i.] RADICAL FINALISM 39 



time is still spoken of: one pronounces the word, but one 

 does not think of the thing. For time is here deprived 

 of efficacy, and if it does nothing, it is nothing. Radical 

 mechanism implies a metaphysic in which the totality 

 of the real is postulated complete in eternity, and in which 

 the apparent duration of things expresses merely the in- 

 firmity of a mind that cannot know everything at once. 

 But duration is something very different from this for 

 our consciousness, that is to say, for that which is most 

 indisputable in our experience. We perceive duration 

 as a stream against which we cannot go. It is the founda- 

 tion of our being, and, as we feel, the very substance of 

 the world in which we live. It is of no use to hold up 

 before our eyes the dazzling prospect of a universal mathe- 

 matic; we cannot sacrifice experience to the requirements 

 of a system. That is why we reject radical mechanism. 



But radical finalism is quite as unacceptable, and for 

 the same reason. The doctrine of teleology, in its extreme 

 form, as we find it in Leibniz for example, implies that 

 things and beings merely realize a programme previously 

 arranged. But if there is nothing unforeseen, no invention 

 or creation in the universe, time is useless again. As in the 

 mechanistic hypothesis, here again it is supposed that 

 all is given. Finalism thus understood is only inverted 

 mechanism. It springs from the same postulate, with 

 this sole difference, that in the movement of our finite 

 intellects along successive things, whose successiveness 

 is reduced to a mere appearance, it holds in front of us the 

 light with which it claims to guide us, instead of putting 

 it behind. It substitutes the attraction of the future for 

 the impulsion of the past. But succession remains none 

 the less a mere appearance, as indeed does movement 

 itself. In the doctrine of Leibniz, time is reduced to a 



