From the Unconscious to the Conscious 



This distinction is not supported by any facts, and 

 contradicts the most certain data of contemporary 

 psychology. 



According to M. Bergson, the divergent lines of 

 evolution have produced on the one hand, the animal 

 instincts, and on the other, the human intelligence. 

 Animal instinct has retained * fringes of intelligence,' 

 and human intelligence has kept a residue of instinct. 

 But instinct and intelligence are separated by an impas- 

 sable abyss, and Man alone is the essential and superior 

 product of evolution, while the vegetable and animal 

 world are its residual products. 



This theory is profoundly distasteful to naturalistic 

 philosophy which sees in it a return, whether sincere 

 or disguised, to old anthropocentric ideas. If it were 

 established on any positive data, it would profoundly 

 disturb the whole evolutionary synthesis. 



But these data do not exist and M. Bergson's 

 teaching rests on an omission fatal to his theory. The 

 concept of Creative Evolution takes no account of sub- 

 conscious psychism. 



The study of this subconscious psychism proves to 

 the point of demonstration, as we shall see, the identity 

 of the nature of animals and man. 



There is no need to seek to discover whether there 

 are in animals more than fringes of intelligence; com- 

 parative psychology is not sufficiently advanced to permit 

 of this being established with any certainty. It will 

 suffice to demonstrate that there is in man much more 

 than residues of instinct; there is a vast subconscious 

 domain which is instinct much more highly developed. 



To this domain belong the automatism of the main 

 functions of life which are identical in animals and men ; 

 the great instinctive impulses of self-preservation, repro- 

 duction, etc., equally potent in animals and Man though 

 frequently masked in the latter; and finally the higher 

 active subconsciousness, of which animal instinct is 



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