XII
PURPOSE AND CHANCE
AN objection is no doubt awaiting us which many consider absolutely fatal to the argument for purpose or design in nature, as above presented. That argument, it will be said, rests entirely upon the assumption that the sole alternative to Purpose is Chance, an assumption which, if not dishonest, betrays ignorance scarcely less discreditable: for men of science constantly warn us that there is no such thing as Chance,—that every occurrence in nature, one as much as another, testifies to the uniformity and regularity of natural causation,—and that if we speak of any phenomenon being due to Chance, this term is but a conventional symbol signifying that we do not know what caused it.
Amongst those who take up this position, which is well-nigh universal, no better representative need be sought than Professor Huxley, who treated the point formally, and was manifestly well satisfied with his performance. We have already heard him declare belief in Chance to be an absurdity of which none but parsons could be guilty, a class in which he clearly conceived the low-water-mark of intelligence[{111}] to be reached. On another occasion,[154] he set himself expressly to the exposure of what he described as, "The most singular of the, perhaps immortal, fallacies, which live on, Tithonus-like, when sense and force have long deserted them."
Probably the best answer [he writes] to those who talk of Darwinism meaning the reign of "Chance," is to ask them what they themselves understand by "Chance." Do they believe that anything in this universe happens without reason or without a cause? Do they really conceive that any event has no cause, and could not have been predicted by any one who had a sufficient insight into the order of Nature? If they do, it is they who are the inheritors of antique superstition and ignorance, and whose minds have never been illumined by a ray of scientific thought.
As an object lesson for his enlightenment, the Professor bids one of these benighted folk betake himself to the sea-shore on which a heavy storm is breaking; and having painted a rather elaborate word-picture of the scene, he thus continues:
Surely here, if anywhere, he [the unenlightened one] will say that chance is supreme, and bend the knee as one who has entered the very penetralia of his divinity. But the man of science knows that here as everywhere, perfect order is manifested; that there is not a curve of the waves, not a note in the howling chorus, not a rainbow-glint on a bubble, which is other than a necessary[{112}] consequence of the ascertained laws of nature; and that with a sufficient knowledge of the conditions, competent physico-mathematical skill could account for, and indeed predict, every one of these "chance" events.
This, however, is mere beating of the air, having no bearing whatever upon the question at issue; and we can only wonder that so able a man as Huxley could thus absolutely miss the whole point, while remaining serenely unconscious that he did so. No sane man ever entertained the foolish notion with which he credits his man of straw. On the contrary, it is precisely those whom he so heartily despises, that disbelieve in Chance, and deny it any share in the making of the world. They neither regard Chance as a possible cause of phenomena, nor make of it a kind of deity or fetish, as some appear inclined to do with Science. Their contention is that according to those who, with Huxley, reject the idea of intelligent purpose, Chance would needs be introduced as a ruling element in nature, which would be absurd. Nor in thus arguing do they introduce any notion so irrational as that of "absolute" Chance, of events happening without causes. But unquestionably there can be "relative" Chance. A cause fully sufficient for the production of a result, may have no tendency whatever to determine or direct this result to a particular end; and if in such circumstances this end be attained it is by Chance. In particular, should many independent[{113}] results of purely mechanical forces combine to produce a result, as intelligence would combine them, its production can only be ascribed to Chance. "Chance" has therefore a very real meaning. It is not a Cause, but the absence of Cause: not of Cause altogether, but of the determining Cause requisite for the production of certain results. The argument based upon the impotence of Chance to obtain such results, is precisely that which the most exact of all the Sciences, Mathematics, accepts and applies in the Theory of Chances.
The answer to the question which Professor Huxley evidently deems unanswerable is plain enough. By "Chance" is meant the concurrence, unguided by Purpose, of independent forces to produce a definite effect. "Chance" denotes the absence of Purpose, as "Vacuum" denotes the absence of air; and when it is denied that certain results can come about by chance, or fortuitously, it is as when we deny that life can be sustained in vacuo. It is no positive feature or action of the vacuum that we have in mind, for its essence is negative; but just because of that negative character, experience has taught us, that it cannot fulfil certain functions. In the same manner the potency of "Chance" is denied, simply because it is not Purpose.