIII, 
 
 as an instrument, as a tool which is prepared for an end. 
 As I can manipulate wood or metal by the hammer or by- 
 iron, so I can utilize my muscles with respect to my needs. 
 Do not all these facts go to support the analogy we have so 
 often appealed to between the industry of man and that of 
 nature ? and do not they imply on the part of nature precisely 
 what human industry implies — namely, the tendency towards 
 an end ? Not only has the animal an end in the efforts it 
 makes to transform its organs, but nature itself has also had 
 an end in enduing the organism with a malleability and 
 a faculty of adaptation necessary to the preservation and 
 development of life. 
 
 The facts, moreover, suffice to prove, what is not disputed, 
 that organs are modified by exercise, consequently that func- 
 tion perfects or adapts to itself its proper mechanism. But 
 does it go the length of creating the mechanism itself ? How 
 could there be function before the mechanism existed ? Let 
 us suppose an animal deprived of all locomotive apparatus. 
 How could it be said that the function of motion exists before 
 being exercised 1 Here, then, there can be no question of 
 function, but only of the desire or idea of function. And, 
 again, how could there be in an animal the idea of a function 
 before it had exercised it, and without it having had experi- 
 ence of it ? The sole question, then, is of a simple need ; and 
 thus we revert to the first law of Lamarck, a principle which 
 M. Marey himself declares to be ' very vague,' for how can it 
 be admitted that the need of seeing produced eyes, the need 
 of hearing ears ? And, once more, if it were so, what an 
 extraordinary adaptation of the course of the fluid, and of the 
 labour of the elements, placing themselves so wonderfully in 
 accord with the needs of the animal ! Could this be anything 
 else than what we call finality ? 
 
 In fine, in the examples quoted, the modifications of the 
 organs are directed towards their end by the intelligence and 
 will of the animal; and one can easily understand that if 
 the organic matter is endued with a certain pliability, it will 
 
THE DOCTRINE OF EVOLUTION : LAMAECK AND DARWIN. 241 
 
 by degrees adapt itself to the end pursued. Suppose an 
 animal indifferently adapted for leaping, and which yet can 
 only get its food by leaping, it will develop in itself by exer- 
 cise an aptitude for leaping, and the muscles which serve for 
 that function. It will thus be itself the proper cause of the 
 adaptation of its organs. But in the case of an animal with- 
 out any species of intelligence, and endued only with a diffused 
 sensation, or of a vegetable in which nothing indicates sensa- 
 tion, what will determine the motion and guide the movements 
 in the favourable direction, instead of letting them go in all 
 directions ? The plant needs light, and knows how to take 
 the direction necessary to find it. Who can have given it 
 this habit, supposing it not to be primordial ? "Whence comes 
 this accord between the passive need of the vegetable for the 
 light, and the precise motion that carries it towards it ? By 
 what chance does it find of itself the direction dictated by 
 a mute, insensible, unconscious, unintelligent need ? But if 
 we suppose in the plant a vague desire, a dim sensation, a 
 tendency more or less blind or more or less conscious, which 
 might serve as a motive and directing principle, it is not 
 perceived that it is precisely the hypothesis of finality that is 
 generalized : in place of being nowhere it wiU be everywhere, 
 and will be the very foundation of nature. 
 
 I will not dwell longer on the theory of Lamarck, its 
 insufficiency being demonstrated by the very theory which 
 Mr. Darwin has tried to substitute for it. We are entitled to 
 call in question the modifying power of media and habits, 
 when this naturalist tells us 'that he has no great con- 
 fidence in the action of such agents.' We must now examine 
 what he substitutes for them. 
 
 The fact that has furnished a point of departure to the 
 system of Mr. Darwin is so prosaic and vulgar, that a meta- 
 physician would never have deigned to cast eyes upon it. 
 Metaphysics must, however, accustom itself to look not only 
 above our heads, but around and beneath us. What ! did 
 not Plato admit that there is a divine idea even of the dung- 
 
 Q 
 
242 BOOK I. CHAPTER VIII. 
 
 hill, even of mud ? Let us not disdain, then, to enter with 
 Mr. Darwin the stalls of breeders, to seek with him the 
 secrets of the bovine, equine, and porcine industry, and in 
 these productions of human art to discover, if possible, the 
 artifices of nature. The facts of nature are joined together 
 by a bond so fine and continuous, and accidents the most 
 insignificant in appearance are so governed by general and 
 permanent reasons, that nothing' can be indifferent to the 
 meditations of the thinker, especially -facts which touch so 
 closely the mystery of Hfe. 
 
 The breeding of cattle is a veritable industry, and an 
 industry that has precise and strict rules and methods that 
 are followed. The most important of these methods is what 
 is called the method of selection or election. It is as follows : 
 When he wishes to obtain the amelioration of a breed in 
 a definite direction, the breeder will choose individuals the 
 most remarkable in respect to the quality he is seeking : if it 
 be agility, the most slender ; if intelligence, the finest, most 
 ingenious, and clever. The products that will result from this 
 first choice wUl possess the qualities of their parents in a 
 greater degree, for it is known that individual characters are 
 transmitted and accumulated by heredity. If these products 
 be operated on as was done with the first individuals, the 
 quality sought will go on constantly increasing, and at the 
 end of several generations there will be obtained those fine 
 breeds, aU of human creation, which agricultural countries con- 
 tend for, and which, by skilful crossing, give place to other 
 new breeds, or at least to innumerable varieties. 
 
 Well, what man does by his art, why should nature not 
 do for its part ? Why not admit a sort of natural selection, 
 which may have occurred in the course of time ? Why not 
 admit that certain individual characteristics, which were 
 originally the result of certain accidents, have thenceforth 
 been transmitted and accumulated in a hereditary way, and 
 that by this means very different varieties have been produced 
 in the same species, as we produce them ourselves ? Let us 
 
THE DOCTRINE OF EVOLUTION: LAMARCK AND DARWIN. 243 
 
 admit, meanwhile, with Mr. Darwin, a second principle, with- 
 out which the first could not produce all that it contains — 
 namely, the principle of the strvggU for life. It is as follows: 
 All beings in nature contend for food ; they all struggle to 
 live, to exist. But there is only for a certain given number 
 of animals a certain amount of subsistence. All, then, cannot 
 alike be preserved. In this struggle the feeble necessarily 
 succumb, and the victory is to the strongest. The strong 
 alone survive, and establish the balance between population 
 and subsistence. We here recognise the celebrated law of 
 Malthus, that has caused so much discussion in political 
 economy, and which Mr. Darwin transfers from man to the 
 whole animal kingdom. 
 
 Granting this law, and it is indubitable, let us see how 
 natural selection acts. The individuals of a given species, 
 which shall have acquired by accident a character more or less 
 advantageous for their preservation, and have transmitted it 
 to their descendants, will be better armed for the struggle for 
 life, they wUl have more chance of being preserved; and 
 when that character shall have been perfected by time, it will 
 constitute for this variety a true superiority in its species. 
 Imagine, now, some change in the surrounding medium causing 
 this advantage, which had not yet been of much use, to become 
 all at once very necessary, as in a sudden refrigeration a 
 longer and thicker fur ; those that have obtained this advan- 
 tage will profit by it and survive, while the others will perish. 
 It is evident that the adaptation, on this hypothesis, will 
 result from a coincidence between the accidental production 
 of an advantage perfected by heredity, and an accidental 
 change of medium. 
 
 Let us see now how Mr. Darwin, by the help of these 
 principles, succeeds in explaining the origin of species 
 — namely, that in one and the same given type there may 
 accidentally be produced advantages of varied nature, and 
 which do not compete ; each profits by its own without 
 injuring that which another has. Hence different varieties, 
 
244 BOOK I. CHAPTER VIII. 
 
 well armed, althougli differently, for the struggle for life. 
 Those, on the other hand, that have remained faithful to the 
 original type, and have acquired no new advantage fitted to 
 preserve them in a new medium, perish. Thus the primitive 
 type disappears; only the extreme varieties subsist; and 
 these varieties, becoming in course of time more and more 
 dissimilar, will be called species, because the traces of their 
 common origin will have been lost. 
 
 Let us apply this theory to an example but little flattering 
 to the human species, but which is here so indicated that it 
 would be a false scruple not to go that length. One of the 
 most urgent objections made to Darwin is that, if his theory be 
 true, it must be admitted that man began by being an ape, 
 which is very humiliating ; to which a partisan of Mr. Darwin 
 lias replied, ' that he would rather be a perfected ape than a 
 degenerate Adam.' But on the theory of Mr. Darwin, it is 
 not true that man descends from the ape ; for if he did, as he 
 has a great advantage over him, he would have conquered 
 him in the struggle for life, and, consequently, would have 
 absorbed and destroyed him. What is true is, that the ape 
 and man are both derived from one and the same type that is 
 lost, and of which they are the divergent deviations. In a 
 word, on this hypothesis apes are not our ancestors, but they 
 are our cousins-german. 
 
 Let us generalize this example. We need not say that 
 the vertebrates have been molluscs, nor the mammalia fish or 
 birds ; but the four sub-kingdoms would be four distinct 
 branches proceeding from one primitive stock. In each sub- 
 kingdom the primitive type would be equally diversified, and 
 it is by these successive determinations, this addition of difiei*- 
 ences, this accumulation of new characters in always diverging 
 series, that the actual species have been produced. In a word, 
 the organized kingdom has always gone from the general to 
 the particular, and, as would be said in logic, by continually 
 increasing the content of its comprehension. 
 
 Such I believe to be, in its essential bases, and without 
 
THE DOOTEINE OF EVOLUTION : LAMAKCK AND DAKWIN. 245 
 
 changing anything, the system of Mr. Darwin, — a system which 
 he defends with mental resources truly inexhaustible, and, 
 above all, with admirable candour ; for, unlike inventors of 
 systems who only set forth the facts favourable to their ideas, 
 and are silent as to those that are contrary, Mr. Darwin 
 devotes the half of his book to stating the difficulties and 
 objections that may be raised by his principle, some of which 
 are so formidable that he has great difficulty in diminishing 
 their weight. Has he, however, come to the capital difficulty 
 that weighs upon the whole system, and which, for our part, 
 holds the mind in suspense ? We do not believe it, and this 
 is what we wiU try to prove. 
 
 The real rock of Mr. Darwin's theory, the dangerous and 
 slippery point, is the passage from artificial selection to natural: 
 to establish that a blind nature, without design, can have 
 attained, by the coincidence of circumstances, the same result 
 that man obtains by a reflecting and calculating industry. 
 In artificial selection, in effect, let us not forget, man chooses 
 the elements of. his combinations : to attain a desired end, he 
 chooses two factors, both endued with the character he wishes 
 to obtain or perfect. If there was some difference between 
 the two factors, the product would be uncertain or mixed ; or 
 even when the character of one of the factors predominated 
 in it, it would still be enfeebled by its mixture with a con- 
 trary character. 
 
 In order that natural selection might obtain the same 
 results, — that is, the accumulation and perfecting of some 
 characteristic, — nature would have to be capable of choice ; 
 in a word, the male, endued with such a characteristic, must 
 unite with a female just like himself. In this case, I admit 
 that the multiple of those two factors would have the chance 
 of inheriting that common characteristic, and even of adding 
 to it. It would still require this multiple or product to seek 
 in its species another individual which should also have 
 accidentally attained the same character. In this manner, 
 by a succession of similar selections, nature could do what 
 
246 BOOK I. CHAPTEK VIII. 
 
 human industry does, for it would act exactly in the same 
 way. 
 
 But who does not see that I employ an impossible 
 hypothesis ? For how can we admit that an animal that 
 has undergone an accidental modification (a shade more or 
 less in colout, for instance) will just seek to discover in its 
 species another individual affected at the same time by the 
 same modification ? That modification, being accidental and 
 individual in origin, should be rare, and, consequently, there 
 are very few chances for two such individuals to meet and to 
 unite. The blind desire which conducts the male towards the 
 female cannot have such a clairvoyance, and if it had, how 
 striking a testimony for finality would it be ! And supposing, 
 what is so unlikely, that such a rencounter once took place, 
 how can we admit it to be renewed in the second generation, 
 then in the third, the fourth, and so on ? It is only on this 
 condition of a constant rencounter between two similar factors 
 that the variety will be produced and fixed. Otherwise, 
 deviating with each new couple, the modifications will have 
 no constant character, and the type of the species will alone 
 remain identical. We boast of the short time needed by 
 human industry to produce a new variety ; and it is said : 
 What cannot nature do, that has ages at its disposal ? It 
 seems to me that in this case time does not matter. The 
 whole knot lies in the multiplication of the advantage sought 
 for, a multiplication requiring thought to choose. 
 
 There are found in the human species itself examples of 
 varieties produced by selection, but that results from constant 
 and successive unions between similar subjects. Thus the 
 Israelitish type is Easily recognisable, and still persists since 
 ancient times, notwithstanding the changes of the medium ; 
 but the Israelites marry among themselves, and preserve in 
 this way the distinctive traits that characterise them. Suppose 
 mixed marriages, — suppose that, prejudices disappearing, the 
 Israelites were to marry with the rest of the population — 
 how long would the Israelitish type last ? It would very 
 
THE DOCTRINE OF. EVOLUTION : LAMARCK AND DAEWIN. 247 
 
 soon be absorbed and transformed. There is, near Potsdam, 
 M. de Quatrefages tells us,^ a village specially remarkable for 
 the size of the inhabitants. Whence arises this specialty ? 
 It arises, we are told, from this, that the father of Frederick 
 the Great, who liked handsome men, chose the tallest peasant 
 women he could find as wives to his grenadiers. This is 
 quite artificial selection, let us not forget. Thus Plato, in his 
 Republic, while prescribing marriage by lot, yet advised the 
 magistrates to cheat a little, and to couple, without seeming 
 to do so, the handsomest women and men, in order to 
 obtain vigorous citizens. It is evident from all these ex- 
 amples, that selection always supposes the rencounter of 
 a common character in the two sexes. This cannot 
 take place in nature, that entirely accidental character 
 being first of all very rare, and those that might possess it 
 at the same time having no reason to meet and choose 
 each other. 
 
 I know that Darwin distinguishes two kinds of artificial 
 selection— one that he calls methodical, the other unconscious. 
 Methodical selection is that of the breeder, who combines his 
 elements as, in mechanics, the wheels of a machine are com- 
 bined. Unconscious selection is that by which the ameliora- 
 tion or modification of a species is obtained without tbat 
 precise result having been sought, — like that of a hunter, for 
 instance, who makes no pretence to perfect the canine race, 
 but who, by taste, is led to choose the best dogs he can pro- 
 cure, and obtains, by the force of things, an accumulation of 
 qualities in that breed. Thus, probably, the various canine 
 varieties have been formed. There is no scientific method 
 here, and yet the result is the same, although slower. It is 
 the same in nature, according to Mr. Darwin. It practises 
 an unconscious selection, and the agent that here takes the 
 place of choice is the struggle for life. Those most favoured 
 necessarily prevail by right of the strongest, and nature is 
 found to have chosen spontaneously, and without knowing 
 ^ UnM de Vespice humaine. 
 
248 BOOK I. CHAPTER VIII. 
 
 it, the subjects best furnished to resist the attacks of the 
 medium — in a word, the most appropriate. 
 
 We here reach the core of the system. That we may duly 
 appreciate it, let us distinguish two dififerent cases ; either 
 the surrounding medium does or does not change. What 
 will happen on these two hypotheses ? We must here notice 
 a great difference between the doctrine of Lamarck and that 
 of Darwin. According to the former, while the medium does 
 not change, the species must remain unmoved, once it is by 
 habit adapted to that medium ; having in effect what it needs 
 in order to live, we do not see why it should try to change. 
 But if the cause of change is natural selection, it should be 
 able to occur even in a fixed medium ; for however well 
 adapted a species may be, one can always conceive that it 
 might be more so : there may always occur some accidents 
 that would secure to certain individuals an advantage over 
 others, and would in some sort afford them a greater oppor- 
 tunity. And thus one does not see why, on this hypothesis, 
 species should not vary before our eyes. It would not even 
 need for this, so far as appears, vast periods of time, when 
 we think with what rapidity human industry creates new 
 varieties. 
 
 Why, then, do not we see such modifications produced ? 
 Because the principle of natural selection, even united to the 
 principle of the struggle for life, cannot, as it seems, have the 
 virtue attributed to it by Mr. Darwin. Let us suppose, in 
 effect, that in hot countries their colour is an advantage, 
 rendering the inhabitants better fit to bear the heat of the 
 climate. Let us suppose that in one of these countries there 
 are only whites, and that, at a given moment, an individual is 
 found accidentally coloured black ; he wiU have an advantage 
 over his compatriots, — he will, if you please, live longer. But 
 he marries. Whom can he wed 1 A white woman, beyond 
 dispute, the black colour here being accidental. Will the 
 child resulting from this union be black ? No, doubtless, but 
 a mulatto ; the child of the latter wiU be of a stiU lighter 
 
THE DOCTRINE OF EVOLUTION : LAMAECK AND DAEWIN. 249 
 
 shade, and in some generations the accidental tint of the first 
 "will have disappeared, and been swallowed up in the general 
 characters of the species. Thus, even admitting that the 
 black colour would have been an advantage, it would never 
 have time enough to perpetuate itself so as to form a new 
 variety more appropriate to the climate, and which would 
 thereby prevail over the whites in the struggle for life. 
 
 If doubts be entertained of the value of the argument that 
 I here propose against the range of Mr. Darwin's principle, 
 I would invoke the authority of another naturalist, M. de 
 Quatrefages, although very favourable to that principle. He 
 mentions several individuals of the human species that have 
 been found accidentally endued with exceptional characters, 
 and he wants to explain why these individuals have not 
 given birth to new varieties. ' A Lambert,' says this naturalist, 
 ' or a Colburn (the names of these abnormal individuals) has 
 formed no alliance with another individual presenting the 
 same anomaly as himself. Selection here tended to efface 
 the superabundant and teratological activity of the skin, the 
 excessive number of the fingers. With each generation the 
 influence of the primitive normal fact would forcibly diminish 
 by the mixture of the normal blood : it must soon end by 
 disappearing altogether.'^ Afterwards he explains, by the 
 absence of artificial selection, the relative uniformity of the 
 human groups compared with the domestic animals. Does 
 it not follow from this, that natural selection is insufficient 
 to vary species, for this main reason, on which I have so 
 much insisted — namely, that the different individuals of the 
 two sexes accidentally affected by the same character could 
 not meet ? 
 
 An analogous objection to the principle of natural selection 
 has been put in the form of a mathematical argument by a 
 learned Englishman.^ He takes, for example, a certain cate- 
 
 ' UniU de I'eepdce humaine, xiii. (Haohette, 1861). 
 
 ' The Theory of Natural Selection in a Mathematical Point of View, by Mr. 
 Alfred "W. Bennett, 1871. (See the Sevue scientijique, 2d series, t. i. p. 100.) 
 
250 BOOK I. CHAPTEE vm. 
 
 gory of butterflies, called Leptalis, whose colour is protective, 
 because it makes them like other butterflies, called Ithomia, 
 which . the birds avoid for their tainted smell. The species of 
 Leptalis which is found to have an accidental resemblance in 
 colour to the Ithomia thus gets the benefit of their immunity. 
 Mr. Wallace attributes this advantage gained by the privileged 
 Leptalis to natural selection. Mr. Bennett opposes him with 
 very close reasoning. 
 
 ' It is evident,' says the latter author, ' that to pass from 
 their ordinary to their protective form, .the Leptalis must have 
 undergone' a series of gradual transformations ; and we can 
 hardly estimate at less than a thousand the number of forms 
 that must have succeeded between the first deviation and the 
 form at last observed. On the other hand, it is clear that the 
 first degenerate Leptalis cannot have sufficiently differed from 
 their sisters to deceive the appetite of the birds interested in 
 recognising them under their disguise, and it is a moderate 
 supposition that, during the first fifth part of the period of 
 supposed transformation, the birds were not deceived. If so, 
 the butterflies not being yet preserved by their new dress, every 
 reason of selection disappears, and we must regard as entirely 
 left to chance the continuation of the metamorphosis. The 
 chances which this has of being realized can then be very 
 approximately calculated. Let us take, in effect, a couple of 
 Leptalis, and suppose that the species had a tendency to vary 
 in twenty different directions, of which only one tends to 
 approach the Ithomia. In the first generation, the chances a 
 favourable variation has of being produced are represented by 
 the fraction ^^ ; and even this valuation is very favourable to 
 the hypothesis of Mr. Wallace, for among the numerous 
 offspring of a pair of butterflies, there would certainly be 
 found more than twenty forms very little different, and 
 deviating from a determinate form. 
 
 ' In the second generation, the forms that already had a 
 tendency to remove from the form Ithomia will have no 
 reason to return to it ; and it is solely in the twentieth part 
 
THE DOCTRINE OF. EVOLUTION : LAMARCK AND DAEWIN. 251 
 
 of the offspring of the first couple that we can reasonably hope 
 to find forms more or less approximating to the protective 
 form. But, in this twentieth, selection does not yet act ; 
 chance will stUl preside over the production of the form 
 sought for : a twentieth only will assume that form. But this 
 wiU only represent the twentieth of the twentieth ; thus the 
 chances will be represented by the fraction 1^. At the end 
 of ten generations the chances will be reduced to |^, — that is 
 to say, that in ten billions of individuals one only will have 
 preserved the marks of the primitive deviation. This is an 
 absolutely negative result, and compels ns to reject the hypo- 
 thesis of selection, since, before even the latter could have had 
 any reason to produce it, the accidental primitive variation 
 would have completely disappeared.'^ 
 
 This reasoning does not mean to deny the principle of 
 natural selection, but to limit its action. It suffices us to 
 prove here that it does not suffice, of itself, to explain the 
 origin of organized forms. There must be, besides, an internal 
 principle of . transformation ; thereupon the idea of finality 
 resumes its whole empire. This is granted by an American 
 naturalist. Professor Cope, who has developed the hypothesis 
 of Darwin, explaining organic evolution by a growth-force, 
 determined to propagate itself in this or that direction by the 
 desire or imagination of the animal. ' Intelligence is the origin 
 of the lest,' says he, ' while natural selection is the tribunal 
 to which are submitted the results obtained by the growth- 
 force.'^ This hypothesis, besides being a return to that of 
 
 ^ The preceding argument is much stronger still when it is applied, no longer 
 to an advantageous, but to a disadvantageous organ, as Broca has shown in a 
 Discours sur le traTisformisme {Revite dee cows scieMtifigues, vii« annee, p. 
 555). I ought to say that M. Delbceuf {Revue scientijlque, 13 January 1877) has 
 combated this argument, as well as that of Mr. Bennett, set forth above. He 
 starts from this principle, that the cause that has produced the first variation 
 having to continue to act, it is conformable to the laws of the calculation of 
 probabilities that its influence should always go on increasing. But that cause 
 having been at first accidental (for instance, the exceptional temperature of the 
 year), there is no reason why it should continue its action during the whole series 
 of ulterior generations. 
 
 ^ Revue dea cours scientifiques. 
 
252 BOOK I. CHAPTER VIII. 
 
 Lamarck, grants to the theory of finality in reality much 
 more than it asks, since it is to the intelligence of the animal 
 that the principle of organization and fabrication would be 
 definitely reduced, which, at bottom, would be Stahl's hypo- 
 thesis. Without pronouncing on this hypothesis, let us merely 
 gather this additional testimony to the impotence of external 
 and accidental causes for the production of organic forms. 
 
 Yet once more, we do not in any way dispute the principle 
 of natural selection, nor that of the struggle for life. They are 
 two very true laws, established by experience, but which 
 apparently must act in a direction entirely different from what 
 we are told, and miich more in the direction of preserving the 
 species than in that of modifying it. In effect, the kind 
 of life of an animal depending always on its structure 
 (whether final causes be admitted or not), it is evident that, 
 in a species, the most favoured are those whose organization 
 is most conformed to the type of the species. In the 
 carnivora, for instance, that one wiU have the advantage 
 which shall have good claws, strong teeth, and supple and 
 vigorous muscles. But if j'ou suppose a modification inter- 
 vening which could ultimately be an advantage in other condi- 
 tions, it wUl, nevertheless, at its origin be an inconvenience, 
 by altering the type of the species, and thereby rendering the 
 individual less fit for the kind of life to which its general 
 organization calls it. Suppose that in a herbivorous animal 
 the molar teeth, so fit for chewing soft grass, were accidentally 
 replaced in some individuals by incisors. Although the 
 incisor is really an advantage for those species that possess 
 it, since it permits them to conjoin two kinds , of food, it 
 would, nevertheless, be a very great disadvantage for the 
 animal in which it should accidentally occur, for it would 
 thereby be less able to find its habitual food, and there would 
 be nothing* in it prepared to accommodate itself to another 
 species of nourishment.^ T conclude that natural selection 
 
 ■■ M. Cournot thinks with us, ' that a mechanical choice does not suffice to 
 explain the marvel of organic adaptations. ... Of what use to the elephant 
 
THE DOCTRINE OF EVOLUTION: LAMARCK AND DARWIN. 253 
 
 must, in a medium always the same, result in maintaining the 
 type of the species, and in preventing it from changing ; I 
 cannot see in it, except accidentally, a principle of modification 
 and change. 
 
 Is it so when the medium itself is changed, when, from 
 whatever causes, the external conditions come to be different ? 
 It is then, according to Darwin, that the principle of natural 
 selection acts in an all-powerful manner. If, in effect, at the 
 moment of this change of medium, some individuals of a 
 species are found to have certain characteristics,' which just 
 render them fit to accommodate themselves to that medium, 
 is it not evident that they will have a great advantage over 
 the others, and that they alone will survive, while the others 
 will perish ? By the operation of natural selection, an at first 
 individual character may thus become specific. 
 
 Here, evidently, Mr. Darwin's hypothesis appears to most 
 advantage, but it is still subject to very great difficulties. 
 And, first, it must be admitted that the modification in ques- 
 tion has occurred at the same time and in the same place 
 among several individuals of different sex. In effect, as we 
 have shown, if it is not at the same time in both sexes, this 
 quality, far from accumulating and becoming determinate by 
 heredity, would be constantly growing weaker, and no new 
 species could be formed. Here, then, already is a first rencounter 
 or coincidence that must be admitted. In the second place, 
 it must be supposed that each animal species has originated in 
 the coincidence of an accidental modification with a change of 
 medium, which multiplies without end the number of coin- 
 cidences and accidents. On this hypothesis, while a certain 
 series of causes altered organic forms according to particular 
 
 for " the struggle for life " would be a noae longer than that of its comrades, 
 though much shorter than was needful to obtain its food ? '— Cournot, MaU- 
 rialisme, vitalieme, rationalitme, p. 166. The same author concludes, like- 
 wise, that ' by substituting for a sudden transformation, a slow gradation, the 
 mechanical explanation is rendered less offensive, and its grossness is in some 
 sort concealed, although, at bottom, there still is sought, from a mechanical 
 cause, what it is incapable of giving.' — Ibid. p. 166. 
 
25-i BOOK I. CHAPTER VIII. 
 
 laws, another series, according to other laws, altered the 
 media. The adaptation in the animals would only be the 
 point of coincidence between these two series. But as the 
 appropriate forms in the organism are counted by thousands, 
 or, rather, cannot be numbered, we must admit that these 
 two series of parallel causes have harmoniously coincided a 
 thousand times, or, rather, an infinite number of times, — that ' 
 is, we must abandon to fortune, not to say to chance, the chief 
 part in the development and progress of the animal scale. Is 
 this a truly rational explanation ? 
 
 One of the gravest difficulties still remains. Cuvier has 
 greatly dwelt, in his zoological philosophy, on the law of 
 organic correlations ; and although there may be a difference 
 as to the extent of this law, it remains generally true. 
 According to it, the organs are bound together by logical rela- 
 tions, and the form of each is determined by that of the 
 others ; whence it follows that certain coincidences of organs 
 are impossible, while others are necessary. Consequently, if 
 a chief organ undergo an important modification, all the other 
 essential organs must be modified in the same way to pre- 
 serve equilibrium. Otherwise an entirely local change, however 
 advantageous it might be in itself, would become hurtful from 
 its disagreement with the rest of the organization. If, for 
 instance, as Lamarck believed, the scales of fish could have 
 been transformed into birds' wings (which Cuvier declared 
 absurd in an anatomical point of view), the sound of these 
 same fish must, at the same time, be transformed into lungs, 
 which appears to Mr. Darwin the most striking example of 
 his theory. Now, without discussing the reality of the facts, 
 I say that these two correlative and parallel transformations 
 cannot be explained by a simple accident. Mr. Darwin seems 
 to have wished to anticipate this objection, by admitting what 
 he calls a correlation of growth. He owns that there are con- 
 nected and sympathetic variations, that there are organs that 
 vary at the same time and in the same manner, — the right 
 and left sides of the body, the limbs, and the jaw ; but this 
 
THE DOCTRINE OF EVOLUTION: LAMA.KCK AND DARWIN. 255 
 
 law leaves the difficulty unsolved. Either this is an entirely 
 mechanical law, that only indicates simple geometrical relations 
 between the organs, and has no reference to the preservation of 
 the animal, — and then it does not serve to solve the problem, — 
 or else these correlations of growth are precisely those required 
 by the change of medium, or of external conditions, and then 
 how can they be understood without a certain finality ? By 
 what singular law should organs that can only act in harmony 
 be modified at the same time and in the same way, except 
 there were here some foresight of nature ? Here, again, the 
 simple coincidence does not suffice, for it is the coincidence 
 itself that must be explained. 
 
 It is evident that the theory of fortuitous modifications, with- 
 out a directive principle, presents the greatest difficulties when 
 applied to the formation of the organs ;^ but these difficulties are 
 much greater still as regards the formation of the instincts. 
 
 It is well known what Lamarck's theory was on this point. 
 Instinct, according to him, is a hereditary habit. Mr. Darwin 
 adopts this theory, while modifying it by the principle of 
 natural selection. He remarks that the same thing can be 
 said of the instincts as of the organs. Every modification in 
 the habits of a species may be advantageous, quite as well as 
 a modification of organs. But when a modification of instinct 
 is produced in a species, it will tend to perpetuate itself, and, 
 if advantageous, will secure to those endued with it the pre- 
 ponderance over the other varieties of the species, so as' to 
 destroy aU the intermediate varieties. True, it cannot be 
 proved by direct observation that instincts have been modi- 
 fied, but some indirect observations seem to warrant this 
 supposition, — such, for instance, as the gradations of instinct. 
 Thus, the making of honey by bees presents three distinct 
 types, but connected together by insensible gradations. First, 
 the humble bees, which make their honey and wax in hollow 
 trees ; next, our domestic bees, which have solved in the 
 construction of their cells a problem of the higher mathe- 
 
 1 See chap. ii. 
 
256 BOOK I. CHAPTER VIII. 
 
 matics ; and, lastly, the American bees, an intermediate species 
 inferior to our bees, but superior to the humble bees. Can 
 we not see here the trace and indication of a development of 
 instinct, which, starting from the lowest degree, has gradually 
 reached the point at which we see it now ? What warrants 
 this conjunction is that, by thwarting the industry of bees, by 
 placing them in new or unfavourable conditions, it has been 
 found possible to vary their habits and change their procedure. 
 Many experiments made in this direction might throw great 
 light on this obscure question. 
 
 The theory that explains instinct by hereditary habit is, 
 beyond doubt, specious, and very worthy of attention ; never- 
 theless, it stUl presents very serious difficulties. First, the 
 variations of instincts, which may be observed in certain 
 particular circumstances, would not necessarily disprove the 
 existence of a primitive instinct proper to each species ; for, 
 even on this hypothesis, nature, having attached an instinct 
 to the animal for its preservation, may have determined that 
 that instinct should not fail just when the least change might 
 take place in the external circumstances. A certain degree of 
 flexibility of instinct is by no means irreconcilable with the 
 doctrine of irrediicible instinct. For instance, nature, having 
 given to the bird the instinct to construct its nest with certain 
 materials, was not bound to determine that if these materials 
 were to fail the bird should make no nest. As our habits, 
 however mechanical they may be, are yet automatically modi- 
 fied, if ever so small an external circumstance happen to 
 oppose them, it might be the same with the instincts or 
 natural habits imprinted from the beginning in the very 
 organization of each species by the provident Author of all 
 things. 
 
 Another grave objection may be raised against the applica- 
 tion of the principle of natural selection to the formation of 
 instincts. According to Mr. Darwin, the modification of 
 instinct, which was at first accidental, was afterwards trans- 
 mitted and fixed by heredity. But what is an accidental 
 
THE DOCTRINE OF EVOLUTION: LAMARCK AND DARWIN. 257 
 
 modification of instinct ? It is a fortuitous action. But can 
 a fortuitous action be transmitted hereditarily ? Notice the 
 difference that there is between a modification of organ and of 
 instinct. The first, however slight and superficial it may be, 
 — were it the colour of plumage, — is permanent, and lasts for 
 life ; it is durably impressed on the organization, and one can 
 conceive it transmitted by heredity. But an instinct is nothing 
 else than a series of given acts ; a modification of instinct is, 
 therefore, a particular action which becomes fortuitously inter- 
 calated in this series. How can we believe that this action, 
 though it were by chance several times repeated during life, 
 could be reproduced in the series of actions of the descendants ? 
 We see fathers transmit to their sons fully formed habits 
 (although imitation and similarity of media must be taken 
 into account), but we do not see the son reproduce the acci- 
 dental actions of the father. What facts would not have to 
 be quoted to render credible so strange a hereditary trans- 
 mission ! 
 
 If it were doubted that Mr. Darwin assigns a great enough' 
 part to chance in the origin of the instincts, I would recall the 
 example he himself mentions — namely, the instinct of the 
 cuckoo. It is known that the female of this bird lays its eggs 
 in another nest than its own. This instinct, which belongs to 
 the cuckoo of Europe, is not found in that of America. Mr. 
 Darwin conjectures that the European cuckoo may formerly 
 have had the same habits as the American. ' Suppose,' says 
 he, ' that it had happened, though seldom, to lay its eggs in 
 the nest of another bird. If the mother or her young derived 
 from this circumstance some advantage, — if the young bird, 
 profiting by the mistaken instinct of an adoptive mother, 
 became more vigorous, — it may be conceived that an accidental 
 fact became a habit advantageous to the species, for all 
 analogy invites us to believe that the young birds thus 
 hatched will have inherited more or less the deviation of 
 instinct which led their mother to forsake them. They will 
 become more and more inclined to deposit their eggs in the 
 
 B 
 
258 BOOK I. CHAPTER VIII. 
 
 nests of other birds.' Here is, indeed, an accidental and 
 fortuitous action considered as hereditarily transmissible. I 
 will ask zoologists whether they allow that the power of 
 heredity could go so far ? 
 
 A great number of facts would have to be collected and 
 discussed to appreciate at its true worth the theory of heredi- 
 tary habits. I shall only mention one, which appears to me 
 absolutely opposed to every theory of this kind — namely, 
 the instinct of the necrophores, These animals have the 
 habit, when they have laid their eggs, of seeking the bodies 
 of animals to lay them beside their eggs, that their young, 
 as soon as hatched, may at once find their food; some of 
 them even lay their eggs in the dead bodies themselves. But 
 what is here incomprehensible is, that the mothers that have 
 this instinct will never see their young, and have not them- 
 selves seen their mothers. They cannot, therefore, know that 
 these eggs will become animals like themselves, nor, conse- 
 quently, foresee their needs. In other insects, the pompilia, 
 the instinct is still more remarkable. In this species the 
 mothers have a kind of life entirely different from their 
 young, for they are themselves herbivorous, and their larvae 
 carnivorous. They cannot, then, conclude from their own 
 case what will suit their offspring. Shall we here have 
 recourse to hereditary habit 1 But this instinct must have 
 been perfect from the beginning, and is not susceptible of 
 degrees : a species that had not had this instinct precisely as 
 it is would not have existed, since the young, being carnivorous, 
 absolutely need animal food ready for. them when they come 
 into the world. If it be said that the larvae were originally 
 herbivorous, and that by chance, and without an end, the 
 mother, attracted perhaps by a special taste, went and laid 
 its eggs in dead bodies ; that the young, born in this medium, 
 became by degrees accustomed to it, and from herbivorous 
 became carnivorous ; that then the mother herself gave up the 
 habit of laying in dead bodies, but that by a remnant of 
 association of ideas she continued to seek those bodies, now 
 
THE DOOTBINE OF EVOLUTION: LAMARCK AND DARWIN. 259 
 
 become useless for herself, and to place them near her eggs, 
 and all that without aim, — we multiply so fearfully the num- 
 ber of fortunate accidents which could produce such a result, 
 that it would seem much better to say we know nothing 
 about it. 
 
 It is very important, from our point of view, to establish 
 that transformism is susceptible of many forms, and that since 
 Darwin, very different systems have been proposed, without 
 giving up the common general idea. But the more one 
 studies these systems, the clearer is the proof of the difiBculty 
 of explaining organic forms by purely mechanical and external 
 causes. I will mention, for instance, jpolymorpMsm. On the 
 hypothesis of Darwin, species are produced by passing from 
 the general to the particular, from simpler and more abstract 
 to richer and more concrete forms, nearly as in the philosophy 
 of Hegel. A very small number of types would thus suf&ce 
 to begin with, and perhaps only one to engender, in course of 
 time, all the living species. M. Agassiz has brought a very 
 serious objection against this system — namely, that if it were 
 so, in proportion as we descend into the geological strata and 
 reach a higher antiquity, we should meet simpler forms and 
 in smaller number. But it is found to be quite the contrary, 
 and that the farther we proceed the more do we find dif- 
 ferent and complicated forms. This objection, strong against 
 Darwinism, does not affect transformism in itself. Other 
 naturalists, in effect, admit that the first appearance of life, 
 however it may be explained, may have just as well been 
 manifested in thousands of different forms as by a single type. 
 Some go so far as to think that originally there were only 
 individuals, and that the species itself is the product of time. 
 However that may be, transformism in no way excludes a 
 plurality of types at the first. The present species might be 
 produced from previous but different species. 
 
 It is evident that polymorphism is a hypothesis intermediate 
 between Darwinism and the common doctrine. According 
 
260 BOOK I. CHAPTER VIII. 
 
 to Darwinism, all organic forms are definitely produced by- 
 external causes, and derived from the principle of natural 
 selection. According to polymorphism, the existing species 
 have been, indeed, produced by the same causes, but the 
 primitive species owed their origin immediately to the creative 
 forces of nature. There was thus a moment in which nature 
 was capable of producing in great number organic types, 
 although it no longer does so now. But these organic forms, 
 however different they were from those of the present, yet 
 behoved to be adapted forms, since they were living. Thus 
 adaptation was not the effect of time or of natural selection : 
 it was produced at the very first, and the abyss that separates 
 dead matter from living must have been cleared at a bound. 
 The impossibility of fortuitous coincidences producing so many 
 diverse organizations — an impossibility which Darwinism art- 
 fully seeks to conceal — reappears in all its force. 
 
 The doctrine of evolution rests upon a principle true in 
 itself, and which Leibnitz has illustrated, the principle of 
 continuity — namely, that nothing is produced that does not 
 originate in a previous state, nothing that is not connected 
 with the past, and having its consequences in the future. 
 The principle is incontestable, but like every abstract principle, 
 we must know how it should be understood. Is the transi- 
 tion from one state to another necessarily and always slow 
 and insensible ? Does it only take place by imperceptible 
 degrees ?. Does not every one know, for instance, that in his 
 own life, while usually facts originate from each other by 
 an insensible gradation, one grows old without perceiving it, 
 ideas and sentiments change unconsciously? On the other hand, 
 in many circumstances, changes are rapid, sudden, prodigious: 
 one grows old in a day ; a sudden death breaks the charm of 
 the sweetest life ; a terrible passion originates in the twinkle 
 of an eye ; in human society there are insensible changes and 
 violent revolutions ; in history we cannot suppress crises, 
 unexpected falls, prodigious good fortune. There are thus 
 two sorts of continuity, — one rapid, the other slow ; two sorts 
 
THE DOCTRINE OF EVOLUTION : LAMARCK AND DAEWIN. 261 
 
 of change, — the one abrupt and sudden, the other slow and 
 imperious. Hence this question arises : How are the trans- 
 formations produced that create new species ? Hence also 
 two hypotheses in transformism, — that of slow and that of 
 abrupt modification. 
 
 A learned botanist, M. Naudin, one of those whom Darwin 
 himself owns as one of his precursors, has defended the 
 doctrine of abrupt transformism against the Darwinist 
 hypothesis of infinitely small modifications, accumulated by 
 time and fixed by heredity. He urges two reasons. The 
 first is, that infinite time is not available, as the Darwinists 
 persuade themselves. ' According to the most recent calcula- 
 tions,' says M. Naudin, ' the maximum duration of animal life 
 upon our globe can be approximately estimated at about fifty 
 millions of years at the very most, and the farther progress 
 of science will never raise this estimate, but, on the contrary, 
 will tend to restrict it.' Wow, fifty millions of years may 
 seem a very good figure, but in reality it is absolutely 
 insufficient to explain the production of all the organic forms 
 if we suppose them produced by insensible modifications. Not 
 miUions of years, but thoxisands of millions of ages would be 
 required.^ 
 
 In the second place, the theory of insensible modifications 
 is entirely contrary to experience. What experience gives 
 us is, in fact, abrupt, not slow change. The study of botany 
 proves this ; and M. Naudin, who has so thoroughly studied 
 the variations of botanical species, is here a weighty authority. 
 ' When even a very notable change is produced,' says he, ' it 
 occurs abruptly in the interval from one generation to another. 
 The fixation of varieties may have required time, but their 
 
 ^ If we consider that in certain parts of the American continent, formed by 
 the accumulated shells of polyps, we can, according to Agassiz, go hack 200,000 
 years, we perceive we can thus reach the 250th part of the total duration of 
 animal life in the globe ; but if, at this depth of antic[uity, not even the shadow 
 of a variation has been detected, how can we believe that 260 times more time 
 could have sufficed to traverse the interval separating the primitive cell from 
 humanity ? 
 
262 BOOK I. CHAPTEK VIII. 
 
 appearance has always been sudden.' According to this new 
 form of transformism, the variation would take place in the 
 germ itself, or during the period of incubation, and the external 
 circumstances so often appealed to, the climate, medium, and 
 habits, would only have very little importance. ' When the 
 species vary,' says M. Naudin, ' they do so in virtue of an 
 intrinsic and innate property, which is only a remains of the 
 primordial plasticity; and the external conditions only act 
 by determining the rupture of equilibrium that permits this 
 plasticity to produce its effects.' The natural selection of 
 Darwin, on this hypothesis, plays only a very secondary part. 
 The species fall of themselves when they have exhausted the 
 quantity of plastic force that they contained, as they originate 
 in virtue of that same force. ' As I view the matter,' says 
 the author, ' the feeble perish because they have reached the 
 limit of their strength, and they would perish even without 
 the competition of the stronger.' In a word, M. Naudin's 
 point of view (and it is done to please metaphysicians) is to 
 substitute, in the theory of evolution, for external, accidental, 
 and purely fortuitous causes, an internal plastic force, which, 
 from a primordial protoplasm, ' derives the great families of 
 organization, then the secondary, and, descending from the 
 general to the particular, all the forms actually existing, which 
 are our species, breeds, and varieties.' 
 
 This doctrine, if true (and the reasons given by M. Naudin 
 seem to us of great force), leaves intact the whole prodigy of 
 final causes, and evidently destroys all that was believed to 
 be gained by Darwinism. The latter, in effect, tried to explain 
 the organism as the result of a thousand internal or external 
 causes, which must necessarily produce thousands of forms of 
 some kind, among which the struggle for life undertook to 
 make a choice. Thus the part of chance was concealed, and 
 the incalculable number of fortunate circumstances that had 
 to be supposed was lost in the immensity of time. But if 
 the passage from one form to another is abrupt and sudden, 
 the problem is still the same, and evolution furnishes no new 
 
THE DOCTBINE OF EVOLUTION : LAMARCK AND DAEWIN. 263 
 
 outlet to escape the difficulty. How does matter spontaneously 
 and blindly find such marvellous adaptations ? How does it 
 realize so many different ideas ? How does it pursue such 
 complicated plans and combinations ? Is not the transition 
 from one form to another a true creation ? 
 
 We have already seen in Darwinism, that the principle of 
 natural selection had seemed to us insufficient without the 
 intervention of the principle of finality. Imagine only the 
 number of fortunate circumstances that must be accumulated 
 to produce, I do not say the human organism, but merely 
 a fly's foot ; and among the innumerable mass of fortuitous 
 accidents to which it would be subject, how could the 
 organized machine resist and survive if it had not in itself a 
 plastic and esthetic force, which makes the useful form pre- 
 dominate over those that are injurious and embarrassing ? 
 But if slow evolutionism itself has need of finality, abrupt 
 evolutionism still more imperiously requires it; for, excluding 
 groping and long experience, it can only explain the appear- 
 ance of forms by an internal plasticity, which is only, under 
 another form, ' the principle of Jinality, a mysterious power,' 
 says M. Naudin, ' indeterminate, a fatality for some, for others 
 a providential wUl, whose incessant action on living beings 
 determines at all periods of the world's existence the form, 
 volume, and duration of each of them, by reason of its destiny 
 in the order of things of which it forms a part. It is this 
 power that harmonizes each member with the whole, by 
 adapting it to the function it must fulfil in the general 
 organism, which function is its reason of being.' ^ 
 
 ^ Semie horticole, 1852, p. 102. The preceding analysis of M. ITaudin's 
 theory is derived from his Notes on Related Species and the Theory of Evolution 
 {Revue Scientifique, 6th March 1875). 
 
CHAPTEE IX. 
 
 THE DOCTRINE OF EVOLUTION : HERBERT SPENCEE. 
 
 IN Lamarck and Darwin, the doctrine of evolution is con- 
 fined within the limits of zoology, and is content with 
 presenting to us a hypothesis on the origin of living species. 
 But the doctrine of evolution can take a general form, and 
 embrace the phenomena and the genesis of the entire universe, 
 as well the mechanical universe as the universe of animated 
 beings. Evolutionism then becomes a philosophic and even 
 metaphysical doctrine. A celebrated English philosopher has 
 given it this form. It remains then that, in order to give a 
 full account of the hypothesis of evolution, we set forth and 
 estimate the systematic structure of Mr. Herbert Spencer. 
 
 I In the first instance, nothing can be more finalistic than Mr. 
 H. Spencer's ideas on the nature of life and organization ; for 
 he reduces the idea of life to two principal characters: 1st, 
 Internal co-ordination ; 2d, External correspondence with the 
 medium. But what would seem more teleological than these 
 two characters ? 
 
 ' Life,' he first says, ' is a co-ordination of actions ; whence 
 it follows that an arrest of co-ordination is death, and that 
 imperfect co-ordination is disease. Moreover, this definition 
 harmonizes with our ordinary ideas of life in its different 
 gradations, seeing that the organisms which we rank as low 
 in their degree of life are those which display but little co- 
 ordination of actions, and that the recognised increase in 
 degree of life corresponds with an increase in the extent and 
 complexity of co-ordination.' ^ 
 
 But this character does not suf&ce ; a second must be 
 ' Principles of Biology, Part i. chap. iv. 
 
THE DOCTRINE OF EVOLUTION : HERBERT SPENCER. 265 
 
 added — namely, correspondence with the medium, or ' the 
 continued adjustment of internal to external relations. This 
 is what is seen especially in the embryo, in which, from 
 beginning to end, there is a gradual and continued adjustment, 
 all the phases of the organism in process of formation strictly 
 corresponding to the phases of the medium.' It might, indeed, 
 be said that in chemical phenomena there is also a correspond- 
 ence between the internal changes and the external relations ; 
 ' but this correlation does not, in the abstract, differ from the 
 connection between the motion of a straw and the motion of 
 the wind that disturbs it. In either case a change produces 
 a change, and there it ends. The alteration undergone by the 
 object does not tend to induce in it a secondary alteration that 
 anticipates a secondary alteration in the environment. But 
 in every living body there are alterations of this nature, and it 
 is in this production that the correspondence consists. The 
 difference may be best expressed by symbols. Let ^ be a 
 change in the environment, and B some resulting change in 
 an inorganic mass. Then A having produced B, the action 
 ceases. Though the change A in the environment is followed 
 by some consequent change, a, in it, no parallel sequence in 
 the inorganic mass simultaneously generates in it some change, 
 h, that has reference to the change a. But if we take a living 
 organism, and let the change A impress on it some change C, 
 then, while in the environment A is occasioning a, in the 
 living body C will be occasioning c, of which a and c will 
 show a certain concord in time, place, or intensity.'^ 
 
 This explanation of life would be the best formula that we 
 could have chosen to explain the very essence of finality ; for 
 it indicates that there is not only a simple relation between 
 
 ' Principles of Biology, Part i. chap. v. Still these formulae do not sufficiently 
 explain the diiference of the two oases, for it might be said that in chemical 
 combinations, as well as in the organism, a change in the medium is also followed 
 by a change in the object. For instance, if oxygen is necessary to combustion, 
 when oxygen disappears or is less abundant combustion ceases or is weakened. 
 There would thus be likewise here four corresponding terms : — 1st, In the 
 medium A, production of oxygen ; 2d, In the object B, combustion ; 3d, In the 
 medium a, diminution of oxygen ; 4th, In the object 6, diminution of combustion. 
 
266 BOOK I. CHAPTER IX. 
 
 A and C, but a proportion which can be expressed thus : — 
 A : -.-.a : c,OY conversely, c : a : : : A. That is to say, 
 that if such a relation exists between two states A and C, 
 the first, being modified, must produce in the second an 
 analogous and proportional modification. But that such a 
 correspondence and proportion should take place by the mere 
 play of the elements, is, as it has seemed to us, impossible. 
 
 Let us translate into sensible facts the preceding abstrac- 
 tions. In order that combustion may occur, there must be 
 a certain relation between the combustible and the medium. 
 Let the medium change, let this correspondence cease (for 
 example, let there no longer be oxygen enough in the medium), 
 and combustion ceases. This is what happens when a lamp 
 goes out. But in living beings it is not so. When the 
 medium changes, it produces a change in the organism, often 
 even a change by anticipation, as if in foresight of the change 
 of the medium, and this renders possible the continuation of 
 action. Thus the embryos of viviparous animals are fed in 
 the mother's womb by a direct communication with the 
 mother ; but this communication ceases at a given moment — a 
 separation takes place between the two beings. What a pro- 
 digious revolution ! Must it not cause death ? Not at all : 
 in the new medium there is a new food all ready in the 
 mother's breasts. It is evident that so considerable a change 
 in the medium would be mortal if it were not accompanied at 
 the same time by a similar change in the embryo, in anticipa- 
 tion and foresight thereof, — that is to say, a prehensile organ, 
 the lips, endued with a force of suction perfectly adapted to 
 the future act on which the preservation of the young depends. 
 I repeat it : this correspondence of four terms, instanced with 
 
 So, if for oxygen another agent be substituted, another combmation will succeed 
 the preceding combination. Thus the change of medium will then likewise 
 have its correspondence in the object. To prove the difference between the two 
 oases, the inorganic and the living, it must be added that in the former case the 
 change will be any change, while in the latter the change is predetermined, — 
 that is, commanded in the interest of the preservation of the whole, — as if, for 
 instance, when oxygen disappears in the medium, the object found means to 
 produce it spontaneously, in order that combustion might still go on. 
 
THE DOCTBINE OF EVOLUTION : HERBERT SPENOEE. 267 
 
 SO much wisdom by Mr. Herbert Spencer as the characteristic 
 trait of the organism, is precisely the fact we have employed 
 to prove the existence of finality. How should such propor- 
 tions and accommodations be the result of mere mechanism ? 
 How could the blind play of the elements at this point simu- 
 late art and invention? 
 
 So, then, co-ordination and correspondence are the two con- 
 stituent characters of life. Sow are these results explained ? 
 By laws which, like the results themselves, seem to have every 
 appearance of finality. In effect, correspondence is explained 
 by the law of adaptation, and co-ordination by the law of 
 integration. Or rather, adaptation and integration are only 
 two different names given to correspondence and co-ordination; 
 the act is taken in place of the result. Adaptation is the 
 act by which life acquires and preserves the correspondence 
 necessary to its duration, and integration is the act by which 
 life co-ordinates its differential elements. To say that an 
 organ is endued with adaptation, is to say that it is apt to 
 produce in itself secondary changes corresponding to the 
 changes of the medium; and to say that an organ is endued 
 with a power of integration, is to say again that it is apt to 
 produce a greater or less co-ordination, in proportion as external 
 or internal causes produce in it a greater or less number of 
 differential modifications. But what are these two aptitudes 
 but the essential and characteristic attributes of that funda- 
 mental force that we have called finality ? 
 
 .For all this, we would be greatly deceiving ourselves, 
 despite the appearance of the formulas, did we think to find in 
 Mr. Spencer anything like finality. In these very facts that 
 he describes so justly, he sees, and means to see, only the 
 development of mechanical forces, the corollaries of that funda- 
 mental law, the conservation of force. If he reproaches 
 Lamarck, and even Darwin, it is for not having completely 
 purged science of all finality, internal or external, and even of 
 all plastic direction (vis formativa), the last refuge of occult 
 qualities. 
 
268 BOOK I. CHAPTER IX. 
 
 ' In whatever way it is formulated, or by whatever language 
 it is obscured, this ascription of organic evolution to some 
 aptitude naturally possessed by organisms, or miraculously 
 imposed on them, is unphUosophical. It is one of those 
 explanations which explains nothing, — a shaping of ignorance 
 into the semblance of knowledge. The cause assigned is not 
 a true cause, — not a cause assimilable to known causes ; not 
 a cause that can be anywhere shown to produce analogous 
 effects. It is a cause unrepresentable in thought ; one of those 
 illegitimate, symbolic conceptions which cannot by any mental 
 process be elaborated into a real conception. In brief, this 
 assumption of a persistent formative power, inherent in 
 organisms, and making them unfold into higher forms, is an 
 assumption no more tenable than the assumption of special 
 creations, of which, indeed, it is but a modification, differing 
 only by the fusion of separate unknown processes into a con- 
 tinuous unknown process.' ^ 
 
 We have not to defend against Mr. H. Spencer the hypo- 
 thesis of an unconscious evolutionism, for we have ourselves 
 opposed it in this work (Book ii. chaps, ii. and iii.) ; but 
 evolutionism in itself in no way excludes, as we have said, an 
 intelligent cause at the origin of things, and such a cause is 
 as conceivable by the mind as mere mechanism. The whole 
 question is. Which of these causes is the more adequate to 
 the effect ? Hitherto it has seemed to us that mechanism 
 was an inadequate cause ; let us see whether the system of 
 Mr. H. Spencer can fill the gaps we have mentioned. We 
 must ascend to what he calls first principles. 
 
 In his book of First Principles, of which we can only give 
 here a very succinct resumi, Mr. H. Spencer establishes two 
 propositions, as representing in the most general form the ten- 
 dencies of all the changes in the universe : 1st, Nature tends 
 to proceed from the homogeneous to the heterogeneous ; 2d, It 
 likewise tends to proceed from the indefinite to the definite. 
 It is needless to add, that there is likewise a double law of 
 ' Biology, Part iii. chap. viil. 
 
THE DOCTRINE OF EVOLUTION : HEEBERT SPENCER. 269 
 
 return in the reverse direction — namely, the tendency beyond 
 a certain limit to return from the heterogeneous to the homo- 
 geneous, and from the definite to the indefinite. But this 
 second aspect of things (or dissolution), ■which, with the first 
 (integration), composes the whole fact of evolution, does not 
 particularly interest us here, and we can place it out of view. 
 
 Let us briefly explain the two laws. 
 
 I. ' The progress from the simple to the complex across 
 a series of successive differentiations, is shown in the first 
 changes of the universe to which the reasoning leads us, and 
 in all the first changes that can be inductively proved. It is 
 shown in the geological and meteorological evolution of the 
 earth, and in that of each of the organisms that people its 
 surface. It is shown in the evolution of humanity, whether 
 considered in the civilised individual or in the groups of the 
 race. It is shown in the evolution of society in the three- 
 fold point of view of its political, religious, and economic 
 institutions. From the most remote past to the novelties 
 of yesterday, the essential feature is the transformation of the 
 homogeneous into the heterogeneous.' ^ 
 
 Now, what are the laws in virtue of which this passage 
 from the homogeneous to the heterogeneous is made ? There 
 are two fundamental laws. The first is the law of the instability 
 of the homogeneotis ; the second, the law of the multiplication 
 of effects. What do these two laws consist of ? 
 
 a. ' Homogeneity is a condition of unstable equilibrium.' 
 In effect, 'in a homogeneous aggregation the different parts 
 are exposed to different forces in species or in intensity, and 
 consequently they are differently modified. Because there is 
 an internal and external side, because these sides are not 
 equally near adjoining sources of action, it follows that they 
 receive influences unequal in quality and quantity, or both 
 together. It follows also that different changes must be 
 effected in the parts that are differently influenced.' ^ Such 
 is the law called the law of the instability of the homoffeneovs. 
 ' First Principles, Part ii. chap. xvi. ^ Ibid. chap, xx. 
 
270 BOOK I. CHAPTEE IX. 
 
 This law presents great enough difficulties, not merely as 
 to being admitted, but even for being understood ; for how 
 can there be in a primitive whole absolutely homogeneous 
 forces different in species, and even in intensity ? How can 
 there be in the whole an internal and an external side? 
 What is the external side of the universe ? — and how can 
 there be something apart from it ? No doubt, if the matter 
 is merely to explain the origin of a secondary whole, — for 
 -instance, our planetary world, — we may start from the hypo- 
 thesis of a nebula that will have an internal and external 
 side, and that can be attracted by different forces. But to 
 warrant such a hypothesis, the technical considerations of 
 Laplace will always have more weight than the abstract 
 speculations of philosophers. What is meant when one speaks 
 of first principles is, not the origin of a particular whole, but 
 of the whole in general, of a primordial state, supposed to be 
 absolutely homogeneous, in the totality of things : wherefore 
 the distribution of force must be as homogeneous as the dis- 
 tribution of matter ; whence also there are no longer forces 
 different in species and intensity, — ^there is no internal or 
 external side in the whole. In such a supposed homogeneity 
 at the beginning, whence would change arise ? If there is an 
 equilibrium during a single instant, what shall disturb it? 
 The primitive homogeneity, once supposed in equilibrium, will 
 remain so indefinitely, — at least till an external motor imparts 
 a change to it, and we then revert to the hypothesis of the 
 first motor ; or, at least, till we suppose an internal principle 
 of development impelling the homogeneous to diversity. 
 But this principle no longer has anything mechanical, and 
 is not deduced from the laws of matter and force. If, 
 in fine, the author objects to this hypothesis of an abso- 
 lutely primitive state as inaccessible to our speculations, and 
 if he has only meant to speak of secondary wholes, such 
 as the solar nebula, the protoplasm of living beings, the 
 seminal germ, etc., it must be acknowledged that the initial 
 point, is then no longer the homogeneous but the hetero- 
 
THE DOCTRINE OF EVOLUTION : HEEBEKT SPENCER. 271 
 
 geneous, since to explain the instability of the homogeneous 
 he is always obliged to have recourse to ' the dissimilarity of 
 the position of the parts in relation to the ambient forces.' 
 But diversity of situation is just a sort of heterogeneity. 
 If, in fine, we are told that the question is not to lay hold 
 of a determinate state, but only of a tendency, and that 
 everywhere we see things go from the homogeneous to the 
 heterogeneous, and then return in the opposite direction, we 
 answer that, even in virtue of this tendency, we are warranted 
 to ascend hypothetically, and at the very least ideally, to 
 the most homogeneous homogeneity possible, which, being 
 supposed to be so, will therefore be immutable. We must 
 conclude that this hypothesis of an absolute homogeneity 
 implies a contradiction, — ^that, however high we ascend, we 
 must stni admit the existence of the same and the other, as 
 Plato said (to avro and to erepov), and that, consequently, the 
 heterogeneous is quite as much a principle as the homogeneous 
 itself. 
 
 6. The second law that explains the transition from the 
 homogeneous to the heterogeneous is the law of the multipli- 
 cation of effects. The author formulates and develops it as 
 follows. He affirms that ' a uniform force, falling on a uniform 
 aggregate, must suffer a dispersion ; and that, falling on an 
 aggregate composed of dissimilar parts, it must suffer a dis- 
 persion from each of these parts, as well as qualitative 
 differentiations ; that the more dissimilar these parts, the 
 qualitative differentiations must be the more marked ; that the 
 greater the number of parts, the greater will be that of the 
 differentiations; that the secondary forces resulting from it 
 must undergo new modifications, by effecting equivalent trans- 
 formations in the parts modifying them ; and that it must be 
 the same with the forces they engender. Thus, these two 
 conclusions, — namely, that (1) a part of the cause of the 
 evolution is found in the multiplication of the effects ; and (2) 
 that that multiplication increases in geometrical progression in 
 proportion as heterogeneity augments, — these two conclusions, 
 
272 BOOK I. CHAPTER IX. 
 
 I say, are derived from the fundamental principle, the conser- 
 vation of force.' ^ 
 
 Without insisting on this deduction, which would oblige 
 us to enter too deeply into the analysis of a system that 
 we have only to examine from our own point of view, we 
 will say that the law of multiplication of effects is so 
 evident in experience, that it would be useless to insist 
 upon it. 
 
 II. But still these two laws (instability of the homo- 
 geneous, multiplication of effects) only explain one thing — 
 namely, how things come from the uniform to the multiform, 
 from unity to plurality. They do not explain the second 
 property of evolution — namely, how it goes from the indefinite 
 to the definite. ' We have not yet found the reason,' he says, 
 * why there is not produced a vague and chaotic heterogeneity 
 in place of the harmonious heterogeneity produced in evolu- 
 tion. We have stOl to discover the cause of the integration 
 accompanying differentiation.'^ Integration is the distri- 
 bution of elements in coherent and definite systems. Now 
 one can understand that the thing should advance from 
 the same to the other, — that is, in differentiating itself, — but 
 that these differences themselves form determinate and regular 
 wholes, does not seem to result from the law. 
 
 The solution of this new problem is in the law of segre- 
 gation. 
 
 This law consists in this, that ' if any aggregate, composed 
 of dissimilar units, is subjected to the action of a force 
 exerted indifferently on all these units, they separate from 
 each other and form smaller aggregates, each composed of 
 units similar among themselves for each aggregate, and dis- 
 similar from those of the others.' ^ Por instance, if a single 
 gust of wind has just struck a tree in autumn, covered both 
 with yellow and green leaves, the dead leaves fall to the 
 ground, and form a separate group from that of the green 
 leaves that remain attached to the tree. So in the mineral 
 
 1 First Principles, chap. xx. '' Ibid. chap. xxi. ^ j^i^^ chap. xxi. 
 
THE DOCTRINE OF EVOLUTION : HERBERT SPENCER. 273 
 
 subjected to the action of fire, the iron falls to the bottom 
 by its own weight, and may thus be separated from useless 
 elements. The electric attraction separates small bodies from 
 great, light from heavy. Chemical affinity, acting diversely on 
 the various elements of a given body, permits us to remove 
 this or that element while leaving the others. There thus 
 takes place a sort of choice in nature («/34o-t?), in virtue of 
 which the homceomeries (to use an expression of Anaxagoras) 
 tend to separate from the chaotic state, or rather incessantly 
 prevent it from forming. But the JVoC? of Anaxagoras does 
 not interfere in the operation. 
 
 Such are the general principles of evolution. These funda- 
 mental laws have to be applied to the formation of organized 
 beings. We will suppose, then, in virtue of these laws, that 
 the organized world began as a homogeneous mass, a proto- 
 plasma apt to take any kind of form. This protoplasm, in 
 virtue of the two laws just mentioned (namely, the instability 
 of the homogeneous and the multiplication of effects), inces- 
 santly passes from the homogeneous to the heterogeneous, 
 whence the formation of varieties, races, and species. All 
 animal life ramifies by a progressive differentiation, just as the 
 individual, starting from the indistinct state of the germ, deter- 
 mines more and more at each new degree of its development. 
 Embryology is the image of zoological history. 
 
 This passage from the homogeneous to the heterogeneous 
 takes place under subjection to an infinite number of internal 
 or external causes,^ which, acting variously on the unstable 
 homogeneity, tend to modify it in all directions, and thus to 
 produce an infinite diversity. The mutability of species is 
 thus only an application of the fundamental laws of nature. 
 
 But it is not enough to explain the diversity of forms. We 
 must still explain their suitableness, their precise and deter- 
 minate character, their adaptability to the ambient medium, 
 their internal concordance, etc. Animal life, like nature 
 itself, does not merely proceed from the homogeneous to the 
 ' Biology, Part iii. chaps, viii. and ix. 
 
274 BOOK I. CHAPTER IX. 
 
 heterogeneous : it goes from the indefinite to the definite ; 
 it tends to form systems more and more coherent, more and 
 more integrate, according to the author's language. 
 
 This effect is due to the law of segregation, which is called 
 in zoology the law of natural selection. Selection, in effect, 
 plays in the biological order the same part as segregation in the 
 mechanical.^ It is it that effects the choice that in some 
 sort sets apart forms suitable and in harmony with the 
 medium, and drops the others. In a word, segregation in the 
 organic order is called the survival of the fittest. 
 
 We ought to add one consideration more — namely, that 
 according to the first principles, the general law of evolution — 
 that is, of the progressive distribution of matter and motion — 
 tends to a relatively stable state, which is equilibrium,'' — not to 
 an absolute equilibrium, which would be repose, but to an equi- 
 librium movens (for example, that of our planetary system). 
 But the organic world, as well as the inorganic, equally tends 
 to equilibrium. Only here the equilibrium is double, for the 
 system of the organized being must' first be in equilibrium 
 with itself, and, in the second place, in equilibrium with the 
 medium. Here we find, again, our two conditions of life — 
 namely, correspondence and co-ordination. Now this double 
 equilibrium is obtained in two ways, either directly or indi- 
 rectly.^ Direct equUibrium occurs by adaptation; indirect 
 equilibrium by selection. The former case occurs when the 
 medium directly produces upon the organism the advan- 
 tageous change that is required; the latter occurs when 
 inability to live causes the less fit to disappear, and allows 
 only those to subsist that are in harmony with the 
 medium. 
 
 We have thus summed up as succinctly and clearly as pos- 
 sible the vast system of Mr. Herbert Spencer. Our aim is not to 
 refute it, which would require a wider discussion than we can 
 engage in. We shall only inquire whether, allowing the whole 
 
 ' First Principles, chap. xxi. => Jhid. chap. xxii. 
 
 2 Biology, Part iii. chaps, xi. and xii. 
 
THE DOCTEINE OF EVOLUTION: HnSEBEET SPENCEK. 275 
 
 system to stand, it is possible to preserve it without intro- 
 ducing into it an intellectual element, external or internal, 
 conscious or unconscious, rational or instinctive, — whether 
 we can appeal exclusively to the double principle of force 
 and matter to obtain the formation of a system and an order 
 in things, — whether there must not be something else, which 
 may be called with Hegel idea, with Schopenhauer will, 
 with Schelling the absolute, with Leibnitz the divine wisdom, 
 but which is distinguishable from the insensibility of matter. 
 The knot of the question always is, whether the law of segre- 
 gation — that is to say, of mechanical choice — is capable of pro- 
 ducing a work of art ; for whatever be the cause of the bird, 
 the dog, or of man, beyond doubt these creations present them- 
 selves to our eyes with all the characters of a work of art. 
 
 The disproportion between the cause and the effect seems 
 evident to us, for segregation, as has been seen, has no other 
 effect than to separate into dissimilar wholes similar parts, — 
 that is, to reform with heterogeneous wholes homogeneous 
 groups; while, on the other hand, organization consists in 
 making heterogeneous elements co-operate in a common action. 
 The very idea of organization thus appears irreducible to the 
 law of segregation. 
 
 It is said that natural selection is itself a segregation ; that 
 it separates the strong from the weak ; that it lets drop the 
 impotent to preserve the fittest ; that it thus assembles all 
 those that have a common character, a determinate aptitude, 
 to set them apart (segregare). But this conciliation between 
 selection and segregation appears to us arbitrary and quite 
 external. In the mechanical order it is segregation that forms 
 groups, while in the biological order selection does nothing 
 but preserve groups already formed. In fact, before selection 
 can take place, the fittest must already be in existence. There 
 must previously have been a formation of systems. Selection 
 does nothingbut assure the preponderance to the fittest, but 
 it does not itself produce that adaptation. The adaptation is 
 presupposed ; but adaptation here constitutes the coherent and 
 
276 BOOK I. CHAPTER IX. 
 
 .definite form that has to be explained, and, therefore, selection 
 lias not produced that form. On the other hand, in the purely- 
 mechanical order, it is segregation that, in a heterogeneous 
 whole, separates the similar elements, to form of them new 
 wholes. There is thus only an analogy of names between 
 selection and segregation, and a profound difference of nature. 
 
 How should segregation, a purely mechanical agent, be in a 
 position to solve the problem of correspondence and propor- 
 tionality that is set in the living being, and that Mr. H. 
 Spencer has himself so well analyzed ? That problem, in 
 effect, amounts to this : Such a state of the medium A being fit 
 to produce in the organized being such a change a, how is it 
 that, to a new state of the medium C, there precisely corre- 
 sponds in the organism the change c, which is necessary , 
 for the organism to exist ? We have here a rule of three 
 solved by nature. How should such a success be rendered 
 possible by the mere fact of the segregation of similar 
 parts ? 
 
 Let the problem be well understood. As regards the first 
 relation, that existing between A and a, nothing is required, 
 for we can understand that any medium, acting on any mass, 
 must produce a certain effect, which is quite undetermined 
 beforehand ; and this is the actual effect. But this first 
 relation once established, all those that follow are determined 
 by the first. Any change, any effect, is no longer sufficient, 
 but a bespoken and predetermined effect ; for it must be, on 
 the one hand, in agreement with the organism, and, on the 
 other, with fhe medium. But this double determination, this 
 double correspondence, cannot be explained by any segregation 
 or selection, since it must pre-exist in order that the selection 
 may .have room to take place. 
 
 Let us explain this by some examples. Let a mass fit to 
 live be plunged into a medium at once nutritious and respir- 
 able. Let this medium nourish this living mass. There will 
 here, I allow, be no more difficulty than in the action of fire 
 on a mineral mass. But let circumstances so change the 
 
THE DOCTKINE OF EVOLUTION: HERBERT SPENCER. 277 
 
 mediiim, that, while remaining respirable, it is no longer nutri- 
 tive, and let the nutritive element be only placed at some 
 distance from the living being, what is the modification 
 required of the organism to become fit for this new state of 
 things ? It is evident that henceforth it needs motor organs. 
 But how should it sufBce for the production of these organs 
 that- the need of them should make itself felt ? And if it 
 were so, would not such a fact prove a pre-established 
 harmony, amply sufficient to demonstrate the law of finality ? 
 It must, then, be admitted that such organs pre-exist,-^that is 
 to say, that some causes have produced them, — and that, the 
 change of medium supervening, the advantage remained with 
 those that were endued with them. But from this it is 
 evident that selection has created nothing, and that it is not 
 the veritable' cause, for the organs already must have existed 
 in order that selection might adapt them to the medium. 
 Let us continue the hypothesis. Instead of abundant food 
 equally disseminated in aU parts of the medium, or, at any 
 rate, at some distance, let us, on the other hand, suppose this 
 food thin sown, dispersed at wide intervals ; what a chance 
 whether even an animal endued with motion should fall in 
 with it ! Something more, then, is necessary,— there is needed 
 a sense that can traverse space and direct the steps,- — there 
 must be sight. But here, again, the same reasoning applies 
 as before. How are we to believe that the simple need 
 produces the organ ? And if it produced it, what a proof of 
 finality ! The organ, then, must have pre-existed, to be found 
 ready at the moment when the change of the medium rendered 
 it necessary, or to facilitate to the animal itself the change of 
 medium ; and yet, once more, it is not selection that has pro- 
 duced the organ, — that is to say, that has given a coherent 
 and definite form to the passage from the homogeneous to 
 the heterogeneous,— for the organ, even before assuming the 
 superiority to the fittest, is already by itself a coherent and 
 definite form. The production of organs by the action of the 
 medium (except when it would not fall under any of the 
 
278 BOOK I. CHAPTER IX. 
 
 above-mentioned laws) is no more admissible, for only the 
 most superficial adaptations can thus be explained. It remains 
 to be said that sonje causes have produced some modifications 
 in the primitive homogeneous mass, and that, when these 
 modifications have been found agreeing with the interest of 
 the living being, these forms have subsisted ; which amounts 
 to saying, in simple and clear terms, that organic forms are 
 the product of chance. Divergent and heterogeneous causes 
 producing all sorts of actions in the medium and in the living 
 being, each fortunate coincidence constitutes a new organ 
 or a new species. This point of view differs little from 
 that of the ancient Atomists, as Aristotle summed it up : ottw? 
 ervxe. 
 
 Having examined the agreement of the living being with 
 its medium, or correspondence, let us now consider the internal 
 agreement of the living being with itself, or co-ordination. 
 
 Here the difficulty is still greater than before. How, in 
 fact, can we comprehend co-ordination being produced in the 
 very proportion to the differentiation of the parts 1 We admit, 
 in effect, that the primitive homogeneity incessantly tends 
 to differentiate, and that its various parts also progressively 
 reach forms and functions more and more special ; but it 
 does not follow from any of the previous laws that this differ- 
 entiation, caused by purely mechanical agents, is ruled by 
 the principle of the common interest, or that this division of 
 labour is established in a hierarchic and systematic manner, 
 and not blindly and like a chaos. Will it be said that — if the 
 division of labour did not take this systematic form, if the 
 diversity did not end in compatible organs and functions — the 
 being would not live, and that, consequently, the only ones 
 that could live, and that experience gives to know, are those 
 in which this compatibility has been met with ? Be it so ; 
 but it is the explanation of Epicurus, and Mr. Spencer, with 
 all his formulas, adds nothing to it. Besides, we will still ask 
 how and why such a compatibility can have occurred, since 
 it might well have been that there were no living beings at 
 
THE DOCTRINE OF EVOLUTION : HEKBERT SPENCER. 279 
 
 all. To find unity in diversity is to do a work of invention. 
 How has nature been so inventive as endlessly to produce 
 types compatible, whether with themselves or with the cor- 
 responding medium ? Of this we here find no explanation. 
 
 No writer has more forcibly shown than Mr. H. Spencer 
 the close correlation that ought to exist in the animal between 
 differentiation and integration, — that is to say, between the 
 division of labour and the concentration or co-ordination of 
 the parts. He expresses himself on this subject as follows : — 
 
 'If a hydra is cut in two, the nutritive liquids diffused 
 through its substance cannot escape rapidly, since there are 
 no open channels for them, and hence the condition of the 
 parts at a distance from the cut is but little affected. But 
 where, as in the more differentiated animals; the nutritive 
 liquid is contained in vessels that have continuous communica- 
 tions, cutting the body in two, or cutting off any considerable 
 portion of it, is followed by escape of the liquid from these 
 vessels to a large extent, and this affects the nutrition and 
 efficiency of organs remote from the place of injury. Then 
 where, as in further-developed creatures, there exists an 
 apparatus for propelling the blood through these ramifying 
 channels, injury of a single one will cause a loss of blood 
 that quickly prostrates the entire organism. Hence the rise 
 of a completely differentiated vascular system is the rise of 
 a system which integrates all members of the body, by making 
 each dependent on the integrity of the vascular system, and, 
 therefore, on^the integrity of each member through which it 
 ramifies. In another mode, too, the establishment of a dis- 
 tributing apparatus produces a physiological union that is 
 great in proportion as this distributing apparatus is efficient. 
 As fast as it assumes a function unlike the rest, each part of 
 an animal modifies the blood in a way more or less unlike 
 the rest, both by the materials it abstracts and by the pro- 
 ducts it adds ; and hence, the more differentiated the vascular 
 system becomes, the more does it integrate all parts, by 
 making each of them feel the qualitative modification of the 
 
280 BOOK I. CHAPTER IX. 
 
 blood which every other has produced. This is simply and 
 conspicuously exemplified by the lungs. In the absence of 
 a vascular system, or in the absence of one that is well 
 marked off from the imbedding tissues, the nutritive plasma, 
 or the crude blood, gets what small aeration it can only by 
 coming near the creature's outer surface, or those inner 
 surfaces that are bathed by water ; and it is probably more 
 by osmotic exchange than in any other way that the 
 oxygenated plasma slowly permeates the tissues. But where 
 there have been formed definite channels branching through- 
 out the body, — and, particularly, where there exist specialized 
 organs for pumping the blood through these channels, — it 
 manifestly becomes possible for the aeration to be carried on in 
 one part peculiarly modified to further it, while all other parts 
 have the aerated blood brought to them. And how greatly 
 the differentiation of the vascular system thus becomes a 
 means of integrating the various organs, is shown by the fatal 
 result that follows when the cun-ent of aerated blood is 
 interrupted.'-^ 
 
 In this passage Mr. H. Spencer clearly proves that, in fact, 
 the differentiation of parts is accompanied by a greater integra- 
 tion ; he shows, besides, that it ought to be so. But why is 
 it so ? This is what he does not tell us. The necessity of 
 which he speaks is only ideal and intellectual, not physical. 
 It must be so, if there must be living beings ; but that such 
 beings are necessary is in no way evident. The connection 
 between integration and differentiation is a connection of 
 finality, not of consequence and mechanism. 
 
 One can easily be convinced of it by comparing mechanical 
 with organic integration. In the former case, integration takes 
 place when, in a whole already differentiated, the similar parts 
 separate to form new groups ; but organic integration, on the 
 other hand, is the reunion of heterogeneous or dissimilar 
 elements in a common group, — that is to say, in an organism. 
 The problem to be solved is to explain the formation of a 
 ' Biology, Part v. chap. ix. pp. 868-370. 
 
THE DOCTRINE OF EVOLUTION : HERBERT SPENCEK. 281 
 
 unity in a multitude of divergent parts. This the law of 
 segregation in no way explains. Even if it were said that it 
 is by segregation that the dissimilar parts separate, and that 
 the similar parts are drawn together, so as to form distinct 
 organs, there would still remain the same difficulty — namely, 
 how these distinct organs co-operate together. Add to this, 
 that the organ itself is not always composed of similar parts, 
 and that it is often itself the unity and harmony of a multitude 
 of very distinct component parts, — for instance, the eye. In 
 fine, the grouping of similar parts into different wholes would 
 still not explain the structure and form assumed by these 
 wholes, and the reciprocal accommodation of these structures 
 and forms. 
 
 The term equilibrium only serves to mask the difficulty, 
 without resolving it ; for the equilibrium here in question is 
 purely ideal, and has nothing to do with mechanical equili- 
 brium, or the balancing of forces. No balancing of forces can 
 explain how it is that, where there is produced an organ to 
 separate the urea from the blood, and another to separate the 
 bile from it, there should be produced at the same time canals 
 to make the blood communicate with both. This kind of 
 agreement cannot be represented nor measured by any mathe- 
 matical formula. There is here a relation of another order. 
 
 There remains, then, to explain internal co-ordination, like 
 external correspondence, the law of natural selection. But 
 this law is only negative, and not positive ; it suppresses the 
 impotent, but produces nothing itself. Adaptation and co- 
 ordination must already exist for it to preserve those that 
 are endued with them. Thus we always come back to the 
 same point, that any agents having produced any modifications 
 on living matter, only such of these modifications can subsist 
 as are fmmd in agreement with themselves and with the 
 medium. Yet, once more, it is the fact of a happy coinci- 
 dence, and that is what every one calls chance. All Mr. H. 
 Spencer's scientific apparatus, the whole mass of these examples 
 accumulated to satiety, all that mechanical and dynamical 
 
282 BOOK I. CHA.PTEE IX. 
 
 terminology, can neither mask nor relieve this low and 
 common result, the only one that can be disentangled from 
 these diffuse amplifications — namely, that organic forms are 
 the product of fortuitous combinations of matter. And no other 
 hypothesis is possible, when every internal or external direct- 
 ive principle is rejected. The fortuitous is the veritable 
 artist, the seminal agent of nature. It is the deus absconditus : 
 its name is not mentioned, but it is hidden behind the scenes. 
 Lamarck, at least, and even Darwin, sometimes allowed the 
 possibility of a plastic principle which might give form to 
 matter. But we have seen that Mr. Spencer expressly and 
 systematically excludes this hypothesis. Now, as organic 
 co-ordinations do not exist potentially in the laws of force 
 and motion, they can only result from a lucky cast of the 
 elements. Such is the last word of this system, which, not- 
 withstanding all its promises, furnishes us no new means of 
 filling the abyss that separates a blind cause from an ordered 
 effect. 
 
 To sum up. The theory of evolution, applied to organized 
 forms, may have two meanings. Either it expresses nothing 
 else than the gradation of organic beings, rising by degrees or 
 intervals from less to more perfect forms, — and in this sense 
 the theory, which is that of Leibnitz and Bonnet, contains 
 nothing opposed to the doctrine of final causes, and even, on 
 the contrary, naturally appeals to it, — or else the theory of 
 evolution is only the theory of fortuitous combinations under 
 a more learned form,— it expresses the successive gropings 
 attempted by nature, until favourable circumstances brought 
 about such a throw of the dice as is called an organization 
 made to live ; and thus understood, the doctrine of evolution 
 falls under the objections which such an hypothesis has. at all 
 times raised. Transformism, then, under whatever form it is 
 presented, shakes none of the reasons we have given above 
 in favour of natural finality ; for, on the one hand, it is 
 not irreconcilable with it, and, on the other, it is inexplicable 
 without it. 
 
THE DOCTRINE OF EVOLUTION : HERBERT SPENCEE. 283 
 
 This last proof finished, we can regard our first task as 
 accomplished, which was to establish the existence of a law 
 of finality in nature. What now is the first cause of that law? 
 This second question, much more arduous than even the first, 
 will be the object of the second part. 
 
BOOK SECOND. 
 
 THE FIEST CAUSE OF FINALITY. 
 
BOOK II. 
 
 THE FIKST CAUSE OF FINALITY. 
 
 TF the series of inductions which we have developed in the 
 -^ previous book be admitted, we shall be brought to this 
 conclusion, that there are ends in nature. But between this 
 proposition, and this other that is generally deduced from it — 
 namely, that a divine understanding has co-ordinated all 
 towards these ends, — between these two propositions, I say, 
 there is still a long enough interval. 
 
 What have we, in fact, seen ? That human intelligence 
 acts for ends ; that, by analogy, it must be admitted that the 
 animals act for ends, not only in their so-called intelligent, 
 but also in their instinctive actions ; that, in fine, by extension 
 of the same reasoning, living nature must be considered as 
 also acting for ends. Thus our argument would signify that 
 living nature expresses, in its rudimentary form, the same 
 property that is manifested under its most salient form in 
 human intelligence — namely, the property of acting for ends, 
 or finality. Finality, then, is one of the properties of nature ; 
 such is the result of the preceding analysis. But how should 
 this analysis enable us to emerge from nature ? how enable us 
 to pass from facts to the cause ? The force of our argument 
 lies precisely in this, that we do not change the genus, but 
 that in one and the same genus — namely, nature — we pursue 
 the same fact or the same property under different forms. 
 But if, on the other hand, in place of following the same 
 order whether ascending or descending, we suddenly pass 
 from nature to its cause, and say there is in nature such a 
 being (itself a member and part of the whole) which acts in 
 a certain manner, therefore the first cause of this whole 
 
288 BOOK II. 
 
 'must have acted in the same manner, — if, I say, we reason 
 thus, and this is what is generally called the proof of God 
 from' final causes, it cannot be doubted that we very 
 boldly and rashly draw a conclusion which is certainly not 
 contained in the premises. 
 
 The legitimate and natural impatience of believing souls, 
 who would have philosophy to guarantee to them an evidence 
 from reason equal to the evidence of feeling, by which they 
 are convinced, can hardly bear the application to such pro- 
 blems of the methods of trial, approximation, and cross- 
 questioning, which are the peculiar features of the scientific 
 method. It is hard to see the noblest beliefs of humanity 
 weighed in the balance of a subtle dialectic. Of what use is 
 philosophy, we are asked, but to obscure what is clear, and 
 to shake what it defends ? It has been thought by some a 
 sufficient praise of such spiritualist philosophy to say : It 
 does not hinder us from believing in God. In this order of 
 ideas, in effect, it seems that demonstration weakens rather 
 than proves, affords more doubt than light, and teaches us to 
 dispute rather than to decide. 
 
 We are as sensible as any of this anxiety and trouble ; and 
 the fact mentioned, which is nothing but the truth, is one of 
 the proofs of the feebleness of the human mind. But it is 
 also precisely part of the greatness of the human mind to 
 learn to consider vigorously and calmly its natural condition, 
 and courageously to seek to remedy it. We distinguish, for 
 our part, even in the order of nature, two things, faith and 
 science, the object of the one being to supplement the other. 
 There is a natural, practical, and moral faith in the existence 
 , of a Deity, which no demonstration can equal, to which no 
 reasoning is adequate.^ But if the soul needs to believe, it 
 also needs to know ; it will try to unfold the causes of things 
 
 ^ ' A single sigh towards the future and the better,' it is admirably said by 
 Hemsterhuys, 'is a more than geometrical demonstration of the Deity ' {ArisUe 
 — '(Euvres d'Herasterhuys, ' ed. 1719, vol. ii. p. 87.— See, on the curious 
 philosophy of Hemsterhuys, the work of M. Em. Grucker, Earis 1866). 
 
THE FIRST CAUSE OF FINALITY. 289 
 
 by the laws of reason ; and it is one of the strongest tempta- 
 tions of the human mind to equalize its knowledge with its 
 faith, fdes qucerens intellectum. Hence the necessity of 
 applying the abstract and discursive methods of science to 
 what it would seem ought only to be an object of love and 
 hope ; even this, as it seems, has something disrespectful in 
 it. The demonstration, even were it as affirmative as possible, 
 is itseK a failure of respect, for it calls in question what it 
 is sought to demonstrate. An J)eus sit ? says St. Thomas 
 Aquinas at the beginning of the Summa ; and, faithful to the 
 scholastic method, he first replies, Dico quod non. But who 
 guarantees this holy theologian that he will retrieve at the 
 end of his argument what he has denied at the beginning ? 
 If he is sure of it beforehand, why does he make a show of 
 seeking it ? Does he only reason, then, for form's sake? Let 
 him be silent, then ; let him pray, let him preach, but let him 
 quit this two-edged weapon, which must not be played with. 
 
 But this is an impossibility. No believer will renounce 
 the temptation to demonstrate what he believes ; and though 
 he wished to do so, he would soon be forced to it by attack. 
 Hence the application of the cold methods of science becomes 
 necessary, and with science there appears all the difficulties 
 inherent in the employment of these methods. Hence he 
 who employs them has the perfect right to proportion affirma- 
 tions to evidence, according to the rule of Descartes. As a 
 philosopher, I am bound to but one thing : to admit as true 
 what appears to me evident, nothing more. That there 
 should be a very great difference between the demonstrations 
 of science and the instincts of faith, is self-evident ; for an 
 adequate demonstration of the Deity, of His existence and 
 essence, would imply a reason adequate thereto. The absolute 
 reason can alone know the absolute Being as He is. If, then, 
 faith, anticipating this impossible knowledge, gives us moral 
 certainty, science can only give a relative approximate know- 
 ledge, subject to revision in another state of knowledge, but 
 which for us is the mode of representation the most adequate 
 
 T 
 
290 BOOK II. 
 
 to which we could attain. When Bacon said that we only 
 know God by a refracted ray {radio refrado), this expression, 
 admired by all, just means that the idea we have of Him is 
 inadequate, without, however, being untrue, — as the projectioji 
 of a circle is not a circle, although it faithfully reproduces all 
 its parts. 
 
 Let us return to the question stated at the opening of this 
 chapter : Is the existence of ends in nature equivalent to the 
 existence of a supreme cause, external to nature> and pursuing 
 these ends consciously and with reflection ? The demonstra- 
 tion of such a cause is what is called in the schools the physieo- 
 theological proof of the existence of God. 
 
 This proof, as is known, has been reduced to a syllogism, 
 whose major is, that all order, or, strictly speaking, all adapta- 
 tion of means to ends, supposes an intelligence, and whose 
 minor is, that nature presents order, and an adaptation of 
 means to ends. 
 
 We have hitherto confined ourselves to the analysis and 
 discussion of the minor. 
 
 There still remains the major proposition of the argument. 
 Finality being a law of nature, what is the first cause of that 
 law ? That cause, says the traditional voice of the schools, 
 from Socrates to Kant, is intelligence; therefore there is a 
 supreme intelligent cause. Is this conclusion legitimate ? 
 Such will be the object of the second part of this treatise. 
 
CHAPTEE I. 
 
 THE PHYSICO-THEOLOGICAL PROOF. 
 
 TN" one of his most profound comedies, Moli^re makes a simple 
 -*- and pious valet give a lesson of theodicy to a sceptical and 
 railing master. He makes the good Sganarelle speak thus 
 to the unbelieving Don Juan : ' I have not studied like you, 
 thank God, and no one could boast of having ever taught me 
 anything ; but with my small sense, my small judgment, I 
 see things better than books, and understand very well that 
 this world that we see is not a mushroom that has come of 
 itself in a night. I would ask you, Who has made these trees, 
 these rocks, this earth, and yonder sky above? and whether all 
 that has made itself? . . . Can you see all the inventions of 
 which the human machine is composed, without admiring the 
 way in which it is arranged, one part within another ? these 
 nerves, bones, veins, arteries, these . . . these lungs, this 
 heart, this liver, and all these other ingredients that are there, 
 and that . . . My reasoning is that there is something 
 wonderful in man, whatever you may say, and which all the 
 savants cannot explain.'^ 
 
 Under this comic and simple form, Moli^re sets forth the 
 most striking and oldest proof of the existence of God, that 
 which persuades most men, and which philosophers have called 
 the proof from final causes. It is this argument that Fen^lon 
 develops so amply and eloquently in his treatise on the 
 Existence of God ; that Cicero before him had set forth, almost 
 in the same words, in his De Natura Deorum; and that Socrates 
 appears to have first employed ; and which Kant himself, even 
 while criticising it, never mentions without respectful sympathy. 
 ^ Lefestin de Pierre, act iii. so. 1. 
 
292 BOOK n. CHAPTER I. 
 
 This classical and traditional proof has been set forth a 
 thousand times under the most varied and sometimes the 
 most piquant forms. Let us give some examples of them. 
 
 The illustrious Kepler, whose soul was as religious as his 
 genius was powerful, found everywhere material for philosophic 
 or scientific reflections. One day, when he had long meditated 
 on atoms and their combinations, he was, as he himself 
 relates, called to dinner by his wife Barbara, who laid a salad 
 on the table. ' Dost think,' said I to her, ' that if from the 
 creation plates of tin, leaves of lettuce, grains of salt, drops 
 of oil and vinegar, and fragments of hard-boiled eggs were 
 floating in space in all directions and without order, chance 
 could assemble them ' to-day to form a salad ? ' ' Certainly 
 not so good a one,' replied my fair spouse, ' nor so well seasoned 
 ^s this.'^ 
 
 A Scottish philosopher, the wise Beattie, formed the in- 
 genious idea of putting in operation the proof of final causes, 
 to inspire his young child with faith in Providence. This 
 child was five or six years old, and was beginning to read ; 
 but his father had not yet sought to speak to him of God, 
 thinking that he was not of an age to understand such lessons. 
 To find entrance into his mind for this great idea in a manner 
 suitable to his age, he thought of the following expedient. 
 In a corner of a little garden, without telling any one of the 
 circumstance, he drew with his finger on the earth the three 
 initial letters of his child's name, and, sowing garden cresses 
 in the furrows, covered the seed and smoothed the earth. 
 ' Ten days after,' he tells us, ' the child came running to me 
 all amazed, and told me that his name had grown in the 
 garden. I smiled at these words, and appeared not to attach 
 much importance to what he had said. But he insisted on 
 taking me to see what had happened. "Yes," said I, on 
 coming to the place, " I see well enough that it is so ; but 
 there is nothing wonderful in this, — it is a mere accident," 
 and went away. But he followed me, and, walking beside 
 
 ^ Al. Bevtrand, Lesfondateurs de I'astronomie moderne, p. 154. 
 
THE PHYSICO-THEOLOGICAL PROOF. 293 
 
 me, said very seriously : " That cannot be an accident. Some 
 one must have prepared the seeds, to produce this result." 
 Perhaps these were not his very words, but this was the sub- 
 stance of his thought. "You think, then," said I to him, "that 
 what here appears as regular as the letters of your name, 
 cannot be the product of chance ? " "Yes," said he firmly, 
 "I think so." "Well, then, look at yourself, consider your 
 hands and fingers, your legs and feet, and all your members, 
 and do not they seem to you regular in their appearance, and 
 useful in their service ? Doubtless they do. Can they, then, 
 be the result of chance?" "No," replied he, " that cannot be; 
 some one must have made me them." "And who is that 
 some one ? " I asked him. He replied that he did not know. 
 I then made known to him the name of the great Being who 
 made all the world, and regarding His nature I gave him all 
 the instruction that could be adapted to his age. The lesson 
 struck him profoundly, and he has never forgotten either it 
 or the circumstance that was the occasion of it.' 
 
 Let us now pass to Baron d'Holbach's drawing-room, to a 
 company where each one outvied the atheism of his neigh- 
 bour so as to scandalize Duclos himself; let us hear Abbe 
 Galiani, the witty improvisatore, so fond of paradox that he 
 did not fear to defend God against his friends the Encyclo- 
 pedists. Here is the scene, as reported by Abb^ Morellet : 
 ' After dinner and coffee the abbe sits down in an arm chair, 
 his legs crossed like a tailor, as was his custom, and, it being 
 warm, he takes his wig in one hand, and, gesticulating with 
 the other, commences nearly as follows : " I will suppose, 
 gentlemen, that he among you who is most fully convinced 
 that the world is the eflfect of chance, playing with three dice 
 I do not say in a gambling-house, but in the best house in 
 Paris, his antagonist throws sixes once, twice, thrice, four 
 times — in a word, constantly. However short the duration 
 of the game, my friend Diderot, thus losing his money, will 
 unhesitatingly saj', without a moment's doubt, ' The dice are 
 loaded; I am in a bad house.' What then, philosopher? 
 
294 BOOK II. CHAPTER I. 
 
 Because ten or a dozen throws of the dice have emerged 
 from the box so as to make you lose six francs, you believe 
 firmly that this is in consequence of an adroit manoeuvre, an 
 artificial combination, a well-planned roguery ; and, seeing in 
 this universe so prodigious a number of combinations, thousands 
 of times more difficult and complicated, more sustained and 
 useful, etc., you do not suspect that the dice of nature are 
 also loaded, and that there is above a great rogue, who takes 
 pleasure in catching you." ' 
 
 It were useless to multiply the different examples whereby 
 it has been sought to bring home the force of this proof, and 
 which are all of the same mould.^ The most ancient known 
 form is that of throwing the twenty-four letters of the alphabet, 
 which, according to Cicero, Fen^lon, and so many others, could 
 not produce a single verse of the Iliad? In a word, the stress 
 of the proof is that chance will never produce a regulated 
 work. 
 
 This last form of the proof, — namely, the throwing of letters 
 of the alphabet, — while it gives it the most striking appear- 
 ance, is yet at the same time the very thing that supplies the 
 objection. We know, in effect, that chance is not impos- 
 sibility. A thing may only happen by chance, and yet 
 happen. For this it suffices that it implies no contradiction. 
 There is no reason why the figures composing the date of the 
 accession of Louis xrv. (1643), that of his personal government 
 (1661), and that of his death (1715), should always form the 
 same number (14), and that this number should be precisely 
 that of his rank among those of his name (Louis xiv.) ; and 
 yet, however improbable these coincidences, they have occurred, 
 and no one will seriously suppose that Providence amused 
 itself with this kind of game, like a philosopher who should 
 
 ' One may quote, however, the instance given hy Tillotsou in one of his 
 sermons : ' If twenty thousand blind men were to set out from different places 
 in England remote from each other, what chance would there be that they would 
 end by meeting, all arranged in a row, in Salisbury Plain ? ' 
 
 ^ It is not known who first employed this argument. Perhaps the germ of it 
 may be found in a passage of Aristotle, De Oen. et Corrupt, i. 2. 
 
THE rHYSICO-TIIEOLOGIOAL PROOF. 295 
 
 bethink himself of playing the juggler for recreation. The 
 improbable may happen, then, — only it happens very seldom; 
 and, for instance, the like coincidences would not be found in 
 the history of all kings. But we know that, to reach a given 
 combination, the more frequent the throws the more probable 
 becomes the event. We know that mathematical calculation 
 can determine the degree of probability of each event, and 
 that it is equal to a fraction whose denominator expresses the 
 totality of the chances, and the numerator the number of 
 these chances, a number which augments with the number 
 of the throws. Starting from this datum, one can calculate 
 what chance there would be, by drawing the letters of the 
 alphabet one after the other, of producing the verse of the 
 Iliad. If, then, we threw the letters the given number of 
 times, the production of the verse of the Iliad would not only 
 be possible, but certain. This is evidently a concession that 
 must be made to the opponents of the argument.' They will 
 
 * M. Charpentier clearly proves this in his ingenious treatise on the logic of 
 probability, already (Quoted (p. 186). But lie himself essays to prevail over the 
 Epicurean argument by one of his own. That a fortuitous combination should 
 take place once, he says, is not astonishing, and might even happen very 
 certainly in the immensity of time ; but that that combination should be repro- 
 ■duced a second and third time in succession, and even an infinite number of 
 times, is what the calculation of probabilities does not allow us to admit. But 
 the world exists from a time, if not infinite, at least indefinite ; therefore the 
 combination from which it results must have been reproduced continually, and 
 is so still daily, which is inadmissible. Thus what opposes the Epicurean 
 objection would not be the existence of the world, but its duration. — Despite the 
 ingenuity of this objection, we do not regard it as decisive. The world, in fact, 
 is not the repetition of a combination which recurs several times by different 
 throws ; it is one single combination, whose peculiar character is that, once 
 found, it lasts just because it has in itself conditions of duration and stability. 
 Given in eifect a certain coincidence of distances and masses among the atoms, 
 there will follow, for instance, a circular motion (that of the stars), which, in 
 virtue of the law of inertia, will last eternally, so long as a new cause does not 
 come to interrupt it ; and so with the other conditions of regularity which we 
 verify in the world. True, we may ask whether chance is capable of producing 
 a world absolutely stable. But is the world, such as it is, absolutely stable ? 
 We do not know ; and there may be such an unknown cause as will one day 
 bring about its dissolution (for instance, the law of entropy of M. Clausius ; see 
 above, p. 196). If it were so, the world would have an end ; it would then 
 be, like all other combinations, unstable, only it would have lasted longer. 
 But what are a thousand millions of years to infinitude ? 
 
296 BOOK II. CHAPTER I. 
 
 not, however, have gained much by this ; for to make these 
 throws a hand and an intelligence were necessary. The types 
 will not of themselves quit their cases to play at this game ; 
 once fallen, they will not rise to begin again. It foUows, 
 then, that the event in question is so improbable as to be 
 practically equivalent to an impossibility. But is it the same 
 if we pass from this particular case to the most general case 
 possible — namely, to that of atoms endued with motion, and 
 which have moved in empty space from infinitude ? If the 
 time is infinite, the number of throws may be infinite. In 
 order, then, that a combination be produced, it is enough that 
 it be possible. But the combination of which the actual world 
 consists is possible, since it is ; it must, therefore, infallibly be 
 produced one day or other. This difiiculty is very old : the 
 Epicureans knew and made use of it. There was scarcely 
 need to know the calculus of probabilities to discover it ; it is 
 an objection suggested by mere common sense. T^n^lon sets 
 it forth in these terms : ' The atoms, we are told, have an 
 eternal motion ; their fortuitous concourse must already have 
 exhausted, during this eternity, infinite combinations. By 
 infinite is meant something that comprehends all without 
 exception. Among those infinite combinations of atoms 
 which have already successively happened, there must neces- 
 sarily occur all those that are possible. The combination of 
 atoms that forms the present system of the world must, there- 
 fore, be one of the combinations the atoms have successively 
 •had. This principle being stated, need we wonder that the 
 world is as it is 1 It must have taken this precise form a 
 little sooner or a little later. We find ourselves in this 
 system now.' 
 
 r^n^lon replies to this objection of the Epicureans by 
 denying that the number of combinations could be infinite, 
 for, as he says, 'no number is infinite.' Given a number 
 alleged to be infinite, I can always subtract a unit from it ; 
 then it will become finite. But if it is finite minus a unit, it 
 cannot be infinite' plus a unit, otherwise it would be this very 
 
THE PHYSICO-THEOLOGICAL PROOF. 297 
 
 unit that made it infinite. But a unit is itself something 
 finite. Now the finite added to the finite cannot make the 
 infinite. So to any number whatever I can add a unit ; 
 therefore it was not infinite before the addition of that unit. 
 From this reasoning it follows that no number actually realized 
 can be infinite, and that, consequently, the number of com- 
 binations of atoms cannot be infinite. The principle being 
 overthrown, the conclusion falls along with it. 
 
 I do not know that this argument of Fen^lou, even granting 
 its principle, — namely, that no number could be infinite, — 
 I do not know that this argument hits the mark, and am 
 inclined to believe that it would rather strengthen the Epi- 
 curean objection. In fact, the strength of this objection is 
 not in the hypothesis of an infinite number of combinations, 
 but in the hypothesis of an infinite time permitting the atoms 
 to take all possible combinations. But this combination is 
 possible, since it is. It matters little, therefore, whether the 
 possible number of combinations be infinite or not ; rather, if 
 the number be finite, there is more chance that this in which 
 we are should happen during infinite time. Suppose, in short, 
 that there were only a thousand combinations possible (that 
 in which we are being one of the thousand, which is proved 
 by the fact that it exists), there will be a greater chance that 
 this combination should occur than if there were a million, 
 a thousand millions, an infinitude of possible combinations. 
 The more you multiply the number of possible combinations, 
 the more surprising do you render the realization of the actual 
 one, — so much so, that even with infinite time we question 
 whether such a combination must necessarily happen, which 
 Fdn^lon too easily grants. . To suppose the world to pass 
 successively through all possible combinations, and that it 
 passes through them all in turn, is to suppose a certain order, 
 a certain plan in the course of the combinations, which con- 
 tradicts the idea of chance. It is clear that it might pass very 
 often through similar combinations, that those recurring most 
 frequently will be the easiest, that those in which there is a 
 
298 BOOK 11. CHAPTER I. 
 
 very complicated combination (were they strictly possible) 
 will only occur with great difficulty, and, despite infinite 
 time, have an infinite chance against their realization. One 
 can bet, then, in a manner, the infinite to one that the present 
 combination will not be realized, however considerable may 
 be the series of ages. 
 
 But let us lay aside the calculation of probabilities, and let 
 us touch the Epicurean argument at the really sensitive part. 
 The strength of this argument consists in supposing that the 
 actual combination forms part of the series of possible com^ 
 binations of atoms. It is possible, we are told, because it is. 
 I say that this is to beg the question. The question, in short, 
 is whether the world is possible without an intelligent cause. 
 Those who deny it maintain that one of the elements of the 
 combination is just intelligence, so that if this intellectual 
 element be suppressed, the world ceases to be possible. Is it 
 not as if it were said : This picture is possible, because it is ; 
 it has, therefore, had no painter ? I deny it ; for without a 
 painter the picture is not possible. Logical possibility and 
 real possibility are here confounded. What implies no contra- 
 diction is possible logically. But a given combination of 
 colours (for instance, a given picture) implies no contradiction, 
 since it is ; it is, then, logically possible. But to pass from 
 this logical to the real possibility, do we not need a precise 
 cause, a determinate agent ? This is at least what we allege ; 
 and it is to resolve the question by the question, to deny the 
 condition that is the object of the debate, by affirming d, 
 priori a possibility which we only grant upon this same 
 condition. 
 
 Besides, it is still a question whether the actual world 
 would have been possible, if the elements of which it is com- 
 posed had not been chosen and prepared precisely that the 
 world might exist ; so that if we suppose, on the contrary, 
 any unprepared elements, the actual combination would 
 become impossible. In fact, in order that a composed and 
 combined work may be effected, indeterminate materials, 
 
THE PHYSICO-TIIEOLOGICAL PROOF. 299 
 
 indifferent to any form, do not suffice ; there are needed par- 
 ticular materials, form, and arrangement. To make a table, 
 for instance, pieces of wood of any form — spheres, cubes, 
 pyramids, or any other solids, more or less regular — do not 
 suffice; wood cut into planks is needed. So to compose a 
 line of print, little pieces of copper or lead do not suffice ; 
 characters — that is, letters — are required. If the materials 
 are not appropriate to the thing to be realized, in vain will 
 they have moved during infinite time. They will not produce 
 that work; for them it is outside of possible combinations; it 
 is incompatible with their essence. Grains of gold moving 
 without end during infinite time will never make a blade of 
 grass. 
 
 I say, then, that to render the present world possible, the 
 first elements of which it is composed must have such a deter- 
 minate essence that precisely this may be in the number of 
 possible combinations of these elements. I even add, that to 
 speak of other possible combinations than this is a bad expres- 
 sion, for all that results, or can result, from the essence of the 
 elements, forms part of the actual combination. By universe, 
 in fact, I mean the whole of the phenomena, past, present, 
 and future, which have followed from the first throw of the 
 elements. There has never, then, been more than one com- 
 bination ;^ and from the first cast the present world was 
 found without groping and without throw of dice. There 
 has only been one cast, and that is the harmonious and 
 regular world of which we see but one moment and one face, 
 but which embraces in its unity all the faces and moments 
 the imagination can conceive. To imagine another world, 
 other combinations, we must suppose, if possible, other 
 elements, but which have never been realized and never 
 existed, otherwise the present world would itself never have 
 
 ' This assertion in no way contradicts the doctrine of free will ; for free will 
 is not exercised at the expense of the laws of nature, and cannot change the 
 essential conditions of the actual combination ; it only shows itself in the very 
 sphere of these conditions. 
 
300 BOOK II. CHAPTER I. 
 
 existed, since it is only compatible with some elements and 
 not with others. 
 
 Hence it follows that the alleged infinitude of combinations, 
 from which all at once the present world resulted, implies a 
 contradiction, and that from the first moment it was already 
 the present world (not the phase in which we form part, but 
 an interior phase bound to this). The present world exists, 
 then, from all eternity (if it exists of itself), and there never 
 have been others. There is room for the inquiry how such a 
 world, so regular and wise, has alone succeeded in existing 
 among so many other worlds that might have been ; and if 
 it be said that no other than this could exist (which, for the 
 rest, we do not know), the question will stiU remain, how the 
 only possible world is precisely that in which order, harmony, 
 and reason reign. 
 
 Let it not, meanwhile, be supposed that the question can 
 be lesolved by applying to the formation of worlds the Dar- 
 winian principle of the struggle for existence, and natural 
 selection. It is the same with worlds, it might be said, as 
 with living species ; the best organized is the most durable, 
 and, among all possible, that alone has endured which has 
 been found possessed of conditions of stability. The com- 
 parison is quite false. A species, in order to last an(i live, 
 needs to be adapted to a medium. That will be the most 
 durable in which most adaptation shall occur; that in which 
 none at all is found wiU only last a moment, or even will 
 never exist. But the world has not to be adapted to a 
 medium, since it is itself the whole. What need has it to be 
 organized, harmonious, and regular ? And why should it not 
 subsist in the state of chaos ? For the totality of things, the 
 absence of order and regularity is not, as in the case of living 
 species, a principle of destruction. The materials being 
 eternal and necessary, what matters it whether they be in one 
 order or in another, or even though they have no order at all ? 
 They will exist none the less. Thus a chaos has not less 
 chance of existing than a cosmos. In the competition of the 
 
THE PHYSICO-THEOLOGICAL PROOF. 301 
 
 possibilities of being, the one is equal to the other. No 
 doubt Leibnitz has justly said that in this competition of 
 possibles, perfection is the cause of choice ; but this is pre- 
 cisely because he occupies the point of view of the final, and 
 not of the material cause. From a purely material point of 
 view all the possibles are equal, and selection can do nothing 
 in it. Hence my question recurs: How is the only world 
 that has managed to exist precisely the world of order and 
 harmony ? 
 
 Besides, the Epicurean objection, if it were accepted, would 
 go much farther than is imagined. If all is the product of 
 chance, it must be admitted that not only the intentional 
 order of nature, but even physical and mathematical order, is 
 purely fortuitous and contingent; for, once upon this path, 
 why should it not be supposed that it is chance that produces 
 an apparent constancy in the laws of nature, like, for example, 
 the constancy of chance in the case of a lucky gambler? 
 There are no laws, it will be said, but simple coincidences 
 which hitherto have been more frequent than others. The 
 order of things would then have no more value than their 
 goodness, and science would be as arbitrary as esthetics. But 
 no one goes so far. On the contrary, it is in the name of 
 science and of the laws of nature that finality is opposed ; but 
 if it is not believed that chance can produce laws that have 
 full mathematical rigour, why should it be admitted that it 
 can produce the appearance of order and wisdom ? 
 
 But let us not insist on an argument now antiquated, and 
 which no one really any longer maintains, which, besides, 
 taken strictly, would carry us much farther than any one 
 wants to go. From the point where the discussion was in 
 the days of F^ndlon, let us come to the point where it is at 
 present, — that is, the point to which it has been brought by 
 the criticism of David Hume, Kant, and Hegel. 
 
 Kant reduces the physico-theological proof to the different 
 points that follow : — 1st, There are everywhere in the world 
 manifest signs of an order regulated by design ; 2d, This 
 
302 BOOK II. CHAPTER I. 
 
 harmonious order is not inherent in the things of the world, 
 it only belongs to them contingently ; 3d, There exists, there- 
 fore, one sublime wise cause (or more), which must have 
 produced the world not only as an omnipotent nature acting 
 blindly by its fecundiiy, but as an intelligence by its liberty ; 
 4th, The unity of this cause is deducible from that of the 
 mutual relations of the parts of the world viewed as the 
 different pieces of a work of art. 
 
 Kant begins by mentioning and setting aside one of the 
 chief difficulties, which he himself, however, seems to consider 
 a cavil here, but which, in the Critique of the Judgment, and 
 in the later German philosophy, becomes the point of 
 departure of an entire revolution in the conception of finality. 
 ' We will riot hen cavil with natural reason,' he says, ' on this 
 argument, in which, founding on the analogy of some produc- 
 tions of nature with the products of human art, it concludes that 
 nature must have as its principle a causality of the same kind.' 
 This analogical reasoning is what we have hitherto made use 
 of to prove natural finality ; but to defend ourselves against 
 the very objection of Kant, we have taken care only to make 
 use of it to prove the existence of this finality, and not to 
 explain its cause. Analogy can serve as a clue while only 
 nature is concerned ; whether it can also enable us to pass 
 beyond nature is quite another question. However, since 
 Kant himself here sets aside this difficulty as a cavil, this is 
 not the time to raise it, and we will revert to it at the fit 
 time and place.^ 
 
 This difficulty being adjourned, there remain two objections 
 urged by Kant against the proof of final causes. The first is 
 that that proof, if it were considered as valid in itself, would 
 only demonstrate that there is an architect but not a creator of 
 the world, — that it is the form of the world, not its matter, 
 that is contingent. To prove the contingency of the matter 
 of the world would need an entirely different argument than 
 this. 
 
 1 This will be the object of the two following chapters. 
 
THE PHYSICO-THEOLOGICAL PKOOF. 303 
 
 Thus, according to this first objection, the argument would 
 indeed prove, according to Kant, that the form of the world is 
 contingent, — that is, supposes a cause, — ^but it does not prove 
 this of the matter. The distribution of the elements, and 
 their co-ordination according to a plan, would suppose a 
 cause ; but as to the elements, the very atoms composing the 
 material of the world, nothing proves them to have a cause, 
 and that they do not pre-exist necessarily and eternally. 
 
 The second objection is, that the argument, resting only 
 upon experience, — that is, upon imperfect, contingent, and 
 limited things, — can only infer a proportionate cause ; in other 
 words, a cause which is itself relative and imperfect. One 
 can only rise to a very wise, very skilful, very powerful cause ; 
 and it is only by imperceptibly changing the argument that 
 we infer an entirely wise, entirely skilful, and all powerful 
 cause. ' The physico - theological proof, then, finds itself 
 arrested in the midst of its undertaking; in its difficulty it 
 leaps of a sudden to the cosmological proof, which is itself 
 only a disguised ontological proof. . . . After having gone a 
 good way on the ground of nature and experience, the par- 
 tisans of this proof suddenly abandon this domain, and rush 
 into the region of pure possibilities.' The conclusion is that 
 the proof of final causes only gives us a relative and inde- 
 terminate cause, and leaves us in complete ignorance as to its 
 nature ; for ' there is no determinate concept but that which 
 comprehends all possible perfection, and it is only the whole 
 (omnitudo) of reality that is completely determinate.' 
 
 It has been generally agreed, even in the modern spiritualist 
 school, to accept the two preceding objections. It has been 
 acknowledged that Kant has clearly limited the range of the 
 proof of final causes, and that we must have recourse to other 
 proofs to complete the demonstration. 
 
 The masters of eclectic spiritualism, M. V. Cousin and 
 M. Emile Saisset, express themselves on this question as 
 follows : — 
 
 ' We are not afraid of criticism for the principle of final 
 
304 BOOK II. CHAPTER I. 
 
 causes,' says M. Cousin/ ' but we believe, with Kant, that its 
 range must not be exaggerated. In fact, the harmony of the 
 phenomena of nature only proves an architect of the world. 
 One may admit a supreme architect, and deny that he can be 
 the creator. These are two entirely different things. In the 
 second place, if we do not pass beyond the argument of final 
 causes, that greatness of the worker which we conceive pro- 
 portionate to his works is quite indeterminate, and experience 
 will never give us the idea of the omnipotence, perfect 
 wisdom, and absolute unity of the supreme author.' 'These 
 objections are valid,' says M. Emile Saisset ;" ' this dialectic is 
 irrefutable ; but what does it prove ? Ifot that the argument 
 from final causes is false, but that it is insufficient ; not that 
 it must be despised or rejected, but that it should be confined 
 to its just range. It does not prove the existence of the 
 creator; it does not even prove the existence of an infinite 
 intelligence; but it' serves powerfully to confirm it.' 
 
 Perhaps it is a little presumptuous to try to gain back 
 from Kant, if not all, at least a part of what such wise philo- 
 sophers have thought it their duty to yield to him. Still 
 let us try. I shall not insist on noticing how inexact it is to 
 blame an argument for not proving what it is in no way meant 
 to prove. The proof of final causes does not aim to prove the 
 creation of the world ; it might as well be criticised because 
 it does not prove the immortality of the soul. There is a 
 time for everything, and in good logic we ought to ask of 
 every proof only what it promises. The existence of God is 
 one thing ; creation is another. One may admit a God with- 
 out admitting creation ex nihilo. Plato, Aristotle, and the 
 Stoics admitted the existence of God, without knowing any- 
 thing of the dogma of creation. Does the physico-theological 
 argument prove, or does it not, an intelligent cause of the world? 
 That is the whole. If it does, the argument is good, even if 
 it did not prove a creating God, nor even a God absolutely 
 
 ^ Philosophie de Kant, 6" le9on, p. 217. 
 
 ' Philosophie religieuae, 2d ed. t. ii. Appcndij:. 
 
THE PHYSICO-THEOLOGICAL. PKOOF. 305 
 
 perfect. That will be matter for another discussion. The two 
 objections of Kant, then, as it, seems to ns, fall into the 
 sophism of the ignoratio elenchi. 
 
 But we will try to go farther, and to prove that Kant's two 
 objections cannot subsist together : the first destroys the 
 second, and of the two difficulties raised at once, the first can 
 alone subsist.^ 
 
 If, in fact, it be maintained that God is only the architect 
 of the world, and that only the fm-m of things is contingent, 
 that means that matter is not so. If matter is not contingent, 
 — that means that it is necessary, — it exists of itself, it has 
 in itself the reason of its existence ; this is the datum of the 
 objection. But if we suppose matter to be necessary, for the 
 same reason we must suppose the cause that gives the form 
 to be necessary, on the same ground as the matter itself, and 
 that it is self-existent. How, in short, can it be admitted that 
 a non-necessary cause would have the power to act on a 
 necessary matter, and to give it orders ? If matter has not 
 the principle of order and harmony in itself, how should that 
 principle be found in an external and contingent cause ? If 
 that organizing cause were contingent, whence would it have 
 derived the reason of its existence ? This could only be in 
 the self-existent matter; but how can it be supposed that a 
 cause, deriving its existence from matter, should be capable 
 of modifying and transforming it, and imprinting order and 
 harmony upon it ? Would not this be as if it were said that 
 matter had given these to itself, which the objection ought 
 not to assume ? This cause does not, then, proceed from 
 matter ; it is, therefore, self-existent, or is derived from a self- 
 existent cause. Notice, besides, that the processus in infinitum 
 
 ^ We had admitted in the first edition that the two objections of Kant de- 
 stroyed each other, and that if the second were granted (namely, the imperfec- 
 tion of the world), one thereby destroyed the idea of an architect God. "We 
 withdraw this assertion, and limit ourselves to affirming that the first objection 
 destroys the second. In other words, we grant that the proof of final causes only 
 infers an architect God ; but it seems to us that that suflaoes to infer a perfect 
 wisdom. As to the reason that has made us abandon the second argument, it 
 •will he seen in the Appendix X. 
 
 U 
 
306 BOOK II. CHAPTER I. 
 
 would hqre avail notliing, for by hypothesis the matter sup- 
 posed necessary is also a last term ; therefore, on the other 
 hand, the cause must likewise have a last term. 
 
 From this it follows that the organizing cause of the world 
 is a cause by itself, — that is to say, that it is an absolute 
 cause; for absolute means nothing else than what is self- 
 sufficient, what has need of nothing else to exist. It is what 
 Kant calls the unconditioned, what does not presuppose any 
 condition; the to avvTroderov of Plato. The hypothesis of 
 necessary matter, contained in the objection, puts us in posses- 
 sion of the idea of the absolute ; and once in possession of 
 this idea, we are entitled and even constrained to suppose it 
 in the cause as well as in matter. 
 
 But then it is evident that the first objection destroys the 
 second. What was the latter ? This, that from a contingent 
 world we cannot rise to an absolute cause ; that there is not 
 in the world material enough to make a primary being 
 sufficient for all. But the first objection, by the hypothesis 
 of a pre-existent — ^that is, necessary — matter, furnishes the 
 material of the absolute idea of which I have need. If the 
 first cause is absolute, it wiU be so in all its attributes : being 
 by hypothesis intelligent, it will be omniscient ; being power- 
 ful, it will be omnipotent ; being good, it will be perfectly good, 
 and so on. Will it be said that this cause is not absolute 
 because it only organizes, not creates, and that it is limited 
 by the matter on which it acts ? But if there were some 
 contradiction here, it would rather belong to the objection 
 than to the argument itself, and we would very soon be 
 brought to conclude that a cause cannot be absolute without 
 existing alone, which would destroy the hypothesis of a pre- 
 existing matter. We may affirm, then, that the Divine 
 Architect would very speedily and inevitably lead to the 
 Divine Creator. But without pressing this conclusion, suffice 
 it to remark, that matter does not limit the first cause in its 
 essence, but only in its action ; that God could still be, for 
 instance, the Good in itself of Plato, the pure Act of Aristotle, 
 
THE PHYSICO-THEOLOGICAL PROOF. 307 
 
 while yet as regards the world only organizer, and not creator, 
 which would amply suffice. 
 
 The truth is that, according to Kant, the organizing cause 
 is not 011I3' contingent, relative, and imperfect — it is indeter- 
 minate to the extent that it cannot even be said whether it is 
 one or several; and the heathen did not reason so badly iu 
 admitting the plurality of gods. Seeing, in short, means and 
 ends, but ends that did not mutually agree, thej"^ supposed as 
 many causes as they saw categories of ends. JLence polytheism, 
 which appears a legitimate product of the hypothesis of final 
 causes. It is the same with Manichaeism. The world con- 
 sisting of good and evil, order and disorder, in strict reason 
 it seems quite as legitimate to infer an evil cause as a good 
 one, or else an indeterminate cause, neither good nor bad, and 
 of which nothing is known but that it is. 
 
 "We are far from saying that there is no share of truth 
 in these objections, but we need not admit more than is 
 necessary. And here again this part of the objection may be 
 circumscribed. 
 
 First, should it be said, strictly speaking, that we have 
 still the right at the present day to infer Manichseism or 
 polytheism, I will ask, then, why humanity has ceased to be 
 polytheistic and ManichEean in proportion as it has become 
 more enlightened. No doubt polytheism might be historically 
 a plausible and relatively legitimate hypothesis. It is in- 
 finitely superior to fetishism and to coarse mechanism. Doubt- 
 less it is a first glance at nature, a first interpretation of the 
 phenomena— an interpretation sufficiently acceptable in relation 
 to the knowledge of the epoch. But in proportion as nature 
 has been studied, all these apparently divergent effects have 
 been seen to converge towards one centre, all these ends to 
 co-ordinate themselves to form one whole, and show themselves 
 with admirable harmony. The stars and the earth have been 
 seen to be connected by bonds and common motions, to show 
 even a common substance, for we find in the sun the elements 
 of our mineral world. We see by the progress of the sciences 
 
oOa BOOK II. CHAPTER I. 
 
 all the classifications . of causes being gradually simplified. 
 Thus, in the scientific world, polytheism disappears, — that 
 is, the hypothesis of several causes is constantly giving 
 place to unity. Hence we need not wonder that humanity 
 at last came to understand that it was to take imaginary 
 beings for realities, to create as many gods as phenomena, and 
 that we mu,st not multiply beings needlessly. If, then, there 
 is an intelligent cause of the world, it must be one. The 
 same holds as to Manichseism. Here experience is less 
 advanced than for the multiplicity of causes. No doubt, we 
 are far from having explained all in the world that is called 
 evil. There remains a certain latitude allowed the hypothesis 
 of something bad or impotent in the first principle, if, that 
 is, one occupy the point of view of experience alone. And 
 yet, even from this point of view, it may be said that the 
 hypothesis of an evil or impotent principle has been, a,t the 
 very least, driven back. Have not a great many phenomena 
 considered pernicious been reduced to phenomena conformable 
 to the order of things ? Did not the idea of a wicked and 
 cruel God arise at the first from the contemplation of volcanoes, 
 comets, and all that, being unexpected, strikes the senses or 
 threatens the life of men ? Yet we now know that many of 
 these phenomena are innocent, and that they only differ by 
 intensity from the most simple that continually surround us 
 and that have nothing pernicious in them. The eruption of a 
 volcano is no more extraordinary than the boiling over of water 
 in a kettle. The lightning that throws down buildings, splits 
 and plucks up trees, is like the electric spark with which we 
 play. In fine, apart from pain, no phenomenon can strictly be 
 called a disorder of nature ; consequently there is in it nothing 
 to indicate a pernicious and unreasonable power. Coming to 
 pain, the explanation presents more difficulty ; yet it cannot 
 be denied that the studies of philosophers and moralists have 
 at least singularly diminished the force of the argument. It 
 is known to be often a salutary warning, a necessary stimulus 
 to human activity, an incitement to the progress of the human 
 
THE PHYSICO-TIIEOLOGICAL PROOF. 309 
 
 race. Pain can thus be explained to a certain extent from 
 the point of view of final causes. As to moral evil, it is a 
 phenomenon of an order so different, and so entirely beyond 
 what we have hitherto been studying, that we are warranted 
 to set aside this aspect of the question. We only remark that, 
 when we see evil restrained in society as the result of the 
 progress of manners and ideas, we find here again, if not 
 a solution, at least a diminution of the difficulty. Thus 
 apart from objections A priori, which are decisive against 
 ]\Ianich£eism, and even from the point of view of experience, 
 from which this doctrine might still derive some support, 
 we see that a certain number of phenomena, which at first 
 appeared most favourable to the idea of a pernicious power, 
 have admitted of explanation. We are, therefore, entitled to 
 suppose that the others will be explained in the same way, or 
 would be explained if the order of things were better known. 
 
 Kant further objects to the proof from final causes as 
 powerless to give us a God apart from the world, or at least 
 to rise to this, except by illegitimately going beyond itself, 
 and surreptitiously borrowing the aid of the ontological or 
 cosmological proof. But here again, as we think, there is a 
 confcision of ideas. 
 
 What is meant by these words, apart from the world? 
 Is it simply, not forming part of the chain of finite and con- 
 tingent beings that we seek to explain ? In this sense it is 
 evident, in fact, that the cause of the world is apart from the 
 world. The world comprising all the things of experience, 
 none of these things is qualified to be, more than another, the 
 universal cause ; the cause, of the world, behoving to be 
 adequate to the entire series of the phenomena, cannot be 
 confounded with apy of them in particular. In this sense 
 the distinction of the world and its cause is incontestable, and 
 rests simply on the principle of causality, in virtue of which 
 the cause is distinct from its effect. But if now by this 
 expression, apart from the world, there is meant a more pro- 
 found distinction and separation, — for instance, a distinction of 
 
310 BOOK II. CHAPTER I. 
 
 substance, — such a distinction, in fact, transcends the data of 
 the physico-theological proof, but no more is it required by 
 the question. The existence of an intelligent cause of the 
 universe is one thing, the transcendence or immanence of that 
 cause is another., Even if we admitted, with the Stoics, a 
 soul of the world, an active principle of which nature would 
 only be the passive side, God would be none the less an 
 intelligent cause of the universe; and if the proof goes no 
 farther, it goes at least this length, and that is the only thing 
 in question at present. 
 
 Metaphysicians are too often in the wrong in setting up 
 the deadly maxim of radical politicians — all or nothing. They 
 do not sufficiently admit what may be called the current coin 
 of truth. A half, third, or quarter of the truth has no value 
 in their eyes, if all they ask be not granted them. However, 
 there is a medium between knowing all and knowing nothing ; 
 and in every question, between the extreme terms there are 
 many degrees. Between the hypothesis of a nature produced 
 by chance, and that of a supreme cause absolutely perfect, 
 there may be many shades of opinion, of which none is to be 
 despised. That nature supposes an ordering principle is a 
 truth of first rank, whatever else may be the more or less 
 extended meaning that may be given to this principle. The 
 criticism of Kant, despite the two objections set forth, allows 
 this proposition, in its essence, to stand ; and on this ground 
 it could not prevent our discussion from advancing a step. 
 From finality, considered as a natural law, we have passed 
 to its cause, and to an intelligent cause. What are the degree 
 and nature of this intelligence ? Is it interior or exterior to 
 nature ? This is what remains in suspense ; but that which 
 has been gained would be none the less of great value. 
 
 Kant, however, believes that there results from the discus- 
 sion instituted by him a critical conclusion much graver than 
 what we have just indicated — namely, that the proof in 
 question only supplies us with a regulative, not a constitutive, 
 principle, — that is, that this proof suggests to us, indeed, a 
 
THE PHYSICO- THEOLOGICAL PROOF. 311 
 
 hypothesis useful, in the course of scientific researches, for 
 conceiving a certain systematic unity in nature, but not a 
 real principle, corresponding to an effective and essential law 
 of the nature of things.^ But it happens that it is precisely 
 in quality of a hypothesis regulative of scientific researches 
 that the theory of final causes is useless or injurious. As a 
 ride, then, it can be dispensed with. It is, on the other hand, 
 in quality of truth that it is imposed upon us ; but what is 
 true is essentially constitutive. Besides, one does not see 
 how this critical conclusion should result from the previous 
 discussion. Because the cause of the world was only organiz- 
 ing, and not creative, — a relative, not an absolute cause, — how 
 should it follow that finality is only an idea, a rule, and has 
 no relation to objective reality 1 However limited may be 
 the field of finality, while the very basis of the argument 
 is conceded, the extent of the conclusions may be limited ; 
 but one cannot change their nature, nor conclude from the 
 real to the ideal. It is on the real that the physico-theo- 
 logical argument takes its stand. This basis not being 
 disputed, the degree of the presumed cause matters little; 
 uncertainty regarding the degree of the cause does not suffice 
 to transfer it from one order to another — from reality to 
 ideality. N"ow, in the previous criticism, Kant did not make 
 the discussion bear on the reality of the data (except in a 
 parenthesis scarcely indicated), and only insisted on the dis- 
 proportion between the latter and an absolute cause. But 
 because that cause was not absolute, it would not follow that 
 it was ideal. 
 
 It seems that there is a kind of contradiction in Kant's 
 thought between what he at first grants to the physico- 
 
 ' It must not be lost sight of that our whole controversy at present only bears 
 upon Kant's argumentation in the Critique of Pure Beason, and that we leave 
 aside the doctrine of finality as it is set forth in the Critique of the Judgment, 
 which will be the object of the following chapter. The only q^ueation debated 
 here is whether, from the two objections above set forth, and which are all that 
 Kant handles ex professo in the Pure Reason, it results that iinality has only a 
 regulative and not a constitutive value, as he affirms. 
 
312 BOOK II. CHAPTER I. 
 
 theological argument and the meaning he attributes to it in 
 the end. ' It would be/ he says, ' not only to deprive our- 
 selves of a consolation, but even to attempt the impossMe, to 
 pretend to take away something from tlie authority of this 
 proof' He here, then, accords to this proof at least a practical 
 and instinctive value, which cannot be diminished ' by the 
 uncertainties of a subtle and abstract speculation.' However, 
 if this proof is limited finally to furnishing us with a rule for 
 the interpretation of nature, — if it is only a ' convenient and 
 useful hypothesis, which, in any case, can do no harm,' — the 
 authority of the argument as a proof of the existence of God 
 absolutely disappears. 
 
 Kant tells us that if the principle of final causes were con- 
 stitutive (that is, objective), and not simply regulative (that 
 is, hypothetical), the consequence of it would be inactive 
 reason (ignava ratio). The investigation of nature would 
 then be regarded as completely achieved, and reason would 
 give itself to repose, as if it had accomplished its work ; the 
 ends of nature would free us from investigating its causes, 
 and we would be led to recur too easily to the unfathomable 
 decrees of the divine wisdom; But it seems to us that this 
 difficulty rather bears against Kant himself than against the 
 opposite doctrine. If finality is nothing else than a principle 
 regulative of the scientific use of the reason, and the antici- 
 pated expression of the unity of nature, we will then be 
 tempted everywhere to assume unity and ends, and will be 
 so much the less inclined to refrain from this, that we will 
 always be able to say to ourselves that it only regards pro- 
 visional and conventional hypotheses. If, on the other hand, 
 the theory of final causes has only a theological, and not a 
 scientific value — if it regards not the immediate explanation 
 of the phenomena, but their last reason, wherein can the 
 doctrine of a creative or ordering intelligence injure the 
 sciences and the study of nature ? On the contrary, as we 
 have often said, the assumption of ends can in no way oppose 
 the investigation of causes, since there can only be ends if 
 
THE PHYSICO-THEOLOGICAL PROOF. 313 
 
 there are causes. How could a means be Jit for an end, if it 
 were not at the same time a cause, ca'palle of producing that 
 effect ? In an experimental and scientific point of view, then, 
 it will always be possible to place the end out of account in 
 investigating nature, and the doctrine of a supreme cause will 
 no more encourage inactive reason than any other. Whatever 
 hypothesis may be formed as to the principle of things, in- 
 active or adventurous minds will always be able to dispense 
 with the study of particular laws and immediate causes by 
 a recourse to the first cause. It will be said, for instance, of 
 a given phenomenon, that it is a mode of motion, and thus 
 one will avoid determining what mode of motion it may be, apd 
 according to what law it is governed. ' The laws of nature ' 
 will be appealed to as immoderately as is the divine wisdom 
 in another camp. Eeciprocally, a partizan of the divine 
 wisdom is as well entitled as any other to place that concep- 
 tion out of account in the study of the particular laws of 
 nature. Thus the fault in question may be common to both 
 sides, and both sides also can escape it. 
 
 It results from the preceding discussion that the objections 
 raised by Kant in the Critique of Pure Reason, against the 
 proof of final causes, only touch, after all, the accessory part 
 of the argument, and leave intact the essence— namely, that 
 order implies intelligence. But this is only the first assault 
 of modern criticism ; the argument has still to undergo many 
 trials before emerging intact from the fire of debate, as will 
 be seen in the following chapters.^ 
 ' See Appendix X., two notes relative to the pliysico-tlieological argument. 
 
CHAPTEE II. 
 
 SUBJECTIVE AXD IMMANENT FIXALITY. 
 
 npHE knot of the argument of final causes so called, or 
 -^ physico-theological argument, is in this major proposi- 
 tion of Bossuet : All order, that is, all proportion between 
 means and ends, supposes an intelligent cause. But here also 
 lies the radical difficulty of the argument. That the order of 
 nature, the finality of the world, supposes a specific, appro- 
 priate principle may be allowed ; but is that principle neces- 
 sarily an intention, a will, a free reflection, capable of choice ? 
 This is another question, and a new object of dispute. 
 
 That is not all. Does the finality assumed in nature really 
 belong to nature, — is it real, objective, or might it not be a 
 forni of our mind, a tendency of our feeling, — ^in a word, a 
 hypothesis more or less useful and convenient for forming 
 our ideas of things, but not an essential, real law, true in 
 itself, as the veritable laws of nature behove to be ? 
 
 Finally, for a third difficulty. Granting that finality must 
 have a cause, still is that cause necessarily anterior and 
 exterior to nature ? May it not be precisely nature itself ? 
 Why should it not be of the essence of nature spontaneously 
 to seek finality ? 
 
 To these three questions , correspond three solutions or 
 hypotheses, which it is necessary to examine : the hypothesis 
 of sutjedive finality in Kant ; the hypothesis of immanent, and 
 that of unconscious finality in Schelling, Hegel, and the whole 
 German pantheism. Is finality subjective ? Is it immanent ? 
 Is it unconscious ? The two first of these questions will be 
 the subject of this chapter, the third that of the two chapters 
 following. 
 
SUBJECTIVE FINALITY. 315 
 
 § 1. Subjective Finality. 
 
 In his Critique of Pure Reason, Kant had striven to limit 
 and circumscribe the range of the physico-theological argu- 
 ment ; but finally he seemed to admit the foundation of it, and, 
 save a reservation of great importance, but hardly indicated,^ 
 he acknowledged that we are warranted to infer from the 
 order of the universe an intelligent cause — in a word, the 
 essence of the proof remained safe and sound. But it remained 
 to examine the value of the principle itself, in virtue of which 
 we thus reason. This new question he has examined in his 
 Critique of the Judgment, and has resolved it in a much more 
 problematic sense than he appeared to do in the Critique of 
 Pare Reason. 
 
 How was Kant led to examine the principle of finality ? 
 He himself tells us. Because the principle of liberty, demon- 
 strated in the Critique of Practical Reason, implied that liberty 
 must realize in the sensible world the eTid set by its laws. 
 In fact, the ideal conception of morality, according to Kant, 
 consists in conceiving the maxim of each action as capable of 
 becoming ' a universal law of nature.' This, again, was to 
 suppose ' that nature does not exclude the possibility of ends 
 that must be attained according to the laws of liberty. If 
 nature were not, in fact, susceptible of ends, how could it 
 contribute to the ends of liberty ? Consequently there must 
 be a principle, rendering possible the agreement of the supra- 
 sensible, that serves as a foundation to nature, with the 
 conception of liberty, and which permits the mind to pass from 
 the one world to the other.''^ In a word, the pure reason fur- 
 nishes us with concepts sufficient to constitute nature, to 
 render it possible. These concepts, which are the categories, 
 and of which the principal is the concept of causality, teach us 
 
 ' 'We will not here cavil with natural reason . . . etc' {Critique of Pure 
 j^mson, Book ii. chap. iii. § 3). See above, p. 302, and below, p. 329. 
 '' C'rilif0e of the Judgment, Introd. § ii. 
 
316 BOOK II. CHAPTER ll. 
 
 that there is a nature subject to laws ; and that would suffice_ 
 for the knowledge of this nature, and to give it a certain 
 unity. But such a nature would still be possible, provided 
 there were laws' even though these particular laws had no 
 mutual relation, and should form separate systems. Only, on 
 this hypothesis, how could we study it ? We must, then, have 
 something more. We need, in order to comprehend nature, 
 and to study it with ease, to believe that it forms a system, 
 an order, that the different parts are bound together. Hence 
 these principles : ' Nature makes nothing in vain ; nature acts 
 in the simplest ways ; nature takes no leaps. (The law of 
 continuity, the law of parsimony, and the law of the least 
 action)' But all these maxims may be reduced to a funda- 
 mental rule — namely, ' tliat the particular laws of nature must 
 be considered according to a unity such as a mind would 
 have established, which, in giving these laws, would have had 
 regard to our faculty of knowledge, and have sought to render 
 possible a system of experience founded on the particular 
 laws of nature.' ^ 
 
 This passage from causality to finality, or from the Critique 
 of Pure JReason to the Critique of the Judgment, will appear 
 obscure to the reader ; but it is because it is obscure in Kant 
 himself The principle of causality serves to constitute a 
 nature in general, but without determining anything as to 
 particular laws. The principles of pure physics might still be 
 found applicable, even if one did not grasp any determinate 
 law.^ These laws are thus contingent, and are only dis- 
 covered by observation. We, however, need a clue to study 
 and comprehend them, and to give them a certain unity. 
 This clue is the principle of finality — a principle necessary, as 
 is evident, but essentially suljective. 
 
 Here we must guard against a misconception. In a sense 
 
 ' Critique of the Judgment, Introd. § iv. 
 
 ^ For instance, the principle of the conservation of the same quantity of force 
 and matter, the principle that external phenomena have an extensive quantity, 
 (^tc. , would remain true, even though the universe formed a sort of chaos witli- 
 out determinate laws. 
 
SUBJECTIVE EINALITY. 3l7 
 
 it is correct to say that, in Kant's view, all the concepts of 
 the reason and the understanding, save those of the practical 
 reason, are subjective. It is known, in fact, that the forms of 
 perception (space and time), and the laws of the understanding 
 (cause and substance), are only the conditions proper to the 
 mind in the study of phenomena. Thus they are subjective 
 laws, since they are only the laws of our mind. But it is to 
 be noticed that Kant never employs the word ' subjective ' 
 to express this meaning. He considers them, on the con- 
 trary, objective in this sense : that being laws absolutely neces- 
 sary and universal, and from which no mind can free itself, 
 they determine those phenomena to affect us as objects,. 
 What is universally and necessarily true is objective. Besides, 
 these laws are constitutive in this sense, that the object is 
 really constituted by them, that without them it would not 
 be possible, nor would intuition, experience, or science itself. 
 
 It is not the same with the principle of finality. This 
 latter is subjective in the proper sense of the word, and it is 
 so even with reference to the preceding laws. These, in fact, 
 being once regarded as objective, the human mind may besides 
 have tendencies, dispositions, needs, which, without being 
 necessary to constitute an object of experience or of science, 
 are not only useful but indispensable to guide the mind in its 
 researches. It is, *hen, if we may say so, a subjectivity in 
 the second degree; These kinds of principles are natural 
 hypotheses, ways of conceiving things, frames, cMes for investi- 
 gations ; they are not constitutive, but regulative principles. 
 
 Kant never tires of repeating that the principle of finality 
 has only a value of this kind. It belongs not to the deter- 
 mining, but to the reflecting judgment. The first, which is 
 the scientific judgment properly so called, applies the law to 
 particular facts, without any kind of liberty. The second, on 
 the other hand, given a particular fact, seeks to bring it under 
 a law, to reduce it to some general notion. This is about the 
 difference that exists between science and philosophy. In the 
 reflections we make on things, we need not see laws, but only 
 
318 BOOK II. CHArTEE II. 
 
 thoughts. Of this kind is the transcendental principle of 
 finality: 'The judgment finds it in itself. ... It does not 
 prescribe it to nature, because it is true that our reflection 
 accommodates itself to nature.' The convei'se is not true, and 
 ' nature, for its part, is not ruled on the conditions according to 
 which we seek to form a conception of it.' Thus, in judging, 'the 
 faculty of judging thereby gives a law for itself, and not for 
 nature.' In fact, ' we cannot attribute to nature itself some- 
 thing like a relation of finality, but only make use of this concep- 
 tion to reflect on nature.'^ And further: ' This transcendental 
 conception of a finality of nature is neither a conception of 
 nature nor a conception of liberty, for it attributes nothing 
 to the object ; it does nothing but represent the only way in 
 which we must proceed in reflecting on the objects of nature 
 to arrive at a perfectly connected experience. It is thus a 
 subjective principle (a maxim) of the judgment.' ' The judf^- 
 ment contains a principle d, priori of the possibility of nature, 
 but only in a subjective point of view, by which it prescribes, 
 not to nature but to itself, a law . . . which it does not find 
 cl priori in nature, but which it admits, in order to render 
 palpablp the ordinance of nature.'^ He adds ' that observa- 
 tion teaches us nothing of this law, although it may confirm 
 it.' In fine, it is the very liberty of our mind in the appli- 
 cation of this law that is the source of the pleasure we 
 find in it. 
 
 Kant attributes this character of subjectivity to the two 
 kinds of finality he has distinguished — esthetical and teleo- 
 logical finality, which he also calls subjective and objective 
 finality respectively.^ Speaking of the first, — that is, of the 
 beautiful, — he distinguishes the realism and the idealism of 
 
 ^ Critique of the Judgment, Introd. §iv. ^ jj^^ Introd. §v. 
 
 3 There are so many degrees of subjective and objective in Kant that one at 
 last gets lost in them. Here the two species of finality are subjective iu the 
 sense we have just stated ; but the one (the beautiful) is only the agreement of 
 the object with our esthetic faculties. The other (finality properly so called — 
 that of organized beings, for instance) is the agreement of the object with its 
 concept. It has thus some foundation in the object itself. 
 
SUBJECTIVE FINALITY. 319 
 
 finality. According to the first of these conceptions, the 
 beautiful would be 'like a real end that nature proposes to 
 itself ;' according to the second, it would be ' only an agree- 
 ment established without an end, of itself and in an accidental 
 way, between the faculty of judging and the forms of nature.' 
 He adds that ' nature everywhere, in its free formations, 
 reveals a mechanical tendency to the production of forms 
 wliich seem to have been expressly made for the esthetic 
 use of our judgment ; and we do not find in it tlie least 
 reason to suspect that anything more is needed for this than 
 the simple mechanism of nature as nature, so that tlie agree- 
 ment of these forms with our judgment may quite well be 
 derived from that mechanism without any idea serving as 
 a principle to nature.' If it is so in the formation of 
 crystals, for instance, why should it not be the same for the 
 production of the most beautiful forms ? In fine, what proves 
 that our judgments on the beautiful are eminently subjective 
 is ' that, in general, when we judge of beauty, we seek in our- 
 selves it, 'priori the measure of our judgment. ... It is we 
 who receive nature with favour, not it that does us one.' ' 
 
 Ought we now, according to Kant, to attribute more 
 reality to the finality he calls objective (that is, what consti- 
 tutes, properly speaking, the relation of means and end) than 
 he attributes, as we have just seen, to subjective or esthetic 
 finality ? No ; and it even seems that Kant attributes still 
 less to it, for he says subjective finality still rests on some 
 principle a priori, while objective finality (final causes properly 
 so called) only rests on analogy. It is a ' problematic ' prin- 
 ciple, which one will do well to admit in the investigation of 
 nature, but on condition that it shall only be made a principle 
 of observation and investigation by analogy with the causality 
 determined by ends, and ' that one shall not pretend to explain 
 anything tliereby.''^ Kant, however, acknowledges' that the 
 objective teleological principle has also ' some foundation a 
 priori^ not in so far as one considers ' nature in general as a 
 ' Critique of the Judgment, t. i. § Ivii. * Ibid. t. ii. § Ix. ' Iffid. % Ixv. 
 
320 BOOK II. CHAPTER 11. 
 
 collection of objects of sense,' ' but so far as one considers ' an 
 organized production of nature ;' only, yet once more, it is 
 ■ a regulative principle,' ' a Tnaxim.' This concept, which has a 
 foundation a priori in the mind, and a determining notion in 
 the life of organized beings, extends at once to the whole 
 of nature, and is legitimately generalized under this form : 
 'Nature makes nothing in vain;' but it is alwaj's 'subjec- 
 tively,' as a ' maxim,' as ' a regula,tive, not a constitutive 
 principle,' as a ' clue ' in our researches, that we are allowed 
 to admit it.* Even thus restricted, the principle of finality 
 can only be warranted in the study of nature on condition of 
 being again circumscribed within its own limits, and not com- 
 plicated with another concept — that of God. Teleology must 
 remain distinct from theologj'.' ' If we introduce into the 
 science of nature the concept of God to explain finality in 
 nature, and then make use of this finality to prove that there 
 is a God, each of these two sciences loses its consistency.' 
 Consequently, one must limit oneself to the modest expres- 
 sion, ' ends of, nature,' before inquiring ' of the cause of nature.' 
 If physics would confine itself within its own limits, ' it must 
 set entirely aside the question whether the ends of nature are 
 intentional or not. ... It is enough that there are objects 
 which can only be explained by taking the idea of end for 
 a principle.' One can employ metaphysically, and for the 
 convenience of use, tKe expressions, wisdom, economy, fore- 
 sight of nature, ' without therefore making of it an intelligent 
 being, which would be absurd, but also without venturing to 
 place outside of it, as nature's workman, another intelligent 
 being, which would be rash.'* 
 
 In fine, the doctrine of Kant is summed up, as it seems, 
 most clearly in the following passage : — ' It is impossible for 
 US to explain organized beings, and their internal possibility, 
 by purely mechanical principles of nature ; and it may be 
 
 ^ Critique of the Judgment, § Ix. 
 
 ^ All these expressions are contained in the same passage, § Ixv. 
 
 ^ Critique of the Judgment, § Ixvii. * Ibid. 
 
SUBJECTIVE FINALITY. 321 
 
 boldly maintained with equal certainty that it is absurd for 
 men to try any such thing, and to hope that some new Newton 
 will one day be able to explain the production of a blade of 
 grass by natural laws over which no design has presided, for 
 that is a view which must be absolutely denied to man. 
 But then, on the other hand, there would be great presump- 
 tion in thinking that, if we could penetrate to the principle 
 of nature in the specification of natural laws, we could not 
 find a principle of the possibility of organized beings which 
 would, dispense with our referring their production to design ; 
 for how can we know that ?'^ 
 
 In a word, finality is a hypothesis, and even a necessary 
 hypothesis, given the conformation of the human mind ; but 
 nothing warrants us to suppose that this hypothesis has an 
 objective foundation in reality, and that an understanding 
 that should penetrate to the very principle of nature would 
 be still obliged to conform to it. 
 
 "We do not entirely reject this doctrine of Kant, We even 
 partly accept it, but on condition of interpreting it, and giving 
 it a different meaning. 
 
 We distinguish two sorts of hypotheses, — one which may 
 be called objective and real ; the other subjective and figurative. 
 In both cases, the hypothesis is never more than a supposi- 
 tion — that is, a conception not absolutely demonstrated ; but 
 in the first case it is regarded as corresponding with the 
 true nature of things, in the second it is only a convenient 
 means for the mind to conceive them. The difference would 
 be nearly that existing between natural and artificial classifi- 
 cations. For instance, the hypothesis of the ether is still only 
 a hypothesis, since that substance does not come immediately 
 under experience ; but for scientists this hypothesis, in pro- 
 portion as it is warranted by the facts, veritably represents 
 nature. Its objectivity is in proportion to its probability, 
 Because a thing is not absolutely certain, it does not follow 
 that it is subjective, but merely that it is only probable. It 
 ' Critique of the Judgment, § Ixxiy, 
 X 
 
322 BOOK II. CHAPTEK 11. 
 
 is the probable, not the siibjective, that is opposed to the 
 certain. In the second case, on the other hand, the hypothesis 
 is only a means fashioned by the imagination to represent the 
 phenomenon to be explained. I can employ the hypothesis 
 of attraction without attributing to it any objective value, but 
 simply because it is convenient for the mind. I may imagine, 
 for instance, a straight cord attached to the moon, and which 
 should be drawn by some one placed in the centre of the 
 earth. Here is a figure, a metaphor, which serves to fix my 
 ideas, as diagrams drawn on the board fix the ideas of the 
 geometrician. 
 
 It is evident from these distinctions that a principle may 
 not impose itself on the mind with the same necessity as the 
 . principle of causality, and yet not be, therefore, an exclusively 
 subjective conception. An opinion is not necessarily a fiction. 
 Even if finality and its cause in a divine intelligence should 
 only be admitted in quality of opinions, it would not follow 
 that they are only conventional rules for the use of the 
 reason. The degree of their probability would have to be 
 determined by comparison with the facts, but one would not 
 thereby be warranted to transform them into figurative 
 symbols having no relation to reality. 
 
 What we grant to Kant, as we have proved it in our first 
 part, is that finality is not a constitutive principle, like the 
 principle of causality. It is not a principle inherent in the 
 human mind, and applicable in a necessary and universal 
 manner, like the principle of causality itself. It is an induc- 
 tion resulting from analogy. No more has it the certainty 
 that experiment and calculation can give ; it is a hypothesis, 
 a doctrine, an opinion ; it is neither a theorem, an axiom, nor 
 a fact. On this account it may be granted that there is 
 something subjective in this doctrine — namely, the part that 
 is insusceptible of demonstration and verification, and also 
 the unknown part that goes on always increasing in pro- 
 portion as we approach the very source of the creative activity. 
 But then, again, the same doctrine is objective where it repre- 
 
SUBJECTIVE FINALITY. 323 
 
 sents facts ; it is real on the same ground as all induction 
 that rises from what is seen to what is not seen. Such is 
 the induction that makes us believe in the intelligence of our 
 fellows. N"o one will maintain, doubtless, that this belief is 
 a constitutive principle of the human reason, and still it will 
 not be concluded that it is only a regulative principle and a 
 symbolic fiction. There is here, then, a medium that Kant 
 has not sufficiently distinguished. 
 
 Besides, we must not forget the fundamental distinction 
 made at the beginning of this book between the finality of 
 nature and the first cause of that finality. , It is one thing 
 to say that nature has ends ; it is another to say that the 
 cause of this nature is a mind that has co-ordinated it accord- 
 ing to ends. The hypothesis of subjectivity can be applied 
 either to the first or the second of these two propositions. It 
 may be maintained either that the ends of nature are only 
 appearances, or that, these ends being admitted as real, it is 
 only the hypothesis of an intelligent cause that is a mere 
 symbol, a mere regulative maxim of the mind. But Kant 
 has never clearly explained himself regarding this difficulty. 
 Sometimes he distinguishes the two questions, and only applies 
 his subjectivism to the second hypothesis ; sometimes, on the 
 other hand, he seems to involve them both in it, — in a word, 
 what he calls subjective is sometimes finality in general, 
 ' sometimes intentionality. Eeserving this second question for 
 discussion afterwards, let it suffice us to say with Trendelen- 
 burg,^ that if finality were a purely subjective hypothesis, it 
 
 ' The Kantian hypothesis of the subjectivity of final causes has been discussed 
 by the learned logician Trendelenburg {Logische Unterstichungen, t. ii. p. 47 
 et seq. ) with great force, and we think we ought here to sum up his argument. 
 
 1st, Kant reasons as if nothing that was subjective could be objective, and 
 vice versa : he has no thought of discussing the hypothesis according to which 
 something might be at once subjective and objective. It is not enough that a 
 principle is not derived from experience for it not to have an objective reality. 
 
 2d, If finality is a principle only regulative, but not constitutive, it signifies 
 nothing ; this principle is no more even a rule. A rule of arithmetic or grammar 
 is constitutive, conformable to the thing itself ; otherwise what would it 
 signify ? But, it will be said, there are rules — as in grammar the rules of the 
 genders — which unite what perhaps has no relation, in order to aid the memory. 
 
324 BOOK II. CHAPTER II. 
 
 would answer no purpose, and it would be quite as well to 
 dispense with it. 
 
 The doctrine of the subjectivity of final causes could have 
 no solidity if it were not attached to the general principle of 
 subjectivism, — that is, the hypothesis that makes of all the 
 laws of nature principles of the human mind ; but it would 
 be passing beyond our subject to enter on the question of the 
 objective value of our knowledge. It is enough for us to 
 
 Jlight not tlie principle of final causes have as low a value ? Even in this case, 
 the rules of the genders say something on the nature of the object itself. If the 
 principle of finality has no objective value, it is only a fortuitous association of 
 
 3d, Why does Kant admit that finality is a principle more which we have 
 need of to subject the phenomena to rules, when mechanism no longer suffices 
 to explain them ? This principle more is a singular acc^uisition. A principle 
 ought to simplify ; that of finality only brings confusion, since it employs an 
 interpretation of the phenomena absolutely contrary to the principle of the 
 efficient cause. If this contradiction has no serious inconveniences because the 
 principle of finality is purely subjective, then that principle has no more value 
 than the alphabetical order followed in dictionaries, or any other artificial 
 classification. 
 
 4th, Kant is wrong to compare the employment of the principle of finality to 
 that of the principle of the absolute, which also is to him only regulative with- 
 out being constitutive. The principle of the absolute {das Unbedingte) prevents 
 us from stopping at the particular and the relative ; it pushes us always for- 
 ward, and excites the inactivity of the reason, but it leaves it in the same 
 domain, in that of the efficient cause. The principle of finality, on the contrary, 
 does not push us in the direction of the efficient cause ; it leads us entirely to 
 reverse the order of the facts. This reversal can only be called a rule so far as it 
 leads to the truth. If finality is not in things, it only leads our mind astray and 
 distorts reality. 
 
 5th, In fine, what is the relation of the principle of finality to the other sub- 
 jective elements of Kant's philosophy ? If finality were a necessary form of our 
 knowledge, as space and time are the necessary forms of sense-intuition, - all 
 things would appear to us in the relation of means and end. But no ; according 
 to Kant, the help of finality is called in when the explanation by the efficient 
 cause no longer suffices ; it is the object itself that forces the mind to quit the 
 road it was following. It is, then, the ol^ect that determines when we must 
 apply the purely subjective principle of finality. — This last objection is borrowed 
 from Herbart. ' How is it,' says the latter, 'that the convenience of the arrange- 
 ments of nature is only made entirely evident in certain cases ; that very often 
 this convenience appears doubtful to us ; in fine, that nature often offers us a 
 certain mechanical regularity, or even simple facts, of which it is impossible for 
 us to give an account ? If the idea of convenience were a necessary form of the 
 mind, it ought to admit of being applied to all things, like the form of time 
 and space (or even the principle of the absolute) ' {Einleitung in die Philosophie, 
 § 132). 
 
SUBJECTIVE FINALITY. 325 
 
 have proved that it is not more subjective than the others. 
 It is true or false, certain or doubtful, probable or improbable, 
 like all that is discussed ; but in proportion as it is established 
 and demonstrated, it is as objective as any other truth. Is it 
 the same when, passing from finality to its cause, and from 
 nature to God, we infer an intentional cause ? We shall see 
 this farther on. 
 
 There is yet a kind of suhjedivist finalism which we find in 
 one of the most distinguished of contemporary philosophers, 
 whose name we have already several times met with in these 
 studies, M. Lachelier. He has thought proper to found the 
 law of final causes not on mind, but on feeling. According 
 to him, the law of efficient causes, which, he says, ' is reducible 
 to the connection of motions,' is essential to the mind ; thought 
 cannot deny it without destroying itself But feeling has its 
 exigencies as well as the mind. 'A world in which motion, 
 without ceasing to obey its own laws, should no longer form 
 any synthesis, or should only form discordant syntheses that 
 would destroy each other, such a world would not, perhaps, 
 be less conformable than ours to the exigencies of thought,'^ 
 but it would be far from satisfying those of our feeling, for 
 in the former case it would leave it absolutely void, and in 
 the latter would only cause it painful modifications.'^ How- 
 ever, the author acknowledges that this is a very insufficient 
 proof; for why should nature be obliged to satisfy our 
 faculties 1 Would not af&rming it a priori be to assume 
 precisely what is in question — namely, that nature has an 
 end ? How, then, could feeling impose on things a law not 
 essential to them ? 
 
 The way the author employs to explain his theory is as 
 follows : It is not only the interest of sensation, but of 
 thought itself, that requires the law of final causes. ' Because 
 
 ^ This is a very great concession. Plato, in the Theceteius, seems to believe 
 the contrary. In fact, if a thing is destroyed as soon as formed, how can we 
 think it ? 
 
 ^ Fondement de Vinduction, p. 83. 
 
326 BOOK ir. CHAPTER II. 
 
 this law especially concerns feeling, it by no means follows 
 that it is foreign to the essence of thought ; and we do not 
 abandon the proof that thought itself siipposes the existence 
 of this law.'^ Thus after having introduced feeling, the 
 author abandons it and speaks of it no more, and reverts from 
 it to the necessities of thought. Since feeling goes for nothing, 
 what need was there to speak of it ? Will it be said that 
 it is not the bare mind by itself that needs final causes, but 
 the mind combined with feeling? This is merely saying 
 that it finds its pleasure in it ; but the preceding objection 
 reappears as strongly : "Why should things correspond to the 
 necessities of our feeling ? If it were only a question of 
 some very rare cases of wonderful adaptation, it might be 
 maintained that it is, in fact, a lively fancy of our mind, 
 against which we do not attempt to strive, to consider these 
 phenomena as the work of an artist ; and the most decided 
 anti-finalists in the theoretic order do not refuse themselves 
 this pleasure in the joy of admiration and enthusiasm. One 
 can see that a man might say in such cases : I don't care 
 whether it is really so ; I can only enjoy on condition that 
 it is so ; do not take away my dream — ^you would take 
 away my happiness. But the author sees finality not only 
 in such cases, but everywhere in all that is ordered,' in all 
 that presents a certain unity — that is, in the whole universe ; 
 nay, more, it is still finality, according to him, that constitutes 
 ' the existence ' and ' reality ' of phenomena.^ Then how can 
 we conceive that our feeling could thus command the order 
 of things ? and how should the laws of motion, in order to 
 please our mind, constrain themselves to form composite and 
 harmonious wholes ? 
 
 The author proves that the law of thought is unity. But he 
 says there are two sorts of imity ; the one a unity of necessity, 
 the other a unity of convenience and harmony. But if the 
 mechanism of the universe strictly satisfies the first of these 
 
 ^ Fondement de Vindttctibn, p. 85. 
 ^ Ibid. p. 85 et seq. 
 
SUBJECTIVE FINAtlTY. 327 
 
 two unities, it is further necessary, to satisfy the second, that 
 the universe be an organism. Thus, regarded as pure thought, 
 the mind imposes on phenomena the law of mechanism ; while, 
 as mingled with feeling, it imposes on them the law of finality. 
 "We cannot comprehend this theory. We would admit it 
 were we told : The phenomena are what they are, and we can 
 effect no change in them ; perhaps they are exclusively 
 mechanical. But as we see in them order which we cannot 
 explain, we are pleased to suppose a final cause. We abandon 
 ourselves to this hypothesis, be it true or false, because it is 
 agreeable and convenient to us. But this is not what the 
 author means. He seems to believe that motion alone has no 
 reason to form any regular compositions, or even any composi- 
 tions at all ; and we quoted from him above a beautiful passage, 
 in which he expresses himself very strongly to this effect.^ 
 The laws of motion do not, then, suffice to explain the harmony 
 of the universe ; there is another principle. But, then, what 
 now becomes of your feeling ? What does it signify whether 
 that pleases you or not ? It is, because it is, and not because 
 it is agreeable to you that it should be. It may be maintained, 
 if you will, in an exaggerated final-causality, that God has 
 only made the world to please us ; that He has illumined the 
 suns and the stars that we might contemplate them. But to 
 give as a proof of final causes what is only an excessive and 
 exclusive consequence of them, is to invert the order of ideas. 
 Will it be said that by feeling must be understood not 
 human feeling, but feeling in general, and by thought not 
 human thought, but thought in general ? In this sense, it 
 might be maintained that thought in the pure state is mani- 
 fested in the universe by mechanism, and that, connected with 
 feeling, it is manifested in it by finality. But then the 
 question would no longer be regarding the faculty that should 
 give us the principle of ends, but regarding the cause of the^ 
 ends themselves, so far as previously granted as object of 
 
 ' See above, Book i. chap. -vi. p. 207 : ' The world of Epicurus before the 
 concourse of the atoms . . . ' 
 
328 BOOK II. CHAPTER II. 
 
 experience; from critical teleology one would pass without 
 notice to dogmatic teleology. One would thus assume what is 
 in question — namely, the ohjective validity of the principle 
 of finality. In fine, is it meant that human feeling and feel- 
 ing in general are but one, and that nature being only the 
 play of our mind, identical with mind in general, we are 
 warranted to conclude from the one to the other ? If, then, 
 it is a necessity of our thought and our feeling to conceive 
 things as ordered, that is true of all thought and all feeling, 
 and nature, having no objective existence apart from the 
 mind that thinks and the feeling that enjoys it, is forced, in 
 order to be something, to conform itself to the exigencies of 
 both. If this be so, we only perceive in it a very complicated 
 and entangled way of expressing what we here maintain, that 
 finality is objective and not subjective ; for it will always be 
 permissible to distinguish the subjective mind as circum- 
 scribed within the limits of the individual consciousness -or 
 the human consciousness, and the objective mind that 
 animates all other men apart from me, before me, after me, 
 and that equally animates all other beings. That nature 
 exists in virtue of the laws of this objective mind is denied 
 by none of those who recognise finality in nature ; but as it 
 derives its laws from this objective mind, it is it that is 
 imposed on our thought and feeling (that is, on the only 
 thought and feeling we directly know) ; it is not we that 
 impose it on nature. 
 
 In a word, it is either admitted that mechanism absolutely 
 cannot, despite the theory of fortunate chances, produce an 
 ordered whole, — hence, as the world in reality has hitherto 
 always presented to us a whole of this kind, it must be 
 acknowledged that there is effectively and objectively a prin- 
 ciple of finality in the universe, and thought, united or not 
 to feeling, can only recognise it, and not constitute it, — or 
 else, on the other hand, it is maintained that it is thought 
 joined to feeling that carries with it the principle of finality. 
 Then how can and ought nature to agree with thought, so as 
 
IMMANENT FINALITY. 329 
 
 to produce for its pleasure the innumerable prodigies of adap- 
 tation of which the universe is composed ? And to say that 
 nature is ourselves, is to pass perpetually from the subjective 
 to the objective sense, according to the need of the moment, 
 by a perpetual succession of equivocations, in which all distinct 
 thought is swallowed up. 
 
 § 2. Immanent Finality. 
 
 If, on the one hand, led by the general tendencies of his 
 critical philosophy, Kant seems to conclude for the doctrine of 
 the subjectivity of final causes, on the other, by certain aspects 
 of his theory, he opens the way again to a very different and 
 more profound doctrine, which, while objectivizing the final 
 cause, like the earlier philosophy, gives it a new form and an 
 entirely different signification. Here it is proper to revert to 
 a reservation made by Kant in the Pure Reason, and already 
 indicated above,^ but too important in its consequences not to 
 be expressly mentioned. 
 
 ' We will not here dispute with natural reason on this 
 argument, in which, founding on the analogy of some produc- 
 tions of nature with the products of human art (our machines, 
 vessels, watches), it concludes that nature must have as its 
 principle a causality of the same kind. . . . Perhaps this 
 reasoning would not bear strict examination by the transcen- 
 dental criticism.' ^ 
 
 The celebrated Dr. Strauss, in his Christian Dogmatic, repro- 
 duces this difficulty. ' This proof,' he says, ' is founded on 
 the analogy of certain products of nature with the works 
 of art ; the organism resembles a clock, the eye a telescope, 
 the body of a fish a vessel, etc. But a clock, a telescope, 
 etc. are the works of a wisdom that has adapted the means 
 to the end; therefore the products of all nature are the 
 work of an intelligence which is apart from it. — But first, 
 
 ' See the previous chapter, p. 302. 
 
 ^ Critique of Pure Reason, ' Transc. dialect.' Book ii. chap. iii. § iii. 
 
330 BOOK II. CHAPTER II. 
 
 vjhy should this intelligence he apart from nature ? What con- 
 strains us to go out of nature ? Therefore the analogy is only 
 superficial. The pieces of a machine, of a work of human 
 industry, remain strangers to each other ; motion and unity 
 are impressed on them from without. On the other hand, in 
 the organism each part is in intimate, continual communication 
 with the others ; they all serve each other as end and means. 
 There is just this difference between the works of human 
 industry and those of nature, that the artist is outside the 
 former, and forms the matter from without inwards ; while he 
 is within the latter, and forms the matter from within out- 
 wards. Life is the end that realizes itself -^ 
 
 The knot of the difficulty, as is evident from this objection, 
 is in the comparison of the works of art and those of nature. 
 "While it is only a question of finality, analogy can go so far ; 
 but when it concerns the first cause of finality, analogy 
 becomes inexact and insufficient, for this reason, that human 
 industry supposes a pre-existing matter, which it turns from 
 its ends to appropriate to its own, while nature works in 
 nothing but itself, and has no need to pass beyond itself to 
 realize its ends. In other words, the industry of man is 
 external, that of nature is internal. 
 
 Aristotle had already noticed this difference between nature 
 and art — nature acting from within,- and art from without.^ 
 Kant has made the distinction deeper. 
 
 ' In a watch,' he says, ' one part is an instrument that serves 
 to move others ; but no wheel is the efficient cause of the 
 production of the others. One part exists for the sake of 
 another, and not hy the latter. Therefore, also, the productive 
 cause of these parts and of their forms does not reside in the 
 nature (of this matter), but apart from it, in a being capable 
 
 ' Strauss, Die Christlkhe Olavhenslehre, 1840, t. i. p. 385. Hegel says like- 
 wise : ' No doubt there is a wonderful agreement between the functions of 
 different organs ; hut does this harmony require another being outside the 
 organism f — Lessons on the Proofs of the Existence of God, p. 458. 
 
 ^ Aristotle, Phys. lib. ii. 8 (Berlin ed., 199, b. 28) : u ykf hm h rS i,iXu ii 
 
IMMANENT FINALITY. 331 
 
 of acting according to the idea of a whole possible by its 
 causality. And as in the naachine one wheel does not pro- 
 duce another, for a stronger reason one machine does not 
 produce others, by employing for this other matter (which it 
 should organize). Besides, it does not replace of itself the lost 
 parts ; it does not repair the faults of the original construction 
 by the aid of the other parts ; it does not restore itself when 
 disorder has entered it, — all which things, on the other hand, 
 we may meet with in an organized being. An organized 
 being is not, then, a mere machine, having only the motive 
 force ; it possesses in it a formative virtue, and communicates 
 it to materials that have it not, by organizing them; and this 
 formative virtue, which propagates itself, cannot be explained 
 by the motive force alone (by mechanism).'^ 
 
 In a word, the works of nature are distinguished from the 
 works of art by the three following differences: — 1st, The 
 organized being has a formative virtue : the germ successively 
 assimilates all the particles it borrows from the external world ; 
 2d, It has a reparative virtue : when it is injured it repairs 
 itself (in this sense it is said that nature is the best physician ; 
 it is even known that after wounds and even mutilations the 
 different parts are often spontaneously reproduced) ; 3d, In 
 fine, it has a reproduetive virtue, for the species perpetuate 
 themselves by the law of generation. 
 
 These differences are so visible that they have never escaped 
 the observers of nature and the defenders of final causes. 
 ' Let us confine ourselves,' ■ says Fenelon, ' to the animal" 
 machiae. There are three things in it that cannot be too 
 much admired : 1st, It has in itself wherewith to defend 
 itself against those that would attack and destroy it ; 2d, It 
 has wherewith to renew itself by food ; 3d, It has wherewith 
 to perpetuate its species by generation. What would be 
 thought of a machine that should flee to purpose, that 
 should recoil, defend itself, and escape in order to preserve 
 itself, when it was sought to break it ? What is more beau- 
 
 ' Critiqui of the Judgment, § Ixiv. 
 
332 BOOK II. CHAPTER II. 
 
 tiful than a machine that repairs and renews itself incessantly? 
 What would be said of a watchmaker who could make watches 
 spontaneously producing others without end, so that the two 
 iirst watches should be sufficient to multiply and perpetuate 
 the species on the earth V ^ 
 
 It is evident that F^n^lon mentions nearly the same charac- 
 teristic differences as Kant ; only, in place of seeing therein a 
 difficulty, he makes use of them as an a fortiori. From these 
 differences between nature and art he concludes not that the 
 cause of nature is not an art, but rather that it is an art very 
 superior to ours. According to Kant, the organization of nature 
 has nothing analogous with any of the causalities we know, 
 and it cannot be conceived and explained exactly by analogy 
 with human art. F^n^lon is right in saying that the art of 
 nature is superior to human art. But are we at liberty to 
 conclude from the one to the other ? Is not nature rather an 
 analogue of life than an analogue of art ? Far from being like 
 human intelligence, it would be the very principle from which 
 human intelligence is itself derived, and the industry of man 
 would only be a particular and entirely relative case of this 
 universal art. 
 
 This distinction of Kant between nature and art attaches 
 to another profound theory of the same thinker, which has 
 had the greatest influence on the further development of 
 German philosophy. I mean the theory of internal finality, 
 which we have often mentioned, but to which it is necessary 
 to revert. 
 
 According to Kant, there are two species of finality-" — 
 internal and external or relative. 
 
 ' Finality purely external — that is, the utility of one thing 
 for another — is never more than relative,' and ' only exists 
 accidentally in the thing to which it is attributed.' ^ In fact, 
 this finality always supposes something else than itself, and is 
 always hypothetical. If the sand of the sea is fittest for the 
 
 ^ F^nelon, TraiU de Ve.xiatence de Dieu, Book i. chap. ii. 
 ^ Critique of the Judgment, § Ixii. 
 
IMMANENT FINALITY. 333 
 
 growth of pines, this property can only be considered as an end 
 of nature by supposing that pines themselves are ends of 
 nature, — that is, that it has resolved beforehand that there 
 shall be pines. In this sort of finality things are never 
 considered but as means, but these means can only be such 
 if there are beings that are considered immediately and in 
 themselves as ends. But these beings are precisely those 
 that show an internal finality. The first, then, are only ends 
 relatively to the second, and the latter alone can afford room 
 for an absolute teleological judgment. 
 
 This profound distinction of Kant has some analogy with 
 that which he sets up in his ethics between suhjedive and 
 objective ends, whence arise two sorts of imperatives — the 
 hypothetical and the categorical. Subjective ends are those 
 that are always subordinated to other ends, and which conse- 
 quently are only means, and only afford room for conditional 
 rules : If you wish to be rich, be economical. Objective ends 
 are absolute, and afford room for absolute precepts : Be 
 sincere, whether it please you or not. So here external finality 
 is hypothetical. Eeindeer in northern lands are food destined 
 for a man, if it be supposed that there must be men in those 
 countries. But why should that be necessary ? On the 
 other hand, in order that an object of nature may be con- 
 sidered immediately as an end, and afford room for an abso- 
 lute teleological judgment, we must, without leaving that 
 object, and without needing to subordinate it to another, 
 remark in it that 'the possibility of the form could not be 
 derived from the simple laws of nature,' that ' this form is 
 contingent on the eyes of reason,' and ' does not seem pos- 
 sible but by it ' — in a word, that it is such that ' the whole 
 contains the possibility of the parts.' ^ 
 
 Such, in the first place, is the character common to every 
 
 end, the works of art as well as those of nature. But for 
 
 a work of nature something more is necessary — namely, ' that 
 
 it be at once its own cause and effect ;^ that is, as we have 
 
 1 Critique of the Judgment, § Ixiii, ' Ibid. 
 
334 BOOK II. CHAPTER II. 
 
 seen, that it be able to organize, repair, and reproduce itself. 
 'The leaves of the tree are the products of the tree, but 
 they also, in their turn, preserve it.' Conseq[uently, an end of 
 nature is a production in which ' all the parts are reciprocally 
 ends and means'^ Such is the character of internal finality. 
 
 We see here one of the sources of all the later German 
 philosophy. The internal finality of this philosopher became 
 the immanent finality of the Hegelian school.^ Instead of 
 conceiving a supreme cause, supf-a-mundane, constructing 
 works of art, as man makes houses and tools (which would 
 seem to suppose a pre-existing matter), the entire German^ 
 pantheism has conceived an intra-mundane cause, realizing its 
 end in itself. The physical theology of the 18 th century, 
 according to the Hegelians, was exclusively founded on 
 external finality, — that is, on utility, — and conceived all the 
 objects of nature as fabricated for an external end. The idea 
 that was formed of nature did not much differ from that of 
 the Epicureans — namely, that therein all was mechanical, and 
 that there was nothing internal in the universe. In place of 
 chance, an external motive cause was brought in, a deus ex 
 machind. But this cause only produced inert works, none of 
 which was in itself a source of action, and whose only end 
 was to serve for something else than themselves. However, 
 Leibnitz had already, by his notion of force, restored the 
 principle of an internal activity of things; the internal finality 
 of Kant completed the same idea. But then, if things are ho 
 longer inert blocks, moved from without, but all living, ani- 
 mated within, the world itself ought no longer to be conceived 
 as an inert and dead mass, but as a veritable whole, as an 
 organism. 
 
 Hegel's doctrine on final causes may be reduced to these 
 three fundamental points : — 
 
 ^ Critique of the Judgment, § Ixv. 
 
 ' 'Kant,' says Hegel, 'in bringing to light tJie internal conformity of things to 
 their end, has called attention to tlie intimate nature of the idea, and, above all, 
 to the idea of life.' — Logic, % 204. 
 
IMMANENT FINALITY. 335 
 
 1st, There are final causes in nature, and even all is final 
 cause. The domain of efficient causes is that of blind neces- 
 sity. The final cause is the sole veritable cause, for it alone 
 has in itself the reason of its determinations.^ 
 
 2d, It is liot necessary to conceive the final cause in the 
 form that it has in consciousness,— that is, as an anticipated 
 representation of the end. The ends that are in nature are not 
 like the ends we realize, which are the result of choice, fore- 
 sight, and voluntary activity. There are two ways of attain- 
 ing an end, — the one, of which we find an example iu 
 human industry ; the other, which is rational, without being 
 conscious and reflective, and which is the activity of 
 nature.^ 
 
 3d, The finality of nature is an immanent, internal finality. 
 It is not, as in the works of human industry, an external 
 cause that produces certain means to attain an end that is 
 foreign to them, — the cause, the means, and the end consti- 
 tuting three terms separated from each other. In nature all 
 is united in the same principle — the end. realizes itself. The 
 cause attains its end by self-development. The image of this 
 development is in the seed that contains the whole being that 
 it has to realize. It attains its end without going outside 
 itself. It may be said of entire nature what Kant said 
 of the organized being, that in it everything is reciprocally 
 
 ' ' The distinction between the final and the efficient cause is of the utmost 
 importance. The efficient cause belongs to the sphere of blind necessity, and 
 of what is not yet developed ; it appears as passing to a foreign terminus, and as 
 losing, in being realized, its primitive nature. The efficient cause is only a cause 
 virtually and for us. The final cause, on the otJier hand, is staled as containing in 
 itself its determination, or its effect, which, in the efficient cause, appears as a 
 foreign term ; wherefore, in acting, the final cause does not go beyond itself, but 
 develops within itself, and is at the end what it was at the beginning, and in its 
 primitive state. This is the true first cause.' — Hegel, Logic, Fr. Tr. t. ii. p. 321. 
 ' Because the mechanical world and finality both are, it does not follow that 
 they both have the same reality ; and as they are opposed, the first question is, 
 "Which of the two contains the truth ? But as they both are, a more precise and 
 higher question is, whether there be not a third principle that forms the truth 
 ot both, or else whether one of them does not form the truth of the other. But 
 finality has been here set forth as the truth of mechanism and chemistry.' — 
 Ibid. ii. p. 334. 
 
 '^ On this second point see the following chapter. 
 
336 BOOK II. CHAPTER II. 
 
 end and means. Internal finality thus becomes immanent 
 finality.^ 
 
 We have no difficulty in admitting, for our part, that 
 internal finality is likewise immanent finality, but on con- 
 dition that the second term shall have exactly the same 
 sense as the first, and shall add nothing more to it ; 
 but from this immanent finality to infer an immanent 
 cause of finality, is to put into the conclusion what is 
 not in the premises, for it is saying that every cause that 
 pursues ends spontaneously and internally is, therefore, a 
 first cause. 
 
 Let us remark, besides, that the opposition of transcendence 
 and immanence is very far from being so absolute in reality 
 as it appears in the eyes of the German philosophers. There 
 is no doctrine of transcendence but implies at the same time 
 some presence of God in the world, and, consequently, some 
 immanence. There is no doctrine of immanence but implies 
 some distinction between God and the world, and, conse- 
 quently, some transcendence. Absolute transcendence would 
 be such a separation of God and the world that they 
 would no longer have anything in common — that God could 
 not know the world, nor the world know God. Absolute 
 immanence would be such an identity of God, and the world 
 that the cause would be but one with the effect, the substance 
 with its phenomena, the absolute with the relative. But 
 there is no example in philosophy of either the one or the 
 other of these conceptions. Even in the scholastic theism, 
 or in that of Descartes and Leibnitz, whoever will fathom the 
 theory of the divinus concursus, or of the continued creation, 
 will see profound traces of the doctrine of immanence. Con- 
 versely, in the pantheism of Spinoza or Hegel, whoever will 
 reflect, on the distinction of Natura naturans and Natura 
 
 ' ' Finality is not external to nature, it is immanent in it. The seed virtually 
 contains all the constituent parts of the plant that have to be produced, and 
 its development is only directed towards preservation. True teleology consists 
 in considering nature as independent in its proper quality . . . ' — Philosophy 
 of Nature, § 245. 
 
IMMANENT FINALITY. 337 
 
 naturata, of the Idea and Nature, will clearly recognise a 
 doctrine of transcendence. 
 
 Thus when it is asked, as by the Hegelians, whether the 
 supreme cause is within or outside nature, the question is badly 
 stated, for in every solution the cause will always be at once 
 within and outside nature. It is a question of degree. But it is 
 true that the physico-theological proof by itself does not furnish 
 sufficient data to fix with precision the degree of distinction 
 between the cause of nature and nature itself. If, for instance, 
 it is required to proceed to a substantial distinction, whoever 
 comprehends the terms of a philosophical question will allow 
 that such a distinction is not contained in the premises of the 
 argument of final causes ; but no more is it necessary to demand 
 it, for it is not that that is in question. No one pretends to 
 resolve with a single argument all the difficulties of philo- 
 sophy, and, conversely, one ought not to require it. The 
 problem of transcendence in the strict sense of the word — 
 that is to say, the conflict between theism and pantheism — • 
 cannot be decided by the proof of final causes,^ A God the 
 soul of the world, as was the God of the Stoics, is, indeed, in 
 no way excluded by the proof of final causes ; but, even on 
 this hypothesis, God would still be distinct from the world, 
 as the cause from its effect, and this distinction suffices here. 
 
 Even in the philosophy of Hegel there is a profound dif- 
 ference between things and their cause or reason. If we 
 consider an individual organized being, Hegel will not say 
 that the cause of this being is in the individual itself as such. 
 Certainly not ; it is in the idea of the species. This idea, so 
 far as it is absolute and immanent, is very distinct from 
 the individual that manifests it, for the latter passes away, 
 while it remains. What is true of the individual is true of 
 the species. No species is its own cause, nor suffices for 
 itself. The cause of humanity as a species ought to be 
 sought in the universal type that constitutes the animal king- 
 
 ' The true point gf debate between theism and pantheism is the explanation 
 of consciousness and the ego, 
 
 Y 
 
338 BOOK II. CHAPTER II. 
 
 dom, and the cause of the animal, as well as 6f the vegetable 
 kingdom, ought to be sought in the idea of life in general. 
 In fine, vitality in its turn is still only a form of the universal 
 principle which manifests itself first by mechanism, then by 
 chemistry, then by organism, and finally by mind. We shall 
 thus distinguish, even in the philosophy of Hegel, the par- 
 ticular beings given by experience from the internal causes 
 that produce them ; we shall distinguish nature, and idea. 
 Since nature is externalized idea,^ it clearly follows that the 
 one of these terms is not the other. For it may always be 
 asked. Why did not the idea remain quiet ? Why did it 
 come out from itself 1 It is clear that that is a new mode of 
 existence for it, and, consequently, even in the philosophy of 
 Hegel, the supreme cause is apart from nature. It is at once 
 apart and within ; and all profound theology has always 
 taught this. 
 
 Is it true, meanwhile, that the theory of internal finality, 
 such as Kant constituted it, excludes all transcendence in 
 the first cause, and absolutely contradicts what Hegel calls 
 finite theology ^ — that is to say, theism ? and, conversely, is 
 
 • ' The absolute liberty of the idea consists in this, that it resolres to prodiKe 
 itself outside as nature.' — Philosophy of Nature, §244. ' The absolute liberty of 
 the idea consists in this, that it decides to derive freely from itself the moment 
 of its particular existence, to separate from itself, — in a word, to place itself as 
 nature. ' — Logic, § cliv. 
 
 ' If God is self-sufficient, how comes He to produce something absolutely dis- 
 similar ? The divine idea just consists in producing itself outside, in sending 
 forth the other from itself, and in then resuming it, in order to be subjectivity 
 and mind.'— PAs7. of Nature, § 247. 
 
 ' Nature being the idea under the form of the other, it is not only external in 
 relation to the idea and to the subjective existence of the idea under form of 
 mind, it is, besides, external to itself; externality constitutes its essential character, 
 its nature.' — Ibid. 
 
 ^ This term, fnite theology, is one of those cleverly -chosen expressions by 
 which a philosophical school finds means to throw back on an adverse school 
 the suspicion and reproach by which it is itself threatened. If there is a finite 
 theology, it would seem to be that which identifies God with the world, and 
 that confounds the Absolute Mind with human pfiilosophy. On the other hand, 
 a doo;trine which, wrongly or rightly, conceives a complete and perfect Absolute 
 apart from the world, and only sees in the world an image, reflection, a feeble 
 expression of God, is as badly as possible represented by the expression finite 
 theology. 
 
IMMANENT FINALITY. 339 
 
 theism condemned, as he maintains, and limited to external 
 finality ? 
 
 These are very arbitrary views, forced consequences, drawn 
 from premises that do not contain them. External finality is 
 a relative and subordinate finality, but it is inseparably con- 
 nected with internal finality, as has been seen above ; ^ it is 
 the converse of it. Hegel himself regards it as we do ; for 
 he owns that finite theology rests on a just idea, which is, 
 ' that nature has not its end in itself.'^ But the theist says 
 no more. Finite theology is by no means bound to af&rm 
 that all has been created since the beginning of the world for 
 the use of man. Descartes and Leibnitz long ago repudiated 
 that doctrine. But transcendental theology, as well as imma- 
 nent, is entitled to say that the different degrees of nature 
 are steps of a ladder that the divine thought successively 
 mounts in order to realize itself, and that the lower are steps 
 to the higher. As far as Aristotle and Hegel admit that final 
 causes have need of efficient, to the same extent finite theology 
 will admit that efficient causes are made for final causes. As 
 to the more or less popular forms which may have been 
 employed to express this doctrine, it is hardly philosophical to 
 make use of them against the doctrine itself, for it is in its 
 highest expression, and not in its most superficial meaning, 
 that it must be taken.' 
 
 ' See above, Book i. chap. vi. p. 267, and Appendix, p. 501. 
 
 ' ' Man,' he aaya, ' considers himself, and with good reason, as an end in 
 regard to natural agents. The consideration of nature, in this point of view, is 
 that of finite theology. This theology rests on a just idea, that nature does not 
 contain in itself the absolute end — the last end. ' — Encyclopoedia of Philosophic 
 Sciences, Philosophy of Nature, % 245. 
 
 * It is not even true historically that the physical theology of the 18th 
 century is exclusively dominated by the utilitarian point of view, or that of 
 external finality. Paley's book, for instance, hardly appeals to this point of view, 
 and rests mainly on the internal finality of organized beings. The existence of a 
 supreme cause of nature is deduced quite as well, and even much better, from 
 internal finality than from external utility, or from pure mechanism. For a 
 cause powerful enough to make a work having in itself the principle and end of 
 its action, is superior to that which would be obliged incessantly to put its hand 
 to the work. The same is true of the frivolities with which Hegel, after Voltaire, 
 and with less wit than he, reproaches the final causalists, but which no more 
 belong to the doctrine of transcendence than to that of immanence. 
 
340 BOOK II. CHAPTER II. 
 
 If infinite finality is impossible without external, conversely 
 external finality is only a relative point of view, which, taken 
 higher, may return to internal finality. In effect, instead of 
 considering each organism by itself, let us consider them all 
 in their totality. We shall see that they are all reciprocally 
 means and ends, like the internal parts of an organism. It is 
 thus, for instance, that the vegetables serve the animals and 
 the animals the vegetables, whether in taking from or in 
 restoring to the air the elements that are useful to them 
 respectively, — these oxygen, those carbon ; or, again, in serving 
 as nutriment for each other, — on the one hand as food, on the 
 other as manure. It is also evident that all living beings 
 nourish each other, in so far as the superior animals, and 
 even man, afford food to the infinitely small ones, whose func- 
 tion seems to be to preserve life in the universe by destroying 
 putrefied matter, which would poison the air and deprive it of 
 every vital property. In fine, living beings in general are in 
 a perpetual commerce with matter in general ; and the circula- 
 tion of the elements constitutes in some sort an internal life 
 of the earth, analogous to that of the individual organism. 
 Such analogies cannot be rejected by Hegel, for no philosopher 
 has pushed them farther. 
 
 Thus we have here a sort of internal finality; but it is 
 not absolute, since things are not founded in a unique being, 
 and all ' natural beings are external to each other, exist out- 
 side and independently of each other.'^ Hence it follows 
 that, in considering them separately, they seem only to be 
 means, and this is what is called external finality. It will, 
 therefore, be allowable, if they are taken thus, and not in 
 their totality, to give prominence to their' external utility — a 
 point of view that does not exclude the other, and is closely 
 united to it. 
 
 If, on the one hand, the transcendental theology is no way 
 bound to the idea of an external finality, and especially to the 
 abuse that may be made of that finality, on the other hand it 
 1 Philosophy of Nature, § 249. 
 
IMMANENT FINALITY. 341 
 
 4s no way contradicted by the idea of an internal finality, 
 such as Kant explained it. That a supra-mundane cause has 
 produced a work manifesting an internal finality, and even 
 realizing that finality by its own powers, presents nothing 
 contradictory ; for there is still a distinction to be made here, 
 and every intet'nal finality is not accompanied by an internal 
 motor, nor conversely. In a statue, for instance, the finality 
 is internal, for a statue is not like a machine, an instrument 
 for making something : it is its own end, and yet it does 
 not realize itself ; the motive cause is outside of it. A trans- 
 cendent cause may therefore produce a work that has an 
 internal end. Conversely, a workman who employs his arms 
 to move a wheel is the internal and immanent cause of the 
 motion of his arms, and yet the end is external ; for the 
 arms do not work for themselves, nor for the rest of the body, 
 but for an external machine : they are machines of machine^ 
 In fine, one may conceive a transcendent cause that should 
 produce a work animated by an internal principle, and acting 
 for an internal end. Thus the father is in relation to his 
 son what the Scholastics called a transitive cause ; and yet the 
 son has an internal principle of action, and that principle 
 moves according to an internal finality. According to this, 
 one does not see why the supreme cause of nature should not 
 have produced works (no doubt derived from it), but not purely 
 mechanical, and having in themselves the cause and end of 
 their evolution. 
 
 The doctrine of a supra-mundane cause not only does not 
 exclude the idea of an internal principle of action in nature, 
 but it may almost be said to require it; and it may be 
 maintained very forcibly, with Leibnitz, that it is only on 
 this condition that pantheism — that is, absolute immanence — • 
 will be overcome. Por it is not for maintaining a certain 
 degree of immanence that a philosophy can be characterised 
 as pantheism ; at that rate there would be none that had not 
 that chai-acter. But the proper character of pantheism (if it 
 knows what it means) is to refuse to finite beings all proper 
 
342 BOOK II. CHAPTER II. 
 
 activity, in order to restore it to the absolute cause and sub- 
 stance. If, then, this absolute cause or substance is believed 
 to be distinct from the world, supra-mundane, transcendental, 
 that can only be by attributing to the finite a proper 
 reality, and that proper reality can only be an internal 
 activity or an internal finality, or both together. If, on the 
 other hand, the doctrine of absolute immanence be maintained, 
 it must be recognised that the finite, considered as such, has 
 nothing that is internal and proper to it. Hence nature, as 
 phenomenon, — that is, perceptible nature, that which alone 
 we know by experience, — will only be composed of appearances 
 and shadows, having in themselves neither their principle of 
 action nor their end, and having no more title than the 
 artificial works of man to a soi-disant internal activity. 
 
 Another objection of the Hegelians^ is that in the 
 hypothesis of finite theology, or of transcendency, things form 
 an indefinite series of means and ends, of which the limit is 
 not to be seen. The true final cause, on the other hand, 
 ought to form a circle, and, being the realization of itself, to 
 return to itself, — that is, to be found at the end what it is at 
 the beginning. Be it, for instance, the immanent principle 
 of nature that the Hegelians call the idea, this principle, 
 issuing from itself, will become physical nature, dead nature. 
 It at first shows itself as foreign as possible to itself in 
 mechanism or pure motion; then, in chemistry, it begins to 
 make a certain effort to return to itself, to arrive at an end ; 
 but it is an impotent effort. This chemical labour, perpetuated 
 and becoming durable, is the organism. Here the return move- 
 ment is still more visible ; the effort to attain unity is more 
 efficacious; there is not merely combination, but concentra- 
 tion. Finally, above the organism rises the mind, in which 
 the return of nature to the idea is completely manifested, first 
 in the individual or subjective consciousness ; then in the con- 
 sciousness of peoples and races, the objective; and finally in 
 
 ^ Kuno Fischer, Logik und Metaphysik, 2 Auflage, Heidelberg, 1865, p. 602 
 et beq. 
 
IMMANENT FINALITY. 343 
 
 the absolute consciousness — that is to say, in art, religion, and 
 philosophy. At this last terminus the idea has realized 
 itself, it has found itself again after having lost itseK. It 
 believed itself distinct from itself, and it was still itself ; 
 and it is still it that arrives at self-consciousness in philosophy.^ 
 Here, then, is a true end — the world forms a circle ; while in 
 the other theology there is no end, and the world incessantly 
 seeks one, but does not attain it. Such would be the advantage 
 of the doctrine of immanence over that of transcendence. 
 
 It is, in our opinion, a pure illusion. I own that, in the 
 conception of a world distinct from God, each being, always 
 being imperfect, cannot be considered as an absolute end ; 
 man himself is not the absolute end of nature. If we suppose 
 above man other creatures superior to him, we no more con- 
 ceive that any of them could be an absolute end. The world 
 is thus an indefinite line of which we cannot see the limit. 
 But is it otherwise in the doctrine of immanence ? In the one 
 as in the other one does not see a terminus ; and as to saying 
 that, in the latter, the development of the world is represented 
 under the figure of a curved line, and in the former of a 
 straight line (except that these are geometrical metaphors of 
 mediocre clearness), there is no reason to make such a dis- 
 tinction ; for, on the hypothesis of transcendence, God being 
 at once the end and the cause of creation, the latter tends to 
 return to Him after having removed from Him, exactly in the 
 same way as in the opposite doctrine. Yet once more, the 
 curve will never be finished ; but it wiE no more be so accord- 
 ing to Hegel than to Leibnitz. The finite will never arrive 
 at an adequate consciousness of the absolute, the mind will 
 never realize the idea in its totality, which would be necessary 
 to complete the circle. In fact, so long as the idea has not 
 
 * ' In itself nature is a living whole. . . . The tendency of its moTement is 
 that the idea place Itself as what it is in itself, or what comes to the same 
 thing, that the idea issue from that externality, which is death, to reduplicate 
 on itself, and become first organism and then mind (Oeist), which is the la^t 
 end of nature, and the absolute reality of the idea. ' — Philosophy of Nature, 
 §261. 
 
344 
 
 BOOK II. CHAPTER II. 
 
 an absolute consciousness equal to itself, a perfect representa-^ 
 tion of itself, so long as the divine knowledge is not equal to 
 the divine being, the intelligence to the intelligible, the circle 
 will not be completed. There will always be an immense 
 abyss between the last degree and the absolute. Thus, on 
 both hypotheses, there is an incessant labour of nature to 
 attain an end it will never reach ; but this impossibility is 
 much more irrational on the hypothesis of immanence than 
 on that of transcendence. That a relative world, distinct 
 from God, never attains the absolute, one can comprehend. 
 But that an absolute world can never return to the principle 
 from which it^emanates is contradictory. But who can have 
 seriously maintained, except in a first moment of intoxication 
 now passed, that philosophy, and in particular the philosophy 
 of Hegel,. is adequate to the absolute itself? Cannot another 
 philosophy be conceived superior to it, and another higher 
 still, ad infinitum ? So long as it is only a question of a 
 human philosophy, there can be no question of a philosophy 
 without error, obscurity, and ignorance. What ! you are the 
 absolute ; and to know the cause of the smallest phenomenon, 
 you are obliged to wait till a scientist has made experiment — 
 has weighed, measured, calculated ! An absolute that in- 
 cessantly seeks and never finds itself is nothing else than 
 a relative. Hence it must either be acknowledged that there 
 is no absolute, that the idea is a pure chimera, that only 
 nature is, and is self-sufficient, which is the negation of 
 Hegelian idealism ; or it must be maintained that the idea, 
 while manifesting itself in nature, is yet entirely itself only 
 in itself, and before being externalized, which is the essence 
 of the doctrine of transcendence. 
 
 To sum up : the idea of a nature, endued with internal 
 activity, and working to an internal, although relative and 
 subordinate finality, — this idea, which is nothing else than 
 the thought of Leibnitz well understood, contains nothing 
 that excludes a supra-mundane cause. This cause is dis- 
 tinguished from nature in that it is .beforehand, entirely and 
 
IMMANENT FINALITY. 345 
 
 }n itself an absolute ; while nature can only express and 
 taanifest this absolute through time and space, without ever 
 completely realizing it. It is this very impotence of nature 
 that should force us to conclude that it is not itself the 
 absolute, for an absolute that incessantly seeks without finding 
 itself is a contradictory notion. If, then, something of this 
 kind be admitted, it ought, if we know what we mean, to be 
 distinguished from nature, at least so far that nature may 
 develop and move without the first principle being involved 
 in its movement. But this is precisely what we call tran- 
 scendentalism well understood. 
 
 But if it were sought to press still farther the terms of 
 the distinction, and to derive from them either a distinction 
 of substances, or the creation ex nihilo, or some other more 
 explicitly dualistic doctrine, we would say yet once more that 
 this is to pass beyond the sphere of our subject, that nothing 
 obliges us to consider these problems, and that finality does 
 not contain in this point of view any particular element of 
 solution. 
 
 In concluding this chapter, we shall recapitulate by saying — 
 1st, That finality, not being a subjective view of our mind, but 
 a real law of nature, demands a real cause ; 2d, That the finality 
 of nature is indeed, as Kant has said, an internal finality, and 
 in that sense immanent, this second term signifying nothing 
 more than the first. But this relative immanence of natural 
 finality does not imply an absolute immanence, and, on the 
 contrary, can only be comprehended by its relation to a 
 transcendent terminus. 
 
 These two difRculties overcome, we are now face to face 
 with the true problem : Is the supreme cause of finality an 
 intelligent cause, a mind ? This will be the object of our last 
 inquiries. 
 
CHAPTEE III. 
 
 INSTINCTIVE AND INTENTIONAL FINALITY. 
 
 ' /^^NTE ought not to conceive the end,' says Hegel, ' under the 
 ^-^ form it assumes in consciousness, — that is to say, under 
 the form of a representation.'* According to this principle, 
 the end is not an effect realized according to a preconceived 
 idea: it is the eternal conformity of things to their idea 
 or essence. Finality is thus not merely immanent, it is 
 unconscious. 
 
 We find a striking instance of unconscious finality in the 
 instinct of animals. 
 
 ' The obscurity in which instinct is enveloped,' says Hegel, 
 ' and the difficulty of laying hold of it, arise entirely from 
 this, that the end can only be understood as an internal 
 notion (innere Begriff), whence it follows that all explanations 
 and relations that are only founded on the understanding are 
 inadequate to instinct. What chiefly causes the difficulty is 
 that the relation of finality is usually conceived as an external 
 relation, and that it is thought that finality only exists where 
 there is consciousness. But instinct is the activity that acts 
 without consciousness in order to an end {die auf bevmsstlose 
 Weise wirkende Zweckthatigheit). The animal does not know 
 its ends as ends'; but this activity that unconsciously acts in 
 pursuit of ends is what Aristotle calls ^v<ri,<i.'^ 
 
 ' This artistic instinct,' says he elsewhere,* ' appears as an 
 intentional and wise act of nature (als zweckmdssiges Thun, als 
 Weisheit der Natur), and it has always been regarded as a 
 surprising faculty, because it has been the habit only to see 
 reason in an external finality. Plastic instinct is, in fact, 
 ^ Logic, %Wi. '^ Philosophy of Nature, %Zm. ^Ibid.%Z%6. 
 
FINALITY ANB INTENTION. 347 
 
 analogous to the conscious mind ; but one should not, therefore, 
 conceive the final activity of nature as a mind that is self- 
 conscious. As artistic instinct, the notion is only the internal 
 virtuality of the animal (das Innere an sich, the internal in 
 itself), an unconscious worker. It is only in thought, in the 
 human artist, that the notion exists for itself 
 
 Thus, according to Hegel, instinct presents us with the type 
 of an unconscious finality, and shows lis the possibility of it, 
 and this is the true notion of nature. Consciousness is only 
 one of the forms of finality ; it is not its adequate and abso- 
 lute form. It need not be supposed, however, that, in 
 Hegel's view, instinct itself should be the last word in finality. 
 Before aU, in his thought, finality is notion, concept, or at 
 least an element of the notion, and instinct is only a form 
 of it. It is only in the Hegelian Left that finality has been 
 more and more confounded with the blind activity of. nature. 
 
 But the school that has most decidedly adopted and 
 defended the doctrine of instinctive finality is that of Schopen- 
 hauer. This school has insisted much on the principle of 
 finality ; but, like the Hegelian school, it asserts an unconscious 
 finality, and finds in instinct the type of it. 
 
 ' There is no contradiction whatever,' says Frauenstadt, ' in 
 admitting that a force, a plastic instinct, by a blind tendency 
 creates works which then are revealed to the analytic under- 
 standing as conformed to an end. An unconscious finality is 
 not, then, a contradiction in adjecto ; and from the denial of a 
 personal creator of the world, aiming at conscious ends, there 
 no more follows denial of the harmony of the world than 
 the denial of the harmony of the organs follows from the 
 affirmation that a plastic organic virtue acts unconsciously in 
 plants and animals. The Aristotelian opposition between the 
 efficient and the final cause is in no way identical with the 
 opposition between the unconscious and the intelligent cause. 
 For the final cause itself may be unconscious.'^ 
 
 ^ Frauenstadt, Briefe ilber die Schopefihauerache Philosophie (Leipzig, 1854), 
 Letter 21, p. ii2. 
 
348 BOOK 11. CHAPTEK III. 
 
 Schopenhauer expresses himself in the same way: 'The 
 admiration and astonishment which are wont to seize us in 
 view of the iniinite finality manifested in the construction of 
 the organized being, rests at bottom on the natural but false 
 supposition that this agreement of the parts with each other 
 and with the whole of the organism, as well as with its 
 external ends, is realized by the same principle that enables 
 us to conceive and judge it, and, consequently, by means of 
 representation; that, in a word, as it exists for the under- 
 standing, so it only exists ly the understanding. No doubt, 
 we can realize nothing regular or conformed to an end, except 
 under the condition of the conception of that end ; but we 
 are not warranted to transfer these conditions to nature, 
 which is itself a prius of all intellect, and whose action is 
 absolutely distinct from ours. It brings to pass what appears 
 to us so wonderfully teleological, without reflection and with- 
 out concept of the end, for it is without representation, a 
 phenomenon of secondary origin.'-' 
 
 'It seems,' says the same author again,^ 'that qature has 
 meant to give us a brilliant comment of its productive 
 activity in the artistic instinct of the animals ; for these 
 show us most evidently that beings may work to an end with 
 the greatest surety and precision, without knowing it, and 
 without having the least conception of it. . . . The artistic 
 instincts of insects throw much light on the action of the will 
 without knowledge, which is manifested in the internal springs 
 of the organism and in its formation. . . . The insects will 
 the end in general, without knowing it, precisely like nature 
 when it acts according to final causes. They have not even 
 the choice of means in general ; it is only the detail that in 
 particular cases is left to their knowledge.' 
 
 Such are the reasons of the adherents of unconscious 
 
 finality. But this doctrine, we have said, may assume two 
 
 forms : finality may be considered as an instinct, which is 
 
 the doctrine of Schopenhauer, or as an idea, which is the 
 
 ' Die Welt als Wille, t. ii. chap. xxvi. ' Ibid. 
 
FINALITY AND INTENTION. 349 
 
 doctrine of HegeL Let us first consider the former. Tiie 
 latter will be the subject of the following chapter. 
 
 To attribute to nature an instinctive activity, is to say that 
 nature acts like bees and the ant, in place of acting like 
 man; it is zoomorphism substituted for anthropomorphism. 
 We see no advantage in it. 
 
 In fact, the true difficulty, the profound difficulty in this 
 question, is that we can only explain the creative activity of 
 nature by comparing it to something that is in nature itself, — 
 that is to say, which is precisely one of the effects of that 
 activity. Kant expresses this in these words : ' Can the 
 internal possibility of nature, acting spontaneously {which first 
 renders possible all art, and perhaps even reason), be derived 
 from another art still, but superhuman?' This, the true, 
 the only difficulty, evidently applies to the hypothesis of a 
 primitive instinct quite as well as to that of a primitive 
 intelligence. Instinct is not less a fact of nature than intelli- 
 gence itself; and in the one case, as in the other, the effect 
 win be transformed into the cause. 
 
 But if one is content to say, like Schopenhauer, that instinct 
 is only a commentary of the creative activity, — ^that is to say, 
 a symbol, an example' that may give some idea of it, — it may 
 be asked wherein this commentary is more luminous than that 
 which we find in intelligence, or in mechanism properly so 
 called. There are, in fact, three modes of action in nature, — 
 mechanism, instinct, and thought. Of these three modes, two 
 only are distinctly known to us, mechanism and intelligence. 
 Instinct is the most obscure, most unexplained. Why, of the 
 three modes of action of nature, should the most luminouls 
 commentary of the creative activity be precisely that of which 
 nothing is understood ? All science since Descartes tends to 
 suppress occult qualities. Instinct is essentially an occult 
 quality. To choose it to explain finality, when it is itself 
 the most incomprehensible instance of finality, is not this to 
 explain olscwrum per dbscurius ? In fine, of three modes of 
 action of nature, one inferior, another superior, the other 
 
350 BOOK II. CHAPTER III. > 
 
 intermediate, why choose as type precisely that which is only 
 a middle term ? Mechanism is inferior, but it has the advan- 
 tage of being the simplest of all. Intelligence is the most 
 complicated, but it has the advantage of being the most 
 elevated term. Instinct presents neither the one nor the 
 other of these advantages. A middle phenomenon, it seems, 
 indeed, to be only a passage from the one to the other, from 
 mechanism to intelligence — to be only a more particular and 
 complex case of the first, or the rudimentary state of the last.; 
 In any case, it seems in no way to have the character of a 
 principle. 
 
 In another point of view, instinct is again subject to the 
 same difficulties as intelligence. That is to say, the latter 
 is objected to as only known to us under the condition of 
 organization. Are we warranted, it is said, to suppress this 
 condition, and to conceive in the pure state, and as anterior 
 to nature, a faculty which is only given to us as a result ? 
 Whatever be the weight of this objection, it is as applicable 
 to instinct as to intelligence ; for instinct, like intelligence, is 
 bound to organization : there is no more instinct than intelli- 
 gence in inorganic beings. 
 
 But if the hypothesis of instinctive finality presents no 
 advantage over that of intelligent finality, it presents, on the 
 other hand, much greater difficulties. The question still 
 remains, how a cause attains an end by appropriate means, 
 without having either known that end or chosen the means ? 
 The question must be well answered. Is the idea of end 
 admitted or not ? If admitted, this idea necessarily implies, 
 whether we will or not, that, a given result being predetermined 
 (for instance, seeing or hearing), the efficient cause, which, as 
 such, was capable of taking millions of different directions, has 
 limited the choice of these directions to those that could bring 
 about the required result. But to say that a hidden cause 
 produces this limitation and determination we know not why, 
 is simply to revert to the hypothesis of chance. 
 
 Will it be said that only one of these directions was pos- 
 
FINALITY AND INTENTION. 351 
 
 sible, and that all the others are excluded by the very nature 
 of the cause ? In this case the final cause is set aside in 
 order to revert to the efficient cause, which is Spinozism. 
 What, in fact, does the idea of end do here, and wherein is it 
 end, if each of the effects is contained in that which precedes, 
 and if all together are only the unfolding of the nature of each 
 being ? On this hypothesis, there is no more final cause in 
 physiology than in geometry. 
 
 To say, with Schopenhauer, 'Because finality exists for 
 intelligence, it does not follow that it exists ly intelligence,' 
 is at bottom to suppress finality. We must choose between 
 stebjective and instinctive finality. If finality only exists for 
 intielligence, it does not in reality exist at all ; it is an illusory 
 phenomenon. ' It is our understanding,' says Schopenhauer, 
 ' that, seizing the object by means of its own forms, time, 
 space, causality, first produces the plurality and divisibility of 
 parts and of their functions, and then falls into amazement at 
 the perfect harmony and co-operation of these parts resulting 
 from the original unity, in which, consequently, it admires its 
 own work.'^ If this be so, finality is only a subjective con- 
 ception. But then the objection of Herbart, quoted above,^ 
 recurs : If we carry with us the concept of finality, why not 
 apply it everj'where, and to all things, like causality ? If we 
 only do so in regard to certain objects, it is because these 
 objects present certain special characters. These characters 
 do not come from us ; they must, therefore, have an objective 
 cause. But instinct is not a cause — it is a non-cause ; for, 
 between the indetermination of the instinctive faculty and 
 the strict determination of the end, there is the disproportion 
 of the infinite to the finite. 
 
 For the rest, the inadequacy of Schopenhauer's theory is 
 confirmed even by the acknowledgment and reform of his 
 disciple and successor Hartmann, Avho, without himself 
 advancing to the conception of intelligent finality, yet makes 
 a way of return towards that conception. In fact, Schopen- 
 1 Die Welt ala Wille, chap. xxvi. ' See p. 324. 
 
352 BOOK II. CHAPTER III. 
 
 liauer had completely separated the will and representation 
 (der Wille und die Vorstellung), Eepresentation, which is 
 the foundation of the intellectual act, was, in his view, a 
 merely secondary thing {ganz secundaren Ursprungs). Hart- 
 mann, on the other hand, restores the bond between these two 
 things, and says very justly : ' Tendency is only the empty 
 form of the will, . . . and as every empty form is only an 
 abstraction, volition is existential or actual only in its relation 
 to the representation of a present or future state. No one 
 can really will purely and simply, without willing this or 
 that. A will that does not will something is nothing. It is 
 only by the determination of its content that the will acquires 
 the possibility of existence, and this content is representation. 
 Thus, then, there is no will without representation, as Aristotle 
 had said before : opexTiKov Be ovk dvev ^avTacria'; (Be An. iii. 
 30).'^ 
 
 Herein lies, Hartmann adds, the cause of the error and 
 ' insufficiency (die Ealbheit) of Schopenhauer's philosophy, 
 who only recognised the will as a metaphysical principle, and 
 made representation or the intellect originate materially.' 
 
 Hartmann admits, then, that the wUl is impossible without 
 representation, only with him this representation is at first 
 unconscious. Finality would thus still remain unconscious. 
 And yet a great step would be taken. There would be con- 
 ceded to the first cause the reality of intelligence, save in 
 considering consciousness as only an accessory phenomenon, 
 which remains for discussion. The question would no longer 
 be as to an intelligent cause, but as to an unconscious intelli- 
 gence, which is different. The question changes ground. Can 
 there be representations without consciousness ? Such is 
 now the point of the debate. Hartmann quotes the opinion 
 of Kant and Leibnitz ; but these two authors rather speak of 
 obscure, indistinct perceptions, of an extremely feeble con- 
 sciousness, than of absolutely unconscious perceptions in strict 
 terms. It is not for us further to engage in these questions, 
 
 ^ Philos. des l/nhewussten, A. iv. 
 
riNALITy AND INTENTIOX. 353 
 
 which would remove us too far from the present discussion. 
 In fact, to reintroduce representation, even unconscious, into 
 activity, is partly to return to the Hegelian conception, which 
 reduces finality to notion, concept, idea, and not merely to 
 pure instinct. But this point of view will occupy us in the 
 following chapter. 
 
 This last transformation of hylozoism (for Schopenhauer's 
 philosophy hardly deserves any other name) suffices to show 
 the nullity of the explanation of finality by instinct. But if 
 instinctive finality seems to us inadmissible, we still admit 
 that intentioiud finality has its difficulties, which must be 
 examined more closely. 
 
 The profoundest discussion that we know against inten- 
 tionalism is that of a Hegelian philosopher, Fortlage, in his 
 History of the Proofs of the Mosistence of God} 
 
 This discussion sums up and completes all the difficulties 
 previously enumerated. We reproduce it here. 
 
 ' I. According to the argument of Paley, wherever there is 
 finality, there must be present and in action the conception of 
 an end to be attained, and, consequently, an intelligence in 
 which this concept resides. If, then, a single case can be 
 produced where an end is attained without the concept of an 
 end necessarily intervening, the argument is invalidated. 
 Consequently, to maintain this argument, I am forced, wherever 
 nature by a blind impulse, or by a secret force of preservation, 
 attains its end of itself, I am forced, I say, to recur without 
 necessity to the creator. For instance, if the end {Zweck) of 
 self-preservation is manifested in the animal, and attains its 
 object (^Ziel) by the taking of food, if the end (Zweck) of hard- 
 ness is manifested in the stone, as the force of cohesion of its 
 atoms, and attains its goal (Ziel) by their reciprocal attraction, 
 I can no longer see the end in the natural forces themselves 
 (for instance, in cohesion hardness, in hunger the instinct of 
 
 ' Daralellung und Kriiih der Beweiae furs Daseyn Oottes, Heidelberg 1840, 
 p. 237 et serj. — Bedenken gegen die Paley ache Schlussform : Difficulties regard- 
 ing Paley's argument. 
 
 Z 
 
354 BOOK II. CHAPTEK III. 
 
 preservation), but I must violently sei^arate the one from the 
 other. 
 
 ' We soon see ourselves drawn to other still more extreme 
 consequences. In the artistic activity of the human race, for 
 instance, ends are manifested that are attained by a feeling 
 acting blindly, and not by a calculation of the mind. How 
 often has criticism been able to discover in a man of genius, 
 ends attained by his action of which he did not think ! 
 Could any calculation of the understanding have presented 
 to the mind of Mozart, for depicting certain emotions of the 
 mind, so appropriate means as those which his genius found 
 under the influence of inspiration ? But if Paley's proof is 
 considered valid, we cannot admit any case where a deter- 
 minate end is attained by determinate means, without the 
 conception of the end being found as such in a certain under- 
 standing, and without the means having been chosen for the 
 end by an intentional arrangement. We must thus believe 
 that, while Mozart composed, the divine understanding assisted 
 him like an arithmetic master, and that for the end of express- 
 ing passion he threw into his heart, in proportion as he had 
 need, the means, carefully chosen and appropriate. If, on the 
 other hand, it is granted us for a moment that Mozart may 
 have attained a single end in his music by an instinct of 
 feeling, without mental calculation, the received argument is 
 invalidated; it may still serve to persuade, but not to 
 convince. 
 
 ' 11. Mathematics give us a great number of instances of 
 finality attained without any end proposed beforehand, or, to 
 speak more exactly, of finality, vi^hich we do not habitually 
 consider as such, because the end attained does not appear 
 more important than the means applied. Kant speaks of 
 this mathematical teleology in the Critique of the Judgment} 
 
 ' Whence comes it that, in this case, we are not astonished, 
 as in other cases, at intentional arrangements ? Why do we 
 hot infer a wise author who had ordained all that conformably 
 1 CrUwine of the Judgment, t. ii. § Ixi. 
 
FINALITY AND INTENTION. 355 
 
 to the end by the most simple means ? Simply because here 
 we do not attach any value to the end attained. Whether 
 the triangle always has the sum of its angles equal to two 
 right angles, whether the peripheric angles subtended by the 
 same chord are equal or not, is of no importance in our eyes, 
 because we do not see the use of it. We do not value a 
 wisdom even acting for an end, if that end is of no use to 
 us. That the triangle has its three angles equal to two right 
 angles does not appear to us an end, but an inevitable con- 
 sequence of the rencounter of primitive mathematical relations. 
 If, on the other hand, the question is of something that has 
 reference to the preservation of man, or of some being affect- 
 ing him, it seems we cannot then too much appreciate the 
 ingenious means created and brought into play, with intelli- 
 gence and zeal, for such an end, although in this case, as in that 
 of the triangle, it might quite as well be supposed that the end 
 is only the inevitable result of the conflict of certain given 
 primitive relations. If the preservation of man, of the animals 
 or plants, were bound up with the persistence of 180 degrees 
 in the triangle, then we would wonder at the high excellence 
 of this adaptation to the end, which we now find quite simple 
 and natural ; and if, conversely, we had no more interest in 
 the preservation of man, the animal, and the plant, than in the 
 persistence of 180 degrees in the triangle, then, like entirely 
 disinterested spectators, we would lose sight of the co-ordina- 
 tion of ends and means, and would at once ask whether all 
 these ends, attained by nature, are not the consequences of 
 the conflict of certain primitive laws, as is the case with ends 
 in mathematics. 
 
 ' III. Besides, it must be remembered that the teleological 
 argument does not derive its decisive force from the existence 
 of a universal finality, extending everywhere, but from a sort 
 of dissemination of final causes, accidentally dispersed over 
 the vast empire of nature, such that the strildng examples 
 shine as exceptions so brilliantly that they seem to be some- 
 thing surpassing the powers of nature itself. If the law of 
 
356 BOOK II. CHAPTER III. 
 
 finality were as universal in nature as the law of causality, 
 if there were even no phenomenon in which it was not 
 manifested, then we would cease to find this law miraculous 
 as a law of nature, and would not be tempted to infer from 
 it any supernatural intervention. For instance, because in 
 a certain country, certain species of plants happen to grow 
 which exactly serve for food or medicine to the animals of 
 that country, or, again, because in a given country such 
 animals are found as deliver the country from other animals 
 that would be hurtful, this appears to us wonderful and 
 surprising, because all natural .events do not exhibit to us so 
 immediately, in their reciprocal relation, so intentional and 
 organic a connection. The poverty that nature presents, in 
 the point of view of finality, inspires us with a certain dis- 
 trust of the powers of that nature, — a distrust that goes so far, 
 that when an accomplished finality is really displayed in it, 
 we usually prefer to have recourse to a miracle, rather than 
 suppose any such thing accomplished by the powers of nature; 
 itself. 
 
 ' This distrust of nature is very analogous to the distrust of 
 misanthropes, as it is shown in the moral world. As the 
 misanthrope is tormented by the morbid prejudice that human 
 nature is too feeble to oppose evil, and that, consequently, 
 therg is no virtuous man in the world, so the physico- 
 theologian lives with the prejudice that nature is too feeble 
 and too impotent for a closer connection of its creatures than 
 the connection of efficient causality ; and in his illusion, where 
 the true law of causality ceases, he draws the bolt, and beyond 
 he prefers to believe in the miracle and in ghost stories rather 
 than consent to the idea of a teleological process in nature 
 itself. 
 
 'IV. Besides, on the teleological hypothesis the creator 
 cannot be cleared of a certain feebleness, or a certain inclina- 
 tion to useless play, when he is seen to attain, by a grand 
 apparatus of ingenious inventions, very small ends, which an 
 Almighty Creator, such as He who is in question, should have 
 
FINALITY AND INTENTION. 357 
 
 been able to attain by simpler means, and much more briefly, 
 without creating for Himself useless obstacles in His way. 
 Even Paley, the great admirer of the divine wisdom in the 
 organization of animals, expresses his astonishment on this 
 point, and sees no other refuge than in the incomprehensi- 
 bility of God's ways : " Why," he asks himself, " has not the 
 inventor of this marvellous machine (the eye) given the 
 animals the faculty of sight without employing this complica- 
 tion of means ?"^ 
 
 ' Again, the human eye is at once the most finished and 
 the simplest of organs. Much less perfect, more insufBcient, 
 and a thousand times more complicated, are the thousand little 
 tubes of the combined eyes of insects. Why has the wisest 
 of creators had recourse in the creation of animals to so 
 imperfect apparatus, when later He was to show by the fact, 
 that the material of nature was capable of producing one 
 much more perfect ? Did He, then, find pleasure in realizing, 
 only to vary, by imperfect and difficult means, what He could 
 obtain much more quickly by more perfect means ? Is such 
 child's play, that creates obstacles for its own amusement, 
 and indulges its humour in oddities and marvels, worthy of a 
 wise Creator ? He has shown in the stomach of man, the 
 birds, and the ruminants, how many means were at His disposal 
 to realize a process of digestion that should take place with- 
 out effort : why have those means failed Him for serpents ? 
 and why has He permitted in this case the function of nutri- 
 tion to be fulfilled by a disagreeable process, as fatiguing for 
 the animal as repulsive to the spectator ? These instances, 
 and others like them, are fitted to awaken the desire for a less 
 forced explanation of nature, in case such an explanation were 
 possible. 
 
 ' V. In fine, there is at the foundation of the physico- 
 teleological proof a sentiment of the soul of quite another 
 nature than that which results from the teleological calcula- 
 tion with concept of the understanding — that is, an edifice 
 ^ Paley, Natural Theology, chap. ii. 
 
358 BOOK ir. CHAPTEK III. 
 
 added later, awkwardly to prop and magnify this instinctive 
 sentiment. Nature, when we contemplate its works, fills us 
 with wonder, and we feel ourselves spiritually, and as if 
 sacredly, inspired. There breathes in us, as it were, a com- 
 munion with the thousand creatures that burst forth in spring, 
 and joyfuUy rush into life. We keenly feel the breath of a 
 spiritual and vivifying power. Such a feeling is scarcely 
 compatible with the point of view of a machine, so wisely 
 ordained by an external mechanician that there is nothing more 
 ingenious and better ordered than the fitting of its wheels.' 
 
 Such is the learned and curious reclamation of the Hegelian 
 philosophy against the doctrine of intention. Let us briefly 
 resume, while submitting them to a severe discussion, the pre- 
 ceding objections. 
 
 I. The first difficulty is this : There are numerous cases in 
 nature where the tendency towards an end is not accompanied 
 by the clear conception of that end. For instance, the ten- 
 dency of bodies towards a centre, the instinct of animals, the 
 inspiration of great men, are facts of this kind. If, then, 
 these different forces are not to be recognised as immanent in 
 nature, recourse must incessantly be had to the first cause 
 without need, and we fall into occasionatism. In a word, 
 immanent and unconscious finality, or deus ex machind — 
 such are the two horns of the dilemma. 
 
 We reply that this dilemma sins against the fundamental 
 rule of this kind of reasoning, which requires that there be 
 only two possible alternatives, without intermediaries, whence 
 the rule of the exclusio tertii. But here there is between 
 the two opposite hypotheses a mean hypothesis, which the 
 author omits, and which consists in supposing that there are, 
 indeed, immanent forces in things, and forces unconsciously 
 tending towards an end, but that this immanent finality is 
 derived and not primitive, relative and not absolute. Between 
 Hegel's hypothesis and Paley's there is room for that of 
 Leibnitz, who by no means admits that we must incessantly 
 have recourse to God as to a mechanician, without whom 
 
FINALITY AND INTENTION. 359 
 
 the machine cannot go. He admits that God has placed in 
 the thing at the first a certain force of spontaneity and energy, 
 which is displayed conformably to an internal law without 
 the necessity of the action of God being added to it, which 
 force will be called, according to occasion, tendency, instinct, 
 inspiration, etc. Such facts do not in the least prove that an 
 activity can be conceived aiming at an end, without any notion 
 of that end ; for these forces, more or less blind and ignorant 
 of their end, may be derived from some being that knows that 
 end for them. Nay, this is the only means we have of com- 
 prehending this hidden and unconscious tendency towards an 
 end. There is nothing in this that touches the principle, or 
 is irreconcilable with it. 
 
 But is it possible, it will be said, to conceive that, even if 
 created, blind forces can attain a certain end ? And if this 
 be granted, why should not an uncreated force equally attain 
 it ? We have here the true difficulty which Bayle, in a 
 similar discussion on plastic natures, had already excellently 
 perceived : ' But if a faculty without consciousness and reason,' 
 he says, * merely because it is created by an intelligent being, 
 becomes fit to accomplish works that require intelligence, is it 
 not as if it were said that, of two men equally blind, the one 
 does not know his way, the other knows it because he has 
 been created by a father with eyes ? If you are blind, it 
 matters little whether you were born of a blind or seeing 
 father, for in both cases you always need to be guided by the 
 advice and the hand of another. So, to regulate matter, it 
 matters little whether plastic nature be born of an intelligent 
 cause, if it is blind and knows not in what way to proceed to 
 compose, separate, distribute, or reunite the elements of matter. 
 Of what use is the power of acting without the faculty of 
 comprehending 1 Of what use are legs to a blind man ? . . . 
 Consequently, if plastic causes are entirely destitute of intelli- 
 gence, they must be continually directed by God as physical 
 instruments.' Consequently, according to Bayle, the hypo- 
 thesis of plastic natures, little different at bottom from the 
 
360 BOOK II. CHAPTER III. 
 
 Leibnitzian forces, either reverts to pure meclianism and occa- 
 sionalism, or leads to the negation of a supreme cause ; for if 
 a blind force, tending towards an end and attaining it, implies 
 no contradiction, we cannot see why such forces should any 
 more imply a contradiction because existing of themselves. 
 
 To this we reply, with J. Leclerc, the defender of plastic 
 natures : What implies contradiction is not the fact of a blind 
 force tending towards an end, since experience shows us such, 
 but is just the hypothesis of such a force existing of itself ; 
 for in that case we do not see whence it can derive the deter- 
 mination towards the end, and the exact choice of means 
 leading to it. If, on the other hand, such a force is only 
 derived, the reason of its determinations is in the intelligence 
 of the cause from which they emanate. What, says Bayle, 
 does it matter, if the force is blind, whether it have as author 
 an intelligent being ? What matters it whether a blind man 
 be born of a seeing father ? To solve this difficulty, let us 
 borrow, like Bayle himself, our examples from experience. 
 Every day we see intelligent beings communicate to other 
 beings dispositions and impulsions that direct them un- 
 consciously towards a determinate end. This takes place, for 
 instance, in education. Parents insinuate by example, by a 
 certain tact, by caresses, etc., a thousand dispositions and 
 inclinations into the soul of their children, of which the latter 
 are unconscious, and which direct them, without their knowing 
 it, towards an end they know not of, — for instance, virtue, 
 wisdom, happiness. Such dispositions, however, are really 
 incorporated in the soul of children, are blended with their 
 natural qualities, become proper to them, and are later truly 
 spontaneous principles of action to them. In this case, then, 
 we clearly enough see how an intelligent cause might origin- 
 ally place in created beings certain dispositions, potencies, or 
 natural habitudes, which should be inherent, immanent, and 
 essential to them, and which should conduct them to their 
 destination without their knowledge, and without the Creator 
 needing to act for them and guide them, as the husbandman 
 
FINALITY AND INTENTION. 361 
 
 the plough. A thousand instances, derived from physiological 
 and moral experience, might be quoted of this premeditated 
 infusion of certain principles of action into souls that are 
 unconscious of them, and that then obey them spontaneously 
 and blindly. And men make use of this power as well for evil 
 as for good. A skilled seducer, for instance, will know how 
 to determine in an innocent mind certain unconscious im- 
 pulses that will lead it unwittingly to the end fixed by him — 
 namely, towards its ruin or misfortune. An orator or a poli- 
 tician will call forth in crowds commotions which, once excited, 
 will lead to this or that consequence, foreseen by him and not 
 by them. Thus the Creator might determine in bodies or in 
 souls certain impulsions or tendencies leading them inevitably 
 to the end fixed, reserving to man alone, and still within a 
 limited circle, the faculty of acting like Himself, conformably 
 to a premeditated end.^ 
 
 In tnith, it will always be possible to oppose hidden quali- 
 ties, which, being neither mechanisms nor systems of thought, 
 present nothing clear to the mind, and to say, with Descartes, 
 that we only comprehend two things clearly and distinctly, 
 thought and motion (or any other modification of space) ; and 
 this objection is at b'ottom that of Bayle, who opposes the 
 dynamism of Cudworth from the point of view of Cartesian 
 occasionalism. But this point of view cannot be that of the 
 German philosopher we are discussing, for he shows himself 
 opposed to every species of mechanism, whether the mechanism 
 of Epicurus (that without God) or the Cartesian mechanism 
 (that with God). He thus necessarily admits something like 
 hidden qualities, under the names of tendencies, instincts, 
 inclinations, inspiration, enthusiasm. He has, consequently, 
 nothing to object to those who will admit the same hidden 
 faculties, on condition of supposing them to be derived and 
 
 ' One may conceive this creation of impulsions in things either as a superero- 
 gatory act of God, adding to beings, when once formed, the instincts or powers 
 they have need of, or else (which would he more philosophical) one may admit 
 that God has at once created beings and their instincts, the nature of things 
 being but the sum of the powers or instincts of which it is composed. 
 
362 BOOK IL CHAPTER III. 
 
 not primitive ; and from the point of view of the explanation 
 of these notions there is no advantage in conceiving these 
 sorts of qualities as existing by themselves in place of being 
 communicated properties. 
 
 There are, besides, in the facts quoted by the author, many 
 differences to be noticed. One might even dispute regarding 
 the approximation of mechanical tendency and instinct ; but 
 what cannot be in any way assimilated is the fact of iijstinct 
 and that of inspiration. 
 
 Instinct is a phenomenon entirely blind, routine, machine- 
 like, always like itself. It may vary more or less under the 
 influence of circumstances ; but as these modifications are 
 slow, rare, and infinitely little, the dominant character of 
 instinct is no less monotony, servile obedience to a blind 
 mechanism. Inspiration is of quite another order ; its proper 
 character is invention, creation. Wherever there is imitation, 
 or mechanical reproduction of a phenomenon already produced, 
 we refuse to recognise the character of inspiration. The pro- 
 perty of instinct is precisely to resemble a work calculated 
 and arranged beforehand. Thus the bee, in choosing the 
 hexagonal form for depositing its honey, acts precisely as an 
 architect would do, who should be asked to construct the 
 most pieces possible in a given space. On the other hand, 
 the property of inspiration is in nothing to resemble calcula- 
 tion, and to be incapable of being in any way represented by 
 calculation. Por instance, when a poet wishes to paint a 
 great sentiment, it would be impossible for him to find laws 
 of combination permitting him to attain his end ; he could 
 not say : By combining words in such a way I shall be sub- 
 lime. For the words must still be given him ; and by what 
 means could he find such words rather than others ? In 
 artificial works (and what renders instinct so marvellous is 
 just that it produces such works), it is by the combination of 
 parts that we succeed in producing the whole. In works of 
 art, on the other hand, it is the whole that commands the 
 arrangement of the parts. For instance, although a musical 
 
FINALITY AND INTENTION. 363 
 
 theme is necessarily successive, in virtue of the laws of time, 
 yet even the first notes are dominated by the entire air ; and 
 one cannot imagine a musician adding note to note in order 
 to reach an end, for that end is the entire air, and the air is 
 in the first notes as well as in the last. No doubt, there is 
 even in inspiration a part to be done by reflection, calculation, 
 and science, as we shall show immediately ; but the essence 
 of inspiration is something entirely different, and cannot be 
 conceived as a calculated combination. 
 
 These observations may appear at first sight more favour- 
 able than otherwise to the objection of the German philo- 
 sopher ; but our aim is first clearly to distinguish inspiration 
 from blind instinct, two things that this philosopher puts 
 almost on the same line as proving the same thing, wherein 
 he deceives himself. No doubt the fact of artistic inspiration 
 can quite prove that there is a sort of finality superior to the 
 finality of foresight and calculation, that the soul attains 
 its end spontaneously, while the mind laboriously seeks and 
 combines the means of attaining its end. Where the versifier 
 employs with consummate ability all the resources of the art 
 of versification, to leave the reader cold while amusing him, — 
 where the rhetorician calls to his aid all figures made to order, 
 to persuade, please, and move according to rule, — a Corneille 
 and a Demosthenes find in their heart unexpected words, 
 sublime turns, whose origin they themselves cannot explain, 
 and which astonish and elevate the soul of the spectators and 
 auditors, and soul speaks to soul. Where shall one discover 
 the like of QiCil mourut^ or, Je ne te hais point ?^ By what 
 process ? by what recipes ? And how superior is emotion here 
 to calculation ! But if one may conclude from these facts 
 that the highest finality is not perhaps that which results 
 from a deliberate combination, still how can we confound 
 this inspiration, in which the ancients saw the seal of the 
 divine, to 0eiov, with a blind instinct, with the mechanical 
 and routine course of a watch that goes alone, which is what 
 
 ' Corneille, Horace, act iii. scene 6. * Corneille, Le Cid, act iii. scene i. 
 
364 BOOK II. CHAPTER III. 
 
 the instinct of animals resembles ? Inspiration may be 
 superior to calculating intelligence, but intelligence remains 
 very superior to instinct. The soul inspired by sentiment is 
 not a blind activity. It is conscious of itself ; it has a vivid 
 and profound intuition of its end ; it is quite full of it ; and 
 it is precisely this vivid sentiment of the end that evokes in 
 it its own realization. In this case, as Hegel says, ' the end 
 realizes itself.' Instinct, on the other hand, not only is 
 ignorant of the means, but of the end. Far from creating 
 anything, it does nothing but repeat and imitate, without even 
 knowing that it imitates what has always been done. The 
 first animal of each species could alone be truly called an 
 inventor. But there is no reason to attribute to it in prefer- 
 ence to its posterity such a superiority of genius. For if it had 
 been capable of such an innovation, why should its successors 
 be reduced to a sterile and routine imitation ? Doubtless the 
 creation of instinct supposes genius ; but instinct is not 
 genius, and is even the opposite of it. 
 
 Moreover, we liave hitherto reasoned on the hypothesis 
 "whereby inspiration would only be a purely spontaneous act, 
 in which intelligence should have no part. But nothing is 
 more contrary to the truth. Every one knows the old dis- 
 putes between art and genius. N"o doubt art is not genius. 
 Eules do not suffice to make masterpieces ; but who does not 
 know that genius is only complete when accompanied by 
 art ? How many parts of the beautiful are derived from 
 intelligence and science ! The wise arrangement of a subject, 
 the division and gradation of the parts, the elimination of 
 useless parts, the choice of times, places, circumstances, the 
 adaptation of the style to the manners and sentiments of the 
 personages — these for the dramatic art. The investigation of 
 proofs, their distribution, their clever gradation, the skilful 
 interweaving of dialectic with the pathetic, the accommoda- 
 tion of the sentiments and motives to the habits and disposi- 
 tions of the auditory — these for the art of oratory. The 
 combination of harmonies or colours, rhythm, the contrasts of 
 
FINALITY AND INTENTION. 365 
 
 light and shade, the laws of harmony or of perspective — these 
 for music and painting. In architecture, the part of science 
 is greater still ; and even industry comes into play. Thus 
 even in the labour of inspiration, science and art — that is, 
 calculation, foresight, and premeditation — play a considerable 
 part ; nay, it is almost impossible rigidly to distinguish what 
 is of art and what is of inspiration itself. No doubt the 
 original conception of a character like that of the Misan- 
 thrope, or, in another class, the Olympian Jivpiter, can only be 
 referred to a first stroke of the creative imagination. What 
 means, in effect, can be employed to conceive a primary idea ? 
 At the very most, the artist may place himself in circum- 
 stances favourable for invention. But the primary idea once 
 given, what is it that fertilizes, animates, colours, and realizes 
 it but art, always, it is true, accompanied by inspiration ? Is 
 there not here a part to be played by calculation and 
 thoughtful combination 1 Will not reflection, for instance, 
 suggest to the author of the Misanthrope : To attain the 
 comic, I must put my principal personage in contradiction 
 with himself. I must then give him a weakness, and what 
 weakness more natural than that of love ? And to render the 
 contrast more striking, and the drama more comical, I will 
 make him love a coquette without soul, who will play with 
 him. I will bring them together, and the man of heart shall 
 humble himself before the selfish and frivolous fine lady. 
 Besides, this coquette must be a perfect woman of the world ; 
 and to depict her as such I will have a conversation scene, 
 where I will paint the salons in all their charming frivolity. 
 That Molifere made these calculations, or others like them, 
 cannot be doubted, although at every step he needed genius 
 — that is, inspiration — to realize his conceptions ; for it is not 
 enough to say, I will have talent, — the great thing is to have 
 it. But talent can no more be found by means of reflection 
 than genius. Eveiy one knows, on the contrary, that to seek 
 talent is the best way not to find it. In music, inspiration 
 properly so called plays a greater part ; but even here there 
 
366 BOOK II. CHAPTEK III. 
 
 are skilful combinations that may be the result of reflection, 
 and produced intentionally. For instance; it may very well 
 be the case that it was after reflection, and voluntarily, that 
 Mozart resolved to accompany the amorous serenade of Don 
 Juan, that air so melancholy and touching, with the playful 
 refrain that inspired some well-known, charming verses of 
 Musset. Donizetti may also very well have calculated before- 
 hand the profound effect produced on the heart by the singing 
 of Lucia's obsequies, interrupted by Edgar's marvellous final 
 air. At every moment one may find in the arts examples 
 of great beauties gained by calculation and reflection. In 
 Athalie, for instance, the introduction of choruses, the prophecy 
 of Jehoiada, the bringing together a divine child and an impious 
 queen ; in Horace, the idea of cutting in two the narrative 
 to produce a sudden dramatic change ; in the Descent from the 
 Cross at Antwerp, the skilful and difficult combination that 
 makes all the personages in some measure bear or touch the 
 body of Christ, — are striking examples of beauties desired, pre- 
 meditated, and prepared by esthetic science, on condition, no 
 doubt, of finding a powerful imagination for their realization. 
 These striking examples of an intelligence at the service of 
 inspiration might incline us in favour of Schopenhauer's 
 theory, that makes intelligence the servant of the will, if we 
 agreed to attribute inspiration to what this philosopher calls 
 the will ; — as if inspiration itself were not already a sort of 
 intelligence ; as if the first conception, the immediate work of 
 the creative imagination, were not also an act of intelligence ; 
 as if, in fine, love itself, which impels to create, to engender, 
 as Plato says, were possible without a certain view of the 
 object loved. All that can be said — and it in no way contra- 
 dicts the doctrinfe of final causes — is that above the comhining 
 and calculating intelligence, there is a primary form of superior 
 intelligence, which is the condition of the second, and which 
 may be called creative. 
 
 If, then, we seek in experience some type or model that 
 may give us an analogical idea of the primary activity, we 
 
FINALITY AND INTENTION. 367 
 
 will not refuse to admit that inspiration is that which, perhaps, 
 in fact, comes nearest to it. At this elevation intention be- 
 comes lost in finality, — that is, the means confound them- 
 selves with the end ; but far from such a conception confining 
 lis within the circle of nature, it is only, on the contrary, by 
 leaving nature that we can conceive such an identity of means 
 and ends. It is the property of nature, on the other hand, to 
 pass by the one to the attainment of the other, which is 
 impossible to a blind force, not directed. Foresight, as it is 
 manifested in the secondary substances, is not, perhaps, the 
 highest expression of finality ; but blind instinct is a still less 
 faithful expression of it, and pure mechanism is its absolute 
 negation. 
 
 If, moreover, we analyze the idea of intention, we shall 
 find in it two elements : — -Ist, The art of willing the end, with 
 the consciousness that we will it ; 2d, The choice of means 
 to attain it. But in the phenomenon called inspiration, 
 intention exists in the first sense, although not always in the 
 second. The artist will express what he has in his soul, and 
 he is conscious of this volition; but how is he to express 
 what he has in his soul ? He does not know. Does it 
 follow that a higher intelligence would know no more ? Is 
 what is unconscious in artistic creation a necessary element 
 of creative genius? On what ground could such an hypothesis 
 be maintained ? It appears that the highest degree of genius 
 it just that which has the completest consciousness of its 
 power. As there is more consciousness in genius than in 
 mere instinct, so what may be called absolute genius should 
 be accompanied by absolute consciousness. 
 
 Supposing, then, that there is a supreme act, of which 
 artistic inspiration can give us some idea, this absolute act 
 should be not the act of a blind force, or of a fortuitous 
 mechanism, but of a creative intelligence, inventing at once 
 means and end by a single act, and in which, consequently, 
 foresight should be identical with immediate conception. It 
 is in this sense that it may be allowed that intention is not 
 
368 BOOK II. CHAPTER III. 
 
 necessary to finality ; not that it is absent, as in ignorant 
 instinct and in the blind forces of nature, but rather that it 
 has become useless, because, being in no way separated from 
 its end, conception and execution are for it but one. But we 
 wiU return to these ideas ; this is not yet the place to give 
 them all their development. 
 
 This first objection being much the most important, we 
 have had to dwell the longer upon it; we will pass more 
 rapidly over those that follow. 
 
 II. The German author appeals against the intentionalist 
 doctrine to what he calls mathematical finality, without ex- 
 plaining very clearly what he means by it. No doubt he 
 means to say that, to render any regular figure possible in 
 geometry, its lines must be arranged in a certain way ; but 
 this pre-arrangement of the lines in relation to the general 
 figure is something analogous, not to say similar, to the 
 arrangement of the members in the organism ; it is an adapta- 
 tion to an end. Yet in this case, he says, no one supposes 
 an intentional arrangement, no one infers a wise author, who 
 has ordained all that, conformably to the end, by the most 
 simple means. Why, according to this author ? Because 
 mathematical figures have no relation to our convenience, and 
 their fundamental relations are absolutely indifferent to us. 
 
 There is here, as it seems to us, much confusion of ideas. 
 But to come at once to the main point, we may say that 
 Kant, from whom the principles of the objection are bor- 
 rowed, has himself, with his usual profundity, furnished the 
 solution of them. It is, that in mathematics we have to do 
 not with the existence of things, but their possilrility, and, 
 consequently, there can be here no question of cause ' and 
 effect.'^ This is why Kant gives to this finality the name of 
 ' finality without an end,' which equally applies to esthetic 
 finality. Kant's explanation amounts to that of Aristotle, 
 according to whom mathematical entities are fixed, — that is, 
 are not subject to generation. But where there is no genera- 
 \ Critique of the Judgment, § Ixii. note. 
 
FINALITY AND INTENTION. 369 
 
 tion, there is no cause and effect (except by metonymy) ; and 
 where there is no cause and effect, there can be no means and 
 end, for means are nothing but a cause fit to produce a certain 
 effect, -which, therefore, is called an end. 
 
 If, however, instead of conceiving geometrical figures as pure 
 abstract possibilities, they be taken as concrete forms, which 
 matter really assumes under determinate conditions, — for 
 instance, in crystallization, — ^there will, in fact, be room to 
 inquire how certain blind materials come to be arranged con- 
 formably to a determinate order ; and a definite reason will 
 evidently be needed to explain why they take this arrange- 
 ment rather than another, since particles left to chance would 
 assume a thousand combinations before hitting on those simple 
 figures that geometry designs and studies. In this case, we 
 will be entitled to suppose that these molecules move as if 
 they aimed to produce a determinate geometrical order ; and 
 to affirm that in this case there is a finality without intention, 
 is to assume precisely what is in question; for it does not 
 follow as of course that any cause can spontaneously, and without 
 knowing anything of what it does, direct its motion according 
 to a regular law and conformably to a determinate type. 
 
 Thus it is not because geometrical proportions and relations 
 have no reference to our use, as Fortlage supposes, but because 
 they are pure ideas, that we do not assume intentional arrange- 
 ments in geometrical figures. But as soon as these figures are 
 objectively realized in the real world, we raise exactly the 
 same question as regarding the most elaborate arrangements. 
 Besides, it is not true that human utility is the sole criterion 
 of finality and intentionaJity. We admire the structure of 
 animals and plants, even in the case of creatures that are of 
 no use to us ; and if bees' honey were of no more use to us 
 than their wax, it would be enough that these two products 
 are useful to themselves to make us admire the industry that 
 yields them. Still more, we recognise finality even in beings 
 hurtful to us, and, as Voltaire says, the very fly should own 
 that the spider weaves its web with wondrous skiU. 
 
 2 A 
 
370 BOOK II. CHAPTEE III. 
 
 Thus it is the internal agreement of the object, and not its 
 relation to us, that determines our judgment of finality ; and 
 if, in place of conceiving geometrical figures as externally self- 
 existent, we saw a luminous point moving in space, and turning 
 round a centre, drawing a curved line, without ever increasing 
 its distance in relation to that centre, we would then seek a 
 cause for this motion, and could not conceive it except as the 
 act of a mind and an intelligence. 
 
 III. It is the very rarity of the fact of finality, it is said, 
 that makes us infer a cause apart from nature, and an inten- 
 tional cause analogous to our own. If finality were displayed 
 in all phenomena like causality, we would have no more 
 difficulty in attributing the one than the other to the power 
 of nature ; but these facts being scattered, we judge nature too 
 feeble to produce them, and think it necessary to have recourse 
 to a miracle to explain them. Fortlage, in this connection, 
 ingeniously compares this distrust of nature in general with 
 the misanthrope's distrust of human nature. 
 
 Here, again, there is much confusion of ideas. The question 
 whether the cause of finality is within or without nature is 
 not the same as this, whether that causality is intentional 
 or blind. Intentionality and transcendence are, as we have 
 repeatedly said, two different things. One may conceive an 
 immanent natural cause (a soul of the world, for instance), 
 which, like the Providence of the Stoics, should act with 
 wisdom and foresight. One may, on the other hand, conceive 
 a transcendent cause, like the pure act of Aristotle, which 
 should act on nature unconsciously, and by a sort of insensible 
 attraction. Thus we should not necessarily exclude intelli- 
 gence from finality if we proved that the cause of finality is 
 within, not outside, nature. Consequently, if this kind of 
 distrust, with which, according to the author, the forces of 
 ■ nature inspire us, were to disappear, and we were brought to 
 consider it as the sole and sufficient cause of finality, it would 
 still remain to inquire how nature can attain its end without 
 knowing it — how it can have adapted means to ends, while 
 
FINALITY AND INTENTION. 371 
 
 knowing nothing of either ; and the hypothesis of a finality 
 without foresight would still remain incomprehensible. Thus 
 it is not our distrust of nature that compels us to recognise 
 intelligence in its works. 
 
 An example will render our distinction evident. Suppose 
 a poet, regarded as mediocre, and of recognised tameness, were 
 to produce hy chance some brilliant work, some beautiful 
 verses, it might be supposed that he was not the author of 
 his work, that some one prompted and inspired him, although, 
 in reality, there is nothing impossible in genius being mani- 
 fested only in sudden leaps and intermittent flashes. There 
 is more than one instance of a poet having produced but one 
 sublime piece, and relapsing into the night of mediocrity. 
 But if this poet, on the other hand, were then continuously 
 to produce a succession of masterpieces, our distrust would 
 disappear, and we would no longer need to seek elsewhere 
 than in the genius of the poet himself the inspiring principle 
 of his writings. But would we thereby have in the least 
 degree proved that genius is a blind force, not self-possessed, 
 foreseeing nothing, and acting without light and thought ? 
 So nature might be the proper cause of its products without 
 our being entitled to draw any inference against the existence 
 of an intelligence in nature itself. 
 
 It will, no doubt, be said that, experience giving us no sign 
 of the immediate presence of an intra-mundane intelligence, 
 we can only conceive a supreme intelligence by supposing it 
 at the same time extra-mundane. We grant it ; and it is one 
 of the most decisive reasons in favour of the transcendence 
 of a first cause. But, after all, the question of transcendence 
 raises difficulties of another kind ; and, therefore, it should be 
 distinguished from that of an intelligent first cause. For 
 instance, the difficulties that arise from the idea of creation 
 ex nihUo, those which arise from the idea of substance, from 
 the exact distinction between the first cause and secondary 
 causes, are independent of those that are raised against the 
 hypothesis of a pre-ordaining foresight. Accordingly, we 
 
372 BOOK II. CHAPTER in. 
 
 say that this hypothesis may be disengaged from that of 
 transcendence — that it rests on its own reasons, whatever the 
 degree of intimacy attributed to the first cause in relation to 
 nature. 
 
 Let us now add that, even if finality were as universally 
 diffused through nature as causality, there would still be no 
 occasion to set aside the idea of a contingency of nature, 
 contingentia mundi ; for this contingency affects causality as 
 well as finality. Because all the phenomena of nature have 
 a cause, it does not follow that that cause is immediately the 
 first cause, and that there are no second causes ; but nature, 
 being by the very definition only the totality of second causes, 
 is not in itself its own cause. Now, if finality were universal, 
 like causality, it would simply follow that all that we call 
 cause would become means, all we call effect would become 
 end ; but the chain of means and ends, no more than that of 
 causes and effects, would be confounded with the absolute, 
 and the question of contingency would remain intact. 
 
 IV. A new difficulty proposed by the German author is 
 that the hypothesis of an intentional finality cannot explain 
 the errors of nature, and the groping with whicK it gradually 
 advances towards its end. This objection has already been 
 discussed above ;^ we need not refer to it. Let us merely 
 say that, if the idea of a sovereign and absolute wisdom 
 excludes the idea of groping, it is not so with the idea of a 
 natv/re created by sovereign wisdom. The groping or grada- 
 tion, in fact, may be the only means that a nature has at its 
 disposal to express the absolute perfection of the creative act 
 that gives birth to it. We wiU add that, if nature seems to 
 you powerful and rich enough to be itself declared divine, A 
 fortiori it must be beautiful enough for an image, shadow, or 
 expression of the divine act. 
 
 V. The last objection is particularly interesting. It tends 
 to put in opposition the belief of God's existence to the senti- 
 ment of nature, such as men feel it at the present time. It 
 
 1 See chap, i, p. 56. 
 
FINALITY AND INTENTION. 373 
 
 seems that to love nature it must be considered as divine, and 
 not merely as the artificial work of the Deity. 
 
 No doubt it ■would be a great exaggeration to say that 
 theism is irreconcilable with a lively sense of the beauties of 
 nature. Nowhere have these beauties been more eloquently 
 described than in the writings of F^n^lon, Eousseau, and Ber- 
 nardin de Saint-Pierre, which are directly intended to prove 
 the existence of a Providence. But what might perhaps be 
 maintained is that a certain manner of loving nature, and 
 that precisely which has been developed in our age, supposes 
 another religious philosophy than that of the Savoyard vicar. 
 The old theodicy, it will be said, that conceives a God fabri- 
 cating the universe as a watchmaker makes a watch, be- 
 hoved to engender an entirely similar esthetic. Nature, to be 
 beautiful, had to be arranged, cultivated, combed, pruned. 
 The beautiful must exclusively consist in the proportion of 
 parts, in a harmonious and sweet agreement : everywhere there 
 were required in works of art plans well arranged and metho- 
 dically executed. The earth was only a machine — ^that is, 
 something cold, dry, more or less agreeable in parts, but with- 
 out internal life, without flame, without a divine spirit. But 
 since a new philosophy has taught us the divinity of nature, 
 now that aU is full of gods, vdvra TrXiqfyq Oe&v, the grand 
 poetry of things has been revealed to us. The voice of the 
 ocean, the roar of the winds, the abrupt depths produced by the 
 elevation of the mountains, the splendour of glaciers, all speak 
 to us of an ever-acting, ever-living power, that has not retired 
 into its solitude after having acted one single time, we know not 
 why, but which, on the contrary, is always here in communica- 
 tion with us, animating this nature that is called dead, but is 
 not, since it speaks to us with accents so pathetic, and penetrates 
 us with seductions so intoxicating. Here is God ; and Goethe 
 did not mean to lessen Him when, like the old Indians, he 
 saw Him everywhere in the rocks, forests, lakes, in that sublime 
 sky — in that totality, in short, of which He is the eternal soul, 
 the inexhaustible source. The theist, on the other hand, only 
 
374 BOOK n. CHAPTEK III. 
 
 admires His cold and pale image, the wretched copy of His 
 eternal perfections, — an insipid work that He has created 
 without knowing why, tired, no doubt, of His immoveable 
 eternity. 
 
 This whole argumentation supposes that, on the hypothesis 
 of a supra-mundane and intelligent cause, nature would be no 
 more than a machine, and the Creator could only be a work- 
 man, which would be to compare the divine activity with the 
 lowest human occupations — that is, with handicrafts. These 
 are very exaggerated consequences, derived from a metaphor. 
 The comparison of the universe to a watch is one of the most 
 convenient presented to the mind, and philosophy is no longer 
 possible if every figure is forbidden on pain of being taken 
 literally. The mechanism existing in the universe, and which 
 may be considered by itself abstractly, warrants such a com- 
 parison, but does not exclude others. Because the Author of 
 things has had regard to utility for His creatures, it does not 
 follow that He has not had beauty in view also. As Leibnitz 
 has said, mechanism, does not exclude metaphysic. The 
 architect who builds a temple like the Parthenon may have 
 made a sublime work while occupying himself with its solidity. 
 Whether immanent or transcendent, intentional or blind, the 
 Cause of nature has been obliged to employ material means to 
 express His thought, and the just combination of these means, 
 to make a stable and solid work, is imposed quite as much on 
 the God of pantheism as on the God of creation ; and, con- 
 versely, the employment of these material means, wisely 
 combined, no more forbids the beautiful or the sublime to the 
 God of creation than to the God of pantheism. If, then, 
 the adherents of a transcendent and intentional cause have 
 specially attached themselves to examples drawn from 
 mechanics, it is not that they are more bound than others to 
 maintain that everything in nature is mechanism, but that 
 there is here one of those privileged facts in which is strikingly 
 manifested the proper character of an intentional cause ; and 
 philosophy, as well as the sciences, is entitled to appeal to 
 
FINALITY AND INTENTION. 375 
 
 the most decisive facts, even though they should appear low 
 to a false imagination. And besides, when it concerns the 
 mechanism of the universe and the conception of the system 
 of the world, who wiU venture to say that that is a small 
 matter, and that the admiration which such a work must 
 inspire is really unworthy of the Divine Being ? 
 
 Thus those who have said that the world is a machine, are 
 in no way deprived of the right to say that it is a poem as 
 well. Wherein does the one exclude the other ? The system 
 of the world for geometricians is certainly only a mechanism. 
 Does any one believe, however, that a geometrician will there- 
 fore become insensible to the beauties of the starry heaven 
 and the infinite immensity ? Will it be disputed that a 
 building, in order to stand, needs to obey the laws of the 
 exactest and driest mechanics ? The gigantic arches of Gothic 
 cathedrals are not supported by miracle. It is not angels or 
 hidden powers that support their stones, but the abstract and 
 dead laws of gravitation. And yet, is the mysterious grandeur 
 of these mystical monuments less overwhelming, divine, and 
 pathetic on that account ? The soul of the architect has 
 manifested or embodied itself in these dumb stones, but it has 
 only been able to do so by observing the laws of mechanics. 
 Why cannot the divine soul, if we may use such an expres- 
 sion, have also passed into its work, whether mechanical or 
 not ? Is it necessary that the architect's soul be present in 
 the brulding substantially in order that it may be truly there? 
 Is there not a kind of ideal presence, the thought of the 
 Creator being communicated to His work, and existing apart 
 from Him, but by Him ? Will it be said that the divine 
 hymn of Stradella has not retained something of the soul of 
 its author, although he is no longer here to sing it ? Thus, 
 that nature be beautiful, touching, and sublime, it is not 
 necessary that God be present in it substantially ; it is enough 
 that He is there by representation, as a prince is present wher- 
 ever his ambassador is, and communicates to him his dignity, 
 without needing to be present in person. 
 
376 BOOK II. CHAPTER III. 
 
 Thus the esthetic ohjection proves nothing in favour of an 
 instinctive and against an intentional finality. Nature, were 
 it only a vast mechanism, might still be beautiful, as expressing 
 a divine thought, just as the succession of the sounds of an 
 instrument may be something sublime, although, for the phy- 
 sicist, it is only in reality a purely mechanical combination. 
 But we have seen, besides, that the doctrine of transcendent 
 and intentional finality is by no means obliged to reduce 
 everything to mechanism. Nature may be composed of forces 
 without being itseK the supreme and absolute force. In fine, 
 the species and degree of the participation of things in the 
 Divine Being is one question, and intelligence in the ordaining 
 cause is another. Were the world nothing but the pheno- 
 menon of God, there would stiU be room to inquire whether 
 it is a phenomenon developed in the way of blind instinct, 
 or of enlightened reason. But on the latter view it is not 
 apparent why nature should be less beautiful than on the 
 former. 
 
 In a word, the fundamental error — ^the trpSiTov ■\JrevSo<; of 
 this whole otherwise very learned discussion — is the perpetual 
 confusion between two distinct questions, that of immanence 
 and that of intentionality, immanence not excluding inten- 
 tionality and wisdom in the cause ; and, secondly, the vague- 
 ness and indecision in which this term immanence, interiority, 
 which is imputed to the first cause, is left. For immanence 
 is not absolutely denied by any one ; the only question is as 
 to the degree, but the degree is not fixed. 
 
 Other difficulties have recently been raised among us against 
 the hypothesis of an intelligent, and in favour of an instinctive, 
 finality* Here, for instance, is how a contemporary philosopher 
 expresses himself: 'We can only conceive in three ways the 
 relation established in a system of phenomena between the 
 end and the means. Either, in effect, the end exerts an 
 external and mechanical action on the means ; or that action 
 is exerted not by the end itself, but by a cause that knows 
 and desires to realize it ; or, finally, the means arrange them- 
 
riNALITY AND INTENTION. 377 
 
 selves in the fit order to realize th^ end. The first hypothesis 
 is absurd, since the existence of the end is posterior in time 
 to that of the means ; the second is useless and blends with 
 the third, for the cause to -which recourse is had is only a 
 means not essentially differing from the others, and to which 
 is accorded, by an arbitrary preference, the spontaneity denied 
 to them.' * 
 
 In this passage it must be confessed that the author of this 
 objection frees himself very easily from a traditional doctrine, 
 defended by the greatest spiritualist and religious philosophers. 
 It win not easily be allowed that the doctrine whereby intelli- 
 gence co-ordinates the means, is reducible to that whereby ' the 
 means arrange tJiemselves in the fit order to realize their end.' 
 May we not here say with r^n($lon : 'What is stranger than to 
 imagine stones that grow — that come out of the quarry, that 
 ascend upon each other, leaving no space, that carry with 
 them the cement to unite them, that arrange themselves so as 
 to provide apartments, that receive beams above them to roof 
 in the work ' ? Why, if I say that an architect has chosen 
 and foreseen the means necessary for building, is it as if I 
 said that these means all alone arranged themselves to build 
 the house ? To say that intelligence is only itself a means 
 like the others, is even a very inexact expression. For can 
 that be called a means that serves to discover means — to 
 choose and distribute them? But even if so improper an 
 expression were admitted, the question would remain the same 
 as before — it would still be the question,, whether the first 
 means, and the condition of all the others, is not the know- 
 ledge of the end and the enlightened choice of the subordinate 
 means. At least it would be necessary to distinguish between 
 the principal and the secondary means, the one being the con- 
 dition sine qua non of all the others. Thus nothing would 
 yet have been proved. To maintain that ' knowledge only 
 produces action by accident,' is one of the strangest doctrines 
 that can be maintained in metaphysic; for it would follow 
 ' Laohelier, Dufondement de Vinduction, p. 96. 
 
378 
 
 BOOK II. CHAPTEK III. 
 
 that, precisely on the hypothesis of intelligence, actions would 
 be fortuitous, — that the doctrine of Leibnitz would be the 
 doctrine of chance, as well as that of Epicurus. The reason 
 given for this paradox is as unsubstantial as the opinion itself 
 is singular. For it is said intelligence can only conceive an 
 end if feeling already impels us to it; thus it is useless. 
 Every phenomenon can only be the result of a tendency. 
 The knowledge that is added to the tendency adds nothing to 
 it. I grant that the tendency towards an end needs no intelli- 
 gence ; but between the tendency and the end there is an 
 interval, — there a.re intermediaries, middle terms that we call 
 means. The question then is, whether the tendency towards 
 the ends suffices to explain the choice and adaptation of the 
 means. This is what the author does not take the trouble to 
 prove, while it is the true point of the difficulty. 
 
 Tendency is one thing, preordination is another. To tend 
 towards an end is not synonymous with acting for an end. 
 These two finalities must be distinguished. The one might 
 be called finality ad quod, the other finality "propter quod. 
 
 Hunger, for instance, is a tendency. It is not the same 
 thing as the industry that finds food. And if it be said that 
 the pursuit of food is only itself the result of a tendency, — ■ 
 that, for instance, the animal goes towards what procures it 
 pleasure, the insect towards the flower to which its smell or 
 sight leads it, — it is not perceived that the question just is, 
 how the particular tendency that impels it to satisfy a certain 
 sense is exactly in agreement with the general tendency that 
 impels it to desire preservation. 
 
 Let us take, for instance, the love of glory in a young man. 
 _ This end can only be attained by the successive satisfaction of 
 a multitude of partial tendencies ; and the problem is how 
 all these partial tendencies shall be subordinated to the 
 dominant tendency. In youth, in point of fact, there is an 
 immensity of other tendencies, which by no means harmonize 
 with the tendency towards glory, and which are even very 
 contrary to it ; but it is the intellect and the will that exclude 
 
FINALITY AND INTENTION, 379 
 
 the one to satisfy the others. How does this elimination take 
 place in brute and unconscious agents 1 How does the brute 
 cause, imbued with innumerable tendencies towards an infinite 
 number of objects, only obey those of them that conduct it 
 to objects useful for its end ? Por example, how does the 
 vital force, or whatever cause produces the organism, being the 
 subject of a thousand chemical, physical, and mechanical ten- 
 dencies, which could determine millions of possible combina- 
 tions, exclude among all these combinations those that do not 
 contribute to the end ? And to say that it is by a sort of 
 groping that nature discards successively the bad chances that 
 arise, and ends by hitting the happy chance that satisfies the 
 problem, would be to prove too much ; for this explanation 
 avails not against intentionality, but against finality itself. 
 
 To sum up. There is a common tendency at present in 
 several schools to adopt a middle theory between the Epicurean 
 theory of fortuitous combinations and the Leibnitzian of intel- 
 ligent choice. This is the theory of instinctive finality, some- 
 times arbitrarily called the Will. This mongrel theory is 
 nothing else than the old theory of hylozoism, which attributes 
 to matter sympathies, antipathies, affinities, preferences, — 
 things that are all absolutely opposed to the idea of it. All 
 that can be attributed to matter, as regards power, is the 
 capacity to produce motion. As to the direction of the 
 motion, and the choice between the possible combinations of 
 motion, it is an indefensible anthropomorphism to explain it 
 by a second mysterious view, that consists in seeing without 
 seeing, in choosing without knowing, and combining without 
 thinking. Say simply that the adaptations of matter are only 
 appearances and results; but to attribute to nature a desire 
 without light, an intelligence without intelligence, an esthetic 
 and artistic faculty that could dispense with consciousness and 
 knowledge, is to take metaphors for realities, — fiera^opiKm 
 Koi Kevw. 
 
 The only substantial thing remaining in the objections that 
 
380 BOOK II. CHAPTEK III. 
 
 may be made against intentionalism is, that our vision always 
 becomes obscure and dim when we come to the mode of action 
 of the first cause, as our experience only gives us to know 
 second causes. Thus no other course is left to us than to say 
 nothing at all about it, as the Positivists do, or to speak of it 
 by comparison with ourselves, always endeavouring to exclude 
 whatever is incompatible with the idea of the perfect and 
 absolute. There is no other method of determining anything 
 of this first cause than the negative, excluding from God what- 
 ever belongs to the finite character of the creation ; and the 
 analogical method, attributing to God, ratione dbsoluti, every- 
 thing with a character of reality and perfection. Every other 
 method, pretending to discover a priori the attributes of the 
 primary being, is a pure illusion; and even those who con- 
 ceive this first cause as an instinct, and not an intelligence, 
 do yet but borrow their type from experience.' 
 
 Thus it will be admitted that all foresight similar to that 
 of man, and which implies time and difficulty, can have no 
 place in the absolute. Is that to say, however, that all fore- 
 sight is absent from it, as in blind instinct ? Or is there not 
 something that represents what we would call foresight, if the 
 divine act were translated into human language ? This is the 
 question. 
 
 Let us examine, then, more closely this idea of foresight, 
 as it occurs in human consciousness. It seems to imply two 
 things incompatible with the absolute: — 1st, The idea of pre- 
 existing matter, whose laws and properties must be mastered, 
 and at the same time utilized ; 2d, The idea of time. 
 
 1. Why has man need of foresight in preparing for the 
 ends he pursues ? Is it not because he finds before him a 
 nature which, not having been made exclusively for him, 
 
 ^ The learned philosopher whose opinion we have just discussed, will perhaps 
 say that in the passage quoted the question is only as to nature, and not as to 
 the first cause. But no one maintains that nature as such is an intelligent 
 cause ; it is meant only of the first cause. In denying, then, absolutely that 
 finality is directed by intelligence, the author by implication makes his denial 
 bear on the first cause. 
 
FINALITY AND INTENTION. 381 
 
 presents a multitude of bodies submissive to laws which, in 
 their actual form, do not in any way promote our convenience, 
 and are even oftener hurtful than useful to us, so that nature 
 might have been as often presented under the aspect of a 
 step-mother as of a beneficent mother. Man thus finding 
 resistance in external forces, is obliged to calculate in order 
 to overcome this resistance, and to make it subserve his 
 designs. No doubt, indeed, given a determinate end, and pre- 
 existing matter not prepared for that end, this matter can 
 only be adapted by foresight, which is nothing but the recip- 
 rocal of experience. But could such a notion be compre- 
 hended in an absolute cause, — absolute mistress of the possible 
 as of the real, — and which, being able to produce aU by a 
 sovereign fiat, has no difficulty to foresee, no obstacle to 
 surmount, no matter to accommodate to its plans ? 
 
 On this first point, we reply that there is no necessary con- 
 nection between the idea of foresight and that of pre-existing 
 matter. In fact, when I pursue an end, I can attain it either 
 by employing means that are not at my disposal, or by creat- 
 ing the means themselves ; and although in the case of man 
 this creation of means is never other than metaphorical, as 
 the matter pre-exists, it is clear that the operation would not 
 change its nature, if, in place of producing means by borrow- 
 ing them from nature, I were endued with the faculty of 
 absolutely creating them. For instance, to attain some end, — 
 say, to make a metre to remain without alteration during so 
 many years, — I need a metal hard enough not to change during 
 that number of years, capable of resisting a certain degree of 
 temperature, and which has so little marketable value as not 
 to tempt cupidity; and not finding this metal in nature, I 
 produce it by the aid of certain combinations. Is it not 
 evident that if I could produce it immediately, the operation 
 would remain the same ? and this matter, once created, would 
 still have to be put in relation to the end, by adapting it, so 
 that the creation of the means in no way excludes the adap- 
 tation of the means. Thus, granting that a given effect is an 
 
382 BOOK II. CHAPTEK IIL 
 
 end (which is the hypothesis allowed at present by common 
 consent), the production of the fit matter for this end is as 
 much the effect of foresight as the adaptation of it in this 
 manner would be. For, first, the production requires the 
 adaptation besides ; and, in the second place, that production 
 itself is already adaptation, for we must first choose this 
 matter,, and then give it this form. Omnipotence being able 
 to create every kind of matter without end, to create those 
 that contribute to the end, and not others, is itself an act of 
 adaptation ; and, so far as the previous conception of the end 
 should have determined this creation and not another, it is 
 what we would call an act of foresight. 
 
 2. To what extent, however, can the term foresight, or 
 intention, be here employed to represent the creative act ? 
 This question may still be asked. The creative act is 
 absolutely one and indivisible ; and, consequently, there can 
 be no distinction between a consequent and an antecedent 
 volition. That act not being in time, there is neither a post 
 nor an ante ; and our youngest scholars know that prescience 
 or prevision is only an immediate vision. That is true ; but 
 if, on the other hand, the act be considered, not in its super- 
 natural origin, but from the point of view of nature which 
 is subject to generation, the act will be decomposed into 
 diverse elements, and so far as the last is called end and 
 recognised as such, the antecedents wiU be preordained in 
 relation to that end ; and if the whole act be considered as 
 the act of an immediate knowledge or vision, the antecedents, 
 relatively to the consequents, will be legitimately called acts 
 of prevision. This will simply mean that no blind cause 
 can have produced such acts ; that they are acts of reason and 
 of absolute reason ; and that this absolute reason, so far as it 
 is regarded in its effects, acts as if it were endued with fore- 
 sight, prescience, and intention. 
 
 We do not hesitate to declare that the doctrine of an 
 adequate conception of the absolute in the human mind can- 
 not be maintained in philosophy. To say that things occur 
 
FINALITY AND INTENTION. 383 
 
 in the divine nature exactly in the way we conceive them, 
 would be to pretend that we can see God face to face, which, 
 according to theology, is only possible in the future life. 
 We only know God, according to Bacon, by a refracted ray, 
 which evidently implies under a point of view that modifies 
 the object, — in other words, in a symbolic manner. Thus we 
 are not far from admitting with Kant that the doctrine of 
 intentional finality is a doctrine relative to the mode of 
 representation of the human mind, a hypothesis. Things occur, 
 we say, as if a, supreme wisdom had regulated the order of 
 things. In these terms I do not believe that any philosopher 
 can dispute the results of Kant's criticism. For what philo- 
 sopher would ever dare to say, I know God as He is in Him- 
 self? And yet this is what must be said, if it be not 
 granted that all our conceptions of God have something 
 relative and subjective belonging to the imperfection of oui: 
 faculties. 
 
 But while Kant absolutely maintains the subjectivity of 
 human conceptions, and, enclosing us within an impassable 
 circle, leaves beyond it only an absolutely indeterminate x, 
 we admit, on the other hand, that these conceptions (when 
 they are the results of the right use of our faculties) are in 
 strict relation to things as they are in themselves, as the 
 stick broken in the water strictly corresponds to the real 
 stick, as the apparent heavens enable astronomers to discover 
 the laws of the real heavens. By analogy we maintain that, 
 if the highest manner of humanly conceiving the first cause 
 of finality is the hypothesis of a supreme wisdom, this con- 
 ception, to him who could penetrate to the deepest foundation 
 of things, would be strictly translated into an attribute corre- 
 sponding to the perfect being, so that goodness, wisdom, justice, 
 and, in general, what are called the moral attributes of God, are 
 not mere names relative to our way of feeling, but symbols, 
 approximations more and more faithful to the absolute 
 essence, considered in its relation to sensible things. 
 
 Consequently these approximations (as symbols of the 
 
384 BOOK II. CHAPTER III. 
 
 absolute), assuming an objective and ontological character not 
 possessed by pure poetic fictions, which are absolutely sub- 
 jective, these approximations should be pushed as far as 
 possible, taking most carefully into account the two data of 
 the problem, — on the one hand, the facts to be explained ; on 
 the other, the nature of the absolute. Thus, foresight, being 
 given as the only attribute intelligible to us that can explain 
 the facts of finality, we ought, on the other hand, to free it 
 from all that is incompatible with the idea of the absolute, 
 and the residue of this operation will be the most adequate 
 possible expression, humanly speaking, of the supreme cause 
 of finality. 
 
 For instance, there is in human foresight a part that 
 evidently belongs to the imperfection of the creature — 
 namely, effort, groping, progressive and successive elaboration. 
 We are not, then, to imagine the absolute as commencing by 
 Conceiving an end, then seeking means to realize it, then 
 finding them, and putting them successively in operation. 
 But is the idea of foresight bound to these accidents that 
 are peculiar to human imperfection ? We may apply to the 
 attribute of the divine foresight what is habitually said of 
 reasoning in God. Does God reason ? No, it is said, if by 
 that is meant that God seeks to prove to Himself a truth He 
 did not know, and that He only discovers the truth step by 
 step. But, on the other hand, if He sees all truths at a single 
 glance, it is still the case that He sees them in their depend- 
 ence and objective subordination. He sees the consequence 
 in the principle, and distinct from the principle ; but this is 
 the essence of reasoning. It is the same with foresight. 
 God sees all at one glance, but He sees the means as distinct 
 from the end, and as being subordinate to it, and that is the 
 essence of foresight. From the side of God there is thus only 
 a single act : from the point of view of things there are two 
 — namely, the act that perceives the end, and the act that 
 distinguishes the means. Consequently, placing ourselves in 
 the point of view of things, and by analogy with ourselves. 
 
FINALITY AND INTENTION. 385 
 
 we will call foresight the view of the end, as it suggests the 
 creation of the means, or the view of the means, as it leads 
 to the realization of the end. Thus it is that, in the single 
 act of the divine volition, theologians have been able to 
 distinguish three distinct acts, — an antecedent volition, a 
 consequent volition, and a total volition, — as mathematicians 
 decompose a given force into hypothetical forces, of which 
 it would be the result. 
 
 Thus the doctriae of the Nov<i, or of intentional finality, 
 has for us no other meaning than this, that iatelligence is the 
 highest and most approximate cause we can conceive of a 
 world of order. All other causes, chance, laws of nature, 
 blind force, instinct, as symbolic representations, are beneath 
 the truth. If, however, it be maintained, with the Alexan- 
 drians, that the true cause is still beyond, — namely, beyond 
 intelligence, beyond volition, beyond love, — this may be quite 
 true, nay, we risk nothing in allowing that it is certain ; for 
 the words of human speech are all inferior to the essence of 
 the absolute. But since this supreme and final reason is 
 absolutely beyond our grasp, it is useless to speak of it ; and 
 we have only to do with the highest manner of conception we 
 can attain. It is in this sense we say with Anaxagoras : Nov<; 
 
 TTCIVTa ZlCKOCT IXTjCre} 
 
 ^ The jjiilosopher wliom we have discussed above (p. 377) has addressed to 
 us the following correction, which our readers will peruse with interest :^ 
 
 ' Favour me regarding the criticism that is applied to me. When I said that 
 knowledge only produces the action by accident, I did not mean to say that it 
 produces it by chance. I only meant to say that a being is inclined to the action, 
 in so far as indued with tendency, and not as indued with intelligence ; in other 
 words, that intelligence in it simply coincides with the very principle of the 
 action, and is not itself that principle (which does not prevent it from being able 
 to direct that principle, which yet, as the example of the animals, especially of 
 the inferior animals, and of vegetable nature proves, could strictly direct itself 
 without it). I said, in a word, that intelligence produced the action iy accident. 
 I acknowledge myself culpable of affected brevity and of a slightly pedantic 
 employment of the language of Aristotle, but not of so great an absurdity as 
 would be the confusion of intelligence with chance. ' 
 
 I admit the author's correction ; but we still need to know how the tendency 
 to the action can predetermine the action. It can do nothing else than push 
 the action in an indeterminate manner, and it can only be by an incompre- 
 hensible concomitance that it rencounters the willed effect. But it is this 
 
 2 B 
 
386 BOOK II. CHAPTER III. 
 
 oonoomitance that has to be explained, and which intelligence explains. The 
 author admits that intelligence can direct the action, but that that is not 
 necessary, as is seen by the example of the vegetables and animals. But that 
 precisely is the protlem. We see a case where the cause is clearly manifested : 
 why not suppose that it is the same in the cases where it is more obscure, 
 whether the intelligence reside outside the being or reside in the being itself in 
 a confused manner ? Apart from intelligence or mechanism, there only remains 
 a hidden faculty that has no proportion to its effects. 
 
CHAPTEE IV. 
 
 THE PURE IDEA AND CREATIVE ACTIVITY. 
 
 TXTE have come to circumscribe the problem more and 
 more narrowly ; but still, the farther we advance, the 
 more difficult becomes the solution, and the means of deciding 
 become more difficult to manage. We have found that there 
 is finality in nature ; that this iinality must have a cause ; 
 that this cause cannot be the mere mechanism which is de- 
 structive of all finality, nor what is above mechanism, instinct 
 or vitality. It seems, therefore, that if the primary root of 
 finality is neither matter nor life, it must be the soul, — that 
 is, intelligence or thought; for there is nothing beyond, at 
 least intelligible to us, except, perhaps, liberty. But liberty 
 without intelligence and thought is only brute force, the 
 'AvarfKri or the Fatum of the ancients ; and as to intelligent 
 liberty, it is precisely what we call by a single word, and for 
 brevity, intelligence. 
 
 But is intelligence the same thing as thought ? Or, if it 
 be agreed to give the same meaning to these two names, is 
 not the fact thus expressed double ? Does it not contain two 
 elements, the thing thought, and the thing thinking — the to 
 cogitans, and the to cogitatum 1 If Descartes could say : 
 Cogito, ergo mm, might he not have said as well : Gogito, ergo 
 est aliquid cogitatum ? Is not the thing thought an essential 
 part of thought? When you say: A = A, is not there here 
 an object distinct from the consciousness you have of it ? 
 And even if there were not an A in the world, is not this A 
 that is in your thought distinct from the thinking subject, 
 and opposed to it ? Being a thing thmight, it is not that which 
 thinks. This objective element, immanent in intelligence, is 
 
388 BOOK II. CHAPTER IV. 
 
 what is called the intelligible, the rational, and is logically 
 anterior to intelligence ; for there must be something in- 
 telligible, in order that there may be intelligence. The truth 
 consists precisely in this intelligible in itself, and not in the 
 consciousness we have of it. Let us call, with Plato and 
 Hegel, this intelligible foundation of all reality, idea ; let us 
 call the internal and rational essence of things, thought ; and 
 we perceive that a new question may be raised — ^ namely, 
 what is the truly constituent element of thought ? Is it the 
 rational in itself, the intelligible, the idea ? Is it, on the 
 other hand, consciousness ? In the first case, it is the 
 objective of thought that is its substratum, and the subjective 
 is no more than an accident, an accessory. In the second 
 case, it is, on the contrary, consciousness that is the essential 
 act of intelligence ; it is it that renders possible the intelligible, 
 that gives it life and being, that evokes it from nothing. For 
 what is an intelligible that no one comprehends, a truth that 
 no one knows ? 
 
 From these two interpretations of the same fact may 
 originate two hypotheses on the first cause of finality. While 
 admitting by common consent that finality has its cause in 
 thought, we may mean by this, either logical finality, that of 
 the concept, of the pure idea (anterior to consciousness), or 
 the finality of intelligence properly so called, — ^that is to say, 
 conscious intelligence. 
 
 It is the first of these two doctrines that is the true 
 foundation of the Hegelian philosophy, and which raises it 
 far above materialist and purely naturalist doctrines, although 
 the Left of this school has too quickly inclined to the side of 
 naturalism. 
 
 Would not the true, the absolute type of finality, which is 
 not in instinct, be found in the finality of the concept or the 
 idea ? In fact, every idea, every concept, contains, on the 
 same ground as a work of art or a living being, an internal 
 finality, a co-ordination of the parts to the whole. On this 
 ground alone is it a concept, an idea. Suppose, in fact, that 
 
THE PURE IDEA AND CREATIVE ACTIVITY. 389 
 
 the elements of wliich a concept is composed were only in 
 juxtaposition and not united, you will have several concepts, 
 and not merely one. Suppose they are in discord, you have 
 a contradictory concept, — that is, a non-concept. Every con- 
 cept is thus a conciliation between a certain multiplicity and a 
 certain unity ; and this is what Plato calls an idea ev •n-epl to, 
 iroWa)} An absolute multiplicity would be unintelligible ; 
 an absolute and indistinct unity would be equally so. There 
 must thus be a union of the two elements, and a graduated 
 scale from the one to the other. ' The wise men of to-day,' 
 says Plato, ' imperil unitT/ and plurality sooner or later, which 
 they should not. Prom unity they pass all at once to infinity, 
 and the intermediate numbers escape them.' These inter- 
 mediate numbers — that is to say, the genera — are the proper 
 objects of knowledge, and make of nature in general an 
 intelligible whole. 
 
 Thus the whole world might be regarded as a bundle of 
 concepts, like to what Leibnitz called the union of germs. On 
 this hypothesis, each concept would itself be a bundle con- 
 taining others, and so on without end to the absolute concept, 
 which is the universal sphere of concepts ; not that it is simply 
 the sum and collection of them, but it contains them in 
 substance in all its plenitude. But each concept amounts 
 to an agreement of the parts with the whole, and, conse- 
 quently, contains an immanent finality. This is what results 
 even from the ideas most generally received on the origin of 
 created finality. In fact, it is generally admitted, after Plato, 
 that God created animals on pre-existing types present to His 
 mind. But these types must already have presented the 
 same relations of finality as their copies ; otherwise it must 
 be believed that the divine intelligence only contained outlines 
 at first, which it afterwards perfected in becoming creative. 
 The possible and the real are distinguished, and it is admitted 
 that there must be a creator, in order that the possible may 
 become real ; but the possible itself is only such on condition 
 1 Rep. lib. A. p. 596. 
 
390 BOOK 11. CHAPTER IV. 
 
 of already containing intrinsic relations of accommodation. 
 No doubt concepts may be combined, and this is secondary 
 or finite finality; but this combination itself supposes pre- 
 existing concepts, in which the agreement of the parts with 
 the whole is already given, and is not the work of a voluntary 
 accommodation. If it be so in the idea, why should it not 
 be the same in the realization of the idea ? Or, rather, is 
 there veritably a difference between the idea and the reality, 
 between the model and the copy? If the idea is logically 
 anterior to consciousness, it has already a mode of existence 
 in itself anterior to the fact of being known. But what is 
 this mode of existence ? And who can .prove to us that it is 
 anything else than just what we call existence ? Are things 
 distinct from their ideas ? Whereby and wherein are they 
 distinct ? We transfer our subjective ideas to the divine 
 intelligence ; we suppose that God may know possible things 
 that are not real, which is Only true of the finite intelligence. 
 But in the absolute, to be thought and to be are only one and 
 the same thing. Being is the intelligible, and the intelligible 
 is being. There are not two men, man iii himself and the 
 real man ; otherwise, as Aristotle says, a third would be 
 needed to set them in harmony. To admit ideas distinct from 
 things (or, what is equivalent, things distinct from ideas) is, as 
 Aristotle says, to count twice the same beings, adding the 
 words in themselves {kuS" avra). Will it be said that things 
 cannot be confounded with their ideas, because they are finite, 
 contingent, and imperfect, and the world of ideas is only the 
 world of the perfect and absolute ? Why, this would just be 
 to deny that things have their ideas, their eternal and pre- 
 existing models. If things have their ideas, these ideas 
 represent them with their characters of contingency, limita- 
 tion, and imperfection. Thus the plant in itself is represented 
 as less perfect than the animal, the animal as less perfect 
 than man. These, being changing things, are represented 
 as changing, and their ideas contain the idea of change. 
 What makes us believe that the totality of things consti- 
 
THE PURE IDEA AND CREATIVE ACTIVITY. 391 
 
 tutiiig the world is finite, is that we ourselves are one of 
 these things, and that we only consider the whole from our 
 limited point of view. But these limitations are only logical 
 and relative, and the entire sphere of concepts is nevertheless 
 an absolute sphere. Besides, has not Plato admirably shown 
 that the not-being itself has its place among ideas ? Without 
 the not-being there were no distinction ; all the genera would 
 be confounded, thought would vanish with being.-' 
 
 For the rest, we know that the question how far the idea 
 is distinct from nature, is one of those that have divided the 
 Hegelian school. Hegel maintains this distinction, which 
 vanishes with his disciples. What with him is ideal becomes 
 with them natural. But even if one maintained, with Hegel, 
 the distinction of the idea and nature, of the abstract and the 
 concrete existence of the idea, onfe might still say that nature 
 is only the idea in motion, the idea externalized, and, conse- 
 quently, that it must manifest externally the internal finality 
 that constitutes it. Nature being only the idea, each of the 
 terms of nature is only one of the terms of the idea. It is, 
 therefore, a concept; and as the concept has an internal 
 finality, the being that represents it has the same finality. It 
 is only the concept realizing itself, the essence seeking and 
 finding itself by degrees ; but as the final end of each being 
 is to attain all its essence, its whole idea, it is, therefore, 
 definitively the end that realizes itself. What is the end 
 of the animal ? It is to live. But is it to live like the 
 plant ? No • as an animal. But is it merely to live like an 
 animal in general ? No ; but as a given animal in particular. 
 The end of each being is thus to live conformably to its own 
 nature ; it is its nature that is its end. And as, at the same 
 time, this proper nature or essence is the cause of its develop- 
 ment, the end is thus the cause. Here is the very essence 
 
 ' It might be said that there is a distinction between things and ideas — 
 namely, that things move, while ideas do not move. But if the doctrine of 
 Kant be admitted on the subjectivity of the idea of time, this distinction would 
 disappear. Motion would be a purely ideal fact, having reference only to our 
 mode of conception. 
 
392 ' BOOK II. CHAPTER IV. 
 
 of the final ca^Tse, the absolute identity of the end and the 
 cause. It is because it is an animal, and such an animal, 
 that it develops in such a direction, and it is in order to be- 
 come that that it develops. Thus the in order to blends with 
 the becaicse. But both are confounded in the concept of the 
 being. It is the concept of the bird that makes it have wings, 
 and it has wings in order to realize the concept of the bird. 
 
 In a word, whoever admits the theory of Platonic archetypes 
 (to, •jrapaBelyfj.aTo), must acknowledge that in this ideal world, 
 that serves as model to the real, each type contains as pure 
 essence and d, priori, and without having previously been 
 fabricated, the same relations of accommodation as, in the 
 real world, the genera really existing. But since this accom- 
 modation may exist in itself before creation, without it being 
 necessary to suppose an anterior cause, except the Absolute, 
 that envelops all, and of which ideas are only the modes, 
 why should these same types need for their realization 
 another virtue than the virtue that gives them being, — that 
 is to say, their own essence, and their relation to the Absolute ? 
 In this conception, finality is not the result of chance ; there 
 is no chance. It is not the result of mechanism, mechanism 
 only being the totality of inferior notions, the poorest of all, 
 and, consequently, the least intelligible. It is not the result 
 of vitality and instinct ; for vitality and instinct are precisely 
 the facts of finality that must be explained. Finality has its 
 cause in thought, — that is to say, in the necessity of things 
 being rational in order to exist. Finality is the truth which, 
 in the common opinion, is bound to the consciousness one has 
 of it, while it is independent of it. Hegel has expressed this 
 in one of his finest pages, that sums up all his doctrine. 
 
 ' When I Jcnow how a thing is, I possess the truth. It is 
 thus one conceives the truth at first. But that is only the 
 truth in its relation to consciousness, or formal truth, mere 
 justness of thought. The truth, in a profounder sense, con- 
 sists, on the other hand, in the identity of the object with the 
 notion. This is the truth we mean, for instance, when we 
 
THE PURE IDEA AND CREATIVE ACTIVITY. 393 
 
 speak of a veritable state, of a veritable work of art. Thes,e 
 objects are true when they are what they ought to be, — that 
 is, when their reality corresponds to their notion. Thus 
 viewed, the false {das Unwahre) is the bad. A bad man is a 
 false man, a man who is not conformed to his notion. In 
 general, nothing can exist in which this agreement of notion 
 and reality is not found. The bad and the false themselves are 
 only in so far as, and in the measure in which, their reality 
 corresponds to its notion. The absolutely bad and the abso- 
 lutely contrary to the notion fall and vanish, so to say, of 
 themselves. The notion alone is that by which things exist, 
 which religion expresses by saying that things are what they 
 are by the Divine Thought that created and animates them. 
 When we start from the idea, it need not be conceived as some- 
 thing inaccessible, and as placed beyond the limits of a region 
 that cannot be reached. For it is, on the contrary, what is most 
 present, and is found in every consciousness, although it be 
 not there in its purity and clearness. We conceive the world 
 as an immense whole that God has created, and that He has 
 created because He finds His satisfaction in it. We also con- 
 ceive it as ruled by Divine Providence. That is to say, the 
 beings and multiplied events that compose the world are 
 eternally reduced to that imity from which they proceeded, 
 and preserved in a state conformable to that unity. Philo- 
 sophy has no other object than the speculative knowledge of 
 the idea, and all research deserving the name of philosophy 
 has only proposed to manifest in the consciousness this abso- 
 lute truth, which the understanding only grasps in some sort 
 by fragments.' ^ 
 
 The grandeur of the conception we have just set forth will 
 not be disputed. It leaves far behind it aU the materialist 
 hypotheses, and even those of hylozoism, themselves so 
 superior to materialism. It is not very certain that Plato 
 himself, in hi^ theory of ideas, had any other conception than 
 that. Although its pantheistic character cannot be mistaken, 
 ' Hegel, Grande EncyclopMie, § 213 
 
394 BOOK II. CHAPTER IV. 
 
 it is yet distinguishable from Spinoza's hypothesis in two 
 essential points : 1st, It reduces to the idea, what Spinoza calls 
 suhstance. The characteristic and determining element of the 
 being is the rational, the intelligible, the logical; while for 
 Spinoza it is the substratum, which is hardly distinguishable 
 from the Aristotelian matter, and has no title to be called 
 God. 2d, The idea is considered as a circle, which returns to 
 itself: it sets out from and returns to itself. It is, therefore, 
 final cause ; while Spinoza's substance is lost in its attributes, 
 the attributes in their modes, so that the being seems always 
 removed farther and farther from itself. The substance is 
 thus only the efficient cause, and its progress is only down- 
 wards, its development is one-sided ; while, in the philosophy 
 of Hegel, the advance of the idea is progressive, and the 
 motion is double, at once centrifugal and centripetal. The 
 idea is the fusion of the two forces. The conception of Hegel 
 is thus more spiritualistic ; that of Spinoza more materialistic. 
 Let us now see on what conditions the Hegelian conception 
 will maintain its superiority over that of Spinoza, and whether 
 it will not be just by reducing itself to the spiritualist con- 
 ception properly so called. 
 
 The essential conception of Hegelianism is to substitute 
 ideas for things, to eliminate the thing {das Bing) as a cajput 
 mortuum, void of all content. A thing only is, and deserves 
 to be, as it is intelligible and rational. Each thing possesses 
 as much being as it has rational content. A heap of stones 
 is only a being by accident, because the stones composing it 
 have only extrinsic and fortuitous relations, and have nothing 
 intelligible. If this conception, which is true, is admitted, 
 it must follow that the being existing because of intellig- 
 ibility, the absolute must be the absolutely intelligible. But 
 what is an intelligible, but what is capable of being compre- 
 hended ? What is the rational, but what satisfies the reason? 
 What is the truth, but what is seen and recognised as true? 
 What is a truth that no one knows, and that does not know 
 itself ? A truth absolutely unknown, which, on the one hand, 
 
THE PUEE IDEA AND CREATIVE ACTIVITY. 395 
 
 does not rest on a substance, and, on the other, is not received 
 in a mind, is nothing but a mere possibility. Bossuet has 
 admirably said, in a famoiis passage which contains the 
 marrow of what is excellent in Hegelianism : ' If I now ask 
 where and in what subject these truths subsist, eternal and 
 immutable as they are, I am obliged to own a being wherein 
 truth eternally subsists and is always understood ; and this 
 being must be the truth itself, and must be all truth ; and 
 from it the truth is derived in all that is, and is understood 
 apart from it.' 
 
 Thus a truth not understood is not a truth. Hegel says 
 that the truth in its relation to consciousness is only a 
 'formal truth.' We, on the other hand, say that a truth 
 without any relation to consciousness is only a formal truth, 
 — that is, a potential truth. No doubt, if we speak of the 
 human consciousness, subjective, particular, localized, the per- 
 ception of that truth will only constitute, if you will, a formal 
 truth. For the truth in itself, to be perceived by man, will 
 only be an external denomination, as the names we give Him 
 are to God, which can add nothing to His perfection. It by 
 no means follows from this that consciousness does not form 
 an integral part of truth. Only to an absolute truth there 
 should be an absolute consciousness to correspond ; the sub- 
 jective element ought to be adequate to the objective. Hegel 
 himself does not hesitate to define the idea, ' the identity of 
 the subject and the object ; ' and he accuses the philosophy 
 of Schelling of having too much sacrificed the subject to the 
 object. But what can remain of the subject if knowledge, 
 consciousness, be taken from it ? The truth can, therefore, 
 only cease to be formal, by being the adequate act of the 
 intelligible and of intelligence, as Aristotle has defined it : it is 
 the thought of the thought. For the rest, this is what Hegel him- 
 self expresses in this proposition, which is the conclusion of his 
 Zogic : ' The idea, as unity of the objective and subjective idea, 
 is the notion of the idea that has no other object than the idea, or, 
 what amounts to the same thing, which takes itself for its object. 
 
396 BOOK II. CHAPTER IV. 
 
 It is the idea that thinks itself.'^ F^n^lon expresses the same 
 thought more clearly when he says : ' It is thus evident that He 
 [God] knows Himself, and that He knows Himself perfectly, — 
 that is to say, that in seeing Himself, He equals by His intelli- 
 gence His intelligibility ; in a word. He comprehends Himself.'^ 
 
 We perceive from this analysis that the Hegelian concep- 
 tion, properly understood, does not essentially differ from 
 that which we propose. In fact, between an idea that thinks 
 itself and an intelligence that thinks the truth, and makes 
 but one with it, the difference would be difficult to grasp. 
 We may indifferently, and according to the point of view 
 selected, give prominence to the rational and objective side 
 of the idea, and we shall have the impersonal God ; or give 
 prominence to the subjective and conscious point of view, and 
 we shall have the personal God. But these two points of 
 view make but one ; and in both systems intelligence, the 
 IV0O9, will be at the origin of things. It is in this sense that 
 the identity of being and thought may be admitted. 
 
 The absolute idea being thus at the same time absolute 
 intelligence, how shall one conceive the ulterior development 
 of other ideas ? For it is this development that constitutes 
 the world properly so called, or nature. 
 
 The question is this : Given the world as the external 
 development of the absolute idea (whatever for the rest may 
 be the cause of this externalization — to Hegel as to us an 
 insoluble problem), the question is whether this development 
 has its cause in the idea considered only in the objective and 
 rational point of view, or in the idea considered in its totality, 
 as the unity of subject and object. In the first case, the 
 world wiU only be the impersonal development of the divine 
 idea ; there is nothing like intentionality, foresight, wisdom. 
 The idea realizes itself by its intrinsic virtue ; finality is only 
 logical. But if the world is derived from the idea considered 
 altogether (that is to say, subject-object), it may be afSrmed 
 quite as well that it is derived from the subject idea as from 
 1 Logic, § ccxxvi. * Fenelon, Exist, de Dieu, 2me part. art. v. 
 
THE PURE IDEA AND CREATIVE ACTIVITY. 397 
 
 the object idea, — that is to say, from intelligence as from 
 being, — and it will be free to us to say, as in the common 
 philosophy, that intelligence has made the world. Therefore, 
 finality is intentional, for intelligence, having made the world 
 conformably to the idea which is itself, knowing the end, 
 knows at the same time all the steps that conduct to the 
 end ; and this relation of subordinate knowledge to -the final 
 and total knowledge is what we call, in human language, 
 foresight and intention — in a word, wisdom. 
 
 Let us consider the matter on another side, so as to effect 
 the complete transformation of the pure idea into creative 
 activity. 
 
 It is, doubtless, with reason that Hegel has set forth the 
 rational character of being, and advanced this proposition, that 
 what is not rational is not real; but the rational as such, 
 taken in the precision of its idea, is something inert, dead, 
 immoveable, from which no action can proceed. Aristotle 
 had made this objection to the ideas of Plato, but without 
 reason ; for Plato attributed a force to ideas, Svvafj,i^. He 
 ascribed to them intelligence, life, and motion, and placed in 
 Jupiter a royal soul (^aa-iXcKrjv ■^v'^ijv). Without force, 
 soul, or activity, the idea not only could not be developed, 
 it could not even be. Existence is not a mere rationality, a 
 simple concept. It is, as Herbart says, ' an absolute position.' 
 Being is because it is. It supposes itself. But this act of 
 supposing itseK is of another nature (taken strictly) than 
 rationality. Granting that the idea supposes itself, and, in 
 doing so, supposes the rest, still, in so far as it supposes itself, 
 it is activity and not pure idea; and as we have seen that 
 the idea itself is at once intelligence and truth, it is thus an 
 intelligent activity. But an intelligent activity is nothing 
 else than a will. The pure idea is thus a pure will, an 
 absolute will. 
 
 What essentially constitutes finality, is that the relation of 
 the parts to the whole is contingent : it is just this that is 
 finality. If, in fact, it be admitted that matter, obeying 
 
398 BOOK II. CHAPTER IV. 
 
 necessary laws, ought by force to take the form of an organ 
 fit for a certain function, the idea of finality must be 
 sacrificed, and only blind necessity be admitted. But when 
 we speak of an end, it is implied thereby that . there is some- 
 thing that limits and circumscribes the mode of action of 
 matter to determine it to a certain effect rather than 
 another. This relation is, therefore, contingent, or, yet once 
 more, there is no finality, which is no more in question. 
 Meanwhile this relation of contingency remains always the 
 same, whether as regards real matter or an ideal matter con- 
 ceived d priori. Idea! matter is no more subject than real 
 matter to a necessary law, determining it to become bird, 
 mammifer, or man. It contains, no doubt, these forms 
 potentially, for, in fact, it realizes them; but this bare power 
 does not suffice to produce these combinations, and to no 
 purpose are they logically possible, — that is, do not imply 
 a contradiction ; they are impossible really because one of 
 the elements of their possibility is precisely something that 
 is not mere matter. Thus ideal matter, distinct or not from 
 real matter, so far as it realizes relations of finality, has not 
 its reason in itself. Ideally, as well as really, it only ex- 
 presses a mere possibility, a subject of motions and indeter- 
 minate figures, but not of precise combinations or appropriated 
 forms. In a word, no more can be said of the concept than 
 of things ; and if, in things themselves, the predetermination 
 of the present by the future cannot have its cause or reason 
 in the material substratum, in the likr] of Aristotle, it is quite 
 the same with the concept. The concept of matter does not 
 contain more adaptation to an end than matter itself; in 
 both cases the true cause must be beyond. If, then, there is 
 a pure concept of the animal in itself, that concept cannot 
 exist by itself. So far as it contains an ideal adaptation of 
 matter to ends, it has in it something contingent, which can 
 only be explained by a will directed towards an end. 
 
 It will be said that if the concept of matter does not 
 oppose the formation of certain determinate bodies, — the 
 
THE PUEE IDEA AND CEEATIVE ACTIVITY. 399 
 
 elements, for instance, — it is not evident why it should be 
 opposed to more complicated bodies. We will ask, in our 
 turn, if even these first bodies are necessarily contained in 
 the concept of matter, and if the idea of a substance which is 
 only by hypothesis endued with motion can, strictly speaking, 
 lead to the concept of anything determinate. 
 
 If, then, real matter does not guarantee us any order, the 
 idea of matter does so no more ; and inversely, if the idea of 
 matter could give birth of itself to all other ideas, — that is to 
 say, to all that presents an order, plan, form, or finality, — it is 
 not evident why it should not be the same with real matter, 
 and not merely with ideal matter. The pure idea is of no 
 further use. But if, in fine, it is said that it is not the con- 
 cept of matter that engenders determinate forms, but that it 
 is the idea of nature altogether, the idea of the whole, which 
 envelops and conditions all its parts, — the concept of matter 
 being itself only the poorest and lowest of all, — I shall 
 willingly admit this thought : but I still inquire. In virtue of 
 what does the absolute idea accommodate the poorest and 
 lowest concepts to the interests of the most elevated, when no 
 relation of necessity exists between the one and the others ? 
 and what other way can there be of conceiving this accommo- 
 dation, essentially contingent as we have seen it, if not by 
 something which can only be called by the name of choice ? 
 
 Will it still be said that necessity, no doubt, is not applicable 
 to the concept of finality, as regards starting from the lowest 
 notions to reach the highest, but, on the other hand, that it 
 is the highest notions that necessarily engender their material 
 conditions ? that thus there may be at once finality and 
 necessity, and, consequently, that it is useless to appeal to 
 choice, foresight, intentionality ? For example, as the notion 
 of the circle implies the notion of radii and renders it 
 necessary, as the concept of ten implies the concept of units, 
 the latter the concept of fractions, and so on, so the concept 
 of the animal would imply that of organs, the concept of 
 the vertebrate that of a circulatory system. Thus a necessary 
 
400 BOOK II. CHAPTER IV. 
 
 and absolute synthesis would be established in an inverse 
 direction to the impotent analysis of materialism, without the 
 very slightest need to appeal to a previous consciousness of 
 the synthesis, and above all a choice and will, as having 
 co-ordinated all the rest. There, is co-ordination, there is 
 order : order is even the essence of things ; but this order 
 has nothing contingent, and is sufficiently explained as logical 
 necessity and impersonal truth. 
 
 We reply that, whether the series be begun above or below, 
 either the idea of finality must be renounced, or the idea of 
 logical necessity. It is as impossible to comprehend that an 
 end necessarily produces its conditions, as to comprehend that 
 the conditions by inevitable destiny conduct to the end. To 
 say that the function creates the organ, is not more intelligible 
 than to say, the organ creates the function. That the idea 
 of sight, for instance, is capable of commanding matter, of 
 organizing it under the form of an eye ; that the idea of life 
 is capable of engendering organs of nutrition, is always 
 absolutely unintelligible: it is to revert to the doctrine of 
 occult qualities and of instinctive finality. In the concept, 
 just as in reality, the end cannot be active of itself; the end 
 cannot be the same thing as what realizes the end. If it be 
 said that glory made Alexander the conqueror of Asia, it is 
 meant that the love and thought of glory — that is, the pre- 
 vious imagination of the result of his actions — determined 
 Alexander. But it is with the logical concept as with the 
 reality. In the concept of the eye, as well as in the real 
 eye, sight has no necessary logical relation to matter, and, 
 consequently, cannot predetermine it to become an eye. 
 
 Thus it is evident that the logical concept can no more 
 explain finality than mechanism or instinct have done ; or, at 
 least, it only explains it if we change the logical into an 
 intellectual concept, — that is to say, if we add to it the intel- 
 ligence that changes the conditions into means, and for which 
 the results are ends. 
 
 But we acknowledge that this whole deduction supposes 
 
THE PURE IDEA AND CEEATIVE ACTIVITY. 401 
 
 that the Platonic exemplarism he renounced, which supposes 
 beforehand all the concepts of things, including their finality, 
 to be given in the divine intelligence d, priori, which thereby 
 removes tliem from the choice and action of God, and which 
 destroys from the foundation the argument of final causes. 
 According to this hypothesis there would be, in fact, in the 
 divine intelhgence, types eternal and absolute, like God Him- 
 self, in imitation of which He would have created the con- 
 tingent and limited beings composing the universe. Every 
 class of beings would have its model, its idea. The divine 
 intelligence would contain from all eternity an ideal exemplar 
 of the world ; and not only of this actual world, but, accord- 
 ing to Leibnitz, of all possible worlds, among which God 
 would have chosen this as the best of all. Not only genera 
 and species, but individuals themselves, would be eternally 
 represented in God. Thus the world would exist under two 
 forms : 1st, Under an ideal form in the divine nature ; 2d, 
 Under a concrete and real form outside of God. 
 
 Such a hypothesis evidently destroys all foresight and 
 creative wisdom in the Supreme Being. For all things being 
 represented beforehand, from all eternity, as they behoved to 
 be, their finality thus equally exists in a necessary and eternal 
 manner, without God intervening otherwise than to contem- 
 plate it. Let the divine idea, for instance, conceive the human 
 body. In this idea are found represented all the relations 
 that constitute the body, and, in particular, the relations of 
 adaptation and of finality, without which there is no human 
 body. Such an idea, being eternal, absolute, like God Himself, 
 is not created by Him ; it is not the product of His wil^ 
 nor of His power, for it is Himself. Must it not, therefore, 
 be concluded that there may be relations of finality self-exist- 
 ing, before any foresight, and independent of any creation and 
 of any personal combination ? If foresight or choice is not in 
 conception, no more is it in creation itself. In fact, when God 
 wished to create the body, what had He to foresee and to 
 combine, since all is foreseen and combined beforehand in His 
 
 2 c 
 
402 BOOK II. CHAPTEK IV. 
 
 eternal thought, in the eternal model that rests in Him ? He 
 had nothing to do but to copy that eternal model, without 
 having need of any particular act of thought to adapt means 
 to ends. This adaptation is given in itself by the very nature 
 of things, in the divine idea of a human body ; and unless it 
 be said there is no such idea, it is not evident in what creative 
 labour consists ; I can only see in it imitation pure and simple. 
 
 No doubt if we suppose, like Plato, matter existing apart 
 from God, already having determinate properties, I would 
 admit that there was room for combination, comparison, and 
 foresight, to adapt the laws and properties of this matter to 
 an ideal plan ; but as such matter does not exist, and, conse- 
 quently, opposes no obstacle to God, He has no difficulty to 
 foresee nor to remove, no means to prepare ; the world is 
 given Him a priori, entire in all its parts, in its totality, in 
 aU its order. He has only a word to say, a fiat to pronounce. 
 In this I see great power, but no act of foresight. 
 
 Thus, on the hypothesis of exemplarism, or of Platonic 
 paradigms, foresight would have no place in God. It would 
 not be in the conception of the types, since they are eternally 
 present to Him (avTa kuO' avTo), holding of Him their essence, 
 no doubt, but necessarily ; it would not be in the execution 
 of the work, since God would have nothing else to do than to 
 execute what He had conceived. It is said in the schools that 
 God is the author ' of existences and not of essences.' But if 
 it be so, as Gassendi said with reason to Descartes, ' What 
 great thing, then, does God do when He produces existence ? 
 Certainly Ee does nothing more than a tailor, vAen he clothes a 
 man vnth his apparel.'^ 
 
 Eeid makes similar objections to the theory of ideas, or 
 eternal essences. ' This system only leaves the Creator, in 
 the production of the universe, the sole merit of execution. The 
 model had aU the beauty and perfection that is admired in 
 the copy, and the Deity had only to copy after a pattern 
 that existed independent of Him. ... 2d, If the world of 
 
 ■ Objections to the Fifth Meditation. 
 
THE PUKE IDEA AND CREATIVE ACTIVITY. 403 
 
 ideas, without being the work of a perfectly wise and good 
 intelligent being, could have so much beauty and perfection, 
 how can we infer from the order and beauty of this world, 
 which is but an imperfect copy of the other, that it must 
 have been made by a perfectly wise and good being ? Either 
 this argument is destroyed by the supposition of an ideal 
 world that exists without cause, or else it applies to that ideal 
 world itself.' ^ 
 
 On the hypothesis of exenvplarism, God would show in creat- 
 ing less invention and genius than the most commonplace of 
 artists. The latter, in fact, as esthetic teaches us, has not only 
 the merit of copying his model, but he creates one for him- 
 self, which he externally realizes. As to God, He would do 
 nothing but slavishly copy the eternal model that He carries 
 in Himself ! Where would be omnipotence in an act so 
 inferior ? He creates, it is said, the material of things, and 
 it is herein that His is superior to human art; but what is 
 this matter compared with the form ? Would he who should 
 create marble be superior to him who creates the statue ? 
 Thus the dignity of the Creator appears to us much reduced, 
 when no other honour is left to Him but to produce the sub- 
 stance of the world, while the world itself, in its harmonious 
 and wise form, would be eternally represented d, priori in His 
 mind, without Him having in any way ordained it Himself 
 and by a free volition. 
 
 Observe that on this hypothesis it is hot merely the general 
 essences that are thus represented in the divine understand- 
 ing, but also individual essences. Not only man in himself, 
 but Socrates in himself, Plato, Adam, and so on, are eternally 
 represented there with their specific and individual characters ; 
 and the whole series of actions that each of them must 
 accomplish, all the consequences, the whole chain of events, 
 all is d, priori in the divine mind. When God creates, He 
 therefore does nothing but externally produce that ideal world 
 — that photograph, by anticipation, of the real world. But is 
 ^ Essays on the Intellectual Powers, vol. i. Essay iv. chap. ii. p. 371. 
 
404 BOOK II. CHAPTEK IV. 
 
 not this, as the opponents of optimism have so often objected, 
 to subject God to fate, — to associate with Him, even as ideal, 
 a world, or even worlds without end, with which He dwells, 
 without having willed it. 
 
 If, then, we wish to maintain the theory of final causes, it 
 is indispensable to push it farther, and to transfer it into the 
 heart of the divine nature — to the very production of the 
 divine types. Creation must be made to commence before 
 the realized appearance of the world, its first lineaments must 
 be discovered in the divine life itself. 
 
 We will admit, then, a sort of primary creation anterior to 
 the creation of the world, and which we would willingly call 
 the ideal creation. God, before creating the world, creates the 
 idea of the world ; He creates what Plato calls the avro^coov 
 or the TrapaSeiy/ia — namely, the ideal type that contains in 
 it all the genera, species, and individuals of which the sensible 
 or real world is composed. 
 
 But to say that God creates essences at the same time as 
 existences, is this not saying with Descartes, that God is the 
 author of the eternal verities, that He creates the true and 
 the false, good and evil ? — a theory a hundred times refuted, 
 and which in itself is indefensible ; for, on the one hand, it 
 makes of God a very tyrant, and, on the other, it puts in peril 
 all certitude and all truth. 
 
 We must here establish a distinction between verities and 
 essences. Wo doubt the truth — that is to say, the logical con- 
 nection of ideas — cannot be the object of a free act of God, 
 nor of any power in the world. No doubt, given a triangle, 
 its three angles must necessarily be equal to two right angles. 
 But is it necessary that a triangle be given ? That is the 
 question. A triangle is the synthesis of three lines arranged 
 in a certain manner. But is this synthesis necessary, eternal, 
 absolute, like God Himself? Must not there be a certain 
 voluntary act to bring these three lines together, so as to 
 intersect ? As for man, it may be said that the idea of the 
 triangle, and of geometrical figures in general, is inevitably 
 
THE PUEE IDEA AND CREATIVE ACTIVITY. 405 
 
 imposed upoa him, whether because he meets them in nature 
 or because he sees them in the divine mind. But in God 
 why should there be supposed of necessity a representation 
 a priori of what does not yet exist ? What contradiction is 
 there in admitting that God, by a free act, produces the idea of 
 the triangle, which being once given, carries with it all that 
 is contained in its essence ? God, on this hypothesis, does not 
 create the truth, but He creates what, being once given, will 
 be, for the mind that contemplates it, the occasion of discover- 
 ing a crowd of ' truths. But these truths would not have 
 existed if the idea that contains and envelops them had not 
 been conceived. 
 
 It is the same with organic forms as with geometric. As 
 soon as we suppose them given, there immediately follows a 
 certain number of necessary truths, which would not exist if 
 these forms were not given. For instance, given an animal, 
 it is necessary for it to have means of nutrition and reproduc- 
 tion; and a certain mode of nutrition being given, certain 
 organs are necessary. Cuvier has clearly proved that 
 there was an anatomy ct priori that could be constructed 
 from this or that datum. But what does not seem necessary 
 is that the idea of the animal should be given. Why should 
 there be supposed an eternal animal, the absolute type of all 
 existing animals ? Would not that be an animal-God, if we 
 may so speak ? In order that this idea of the animal may 
 exist, there must be an activity that makes the synthesis of 
 all the elements of which the idea of the animal consists, and 
 that distributes them conformably to a plan. No doubt it is 
 not by chance and caprice that God creates such a combina- 
 tion, and even it has its laws. But I mean to say that if 
 the creative activity did not exist, no more would such types 
 exist. What I criticise is the conception of a God condemned 
 to contemplate images of which the real examples nowhere 
 exist. To my thinking, these models or essences must have 
 their origin and causality in the divine power and will as 
 well as existences. 
 
406 BOOK II. CHAPTER IV. 
 
 To make this point of view more clearly understood, let us 
 notice that in intelligence, as experience gives it to us, two 
 things may be distinguished, — contemplation and creation. 
 There is contemplative intelligence and creative intelligence. 
 When we learn a science, as geometry, algebra, etc., our intelli- 
 gence does nothing but recognise and contemplate the pre- 
 sented truth, and it is still the same when we think of the 
 truths we have once discovered. They are now for us 
 only an object of contemplation. No doubt that is not a 
 purely passive state of the mind, and Aristotle was right to 
 consider contemplation as an activity. But is it the highest 
 of activities ? Is there not above it the creative activity, — 
 that of the poet, the artist, the savant even? Here intelli- 
 gence is not content to contemplate what exists ; it produces 
 itself what did not exist before. Moliere creates the type of 
 the Misanthrope, Shakespeare that of Hamlet. Where had 
 they seen those types ? Nowhere, or at least nowhere entirely. 
 It is the poet himself that has given birth to these forms and 
 types; he has combined their elements into a harmonious 
 and living whole ; so do the sculptor, painter, and architect. 
 Where was St. Peter's at Eome before Michael- Angelo ? He 
 caused it to spring from his thought ; and although the myth 
 of Jupiter taking Minerva from his brain has been a thousand 
 times mentioned, it becomes for us here more than a common 
 metaphor — even the vivid and exact expression of the theory 
 we maintain. In the genius of the savant it seems that the 
 two modes of intelligence iinite ; for, on the one hand, there is 
 for him the contemplation of a truth he has not made, and, on 
 the other, by his discovery, there is a creation of means by 
 which he forces the truth to reveal itself; and the more 
 creation there is, there is the more genius. 
 
 In pure contemplation, the intelligence derives nothing from 
 its own self; it is only a mirror reflecting an object superior 
 to it. And even if it be admitted, with Leibnitz, that pure 
 knowledge is innate, or, with Plato, that the soul does nothing 
 but remember, it is still the case that in knowledge acquired. 
 
THE PURE IDEA AND CREATIVE ACTIVITY. 407 
 
 if there be spontaneous evolution, that evolution, has nothing 
 personal, nothing that the soul could consider as its individual 
 work. It is not so in discovery, or in poetic and artistic 
 production. In both these cases the soul not only has 
 thoughts, it makes them. . There is an internal elaboration 
 and a fertilizing activity that can only be explained by 
 the word creation. 
 
 So, too, the epithet ' creative genius ' is well applied to 
 those who have introduced new types, methods, or truths into 
 the world. 
 
 The difference will now be understood that we make out 
 between contemplation and creation ; and who can deny that 
 the second of these terms is superior to the other? This 
 superiority is sufficiently attested by the different amount of 
 pleasure procured by the two acts. 
 
 To enjoy a truth is evidently not so sweet as to enjoy the 
 conquest of truth ; to contemplate beautiful works of art 
 cannot equal the pleasure of creating them ; the pleasure of a 
 virtue practised is nothing compared to the pleasure caused by 
 a triumph over actual temptation ; and, in general, productive 
 activity is superior to mere contemplation. 
 
 When Aristotle considered contemplation as the highest of 
 activities, he compared it to material activity that produces 
 outside; but, in what he called contemplation, he did not 
 pay attention to the difference we have mentioned. He did 
 not observe that in pure intelligence there may still be two 
 modes of activity — the one creative, the other purely con- 
 templative, and, therefore, more passive. He only thought of 
 the infinite pleasure that the discovery of truth procured him ; 
 and he did not perceive that even this discovery was not 
 purely contemplative, but that there was on his part a display 
 of inventive activity, and that it was in that very thing that 
 his happiness consisted. 
 
 Those who have said that the search for truth is worth 
 more than the possession of truth itself, have had a presenti- 
 ment of the thought we express. But they deceived them- 
 
408 BOOK II. CHAPTER IV. 
 
 selves nevertheless: it is not the search, but the discovery 
 that is the supreme pleasure. For to seek without finding 
 has never been a pleasure. No more is it when the artist is 
 painfully seeking his theme that he is happy ; it is when he 
 has brought it forth. What is true is, that for the scientist 
 discovery, and for the artist production, are the supreme happi- 
 ness ; but, the truth once found and the masterpiece achieved, 
 they both pass on to other discoveries, to other thoughts. 
 
 It will now be understood what we call in God ideal 
 creation. It is in Him an analogous act (save the difference 
 of infinitude) to what we call the creative act in human 
 genius.^ 
 
 We therefore conceive two periods in the divine life, whether 
 historically or logically distinct does not here much concern 
 us. In the first period, God is in Himself collected, concen- 
 trated, gathered in Himself in His indivisible unity. This 
 unity is not an empty and bare unity, whence all proceeds 
 without one knowing why (for, being nothing in itself, it 
 would have no reason to determine itself in one direction 
 rather than another) ; it is an active and living unity ; it 
 is the absolute determination, the absolute concentration of 
 being ; it is the plenuvi. 
 
 God being thus conceived as the absolute unity, act, and 
 consciousness, creation commences when God comes out of 
 Himself, and thinks something else than Himself. But this 
 very thing is creation. There would thus be in some sort 
 two creations, — the one concrete, historical, in time and space, 
 composed of individualities that have their proper being, and 
 are distinct from their Creator, at least in that superior state 
 in which they become self-conscious ; and another creation, 
 which I call ideal, and which consists in the very invention 
 of this world, which may be considered as conceived before 
 
 ' For the rest, Plato himself is not far from this thought (see Sep. lib. x., 
 the idea of the bed) : ' There are thus three species of teds — one which exists in 
 itself {h TJ? (piffsi), and of which it may be said that God has made it, «» pa/^sv 
 
THE PUKE IDEA AND CKEATIVE ACTIVITY. 409 
 
 being externally produced. If we call this world the word of 
 God, the divine logos, we shall thus distinguish, with the 
 Alexandrians and Philo, two kinds of word or logos — the 
 internal and the manifested word: X070? evtiddeTo^, Xajois 
 •7rpo<f>opiKb<;. There will thus always be an ideal and a real 
 world, a paradigm and a copg. But, properly speaking, these 
 are purely logical distinctions, borrowed from the mode of 
 action of the human intelligence, for which thinking and doing 
 are two things. This duality is useless when applied to the 
 creative activity. To invent and create are one and the same 
 thing. The two creations thus blend into one. But then we 
 know the meaning of the expressions, wisdom, art, science, 
 applied to the works of creation. God is no longer a copyist, 
 faithfully reproducing a fixed model ; He is not a magician, 
 who, by an act of will, evokes spirits pre-existing in a supra- 
 mundane world. He is a true creator, who knows, who can, 
 and who wills, all together ; who wills at once the end and the 
 means, — the end by an antecedent, the means by a consequent 
 volition, — that is to say, in reality, by a unique and absolute 
 volition, which we logically analyze to bring it down to our 
 understanding. 
 
 Thus, as we said above,^ the type of creative activity is not 
 mechanical industry, although it is from this datum that we set 
 out to rise to the idea of divine art, and although there is even 
 here a mode of action much superior to mechanical instinct. 
 No more is it a calculating intelligence obliged laboriously 
 to combine means to reach its end. It is creative genius, in 
 which is contained the faculty of combining and foreseeing, 
 while at the same time it is absorbed by a higher power ; it 
 is the point where intelligence is united to feeling and wiU in 
 an indissoluble union. Such is the commentary, the most 
 iinished monogram that nature could offer us of divine 
 wisdom ; but let us not forget it is only a commentary. Our 
 knowledge of the first cause, as all the great theologians have 
 thought, is only analogical, and not ontological. God alone 
 ■■ See Book ii. chap. iii. 
 
410 BOOK 11. CHAPTEE IV. 
 
 knows Himself as He is ; we can only know Him in rela- 
 tion to us. 
 
 It would, moreover, be to deceive ourselves, and wrongly to 
 think that what is necessarily relative in our knowledge of 
 God had been set aside, to seek to imagine something more 
 than intelligence, by saying, for instance, that God is liberty, 
 that He is love, etc. That would, in fact, be saying nothing 
 more than what we say. No doubt, God is absolute liberty ; 
 but a liberty without intelligence is no liberty : it is caprice, 
 or rather fate and chance. No doubt, God is love ; but a love 
 without light is no love, and may do more harm than good. 
 Thus He is enlightened liberty and love ; in a word. He is 
 wisdom, as well as power and love. But it is, above all, as 
 wisdom that He appears to us in creation, and thereby it is, 
 above all, that our reason can find some way to Him. For 
 although the world, by its immensity and infinity, proclaims 
 an infinite power, such a power is not more the attribute of 
 God than of His opposite. 'No doubt the world affords us 
 proofs of goodness, or, at least, there are many good things in 
 the universe ; but there are also many bad things, and we 
 know that a blind power might produce by chance both good 
 and evil, as water is a benefit to him who is thirsty and a 
 plague to him whom it inundates. But what a blind power 
 cannot simulate are wise and industrious works, made with 
 art. The apparent disorders that may be found mingled with 
 these wise works prove nothing against them, for it is not 
 here as with goodness. One may be good by chance ; one 
 cannot be wise by chance. "We can understand that an 
 apparent disorder is accidentally met with in a work of 
 wisdom, but not that a wise combination, and even a 
 thousand million wise combinations, are accidentally shown 
 in a blind production. 
 
 Some philosophers of these last times, who combine with 
 extreme subtlety sentimental tendencies, have, above all, 
 characterised the nature of God by love, and seem to have 
 disdained wisdom as too vulgar an attribute. It seems it 
 
THE PUBE IDEA AND CREATIVE ACTIVITY. 411 
 
 was no very great affair to know how to make a fly's wing ; 
 and, as proof of final causes, they will mention attraction, 
 aspiration, tendency, love — rarely art, artifice, skill, know- 
 ledge. But attractions and tendencies may be reconciled with 
 the idea of a blind and dissolute force, which casts away its 
 surplus, and diffuses at once life and death. Such facts do 
 not prove more in favour of Providence than its opposite. 
 The art of nature, on the other hand, is a 'brilliant and 
 prerogative' fact, as Bacon says, in presence of which all 
 theories of fortuitous combinations and of blind instinct will 
 always be shipwrecked. It is also a fact from which one 
 cannot escape by indifference, by forgetting the problem, by 
 a sort of design of not receiving. One may cease to ask 
 whether the world is finite or infinite, if it has had a be- 
 ginning or will have an end ; for nothing obliges us to put 
 these q^uestions to ourselves. But one will never see a flower, 
 a bird, or a human organism without experiencing a wonder that 
 Spinoza rightly calls ' stupid,' for it amounts to stupefaction. 
 Finality is in some sort the only idea that is necessarily 
 implicated in experience. I can consult experience without 
 thinking of the absolute ; I can see things beside others with- 
 out thinking of infinite space ; I can neglect causality as an 
 active power, and replace it by the relation of the antecedent 
 to the consequent, or by the generalization of phenomena. 
 But how can I see an eye without thinking that it is made 
 in order to see, so far, at least, as I think as a man, and not 
 as a systematic philosopher ? The in order to, however, does 
 not occur to the senses, is not a phenomenon of experience. 
 It is an idea, only an idea ; but an idea so bound to experi- 
 ence that it seems to make but one with it. What is vulgar 
 in the idea of finality is precisely what constitutes its high 
 metaphysical value. For the more that metaphysic connects 
 itself with the common reason, the more chance has it of 
 being a solid and necessary science. The more it rarifies its 
 conceptions, the more ground will it give for believing that 
 they are only the artificial creations of an overwrought brain. 
 
412 BOOK II. CHAPTER IV. 
 
 This is why we have specially given ourselves in this whole 
 book to analyze and interpret the idea of combination, which 
 at all times has been what most struck the vulgar. It is 
 combination — that is to say, the rencounter of a very great 
 number of heterogeneous elements in a single and determinate 
 effect — that is the decisive reason of finality. The agreement 
 and proportion existing between such a rencounter and such 
 an effect would be a mere coincidence (that is, an effect with- 
 out a cause) if the effect to be reached were not itself the 
 cause of the combination. Mechanism, in explaining the 
 production of each effect by its own cause, does not explain 
 the production of an effect by the rencounter and agreement of 
 causes. It is thus condemned, whatever effort it may make 
 to dissemble such nonsense, to explain the imiverse by the 
 fortuitous, — ^that is, by chance. Fortunate rencounters, favour- 
 able circumstances, unforeseen coincidences must be multiplied 
 without end, and continually increase in number, as the uni- 
 verse passes from one degree to another, from one order of 
 phenomena to another. Is it sought to explain this faculty of 
 combination which nature possesses, and which is like that of 
 the industrious animals and the innate art of insects, by an 
 analogous cause, — that is to say, by a sort of instinct, — ^nature 
 proceeding to its end, like the animal itself, without knowing 
 and without willing it, by an innate tendency ? In admitting 
 such a hypothesis, we should do nothing but state the very 
 fact of combination, while assigning to it some unknown cause, 
 called instinct, by analogy, but which would tell nothing more 
 than the fact to be explained— namely, that nature goes 
 towards ends. The only way in which we could conceive an 
 end is to view it as a predetermined effect. But how can an 
 effect be predetermined except so far as it is designed before- 
 hand, and preconceived in the ef&cient cause called to produce 
 it ? And can this preconception or predestination be for us 
 anything but the idea of the effect ? And, in fine, what can 
 an idea be but an intellectual act, present to a mind in a 
 consciousness ? 
 
THE PUKE IDEA AND CREATIVE ACTIVITY. 413 
 
 Take away consciousness from an intellectual act, and what 
 will remain but an empty dead concept, a potential concept ? 
 Take away this concept itself from the efficient cause, and 
 what will remain but an indeterminate tendency, which 
 nothing wiU lead towards one effect rather than another ? 
 Take away even this tendency, and what will remain ? 
 Nothing — at least, nothing that can serve to connect the 
 present with the future ; nothing that can explain the ren- 
 counter of causes with the effect. This rencounter being the 
 problem to be solved, the knot to untie, even the hypothesis 
 of tendency {op/ii), Spe^i^) establishes a certain intermediary 
 between cause and effect ; the hypothesis of the concept (X070? 
 airepfuiTiKo';) adds to it a new intermediary ; the conscious 
 concept {voria-i<s vorjarjoa'i), such is the third degree, such is 
 the true link of cause and effect. There the range of our 
 vision stops ; beyond begins the region of the UnknowcMe, 
 which the Gnostics admirably called the Abyss and Silence. 
 "We too keenly feel the limits of our reason to make our 
 own conceptions the measure of the Absolute Being ; but we 
 have too much coniidence in His veracity and goodness not 
 to believe that human conceptions have a legitimate and 
 necessary relation to things as they are in themselves. If, 
 then, we have been able suitably to use our reason, if we 
 have obeyed as strictly as possible the severe rules of the 
 philosophic method, we are entitled to believe that the 
 highest hypothesis that the human mind can form regarding 
 the supreme cause of the universe would not be contradicted, 
 but rather would be confirmed and cleared of its obscurities, if 
 it were given to us, as the theologians say, to see God face to 
 face by a direct and immediate vision. Such a hypothesis 
 may well be but an approximation to the truth, and a human 
 representation of the divine nature ; but although inadequate 
 to its object, it does not follow that it is unfaithful to it. It 
 is its projection into a finite consciousness, its translation into 
 the language of men, which is all that philosophy can demand. 
 
CHAPTEE V. 
 
 THE SUPBEMK END OF NATUEE. 
 
 rriHE doctrine of final causes caunot escape, as it would 
 -*- seem, a final problem. If each of the things of the 
 universe, taken separately, has been produced for another, for 
 what, to what end, have they, taken altogether, been made ? 
 Unity of cause supposes unity of end. If a single cause 
 has made all, it must have made all for a single end; and as 
 the cause is absolute, the end must be absolute. In fine, as 
 there are not two absolutes, the cause and the end must be 
 identical, and, consecLuently, God must have made the world 
 for Himself. 
 
 Here the difficulties commence. If God has made the 
 world for Himself, it is evidently to enjoy it, to find His 
 satisfaction and happiness in it, or else to glorify Himself 
 The common theological doctrine also is that God has made 
 the world for His glory. But if it be so, whatever be the 
 profit that God derives from the world — glory, disinterested 
 joy, esthetic satisfaction — it matters little: in any case, He was 
 without that joy before He created the world. He created it 
 to procure it. Thus He was deprived of something before 
 the creation, and therefore He was not perfect. For the 
 perfect, as Bossuet says, ' is the being to whom nothing is 
 aiwanting.' To suppose that God created the world for Him- 
 self, is thus to attribute to Him lack and privation. ' This 
 doctrine,' says Spinoza, ' destroys the perfection of God, for if 
 God acts for an end. He necessarily desires something of which 
 He is deprived. And although theologians and metaphysicians 
 distinguish between an end pursued hy indigence and an end 
 hij assimilation, they yet avow that God has made all for 
 
THE SUPREME END OF NATUEE. 415 
 
 Himself, and not for the things He was to create, seeing that 
 it was impossible before creation to assign any other end 
 for the action of God than God Himself; and in this way 
 they are forced to admit that all the objects that God pro- 
 posed to Himself, while arranging certain means to attain 
 them, God had been at one time without, and had desired to 
 possess them.' 
 
 Another solution, which is not opposed to the preceding, 
 and which is subordinate to it, is that God has created the 
 world for man, and man himself to honour and serve Him. 
 But we have already said how narrow such a doctrine is, that 
 only sees man in the world, and refers everything to him. 
 This anthrffpocentric doctrine, as it has been called, appears to 
 be connected with the geocentric doctrine, that made the earth 
 the centre of the world, and ought to disappear with it. The 
 greatest philosophers of the I7th century, Descartes and 
 Leibnitz, have expressly disavowed it : ' For,' says Descartes, 
 • even if it be a pious and good thought, as regards morals, to 
 believe that God made all things for us, yet it is not at all 
 probable that all things have been made for us in such a way 
 that God had no other end in creating them, . . . for we 
 cannot doubt that there is an infinity of things that are now 
 in the world, or that have formerly been and have now 
 entirely ceased to be, without any man having ever seen 
 or known them, and that have never served him for any 
 purpose.' 
 
 If, then, the end of the universe can neither be God nor 
 man (nor a fortiori the creatures inferior to man), it seems to 
 follow that we can conceive no end for the universe, which 
 appears to invalidate the whole doctrine of final causes. 
 
 No doubt, it is always allowable to a philosopher, as 
 Descartes here does, to suspend his judgment, and to pause 
 in ignorance : this is a natural right in philosophy. We by 
 no means admit that we should be told: Since you are 
 ignorant of such a thing, it follows that you know nothing. 
 Thus, even if the first causes were unknown, it would not 
 
416 BOOK II. CHAPTER V. 
 
 follow that there are no second causes; and even though the 
 last ends should escape us, we would not therefore be obliged 
 to remain ignorant of the existence of secondary ends. In 
 fine, as we rise from second causes to the first cause, with- 
 out knowing how they communicate with it, it is the same 
 with the relation of secondary ends to the last ends. But, 
 indeed, the argument ad ignorantiam ought only to be 
 employed in the last extremity. 
 
 Another hypothesis has recently been proposed to explain 
 the wherefore of creation. ' It would seem,' says an eminent 
 philosopher, ' that one cannot comprehend the origin of an 
 existence inferior to the absolute existence, except as the 
 result of a voluntary determination, whereby that high 
 existence has spontaneously moderated, mortified, extin- 
 guished, so to say, something of its omnipotent activity. 
 God has made all out of nothing, of that relative nothingness 
 that is the possible, for He was first the author of this nothing- 
 ness, as He was of being. From that which He annulled in 
 some sort and annihilated of the infinite plenitude of His 
 being (se ipsum exinanivit). He has derived by a sort of 
 awakening and resurrection all that exists.' ^ 
 
 This doctrine, as we see, instead of explaining creation by 
 a want, a desire, or an imperfection of the Creator, would 
 explain it, on the contrary, by a superabundance, an excess, 
 a sort of plenitude, God having annihilated a part of Himself 
 to make the world of it. Such a hypothesis does not appear 
 much more admissible than the inverse doctrine. We are not 
 less unfaithful to the notion of a perfect being in attributing 
 to it superfluity, a sort of plethora of being, of which it should 
 abandon a part as the gravid female casts its young, than in 
 representing it as a germ that develops and grows. We admit 
 that the supreme name of God is ' grace, gift, liberality ;' but 
 never has it been said that the Christian God ' creates the 
 creature from His own being:' that is an essentially Oriental 
 and non-Christian notion. The Christian nihihim is a true 
 
 ' Eavaisson, Phil, du 19me siecle, p. 26ii, 
 
THE SUPREME END OF NATURE. 417 
 
 niliilum, and not a part of the divine substance annihilated.'' 
 It is, as it would seem, profoundly to alter the Christian 
 dogma to maintain that the world was made of something, 
 even were that something a part of the divine substance. "We 
 cannot better reply to this hypothesis than by opposing the 
 author to himself : ' God does not pass entirely into things,' 
 says he elsewhere, in summing up the doctrine of Philo ; ' nor 
 does He give them, properly speaking, a part of Himself. He 
 gives. He communicates, Himself, and yet He remains in Him- 
 self in His pristine integrity. Nothing comes from God ly 
 separation, but by a sort of extension that takes nothing from 
 Him. Our soul is something that comes from the divine soul, 
 and is not a section of it' ^ In this interpretation, much 
 nearer the truth, the world is not born of the superfluity of 
 God, of a part of Himself which He had annihilated. Only 
 the word extension {iKTeiverai) is still saying too much — it 
 gives too much room for the doctrine of emanation; and God 
 is no more augmented than diminished by creation. Creation 
 can thus be considered as a gratuitous gift, without one being 
 obliged to have recourse to the desperate hypothesis of a God 
 who annuls Himself in creating. This metaphysical hypo- 
 thesis adds nothing in point of probability and clearness to 
 the only doctrine that can explain creation — the doctrine of 
 divine love. 
 
 We are thus brought back to the previous dilemma. 
 Either the supreme cause acts for an end adequate to itself, 
 — that is to say, absolute, and that end can only be itself, 
 but in that case it wants something to be entirely what it 
 ought to be, and thus it is not perfect, it is not God, — or else 
 the supreme cause acts for an end that is not itself, — for 
 example, the welfare of created beings, — and then the end is 
 not adequate to the cause. The absolute being acts for a 
 
 1 M. Eavaisson here confounds and involves in his explanation two distinct 
 dogmas — incarnation and creation. Creation already seems an incarnation. 
 This Is to transform Christianity into Brahminism or Gnosticism, as M. A. 
 Tranck has justly remarked. 
 
 " Eavaisson, JEssai sur la M4taph. d'Arktote, t. ii. p. 306. 
 
 2 D 
 
418 BOOK II. CHAPTER V. 
 
 relative end ; the infinite being for a finite end. We cannot 
 seemingly escape from this alternative. 
 
 The difficulty raised by Spinoza would go much farther than 
 he imagines. It is only a particular case of the general 
 question of the relations of the finite to the infinite. In 
 ■whatever manner this relation is conceived, it may still be 
 said that, if the infinite did not remain eternally alone, it is 
 because it needed the finite to exist. Thus, whether it be 
 held that God produced the world by a necessary emanation, 
 or that He created it freely, the objection still remains the 
 same. Why did He create it? Why did He not remain 
 wrapped up in Himself ? The insoluble problem is this : 
 Why is there anything but God ? ^ And to solve that problem 
 one would need to be God. But since the world exists, it 
 cannot be in contradiction to the divine nature. To say that 
 this existence of the world has an end, and that that end is 
 God, is not an additional difficulty. 
 
 The whole difficulty is to know how God can love any- 
 thing but Himself; but it is the same difficulty as to know 
 how God can think anything but Himself. That other thing 
 can, according to us, coexist with God without either in- 
 creasing or diminishing Him, without being added to Him or 
 subtracted from Him, because it is not of a common measure 
 with Him. No doubt this being has its root in Him, but 
 eminenter, as the Schoolmen say, in this sense, that, in the idea 
 of the, absolute and the infinite, there is contained d, priori 
 the possibility of an infinite multiplication of being, without 
 any change in the divine substance. This coexistence once 
 admitted (and it is admitted by all philosophers who admit 
 at once God and the world), the wherefore of creation can 
 only be sought in the motive of good. It is by goodness 
 ,that Plato, as well as Christianity, explains the production of 
 things. 
 
 If it be held absolutely that God can have no other end 
 than Himself, creation is inexplicable ; for, as already possess- 
 1 See Saisset, PhUos. Relig. Part ii. 3d Meditation. 
 
THE SUPREME END OF NATURE. 419 
 
 ing Himself, why should He still seek Himself in a round- 
 about way ? If it were Himself He sought through the 
 world, a want and desire would then be legitimately ascribed 
 to Him. 
 
 To solve this problem, Malebranche had uttered this 
 singular and profound thought, that the end of creation was 
 the incarnation of Jesus Christ. It was in prevision of the 
 incarnation that the world had been made. The incarnation, 
 in place of being a miracle, on this hypothesis, was reason 
 itself, the ultimate law of the universe. ' God,' he says, ' finds 
 iu the incarnation of the Word a motive, not invincible, but 
 sufficient to take the part of creator, a part little worthy of 
 Him without this denouement which He finds in His wisdom 
 to satisfy His goodness.' ^ This extraordinary doctrine only 
 escapes the philosophical difficixlty to compromise theology. 
 If the incarnation only took place for the glory of God, where 
 is the merit of the Eedeemer ? What would become of the 
 love and gratitude that are due to Him ? But if we separate 
 from this hypothesis all that relates to positive Christian 
 dogma, there remains then the JBrahminical doctrine of in- 
 carnation, — that is to say, pure pantheism. We have no 
 longer to ask why God created the world, since the world is 
 Himself. 
 
 Malebranche admirably says that the world is a ' profane ' 
 work, and that to be worthy of God it must become a ' divine ' 
 work. But to be divine must it contain God in substance ? 
 and is it not enough that it contain Him by participation, 
 Koivuvla ? AU that proceeds from God is divine, from that 
 very fact, and so much the more as it contains more divine 
 expression. That the creation be worthy of God, it is enough 
 that the act itself be divine; it is not necessary that the 
 terminus of the act be so. 
 
 The word end may signify two things : either the motive 
 of the creative act, or the terminus of that act. God may act 
 
 ' Entretiem Metaphya. ix. 1. See Philosophie de Malebranche, by Olle 
 Laprune, tome i. chap. vii. p. 389. 
 
420 BOOK II. CHAPTER V. 
 
 divinely even if the terminus of His action be not Himself. 
 If it be held that God can only act for Himself, it must be 
 held still further that He can only love Himself and will 
 Himself; hence creation is impossible, and yet it exists. 
 If creation be admitted, or the coexistence of God and the 
 world, it must be allowed that God might pass beyond Him- 
 self; consequently, that the terminus of His action might be 
 another than Himself. For the act to be divine, it is enough 
 that the motive be so. Whether that motive be derived from 
 His power. His wisdom, or His goodness, or from all the 
 three attributes together, or even though that motive cannot 
 be represented to the human understanding, it is enough that 
 we conceive the possibility of it to prevent the act from losing 
 its divine character, even if its terminus should remain profane. 
 
 If God, as absolute perfection, cannot have created the 
 world for an egoistic end (for then the simplest way would 
 be not to create at all), — if, on the other hand. He cannot be 
 supposed to have created by chance and sport (Zev<; 'i-rraL^ev 
 Koa/ioTToiriaa';), — it follows that He can only have made the 
 world in the interest of created beings, — that is to say, by 
 goodness {aja66<s rjv . . . ^ovXTjOeU ayaOa iravTo). Such is, 
 at least, the only way in which the human mind can con- 
 ceive the reason of creation ; such is, translated into human 
 language, the only hypothesis that allows us to conceive the 
 relation of the infinite and the finite, the imperfect and the 
 perfect, the creator and the creature. 
 
 But evil 1 — Evil could only have been to the divine good- 
 ness a reason for not creating, if it behoved in the nature of 
 things to outweigh the good in quantity; for that there 
 should be some evil in the creation may very well be an 
 inevitable consequence of creation itself, as the Stoics, the 
 Alexandrians, and Leibnitz have proved. Atheists explain 
 evil by saying that it is an inevitable consequence of natural 
 laws. This explanation is precisely the justification of Pro- 
 vidence. If, in effect, evil is a consequence of the laws of 
 nature, either there must have been no nature, or evil behoved 
 
THE SUPREME END OF NATURE. 421 
 
 to coexist with nature. Let us suppose, for instance, that 
 pain is a necessary consequence of feeling ; either there must 
 have been no sentient beings, or it was necessary that they 
 should suffer. The whole question, then, comes to be, whether 
 it was better that there should be a nature, or that there 
 should be none ; that there should be sentient beings, or that 
 there should be none. If death is the consequence of life, God 
 could only prevent death by suppressing life. God is then 
 impotent, you will say. This difficulty has been sufficiently 
 answered. All creation implies condition and limitation, and 
 consequently defect, which is translated into suffering in the 
 region of feeling, and into sin in the region of the will. 
 
 The only question, then, is whether the amount of evil out- 
 weighs the amount of good in the universe. Only in this 
 latter case would Providence be without excuse. But we 
 believe that experience and reason sufficiently attest that 
 good, not evil, most prevails, not only, in the universe in 
 general, but in human life in particular. Leibnitz wittily 
 said : ' There are more houses than hospitals ;' and one of his 
 disciples, carrying his thought farther, added : ' There are more 
 cooks than doctors.' It is difficult, for the rest, to decide 
 such a question, if we limit ourselves to appealing to the 
 facts and the humour of each one ; the decision will too 
 much depend on imagination and feeling. An ardent and 
 sombre imagination will take all for evil; a sweet and 
 amiable imagination will regard all as good. There must be 
 other principles in order to decide. But if we ascend to 
 principles, I think the word evil can have only one precise 
 sense in philosophy, — namely, a principle of destruction, — while 
 good, on the other hand, is a principle of conservation. Apart 
 from this there is nothing but arbitrariness and fantasy. 
 These definitions being stated, what manifestly proves that 
 good outweighs evil is the fact that the world exists. Wher- 
 ever the principle of destruction prevails over the contrary 
 principle, nothing continues, and nothing can even be formed. 
 A people devoted to anarchy necessarily dissolves, or is. 
 
422 BOOK II. CHAPTER V. 
 
 absorbed by others more powerful But it is a certain fact 
 that the world continues, and has done so long enough to 
 assure us that it is not by accident. This is a suflBcient proof 
 that in the universe, taken as a whole, order prevails over 
 disorder. Nay, more, not only does the world endure, but 
 science teaches us that it has always gone from the simple 
 to the complex, from the less to the more perfect. But the 
 more complex a mechanism, the more difficult is it to pre- 
 serve. Therefore the conservative force of the universe must 
 always go on increasing ; or rather, the principle of good that 
 is in the universe must not only be conservative, but organiz- 
 ing, creative, promotive. There must be enough of good to 
 overflow in new creations, and in creations more and more 
 complicated. 
 
 Now these principles may be applied, not only to the 
 abstract good of the universe in general, but also to felt good 
 — to the good of sentient and conscious beings in particular. 
 In effect, what is true of good and evil in themselves, is true 
 of pleasure and pain. Pleasure must be a principle of con- 
 servation, and pain a principle of destruction ; and from the 
 simple fact that humanity lasts, pain must be infinitely less 
 diffused than pleasure. Schopenhauer, the pessimist philo- 
 sopher ]par excellence, thinks he can philosophically demonstrate 
 the predominance of pain over pleasure ; and he reasons thus : 
 ' All life is summed up in effort, and effort is always painful ; 
 therefore life is pain.' This argument may be retorted thus : 
 ' Life is active ; but action is always accompanied by pleasure ; 
 therefore life is pleasure.' And this latter argument seems to 
 me much more solid than the former. It is by no means true 
 that effort is always painful. On the contrary, it only is so 
 exceptionally, and when it surpasses our strength ; otherwise, 
 a certain degree of effort is a pleasure, and without effort 
 there is no pleasure. The effort that must be made to climb 
 a mountain, the effort of a hunter in the pursuit of game, or 
 of a thinker in the investigation of a problem, involves more 
 pleasure than pain ; and "the pain is only a seasoning to the 
 
THE SUPREME END OF NATURE. 423 
 
 pleasure. But life in general, in a state of health, only 
 demands a moderate effort, and that effort is just what is 
 needed to feel that we live. Evil, therefore, does not come 
 from effort, but from the conflict between external forces and 
 our own. But now no one can prove that the external 
 forces are necessarily victors in this conflict ; rather the 
 contrary is evident, otherwise the human race would not 
 survive. 
 
 Leibnitz seems to believe that there is danger in maintain- 
 ing that the welfare of the creatures is the only end that God 
 proposed to Himself in creating the world ; ' for then,' he 
 says, ■ no sin nor misfortune would happen, not even by con- 
 comitance. God would have chosen a succession of possi- 
 bilities, whence all these evils would be excluded.' But in 
 speaking of the good of created beings, we can mean nothing 
 but ' the greatest good possible, salvd sapiential which leaves 
 intact all the explanations of Leibnitz. "With this reservation, 
 %ve maintain that the terminus of the divine action can only 
 be the creature, and not the Creator ; otherwise He would not 
 have come forth from Himself, since by hypothesis He is 
 absolute and perfect, and wants nothing. 
 
 Is that to say, however, that it is in the feeling of sentient 
 and living beings that we shall find that end without which 
 the universe would not deserve to exist ? No doubt the 
 happiness of created beings, living and sentient, is, and ought 
 to be, one of the ends of creation. But is it its last end ? 
 Is there in happiness (if it be identified with the good of 
 the senses) a value so great, that God should have decided to 
 create, merely on behalf of our fragile and transient enjoy- 
 ments ? Because God's end in creating was not the absolute 
 itself, does it follow that He could act for an end containing 
 nothing of the absolute ? Can we attribute to the Almighty 
 a merely human goodness, that only should propose to give 
 pleasures like a mother to spoilt children ? Must not His 
 love understand our good in a higher way than we ourselves 
 would do if we were consulted ? But if there are creatures 
 
424 BOOK II. CHAPTER T. 
 
 that have only feeling as their lot, enjoyment is for them the 
 last end. But they themselves are only relative ends to the 
 Creator ; and as to the creatures in whom feeling is united to 
 reason, the ends of the former must be subordinated to those 
 of the latter. 
 
 Is it, then, intelligence (whether in man or in any other 
 thinking creature) that is the end of nature ? Does nature 
 exist, as the Hindus have said, to be contemplated by man or 
 by some reasoning being ? ' But,' as Kant profoundly says, 
 ' it is not man's faculty of knowing, the theoretic reason, that 
 gives a value to all that exists, — that is to say, man does not 
 exist that there may be one to contemplate the world. In 
 effect, if that contemplation only shows us things without an 
 end, the mere fact of being known can give no value to the 
 world ; and we must already suppose a final end for it, which 
 itself furnishes an end for the contemplation of the world.' ^ 
 Thus, to be contemplated, to be known, is only one of the 
 ends of the existence of the world, and there must be still 
 another for the latter to have any value. Knowledge is, 
 therefore, not the absolute end of the universe. 
 
 For these reasons Kant arrives at the conclusion that the 
 supreme end of the universe, being neither in feeling nor 
 in the contemplative intelligence, can only be in morality. 
 ' The most vulgar minds,' says he, ' agree in replying that 
 man can only be the final end of the creation as a moral 
 being. What purpose does it serve, they will ask, that this 
 man has so much talent and activity, that relatively to his 
 interests, as well as to those of others, he has so much value, 
 if he is vnthmit a good will, if, as regards his inner man, he is 
 only an object of contempt?' In considering not only man, 
 but every moral being in general, as the end of creation, ' we 
 have a reason for being warranted to regard the world as a 
 system of final causes.' The world has as its end to become 
 the theatre, the instrument, and the object of morality. In 
 order to be appropriated to that end, it must already be 
 
 ^ Critique of the Judgment, § Ixxxv. 
 
THE SUPREME END OF NATURE. 425 
 
 susceptible of finality ; the lower degrees must be the steps 
 whereby nature rises to its last terminus. There must be a 
 Succession of relative ends, to render possible this absolute end. 
 In effect, morality alone deserves the name of absolute 
 end ; and hereby the antinomy mentioned above finds its 
 solution. God can only come forth from Himself for an 
 absolute end ; and, on the other hand, if He pursue this 
 absolute end, it seems He can find no other than Himself, and, 
 consequently, that He need not come forth from Himself. 
 But it is one thing to say, God, in creating, had only Himself 
 as end ; and another thing to say, God had for end a nature, 
 whose end should be Himself. The terminus of the divine 
 action is nature ; the terminus of nature is God. If you 
 suppress the first of these propositions, nature would have no 
 worth by itself : why, then, should God have created it ? Why 
 not remain at rest ? If, on the other hand, the second be 
 suppressed, nature would no longer have any final, absolute 
 end ; and why, again, should God have created it ? But His 
 action proceeds from Him, inasmuch as He creates a nature, 
 and it is just this nature, as created nature,, that is His object ; 
 and it returns to Him, in that this nature, not being self- 
 suflBcient, only finds its signification, its reason of being, and 
 its end in the absolute. 
 
 But how does nature assume an absolute signification ? Is 
 it by self-annihilation in the absolute ? No ; for then it would 
 have been much simpler not to create it. Is it in being absorbed 
 in it, losing itself in it, and forgetting itself 1 No ; these are 
 so many forms of annihilation. If God created nature, it was 
 that it should be, not that it should not be — to live, not to 
 die. The end of nature is, therefore, to realize in itself the 
 absolute as far as possible, or, if you will, it is to render pos- 
 sible the realization of the absolute in the world. This is 
 brought to pass by morality. 
 
 Meanwhile, let us not forget that if there are no ends in 
 the universe, there are none for man any more than for nature ; 
 that there is no reason why the series of causes should be 
 
426 BOOK II. CHAPTER V. 
 
 mechanical iip to the appearance of man, and hecome teleo- 
 logical from man onwards. If mechanism reigns in nature, it 
 reigns everywhere, and in ethics as well as in physics. No 
 doubt, there might still be subjective and contingent ends, 
 pleasure or utility ; but not unconditional and absolute, not 
 truly moral ends. Morality is, therefore, at once the accom- 
 plishment and the ultimate proof of the law of finality. 
 
APPENDIX. 
 
 I. 
 
 THE PEOBLEM OF INDUCTIOK 
 (Book I. Chapter i. Page 26.) 
 
 MLACHELIER, the author of a very remarkable and 
 striking book on The Foundation of Induction, and 
 ■whom we have several times encountered in the course of 
 these studies, has stated very clearly the problem of induc- 
 tion. But when he proceeds to the solution of this problem, 
 he seems to us to fall into the error mentioned by Aristotle, 
 and which he calls iieTopaXKeiv eh aXKo 761/09, passing from 
 one genus to another. He states, in fact, a logical problem, 
 and answers it by a metaphysical solution. How does one 
 pass from some to all ? he asks (which is a logical difficulty). 
 Thought is the foundation of things, he replies. True or false, 
 this reply is ontological, and does not touch the question. In 
 a logical point of view the author seems to rest satisfied with 
 the Scottish solution — namely, belief in the stability of 
 the laws of nature. He merely formulates this principle 
 with more precision, by analyzing it into two others, — 
 the principle of efficient and that of final causes.^ He then 
 hastens on to the ontological question, which is not to the 
 point, or which, at least, does nothing to solve the difficulty 
 stated. 
 
 Another philosopher who has handled the same question, 
 M. Ch. Waddington,^ seems, on the other hand, to have 
 
 1 It is, liesides, still a question whether the principle of final causes forms an 
 integral part of the inductive principle. We do not believe it ; for, as we 
 hold, it is only by induction that we can rise to the final cause. See below, 
 p. 431. 
 
 * JEssais de logique (Paris, 1857), Essay vi. p. 246 et seq. 
 
428 APPENDIX. 
 
 put his finger on the true difficulty. Precisely expressed, 
 it is as follows : — ' What means,' he asks, ' this pretended 
 major. The laws of nature are general and stable ? It means 
 that nature is subject to laws, and nothing else. But with 
 such a proposition, the cleverest logician could not prove the 
 truth of a single law. Let us take, for instance, this common 
 proposition. All bodies fall. This sophism will be given us 
 as a valid reasoning: Nature is subject to laws; but some 
 bodies fall, therefore it is the law of all bodies to fall.' The 
 same author rightly says, again, that ' if this belief in the 
 stability of laws were capable of justifying a single induction, 
 it would justify all. Error and truth, the most gratuitous 
 hypotheses and the most constant laws, would alike be 
 demonstrated.' This is, in fact, the real difficulty. The 
 general belief in the stability of the laws of nature, were 
 it admitted d, priori as a principle, can be of no use to deter- 
 mine any law in particular. Even if I allowed that laws are 
 constant, or, in other words, that there are laws (for law means 
 a constant rule), that would not convince me that a given 
 phenomenon is a law, as, for instance, the fall of bodies left 
 to themselves. The question still remains. How do we know 
 that it is a law ? How do we pass from the particular to the 
 general? It is experience, we will be told, that decides. But 
 the question still recurs ; for experience only multiplies par- 
 ticular cases, and still I ask, by what sign shall I recognise 
 that a fact ceases to be accidental and becomes a general law 1 
 Are we told, by repetition ? But what, then, is the virtue of 
 repetition, and what is the number of repeated cases, compared 
 with the infinite, to warrant me to affirm that the induction 
 is made ? Such is the persistent difficulty, the solution of 
 which we think we have found in the principle laid down 
 above — namely, that ' the agreement and the coincidence of 
 phenomena require a precise reason, and that with a probability 
 increasing with the number of the coincidences.' 
 
 Let us, in effect, resume the inductive question. 
 
 We ask how, from a certain number of particular experi- 
 ences, we can infer a general and universal law without excep- 
 tion ? For instance, how, having seen water boil at 100 degrees- 
 a certain number of times, we can conclude that the same 
 phenomenon will be reproduced in the same circumstances as 
 
THE PROBLEM OF INDUCTION. 429 
 
 often as the temperature is at 100 degrees.^ It is a problem ; 
 for although the fact has been reproduced very often, and even 
 always, it is only, after all, a small number of experiences 
 compared with the infinite. But we affirm infinitude when 
 we say that everywhere and always a fact will be reproduced. 
 
 If it be considered, it will be seen that the real difficulty 
 is not to conclude from the present to the future, but to 
 characterise and interpret the present state. The ques- 
 tion is not whether a given law, once proved, will be stable 
 and immutable (that is granted), but whether a given 
 phenomenon is the expression of a law. The question is 
 not whether the same causes will produce the same effects 
 (that is granted), but whether a given phenomenon is a cause 
 and another an effect. For example, I will allow that heat 
 will always make water boil at 100 degrees, if I begin by 
 granting that it is really the heat that makes the water boU, — 
 that is, if I grant that heat is the cause and boiling the effect. 
 But that is the whole question. If I grant that, I at once 
 grant that it is a law. The induction is made ; the applica- 
 tion to the future and to all times is only a conclusion. 
 
 But, now, is the relation which I have already proved in 
 fact a law or an accident ? This is the real question. Let 
 us suppose, for instance, that this relation is not a law. What 
 does that mean ? Is it not to suppose that heat is not a 
 cause, nor boiling an effect 1 If this be so, the relation 
 between the two phenomena is not real, but apparent, not 
 necessary, but fortuitous — in a word, the effect of chance.^ If 
 the boiling of water at 100 degrees is not a law of nature, I 
 
 ^ This example has been objected to as being a sort of tautology or vicious 
 circle ; for it is said, 100 degrees being by definition the temperature of boiling 
 water, to say that water will always boil at 100 degrees is to say that it wiUboil 
 when it wiU boil. But there is here a confusion of ideas. No doubt by usage 
 the term 100 degrees has become synonymous with the temperature of boiling 
 water ; but at first 100 degrees only represented a division of the thermometer. 
 To say that water will always boil at 100 degrees is therefore to say that it will 
 always raise the thermometer to the same level when it boils. The boiling is 
 one fact : the ascent of the thermometric column is another. It is by no means 
 said that these two facts will always go together. It is a connection established 
 by experience, but which could fail if the induction were not legitimate. There 
 is here not the shadow of tautology. 
 
 2 We have found the same mode of reasoning in the German philosopher 
 Mendelssohn (see G^rando, Histoire compar4e, part i. chap, iv., and the note of 
 our TraiU elementaire de philosophie, 2d edition, p. 463). 
 
430 APPENDIX. 
 
 must then suppose that, while certain causes raise the tempera- 
 ture to 100 degrees, other causes, having no relation to the 
 former, have always coincided at the same time to make water 
 toil ; if, in fact, I allowed that there Is some relation between 
 these two causes, I would thereby allow that there is a law. 
 If I doubt whether there is a law, it is because I do not refuse 
 to believe that chance may produce a constant coincidence so 
 extraordinary. But this is what we justly regard as impos- 
 sible ; and here is the true inductive principle, — here is the 
 difference between true and false inductions. 'What differ- 
 ence is there, in fact, as we said before,^ between this certain 
 proposition, Water boils at 100 degrees, and this other. An 
 eclipse is a presage of public calamities ? The difference is, 
 that in the former case the coincidence of the two phenomena 
 is constant and without exception, and that in the latter the 
 coincidence does not always occur. Now chance may well 
 bring about sometimes, nay, often, a coincidence between an 
 eclipse and an event so frequent as public misfortunes ; but 
 reason refuses to admit that chance brings about a constant 
 coincidence without exception. This coincidence must have 
 its reason of being ; the reason is, that one of these pheno- 
 mena is the cause of the other, or that the two phenomena 
 have a common cause.' In other words, it is a law. 
 
 Hence we see why the knot of the inductive problem is in 
 the experimental method, or experimentation. It is not only 
 a process, it is the essence of induction — ^it is the proof of it. 
 In fact, by the suppression of presumed causes {per rejec- 
 tiones debitas) we set in relief the capital fact of coincidence ; 
 by the method of concomitant variations we render it still 
 more perceptible. Finally, by calculation applied to experi- 
 ment, and to the presumed hypothesis, drawing beforehand the 
 most remote possible consequences from the facts, — conse- 
 quences which new experiments permit us to verify, — we raise 
 new coincidences confirmatory of the first, and unintelligible 
 if there be not here a true cause. It is thus that repetition, 
 which would be insignificant if it merely had reference to the 
 number of the facts (since we are always equally remote 
 from the infinite), — ^it is thus, I say, that repetition acquires 
 a logical value. In fact, the improbability of coincidences is 
 
 1 Chap. i. p. 26. 
 
THE PROBLEM OF INDUCTION. 431 
 
 the greater the oftener they are repeated. From this, also, 
 we see how it may happen that a single experiment suffices 
 for proof, because it is such a coincidence as could scarcely 
 occur even once, had it not its reason in the laws of nature. 
 This is what causes great scientists rarely to mistake the worth 
 of a significant fact, though occurring only once. It is said 
 that Sir C. Bell would not repeat the famous experiment that 
 established the difference between the motor and sensory 
 nerves, so much did his feelings recoil from causing animals 
 to suffer. Does any one believe that he was, therefore, in 
 any doubt of his discovery ? The Abb^ Haiiy lets fall a piece 
 of quartz, and merely by observing the fracture, he at once 
 concludes that he has discovered a law of nature ; for what is 
 the likelihood that a mineral should break by chance accord- 
 ing to the laws of geometry ? So in a thousand cases. The 
 knot, then, is not in the repetition itself, but in the fact of the 
 coincidence ; only the repetition evidently adds much to the 
 value of the coincidences. 
 
 The first affirmation being once established, the rest follows 
 of course, and the application to the future no longer presents 
 any difficulty. For if a given phenomenon is the product of a 
 given cause, it manifestly follows that, the cause being given, 
 the phenomenon will follow ;^ as Spinoza says, Ex datd causd 
 determinatd necessario sequitur effectus. This reciprocal of the 
 principle of causality is as true as it, and is only that very 
 principle reversed. 
 
 Induction is thus composed, in our view, of two elements, 
 and is reducible to two propositions, the one synthetic, the 
 other analytic. The first is this : Every constant coincidence 
 
 ' It is here that, according to M. Laohelier, the second law, or law of final 
 causes, would intervene, which, with the first or law of eiiicient causes, would 
 compose the inductive principle. We do not, in fact, merely affirm this hypo- 
 thetical proposition : if such conditions are given, such an effect will follow. We 
 affirm a categorical proposition — namely, that such conditions are in fact given. 
 Our confidence towards nature is not problematical ; it is affirmative, as Kant 
 would say. But this confidence implies that nature has an interest in preserv- 
 ing the order of things, which is at bottom the principle of finality. — We do not 
 for ourselves believe that the difference between the z/and the that (the ri u and 
 the TO oTi) has so great a range here as the author would make out ; and we 
 still resolve the difficulty by the same principle as above. In fact, whatever may 
 be the future stability of the order of the world, it at all events holds good that 
 this order has existed hitherto. Now this order is the resultant of an infinite 
 
432 APPENDIX. 
 
 of phenomena has its reason of being (whether in the causality 
 of one of the phenomena in relation to the others, or in a com- 
 mon causality). The second entirely analytic proposition is this : 
 A given cause (considered in the same point of view and in 
 the same circumstances) always produces the same effect which 
 has once been given. 
 
 Thus the real difficulty of induction is not, yet once more, 
 the application to the future, for that results from the very 
 nature of things. It is in the proof of a constant coincidence 
 between two phenomena. But it is in the demonstration of 
 this coincidence that the experimental method is employed; 
 it disengages all the accessory circumstances to preserve only 
 the fact and its determining condition. This coincidence once 
 discovered, it is no longer necessary even to repeat the experi- 
 ment very often, and the mind at once infers a determinate 
 relation between the two facts. 
 
 We have just explained the principle of induction. Some- 
 thing more is needed for finality. But it is still the same 
 mode of reasoning ; and if we refuse to admit the one, there 
 is no reason to admit the other. 
 
 In fact, the same reason that makes us suppose that every 
 coincidence of phenomena has its reason, ought also to make 
 us suppose that every agreement of a complex whole with a 
 future phenomenon more or less remote must also have its 
 reason ; and if this reason were not given in the future pheno- 
 menon itself, it would necessarily follow that the agreement of 
 the complex whole with that consequence, so well prepared, 
 would be a fortuitous rencounter. This is the objection that 
 absolute mechanism can never dispose of. It is obliged to 
 assign a considerable part to the fortuitous — in other words, 
 
 number of coincidences, whicli must have taken place to produce equilibrium ; 
 but chance cannot have brought about such a mass of coincidences. Therefore 
 the order of the world, not in the future, but in the past and the present, sup- 
 poses a precise cause, a cause of order. This cause being given, it follows, of 
 course, that it will continue to act conformably to its nature ; in other words, that 
 order will last as 16ng as we perceive no indications to make us suspect the 
 contrary. What proves that there is no d priori belief in this, is that Newton 
 had come by the study of facts to believe that the system of the world would 
 become deranged, and would need a new act of divine power to re-establish it ; 
 and, again, it is by the study of facts that this doubt has been set aside. Belief 
 in the stability of nature is thus only one of the results of induction, in place of 
 being its foundation, '^ 
 
THE PROBLEM OF INDUCTION. 433 
 
 to chance. But by parity of reason I might as well say that 
 chance is the primary cause of every coincidence, that all is 
 fortuitous, accidental, and contingent — that is, that there is no 
 science. In fact, if it is not repugnant to you to say that the 
 extraordinary harmony and the amazing finality manifested 
 in the sexes are only a result of concomitant mechanical causes, 
 I do not see why I should not say that the constant correla- 
 tion of heat and dilatation, of clouds and lightning, of vibrations 
 and sound, are only mere rencounters, accidental coincidences 
 of certain mechanical causes acting separately, each in their 
 sphere, without any agreement or reciprocal action, and per- 
 fectly strange to each other. It matters little, it wiU be said, 
 that from the point of view of things in themselves these 
 causes and effects are really connected, provided they appear 
 so to us ; it matters little that they are divergent and strange 
 causes, that are found by chance acting together, or veritable 
 connections ; it is enough for us that these connections appear 
 in experience to affirm them, and we do not go farther. 
 With equal right we can reply: It matters little that from the 
 point of view of things in themselves it may be supposed 
 that an unintelligible concomitance of mechanical causes may 
 produce the agreement of means and ends ; it suffices that 
 this agreement be given me in experience, to warrant me to 
 reason as if it resulted from a veritable intrinsic concordance, 
 and from an objective adaptation. 
 
 It is said that finality is an entirely subjective conception, 
 which cannot be justified by experiment. By this it is evi- 
 dently meant that the principle of induction, on which all the 
 positive sciences rest, would> on the other hand, be verifiable 
 by experiment. But that is a mistake, and the difference 
 sought to be established between the principle of finality and 
 the inductive principle is altogether apparent. In other words, 
 I can no more verify mechanical causality than finality. 
 
 Wherein does experimental verification in fact consist ? 
 It consists in the artificial and voluntary reproduction of a 
 certain coincidence of phenomena which has previously been 
 furnished to me by observation. What, then, does experiment 
 do 1 It simply multiplies coincidences. But if I had not 
 already this preconception in my mind, that every constant co- 
 incidence has its reason of being in the nature of things, every 
 
 2 E 
 
434 APPENDIX. 
 
 new fact would teach me nothing more, and I could always 
 suppose that it is chance that brings to pass such an apparent 
 agreement of phenomena. This postulate, then, is indispensable 
 to science — it is science itseK; and yet it cannot be verified. 
 It is not, then, superior in this to the principle of finality. 
 To arrive at a veritable and absolute verification of induction, 
 we would need, on the one hand, to exhaust the infinite series 
 of phenomena, and, on the other, to know the essence of things 
 in themselves. But both are alike impossible for us, and still 
 no scientist doubts the truth of induction ; and it does not 
 even require the coincidence of facts to be reproduced very 
 often for him to infer a necessary and essential relation. 
 
 It ought not, then, to be objected to the principle of finality 
 that it is a subjective and unverifiable point of view, for that 
 is also true of efficient causality. If we are told that experi- 
 ment has more and more brought to light constant connections, 
 we reply that the same experiment has more and more brought 
 to light relations of finality. The first men and the first sages 
 — Socrates, for instance — were only struck with the most 
 apparent ends, — the legs made for walking, the eyes for seeing, 
 and so on. But in proportion as science has fathomed the- 
 organization of living beings, it has infinitely multiplied the 
 relations of finality. If it be said that false final causes have 
 been assumed, we reply that false efiBcient causes have been 
 assumed. If we are shown in nature things whose end we do 
 not know, we reply that there is an immensity whose cause we 
 do not know ; that even if there are some that apparently do 
 not agree with the principle of finality, — for instance, monsters, 
 — there are also phenomena that may have appeared to unre- 
 flecting minds to depart from the ordinary laws of causality — 
 namely, prodigies and miracles. In fine, as the entanglement 
 of causes limits the action of each of them, and often prevents 
 us from isolating them, so the entanglement of ends may also 
 well counteract and connect them so as to prevent us from 
 unravelling them with precision. In a word, there is a perfect 
 parity between finality and causality ; and he who denies the 
 former might just as well deny the latter. But whoever denies 
 causality denies science. The belief in finality,, so much 
 disputed by certain scientists, is founded on precisely the 
 same principle as the belief in science itself. 
 
II. 
 
 CUVIER'S LAW. 
 (Book i. Chapter i. Page 47.) 
 
 CUVIEE'S law, as a whole, remains one of the fundamental 
 laws of zoology. It has, however, given rise to various 
 difficulties, and we have here to inquire how far these diffi- 
 culties might invalidate the deductions we have above set 
 forth. 
 
 Blainville, for instance, keenly assails the claim of Cuvier 
 and his disciples to be able to reconstruct a lost animal from 
 a single one of its fragments, in virtue of the law of correla- 
 tion of the organs. ' This principle may be true,' he says,' ' of 
 the general form of an animal, but it is far from being applic- 
 able to each fragment of each of the parts. One may infer, 
 it is true, from the form of the bones that of the muscles, 
 because these two kinds of organs are made to produce 
 together one single function, one and the same action, which 
 the one could not produce without the other ; still this is true 
 only of the vertebrates. . . . But to infer, even from the 
 teeth, the form and proportion of the skeleton, becomes impos- 
 sible in the feline genus. The teeth all show us a carnivorous 
 animal, feeding, on living prey, but as to inferring from them 
 the osseous system of a tiger, or a lion, the differences are 
 so small that you will never accomplish this. When you 
 come to the different species of lions, only distinguished by 
 their hair, the one having tufts of hair on the flanks, the other 
 not, it would be impossible, from these simple parts of the 
 skeleton, to distinguish the one species from the other. . . . 
 M. Cuvier himself found his principle at fault. The tapyrium 
 giganteum, which he had determined from a single complete 
 tooth, turned out to be, when the whole head was discovered, 
 with teeth absolutely the same, a dinotherium, an extinct 
 ' Blainville, Histoire des sciences de V organisation, t. iii. p. 398. 
 
436 APPENDIX. 
 
 animal, ■which is not a tapir, and seems to be an aquatic 
 pachyderm, like the morse, although very different. This 
 principle of M. Cuvier is, therefore, false as a general rule, 
 even confining it to the teeth, where yet its application is 
 more frequently possible.'^ 
 
 These observations of Blainville, the weight of which it is 
 not for us to judge, may prove, supposing them well founded, 
 that the range of Cuvier's principle must not be exaggerated, 
 and that it were an illusion to think that with any fragment 
 of a bone one could reconstruct, in all the details of its 
 organization, an extinct animal. But it is, from our point of 
 view, sufficient that it may be done for a certain number of 
 animals, and for the general form of the skeleton. Even if 
 such a method should not yield the species, but only the genus 
 or the family, this would itself be a very important principle ; 
 and a harmonious connection, though reduced to the most 
 general conditions of organization, would still be infinitely 
 above forces of a purely blind nature ; for the rest, reserving 
 entirely the explanation of such correlations, as of each organ 
 in particular, by the hypothesis of selection, discussed in the 
 eighth chapter of our first part. Setting aside this hypo- 
 thesis, and every other of the same kind, for the present, the 
 only point we would here maintain is that the more or less 
 latitude allowed to Cuvier's law by naturalists (of which they 
 remain sole judges) still leaves to that law a large enough 
 share of truth to warrant our inductions. 
 
 Another objection taken to this law is that, supposing it 
 well founded as regards the superior animals, and particularly 
 the vertebrates, to which alone Cuvier has applied it, it is far 
 from being so as regards the inferior animals. The correlation 
 of the whole to the parts in these animals is so far from being 
 strict, that they may be cut through without ceasing to live, 
 and that these sections can reproduce the entire animal. 
 This takes place in the case of the naiads, hydras, etc. In 
 these animals there seems to be no more connection between 
 the parts than there is between the different parts of a 
 mineral, as they may be divided without being destroyed. 
 Thus these parts are not reciprocally means and ends to each 
 other. 
 
 ' Histoire dee sciences de Vorganisation, t. iii. p. 398. 
 
cuvier's law. 437 
 
 M. Milne-Edwards has given a very satisfactory explana- 
 tion of this singular phenomenon. 
 
 ' To comprehend this phenomenon,' he says, ' in appearance 
 so contrary to what the higher animals exhibit, we must' first 
 of all examine the mode of organization of the polyps of which 
 we have just spoken. These animals are too minute to be well 
 studied by the naked eye ; but when observed by the micro- 
 scope, it is found that the substance of their body is identical 
 throughout. It is a gelatinous mass, containing small fibres 
 and extremely minute globules, and in which no distinct 
 organ is perceptible. But, as we have already remarked, 
 identity in the organization supposes identity in the mode of 
 action, in the faculties. It follows that all the bodily parts 
 of these polyps, having the same structure, must fulfil the 
 same functions; each of them must concur in the same 
 manner as all the others in the production of the phenomenon 
 of which the totality constitutes life ; and the loss of one or 
 other of these parts ought not to involve the cessation of any 
 of its acts. But if that is true, if each portion of the body of 
 these animals can feel, move, take food, and reproduce a new 
 being, there seems no reason why each of them, after having 
 been separated from the rest, might not, if placed in favour- 
 able circumstances, continue to act as before, and why each of 
 these animal fragments might not produce a new individual, 
 and perpetuate its species, a phenomenon to which Tremblay's 
 experiment bears witness.' 
 
 This explanation shows us that the fact in question is 
 in no way contrary to Cuvier's law. This law is evidently 
 only applicable to the case in which organs as well as 
 functions are specialized, and is manifested more and more 
 in proportion as the division of labour increases. As 
 Mr. Herbert Spencer says,^ ' integration is in proportion to 
 differentiation.' 
 
 Thus it is no wonder, as M. de Quatrefages has likewise 
 remarked, that Cuvier's law, incontestable in the higher animals, 
 fails in the lower animal kingdoms. For instance, in the 
 molluscs, according to this naturalist, great changes may take 
 place in certain organs, without such corresponding changes in 
 the relative organs as might have heen expected. Organic 
 
 ' See further, the dissertation entitled Herbert Spencer and Evolutionkm. 
 
438 APPENDIX. 
 
 forms in these animals are not connected so rigorously and 
 systematically as in vertebrate animals. The law of organic 
 correlations is thus only a relative, not an absolute law. 
 
 It may be conceived that the conditions of animal nature 
 are less and less rigorous in proportion as we descend the 
 scale. Where life is more sluggish, less complex, co-existences 
 should be easier, and incompatibilities rarer between the dif- 
 ferent organs. Suppose an intelligent animal: this fundamental 
 condition immediately implies a very considerable number of 
 secondary conditions, exceedingly delicate, bound together most 
 exactly, so that, one failing, the whole being suffers or perishes, 
 or even absolutely cannot be. Suppose, on the other hand, 
 a living animal of a torpid and merely vegetative life, in 
 external conditions favourable to its development; the bond 
 between its different parts might be very feeble and loose, 
 without hindering its preservation. However, even here it 
 seems to me impossible that there are not certain incompati- 
 bilities and correlations, which the theory indicates as behoving 
 to be, in proportion to the degree of complication the animal 
 presents. Thus there cannot but be a certain relation between 
 the organs of nutrition and those of motion ; and this relation 
 must be determined by the ease with which the animal, 
 according to the medium in which it lives, finds its prey. 
 Thus, even in the republics of polyps, there must be necessary 
 correlations, without which they would not exist. 
 
III. 
 
 LESAGE OF GENEVA AND FINAL CAUSES. 
 (Book i. Chapter ii. Page 62.) 
 
 LESAGE, a celebrated natural pMlosopher of Geneva, 
 known by his Lucrdce Newtonien, had projected a 
 work which seems, although from another point of view, 
 conceived on a plan analogous to that of Kant's Critique of 
 the Judgment. It was, as we are told by Prevost of Geneva, 
 his editor and friend, a Theory of the ends of nature and art. 
 He was to have called it Teleology; and by this work he 
 responded to the desire of Wolf, \frho, in the preface of his 
 Logic, had uttered the wish that the doctrine of ends were 
 handled apart, as a body of distinct science. Unhappily this 
 work of Lesage has only come down to us in the form of 
 detached fragments, sufficiently obscure,-' and it is difficult for 
 us to form a just idea of the method he meant to follow, and 
 of the principal thoughts he was to develop in it. We shall 
 extract from these fragments some of the ideas that appear 
 most interesting. 
 
 Lesage himself, in the preface of his Essai de Chimie 
 micanique (pp. 92 and 93), tells us how he had conceived the 
 object and plan of his treatise. He says : ' It would be pos- 
 sible to give a theory of ends, which should embrace the works 
 of art and those of nature, and which, after having furnished 
 rules of synthesis for the composition of a work on given aims 
 with given means, should propose rules of analysis to discover 
 the views of an agent by the inspection of his works.' 
 
 According to this passage it may be supposed — 1st, That 
 Lesage had first to give the theory of ends, beginning with 
 the consideration of works of art, and thence to pass to the 
 works of nature ; 2d, That in the former case, knowing the 
 
 ' These fragments will be found, as well as the Lucrdee Newtonien, in the 
 Notice de la vie et des icrits de Lesage, by Pierre Prevost (Geneva, 1805). 
 
440 APPENDIX. 
 
 cause that acts (namely, the intelligent cause), and being able 
 to observe it when it acts in pursuit of ends and by deter- 
 minate means, he would have derived from this observation 
 the general rules of an action directed in order to an end, and 
 these rules might be called rules of synthesis, because they 
 would be derived from a knowledge of the cause ; 3d, That 
 from these rules of synthesis he must derive rules of analysis, 
 which should admit of rising from the effect to the intelligent 
 cause, when the latter is not given, and to determine by the 
 examination of a work the ends that have controlled it. He 
 even behoved, whether in the first or the second part, not to 
 rest satisfied with logical rules, but to employ even mathe- 
 matical principles, as appears from a sort of table of contents, 
 where this title occurs : ' On the greatest and least of the 
 mathematicians. Or on the best and the least bad in general. 
 An illustration from the cells of bees.' 
 
 The fragments that remain nearly correspond to the plan 
 indicated. They consist of two chapters, the one upon the 
 synthesis, the other upon the analysis of ends. 
 
 Synthesis of ends. 
 
 Definitions. — Lesage defines the end nearly as we have 
 ourselves done at the beginning of this work. 
 
 ' The effect of an intelligent cause, considered in so far as 
 it has known and willed it, is called the end of that cause.' ^ 
 
 'AH intermediate causes are called means of execution, or 
 simply the means. 
 
 ' When the means are considered as ends, that on which 
 the ordaining cause immediately acts is called the proximate 
 end ; all the others, if there are any, are called remote ends ; 
 and that in which all the means terminate is called the last 
 end.' 
 
 The former are also called subordinate ends in relation to 
 
 ' Afterwards he defines the final cause as 'the motive that determines an 
 intelligent being to will an end.' I know not whether it is admissible to con- 
 found the final cause with the motive. It seems that from the habitual use of 
 the word, the final cause is nothing but the end itself ; it is the end, considered 
 as one of the causes of the action. The motive is an impnlme, and not final 
 cause. Accordingly Ubags very well says: ' Differt j^ni* d motivo; nam 
 motivum causa impulsiva dicitur. . . . Tempus amoenum v. g. ambulationis 
 motivum, sed non finis esse potest. Ergo omuis finis motivum, sed non omne 
 motivum finis quoque est. ' — Ubags, Ontologia, chap. iii. § 4. 
 
LESAGE OF GENEVA AND FINAL CAUSES. 441 
 
 the last, which is the principal end, and which, for the same 
 reason, alone deserves the name of end. 
 
 From this important principle Lesage infers the following 
 consequences : — 
 
 ' When two aims conjoined in an object cross each other, 
 the ordaining being will have to sacrifice more or less of each, 
 in order to take the best of all the imperfect executions of 
 each. In this choice two motives must decide him — the 
 importance of each aim for the principal end, and the degree 
 of contrariety that is found between the execution of this 
 subordinate aim and that of the other or others. 
 
 ' Thus, 1st, If one of the aims conjoined in an object were 
 much more important than the others, and were at the same 
 time very contrary to them, all these less aims would gradu- 
 ally disappear. 
 
 ' 2d, If the different aims were nearly equally important, 
 and nearly equally opposed to each other, they would also 
 be nearly equally well executed — or ill, as the case might be. 
 
 ' 3d, If there were a very great inequality of importance 
 in the ends, but the execution of the least did extremely little 
 injury to the execution of the greatest, these least would be 
 almost perfectly fulfilled.' 
 
 From this last rule Lesage concluded, in response to a 
 celebrated word of Diderot, ' that there is no absurdity in 
 conceiving the Eternal Being occupied in folding the wing of 
 a beetle or in proportioning the cell of a bee.' 
 
 To prove that, when an agent pursues several aims at once, 
 he makes a less perfect work than when he has only one, 
 Lesage cites the following examples : — 
 
 ' Nocturnal birds have the pupil of the eye very open ; 
 for the same reason they do not see so well by day. An 
 alternate dilatation and contraction of the pupil might render 
 the same eye equally fit for seeing by night or day ; but this 
 flexibility of the fibres of the iris would at the same time 
 render the organs feebler and more fragile, and would injure 
 the animal more than help it. An intelligent Creator has 
 thus had to take a mean between an injurious flexibility and 
 absolute rigidity. ... So birds are usually less fit for walking 
 in proportion as they are adapted for flying. 
 
 ' When the execution of a project gives occasion to some 
 
442 APPENDIX. 
 
 reparable inconvenience, of all the reniedies that may be 
 applied, those are the most useful that arise from the evil 
 itself. . . . The skin which heat renders dry is moistened by 
 the very glands that it covers, and which the heat opens when 
 it renders the moisture necessary.' 
 
 Such was to be the first chapter of the work, containing the 
 synthesis of ends. Lesage added this note : ' There are too 
 many scholastic distinctions in this chapter, and Twt eriough of 
 rules. I intend to double the latter and reduce the former.' 
 Thus it is evident that the chief originality that Lesage pur- 
 posed was to give the rules of a work composed in reference 
 to ends. 
 
 In principle, he would only have needed to take his examples 
 from facts where ends are granted — namely, from human acts ; 
 but, in reality, he borrowed them indifferently from this sphere 
 and from that of nature. 
 
 Let us pass to the second chapter, which was to contain 
 rules ' for discovering the ends of a system.' 
 
 This second chapter is more obscure than the first, and 
 does not correspond to what the title promised. We shall 
 extract from it the following passages : — 
 
 ' Thus, there being a system to examine, there are an 
 infinitude of hypotheses which may correspond to it more or 
 less perfectly ; but they all occur between these two extremes 
 — 1st, The system in question has no other arrangement than 
 it has received from chance, or, what is the same thing, there 
 are no ends ; 2d, This system is in aU its parts, and in all 
 respects, the work of an intelligent cause. 
 
 ' The hypothesis that attributes a system to chance may be 
 confirmed or overthrown by comparing the known laws that 
 chance follows with the usages of the proposed system.^ 
 
 'The supposition of an intelligent cause which fulfils its 
 ends with all possible precision is not a complete hypothesis — 
 some end in particular must still be attributed to it ; but, in 
 order not to do it by chance, it will be well to make the 
 following observations : — 
 
 ' 1. The end of the author of a work is one of the effects 
 of that work. 
 
 ' This is nearly the fundamental idea which we have ourselves endeavoured to 
 develop in this treatise. 
 
LESAGE OF GENEVA AND FINAL CAUSES. 443 
 
 ' 2. All the parts of the work must tend to the execution 
 of the most perfect end, whether as a direct means or as a 
 remedy for obstacles ; or else, if there are parts and effects of 
 this work which do not directly tend to the end, these parts 
 and eifects are necessary and inseparable accompaniments of 
 the most perfect execution of the end. 
 
 ' 3. When in a work a part is observed that has no effect 
 but to stop a certain movement, this movement must also be 
 contrary to the end. 
 
 ' 4. One should avoid attributing an end to a very intelli- 
 gent being, when the execution of that end is produced by 
 very complicated means, while simpler ones are known that 
 would have produced the same effect. And if one hesitated 
 between two ends, it would be necessary, other things being 
 equal, to attribute to him that which appeared to be accom- 
 plished by the simplest means. 
 
 '5. When uniformity among several beings is perceived, it 
 should be supposed that they are made for the same end if 
 they are perfectly similar, or for ends nearly alike if they 
 only nearly resemble each other. 
 
 ' 6. In general, when we perceive observed in a work the 
 rules that intelligent beings follow in their operations (Chap, i.), 
 it must be supposed that these rules have effectually given 
 rise to the phenomena, which leads to the supposition of an 
 end, the end of the author's system. 
 
 ' When we have once fixed on an effect, and inquire whether 
 it is effectually the universal end, we must not abandon our 
 hypothesis even if we find effects or parts that, considered 
 by themselves, appear not to be entirely conformed to the 
 universal end ; for we have seen (§§ 3 and 4) that a universal 
 end may be subdivided into several partial ends that may 
 cross each other.' 
 
 Following these two chapters there is a third fragment, 
 entitled, ' Concerning Variety,' and which is not very dis- 
 tinctly connected with the preceding. We shall extract from 
 it some laws interesting from the point of view of finality, 
 which the author had himself extracted from a much more 
 complete, work, of which he tells lis 'the deciphering had 
 become impossible to him.' 
 
 ' 1. The quantity of breath in a given time, other things 
 
444 APPENDIX. 
 
 being equal, is in proportion to the surfaces, while the quan- 
 tity of moisture thus furnished is in proportion to the volume 
 of the animal. But as we descend to the smallest animals, 
 the surface decreases in a less proportion than the volume. 
 Thus the perspiration of small animals would be too great, 
 relative to the mass of their humours, if their skin were as 
 porous as that of the large animals. Hence it was suitable 
 that the skin of insects should be a kind of shell, as is the 
 case. ^ 
 
 ' 2. The force with which a fruit tends to detach itself 
 from its stalk is in proportion to its weight or its inertia, — 
 that is, in both cases, to the cube of its dimensions, — while 
 the resistance opposing it is in proportion to the transverse 
 section of the stalk, — that is, merely to the square of the 
 dimensions. Thus it was necessary that great fruits should 
 have stalks still greater than if they were exactly like the 
 small. We also see that high plants either do not bear large 
 fruits (according to La Fontaine's remark in his Mathieu Gard), 
 or bear them fastened to the trunk and the chief branches, as 
 is the case in some Indian trees. 
 
 ' 3. That the weight of herbivorous quadrupeds be propor- 
 tioned to the resistance of their neck, it was necessary that 
 those with the largest heads, like the ox, should have a still 
 larger neck than in proportion to the corresponding dimen- 
 sions ; or else that, like the camel, they should have a smaller 
 head than others, in proportion to the trunk, the neck usually 
 vertical, and be able to sit gently down to take their food on 
 the earth or ruminate it ; or, in fine, that if too large for these 
 expedients sufficing without inconvenience, as in the case of 
 the elephant, they should have almost no neck, but a member 
 fit for seizing their food in mass, for sucking up their drink, 
 and conveying both into the mouth. And all this is found 
 realized in nature.' 
 
 We know not whether these relations, or others like them, 
 are generally verifiable in zoology ; we quote them as examples 
 of an attempt to reduce to scientific principles the theory of 
 finality. 
 
 The extracts we have just cited suffice to give us some idea 
 of what the Teleology of Lesage would have been if he had 
 had time to execute it. It would have been, evidently, a 
 
LESAGE OF GENEVA AND FINAL CAUSES. 445 
 
 book of quite a different nature from the treatises of physical 
 teleology so numerous in the 18th century. It would have 
 stated general principles, rules, theorems, instead of confining 
 itself to the enumeration of examples. However, according 
 to the fragments that remain to us, it seems the author rather 
 proposed to furnish us with rules to determine the ends of 
 nature than to give the proof that there are ends, and the 
 precise criterion of their existence. His work would rather 
 have heen a theory of ends than a critique of finality. It 
 was not yet the work of Kant, but it would have been more 
 than the works of Derham and Paley. 
 
IV. 
 
 GEOFFEOY ST. HILAIRE AND THE DOCTRINE 
 OF FINAL CAUSES. 
 
 (Book i. Chapter iv. Page 123.) 
 
 ANATOMY, equally with physiology, has protested against 
 the exaggerated use of the principle of final causes. 
 G. St. Hilaire severely condemned this, which he called the 
 Aristotelian method, exclusively confined, according to him, to 
 /the consideration of the forms and uses of organs.^ He 
 accuses this method of not having perceived the profound 
 analogies of organs hidden under innumerable differences of 
 form and structure, or at least only to have seized such of the 
 analogies as strike the eyes of the vulgar, and of furnishing 
 no scientific method for disengaging the hidden relations. 
 He says, ' It stops at the very moment when it should he 
 didactic, when it would need to become an Ariadne's thread 
 to discover more hidden relations. . . . This method con- 
 sists,' he says again, 'in following, step by step, what it calls 
 the degradation of forms, beginning with man, whom it would 
 consider the most perfect creature. At every moment of its 
 researches it is upon an almost similar, whence it descends to 
 each comprehensible difference. The orang-outang's hand is 
 nearly that of man, but differs from it by a shorter thumb 
 and longer fingers. . . . Thence we pass to the hand of the 
 ateles, defective in a very different • way, 'for in one of the 
 species of this genus there is no thumb at all. Passing to 
 other monkeys, the five fingers are still seen, — the very nearly 
 still continues ; but the moment we examine the differences, 
 we perceive it is no more a hand. . . . Proceeding to the 
 
 1 Geoffroy St. Hilaire, Philosophie zoologique, ' Preliminary Discourse. ' We 
 are obliged in quoting this illustrious naturalist, to respect the detestable style 
 in which he has expressed his great and profound thoughts. 
 
GEOFFEOY ST. HILAIRE AND THE DOCTRINE OF FINAL CAUSES. 44:7 
 
 bear, their paw is still very near the monkey's hand, . . . 
 but the differences here are more pronounced. I pass over 
 several and come to the otter. Here a new circumstance is 
 found; the fingers of this mammifer are united by large 
 membranes. This nearly the same thing has thus strangely 
 changed its form ; and as it gives the animal powerful means 
 of natation, they are called fins. The method does not go 
 farther : it ends with the unguicular mammifers.' 
 
 On this Aristotelian method, which G. St. HUaire accuses 
 Cuvier of having slavishly adopted, he makes two criticisms : 
 1st, It is, according to him, neither logical nor philosophical. 
 ' At every moment one is forced to appeal to a half- 
 resemblance, a presentiment of relations not scientifically 
 justified. A vague idea of analogy is the link by which 
 these observations of different cases are connected. Is it 
 logical to conclude from resemblance to difference, without 
 having previously explained what should be understood by 
 the nearly similar? 2d, This method is insufficient. You 
 have stopped at the cloven-footed mammifers ; and it would 
 be necessary to come to the feet of ruminants and of horses. 
 But there the differences appear to you too considerable. . . . 
 The method remains silent. It was a guiding clue ; it is 
 broken ; we change the system.' 
 
 Accordingly it would be wrong, thinks the same naturalist, 
 to regard Aristotle as the founder of comparative anatomy ; 
 he had the presentiment of it, but had not its method. To 
 make an exact science of comparative anatomy, there is 
 needed a philosophical and strict principle, that permits to 
 seize with certainty not almost resemblances, but evident and 
 strictly demonstrable analogies. This principle, discovered by 
 Gr. St. Hilaire, and which has remained in science, is what he 
 calls the law of connections. "We have already seen that G. 
 Cuvier also himself discovered a great law, the law of correla- 
 tions. It may be said that these two laws together contain 
 the whole zoological philosophy of these two eminent 
 naturalists. 
 
 We already know Cuvier's law. It rests on this simple 
 and evident idea, that, in an organized being, all the parts 
 must harmonize together to accomplish a common action. 
 The law of connections, again, rests on the fact that an organ 
 
448 APPENDIX. 
 
 is always in a constant relation of position with any other 
 given organ, which, in its turn, is in a constant relation of 
 position with another; so that the position may suffice for 
 the recognition of the organ under whatever form it occurs. 
 Let us notice the difference between connections and correla- 
 tions. Correlation is a relation of action, co-operation, finality. 
 Connection is an entirely physical, mechanical relation of 
 position, of dovetailing in some sort. In a machine, the 
 remotest parts may be in correlation : those only that are 
 near and fit together are in connection, at least according to 
 the language of G. St. Hilaire. But connections appear to 
 this great anatomist much more interesting than correlations. 
 If you neglect the physical bond that attaches, according to 
 a fixed law, one organ to another, you will let yourself be 
 deceived by appearances. You will attach an exaggerated 
 importance to the forms of organs and their uses ; and those 
 differences, so striking to superficial eyes, will hide from you 
 the very essence of the organ. Analogies will disappear 
 under differences. There wiU be seen as many distinct types 
 as accidental forms. The unity of the abstract animal, that is 
 hidden under the diversity of organic forms, will vanish. If, 
 on the other hand, you fix the idea of an organ by its precise 
 and certain connections with the adjacent organs, you are 
 sure not to lose sight of it, whatever forms it may affect. 
 You have a clue that enables you to recognise the type under 
 all its modifications, and in this way you will attain to the 
 true animal philosophy. 
 
 We may give an idea of G. St. Hilaire's method by a 
 very simple example furnished by himself. It is necessary, 
 he says, to set out from a determinate subject, — ^that is to say, 
 from a precise piece always recognisable. This piece may be, 
 for example, the terminal portion of the anterior extremity. 
 That extremity, in all the vertebrate animals, is composed of 
 four parts, — ^the shoulder, the arm, the fore-arm, and a last 
 section, capable of assuming very diverse forms (hand, claw, 
 wing), but which, under all these secondary modifications, 
 has always the common essence of being the fourth section of 
 the anterior member. Where the third ends the fourth begins. 
 This is a fixed datum that determines the organ ; its use, on 
 the other hand, only determines it in a superficial and quite 
 
GEOFFROY ST. HILAIRE AND THE DOCTRINE OF FINAL CAUSES. 449 
 
 vulgar manner. What more different than a hand, a wing, 
 and a fin, in the eyes of the vulgar ? For the anatomist they 
 are one and the same thing. This the school of Geoffrey 
 calls the anatomical element. But in following this method, 
 in ascending from organ to organ, from connection to connec- 
 tion, ohservation reveals this law to us : ' An organ may be 
 annihilated, atrophied, never transposed,' which is called the 
 law of connections. 
 
 The following are, according to G. St. Hilaire, the advan- 
 tages of the new method compared with the old: — ' 1st, It is 
 not a disguised repetition of old ideas on the analogies of 
 organization. Tor the theory of analogues from the outset 
 declines the consideration of form and functions. 2d, Not 
 only does it extend the old bases of zoology, but overthrows 
 them by its recommendation to keep to a single element of 
 consideration as the first subject of study. 3d, It recognises 
 other principles, because, in its view, not the organs in their 
 totality are analogous, which is always the case in animals 
 nearly similar, but the materials of which the organs are 
 composed. 4th, Its precise .iim is different; for it requires 
 a mathematical strictness in the determination of every kind 
 of material by itself 5th, It becomes an instrument of 
 discovery (example, the hyoid bone), 6th, In fine, the theory 
 of analogues, to be always equally comparative, confines itself 
 in this case to the observation of a single order of facts.' 
 
 Has the law of connections the range that G. St. Hilaire 
 attributed to it 1 Can it lead to all the consequences that he 
 has deduced from it ? We will not venture to determine. 
 But without prejudice to the range of the law, it is incontest- 
 able that there is in it a profound idea, and which must 
 certainly have led to the perception of relations and analogies 
 that the school of Cuvier, not directing their attention to that 
 quarter, may have failed to recognise. The consideration of 
 functions — so rigidly excluded by G. St. Hilaire, so highly 
 recommended by Cuvier — evidently behoved to turn away the 
 latter and his disciples from the consideration of the anatomical 
 elements, analogous by situation and relation, profoundly 
 different in structure and function. , It must either be believed, 
 that principles do not involve their consequences, or it must 
 be presumed that Cuvier and his disciples ought especially to 
 
 2f 
 
450 APPENDIX 
 
 direct their attention to the differences of animals and ignore 
 the analogies ; while the school of Geoffroy, guided by the 
 master's principles, must have been particularly struck by 
 these analogies, and consequently have extended the synthetic 
 knowledge of the animal kingdom. 
 
 But now, does this mean that Cuvier's method was, as 
 G. St. Hilaire alleged, unphilosophical, superficial, obedient to 
 vulgar prejudices, and, in fine, unfruitful ? These are unjust 
 accusations. How can a method be accused of sterility that 
 has given birth to palaeontology ? Attempt by the principle 
 of connections to reconstruct the fossil world, and you will 
 not succeed. In effect, given an anterior member wanting 
 the fourth section, how can we divine, from the sole fact of 
 the connection, the form this fourth section must have taken, 
 and thereby the form of all the organs awanting ? The law 
 of connections serves to find the unity in a given variety, 
 which is doubtless a great philosophical object ; but it does 
 not serve to find variety by unity. In the most varied and 
 complex forms it can disengage the anatomical element. But 
 given this element, it cannot reconstruct these varied and 
 complex forms, which are animality itself. In a word, in the 
 law of connections, and in G. St. Hilaire's method in general, 
 which is usually considered as synthetical, I would prefer to 
 see a method of analysis, and in that of Cuvier, which passes 
 for analytic, a method of synthesis. The former will reduce 
 abstract organization to its elements ; the latter will recon- 
 struct organizations by means of their elements. The former 
 is like a chemist, who should show you the identity of the 
 elements composing coal and the diamond, which is an 
 analysis ; the other is like a chemist who, with given elements, 
 reconstructs organic substances that had so long escaped 
 synthesis. The prominent character of synthesis is recon- 
 struction. But that is what least admits of dispute in 
 Cuvier's zoological philosophy. 
 
 If we compare, in yet another point of view, the law of 
 correlations and the law of connections, it will appear that 
 the first gives us unity and harmony in the animal itself, the 
 second unity and harmony in the animal series. Given an 
 organized being, you can consider it in itself, or in the series 
 of which it forms part. In itself, you find that all the pieces 
 
GEOFFEOY ST. HILAIEE AND THK DOCTRINE OF FINAL CAUSES. 451' 
 
 composing it are bound together by a final aim, which is 
 its unity, its form, its essence. This is what Cuvier's law 
 expresses. Compared, again, with other beings of the series, 
 it shows constant relations under the most diverse forms; it 
 expresses in its way one and the same type with all those of 
 the same series. This is what G. St. Hilaire's law expresses. 
 The first gives us a profound and philosophical idea of the 
 organization in itself, the second gives us a philosophical 
 idea of the animal scale, of the organized series. Why 
 sacrifice one of these two ideas to the other ? That of Cuvier 
 is not less philosophical than that of G. St. HUaire, but it is 
 so at another point of view. The latter was wrong, then, in 
 accusing his rival of using a method more superficial than 
 philosophical. But it must be owned that Cuvier was equally 
 wrong himself; for he accused G. St. Hilaire of taking 
 abstractions for realities, vague resemblances for certain 
 analogies. Doubtless, said he, there is something common 
 between all animals, and this general analogy had struck the 
 vulgar long before the savants, since they have combined 
 them under the common name animal; but from this to 
 a precise and determinate unity of type there is an abyss 
 that only hypothesis and imagination can overleap. These 
 observations might be justified by the abuse that Geoffrey 
 and his school made of the principle of analogy ; but they 
 did not apply to the law of connections, taken by itself. For, 
 on the contrary, that law (the range and limits of which 
 we are not to measure) furnished a certain and precise 
 principle of comparison ; for the superficial analogies per- 
 ceived by the vulgar, it substituted rational and more profound 
 analogies. 
 
 Finally, in order duly to judge the doctrine of unity of 
 type and composition, it would have to be considered, not 
 merely as G. St. Hilaire expounded it, — a single man being 
 unable to derive from an idea all that it contains, — but as it 
 has emerged from the labours of a great number of naturalists, 
 his contemporaries or successors, Goethe, Oken, Carus, CandoUe, 
 etc. But from all these multiplied labours, into the particular 
 examination of which it does not belong to us to enter, it results 
 that an organ may not only be modified and take the most 
 diverse forms in the different animals and plants (by atrophies. 
 
452 APPENDIX. 
 
 abortions, changes of dimension, unions, separations, etc.), 
 but, besides that, in the organized being itself the different 
 organs are again but the same organ modified. Goethe has 
 shown this in his treatise on the Metamorphosis of Plants. 
 In his view, all the organs of the plant are only the leaf 
 transformed ; and this view has been adopted by most natural- 
 ists. So in the animal organization, he was the first to 
 recognise the analogy of the skull with the vertebral column, 
 an idea now generally adopted, and the demonstration of 
 which belongs to the naturalist Oken. This way has been 
 followed out ; and the decided partisans of this bold method 
 have tried to reduce to the vertebrate principle even the 
 breast-bones, and some of them even the members. In fine, 
 the osseous system itself has appeared a modification of the 
 muscular system. Following all these ways, the school of 
 unity reaches this double conception: 1st, A universal veget- 
 able type, reducible to a branch bearing leaves ; 2d, A 
 universal animal type, reducible to a digestive cavity sur- 
 rounded by a muscular sac provided with appendages. Finally, 
 a still bolder school, carrying abstraction farther, would reduce 
 the elementary idea of the organization to the cell, and would 
 only see in the vegetable or animal two different systems of 
 agglomeration of globules.^ 
 
 Doubtless, if we believe the objections of Cuvier and his 
 school, it is possible that the doctrine of unity of type may 
 have been exaggerated ; but leaving this point to naturalists 
 to debate, and taking the idea of the organization as it is 
 given us by the school of G. St. Hilaire, let us see whether 
 it contradicts the idea that Cuvier has given us of it. 
 In no manner. For even if it were true that nature only 
 employs a very few materials, or even a single element end- 
 lessly modified, to produce all organized beings, still all these 
 modifications must produce in each living being forms and 
 organs compatible with each other, and harmoniously con- 
 nected. Whether the skull be a vertebra or not, it is no less 
 true that the vertebra only takes this remarkable form when 
 it has to contain a brain. Thus there is always a harmony 
 
 ^ See on this doctrine and its recent developments the work of M. Martins, 
 De Vvmti organique des animattx et des vigitaux {Rev. des Deux Mondes, 
 June 15, 1862). 
 
GEOFFEOY ST. HILAIRE AND THE DOCTRINE OF FINAL CAUSES. 453 
 
 hetween the skull and the brain. Thus it will always be 
 admissible to remark, that where the spinal marrow expands 
 under the form of the encephalon, the vertebral column is 
 developed under the form of the skull. I go farther ; without 
 these harmonious relations, the transformations, repetitions, 
 symmetries, connections, and analogies are nothing but purely 
 materia], anatomical facts, that tell the mind nothing. By 
 omitting or setting aside the idea of function, the school 
 of Gr. St. Hilaire would sacrifice physiology to anatomy, and 
 would suppress in some sort the idea oi the living being, 
 in order to see only the number and arrangement of the 
 parts — the material of life in place of life itself ; for what is 
 life, if it be not function and the co-ordination of functions ? 
 
 To sum up : Cuvier's idea and that of G. St. Hilaire are 
 in no way irreconcilable ; and Goethe could profoundly say : 
 ' The naturalists that are followers of Cuvier and of Geoffrey 
 seem to me to be soldiers digging mines and counter-mines ; 
 the one party dig from without inwards, the others from 
 within outwards. If they are clever, they must meet in the 
 depths.' ^ 
 
 As regards final causes, the theory of G. St. Hilaire is 
 no more against them than that of Cuvier; only the one 
 attaches itself to what we have called the finality of plan, the 
 other to the finality of use.^ Unity of plan is as conformable 
 to the idea of a primordial wisdom as utility of organs ; and 
 it is no easier for a blind nature to make a well-designed 
 animal than to make adapted machines. 
 
 ' Scientific Works of Goethe by Ernest Faivre (Paris, 8vo, 1812), p. 371. 
 M. Fairre likewise shows by examples how the two principles may be reconciled. 
 * See above. Book i. 
 
V. 
 FINAL CAUSES AND THE POSITIVIST OBJECTION. 
 
 WE say in the text : ' Final causes are not miracles' Yet 
 the principal objection of Positivism to final causes is 
 that they suppose supernatural interventions. This hypothesis 
 would then be incompatible with the law of modern science, 
 which confines itself to the search of second causes, without 
 making appeal to the first cause. ' It isf says M. Littr4, ' to 
 marks of design that reference is made in order to arrive at 
 the first cause ; but marks of design, perpetually renewed in 
 the structure of the worlds, in the motion of the stars, in the 
 adaptation of our planet, in the organization of living beings, — 
 such marks of design, I say, what else are they than marks of 
 incessant intervention of the first cause ? Consequently, the 
 principle of the Positivist philosophy is broken with, which 
 repels interventions and only accepts laws.' ^ 
 
 Mr. Stuart Mill, however, who is quite as much entitled as 
 M. Littr^ to speak in the name of the Positivist philosophy, for 
 his part thinks, on the contrary, that there is no contradic- 
 tion between the Positive method and final causes. Let us 
 here set forth, although somewhat at length, his valuable 
 testimony upon this question. 
 
 ' It is proper,' says Mill, ' to begin by relieving the doctrine 
 from a religious prejudice. The doctrine condemns all theo- 
 logical explanations, and replaces them, or thinks them destined 
 to be replaced, by theories which take no account of anything 
 but an ascertained order of phenomena. It is inferred that, 
 if this change were completely accomplished, mankind would 
 cease to refer the constitution of nature to an intelligent will, 
 or to believe at all in a Creator and supreme Governor of the 
 world. This supposition is the more natural, as M. Comte 
 was avowedly of that opinion. He indeed disclaimed dogmatic 
 ' Beime dee Dextx Mondes, 16th August 1866. 
 
FINAL CAUSES AND THE POSITIVIST OBJECTION. 455 
 
 atheism with some acrimony, and even says (in a later work, 
 but the earliest contains nothing at variance with it) that the 
 hypothesis of design has more probability than that of a blind 
 mechanism ; but conjecture, founded on analogy, did not 
 seem to him in a mature state of the human intelligence a 
 sufficient basis to rest a theory on. He regarded all real 
 knowledge of a commencement as inaccessible to us, and the 
 inquiry into it an over-passing of the essential limits of our 
 mental faculties; but those who accept the theory of progressive 
 stages of opinion are not obliged to follow it so far. The 
 Positive mode of thi eking is not necessarily a negation of the 
 supernatural ; it me-.'.ily throws back that question to the 
 origin of all things. If the universe had a beginning, that 
 beginning, by the very conditions of the case, was super- 
 natural; the laws of nature cannot account for their own 
 origin. The Positive philosopher is free to form his opinion 
 on this subject conformably to the weight he attaches to the 
 said marks of design. The value of these marks is indeed a 
 question for the Positive philosophy, but it is not one on 
 which Positive philosophers are necessarily agreed. It is one 
 of M. Comte's mistakes, that he never allows of open questions. 
 The Positive philosophy maintains, that within the limits of 
 the existing order of the universe, or rather of the part which 
 is known to us, the cause directly determinative of each 
 phenomenon is natural, not supernatural. It is cgmpatible 
 with this principle to believe that the universe was created, 
 and even that it is continually governed, by an Intelligence, 
 provided we admit that the intelligent Governor adheres to 
 fixed laws, which are only modified or counteracted by other 
 laws of like operation, and which are never superseded in 
 a capricious or providential manner. Whoever regards all 
 events as parts of a constant order, each of these events being, 
 the invariable consequent of some antecedent condition or 
 combination of conditions, fully accepts the Positive mode of 
 thinking, whether or not he recognise a universal antecedent, 
 whereof the whole system of nature was originally the conse- 
 quent, and whether that universal antecedent be conceived as 
 an intelligence or not.' ^ 
 
 1 Stuart Mill, Auguste Comte and Poeifwism, pp. 13-16. Let us further quote, 
 in the same connection, the interesting testimony of Cabanis, Lettre sur lea 
 
456 APPENDIX. 
 
 On this question we are entirely of Mr. Mill's opinion. 
 The doctrine of final causes has nothing to do with the doc- 
 trine of supernatural interventions, in other words, with the 
 doctrine of miracles. We have already several times indi- 
 cated this point of view. This is the place to insist upon it, 
 and to have done with this difficulty. 
 
 M. Littrd here affirms, without demonstrating, what is just 
 the question, namely, that the doctrine of finality demands 
 an incessant intervention of the Creator in the series of natural 
 phenomena. This is not at all evident, and it is even evident 
 to us that there is no necessary connection between these two 
 things. To be convinced of this, it is enough to observe one 
 of the facts where finality is indisputable, namely, one of the 
 combinations created by human industry. It will be seen 
 that intelligence only intervenes at the beginning, and that 
 the chain of phenomena then unrolls, according to physical 
 laws, without any new intervention of the directing agent. 
 If, for instance, — to take a very simple example, — I kindle a 
 
 causes premiires, p. 41 : ' It suffices to cast the most superficial glance on the 
 organization of vegetables and animals, on the manner of their reproduction, 
 development, and fulfilment, according to the spirit of this very organization, 
 of the part assigned to them in the series of beings. The mind of man is not made 
 to understand that all that takes place without foresight and end, without intelli- 
 gence and will. No analogy, no probability, can conduct him to such a result ; all, 
 on the contrary, incline him to regard the works of nature as operations compar- 
 able to those of his own mind, in the production of works most skilfully combined, 
 which only differ from them by a degree of perfection a thousandfold greater ; 
 whence arises for him the idea of a wisdom that has conceived and a will that 
 has executed them, — but a wisdom the highest, and a will most attentive to all 
 details, exercising the most extensive power with the most minute precision. 
 
 ' It is not that we must always in researches on nature, or in philosophical 
 discussions to which they give rise, adopt the vain and sterile explanations of 
 final causes ; nothing, doubtless, is more fitted to quench and mislead the genius 
 of discovery, nothing more inevitably leads us to chimerical results, often as 
 ridiculous as erroneous. But what is tnie in all researches, and in all discus- 
 sions of detail, is so no longer when one is at the end of them, where we have 
 by hypothesis supposed man to be ; and when we reason on causes, or, if you 
 will, on first causes, all these rules of probabUity force us to recognise them as 
 final. Such, at least, is our mind's method of conceiving and proceeding ; and 
 its conclusions can only be opposed by subtle arguments, which, by that very 
 fact, hardly seem that they can have been founded in reason, or by learned 
 systems in which there always remain great gaps. But, certitude being by no 
 means to be found in this last, the more one will take the trotible to examine the 
 motives enounced by those that adopt it, the more, it seems to me, we will find 
 ourselves invincibly driven, as it were, towards the first, which combines in its 
 favour the strongest probabilities.' 
 
FINAL CAUSES AND THE POSITIVIST OBJECTION. 457 
 
 fire in my grate, I only intervene to produce and combine 
 together the different agents whose natural action behoves to 
 produce the effect I have need of; but the first step once 
 t^iken, all the phenomena constituting combustion engender 
 each other, conformably to their laws, without a new inter- 
 vention of the agent ; so that an observer who should study 
 the series of these phenomena, without perceiving the first hand 
 that had prepared all, could not seize that hand in any special 
 act, and yet there is there a preconceived plan and combination. 
 
 In the controversy between Leibnitz and Clarke, the ques- 
 tion was raised whether it would be more for the honour of a 
 workman to make a work that would go quite alone, without 
 having need of help or repair, or a work that the hand of the 
 workman retouched from time to time. Clarke, starting from 
 the idea of Newton (and that a false one), that the planetary 
 world needs to be refitted from time to time by its Author, 
 said that it was better that the work should bear the mark 
 of its dependence, and that the divine Author should make 
 His power and existence felt by personally appearing when it 
 was necessary. Leibnitz maintained, on the other hand, that 
 the abler a workman is, the more durable should his work 
 be, and have in itself whereon to subsist. In our opinion 
 Leibnitz is right ; but because the workman should not have 
 to interpose to repair or maintain his work, it does not follow 
 that he did not interpose a first time by an initial act, which 
 implicitly contained aU ulterior manifestations. 
 
 It cannot, therefore, be said, taking matters in principle, that 
 the doctrine of final causes demands incessant interventions 
 of Providence. We must always recognise that on certain 
 special points — for instance, the origin of life, the origin of 
 living species — one seems almost forcibly driven to the 
 miraculous intervention of the Deity, if we do not wish to 
 lend ourselves to various hypotheses which attempt to reduce 
 these diverse phenomena to known natural laws. But this is 
 a difficulty which we have discussed in its place (Book i. 
 chap, vii.. Doctrine of JUvolution). Suffice it here to point out 
 that the idea of final cause, taken in general, and without 
 examining this or that special problem, contains nothing con- 
 trary to the idea of a universal mechanism, ruled by natural 
 laws, of which God might be the primary author, and which 
 
458 APPENDIX. 
 
 He might sustain by His general action without needing to 
 interpose in each particular act. 
 
 Tor the rest, the Positive school appears to us less entitled 
 than any other to dispute the incessant and universal interven- 
 tion of the first cause in phenomena, since, strictly admitting 
 only facts and relations, it knows not at all whether there are 
 second causes, distinct from the first, and having proper virtu- 
 ality in them. Since there are empirically only facts and 
 relations, and beyond, a vast unknown iioumenon, who can 
 tell that this is not the first and universal cause, which is the 
 sole cause, and which immediately produces in a given order 
 all the phenomena of the universe ? And by what right 
 could you affirm that, apart from this unique cause, there are 
 second and subordinate causes that act under it ? When you 
 say that all these phenomena result from the properties of 
 matter, what do you mean to say ? What do you mean by 
 matter ? Matter and its properties are hidden causes which 
 are not evident to experience. You only know phenomena 
 and laws, you say. Very well. Beyond that you know 
 nothing, then — matter no more than all the rest. There is, 
 then, beyond all phenomena only an unknown cause, whose 
 mode of action is unknown to you: you are no more at 
 liberty to call it matter than we would be at liberty, if we 
 reasoned according to your principles, to call it God. 
 
 According to M. Littr^, the property of accommodating 
 itself to ends — of adjusting itself, as he says — is one of the 
 properties of organized matter. It is of the essence of this 
 matter to adapt itself to ends, as it is of its essence to con- 
 tract or expand, to move or to feel. One wonders to see a 
 mind so familiar as that of M. Littr^ with the scientific 
 method, so easily satisfied with words. Who does not recog- 
 nise here one of those hidden qualities on which scholasticism 
 lived, and which modern' science everywhere tends to elimi- 
 nate ?^ Let men but think of it, and they will own that 
 there does not exist a sort of entity, called organized matter, 
 endowed, one knows not why nor how, with the property of 
 attaining ends ; what really exists is a totality of solids, 
 liquids, tissues, canals, hard parts, and soft parts — in a word, 
 
 ■■ This is so true that another Positivist writer, M. Robin, has abandoned him 
 on this point. (See above, Book i. chap, iv.) 
 
PINAL CAUSES AND THE POSITIVIST OBJECTION. 459 
 
 an incalculable totality of second causes and blind agents that 
 all unite in a common action, which is life. What must be 
 explained is, how so many different causes know how to meet 
 and produce this common action, this coincidence of so many 
 divergent elements in a single effect. To say that this 
 rencounter, this coincidence, is quite a simple thing, and is 
 explained by an accommodating virtue in matter (for is not 
 this what M. Littr^ calls the property of adjusting itself to 
 ends ?), is to resuscitate the dormitive and other virtues of 
 scholasticism. In another writing,^ M. Littr^ had opposed 
 with eloquent vivacity the 7ns medicatrix of the school of 
 Hippocrates. Wherein is it more absurd to admit in matter 
 the property of healing itself, than the property of adjusting 
 itself to ends ?^ 
 
 ' Revue des Deux Mondes, 15th April 1846. 
 
 ' la.Tneu'aaAS, Enquiase d'une philosophie(t. iv. book xii. chap, vi.), likewise 
 shows that the theory of final causes in no way requires a succession of super- 
 natural interventions and of special volitions. 
 
VI. 
 
 OPTIMISM.— VOLTAIEE AND ROUSSEAU. 
 
 I. 
 
 (Book i. Chapter v. Page 171.) 
 
 THE question of Evil only touched our subject indirectly, 
 and we required to pass it by, otherwise it would have 
 absorbed all the rest. Our aim was principally to seek in 
 the universe wisdom, not goodness, leaving this latter question 
 to theodicy properly so called. However, not to neglect it 
 entirely, independently of some views set forth in the text, 
 let us here recapitulate the great debate raised on this question 
 in the 18th century between Voltaire and Eousseau. Nearly 
 everything of most weight that can be said for and against 
 Providence is to be found collected in this famous controversy, 
 in which Kant was indirectly mixed up. 
 
 The subject of debate is the doctrine of optimism professed 
 by Pope in his Essay on Man. According to the English 
 poet, in nature all is good ; and his poem, in this respect, is 
 only the poetic translation of the philosophic doctrine of 
 Leibnitz, who in his Theodicy affirmed, as is known, that ' the 
 world as it is, is the best of all possible worlds.' Pope says 
 just the same thing in this passage : 
 
 ' All Nature is but Art unknown to thee ; 
 All Chance, Direction which thou canst not see ; 
 All Discord, Harmony not understood ; 
 All partial Evil, universal Good ; 
 And spite of Pride, in erring Reason's spite, 
 One truth is clear, Whatever is, is right. '^ 
 
 These affirmations excited in England a keen controversy, with 
 which we shall not meddle. Pope was accused of impiety, as 
 Montesquieu had been of atheism and fatalism. Warburton 
 defended him ; Bolingbroke and Shaftesbury took the side of his 
 
 ' Eaeay on Man, Ep. i. p. 289. 
 
VOLTAIKE AND KOUSSEAU. 461 
 
 doctrine. This whole philosophic quarrel had been forgotten 
 when there occurred a lamentable event, one of those disasters 
 to which humanity is always exposed, and which always take 
 it by surprise — the earthquake of Lisbon in 1755. 
 
 In our climes, so rarely visited by this scourge, men were 
 confounded to learn that a vast subterranean wave had shaken 
 Spain, Africa, Italy, and Sicily. In a few hours Lisbon was 
 overthrown, and almost completely destroyed ; and, a fire being 
 added to the disorder of nature, from 50,000 to 60,000 people 
 perished. The following is the account given immediately 
 after the event by the Gazette of France (No. 567, November 
 1755) : — 'We have been informed by a courier from Lisbon, 
 that on the first of this month, about nine in the morning, the 
 earthquake was felt there in a terrible manner. It overthrew 
 the half of the city, all the churches, and the king's palace. 
 Happily, no accident happened to the royal family, which was 
 at Belem, though the palace they occupied there was injured. 
 When the courier left they were still in huts, sleeping in 
 coaches, and had been nearly twenty-four hours without 
 servants, and without almost anything to eat. The part of 
 the city not thrown down has taken fire, and was still burning 
 when the courier left. . . . People allege that 50,000 inhabi- 
 tants have perished in Lisbon.' 
 
 Let us also quote the poetical and eloquent passage in 
 which Goethe has related the same event: 'On the 1st of 
 November 1755 occurred the earthquake of Lisbon, and spread 
 over the world, accustomed to peace and tranquillity, a tre- 
 mendous terror. A great and splendid capital, which was also 
 a commercial city, is suddenly overtaken by a most dreadful 
 calamity. The earth quakes and moves, the sea boils, the 
 ships collide ; houses, churches, and towers fall down ; the 
 royal palace is partly swallowed up by the sea. The cleft 
 earth seems to cast forth fire and flames, for on every hand 
 fire and smoke proceed from the ruins. Sixty thousand 
 persons, who the moment before were enjoying tranquillity 
 and the pleasures of life, perish together, and the happiest 
 is he who has not been allowed to foresee and to feel the 
 calamity. . . . Thus nature seems to manifest on all hands its 
 boundless power.' 
 
 Such was the event that moved and inflamed the imagina- 
 
462 APPENDIX. 
 
 tion of Voltaire, and inspired his poem on the- Earthquake of 
 Lisbon, one of his finest works. It is entirely a philosophical 
 poem, directed against Pope's All is good. He successively passes 
 in review all the explanations of this fatal event that can be 
 given to justify Providence, and states his objections to them. 
 
 1. The first explanation of the evil consists in saying that 
 it is a chastisement, an expiation. But the expiation of 
 what? Por every one is smitten indiscriminately, the inno- 
 cent as well as the guilty : 
 
 ' Will you say, while this mass of victims you behold : 
 God is avenged ; their death but pays their crimes ? 
 "What crime, what fault have these poor infants done, 
 Laid crushed and bleeding on the maternal breast ? 
 Was Lisbon, now destroyed, more given to vice 
 Than London or Paris, immersed in luxury ? 
 Lisbon is swallowed up, in Paris stUl they dance.' 
 
 2. It is a great mystery, and the explanation is certainly 
 insufficient. But Pope, like Plato, Leibnitz, and Malebranche, 
 has given another : ' Evil,' he has said, ' is the effect of general 
 laws, to which God behoves to submit, for He has made them.' 
 If this is a profound explanation, it is very hard for the 
 human species : 
 
 ' Do you say, it is the effect of lasting laws 
 That force the choice of a God good and free ? 
 All is well, you say, and all is necessary. 
 What ! would the universe, without this hellish gulf, 
 W^ithout engulfing Lisbon, would it have been worse ? 
 
 Has not the Eternal Artist in His hands 
 
 Infinite means all ready for His plans ? 
 
 I humbly do desire, not to offend my Master, 
 
 That this dark burning gulf of sulphur and saltpetre 
 
 Its flames had kindled in the desert's heart ; 
 
 For I respect my God, but love the universe. ' 
 
 3. Pope had further said that the world forms a systematic 
 whole, in which each detail, each stone and blade of grass, is 
 like a ring in an immense universal chain : the smallest ring 
 removed, the whole chain is broken. Voltaire sees nothing 
 but fatalism in this explanation : 
 
 ' God holds the chain in hand, and is Himself not chained ; 
 All is arranged by beneficent choice. 
 Free is He ; He is just, and not implacable. 
 Why, then, do we still suffer under a just Master ?.' 
 
VOLTAIRE AND ROUSSEAU. 4G3 
 
 Thus the theory of the concatenation of beings, the elfiap- 
 /jLEvr) of the Stoics, a theory that remains the same with 
 Providence and with fatalism, is only in Voltaire's view a 
 fatalist theory. He renews the dilemma of Epicurus : either 
 God could, but would not, prevent evil, and then He is 
 wicked ; or else He could not, and then He is impotent. 
 
 4. Another explanation is that there is no absolute evil, 
 and that nature proceeds by compensations: such an evil 
 produces such a good. Voltaire does not admit this principle 
 of compensations : 
 
 ' Would the sad inmates of those regions spoiled, 
 In all their anguish, would they be consoled 
 If one said to them, " Fall, and calmly die, 
 For the welfare of the world ; your houses are destroyed,— 
 Other hands will build your burnt-down palaces ; 
 The North will richer grow from all your fatal loss ; 
 Your ills are all a good, viewed under general laws " ? ' 
 
 And further on : 
 
 ' This evil, as you say, is another being's good ; 
 And from my gory corpse will a thousand insects rise. 
 When death completes the iUs I have endured, 
 There is this fine solace, to be devoured by worms ! 
 
 Console me not, I pray ; you aggravate my pains. 
 And I can only see in you the vain attempt 
 Of a proud wretch feigning to be content ! ' 
 
 5. It has been said, again, that God being an omnipotent 
 Master, we ought to submit to His will, and even to His caprices. 
 Pope repeats, after St. Paul: 'The vessel does not ask -the potter 
 why he has made it coarse.' Voltaire replies as follows : — 
 
 ' The vessel, we well know, does not the potter ask, 
 ' ' Why, then, am I so vile, so feeble, and so coarse ? " 
 It has no power of speech, nor has it power of thought. 
 This urn, which in formation broken falls 
 Out of the potter's hand, received no heart, 
 That it might good desire and feel calamity. ' 
 
 The metaphor, in effect, is unjust : I protest, I cry, which 
 the vessel cannot do. 
 
 6. Then follows the Christian explanation by redemption : 
 
 Evil comes from sin, and redeems sin. Here again Voltaire 
 
 triumphs : 
 
 * A God came to console our much afflicted race ; 
 He visited the earth, and yet did it not change. . 
 
464 APPENDIX. 
 
 An arrogant sophist tells us that He could not ; 
 
 He could, the other says, but only He would not. 
 
 No doubt but that He would ; aud while they reason thus, 
 
 Internal fires have swallowed up Lisbon. ' 
 
 Eedemption has left the world as it was, and can only 
 have its effect in the other world. 
 
 Should Voltaire's conclusions after these objections be 
 entirely sceptical ? Having opposed, with perfect good sense, 
 the excesses of optimism, must he be regarded as a partisan 
 of pessimism ? 
 
 No ; he explains, he does not wish to excite to revolt, but 
 he finds himself in presence of an enigma of which he seeks 
 the key with pain, but without impiety. 
 
 ' The author of the poem on the calamity of Lisbon does 
 not oppose the illustrious Pope,' says Voltaire in his preface. 
 ' He thinks with him on all points ; but, affected by the 
 misfortunes of men, he protests against the abuse that may be 
 made of this maxim. All is good. He adopts the sad and 
 ancient truth, that there is evil on the earth; he declares that 
 the saying All is good, taken absolutely, and without hope of 
 a hereafter, is only an insult to the sorrows of life.' 
 
 His poem is thus rather a vindication of a compensating 
 hereafter than a plea against Providence : 
 
 ' We have need of a God to speak to mortal men ; 
 It but belongs to Him to interpret His work. 
 
 One day all tviU be well, this is what is our hope ; 
 All even now is well, this is illusion. 
 
 I do not against Providence rebel ; 
 I can but suffer without murmuring. ' 
 
 What other conclusion can be come to on the question of 
 evil ? Voltaire's objections are rather religious than impious. 
 He does not exclude Providence, but claims to hope ; so that 
 the sum of this debate is that every one is agreed ; and J. J. 
 Eousseau will be found to conclude likewise. 
 
 But before analyzing the pages in which this powerful 
 writer has criticised Voltaire's poem, let us recall the opinion 
 of a great philosopher, Kant, who, then thirty years old and a 
 professor in the University of Koenigsberg, was moved, like 
 all the world, by the disaster of Lisbon. He said his say on 
 
VOLT AIRE AND ROUSSEAU. 465 
 
 the question engaging us, in two untranslated writings — the 
 one geological, the other purely philosophical. The first is 
 entitled. On the Earthquake of Lisbon (1756) ; the other. On 
 Optimism, and appeared in 1759. 
 
 To his treatise on the earthquake of Lisbon, Kant had 
 added a preamble, containing considerations favourable to 
 optimism. He there set forth the moral utility that man 
 could derive from those catastrophes. They, in effect, remind 
 him that all is not made for him on the earth, and that he 
 himself is not made exclusively for the earth. He ought, 
 therefore, to look beyond, and think that all his being is not 
 destroyed by death. In these observations, Kant already 
 rises above Pope and Voltaire : ' The consideration of these 
 terrible events is,' he says, ' instructive. It humbles man by 
 making him see that he has not the right, or at least has lost 
 the right, to expect from the laws of nature ordained by God 
 consequences always agreeable to him ; and perhaps by this 
 means he also learns that this arena of his passions ought not 
 to be the end of all his thoughts.' Such are the two lessons 
 that these scourges teach us. Kant then develops the point 
 of view of compensations, not in the superficial sense that evil 
 is compensated by good, and may be annulled thereby, but in 
 the sense that particular evil is only an insignificant conse- 
 quence of general utility. He forms in some sort the theory 
 of earthquakes from the point of view of human utility. 
 Whence come these famous phenomena ? — From the internal 
 fire, which is the very condition of the existence of living 
 beings on the earth. Suppose the earth refrigerated, as the 
 moon is said to be, and life will at once cease on our planet. 
 To prevent this general evil, there must be accidentally pro- 
 duced evils, — deadly, indeed, but particular and exceptional. 
 That the earthquake should only occur in deserts is an impos- 
 sibility so much the more absolute, that the internal fire is 
 necessary for human industry. We must, then, accept this 
 necessity, and, to repeat a word as true as commonplace, bear 
 what cannot be prevented. 
 
 ' One is scandalized,' says Kant, ' to see so terrible a scourge 
 for the human race considered from the point of view of utility. 
 I am convinced that this utility would willingly be renounced 
 if we could be freed from the fear ^nd danger attached to it. 
 
 2 G 
 
466 APPENDIX. 
 
 We have an unreasonable pretension to an absolutely agree- 
 able life, and would have the advantages without the incon- 
 veniences. Men born to die, we cannot bear that some have 
 died in an earthquake ; strangers here below, and having no 
 possession, we are inconsolable that earthly property is lost, 
 property which would have perished of itself, in virtue of the 
 universal laws of nature. It is easy to understand that if 
 men build on a soil composed of inflammable materials, sooner 
 or later all the magnificence of their structures must be over- 
 thrown by earthquakes. But should one, therefore, seem 
 impatient towards the ways of Providence ? Would it not 
 be wiser to say. It was necessary for earthquakes to happen 
 from time to time, but it was not necessary to build magni- 
 ficent dwellings there ?' 
 
 It is for us to foresee disasters, and prevent them if we 
 can, by adapting our structures, for example, to the nature of 
 the soil. 
 
 'Although the cause that produces earthquakes,' continues 
 Kant, ' is deadly to man in a certain point of view, in others 
 it recompenses this evil with usury. We know, in effect, that 
 the warm springs that are so useful to man's health owe their 
 mineral properties and their heat to the same causes that cause 
 the earth to quake. ... If this be so, as we cannot but admit, 
 we will not object to the beneficent effects of this subterranean 
 fire, that communicates a gentle warmth to the earth when 
 the sun refuses his, and that contributes to favour the vegeta- 
 tion of plants and all the economy of nature. In view of so 
 many advantages, are the evils that may happen to the human 
 race, because of this or that disaster, of such a nature as to 
 absolve us from the gratitude we owe to Providence for its 
 other benefits V 
 
 The true force of this line of argument evidently consists, 
 not in saying that this evil is compensated by that good, but 
 that this evil is an accident connected with a general cause, 
 without which there would have been no good. 
 
 Kant's second writing. On Optimism, is exclusively philo- 
 sophical The philosopher here essays to reply to an entirely 
 metaphysical objection to optimism. There cannot, it is said, 
 be a realized maximum. Thus the greatest number possible 
 cannot be realized; every real number can always be aug- 
 
VOLTAIRE AND EOUSSEAU. 467 
 
 raented. The maximum is a virtuality impossible in actu. 
 How, then, could there be a world that should be the lest 
 possible ? The world, being finite, is necessarily imperfect ; no 
 doubt it may always be less and less imperfect, but without 
 ever being able to reach a fixed limit beyond which a better 
 could not be conceived. It is the objection that F^n^lon 
 had brought against Malebranche, the conclusion of which is, 
 that there is no best possible world in itself, and that if this 
 world exists, and no other, it is because of the free choice 
 of God. 
 
 The objection rests on a confusion that Kant mentions at 
 the first, by distinguishing the optimum of a world from the 
 maodmum of a number. There is contradiction for the 
 maximum, but not for the optimum. Quantity is of quite 
 a different nature from quality. The maximum of quality 
 exists, and God Himself is the optimum in itself. No doubt, 
 the world cannot be God ; but, exclusive of this sole condition, 
 it can realize the relative optimum — in other words, be the 
 best possible. 
 
 ' Without,' says Kant, ' insisting on this point, that the 
 degree of reality of a thing is not suitably conceived in rela- 
 tion to an inferior degree, by comparing it to the relation of a 
 number to its units, I shall content myself with the following 
 consideration, to show that the proposed instance is not applic- 
 able here. There is no greatest number possible, but there is 
 a highest degree of possible reality ; and that degree is found 
 in God. The conception of the greatest possible finite number 
 is the abstract conception of plurality in general, which is 
 finite, which, however, can still be added to without it ceasing 
 to be finite ; in which, consequently, the fixity of greatness 
 places no determinate limit, but only limits in general, because 
 of which the conception of the greatest possible cannot be 
 applied as predicate to any number. For if any determinate 
 quantity be thought of, one can still add a unit without pre- 
 judice to the character of finite that belongs to it. On the 
 other hand, the degree of reality of a world is absolutely 
 determinate ; the limits of a world the best possible are iiot 
 only set in a general or abstract manner, but set by a degree 
 it must absolutely come short of. Independence, the attribute 
 of self-sufficiency, omnipresence, power to create, are perfec- 
 
468 APPENDIX. 
 
 tions that no world can have. It is not here, then, as in the 
 mathematical infinite, where the finite indefinitely approaches 
 the infinite, according to the law of continuity. Here the 
 interval between infinite and finite reality is set by a deter- 
 minate greatness that makes their difference. The world that 
 is found at that degree of the scale of beings where the abysS 
 opens that contains the incommensurable degree of perfection, 
 that world is the most perfect among all that is finite.' 
 
 There would thus be a limit beyond which there is only 
 absolute perfection. I know not whether Kant, twenty years 
 later, would have been fully satisfied with this passage. It 
 even appears that he did not much like to be spoken to about 
 this work. It is not the less true that his penetrating mind 
 has justly signalized the difference between optimism and the 
 maximum — ^the one having no limit, while the other may have. 
 
 Let us now come to Jean-Jacques Eousseau. Voltaire had 
 sent him his two poems on natural law and the disaster of 
 Lisbon ; and in his letter of thanks, while expressing his 
 admiration, Eousseau made his reservations with that inde- 
 pendence that is not always agreeable.^ Voltaire was stung 
 to the quick, and from this moment the rupture was complete 
 between the two philosophers, already embroiled with regard 
 to the theatre of Geneva. 
 
 Eousseau first opposes to Voltaire a sentimental reason, in 
 which he conforms to the general spirit of his philosophy. 
 His heart resists the doctrines of the Lisbon poem; tl^ey 
 appear to him sad and cruel ; they weaken the moral powers. 
 In this respect he prefers the maxim All is good. This objec- 
 tion is not entirely just, if one recalls Voltaire's last word, or 
 at least it could not be applied in all its strictness to the 
 Lisbon poem. It would, on the other hand, very well apply 
 to another of Voltaire's writings, his famous Candide, a master- 
 piece of irony and sarcasm, which breathes only contempt of 
 the human race, and is not written with the heart like the 
 Lisbon poem. Here Voltaire submits to Providence, and 
 Eousseau seems to forget this. 
 
 ' Pope's poem,' he tells him, * mitigates my ills, and brings 
 me patience ; yours aggravates my pains, and excites me to 
 murmur, and, depriving me of all but an enfeebled hope, it 
 ' J. J. Rousseau, Oorrespond. 18th August 1756, 
 
VOLTAIRE AND ROUSSEAU. 469 
 
 reduces me to despair. . . . Tell me who abuses sentiment or 
 reason 1 ... If the difficulty of the origin of evil forced you 
 to alter some one of the perfections of God, why seek to justify 
 His power at the expense of His goodness V At any rate, 
 this is still only an objection of prejudice, resulting from 
 incompatibility of disposition. 
 
 Eousseau then seeks for the cause of evil, and finds it, as 
 regards moral evil, in human nature, and as regards physical 
 evil, in nature in general. As for man, having received from 
 God liberty and feeling, he must consequently know evil and 
 sorrow. ' I do not see that the cause of moral evil can be 
 sought elsewhere than in man free, perfected, therefore corrupt; 
 -and as to physical evils, if sensible and impassive matter is 
 a contradiction, . . . they are inevitable in every system of 
 which man forms part; . . . and then the question is not, 
 why man is not perfectly happy, but why he exists.' Man, 
 as he is, is composed partly of matter : he is therefore sensible 
 of pain, as of pleasure : for pleasure is only a less pain, as 
 pain is only a less pleasure — ^they .are degrees of a scale. 
 
 Further on, Eousseau expresses the same thought as Kant, 
 in adopting the principle of Pope and Leibnitz, who only see 
 in evil an accidental effect of universal laws : ' You would 
 have preferred the earthquake to have occurred in the heart 
 of a desert rather than at Lisbon. Can it be doubted that 
 they also occur in the deserts ? . . . "What would such a 
 privilege signify ? Would it mean, then, that the order of the 
 world must change according to our caprices ? that nature is 
 subject to our laws ? and that to forbid an earthquake in any 
 place, we would only have to build a town there ?' 
 
 What strikes and moves us in these great disorders of 
 nature is the suddenness of the scourge and the number of the 
 dead ; but this earthquake teaches us nothing new, and we 
 know well that all those who have died at once had to die 
 some day. Must they be lamented because their death was 
 sudden ? ' Is it a sadder end,' replies Eousseau, ' than that of 
 a dying man, overwhelmed with useless cares, whom a lawyer 
 and heirs do not allow to breathe, whom doctors assassinate 
 in his bed at their ease, and whom barbarous priests skilfully 
 cause to taste death?' 
 
 If evil is a consequence of natural laws, it would only be 
 
470 APPENDIX. 
 
 avoided by suppressing nature itself, that is, the very condi- 
 tion of good. In order not to suffer, we must -have been 
 incapable of enjoying ; in order not to die, we ought not to 
 have been called to live. It is said, I would rather not have 
 been ; but it is said from the lips more than from the heart. 
 Most men would rather suffer than die, and these still pro- 
 nounce in favour of Providence. 
 
 ' It is difficult,' we read further, ' to find on this point good 
 faith among men, and to calculate all with philosophers; because 
 the latter, in the comparison of good and evil, always forget the 
 pleasant feeling of existence, independent of every other sensa- 
 tion ; and the vanity of despising death requires the others to 
 calumniate life, almost like those women who, with a stained 
 robe and scissors, pretend to prefer holes- to stains. You 
 think, with Erasmus, that few people would wish to be born 
 in the same circumstances they have lived in ; but such a one 
 puts a very high price on his merchandise who would greatly 
 lower it if he had any hope of closing the bargain. Besides, 
 whom am I to believe ? . The rich, . . . literary people, of 
 all classes of men the most sedentary, the most sickly, the 
 most thoughtful, and, consequently, the most unhappy ? . . . 
 Consult a citizen, ... an artisan, ... a peasant even,' etc. 
 
 Life is good, let us accept the ills of it ; such is Eousseau's 
 conclusion on this question. 
 
 As to the chain of beings, Voltaire's verse, already quoted, 
 and the notes he had added to his poem, also called for a 
 reply. Change a grain of sand, and you change all ; ' but,' said 
 Voltaire, ' is free will compatible with this theory V That 
 is another question. What is certain is that every cause sup- 
 poses an effect, just as every effect is determined by a cause. 
 Voltaire, however, does not admit this chain of the world. 
 ' One may,' he says, ' suppress a body without injuring the 
 whole. If a pebble were suppressed, wherein would that injure 
 the universe ?' 
 
 ' A drop of water,' says he in his notes, ' a grain of sand, 
 more or less, can cause no change in the general constitution. 
 ;N"ature has not subjected itself to any precise quantity, nor 
 to any precise form. No planet moves in an absolutely 
 regulat curve. . . . Nature never acts strictly. . . '. There are 
 events that have effects, and others that have none. . . . Several 
 
VOLTAIKE AND ROUSSEAU. 471 
 
 events remain without filiation. . . . Tlie wheels of a coach 
 serve to make it go ; but whether they raise a little more or less 
 dust, the journey is made all the same.' 
 
 Here Voltaire denies the Leibnitzian principle of sufficient 
 reason, and contradicts Spinoza's axiom, ' Ex causa determinata 
 sequiticr effectus.' Eousseau defends against Voltaire this pre- 
 cision, this determination of nature always acting according to 
 mathematical laws, often complex, but not less strict because 
 we cannot grasp them : 
 
 ' Far from thinking that nature is not subject to precise 
 quantities and figures, I would hold, on the contrary, that it 
 alone strictly follows this precision. ... As to these pretended 
 irregularities, can it be doubted that they have all their physical 
 causes? These apparent irregularities come, no doubt, from some 
 law we are ignorant of.' 
 
 Let us remark, in passing, that astronomy has proved the 
 truth of these assertions, and that the irregularities instanced 
 by Voltaire in the motion of the planets are comprised in 
 Kewton's law. 
 
 ' Let lis suppose,' continues Eousseau, ' two weights in 
 equilibrium, and still unequal. Add to the smaller the quan- 
 tity by which they differ. Either the two weights will remain 
 in equilibrium, and we shall have a cause without effect, or 
 the equilibrium will be broken, and we shall have an effect 
 without cause. But if the weights were of iron, and there were 
 a grain of loadstone hidden under one of them, the precision 
 of nature would then deprive it of the appearance of precision, 
 and, by means of exactitude, it would appear to want it.' 
 
 Thus the doctrine, there is no cause without an effect, is 
 as true as the converse ; and when a cause does not produce 
 its effect, it is because it is^.arrested by another cause : 
 
 'You distinguish the events that have consequences and 
 those that have none. I doubt the validity of this distinction. 
 . . . The dust a carriage raises can have no influence on the 
 progress of the vehicle, nor on the rest of the world. ... I 
 see a thousand plausible reasons why it was not indifferent to 
 Europe that one day the heiress of Burgundy had her head 
 well or ill dressed, nor to the destiny of Eome that Csesar 
 turned his eyes to the left or the right.' 
 
 With the same force and dexterity Eousseau maintains 
 
472 APPENDIX. 
 
 against Voltaire the principle of good relative to the whole, and 
 not to a part : 
 
 'You tell man, I must be as dear to my Master — I, a 
 thinking and sentient being — as the planets that probably do 
 not feel. . . . But the system of this universe, that produces, 
 preserves, and perpetuates all these sentient and thinking 
 beings, must be dearer to Him than a single one of these 
 beings. ... I believe, I hope, I am worth more in the eyes 
 of God than the territory of a planet ; but if the planets are 
 inhabited, . . . why should I be worth more in His eyes than 
 aU the inhabitants of Saturn 1 ' In a word, the existence of a 
 living being is connected with all sorts of laws more precious 
 than that one being. 
 
 ' But,' says Voltaire, ' the nice comfort of being eaten by 
 worms ! ' Eousseau replies to this whim, ' That the carcase of 
 a man should feed worms, wolves, or plants, is not, I grant, a 
 recompense for the man's death ; but if, in the system of this 
 universe, it is necessary for the preservation of the human 
 race that there should be a circulation of substance between 
 men, animals, and vegetables, then the special evil of an 
 individual corresponds to the general good.' 
 
 Drawing to a close, Eousseau ends by coinciding with Vol- 
 taire. Eousseau does not deny that there is evil in the world, 
 and Voltaire declares that he meant to say nothing else ; so it 
 is only the form that differs : 
 
 ' To return to the system that you attack, I believe it cannot 
 be suitably examined without carefully distinguishing the par- 
 ticular evil of which no philosopher has denied the existence, 
 from the general evil which optimism denies. The question 
 is not, whether each of us suffers or not, but whether it was 
 good for the universe to be, and whether our evils were inevit- 
 able in its constitution. Thus the addition of an article would 
 render, it seems, the proposition more exact ; and, in place of 
 saying yAllis good,, it would perhaps be better to say. The whole 
 is good, or, All is good for the whole.' 
 
 Thus no one really denies the existence of evil ; and if the 
 Stoics appeared to do so, it was in words rather than in deed. 
 Only the question is. Whether this word is absolute or relative, 
 universal or partial; whether it prevails over good, or whether, 
 on the other hand, good prevails. A question difficult to decide. 
 
VOLTAIEE AND ROUSSEAU. 473 
 
 and which will usually be decided by the feelings and imagi- 
 nation of each one. Good-humoured people are optimists, the 
 bad-humoured are pessimists. La Eochefoucauld said, ' Happi- 
 ness is in the taste, not in things.' Experience gives us no 
 satisfactory solution, and the question must be decided by a 
 priori reasons, as Eousseau again says : 
 
 'The true principles of optimism can neither be deduced 
 from the properties of matter nor from the mechanism of the 
 universe, but only from the perfections of God, who presides 
 over all; so that the existence of God is not proved by the 
 system of Pope, but the system of Pope by the existence 
 of God.' 
 
 In other words, optimism is the consequence of the existence 
 of God, and cannot be contradicted by experience. The world is 
 as good as it could be, because God cannot be the devil — ^that 
 is to say, the principle of evil.^ 
 
 ' All these questions,' says Eousseau, 'again, are reducible to 
 that of the existence of God. If God exists. He is perfect ; if 
 perfect. He is wise, powerful; if wise and powerful, my soul 
 is immortal ; if my soul is immortal, thirty years are nothing 
 to me, and are perhaps necessary to the welfare of the 
 universe.' 
 
 It is evident that this conclusion is not, after all, very 
 different from that of Voltaire : 
 
 ' One day all will be well ; sucli is our hope. 
 All is well here below ; this is illusion. ' 
 
 ' On the question of evil, see again the last chapter of our book i Of the 
 Supreme End of Nature. 
 
VII. 
 OBJECTIONS AND DIFFICULTIES. 
 
 LUCRETIUS, BACON, DESCAETES, AND SPINOZA. , 
 (Book i. Chapter t. at the end. ) 
 
 IN" our first edition we had inserted a chapter entitled 
 Objections and Difficulties. It has been pointed out that 
 that chapter often made a repetition of the rest of the dis- 
 cussion, that it interrupted and complicated it uselessly. We 
 have recognised the justice of this criticism, and while 
 preserving under the title of Contrary Facts (Chap, v.) all 
 that seemed essential to the course of the discussion, we judge 
 it rfght to remit to the Appendix the objections having a 
 more historical character, and which might appear repetitions 
 or episodes. Of this kind are the objections of Lucretius, 
 Bacon, Descartes, and Spinoza. 
 
 I. Lucretius. Objection of the Epicureans. 
 According to Lucretius, the theory of final causes inverts 
 the order of the facts : it takes the effect for the cause. The 
 bird flies because it is capable of flying; the eye sees because 
 it is capable of seeing. Vision and flight are effects; the 
 finalists make them causes. Lucretius thus expresses this 
 objection : 
 
 ' Istud in his rebus vitium vehementer, et istum 
 Effugere errorem, vitarecjue prsemeditator, 
 Lumina ne facias oculorum clara creata, 
 Prospicere ut possimus ; et, ut proferre vias 
 Proceros passus, ideo fastigia posse 
 Surarum, ao feminum pedibus fundata plioari ; 
 Brachia turn porro validis et apta lacertis 
 Esse ; ir.anusque datas utraque ex parte ministras ; 
 Ut facere ad yitam possimus, quse foret usus. 
 
OBJECTIONS AND DIFFICULTIES. 475 
 
 ' Csetera de genere hoc inter qusecumc^ue pretantur ; 
 Omnia perversa prtepostera sunt ratione. 
 Nil ideo quoniam natum est in oorpore ut uti 
 Possemus, sed quod natum est id procreat usum. 
 ■Nee fuit ante videre oculorum lumina nata, 
 Nee dictis orare pvius, quam lingua oreata est, 
 Sed potius longe linguae prsecessit origo 
 Sermonem ; multoque oreatse sunt prius aures, 
 Quim sonus est auditus ; et omnia denique membra 
 Ante fuere, ut opinor, eorum quim foret usus, 
 Hand igitur potuere utendi crescere causa. 
 
 'At contra conferre mauu certamina pngniE, 
 Et lacerare artus, foedareque membra cruore, 
 Ante fuit multo qukm. lucida tela volarent. 
 Et volnus vitare prius natura coegit, 
 Quim daret objectum parmai Iseva per artem. 
 Scilicet et fessum corpus mandare quieti 
 Multo antiquius est, quim lecti mollia strata. 
 Et sedare sitius prius est, qu&m pocula, natum. 
 Haec igitur possunt utendi cogilita causa 
 Credier, ex usu quae sunt vitaque reperta 
 Ilia quidem seorsum sunt omnia, quee prius ipsa 
 Nata dedere suae post notitiam utilitatis. 
 Quo genere in primis sensus et membra videmus. 
 Quare etiam atque etiam procul est ut credere possis 
 Utilitatis ob officium potuisse creari. ' ^ 
 
 ' But before all, Memmias, be on your guard against too 
 common an error: believe not that the shining orb of our 
 eyes has only been created to procure for us the sight of 
 objects ; that these legs and these moveable thighs have only 
 been reared on the basis of the feet to give greater extent to 
 our paces ; that the arms, in fine, have only been formed of 
 solid muscles, and terminated by the right and left hands, to 
 be the ministers of our wants and of our preservation. By 
 such interpretations the respective order of effects and causes 
 has been reversed. Our members have not been made for 
 our use, but we have made use of them because we have 
 found them made. Sight has not preceded the eyes ; the 
 word has not been formed before the tongue — on the contrary, 
 language has followed long after the origin of the organ ; the 
 ears existed long before sounds were heard, and all our mem- 
 bers long before we made us of them. It is not, then, the 
 view of our wants that has produced them. 
 
 ' On the contrary, men fought with the fist, tore with the 
 ^ Lucretius, lib. iv. 822, § 99. 
 
476 APPENDIX. 
 
 nails, were soiled with hlood, long before the arrows flew 
 through the air. Nature had taught men to avoid wounds 
 before art had suspended a buckler on his left arm wherewith 
 to shield himself. Sleep and rest are much older than the 
 couch and down. Thirst was quenched before the invention 
 of cups. All those discoveries, which are the consequences 
 of want and the fruit of experience, we may believe to have 
 been made for our use. But it is not so with objects whose 
 use has only been found after their origin, such as our 
 members and organs. Thus everything forbids us to think 
 that they have been made for our use.' 
 
 Aristotle, recapitulating the same objection, already, to all 
 appearance, made by the atomists, expounds it in a manner 
 still more exact and profound than Lucretius : ' But here a 
 doubt is raised. "Why, it is said, may not nature act without 
 having an end, and without seeking the best of things ? 
 Jupiter, for instance, does not send rain to develop and 
 nourish the grain, but it rains by a necessary law ; for in 
 rising, the vapour must grow cool, and the cooled vapour 
 becoming water, must necessarily fall. But if, this phen-' 
 omenon taking place, the wheat profits by it to germinate and 
 grow, it is a simple accident. And so again, if the grain 
 which some one has put into the barn is destroyed in conse- 
 quence of rain, it does not rain apparently in order to rot 
 the grain, and it is a simple accident if it be lost. What 
 hinders us from saying as well, that in nature the bodily 
 organs themselves are subject to the same law, and that the 
 teeth, for instance, necessarily grow — those in front incisive 
 and capable of tearing food, and the molars large and fitted 
 for grinding it, although it is not in order to this function that 
 they have been made, and that this is only a simple coin- 
 cidence ? What hinders us from making the same remark for 
 all the organs where there seems to be an end and a special 
 destination?^ 
 
 It is easy to see that Lucretius has only reproduced the 
 objection of Aristotle, while weakening it and adding to it 
 unphilosophical considerations. For to suppose, for instance, 
 an interval between the origin of the organs and their use is 
 very unreasonable. It is evident that the heart behoved to 
 ^ Physics, lib. ii. chap, viii., Berlin edition, p. 198, B. 
 
OBJECTIONS AND DIFFICULTIES. 477 
 
 beat and the lungs to breathe as soon as they were produced ; 
 the mouth behoved to imbibe nourishment, and the members 
 to take it, almost immediately after birth, otherwise the animal 
 would not have lived. Besides, Lucretius improperly com- 
 pares the use of the organs to artificial inventions, which are 
 phenomena of quite a different kind. It is not at all in the 
 same way that man makes use of the eye for seeing and of 
 a stick for walking. The first is natural, the second artificial. 
 Nobody maintains that the use of the organs is of the same 
 kind as that of arms, furniture, or utensils of human industry. 
 There is, on the contrary, a radical difference, entirely to the 
 advantage of final causes. In the second case, in effect, it is 
 man who himself applies to his use all the objects of nature-; 
 but in that, it is he who proposes an end to himself, and one 
 may hesitate to say that nature has prepared these things for 
 his use that he may derive benefit from them. On the other 
 hand, the use of the organs is entirely natural. It is false and 
 absurd to suppose that man, perceiving that the legs were 
 good for walking, began to walk ; or perceiving that the eyes 
 were capable of seeing, began to see. There are even certain 
 usages of our active life which have long appeared artificial 
 results of our will, and which it is now agreed to consider 
 as natural and spontaneous. Such are, for instance, language 
 and society. Nobody now any longer believes that man 
 invented language as he invented the plough. Those who 
 said that language is necessary to explain the invention of 
 language were right if they spoke of a thought-out invention ; 
 but it is not so. In all probability man has always spoken, 
 as he has always lived in society. Thus this spontaneous 
 and necessary use of our organs and faculties cannot be com- 
 pared to the artificial use of the objects of nature. The 
 argument of Lucretius, which rests on this comparison, would 
 therefore fall with it. For what does he say ? That if the 
 organs had been created for an end, that end must have 
 already preceded the production of the organs, since, being the 
 cause of that production, it ought as such to pre-exist. Thus 
 men had already fought before creating arms for combat ; so 
 it seems that, for Lucretius, vision must have already existed 
 somewhere before eyes were invented for seeing : that would 
 only be true if man himself invented his eyes, which is 
 
478 APPENDIX. 
 
 absurd, or only invented the use of them, which is false. 
 Besides, we can retort against Lucretius the principle he 
 employs, for he seems to say that man has discovered the 
 use of his eyes and his legs as he has discovered the use of 
 arms or beds. But then he must in the first, as in the second 
 case, have found a model ; therefore, on his own hypothesis, 
 sight must have preceded the eyes, and walking have preceded 
 the legs. But, as that is absurd, it follows that the use of 
 the eyes and legs is natural and not artificial. 
 
 Disengaging the objection of Lucretius from the complica- 
 tions which obscure and enfeeble it, there simply remains as 
 the knot of the objection this fundamental difficulty, that the 
 doctrine of the final cause inverts cause and effect — omnia 
 perversa prcepostera sunt ratione — ^which Spinoza has expressed 
 in these terms : ' The first defect of the doctrine of final 
 causes is to consider as cause what is effect, and vice versa.' ^ 
 But who does not see that this objection is none other than 
 the very question itself? For, if there are final causes, the 
 effect is no longer merely an effect, it is also a cause (at least 
 so far as it is represented d, priori in the efficient cause). 
 The question, then, is just this, whether there are not effects 
 which are at the same time causes ; and that cannot be put 
 forth as an objection which is precisely the object of debate. 
 If mechanism is right, doubtless we shall have taken the 
 effect for the cause; but if we are right, it is mechanism 
 itself that will have done so. The objection, then, holds on 
 both sides, or rather it holds on neither, for in either case it 
 supposes what is disputed. In reality it is no longer an 
 objection, but a doctrine, — the doctrine of mechanism, which 
 we have thoroughly examined (see our chapter: Mechanism 
 and Finality), and to which we do not need to revert. 
 
 Will it be said that it implies contradiction that an effect 
 be a cause ? and that a thing cannot act before existing ? 
 This is what we say ourselves, and therefore it is that we 
 
 ' Mhique, Ire part. Appendix. Buffon has also said : ' Those who believe 
 they can answer these questions by final causes do not perceive that they take 
 the effect for the cause ' {History of Animals, oh. 1). Descartes says, likewise : 
 ' I mean to explain effects hy causes, cmd not causes by effects ' {Principes, 
 iii. 4). 
 
OBJECTIONS AND DIFFICULTIES. 479 
 
 reduce finality to the foresight of the end. It is not the 
 effect itself that is the cause ; it is the idea of the effect. 
 ]3ut this idea, in so far as it might determine the efficient 
 cause, is anterior to its action. The objection thus would 
 only hold against the hypothesis of an unintelligent and 
 unconscious finality, which should be determined beforehand 
 by an effect not existing and not represented. It would, 
 therefore, only hold against a certain manner of understanding 
 finality which is not ours, and which we have examined in 
 our second part (see our chapter : Instinctive Finality) ; but it 
 is of no avail against the hypothesis of finality considered in 
 itself. 
 
 Besides, this objection arises from not perceiving where is 
 the real point of the question. In effect, it goes without say- 
 ing that, a cause being given, such an effect must follow. 
 ' Such an organ, such a function.' But the question is, how 
 such an organ is found given. If we assume the existence of 
 the eye, sight follows. But how comes it that the eye exists ? 
 There is the problem. All function is the solution of a 
 problem, which consists in harmonizing the internal conditions 
 of the organism with the external conditions of the physical 
 medium. The harmony once found, the effect follows as a 
 thing of course ; but how the harmony has come about is not 
 thereby resolved, but remains to be sought. The objection, 
 then, does not occupy the true point of view, it does not 
 touch the true problem. 
 
 11. Bacon. The sciences and final causes. 
 
 ' The habit of seeking fi/nal causes in physics,' says Bacon, 
 'has expelled and, as it were, banished from it th.e physical 
 causes. It has brought it about that men, reposing in appear- 
 ances, have not given themselves to search for real causes. 
 In effect, if, to explain certain arrangements and conformations 
 of the human body, it be said that the eyelids, with the hairs 
 which cover them, are like a hedge for the eyes ; or that the 
 hardness of the skin on animals is intended to preserve them 
 from heat or cold ; or that the bones are like so many columns 
 or beams which nature has raised to serve to support the 
 human body ; or, again, that trees put forth leaves in order to 
 be less exposed to the sun or the wind ; that the clouds are 
 carried towards the upper region in order to water the earth 
 
48-0 APPENDIX. 
 
 by showers ; or, in fine, that the earth has been condensed and 
 consolidated in order that it may serve as a firm abode, a 
 basis for animals, all explanations of this kind are like those 
 sea-lampreys which, as certain navigators have imagined, 
 fasten upon vessels and stop them. . . . They have caused 
 the investigation of physical causes to be long neglected ; 
 moreover, the philosophy of Democritus and of those con- 
 templative authors who have discarded God from the system 
 of the world, appears to us, as regards physical causes, to have 
 more solidity than those of Plato and Aristotle.' ^ 
 
 From this objection of Bacon is dated and has originated 
 the war which men of science since then have not ceased to 
 wage against final causes. But this warfare arises from a 
 mistake. We have already said that men of science are alone 
 judges of the method which it is suitable to employ in the 
 sciences. If they have sufficiently verified by experience that 
 final causes deceive more than they serve them ; if they have, 
 in fact, the troublesome effect of turning aside the mind from 
 the investigation of physical causes, and of thus encouraging 
 a slothful philosophy, we at least will not dispute this right 
 with them. The objection of Bacon may have had a historical 
 basis, and may, to a certain extent, have it still. It might be 
 shown that in certain cases — for instance, in the case so often 
 quoted of the valves of the heart — the final cause has guided 
 to the physical cause. One might say with Schopenhauer, 
 that, in physiology, the final cause is often more interesting 
 than the physical.^ But yet, once more, this is a question for 
 men of science to discuss. Let them settle it as they think 
 best; let them absolutely exclude teleological investigations, 
 or use them to a certain extent, it is their affair. Their 
 function is to discover facts and laws. When they have 
 observed true facts and discovered true laws, they have done 
 their work, and there is nothing further to be asked of them. 
 
 But if, meanwhile, by abstaining from final causes, they 
 think they have actually excluded and suppressed this notion 
 from the human mind, they change the question. JFrom a 
 question of logic and method, they pass without hesitation to 
 
 ' Bacon, De Dignitate Scientiarum, b. iii. c. iv. 
 
 ^ Die Welt als Wille, t. ii. chap. 26. For instance, he says : ' It is more in- 
 teresting to know why the blood circulates than to know how it circulates.' 
 
OBJECTIONS AND DIFFICULTIES. 481 
 
 a metaphysical and fundamental question ; and these are two 
 profoundly different points of view. Because the first is de- 
 termined in one way, it by no means follows that the second 
 is so in the same way as well. Because you remove final 
 causes from your methods, does it follow that there are none ? 
 When Bacon removed final causes from physics, in order to 
 remit them to metaphysics, it was no vain subterfuge, but a 
 distinction as solid as profound. The physicist seeks for the 
 physical and concrete conditions of phenomena; the meta- 
 physician seeks their intellectual signification. But the second 
 of these points of view is in no way excluded by the first ; 
 and after having explained how things happen, it is still 
 competent to ask why they happen thus. The question of 
 the how does not exclude that of the why, and leaves it 
 entirely open. 
 
 When scientists, after having eliminated final causes from 
 their methods (which they have a right to do), proceed to 
 banish thdm from reality itself, they do not see that they are 
 then no longer speaking as scientists, but as philosophers ; and 
 they do not distinguish these two parts. They attribute to 
 themselves the same infallibility as philosophers which they 
 have as scientists ; they believe that it is science that pro- 
 nounces by their mouth, while it is only free speculation. 
 This distinction is very important, for it removes many 
 equivocations and mistakes. A scientist, however bound he 
 may be by the severities of the scientific method, yet cannot 
 escape the temptation to think, to reflect on the phenomena 
 whose laws he has discovered. Like other philosophers, he 
 gives himself up to reasonings, inductions, analyses, — to con- 
 ceptions no longer belonging to the domain of experience, but 
 which are the work of thought operating on the data of ex- 
 perience. It is clearly his right, and no one will complain 
 that scientists should be at the same time philosophers ; it 
 may even be thought that they are not so enough. But 
 forthwith to attribute to these personal interpretations the 
 authority which attaches to science itself, is to commit 
 the same error, the same abuse of power, as that of the 
 priests of the Middle Ages, who availed themselves of the 
 respect due to religion to cover all the acts of the temporal 
 power. 
 
 2 H 
 
482 APPENDIX. 
 
 III. Descartes. The ignorance of ends. 
 
 Descartes, like Bacon, and even more than he, has shown 
 himself opposed to final causes, for Bacon only removed them 
 from physics to relegate them to metaphysics. Descartes, on 
 the other hand, seems to exclude them at once from meta- 
 physics and from physics, or at least he refuses to make use 
 of them in either of these two sciences. It is not that he 
 denies the existence of ends in nature, but he thinks that we 
 cannot know them, because of the infirmity of our mind. 
 Hence this objection, so often reproduced by able men, namely, 
 that it belongs not to us to sound the intentions of the 
 Creator.' 
 
 "We ought always, he says, to keep before our eyes ' that 
 the capacity of our mind is very mediocre, and not to presume 
 too much on ourselves, as it seems we would do were we to 
 persuade ourselves that it is only for our use that God has 
 created all things, or even, indeed, if we pretended to he aUe to 
 know hy the force of our mind what are the ends for which He 
 has created them! ^ 
 
 In this passage, Descartes mingles two distinct objections, — 
 one directed against the prejudice which would make man the 
 last end of the creation ; the other which is founded on the 
 disproportion between the powers of the human and the 
 divine mind, and on ignorance of ends. 
 
 This objection, as it seems to us, rests on an easily disen- 
 tangled confusion between absolute and relative ends. If even 
 it were not known to what end God has created all things, — ■ 
 that is, when their final destination was unknown, — it would 
 not follow that we could not know in any given being the 
 relation of means to ends. Suppose I do not know to what 
 end God has given sight to the animals, does it follow that I 
 am forbidden to affirm that the eye has been made for seeing ? 
 Because I do not know why God has willed that there should 
 be vegetables, does it foUow that I cannot recognise the rela- 
 tion of correspondence and adaptation which is to be seen 
 between their parts ? The same objection rests upon yet 
 another confusion, — made, too, by all the philosophers before 
 Kant, — that of external and internal finality.^ No doubt, I 
 
 ' Principes de philosophie, iii. 2. See also in the MMiiations, iv. 
 ^ See above, p. 192. 
 
OBJECTIONS AND DIFFICULTIES. 483 
 
 can affirna nothing with exactness regarding external finality, 
 because it is not written in the constitution of the being itself. 
 But even if I could not say why God has made vipers, it 
 would not follow that the internal organization of the viper 
 does not manifest relations of adaptation, which I am entitled 
 to call relations of finality. 
 
 It is remarkable that a votary of empiricism and Epicurean- 
 ism, Gassendi, has defended the principle of final causes against 
 Descartes. ' You say,' he answers Descartes, ' that it does not 
 seem to you that you could investigate and undertake to dis- 
 cover, without rashness, the ends of God. But although that 
 may be true, if you mean to speak of ends that God has willed 
 to be hidden, still it cannot be the case with those which He 
 has, as it were, exposed to the view of all the world, and which 
 are discovered without much labour.'^ Then, instancing the 
 marvellous arrangement of the valves of the heart, he asks 
 why ' it should not be permitted to admire this wonderful 
 action and that ineffable Providence which has so conveniently 
 arranged these little doors at the entrance of these concavities 
 . . . and which has not only arranged these things conform- 
 ably to their end, but even all that we see most admirable in 
 the universe.' 
 
 Pressed by this objection, Descartes is indeed obliged to 
 grant the reality of it, and upon the pain of assuming against 
 Gassendi himself his part of Epicurean, he must consent to 
 recognise ' that a work supposes a worker.' Only he thinks 
 to escape the objection by a sort of evasion, inadmissible in 
 good philosophy, namely, that the preceding argument is 
 founded on the efficient, not on the final cause. This is a 
 manifest confusion. No doubt, when we say the work sup- 
 poses a worker, we pass from the effect to the efficient cause ; 
 it is even merely a tautology, for he who says work says a 
 thing made by a worker. But the stress of the argument just 
 consists in affirming that such a thing is a work (opus), and 
 not merely a simple effect ; and this we can only do by com- 
 paring means with ends ; consequently, by the principle of 
 final causes. If the contemplation of ends is forbidden us, 
 the consideration of means is equally so. The agreement of 
 the one with the other has no longer any significance, and 
 ' Gassendi, Objections d la i' miditation (edit. Cousin, t. ii. p. 179). 
 
484 APPENDIX. 
 
 nothing warrants us to consider the work as a work of wisdom, 
 and consequently to conclude the existence of a worker. No 
 doubt the world still remains as an effect which requires a 
 cause; but it is enough for us to know that this cause is 
 powerful, without deciding whether it is wise. Consequently 
 there is no middle way for Descartes : he must either 
 permit the consideration of the final cause, or renounce, as 
 Gassendi objects to him, the recognition of Providence in 
 nature. 
 
 Another contemporary of Descartes, eminent in the physical 
 sciences, has replied very justly and precisely to the objection 
 of Descartes. We mean Eobert Boyle. 
 
 ' Suppose that a peasant, entering in broad daylight the 
 garden of a famous mathematician, finds there one of those 
 curious gnomonic instruments which indicate the position of 
 the sun in the zodiac, its declination from the equator, the day 
 of the month, the length of the day, etc. etc. ; it would, no 
 doubt, be a great presumption on his part, ignorant alike of 
 mathematical science and of the intentions of the artist, to 
 believe himself capable of discovering all the ends in view of 
 which this machine, so curiously wrought, has been con- 
 structed ; but when he remarks that it is furnished with an 
 index, with lines and horary numbers, in short, with all that 
 constitutes a sun-dial, and sees successively the shadow of the 
 index mark in succession the hour of the day, there would be 
 on his part as little presumption as error in concluding that 
 this instrument, whatever may be its other uses, is certainly a 
 dial made to show the hours.' ^ 
 
 IV. Spinoza, a. The ignorance of causes, h. The less per- 
 fect taken for the more perfect, c. The motive of the creation, 
 d. The final cause in man. 
 
 Of all philosophers, the one who has maintained the most 
 learned and profound contest against the doctrine of final 
 causes is Spinoza. Let us single out from that discussion 
 the essential points of the debate. 
 
 1st, It is the ignorance of causes that has evoked the 
 hypothesis of final causes. 
 
 ' Boyle, Letter on Final Comes. 3. J. Rousseau, in the Emile, replies to the 
 same objection nearly in the same manner : ' I judge of the order of the world, 
 although I know not its end.' 
 
OBJECTIONS AND DIFFICULTIES. 485 
 
 2d, This hypothesis not only takes the effect for the cause, 
 as Lucretius has already said, but the less perfect for the more 
 perfect. 
 
 3d, It supposes a poor and indigent God, who has need of 
 the world to enjoy His glory. 
 
 4th, Even in man, where it appears most warranted, it still 
 confounds the effect with the cause. 
 
 a. ' All must agree that men are born ignorant of causes, 
 and that a xxniversal appetite, of which they are conscious, 
 impels them to seek for what is useful to them. A first con- 
 sequence of this principle is, that men believe themselves 
 free. It results from it, in the second place, that men always 
 act in order to an end, namely, their own convenience ; whence 
 it comes that for all possible actions they never seek to know 
 any but the final causes, and as soon as they know them, 
 they remain at rest, having no longer in the mind any motive 
 for uncertainty. . . , Thus, when our adversaries consider 
 the economy of the human body, they fall into a stupid 
 amazement, and as they know not the causes of so marvellous 
 an art, they conclude that it is not mechanical laws, but a 
 divine and supernatural industry that has formed this work, 
 and has arranged the parts of it so as not to injure each other. 
 This is why every one that seeks the true causes of miracles, 
 and strives to comprehend natural things as a philosopher, in 
 place of admiring them as a stupid man, is at once regarded 
 as impious.' 
 
 We see that Spinoza explains the belief in final causes as 
 he explains the belief in liberty, by ignorance of causes. When 
 we act without knowing what determines us to act, we 
 think ourselves the masters of our actions, and we say that 
 we act freely. So when we do not know how nature acts, 
 we suppose that it acts voluntarily, and in order to be useful 
 to us. 
 
 Leaving aside human utility, which is by no means, as we 
 have seen, an essential element of the notion of final cause, 
 we allege that there -is no equivalence between these two 
 terms, ignorance of causes and finality. In effect, every one 
 knows that there is nothing more unknown than meteoro- 
 logical phenomena — science has made little progress regarding 
 their causes and laws ; yet this is precisely the domain where 
 
486 APPENDIX. 
 
 the final cause appears most absent (not for the vulgar, per- 
 haps, but for the philosopher). The causes of the shooting 
 stars have been long unknown — they are nearly so still ; yet 
 no philosopher has attached them to a system of finality. 
 Ignorance can lead to superstition, and sees miracles every- 
 where. But we have said already, and cannot too often 
 repeat, that final causes are not miracles ; and it is a confusion 
 far from philosophical to assimilate the doctrine of final causes 
 with that of supernatural interventions (see Appendix V.). 
 For the rest, this is a point to which we will return. Let it 
 suffice us to say, that there are thousands of phenomena whose 
 causes are unknown, and which are by no means, therefore, 
 given as examples of finality. On the other hand, nothing is 
 better known than the laws of sight ; optics and physiology 
 explain to us exactly how it takes place, and yet it is just 
 here that finality shines forth. The objection of Spinoza rests 
 upon the principle, already refuted, that physical causes 
 exclude final causes, or reciprocally : this is what scientists 
 believe. If, on the other hand, as we have seen, these two 
 kinds of causes can and should be reconciled, the knowledge 
 of physical causes does not exclude final causes ; and, reci- 
 procally, the hypothesis of final causes is not bound up with 
 ignorance of physical causes. 
 
 6. ' The defect of this doctrine,' says Spinoza again, ' is to 
 regard as cause what is effect, and, reciprocally, to take what 
 is anterior for what is posterior ' (objection of Lucretius, see 
 above, I.) ; ' in fine, it reduces the more 'perfect to the less perfect. 
 In effect, to say nothing of the first two points, which are 
 evident by themselves, it results from the propositions (xxi., 
 xxii., xxiii.) that the most perfect effect is that which is pro- 
 duced immediately by God, and that an effect becomes more 
 and more imperfect in proportion as its production supposes 
 a greater number of intermediate causes. But if the things 
 which God immediately produces were made in order to 
 attain an end, it would follow that those which God produces 
 last would be the most perfect of all, the others having been 
 made in order to these.' 
 
 This second objection belongs to the foundation of the 
 doctrine of Spinoza. According to him, the type of perfection 
 is God. He defines Him, with Descartes, as the infinitely 
 
OBJECTIONS AND DIFFICULTIES. 487 
 
 perfect being. Like Descartes, too, lie allows more perfection 
 or reality to substance than to attribute, to the attribute than 
 to the modes ; and among the modes, more perfection to the 
 simple modes derived immediately from the attributes, than to 
 the complex modes which result from these simple modes. 
 But what are called ends ox final causes are effects — for instance, 
 sight, in relation to the eye ; life, with reference to the 
 organized being : these are, therefore, complex modes, resulting 
 from the combination of certain motions, which are the simple 
 modes. In the system of final causes, the end is superior to 
 the means, consequently the composite to the component 
 elements, the idterior to the anterior. This is contrary to the 
 true order, according to Spinoza. 
 
 This objection, though one dare hardly say it of so great 
 a logician, is nothing but a petitio principii. No doubt, if 
 Spinoza is right, if there are only efficient and not final causes, 
 the order of perfection goes from cause to effect, that is, 
 descending. But if there are final causes, the order of perfec- 
 tion will be inverse, and will go from low to high, from effect 
 to cause — in a word, will be ascending. But the question is, 
 just whether this order is ascending or descending. To lay 
 down in principle that it must be descending, is to lay down 
 what is in question. But, Spinoza will say, what is remote 
 from God is necessarily less perfect than what is nearer Him. 
 Is it not evident that this is still the question ? If there are 
 final causes, each end is a degree of perfection attained by 
 nature, which rises gradually from the less to the more per- 
 fect. In this respect each of these degrees is, if you will, 
 farther from God considered as cause, but it is nearer Him if 
 we consider Him as end. If we imagine the creation as a 
 vast circulus, which goes from the perfect to the perfect, or 
 from God to God, traversing all the possible degrees of finite 
 existence, one cannot say that there is necessarily more perfec- 
 tion in the anterior than in the ulterior, for if power is on the 
 one side, goodness is on the other. That an effect may be 
 produced, no doubt there must be anterior causes, to which 
 God communicates power; they are, therefore, in this more 
 perfect than their effects, since they contain them. But that 
 these powers may act, they must be determined by goodness 
 to produce certain effects rather than others; in this respect 
 
488 APPENDIX. 
 
 the effect is better than the cause, since it determines its 
 action. 
 
 Such an objection would only have all its force by sup- 
 posing a nature existing of itself, without a supreme cause — a 
 nature which, by its own powers, and without being directed 
 in its movement, should rise spontaneously from the less to 
 the more perfect — a nature which, consequently, must have 
 set out from the minimum of existence (equivalent to 0) to 
 seek a maximum of existence (equivalent to the absolute). 
 Such a nature, in effect, would come under the objection of 
 Spinoza ; ^ but such a hypothesis is not ours, and is in no way 
 bound up with the doctrine of final causes. 
 
 e. ' Add that this doctrine destroys the perfection of God ; 
 for if God acts for an end. He necessarily desires something 
 which He lacks. And although theologians and metaphy- 
 sicians distinguish between an end oi indigence and an end of 
 assimilation, they yet avow that God has made all for Him- 
 self, not for the things He was to create, seeing that it was 
 impossible to allege, before creation, any other end for the 
 action of God than God Himself; and in this way they are 
 forced to admit that all the objects which God has set before 
 Himself, by arranging certain means to attain them, God has 
 at some time lacked, and has desired to possess them — a 
 necessary consequence of their principles.' 
 
 This objection greatly transcends the sphere of our present 
 discussion. The only point we have hitherto had to discuss 
 is this : Are there final causes in nature ? As to the primary 
 cause of finality, and as to the last end of nature, we are 
 warranted at present to dismiss these two problems. Because 
 we might not know the supreme end of nature (or the motive 
 of creation), it would not follow that we did not know the 
 secondary ends; and though we might not know the first 
 cause of finality, it would not follow that there was no finality. 
 We shall elsewhere meet these questions again (see our last 
 chapter : The Supreme End of Nature), but they do not bear on 
 that which is the present point of discussion. 
 
 Let it suffice us to say that the difficulty raised by Spinoza 
 not only bears against the doctrine of final causes, but against 
 
 1 This hypothesis is that of Hegel, and that of the Pythagoreans and of 
 Leusippus ; sj inXm rx nkiiaTB/ix, says Aristotle (Metaph. xvi. 5). 
 
OBJECTIONS AND DIFFICULTIES. 489 
 
 his own doctrine ; because, for whatever reason, God has 
 come forth from Himself as well in pantheism as in creation- 
 ism or intentionalism. Even by the doctrine of Spinoza, God 
 would not therefore be perfect in Himself, since He needed 
 self-development. The difficulty of the co-existence of the 
 finite and the infinite exists in every doctrine without excep- 
 tion that admits both, which the Spinozists do as well as we. 
 Schelling asked Hegel why the Idea had thought of going 
 out of itself, and if it was wearied of the abstract state that 
 it decided to pass to the concrete ; and even he, in his last 
 philosophy, when he admits a pure will that decays, tells us 
 nothing much more satisfactory. As to the hypothesis that 
 would explain nature as a power primordially undetermined, 
 and which should progressively be developed by passing into 
 action, we have just seen that it is precisely this hypothesis 
 which lies open to the preceding objection. 
 
 d. ' That species of cause called final is nothing else than 
 the human appetite, in so far as it is regarded as the principle, 
 or the principal cause of a certain thing. For instance, when 
 we say that the final cause of a house is to provide a dwelling, 
 we mean thereby nothing more than this, that man, having 
 represented to himself the advantages of the domestic life, has 
 had the desire to build a house. Thus, then, this final cause 
 is nothing more than the particular desire just mentioned, 
 which is indeed the efficient cause of the house ; and this is 
 for men the primary cause, for they are in common ignorant 
 of the causes of their appetites.' 
 
 This analysis of the final cause contains, in fact, nothing 
 that really contradicts it. No one maintains that the house 
 itself as house is the cause of the structure. No one denies 
 that the final cause may be reduced to the efficient cause, 
 if in the efficient cause itself the final cause be introduced, 
 namely, the desire and idea, in other words, the anticipation 
 of the effect; and it matters little whether the cause, thus 
 analyzed into its elements, is called final or efficient. The 
 only question is, whether a house is produced without there 
 having previously been an anticipatory representation of it; 
 whether it has not had an ideal before having a concrete 
 existence ; and whether it is not the ideal that has determined 
 and rendered possible the concrete existence ? Hence the 
 
490 APPENDIX. 
 
 question, whether an analogous cause ought not to be sup- 
 posed wherever we shall meet with similar effects, that is, co- 
 ordinations of phenomena, themselves linked to a final deter- 
 minate phenomenon. Such is the problem ; the psychological 
 analysis of Spinoza contains nothing that contradicts the 
 solution we have given of it. 
 
VIII. 
 
 ABUSE OP FINAL CAUSES. 
 
 (Book i. Chapter t.) 
 
 TTTE likewise attach to the sequel of Chapter v. on the facts 
 ' ' contrary to final causes one of the most ■widespread 
 objections, that derived from the abuses which have been 
 made of them and which can easily be made. These abuses 
 have been, in fact, very frequent. The following are the 
 principal : — 
 
 1. The first and principal abuse of final causes, which is 
 now hardly any more to be found, but which long prevailed, 
 is to make use of this principle as an argument against a fact, 
 or against a law of nature, even when that fact or law was 
 demonstrated by experiment and calculation — that is, by the 
 strictest methods which human science can employ. There is 
 not now a single scientist who would dare to reject a fact 
 because its final cause was not seen, or because it appeared 
 contrary to some final cause which had been devised before- 
 hand in the mind. But it has not always been so. 
 
 For instance, one of the most beautiful astronomical dis- 
 coveries of modern times, due, if I mistake not, to the pro- 
 found genius of Herschell, is that of the double and multiple 
 stars — that is, of stars revolving round other stars, and serving 
 them in some sort as planets. Till then, it had been believed 
 that every star must play the part of a sun, that is, of a 
 centre, and that around that sun only dark bodies could 
 gravitate, receiving the light of the central sun. It is now 
 proved that there are suns which gravitate iaround other suns, 
 and this discovery has enabled Bessel to apply to the stellar 
 universe the great Newtonian system of gravitation, which, 
 till then, was only applicable to our solar system. But when 
 this theory began to come to light, towards the end of 
 
492 APPENDIX. 
 
 the 18th century, a celebrated astronomer of tlie time, 
 Nicholas Fuss, rejected it, relying on the principle of final 
 causes. ' What is the good,' said he, ' of some luminous 
 bodies revolving round others ? The sun is the only source 
 whence the planets derive light and heat. Were there entire 
 systems of suns controlled by other suns, their neighbourhood 
 and their motions would be objectless, their rays useless. 
 The suns have no need to borrow from strange bodies what 
 they have themselves received as their own. If the secondary 
 stars are luminous bodies, what is the end of their motions ? ' 
 To this question of Mcholas Fuss it is easy to reply that we 
 do not know what is that end ; but if the fact is proved by 
 experience, as it really is, we ought to admit it as a fact, 
 whatever may be its end, and without even asking if it have 
 one. Such aberrations give too much scope to the adversaries 
 of final causes ; and Arago, in relating to us these words of 
 (what is rare) a too teleological astronomer, could say with the 
 somewhat haughty satisfaction of a scientist who has found 
 metaphysic at fault : ' Such were regarded as profound objec- 
 tions in 1780. Well, these things which seemed good for 
 nothing, which appeared without end, without use, really 
 exist, and have taken their place among the most beautiful 
 and incontestable truths of astronomy.' We must conclude 
 with the same scientist that the principle cui bono has no 
 authority in the positive sciences, and cannot serve as an 
 argument against the truth of a fact or a law. 
 
 Let us take another example of the same illusion. Although 
 the theory of the motion of the earth encountered especial 
 theological prejudices at the first, it has also had to contend 
 against this philosophical prejudice, that man is the final cause 
 of all things, the centre and end of the creation. Taking for 
 granted that all has been made for man, one was thus led to 
 give to the earth a privileged place in the universe, and it 
 appeared natural that the creature who was the end of all 
 things should inhabit the centre of the world. To bring down 
 the earth from this high rank to the humble destiny of a 
 satellite of the sun was, as it was believed, to put in peril the 
 excellence and majesty of human nature, and to throw a veil 
 over the grandeur of its destinies ; as if the greatness of man 
 could consist in inhabiting a motionless centre rather than a 
 
ABUSE OF FINAL CAUSES. 493 
 
 moveable planet ; as if it concerned his destiny that the stars 
 had been made to turn round him, and to afford him a divert- 
 ing spectacle ; as if, in fine, to discover the true system of the 
 world were not a more brilliant proof of his greatness than the 
 little privilege of inhabiting the centre of the world.^ 
 
 2. An abusive employment of the principle of final causes 
 has been made not only to oppose speculative truths, but 
 inventions practical and useful to men. Euler, in his letters 
 to a princess of Germany, speaking of the possibility of pre- 
 venting the effects of lightning, tells us : ' Even if the thing 
 succeeded, still there are many persons who would doubt 
 whether it was lawful to make use of such a remedy. In 
 effect, the ancient pagans would have regarded him as impious 
 who should undertake to stop Jupiter in casting his thunder- 
 bolts. Christians who are assured that lightning is a work 
 of God, and that Divine Providence often employs it because 
 of the wickedness of men, could equally say that it is an 
 impiety to seek to oppose sovereign justice.' At the epoch 
 of Jenner's great discovery, an English physician. Dr. Eowley, 
 said of small-pox, ' that it is a malady imposed by the decree 
 of Heaven ; ' and he declared vaccination ' an audacious and 
 sacrilegious violation of our holy religion. The designs of 
 these vaccinators,' he added, ' appear to defy Heaven itself, and 
 the very will of God.' * On the introduction of winnowing 
 machines, certain fanatical Scottish sects opposed them, on 
 the pretext that the winds were the work of God, and that it 
 is sacrilege in man to wish to raise them at will. The wind 
 thus artificially obtained was called the devil's vjind. Walter 
 Scott, in his charming work on the Scottish Puritans, has not 
 failed to introduce this interesting trait of manners.^ In fine, 
 even in our days, on the introduction of anesthetic agents, 
 
 ' See also the argument drawu from the abhorrence of a vacuum, to which 
 Pascal alludes {Pensies, ed. Havet, t. i. p. 155) : ' To act with a view to an end 
 belongs only to an intelligent nature. But not only is everything co-ordinated 
 in relation to the particular end, but also everything conspires to the common 
 end of all, as is seen in water, which rises contrary to its nature, lest it should 
 leave a void to break the great contexture of the world, which is only maintained 
 by the uninterrupted adherence of all its parts. ' This argument is taken from 
 Grotius, De Veritate Religioms Christiana, lib. i. chap. vii. 
 
 ' Revue Britannique (August 1861). 
 
 » The old Mause says to her mistress : ' Your ladyship and the steward are 
 wishing Cuddle Jo use a new machine to winnow the corn. This machine 
 
494 APPENDIX. 
 
 many minds have opposed them, appealing to the curative 
 function of pain in surgical operations. 
 
 3. A third abuse of final causes consists in employing 
 them as the explanation of a phenomenon which does not 
 exist. F^n^lon, in his Treatise on the Existence of God, main- 
 tains that the moon was given to the earth to give it light 
 during the absence of the sun. ' She appears at the right 
 time, with all the stars/ says he, ' when the sun has to go 
 away to bring the day to other hemispheres.' This opinion 
 furnished to Laplace the occasion of a victorious refutation : 
 ' Some partisans of final causes,' says he, ' have supposed that 
 the moon was given to the earth to give it light by night. 
 In that case, nature would not have attained the end it had 
 proposed to itself, since we are often deprived at once of the 
 light of the sun and of that of the moon. To attain it, it 
 would have sufficed at the beginning, to place the moon 
 opposite the sun in the same plane of the ecliptic, at a 
 distance from the earth equal- to the hundredth part of the 
 distance of the earth from the sun, and to give to the moon 
 and the earth parallel rates of movement proportional to their 
 distances from that luminary. Then the moon, constantly 
 opposite the sun, would have described around it an ellipse 
 similar to that of the earth ; these two luminaries would have 
 succeeded each other above the horizon ; and as at that dis- 
 tance the moon would not have been eclipsed, its light would 
 constantly have replaced that of the sun.' ^ Here, it must be 
 confessed, the scientist is right as against the theologian. 
 Thus it is that by an indiscreet use of final causes. Provi- 
 dence is exposed to receive a lesson in mathematics from a 
 simple mortal.^ 
 
 4. Lastly, there came the puerile and frivolous applica- 
 
 opposes the designs of Providence, by fumishingwind for your special nse, and 
 by human means, in place of asking it by prayer, and waiting with patience till 
 Proridence itself sends it.' (See Old Mortality, chap, vii.) 
 
 ' Laplace', Exposition du systeme du monde, 1. ir. c. vi. See also, on the final 
 cause of the moon, d'Alembert, Elements de Philosophie, explanation § vi. We 
 ought to add that a learned mathematician of Belgium, M. Mansion, professor 
 in the university of Ghent, points out to us that this passage of Laplace is ' more 
 erroneous than that of Ftoelon,' and that Laplace has been himself refuted by 
 M. Liouville. {Additions d la connaissance des temps, 1845.) 
 
 * An error of the same kind is that of Hippocrates, who admires the skiU with 
 which the auricles of the heart have been made ' to blow the air into the heart ' 
 
ABUSE OF FINAL CAUSES. 495 
 
 tions of final causes, applications which fill books, no doubt 
 excellent, but more fitted to edify than to instruct. Some of 
 these applications are so ludicrous, that one could believe 
 them invented to ridicule the theory itself. When Voltaire, 
 who was, however, as he calls himself, a final causist, wrote 
 in Candide, ' Noses are made to bear spectacles ; let us also 
 wear spectacles,' he said nothing more pleasant than some of 
 the assertions of Bernardin de Saint- Pierre in his Studies and 
 in his Harmonies of Nature. M. Biot, in a charming article on 
 ' The Exact Ideas in Literature,' has cited several examples of 
 them which are hardly credible. Thus, according to Bernardin 
 de Saint-Pierre, ' dogs are usually of two opposite colours, the 
 one light and the other dark, in order that, wherever they 
 may be in the house, they may be distinguished from the 
 furniture, with the colour of which they might be confounded. 
 . . . Wherever fleas are, they jump on white colours. This 
 instinct has been given them, that we may the more easily 
 catch them. ' ^ 
 
 To these amusing instances cited by Biot, one might add 
 others not less so. Thus, Bernardin de Saint-Pierre informs 
 us ' that the melon has been divided into sections by nature 
 for family eating,' and he adds ' that the pumpkin, being 
 larger, can be eaten with one's neighbours." On reading 
 such puerilities, one may well exclaim with M. Biot, 
 ' Seriously, are these things harmonies of nature ? ' An 
 English author, Buckland,' asks why the lamb is eaten by the 
 wolf, and replies : ' We have here a proof of the goodness of 
 Providence, for thereby it escapes sickness and old age.' Such 
 apologies for Providence make more atheists than believers ; 
 at the most, they might be excusable when addressed to 
 children, but philosophy is meant to speak to men. 
 
 If we sum up what is common in all the abuses we have 
 
 (Littr^, (Ehivres d' Hippocrate, t. ix. p. 77). It is with reference to errors of this 
 kind that Condorcet wrote : ' This optimism, which consists in finding every- 
 thing admirable in nature as they invent it, on condition of equally admiring its 
 wisdom if unfortunately it has been discovered to have followed other combina- 
 tions, — this optimism of detail ought to be banished from philosophy, the end of 
 which is not to admire but to know ' {Fragment aur V Atlantide). 
 
 ^ Biot, Milanges, t. i. 
 
 * Etudes de la nature, Etude xi., ' Harmonies v^g^tales.' 
 
 " Quoted by Jules Simon in his book, De la religion naturelle, part 2, chap. i. 
 
496 APPENDIX. 
 
 just instauced, we shall see that the error does not consist in 
 admitting final causes, but in assuming false ones. That 
 there are erroneous and arbitrary final causes there is no 
 doubt; that there are none at all is another question. Men 
 are as often mistaken regarding efficient as regarding final 
 causes; they have as often attributed to nature false pro- 
 perties as false intentions. But as the errors committed re- 
 garding the efficient cause have not prevented scientists from 
 believing that there are true causes, so the illusions and pre- 
 judices of the vulgar with respect to final causes ought not to 
 determine philosophy to abandon them altogether. 
 
 As regards the first point, we have already seen that the 
 final cause ought in no way to restrict the liberty of science. 
 No preconceived idea can prevail against a fact: but the 
 fact once discovered, nothing forbids us to seek its finality. 
 ' "We must,' as M. Florens has justly said, ' proceed not from 
 final causes to facts, but from facts to final causes.' 
 
 As to the second point, the final cause, far from forbidding 
 any useful invention, justifies them all beforehand, and d 
 priori. For, without even going so far as to say that all has 
 been made for man's use, it sufi&ces that man, having been 
 created industrious, has been made to make use of all things, 
 in order that every new invention may thereby be warranted 
 as implicitly willed by Divine Providence. It is only, then, 
 an unenlightened superstition, and not the doctrine of final 
 causes, which is here in question. 
 
 For the third point, we shall say as before, that one must 
 advance ' from facts to final causes, and not from final causes 
 to facts.' Thus understood, this theory can in no way favour 
 any scientific error. 
 
 And for the fourth part, one must distinguish accidental 
 from essential final causes. The first are the more or less 
 arbitrary uses which men obtain from external things, and 
 which have not always been attached to them; the second 
 are the uses inherent in the very essence of the things — for 
 instance, the uses of the organs.^ Abuses of this kind almost 
 
 1 Voltaire says very well on this subject : ' In order to become certain of the 
 true end for which a cause acts, that effect must be at all times and in all places. 
 There have not been vessels at all times and on all seas : thus it cannot be said 
 that the ocean has been made for vessels. One feels how ridiculous it would be 
 
ABUSE OF FINAL CAUSES. 497 
 
 always arise from confounding external and internal finality ; 
 and this very confusion is the source of the most part of the 
 objections directed against this theory, and, in particular, of 
 the following objection. 
 
 Man the final cause, of the creation. 
 
 The principal abuse which has been made of the doctrine 
 of final causes, and which has been the most protested against, 
 is that to which we have already alluded, and which consists 
 in making man the centre and end of the creation, and in 
 believing that all has been made for his use and convenience.^ 
 F^nelon has often fallen into this extreme. He regards water 
 as made ' in order to sustain those immense floating edifices 
 which are called vessels. It not only quenches men's thirst, 
 but also waters the dry fields. . . . The ocean, which seems 
 placed between the continents to divide them for ever, is, on 
 the contrary, the meeting-place of all nations ; it is by this 
 road that the Old World joins hands with the New, and that 
 the New affords the Old so many commodities and riches.' 
 F^nflon forgets that many centuries had to ' elapse before the 
 ocean served as a road between the Old World and the New, 
 and that when the trial of it was made, other defenders of 
 Providence said that these unknown and perilous ways ought 
 not to be faced. This too exclusively anthropological point of 
 view was denounced by Descartes as anti-philosophical. ' Al- 
 though it be,' says this philosopher, ' a pious and good thought 
 as regards morals, to believe that God has made aU things for 
 us, to the end that that may stir us up the more to love and 
 thank Him for so many benefits ; although it be also true in 
 some sense, because there is nothing created from which we 
 cannot derive some use, ... it is not at all probable that all 
 things have been made for us, in such a way that God has 
 
 to allege that nature had wrought from the earliest times to adjust itself to our 
 arbitrary iuventions, which have all appeared so late ; but it is very evident 
 that if noses have not been made for spectacles, they have been for smelling, and 
 that there have been noses ever since there have been men.' — Diet. pMl, art. 
 'Causes finales.' 
 
 ' This doctrine has indeed fallen into abeyance in modern philosophy since 
 Descartes and Leibnitz. However, it still has defenders. We will mention, for 
 example, as particularly interesting in this point of view, the work entitled 
 I'Homme et la creation, tMorie dea causes finales, by Desdouits (Paris, 1834, 
 2d ed. 1846). Nowhere has the amthropoeentric point of view been expressed 
 in a more affirmative and decided manner. 
 
 2 I 
 
498 APPENDIX, 
 
 had no other end in creating them ; and it would be, as I 
 think, to he impertinent to seek to use this opinion in support 
 of reasonings in physics, for we cannot doubt that there are 
 an infinity of things now in the world, or that there formerly 
 were, though they may have entirely ceased to be, without 
 any man having seen or known them, and which have never 
 served him for any purpose.'^ Descartes, as we see, only 
 admits edification in one point of view; but as regards 
 science, he sets aside this too easy explanation of things 
 with reference to the convenience of man, this presumptuous 
 pretence to refer all to ourselves. Goethe has criticised the 
 same prejudice : ' Man is naturally disposed to consider him- 
 self as the centre and end of creation, and to regard all the 
 beings that surround him as bound to subserve his personal 
 profit. He takes possession of the animal and vegetable 
 kingdoms, devours them, and glorifies that God whose fatherly 
 bounty has prepared the festal board. He removes its milk 
 from the cow, its honey from the bee, its wool from the 
 sheep ; and because he uses these animals for his profit, he 
 imagines they have been created for his use. He cannot 
 imagine that the least blade of grass is not there for him.' ^ 
 
 But no one has criticised this singular illusion regarding 
 final causes in a more spirited and piquant manner than 
 Montaigne, in a famous passage : ' Why should not a gosling 
 say thus : AU the parts of the universe regard me ; the earth 
 serves me for walking, the sun to give me light, the stars to 
 inspire me with their influences. I have this use of the 
 winds, that of the waters ; there is nothing which this vault 
 so favourably regards as me; I am the darling of nature. 
 Does not man look after, lodge, and serve me ? It is for me 
 he sows and grinds : if he eat me, so does he his fellow-man 
 as well ; and so do I the worms that kill and eat him. . . , 
 A crane could say as much, and still more magnificently, for 
 the liberty of its flight, and for the possession of that high 
 and beautiful region.' ^ 
 
 ^ Descartes, Principes de la philosophie, iii. 2. 
 
 ^ Eckennann, Gesprdche mit Ooethe, t. ii. p. 282. 
 
 3 Essais, ii. xii. He says again : ' Who has persuaded himself that this 
 motion of the celestial vault, the eternal light of these lamps revolving so 
 proudly above his head, the awful movements of this infinite sea, were estab- 
 lished and are maintained so many ages for his convenience and service ? ' See 
 
ABUSE OF FINAL CAUSES. 499 
 
 Doubtless, no philosopher will dispute the justice of the 
 preceding observations, and in truth it is almost entirely in 
 popular or religious writings that the prejudice in question 
 will be found especially developed. But it would be a grave 
 error to believe that we have arraigned the doctrine of final 
 causes by destroying or reducing to its just limits the doc- 
 trine of man the end of the creation.^ Wherein, I ask, are 
 these two conceptions bound together ? Cannot I then 
 believe, in a general manner, that God has proportioned in 
 every being the means to the end, without affirming that all 
 beings have been prepared for the use of one ? Montaigne, 
 doubtless, has the right to humble man by the ironical lan- 
 guage he attributes to the goose, still we need only see in 
 this the hyperbole permitted to satire, and not the exact 
 expression of things. But it being true that the universe has 
 neither been created for the use of the goose nor for that of 
 man, does it follow that the organs of each have not been 
 given them for their own use ? 
 
 If we contemplate the immensity of the worlds, many of 
 which are only known to us by the light they send us, and 
 which takes ages to come to us, others of which have only 
 been revealed to us since the invention of the telescope, — if we 
 consider these two infinitudes of Pascal, between which man 
 is suspended as a mean between nothing and all, it is abso- 
 lutely untenable that all has been created for man. Even 
 the earth is not entirely for his use. Let us add that the 
 obstacles which he encounters there, the evils which nature 
 opposes to him at every step, the noxious animals, maladies, etc., 
 seem also to indicate that man has not been the exclusive 
 object of the designs and provisions of Providence ; and even 
 if these means should be to him a trial, still they have not 
 necessarily this end, since such beings exist where man has 
 not yet gone, where it would be possible for him not to go if 
 he chose : he could then put nature in default, and it would 
 then have wrought in vain. 
 
 again, for the same objection, Spinoza, Ethics, Book i. appendix ; Buffon, 
 Histoire dee animaux, chap. i. ; Biot, Melanges, t. ii. p. 7 ; Ch. Martins, De 
 Vuniii de Vorganisme (Revue dea Deux Mondes, 15 Juin 1862) ; and among the 
 ancients, Cicero, De NaturA Deorum, lib. i. ix., 'Disc, of Velleius.' 
 
 ' LeibnitZ; whose whole philosophy rests on the iinal cause, is one of those who 
 have most contributed to uproot the prejudice in question. 
 
500 APPENDIX. 
 
 In place of saying that all has been created for the use of 
 man, we must say that every being has been created for itself, 
 each being having received the means necessary to support 
 its own existence ; and it is above all in this internal adapta- 
 tion of the being that the principle of finality is displayed. 
 In this point of view, nothing is more false than the conjec- 
 ture of Lucretius and of Spinoza, reproduced by Goethe, 
 namely, that man, having known how to satisfy his wants 
 from external things, and having for this reason imagined 
 that all has been made for his use, has thereupon applied this 
 sort of reasoning to the organs even of animals, and to his own 
 organs, and has concluded from them that these organs were 
 means arranged for ends, — that the eye was made for seeing, the 
 teeth for cutting, and the legs for walking. There is no need 
 of such a circuit to perceive the adaptation of organs to their 
 ends ; and even supposing that in fact men had reasoned thus, 
 which is scarcely probable, there is no reason to bind these two 
 ideas together, namely, the personal utility for man of external 
 things, and the respective utUity of the organs and instincts 
 for the animals themselves which are endued with them. 
 
 We cannot too much insist on the distinction established 
 by Kant between internal finality, or the principle according 
 to which each being is organized for its own preservation, and 
 relative or external finality, according to which each being is 
 only a means for the subsistence of another being. Each being 
 is at first organized for itself, and in the second place it is 
 subordinately fit for the subsistence of other beings. Man 
 himself is not exempt from this law ; and it could as well be 
 said that he is made in order to feed worms, as it can be said 
 that other animals are made to feed him : he is, therefore, 
 himself a means as well as an end. 
 
 But after having insisted on this first principle, that each 
 being is created for itself, it is evident that one cannot stop 
 there; for it would follow that each being is an absolute 
 whole, having no relation to other beings, each of which would 
 equally form an absolute system. It must not be forgotten 
 that each being forms part of the universe, — that is, of a more 
 general system, of which it is only a member, and without 
 which it could not itself exist. This relation of the part to 
 the whole proves to us that no organized being can be con- 
 
ABUSE OF FINAL CAUSES. 501 
 
 sidered as a centre except relatively ; each of these partial 
 systems ought, therefore, to be co-ordinated to the whole and 
 to each other, whence those reciprocal correlations, according 
 to which aU nature's heings are at once ends and means.'^ 
 "What is the part of man in this system ? This is the question 
 we have meanwhile to examine. 
 
 Every being requiring, in order to exist, 1st, An appro- 
 priate organization, 2d, Means of subsistence prepared apart 
 from itself, may be considered, as we have seen above, as an 
 end of nature in these two points of view ;^ nature has busied 
 itself with it, and has made it one of the objects of its con- 
 cern by thus preparing, internally and externally, all that is 
 necessary for it. By this title man is an end of nature, as 
 well as the other creatures. Moreover, in proportion as a 
 greater number of means are found disposed for the preserva- 
 tion of a being, or, what is the same thing, as the organization 
 of a being has been made to enjoy a greater number of things, 
 it may be said that the being thus privileged is a more im- 
 portant end for nature; so that a being has the right to 
 measure its importance as a centre or end in the universe by 
 the number of uses it can derive from the medium in which 
 it lives, without, however, having ever the right to arrogate 
 to itself the quality of last and absolute end. But who can 
 deny that, of all creatures, man is the one most fitted to use 
 external things, the one to whom the greatest number of things 
 are co-ordinated in quality of means ? and, consequently, why 
 should not he have the right to believe himself the most im- 
 portant end of Providence, not in the universe taken as a whole, 
 but relatively to the little corner of it which we know, and 
 that without in any manner affirming that even in that little 
 corner all is made exclusively for him ? 
 
 It is objected that this supposition, even thus reduced, will 
 stni lead to the most puerile and ridiculous consequences : 
 aU the artificial inventions of man will be considered as ends 
 
 ' ' There is no being, ' says Rousseau very well, ' whicli cannot in some respects 
 he regarded as the centre of all the others, around which they are arranged, ao 
 that they are all reciprocally ends and means relatively to each other. The mind 
 is confounded and loses itself in this infinitude of relations.' These expressions 
 of Kousseau will be observed, which are precisely the same as those Kant after- 
 wards applied to the definition of living beings. 
 
 " See p. 193. 
 
502 " APPENDIX. 
 
 prepared by the goodness of Providence ; that is, say they, but 
 to confound the use with the end, and to refer to the first 
 cause what is only the result of human reflection. 
 
 r^ndlon has expressed this objection in these terms : ' I 
 hear certain philosophers replying to me that all this discourse 
 on the art displayed in nature is only a perpetual sophism. 
 All nature, they will tell me, is for the use of man ; it is 
 true, but it is rashly concluded that it has been made with 
 art for the use of man. ... It is true that human industry 
 makes use of an infinity of things with which nature furnishes 
 it, . . . but nature has not made these things expressly for 
 its convenience. For instance, villagers daily climb by certain 
 pointed rocks to the summit of a mountain ; yet it does not 
 follow that these pointed rocks have been cut with art as 
 a ladder for the convenience of men. So, too, when one is 
 in the country during a storm, and meets with a cavern, one 
 makes use of it as a house to take shelter ; yet it is not true 
 that this cavern has been expressly made to serve as a house 
 for men. It is the same with the entire world. It has been 
 formed by chance, and without design ; but men, finding it 
 such as it is, have had the skiU to turn it to their uses."^ 
 
 It is, in effect, to abuse final causes even to include these 
 sort of inventions among them — as, for iijstance, if it be said 
 that the elasticity of steam exists in order that there may be 
 railways. But yet once more, we must not confound artificial 
 with natural inventions, like walking, sight, or nutrition. 
 For it would be absurd to say that man, having found animals 
 good to eat, has eaten them. There is here a necessary rela- 
 tion, which does not exist in the other case ; and the preser- 
 vation of man being attached to the satisfaction of this want, 
 it is here not the mere result of reflection. For, first, it is a 
 blind force, and not a reflecting industry, that leads him to 
 the satisfaction of these wants ; and, in the second place, 
 there is a natural adaptation, anterior to all industry, in the 
 organs themselves. 
 
 In a word, to recall what we have said in the previous 
 
 chapter, the internal supposes an external finality, and the 
 
 latter is only the reciprocal of the former. If man, according 
 
 to his organization, is made to use things, these things re- 
 
 1 Fenelon, Existence de Dieii, Ire part. c. iii. 
 
ABUSE OF FINAL CAUSES. 50 3 
 
 ciprocally are made to be utilized by him. And ia proportion 
 as he uses and can use these things, he has the right to 
 consider himself as being one of their ends. It is in this 
 sense and measure that we must restrict the general proposi- 
 tion which has been abused, namely, that man is the end, if 
 not of the creation, at least of the little world he inhabits.' 
 
 ^ One can understand it, with Kant, in a, much higher sense, by saying that 
 the world only exists to be the theatre of morality. 
 
IX. 
 FINAL CAUSES IN" THE SANKHYA PHILOSOPHY, 
 
 (Book I. Chapter vi. Page 192.) 
 
 THE quotation inserted in the text gives us occasion to 
 make known a beautiful and original application of the 
 principle of final causes in the Hindu philosophy. We find 
 it in the exposition of the Sankhya system made by M. 
 Barth^lemy St. Hilaire.^ 
 
 Ordinarily, the final cause, from Socrates to Leibnitz, has 
 served to prove the existence of God. In the system of 
 Kapila, which is called the atheistic Sankhya (in opposition 
 to the system of Patandjali, or the theistic Sankhya), final 
 causes are employed to prove the existence of the soul. 
 
 ' The soul exists, it is said in the Sankhya Karika,^ because 
 this vast assemblage of sensible things only takes place for 
 the use of another (consociatio propter alius causam Jit).' 
 
 We see that the point of departure of the argument, as in 
 the physico-theological argument, is the order, harmony, and 
 combination of material elements. Only, in place of inferring 
 the existence of an ordaining being, there is inferred the 
 existence of a being that serves as the end of the combina- 
 tion ; and that being is the soul. The major pr6miss is not : 
 Every work supposes a worker, — ^that is, some one that has 
 made it, — ^but : Every work supposes some one for whom it 
 
 1 Memoires sur la philosopMe Sankhya, by Barthflemy St. Hilaire [Mimoires 
 de I'Acadimie des Sciences Morales et Politiques, tome viii.). 
 
 ^ The Sankhya Kariha is an abridgment in verse of the doctrine of Kapila. 
 We have besides the Sanhhya Pravachdna, which is attributed to Kapila him- 
 self. M. Barth^lemy St. Hilaire has given us a French translation of the 
 Karika, and M. Lass?n a Latin translation. Besides, Mr. Wilson, in an essay of 
 which M. Barth6lemy St. Hilaire has largely made use, has given us the trans- 
 lation of a Hindu commentator of the Karika, named Gaoudapada, belonging to 
 the 8th century of our era. 
 
SANKHYA PHILOSOPHY, 505 
 
 has teen made. This major is proved, as in the schools of 
 the West, by examples borrowed from human industry : ' A 
 bed supposes some one for whom it is made ; so also the 
 body is made for the, use of some one.' * 
 
 Another argument, analogous to the preceding, and which 
 is another form of it, serves again to prove the existence of 
 the soul : ' There must be a being to enjoy things ; esse debet 
 qui fruitur,' which is explained in the commentary by these 
 words, ' Things are made to be enjoyed ; things visible to be 
 seen. There must be a guest to taste the ilavour of the dishes.' 
 
 What, then, is the part of the soul in nature 1 It is ' a 
 witness, an arbiter, a spectator; testis, arbiter, spectator.' It 
 is, says the commentator, ' like a beggar that passes through 
 life, like a traveller who removes without remaining in the 
 place he visits, like the ascetic who contemplates the toils of 
 the villager without taking part in them.' 
 
 We perceive the character of this strange system taking 
 shape. While in the Western philosophy the principle of 
 final causes is employed to prove the existence of an active 
 and productive cause, here it serves to prove the existence of 
 a contemplator who is present at the spectacle of the universe, 
 without mingling with or acting in it. 
 
 The soul, according to the Hindu philosophy, is essentially 
 inactive, and the body is essentially insensible. It is by its 
 union with the body that the soul appears active ; it is by its 
 union with the soul that the body appears sensible. ' The 
 body,' says the commentator, ' appears sensible without being 
 so ; as a vessel filled with a warm liquid appears warm — with 
 a cold liquid appears cold. . . . The soul appears active 
 without being so ; as a man mixed with thieves, without being 
 one himself, appears culpable and is not.' ' It is,' says the 
 Karika, ' the union of the lame and the blind.' 
 
 We see the reason of the union of the soul with the body, 
 or with nature. By this union nature has an end and a 
 reason of being ; by it the soul becomes self-conscious. 
 
 ' It would even seem that this is the true form of the principle of final causes ; 
 for to say, ' Every work supposes a worker,' is to infer the efficient rather than 
 the final cause. It is more exact to say, like the Hindus, ' Every combination 
 supposes amend;' but then, to conclude by a second principle, 'AH that is made 
 for an end supposes a worker, that is to say, an intelligent cause.' (See Pre- 
 limiuary Chapter.) 
 
506 APPENDIX. 
 
 ' The soul, in becoming united to nature, has only a single 
 object, to contemplate and to know it ; this knowledge is the 
 condition of its safety. To contemplate nature is to enjoy it. 
 Nature would be without an end, if there were not a being to 
 enjoy and contemplate it. . . . Without the soul that knows 
 and thinks, nature would be as if it were not ; without 
 nature, the soul in its isolation would be next to a nonentity. 
 By their union, the universe lives and exists, and the soul 
 becomes self-conscious.' 
 
 But if nature is made to be contemplated by the soul, is 
 the soul made exclusively to contemplate nature ? No, beyond 
 doubt ; on the contrary, ' there comes a moment when the 
 satiated soul desires to be delivered from the bond that fetters 
 it ; but this deliverance can only take place after having been 
 first united to nature. . . . The evolution of nature has thus 
 no other end than the liberation of individual souls, and 
 therein nature acts for another as if it acted for itself.' 
 
 Hence an admirable theory, that of the disinterestedness of 
 nature, that only works for another than itself, and without 
 receiving anything in return. ' Nature only acts to bring 
 about the liberation of the soul ; but the soul yields nothing 
 to nature, which acts for another disinterestedly. It is like a 
 person who should neglect his own affairs for those of a friend. 
 If it concerned itself alone, nature would remain inert; but 
 for the soul it displays an indefatigable activity.' 
 
 However, this theory of an unconscious activity of nature 
 working in the interest of the soul gave rise to a great 
 difSculty. On the one hand. How, in short, can nature, being 
 blind, apply itself to procure the good of the soul ? on the 
 other hand. How can the soul, being inactive, act on nature ? 
 The Hindu philosophy here met, under a very special form, 
 the great problem of the union of soul and body, of nature 
 and spirit. By this means the theistic idea, till then very 
 much hidden, was introduced into the Sankhya philosophy. 
 Nature needs, not a worker, but a guide. It is evidently, 
 again, the principle of final causes that has produced this con- 
 sequence. ' Whether the evolution of nature takes place for 
 nature itself,' says a Hindu commentator,^ ' or takes place for 
 another, it is always an intelligent principle that acts. Nature 
 1 Vatcheapati Miara. See Wilson, p. 168. 
 
SANKHYA PHILOSOPHY. 507 
 
 cannot be without rationality, and there is necessarily an 
 intelligent being that directs and dominates nature. Souls, all 
 intelligent though they ar^, cannot in their individuality 
 direct nature, because they do not know its proper and 
 essential character. There must, then, be a being that sees 
 all things and that is the sovereign of nature ; there must be 
 a God (Isvara).' 
 
 But this interpretation is comparatively recent, and in the 
 Sankhya of Kapila, nature, as in Aristotle, is unconscious ; it 
 acts for the best, without knowing what it does. ' As the 
 action of milk, that knows not what it does, is the cause of 
 the growth of the calf, so the action of nature is the cause of 
 the liberation of the soul.' — ' Nature is in itself incapable of 
 enjoying ; it is like the transport of a load of saffron by a 
 camel.' 
 
 In whatever manner this predetermination of nature to the 
 deliverance of the soul is made, it still holds — and this is the 
 capital point of the Hindu doctrine — ^that nature has not its 
 end in itself, and that it only exists in the interest of the soul. 
 At this point occurs the passage quoted in our text (Book I. 
 chap. vi. p. 192), as well as several not less charming, and 
 which mean the same thing : 
 
 'As a dancer, after having shown herself to the assembly, 
 ceases to dance, so nature ceases to act after having mani- 
 fested itself to the mind of man.' The commentary adds : 
 ' Nature seems to say to man, " See what I am ; thou art 
 other than me.'" — ' Nothing more timid than nature ; and 
 when once she has said to herself, " I have been seen," she 
 does not expose herself a second time to the view of the soul.' 
 — ' Nature, when once her fault has been discovered, no longer 
 glides under the eyes of man, and hides herself like a woman 
 of good family.'^ — '"She has been seen by me," says the 
 spectator to himself. " I have been seen by him," says the 
 nature that ceases to act, " and there is no more motive for 
 creation." ' 
 
 All these texts have the same meaning. Nature, in the 
 Hindu philosophy, has but one reason of being, one end — to 
 
 1 There is a dispute among Hindu commentators on the meaning of this 
 thought. The most prohaWe is, that for nature it is a sort of fault to let itself 
 be seen. 
 
508 APPENDIX. 
 
 be contemplated by mind, and, in giving it self-consciousness, 
 to lead it to liberation and salvation. There is here, as it 
 seems, a sort of vicious circle. For if the soul has need to be 
 delivered, it is because it is bound ; and if it is bound, it is 
 because it is united to nature; so that if nature were not, 
 the soul would have no need to be delivered. But although 
 we do not find in the texts the explanation of this difficulty, 
 we may yet be allowed to think that the soul without its 
 union to nature would remain in the enveloped and unconscious 
 state, that union with nature is necessary to give it self- 
 consciousness by the contemplation and knowledge that it 
 takes of it, by the distinction of the me and the not me. 
 ' Nature seems to say to man, " This is what I am ; thou art 
 other than me." ' But this consciousness that the soul takes 
 of itself is for it the first step of deliverance. It learns to 
 distinguish itself from nature, to oppose itself to it, to raise 
 itself above it ; and thereafter nature has nothing more to 
 teach it, nor to do for it. ' They might be called a creditor 
 and debtor who have squared their accounts.' 
 
 Let us add, to complete this theory, that liberation in the 
 Hindu philosophy has two degrees : in this life, and after 
 death. In the first case, the soul, although free, and become 
 indifferent to nature, remains united to the body, ' as the 
 potter's wheel still turns after the action that had set it in 
 motion.' In the second case, the soul separates from the 
 body, and, the end being attained, nature ceases to act. It is 
 then that 'the mind obtains a liberation that is altogether 
 definitive and absolute.' This supreme state the Buddhists 
 afterwards called Nirvana, on which so many controversies 
 have been raised. 
 
 To sum up : the entire system of the Sankhya rests on the 
 idea of the final cause. But in place of conceiving a supreme 
 cause that acts with intelligence for an end, it is this intelli- 
 gent and unconscious nature that tends towards an end. Thus 
 the Sankhya approaches the philosophy of Aristotle. But while 
 in Aristotle nature has as its object God or the pure act, in 
 the Sankhya it has as its object Soul and the soul of man. 
 .While, according to Aristotle, it is an instinctive desire, and 
 in some sort for its own satisfaction, that nature is developed, 
 in the Sankhya philosophy it is in the interest of another, in 
 
SANKHYA PHILOSOPHY. 509 
 
 the interest of the soul, that this development takes place. 
 No doubt one might push the approximation farther, and 
 maintain that the contemplation, which is for Aristotle the 
 final term of activity, corresponds to the deliverance of the 
 soul in the Sankhya. But this would perhaps be to press the 
 approximations too far. There will still remain the difference, 
 that for Aristotle nature has its own value, its reality, while 
 for the Hindu philosophers it is only a spectre, a sport, and, as 
 the Vedantists would say, an illusion, maya. Thus there will 
 always be ground to distinguish between the realism of Aris- 
 totle and the Hindu idealism ; but the analogies we have 
 noticed are nevertheless very striking. 
 
X. 
 
 THE PHYSICO-THEOLOGICAL PEOOF. 
 
 (Book ii. Chapter i.) 
 
 WE shall be allowed to add to our chapter on the physico- 
 theological proof two interesting notes that have been 
 addressed to us by two very distinguished minds : the one by 
 M. Mansion, professor of Mathematics in the University of 
 Ghent, on the Epicurean Argument ; the other by M. Rabier, 
 professor in the Lyceum Charlemagne, on the Argument of 
 Kant. The first of these notes is entirely mathematical, and 
 concerns the application of the calculation of probabilities to 
 the formation of the world; we shall rest satisfied with re- 
 producing, without adding anything to it. The second is 
 philosophical, and is a reply to our own discussion on the 
 argument of Kant. 
 
 I. The Epicurean Argument and the Calculation of Probabilities. 
 
 ' The calculation of probabilities cannot serve so much as 
 might, in the first instance, be believed, to elucidate the 
 questions raised by the Epicurean argument, for two reasons, 
 the one general, the other special. 
 
 ' The general reason is this : In mathematics one is never 
 occupied, and one can never really be occupied, with an infinite 
 number; although one speaks of it at every moment. The 
 phrases where this term infinite occurs are concise, and con- 
 ventionally/ take the place of longer phrases. Examples : 1st, 
 "Two straight lines that meet in the infinite form with a 
 secant internal angles whose sum is equal to two right angles," 
 signifies : " Two straight lines situated in the same plane, and 
 parallel, form 7°." 2d, "A fraction ^ for to = oo ( oo repre- 
 sents the infinite) is nil," signifies : " If ?i increases indefinitely, 
 
THE PHYSICO-THEOLOGICAL PROOF. 511 
 
 SO as to exceed any number given beforehand, J will become 
 as little as you please, so as to be less than any fraction given 
 beforehand, however small." 
 
 ' This mode of view is that of the most of the mathematicians 
 of our days, and that of the great geometricians of the I7th 
 century (see in particular Newton, Principia, scholia of 
 lemma xi. of the first section of the first book). In the 
 18 th century the most celebrated mathematicians, on the 
 other hand, could only think on this point as in general on all 
 the questions of principles. Hence their errors and embarrass- 
 ments. Cauchy in France and Gauss in Germany have 
 restored the sound doctrine. 
 
 ' The special reason is derived from the small objective 
 range of the calculus of probabilities. I shall explain this by 
 particular examples. Given a gaming die with six faces, it 
 may be said, in two different senses, that the probability of 
 the occurrence of 6, for instance, is •^. In the mathematical 
 or subjective sense that merely signifies that one of the six 
 faces bears the number 6. In the physical or objective sense 
 that signifies that the die is such that if it be thrown a great 
 number of times, 600 times for example, the 6 occurs about 
 100 times. If the die were loaded, so that only 6 or 5 could 
 be thrown, these two occurring besides with equal ease, that is, 
 each of them about 300 times in 600, the mathematical pro- 
 bability of the occurrence of 6 would still be \, but the 
 physical probability would be | or ^. 
 
 ' If the letters of the first verse of the Iliad, or, if you will, 
 of the whole Iliad, can form n different combinations, of which 
 one is the poem attributed to Homer, it may be said that the 
 probability of the occurrence of that poem is ^ in two senses 
 still. In the subjective sense, that simply signifies that one 
 of the imaginable combinations of the given letters is the Iliad. 
 In the objective sense, it means that these letters are made in 
 such manner, obey such laws, that in m times n throws of all 
 these letters, the Iliad occurs about m times ; m is a very 
 great number in relation to n. 
 
 'The pure mathematicians of the 18th and 19th centuries 
 have scarcely spoken with exactitude of these two sorts of 
 probability ; but, in the 1 7th, Jacques Bernoulli, and in our 
 
512 APPENDIX. 
 
 own time Cournot and, above all, Bienaym^ have well dis- 
 tinguished objective from subjective probability. 
 
 'After these preliminaries you understand that the Epi- 
 curean argument can hardly be defended nor attacked by 
 means of the calculus of probabilities. However, this last 
 calculus may at least serve to give precision to the question. 
 
 ' To give the most force possible to the Epicurean argument, 
 suppose that the world is composed of a finite number of 
 atoms, of which we are studying the possible combinations, 
 not since infinite time, which would bring down all the 
 mathematicians upon us, but from an indeterminate time (as in 
 your note on p. 295). That indeterminate time is as long as 
 we can have need of for our reasoning. Let us, besides, regard 
 the actual world, from the moment when men have thought 
 they saw marks of ^design in it, to the present, as an immense 
 Iliad. Whether the previous combinations were without 
 order or not matters little to us. If there are iV combinations 
 possible in all, it is clear that the mathematical or subjective 
 probability of the occurrence of the actual world is ^ But it 
 is impossible to determine whether the physical or objective 
 probability of it is also ^, For that it would he necessary to 
 show that there are in the atoms immanent forces that compel 
 them to pass m times through the n possible combinations, and such 
 that the actual world is presented about m times, M being a 
 number very great in relation to N. A priori, one knows 
 nothing of such immanent forces, and consequently the Epi- 
 curean argument can get no aid from the calculus of probabilities. 
 The only thing that one knows is that the actual combination 
 is one of the possible N, since it is realized, or that the sub- 
 jective probability is j^ (which is, I believe, what you say in 
 substance, p. 2 9 8). Besides, N is unknown, and the greater the 
 Epicurean supposes it, the more the subjective possibility of 
 the world diminishes, as you say p. 297. 
 
 ' For the rest, speaking mathematically, one cannot make N 
 infinite, for the reason given above, on the exclusion of the 
 infinite from mathematics. 
 
 'After the preceding remarks, one may, it seems to me, 
 leaving aside the calculus of probabilities, state the question 
 as follows : Are there in the atoms imwMnent forces that compel 
 
THE PHYSICO-THEOLOGICAL PROOF. 513 
 
 the world to pass m times through n different conibinations, oj 
 which one is the actual wm-ld ? Stated thus, and resolved 
 affirmatively, the Epicureans would not yet have triumphed, 
 since one does not know whether the (iV — 1) other combina- 
 tions do not also present marks of design.' 
 
 II. On the Criticism made hy Kant of the Physico- Theological 
 
 Proof. 
 
 ' If the criticisms of Kant are just,' M. Eabier writes us, 
 ' how can it be denied that they are useful ? All the world 
 has not your reserve, only to demand of a proof what it can 
 giva How many times has this argument been presented as 
 a proof of the existence of God, that is to say, of a being 
 infinite, unique, distinct from the world, etc. Is it not classed 
 among the proofs of the existence of God? It was then 
 important to say precisely what this proof could yield, and to 
 make restrictions that many have not thought to make.' 
 
 JReply. — I admit this observation. No doubt the criticism 
 of Kant has been useful. But I maintain that the restrictions 
 in question do not touch the foundation of the argument, which, 
 to my knowledge, has never been employed to prove an 
 infinite, creative, unique being, etc., but simply an intelligent 
 God. It sufficed to remark that the argument of final causes 
 is only a part of a complete demonstration of the existence 
 of God, as Clarke, for example, has shown, who, in place of 
 stating separate and incomplete proofs, presents them as the 
 successive propositions of one and the same demonstration. 
 Even taken separately, the proof of final causes can lead to 
 an incomplete God, but still to a God. One is not an atheist 
 for not admitting the creation, nor yet for admitting several 
 
 gods, as Socrates and Plato do when they speak like the 
 
 vulgar. 
 
 But let us leave these preliminary observations and go to 
 
 the root of the argument. 
 
 'Are the criticisms of Kant just?' proceeds M. Eabier, 
 
 'The first two are: 1. The argument does not give a creator 
 
 God ; 2. The argument dcJes not give an infinite intelligence. 
 'You think these two objections destroy each other. If 
 
 that were so, it would not follow, you acknowledge, that neither 
 
 2 K 
 
514 APPENDIX. 
 
 the one nor the other is just. But is it quite sure that they 
 destroy each other ? 
 
 ' 1. Does the first destroy the second ? In other words, if 
 God is only the architect of the world, cannot He still be not 
 infinite ? 
 
 ' Here is your reasoning, with my objections within par- 
 entheses. 
 
 ' To say that God is only architect, is to say that the matter 
 of the world is necessary. (That is true.) But if the matter 
 is necessary, the cause of the form is so also. (The consequence 
 seems to me impossible to demonstrate.) In effect : (a) How 
 conld a contingent cause act on a necessary matter ? (Why 
 not ? Let us suppose Epicureanism true, what impossibility 
 is there that man should act on matter ?) (6) Where would 
 this cause have derived the reason of its existence ? In 
 matter ? (This is not manifestly impossible ; the materialism 
 according to which intelligence proceeds from matter is not 
 evidently absurd, since it is.) (c) Would a cause coming from 
 matter be able to react upon matter? (It seems to me it 
 would ; the effect often rests upon the cause, like the word on 
 the thought.) Then that cause exists of itself (That is not 
 proved, as it seems, but let us admit it.) It is then absolute. 
 (Yes ; but the absolute here only concerns the being, not the 
 modes of being.)' 
 
 Eeply. — Let us pause here, for we are entering into another 
 order of difficulties. Up to this point the author of the 
 objections only disputes that the first cause is a necessary 
 cause, a cause by itself. He only consents to it at the end by 
 way of concession, and to push the objection further; other- 
 wise it does not appear to him impossible that a contingent 
 cause should act on necessary matter. He cites man, who, 
 according, to Epicureanism, can act on matter, all contingent 
 as he is, and proceeding entirely from it. But the question 
 here is not of a partial and isolated action on some points of 
 matter, which is only one of the particular cases of the respec- 
 tive reaction of the molecules upon each other. It concerns 
 an action upon all matter, an action that changes the chaos 
 into cosmos. But a system that would admit that matter is 
 capable of producing such a cause could quite as well dispense 
 with it, for it would be much more simple to admit that 
 
THE PHYSIOO-THEOLOGICAL PHOOF. 515 
 
 matter produces order directly by tlie mixture and accommo- 
 dation of the parts. But those who allow an architect God do 
 not admit that matter can produce order ; d fortiori, they will 
 not admit that it can produce an ordaining cause. 
 
 Nevertheless, one would not yet have gained anything, it 
 appears, by admitting that the organizing cause is a cause by 
 itself. For, says our critic, ' the absolute here only concerns 
 the being, not the modes of being.' He then goes on con- 
 tinuing to sum us up, and adding within parentheses his own 
 objections. 
 
 ' The second objection of Kant (and it is in that that it 
 would be destroyed by the first) disputes that there is in this 
 contingent world enough of material to rise to the notion of 
 the absolute. (It seems to me that the objection of Kant is 
 not precisely that ; it does not rest on the contingency of the 
 form or of the matter. The objection is : We do not know 
 whether the art that shines in the world is infinite, and conse- 
 quently whether it necessitates an infinite intelligence. The 
 question is of the degree, and not of the contingency or non- 
 contingency of the world.) Then this second objection is 
 destroyed by the first. (I do not believe it, and it seems to 
 me that it is the double sense of the word absolute that 
 deceives. The absolute implied, according to us, in the first 
 objection, is the absolute of existence, the necessary, the uncon- 
 ditional, avviroderov, Uavov. The absolute contested by Kant 
 in the second objection is the absolute of quality, the finished, 
 the perfect, reXetov. Until it be proved that the first of these 
 absolutes involves the second, in other words, that the neces-> 
 sary is necessarily perfect, I do not see a contradiction. 
 Eemark, besides, that you yourself reason against Kant by 
 admitting a necessary mode, that is, an absolute of existence 
 which is not an absolute of quality.)' 
 
 Beply. — I grant to the critic that the absolute of existence 
 (the necessary) is not the same thing as the absolute of quality 
 (the perfect), and that one has not the right (at least at first 
 sight) to conclude from the one to the other. Nor do I do so. 
 What I maintain is, that the absolute being given me on the 
 one hand, and intelligence being given me on the other, I have 
 the right to conclude an absolute of intelligence. If I did 
 not know otherwise that God is intelligent, I would not learn 
 
516 APPENDIX. 
 
 it by consulting the notion of the absolute. But this notion 
 being posited, it follows, according to me, that every attribute 
 that shall be recognised in God will be so in quality of 
 absolute ; for the absolute being His essence, He must be 
 absolute in all that He is. To employ the paradoxical form 
 that Descartes has given to this argument, we shall say with 
 him that if God can have given Himself the greatest of per- 
 fections, which is to exist. He must have given Himself at the 
 same time all the perfection of which He is susceptible. But 
 He is intelligent; therefore He must have given Himself the 
 highest degree of intelligence possible, that is, an absolute of 
 intelligence. Cut off from this Cartesian argument the singular 
 idea of a God who creates Himself, and there remains a very 
 solid foundation, namely, that the absolute of existence im- 
 plies the absolute of essence and the absolute of each attribute. 
 ' 2. Inversely, the second objection destroys the first.^ The 
 world is contingent, says Kant in his second objection ; there- 
 fore one must only infer a contingent cause. (I admit that 
 that is the objection.) But if the world is contingent, it must 
 be so entirely, creation and form ; for what right would one 
 have to conclude from the contingency of the form the 
 necessity of the matter ? (It is certain that one cannot con- 
 clude from the contingency of the form the necessity of the 
 matter ; but no more is it permissible to conclude from the 
 contingency of the form the contingency of the matter. The 
 form being contingent, the question whether the matter is 
 contingent or not remains doubtful. If this remark is just, 
 the whole sequel of the reasoning does not apply.)' 
 
 I grant the objection ; and, in consequence, the passage in 
 question has been withdrawn. 
 
 The result of that is that what subsists, according to us, in 
 our criticism of Kant, is that the proof of final causes may 
 well, it is true, infer only an architect God, but that the 
 architect God must enjoy a perfect wisdom as well as the 
 creator God. 
 
 ^ That which we maintained in the first edition, and which we withdraw after 
 the present objection. 
 
INDEX. 
 
 Actions, instinctive and voluntary, 104. 
 
 Adaptations, hurtful, 154. 
 
 Agassiz on types, 212. 
 
 Alphabet, chance throw of letters of, 
 
 186. 
 Ampfere on the iinal cause of todies, 
 
 192. 
 Analogy, worth of reasoning by, 112. 
 Animals, two kinds of actions of, 101. 
 Apparatus, respiratory, 78. 
 Arago on groups of stars, 23. 
 Archetypes, Platonic, 392. 
 Aristotle — 
 
 On chance, 19. 
 
 The final cause explained by, 1, 5, 
 9, 38. 
 
 Disputes final causes, 476. 
 Automatism, the Cartesian, 180. 
 
 Pbattie, anecdote of, 292. 
 Bennett, Alfred "W., on natural selec- 
 tion, 249. 
 Bernard, Claude — 
 
 Quoted, 62. 
 
 On digestion, 76. 
 
 On physiology, 118. 
 
 On the heart, 129. 
 
 On physiology and zoology, 130. 
 
 On the life of the organism, 133. 
 
 Recognises a directive idea, 136. 
 
 On life, 230. 
 Bichat on tissues, 118. 
 BlaiuviUe against Cuvier, 435. 
 Bossuet on mechanism, 185. 
 Brain, the, and chance, 187. 
 Buffon and Clairaut, 204. 
 
 Cabanis on final causes, 455. 
 Causality and finality — 
 
 Compared, 5. 
 
 Eavaisson on, 8. 
 
 Cause and effect, 17. 
 Chance — 
 
 Games of, 18. 
 
 Coumot on, 19. 
 Chances, happy, 141. 
 Coincidences, 20, 26, 28, 40, 42, 294. 
 
 Examples of, 21, 22. 
 Concordance, principle of, 60. 
 Conditions of existence, principle of, 
 
 137. 
 Conflict of final and efficient causes, 
 
 166. 
 Copernicus, 203. 
 Corneille quoted, 363. 
 Correlations, law of organic, 47. 
 Creation, 408. 
 
 Hypotheses of, 415. 
 Creations, hypothesis of special, 227. 
 Crystallization, 198. 
 Cuvier and G. St. Hilaire, 449. 
 
 On comparative anatomy, 48. 
 
 Dabwin — 
 
 On natural selection and origin of 
 
 species, 241. 
 On instinct, 255. 
 Descartes on creation, 220. 
 Dnhamel on analysis and synthesis, 
 35. 
 
 Entrophy, 196. 
 
 Epicurean argument, reply to, 298. 
 
 Epigenesis, doctrine of, 138. 
 
 Epiglottis, the, 76. 
 
 Evil, problem of, 168, 420. 
 
 Evolution — 
 
 Defined, 215. 
 
 Leibnitz the true founder ofj 219. 
 
 Does not explain the universe, 231. 
 
 Bests on a true principle, 260. 
 
 Two meanings of, 282. 
 
518 
 
 INDEX. 
 
 Exempkrism, hypothesis of, 402. 
 Eye, the— 
 
 And sight, an illustration of means 
 and end, 40. 
 
 And the camera, 67, 109. 
 
 The crystalline humour of, 69. 
 
 The achromatism of, 72. 
 
 Faith and Knowledge, 288. 
 Fenelon — 
 
 Reply of, to Epicurean objection, 
 296. 
 
 On the animal machine, 331. 
 Final cause, or finality — 
 
 Defined, 3. 
 
 Is there a principle of ? 4. 
 
 Th. Jouffroy's definition of, 5. 
 
 Is a law of nature, 9. 
 
 Formulated by Eeid, 11 ; by Bossuet, 
 12. 
 
 Inferred from tools, 31. 
 
 Illustrated by digestion, 32 ; by 
 lactation, 33. 
 
 John Stuart Mill on, 33. 
 
 Criterion of, 39. 
 
 Idea of, extended from ourselves to 
 others, 98. 
 Final causes — 
 
 Not miracles, 126. 
 
 Require physical causes, 128. 
 
 Abuses of, 491. 
 
 Final problem of, 414. 
 Finality — 
 
 External and internal, 192, 332. 
 
 Of use and of plan, 211. 
 
 Esthetical, 213. 
 
 Subjective and objective, 318. 
 
 And induction, 432. 
 Flourens on respiration, 49. 
 Foresight, idea of, examined, 380. 
 Fortlage — 
 
 Against intentionalism, 353. 
 
 Reply to, 358. 
 Frauenstadt on unconscious finality, 
 347. 
 
 Germs of Animals, growth of, 51, 137. 
 God is wisdom, power, and love, 410. 
 
 Habit, 179. 
 Hartmann — 
 Analysis by, of final causes, 2. 
 
 Calculation of probability by, 40. 
 
 On finality, 352. 
 Havet, M. Ernest, letter of, 44. 
 Hearing, organ of, 73. 
 Heart, structure of the, 77. 
 Heckel on differentiation, 142. 
 Hegel — 
 
 Doctrine of, on final causes, 334. 
 
 On unconscious finality, 346. 
 
 On truth, 392. 
 Hegelians, objection of, 342. 
 Helmholtz on the eye, 46. 
 Holbach, Baron d', scene in his draw- 
 ing-room, 293. 
 Huxley on Kant and Schwann's cellu- 
 lar theory, 48. 
 
 Idea, the, of Plato and Hegel, 318. 
 Incubation, 43, 106. 
 Inductions true and false, 430. 
 Industry of man and vital industry, 
 
 107. 
 Instincts, the, 81. 
 
 Milne-Edwards on, 81. 
 
 Reaumur on, 81. 
 
 Reimar on, 82. 
 
 Preservative of individuals, 83 ; of 
 species, 87. 
 
 Of society, 90. 
 
 And functions, 105. 
 Intention, analysis of, 367. 
 
 Kant on the physioo-theological proof, 
 301. 
 
 Objections of, to final causes, 302. 
 
 Regards finality as subjective, 316. 
 
 His doctrine of finality summed up, 
 320. 
 
 On immanent finality, 330. 
 
 On supreme end of universe, 424. 
 
 On earthquake of Lisbon, 464. 
 Kepler, anecdote of, 292. 
 
 liAOHBLIEE — 
 
 On the harmony of the elements, 
 
 207. 
 On the laws of motion, 209. 
 On subjectivist finalism, 325. 
 Against intelligent finality, 307. 
 Correction by, 385. 
 On the problem of induction, 427. 
 Lamarck on transformism, 232. 
 
INDEX. 
 
 519 
 
 Laplace on the solar system, 23, 172. 
 
 Nebular hypothesis of, 201. 
 Law of division of labour, 134. 
 Leibnitz — 
 
 On physical and final causes, 128. 
 
 On automata, 183. 
 
 And Clarke, 221. 
 
 On the end of creation, 423. 
 Lisbon, the earthquake of, 461. 
 Littre on final causes, 218, 454. 
 Lucretius quoted, 474. 
 
 Mauebbakche on the end of creation, 
 
 419. 
 Man not opposed to, but a part of 
 
 nature, 94. 
 Mansion, M., on Epicurean argument, 
 
 510. 
 Mechanism defined, 172. 
 
 Excludes every kind of finality, 179. 
 
 And the intelligent being, 184. 
 Mill, John Stuart, on Positivism and 
 
 final causes, 454. 
 Molecules, sensation in, 189. 
 Moleschott on the human machine, 
 
 130. 
 Moli&re quoted, 291. 
 
 Misanthrope of, 365. 
 Monsters, 57, 140, 161. 
 
 Dareste on, 163. 
 Miiller — 
 
 On locomotion of animals, 45. 
 
 On vision, 64. 
 
 On hearing, 74. 
 
 On organs of motion, 79. 
 
 On vocal organs, 80. 
 
 On germs, 137. 
 
 IfATD-KE, forces of, 185. 
 
 Compared to a dancer, 507. 
 Kaudin defends abrupt transformism, 
 
 261. 
 Kerve-cells, structure and functions of, 
 
 132. 
 Kewton and the solar system, 197, 205. 
 
 Objections — 
 Of Bacon, 479. 
 Of Caro, 95. 
 Of Descartes, 482. 
 Of the Epicureans, 474. 
 Of Maupertuis, 55. 
 
 Of Spinoza, 484. 
 
 Positivist, 454. 
 
 Of naturalists, 146. 
 
 OfVulpian, 160. 
 Organism, the, 224. 
 Organs and functions, 62, 117. 
 Organs, reproduction of, 110. 
 
 Adaptation of, to functions, 175. 
 Organs, formation of, 176. 
 
 Useless, 149. 
 
 Kudimentary, 151. 
 
 Palbt on the solar system, 173. 
 Physico- theology, treatises on, 62. 
 Physiology, ancient and modern, 117, 
 
 122. 
 Polymorphism, 259. 
 Pope's essay on man quoted, 460. 
 Preformation, hypothesis of, 139. 
 Properties of life, the essential, 121. 
 
 QuATKEFAGES on origin of varieties, 
 249. 
 
 Eabiek, M., on Kant's argument, 513. 
 Ravaisson's hypothesis of creation, 
 
 416. 
 Eeid on theory of ideas, 402. 
 Robin on the organism, 119. 
 
 On adaptation of organ to function, 
 
 141. 
 Rousseau on the cause of evil, 468. 
 
 St. HilAiKE, Geoifroy, on anatomical 
 
 elements, 123. 
 Sankhya and Aristotle, 508. 
 Schopenhauer on unconscious finality, 
 348. 
 On predominance of pain, 422. 
 Science and philosophy, 123. 
 Scientists and final causes, 10. 
 Scott's Old Mortality quoted, 493. 
 Segregation, law of, 272. 
 Sexes, existence and organs of, 52. 
 Soul, the, in the Hindu philosophy, 
 
 505. 
 Spencer, Herbert — 
 Against final causes, 220. 
 On creation, 223. 
 His doctrine of evolution examined, 
 
 264. 
 And found reducible to chance, 282. 
 
520 
 
 INDEX. 
 
 Strauss, Dr., on immanent finality, 
 
 329. 
 Strauss-Durkeim on the fliglit of birds, 
 
 36. 
 Symmetry, four kinds of, in animals, 
 
 211. 
 
 Teeth, shape of the, 75. 
 Teleology of Lesage, 444. 
 Theology, finite, 338. 
 Thought in the imiverse, how re- 
 cognised, 125. 
 Transcendence and immanence, 336. 
 Trendelenburg — 
 
 On the eye and light, 44. 
 
 On Kant, 323. 
 
 Truth, the search for, 407. 
 
 Types, chemical and zoological, 174. 
 
 TJbags on end and motive, 440. 
 Unknowable, region of the, 413. 
 
 Valves, the, of the veins, 76. 
 Verities and essences, 404. 
 Vision, two systems of, 65. 
 Voltaire on earthquake of Lisbon, 462. 
 
 Waddington on the problem of in- 
 duction, 427. 
 World, the, for what end created, 414. 
 
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 SYNTAX OF THE HEBREW LANGUAGE 
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 OLD TESTAMENT HISTORY OF 
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