: they have come from his hands with his personal mark
in many places. We cannot express all that the present work owes to him.

ARTHUR MITCHELL

HARVARD UNIVERSITY

CONTENTS

PAGE

INTRODUCTION ix

CHAPTER I

THE EVOLUTION OF LIFE--MECHANISM AND TELEOLOGY

Of duration in general--Unorganized bodies and abstract
time--Organized bodies and real duration--Individuality and
the process of growing old 1

Of transformism and the different ways of interpreting it--Radical
mechanism and real duration: the relation of biology to
physics and chemistry--Radical finalism and real duration:
the relation of biology to philosophy 23

The quest of a criterion--Examination of the various theories
with regard to a particular example--Darwin and insensible
variation--De Vries and sudden variation--Eimer and
orthogenesis--Neo-Lamarckism and the hereditability of
acquired characters 59

Result of the inquiry--The _vital impetus_ 87

CHAPTER II

THE DIVERGENT DIRECTIONS OF THE EVOLUTION OF
LIFE--TORPOR, INTELLIGENCE, INSTINCT

General idea of the evolutionary process--Growth--Divergent
and complementary tendencies--The meaning of progress and of
adaptation 98

The relation of the animal to the plant--General tendency of
animal life--The development of animal life 105

The main directions of the evolution of life: torpor, intelligence,
instinct 135

The nature of the intellect 151

The nature of instinct 165

Life and consciousness--The apparent place of man in nature 176

CHAPTER III

ON THE MEANING OF LIFE--THE ORDER OF NATURE
AND THE FORM OF INTELLIGENCE

Relation of the problem of life to the problem of knowledge--The
method of philosophy--Apparent vicious circle of the method
proposed--Real vicious circle of the opposite method 186

Simultaneous genesis of matter and intelligence--Geometry
inherent in matter--Geometrical tendency of