284 CREATIVE EVOLUTION CHAP. 



body just where it really is, on the road that leads to the 

 life of the spirit. But it will then no longer have to 

 do with definite living beings. Life as a whole, from 

 the initial impulsion that thrust it into the world, will 

 appear as a wave which rises, and which is opposed by 

 the descending: movement of matter. On the greater 



O o 



part of its surface, at different heights, the current is 

 converted by matter into a vortex. At one point alone 

 it passes freely, dragging with it the obstacle which will 

 weigh on its progress but will not stop it. At this 

 point is humanity ; it is our privileged situation. On 

 the other hand, this rising wave is consciousness, 

 and, like all consciousness, it includes potentialities 

 without number which interpenetrate and to which 

 consequently neither the category of unity nor that of 

 multiplicity is appropriate, made as they both are for 

 inert matter. The matter that it bears along with it, 

 and in the interstices of which it inserts itself, alone can 

 divide it into distinct individualities. On flows the 

 current, running through human generations, sub 

 dividing itself into individuals. This subdivision was 

 vaguely indicated in it, but could not have been made 

 clear without matter. Thus souls arc continually being 

 created, which, nevertheless, in a certain sense pre 

 existed. They are nothing else than the little rills into 

 which the great river of life divides itself, flowing 

 through the body of humanity. The movement of 

 the stream is distinct from the river bed, although it 

 must adopt its winding course. Consciousness is 

 distinct from the organism it animates, although it 

 must undergo its vicissitudes. As the possible actions 

 which a state of consciousness indicates are at every 

 instant beginning to be carried out in the nervous 

 centres, the brain underlines at every instant the motor 



