n8 CREATIVE EVOLUTION CHAP. 



ness sleeps in the animal which has degenerated into a 

 motionless parasite, it probably awakens in the vegetable 

 that has regained liberty of movement, and awakens in j ust 

 the degree to which the vegetable has reconquered this 

 liberty. Nevertheless, consciousness and unconscious 

 ness mark the directions in which the two kingdoms 

 have developed, in this sense, that to find the best 

 specimens of consciousness in the animal we must 

 ascend to the highest representatives of the series, 

 whereas, to find probable cases of vegetable conscious 

 ness, we must descend as low as possible in the scale of 

 plants down to the zoospores of the algae, for instance, 

 and, more generally, to those unicellular organisms 

 which may be said to hesitate between the vegetable 

 form and animality. From this standpoint, and in this 

 measure, we should define the animal by sensibility and 

 awakened consciousness, the vegetable by conscious 

 ness asleep and by insensibility. 



To sum up, the vegetable manufactures organic sub 

 stances directly with mineral substances ; as a rule, this 

 aptitude enables it to dispense with movement and so 

 with feeling. Animals, which are obliged to go in 

 search of their food, have evolved in the direction of 

 locomotor activity, and consequently of a consciousness 

 more and more distinct, more and more ample. 



Now, it seems to us most probable that the animal 

 cell and the vegetable cell are derived from a common 

 stock, and that the first living organisms oscillated 

 between the vegetable and animal form, participating 

 in both at once. Indeed, we have just seen that the 

 characteristic tendencies of the evolution of the two 

 kingdoms, although divergent, coexist even now, both 

 in the plant and in the animal. The proportion alone 



