, a distribution fixed by a
rational and foreknowing Being (p. 222).

Which of the two conceptions is to be adopted in biology? Teleological
explanations have long been banished from the physical sciences, and in
biology they are only a last resort when physical explanations have
proved incomplete (p. 223). And if the ground of the purposiveness of
living Nature is the same as the ground of the purposiveness of the
universe, is it not reasonable to suppose that explanations which have
proved satisfactory for inorganic things will in time with sufficient
knowledge prove adequate also for organic things?

The teleological conception, again, leads to difficulties particularly
when it is applied to the facts of reproduction. If we suppose that a
vital force unifies and coordinates the organism and is its very
essence, we must also suppose that this force is divisible and that a
part of it--separated in reproduction--can bring about the same results
as the whole. If on the contrary the forces having play in the organism
are the mere result of the particular combination of the matter
composing it, the reconstruction of a particular combination of
molecules in the ovum is all that is necessary to set development
a-going along exactly the course taken by the ovum of the parent.
Another argument against the teleological view is derived from the facts
of the cell-theory. The cell-theory tells us that the molecules of the
living body are not immediately built up in manifold combinations to
form the organism, but are formed first into unit-constructions or
cells, and that these units of composition are invariably formed in all
development, of plants and animals alike, however diverse the goal of
development may be. If there were a vital principle would we not expect
to find that, scorning this roundabout way of reaching its goal, it went
straight to the mark, taking a different and distinctive course for each
individual development, building up the organism direct without the
intermediary of cells? But since there is a universal principle of
development, namely, the formation of cells, does it not seem that the
cells must be the true organisms, that the whole "individual" organism
must be an aggregate of cells, and that the concept of individuality
applied to the organism is accordingly a logical fiction? And it is just
upon this notion of the individuality of the organism that the
teleological concept is based. The teleological v