STATEMENT OF THE PROBLEM. 105 



This is altogether impossible, since such an opinion 

 is opposed to the genuine development of the intelli- 

 gence, to its primitive constitution and progress, and 

 to the essential solidarity of human and animal 

 nature. 



In the case of animals as well as of man the 

 implicit act and psychical process of communication 

 between the world and themselves consist in the in- 

 dividual and concrete animation of the thing or phe- 

 nomenon perceived ; whence they are resolved into 

 conscious subjects, acting with a given purpose ; the 

 difference in man's case, due to his power of reflec- 

 tion, consists in the fact that he ascribes to the fetish 

 distinct mental characteristics, regarding it as a sub- 

 ject, actuated by will, and invested with an external 

 form. Hence it is impossible that man should have 

 had any primitive intuition of a perfectly rational 

 and universal Idea, since his intelligence is so con- 

 stituted that it is slowly developed from the animal 

 condition into a humanity which is mythically reflex, 

 and he rises from the single to the specific, from 

 phenomena to the type which more or less exactly 

 corresponds to them. 



We are convinced that by these researches, we 

 have eradicated the previous misconception, which 

 cannot be revived or maintained except with the 

 weapons of sophism, and by defying evidence and 

 the very nature of things. 



While man has risen from the individual myth to 



