a 'variant principle' acting within the organism, or give up the problem as hopeless.

What, then, can we say as to the nature of the 'germinally conscious impulse '?

Keeping to the general analysis of mind which we have already formulated, we are obliged to conclude that the simplest possible purposive movement means, psychologically, attention to a motor representation (or image) under the stimulus of feeling excited by a sensory presentation. But in fact the simplest possible purposive movement cannot be of this kind, for this implies previous movements whose residual traces (i.e., the motor images) are left in consciousness. Since we have rejected the view that these previous movements can be explained without reference to consciousness or any kind of subjective condition, we must suppose them to have been due directly to feeling excited by a sensory presentation without the mediation. of any kind of motor presentation. But this conclusion is thoroughly unsatisfactory. Where physiological differentiation is so limited that there are no distinct motor nerves, then there are no distinct sensory nerves. If differentiation of presentations is the psychical parallel of differentiation of nervous structure, we seem forbidden to assume the possibility, on the psychical side, of sensory presentations appearing without their motor correlatives. General considerations, as to the character of mental growth, should also lead us to assume that at the stage of consciousness where distinct sensory presentations are found, distinct motor presentations are also found; and that as the distinction of sensory presentations from one another becomes evanescent, so does the distinction of sensory from motor presentations. Physiological

considerations suggest forcibly that both emerge together, as forms of noetic consciousness-i.e., as contents distinguishable (in some degree) by the consciousness for which they exist.1 Physiologically we cannot even speak of a definite "simplest possible purposive movement," or argue from the assumption of such a thing. We cannot represent in intelligible terms the rise of motor presentations, any more than the rise of sensory; we can conceive the differentiation of both, but not the absolute origination of either.

Granting, then, that in the primitive consciousness these distinctions are evanescent-in other words, that the noetic consciousness involved in their discrimination is evanescent-can we suppose that what we analytically know as feeling (pleasure and pain) has a place in it? The only analogy to be suggested for this primitive feeling probably consists of those bodily and organic feelings of ours in which the conditioning presentation is undiscriminated. But in these cases the more intense the feeling is, the more definitely it is localised. In those broad, massive, diffused organic sensations whose feeling-tones are not definite pleasure or definite pain-and which, even when we reflect about them, are only localised vaguely as being somehow 'in us'—we probably have the best analogue of the contents of the primitive consciousness. This view has a physiological basis, for these 'feelings attend the most general vital functions. Professor James suggests a 'buzzing in the ear' as least inadequately representing the earliest form of consciousness; but of course this resemblance is only that of a metaphor, though the metaphor is doubt

1 I of course assume a continuous growth in range and power of intellectual functions through the animal kingdom up to man.

less a good one. Our conclusion therefore must be, that just to the extent to which presentations are undifferentiated from one another, and undistinguished, to that extent feeling and conation are not distinguished from one another or from presentations.

Let us see how far Biology affords help to a satisfactory psychological conclusion on this obscure question. We are postulating a form of consciousness as the primary condition of organic movements, while Biology has to deal with certain general characteristics of these movements in relation to the environment, and may therefore be expected to throw light on the nature of the consciousness which is their condition. What are the general characteristics of living beings which are strictly necessary in order that biological evolution may be possible?

Recent discussions in the biological world seem to have limited the range and importance of 'Natural Selection,' but still leave it as a vera causa of the evolutionary process. Natural Selection is a purely physical, even a quasi-mechanical process by which some organisms more fitted to certain recurring situations than others-and having therefore better opportunities of coping with the actual difficulties incident to the struggle for existence'-survive longer than the others and have more opportunity of propagating their like. The 'struggle for existence' signifies simply that every creature must work for its living, to use a familiar phrase, and in part can only do it at the expense of other forms of life. The dawn and development of social consciousness among animals tends to make this a struggle much less between individuals than between groups. This 'struggle' of course presupposes the continual occurrence of vari

ations (slight or the reverse), from which the favourable are 'naturally selected.' Modern biology is also beginning to recognise that another vera causa of the gradual development of new races of animals is the continual activity and efforts of the animals themselves. This is simply a partial return to the doctrine. of Lamarck and Erasmus Darwin. Charles Darwin and his early followers failed entirely to do justice to the Lamarckian view;1 but now there is distinct evidence—particularly in France and America—that a change is taking place, although Weismann and his followers in England and Germany maintain a vigorous opposition to all movement in the direction of Lamarckian principles. The latter are distinctly opposed to the doctrine which regards the mechanical forces of the environment, together with the excessive multiplication of life, and the (usually) small variations inevitably associated with reproduction, as the sole determinants of the evolutionary process. This is the extreme or 'ultra-Darwinian' view. The essence of Darwin's theory, in its more moderate form as stated above, is that, as a rule, organs grow because they are useful, because they are needed, -that this is the chief though not the exclusive cause of their development and perfection. But they are needed because of the attitude which the creature takes up towards its environment: changed circumstances lead to new wants, and hence to new habits of action, and hence to the modification of organs through the effects of use and disuse, which are inherited; these are the Lamarckian factors.' But it would seem

1 This has been well illustrated by S. Butler in his writings on Evolution, especially in Evolution Old and New. Cf. Osborn, From the Greeks to Darwin, p. 156.

that we may even go further than Lamarck in emphasising the importance of the element of subjective activity. The attitude which the creature adopts towards its circumstances is not wholly determined by those circumstances, but partly by causes in advance of them; we may say that evolution is possible only because a spirit of hopeful endeavour possesses everything - there is something in every creature such that its action is in advance of its experience, at every stage of its growth; it acts spontaneously, and learns by acting, and in learning qualifies itself for a new sphere of life, with which come new experiences and fresh enterprises. Watercreatures did not first acquire lungs, and then proceed to live on land, nor did the creeping things of the earth first grow wings and then attempt to fly; these organs became developed because they were needed, and they were needed because trials were made in advance of experience,―trials which there was nothing in past experience to justify.

Thus the conclusion is that in every creature, organism, or animal there is an indwelling principle whichhowever little else Biology may be able to say about it -is in effect a Wille zum Leben, a conatus, an epos or striving on the part of every living thing not only to keep itself alive, but to increase the scope and fulness of its life. It is a significant fact that the greatest thinkers, prophets, and philosophers of the Eastern and Western worlds, have recognised such a principle operative through all creatures, and being more than the sum of all, though they have given very different accounts of its nature and tendency. But it is not relevant to our present purpose to discuss the significance of the conception when expressed in this general