the bee is not useful to itself alone, it is useful for the propagation of plants so that one might say that this fur has been developed by the bees for the propagation of plants, not for themselves. Don’t you begin to see in this behavior that animals sacrifice themselves for the welfare of other types of life, instead of trying to eat as much as possible merely for their own existence or upkeep? The more one studies the behavior of animals and of plants, the more clearly one sees that they have a task to perform for the welfare of the whole.
There are certain unicellular animals which live in the ocean and drink such an enormous quantity of water that if they were calculated to the proportion of man, they would need to drink a gallon of water per second during their whole life. Certainly one could call this intemperance, for these animals cannot do it to satisfy their thirst. It is not a vice, however, it is rather like a virtue. They must work at high speed because their task is to filter all the water of the ocean, to eliminate from it certain salts which would be a terrible poison for all the other inhabitants of the ocean.
The same is true of corals. Corals are inferior animals and if the theory of evolution were true, it would be incomprehensible that having been among the first animals to appear, they have remained for millions of years always the same. Why have they not changed? Because they have a function to fulfil and they fulfil it in a perfect manner. This is the same function as that of the animals mentioned above: to eliminate from the ocean the poisonous matter which is brought into it by the flow of rivers. Their work is that of coating themselves with those salts. This has been going on for millions and millions of years and so we can imagine the enormous quantity of rock they have accumulated. They accumulate enormous quantities and these animals have been entrusted with the formation of new continents. Look at the innumerable little islands of the Pacific Ocean that today have come into the lime-light on account of the war which has been fought between the Japanese on one side and the Allies on the other. Those islands are constructions made by these animals, the corals. They are the tops of mountains that today are rising out of the water, forming islands. If we study the rocks on dry land, we find that many of them are formed by animals. Even in the Himalayas much of the massif is of coralline origin. We may well say that these corals are the constructors of our continents.
So the more one studies the functions of these animals, the more one finds, that these functions are not for the upkeep of the animal’s body only, but that all give their contribution to the harmony of the whole. Let us say then that these animals are not merely inhabitants of the earth: they are the constructors and workers of this earth, they keep it going. This is the vision given by these new discoveries. Once given this light, by studying the geological epochs of the past, we find testimony of similar work carried out by animals which are now extinct. There has always been this relation between the animals and the earth, of the animals between themselves and between the animals and the vegetation. A new science has arisen from this which is called Ecology, a science which is widely applied today and forms an important part of the study in universities. Ecology is a study of the different behaviors of animals, and it reveals that they are not here to compete with each other, but to carry out an enormous work serving the harmonious upkeep of the earth. When we say they are workers, we mean that each one of them has a purpose, a special aim to fulfil and the result of these tasks is our beautiful world.
A fundamental study today is to consider the task of each upon this earth. Behavior does not merely fulfil the desire to continue to live. It serves a task which evidently remains unknown and unconscious to the being, because it does not form part of what one might wish. If animals were to become self-conscious, they would be conscious of their habits, of the beauty of the places in which they live, but certainly the corals would never realize or understand that they are the builders of the world, nor would the worms which fertilize the earth consider themselves agriculturists, nor would others consider themselves the purifiers of the environment and so forth. The purpose which places the animals in relation to the earth and its upkeep would never enter their consciousness. Yet life and its relation with the surface of the earth, the purity of the air, the purity of water are dependent upon these tasks. So there is another force which is not the force of the desire for survival, but a force which harmonizes all the tasks. Let us say that each one is important, not because it is beautiful, or because it has succeeded in the struggle for existence, but because it carries out tasks which are useful to the whole and the effort of each is to try and reach the place allotted to it and the task which it is to fulfil. That is why we said that there was a pre-established plan, and that the organs were formed to fulfil this plan. This pre-established plan puts the animals in relation with the task that they have to accomplish upon the earth. Nor is the purpose of life to perfect oneself, nor only to evolve. The purpose of life is to obey the hidden command which ensures harmony among all and creates an ever better world. We are not created only to enjoy the world, we are created in order to evolve the cosmos. Today the influence of the existence of a cosmic plan is gradually changing the theory of the linear evolution of past times.
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