From the Unconscious to the Conscious 



Now nothing is more familiar in its main outline? 

 than the functioning of our own organism, and nothing 

 seems simpler to the vulgar mind; but in reality nothing 

 is more mysterious. 



What life is in itself involves a mystery as yet 

 impenetrable. The vital mechanism, and the activity 

 of the great organic functions, are equally unexplained. 

 This activity, which lies outside the conscious will of 

 the Self, is elaborated and completed unconsciously, 

 exactly as we shall see is the case in so-called super- 

 normal physiology. Normal function is just as ' occult ' 

 as that which is called supernormal. 



Even the constitution of the organism and all that 

 pertains to it, birth, growth, embryonic development, 

 maintenance of the personality throughout life, organic 

 repair (which in certain animals goes as far as the repro- 

 duction of lost members and even of viscera), all these 

 are so many insoluble enigmas if the classical concept of 

 individuality be accepted. 



Let us try, by the light of this concept, to understand 

 the building up and the functioning of the anatomico- 

 physiological individuality, leaving purely philosophical 

 and even psychological questions on one side. Let us 

 look only at the physical being, the physiological 

 individual, considered as a cellular complex. Whence 

 and how does the complex of cells that makes up a 

 living being draw its specific form ? How does it keep 

 that form throughout its life ? How is its physical 

 personality formed, maintained, and repaired ? 



It is not admissible, let us remark, to invoke an 

 organising dynamism, for that is rejected by classical 

 physiology. We cannot even resort to the ' directing 

 idea ' of Claude Bernard, which is held to be antiquated. 

 How, then, does the cellular complex, by the mere fact 

 of the association of its constituent elements, acquire this 

 vital and individualising power ? 



Whence ? How ? Why ? Once more, so many 



42 



