at all.

Consider the most complex and the most harmonious organism. All the
elements, we are told, conspire for the greatest good of the whole. Very
well, but let us not forget that each of these elements may itself be an
organism in certain cases, and that in subordinating the existence of
this small organism to the life of the great one we accept the principle
of an _external_ finality. The idea of a finality that is _always_
internal is therefore a self-destructive notion. An organism is composed
of tissues, each of which lives for itself. The cells of which the
tissues are made have also a certain independence. Strictly speaking, if
the subordination of all the elements of the individual to the
individual itself were complete, we might contend that they are not
organisms, reserve the name organism for the individual, and recognize
only internal finality. But every one knows that these elements may
possess a true autonomy. To say nothing of phagocytes, which push
independence to the point of attacking the organism that nourishes them,
or of germinal cells, which have their own life alongside the somatic
cells--the facts of regeneration are enough: here an element or a group
of elements suddenly reveals that, however limited its normal space and
function, it can transcend them occasionally; it may even, in certain
cases, be regarded as the equivalent of the whole.

There lies the stumbling-block of the vitalistic theories. We shall not
reproach them, as is ordinarily done, with replying to the question by
the question itself: the "vital principle" may indeed not explain much,
but it is at least a sort of label affixed to our ignorance, so as to
remind us of this occasionally,[21] while mechanism invites us to ignore
that ignorance. But the position of vitalism is rendered very difficult
by the fact that, in nature, there is neither purely internal finality
nor absolutely distinct individuality. The organized elements composing
the individual have themselves a certain individuality, and each will
claim its vital principle if the individual pretends to have its own.
But, on the other hand, the individual itself is not sufficiently
independent, not sufficiently cut off from other things, for us to allow
it a "vital principle" of its own. An organism such as a higher
vertebrate is the most individuated of all organisms; yet, if we take
into account that it is only the development of an ovum forming part of
the body of i