From the Unconscious to the Conscious 



is very much more restricted than in the lower forms 

 because of the high centralisation in the former which 

 monopolises the greater part of the energy for the 

 functions of the nervous system. 1 Certainly in these 

 more evolved forms it has far less than the amazing 

 power observable in the invertebrates and even in some 

 lower vertebrates ; a power which extends to the renewal 

 of members or even of viscera. 



Even such as it is, it is capable of unexpected 

 marvels, and if it is premature to anticipate a new 

 system of medicine based on a deeper study of 

 the vital dynamism, at least its possibility may be 

 foreseen. 



The function and purpose of the body and the 

 vital dynamism which, together constitute the lower 

 self of the individual, seem to be to limit the activity 

 of the Self and give it a specific direction to specialise 

 it, so to speak. Everything occurs as though each 

 terrestrial existence, each organic objectification, each 

 * incarnation ' if the term is preferred, were for the real 

 being a limitation in time, space, and means. It would 

 seem to resemble a compulsion to a restricted and 

 specialised task, an effort directed to a single aim exclu- 

 sive of others. Sharply defined as this is from the 

 physiological point of view, this limitation is still more 

 strict psychologically. 



This limitation is the cause of the impotence of the 

 supernormal faculties. It trammels the manifestation of 

 the inspiration of intuitive and creative genius. It is the 

 cause of the forgetting during organic life of the immense 

 majority of acquired experiences in their quality of 

 remembrances as distinct from capacities developed; it 



1 It is not absurd to surmise that prolonged artificial quiescence of the 

 nervous system, say by a long period of special hypnosis, might render 

 possible a quite unexpected extension of the healing and reparatory 

 power of the vital dynamism. 



This power is actually shown, exceptionally, in abnormal states and 

 in the cures which are called miraculous. 



233 



