on of special vital
forces. But how can they be "given"? The sole analogy to be found is the
making of real machines, artificial products as distinguished from
fortuitous products. They cannot be made without the influence and
activity of intelligence. To explain the incomparably more ingenious and
complex vital machine as due to a fortuitous origin and collocation of its
individual parts would be more absurd than it would be to think of a watch
being made in this way. The dominance of a creative idea cannot but be
recognised. An intelligent natural force which is conscious of its aims
and calculates its means must be presupposed, if we are really to satisfy
our sense of causality. It is a matter of personal conviction whether we
find this force in "God" or in the "Absolute."

These views are more fully developed in the theory of dominants expounded
in Reinke's later work, "Die Welt as Tat" (after what has been said the
meaning of the title will be self-evident), and in his "Theoretische
Biologie."(97) Very vigorous and convincing are the author's objections to
the naturalistic theories of organic life, especially to the "self-origin"
of the living, or spontaneous generation. In all vital processes we must
reckon with a "physiological _x_," which cannot be eliminated, which gives
to life its unique and underivable character. There are "secondary
forces," "superforces," "dominants," which bring about what is peculiar in
vital functions and direct their processes. "Vitalism" in the strict sense
is thus here also rejected. The machine-theory is held valid. There are
"dominants" even in our tools and utensils, in our hammer and spoon, and
the "operation" of these cannot be explained merely physico-chemically,
but through the dominants of the form, structure and composition, with
which they have been invested by intelligence. The association with the
views of the tectonists is so far quite apparent. But the idea of
"dominants" soon broadens out. We find dominants of form-development, of
evolution, and so on. What were at first only peculiarities of structure
and architecture have grown almost unawares into dynamic principles of
form which have nothing more to do with the mechanical theory, and which,
because of their dualistic nature, result in conclusions and modes of
explanation which can hardly be called very useful. The lines along which
the idea has developed are intelligible enough. It started originally from
that of th