vn] The Awakening of Personality 2 \ i 



that is manifested in the whole cosmos while its pro- 

 gressive development becomes a growing acquaintance 

 with the full meaning of that purpose and solidarity. 

 As well as being the recognition of purpose in the cosmos, 

 it is the recognition that / have purpose. Before, the 

 purpose of another was blindly followed out in evolution 

 as a whole ; now the eyes see, and the self -purposes are 

 visualised in accordance with the purpose manifested 

 all around. 



This, of course, simply brings us back to the recog- 

 nition of self-hood, but it gives fuller meaning to Berg- 

 son's phrase "the inturning of the consciousness on 

 itself." Bergson's "unconscious consciousness" is the 

 blind following out of purpose under the urging of the 

 vital impulse, or whatever else one chooses to call the 

 claim of the creature to increasing freedom; self -con- 

 sciousness is the recognition and self-chosen realisation 

 of that same purpose, whose ultimate object is fellow- 

 ship. 



Let us, then, analyse this question of closed systems 

 in relation to the origination of personality a little more 

 closely. The operation of natural law appears always 

 to tend towards the formation of such systems, be they 

 atoms, planetary groups, animal colonies, or what you 

 will. This is very fully set out in L 'Evolution Criatrice. 

 The inorganic world consists of systems that are 

 practically closed or isolated. As Bergson points out, 

 this is not absolutely true. There are tenuous threads 

 that bind the organised universe into one whole. There 

 is unity, or the universe would not serve its purpose; 

 and we have found purpose preeminently characteristic 

 of all that exists. Similarly with the creatures that in- 

 habit the earth. Each group the organism and its 

 congeners, their prey and their enemies forms a nearly 

 closed system. Much of the environment -sum bears no 

 direct relation to the activities of the group. Bees have 



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