22 An Introcjuction to
/ to have shown that otr duration can be presented to us directly in an intuition,
j that it can be suggested to us indirectly
by images, but that it can never — ^if we
confine the word concept to its proper
meaning — be enclosed in a conceptual
f representation.
Let us try for an instant to consider our
duration as a multiplicity. It will then be
necessary to add that the terms of this
multiplicity, instead of being distinct, as
they are in any other multiplicity, encroach
on one another; and that while we can no
doubt, by an eflfort of imagination, solidify
duration once it has elapsed, divide it into
juxtaposed portions and count all these
portions, yet this operation is accomplished
on the frozen memory of the duration, on
the stationary trace which the mobility of
duration leaves behind it, and not on the
duration itself. We must admit, therefore,
that if there is a multiplicity here, it bears
no resemblance to any other multiplicity
we know. Shall we say, then, that dura-
Metaphysics 23
tion has unity? Doubtless, a continuity of
elements which prolong themselves into one
another participates in unity as much as
in multiplicity; but this moving, changing,
colored, living unity has hardly anything
in common with the abstract, motionless,
and empty unity which the concept of pure
unity circumscribes. Shall we conclude
from this that duration must be defined as
unity and multiplicity at the same time?
But singularly enough, however much I
manipulate the two concepts, portion
them out, combine them diflferently, prac-
tise on them the most subtle operations
of mental chemistry, I never obtain any-
thing which resembles the simple in-
tuition that I have of duration; while,
on the contrary, when I replace myself in '
duration by an effort of intuition, I im-
mediately perc^ve how it is unity, multi-
plicity, and many other things besides^'
These diflFerent concepts, then, were only so
many standpoints* from which we could
consider duration. Neither separated nor
An Introduction to
reunited have they made us penetrate inl it.
We do penetrate into it, however, and
that can only be by an effort of intuition.
In this sense, an inner, absolute knowledge
of the duration of the self by the self is
possible. But if metaphysics here demands
and can obtain an intuition, science has
none the less need of an analysis. Now
it is a confusion between the function
of analysis and that of intuition which
gives birth to the discussions between
the schools and the conflicts between
systems.
Psychology, in fact, proceeds like all the
other sciences by analysis. It resolves the
self, which has been given to it at first in
a simple intuition, into sensations, feelings,
ideas, etc., which it studies separately. It
substitutes, then, for the self a series of
elements which form the facts of psy-
chology. But are these elements really
parts? That is the whole question,
is because it has l)een evaded tl
int^H
Metaphysics 25
problem of human personality has so often been stated in insoluble terms.
It is incontestable that every psychical \
state, simply because it belongs to a per- /
son, reflects the whole of a personality.
Every feeling, however simple it may be,
contains virtually within it the whole
past and present of the being experiencing
it, and, consequently, can only be separated
and constituted into a " state " by an effort
of abstraction or of analysis. But it is no ^ .,
less incontestable that without this effort /
of abstraction or analysis there would be j
no possible development of the science of '
psychology. What, then, exactly, is the
operation by which a psychologis t detaches
a mental state in order to erect it into a
more or less independent entity? He be-
gins by neglecting that special coloring
of the personality which cannot be ex-
pressed in known and common terms.
Then he endeavors to isolate, in the person
already thus simplified, some aspect which
lends itself to an interesting inquiry. If
An Introduction to
he is considering inclination, for exampi
he will neglect the inexpressible shade
which colors it, and which makes the in-
clination mine and not jours; he will fix
his attention on the movement by which
our personality leans towards a certain
object : he will isolate this attitude, and it
is this special aspect of the personality, this
snapshot of the mobility of the inner life,
this " diagram " of concrete inclination,
that he will erect into an independent
fact. There is in this something very like
what an artist passing through Paris does
when he makes, for example, a sketch of a
tower of Notre Dame. The tower is in-
separably united to the building, which is
itself no less inseparably united to the
ground, to its surroundings, to the whole
of Paris, and so on. It is first necessary
to detach it from all these ; only one aspect
of the whole is noted, that formed by the
tower of Notre Dame. Moreover, the spe-
cial form of this tower is doe to the group-
ing of the stones of which it is composed ;
ipl^H tade '
Metaphysics 27
but the artist does not concern himself with
these stones, he notes only the silhouette of
the tower. For the real and internal organi-
zation of the thing he substitutes, then, an
external and schematic representation. So
that, on the whole, his sketch corresponds
to an observation of the object from a cer-
tain point of view and to the choice of a
certain means of representation. But ex-
actly the same thing holds true of the
operation by which the psychologist ex-
tracts a single mental state from the whole
I)ersonality. This isolated psychical state
is hardly anything but a sketch, the com-
mencement of an artificial reconstruction;
it is the whole considered under a certain
elementary aspect in which we are specially
interested and which we have carefully
noted. It is not a part, but an element.
It has not been obtained by a natural
dismemberment, but by analysis.
Now beneath all the sketches he has made
at Paris the visitor will probably, by way
of memento, write the word " Paris." And
^n Introduction to
as he has really seen Paris, he will be able,
with the help of the original intnitiou he
had of the whole, to place his sketches
therein, and so join them up together. But
there is no way of performing the inverse
operation; it is impossible, even with an
infinite number of accurate sketches, and
even with the word "Paris" which indi-
cates that they must be combined together,
to get back to an intuition that one has
never bad, and to give oneself an impi-ession
of what Paris is like if one has never seen
it. This is because we are not dealing here
with real parts, but with mere notes of the
total impression. To take a still more
striking example, where the notation is
more completely Rymbolic, suppose that I
am shown, mixed together at random, the
letters which make up a poem I am
ignorant of. If the letters were parts of
the poem, I could attempt to reconstitute
the poem with them by trying the different
possible arrangements, as a child dofs with
the pieces of a Chinese puzzle. But I
Metaphysics 29
should never for a moment think of attempt-
ing such a thing in this ease, because the
letters are not component partSy but only
partial expressions, which is quite a dif-
ferent thing. That is why, if I know the
poem, I at once put each of the letters in
its proper place and join them up without
difficulty by a continuous connection,
whilst the inverse operation is impossible.
Even when I believe I am actually attempt-
ing this inverse operation, even when I put
the letters end to end, I begin by thinking
of some plausible meaning. I thereby give
myself an intuition, and from this intuition
I attempt to redescend to the elementary
symbols which would reconstitute its ex-
pression. The very idea of reconstituting a
thing by operations practised on symbolic
elements alone implies such an absurdity
that it would never occur to any one if
they recollected that they were not dealing
with fragments of the thing, but only, as /
it were, with fragments of its symbol.
Such is, however, the undertaking of the
An Introduction to
philosophcre who Iry to reconstruct
souality with psychical states, whether they
confine themselves to those states alone, or
whether they add a kind of thread for the
purpose of joining the states together. Both
empiricists and rationalists are victims of
I the same fallacy. Both of them mistake
partial notations for real parts, thus con-
fusing the point of view of analysis and
of intuition, of science and of metaphysics.
The empiricists say quite rightly that
psychologi<ral analysis discovers nothing
more in personality than paychical states.
Such is, in fact, the function, and the very
definition of analysis. The psychologist has
nothing else to do but analyze personality,
that is, to note certain states; at the most
he may put the lahel " ego " on these states
in saying they are " states of the ego," juat
as the artist writes the word " Paris " on
each of his sketches. On the level at which
the psychologist places himself, and on
which he must place himself, the "ego
only a sign by which the primitive,
they 1
Metaphysics 3'
moreover very confused, intuition which
has furnished the psychologist with his
subject-matter is recalled ; it is only a word,
and the great error here lies in believing
that while remaining on the same level we
can find behind the word a thing. Such
has been the error of those philosophers who
have not been able to resign themselves to
being only psychologists in psychology,
Taine and Stuart Mill, for example. Psy-
chologists in the method they apply, they
have remained metaphysicians in the object
they set before themselves. They desire an
intuition, and by a strange inconsistency )
they seek this intuition in analysis, which/
is the very negation of it. "I They look for'
the ego, and they claim to find it in psy-
chical states, though this diversity of states
has itself only been obtained, and could only
be obtained, by transporting oneself outside
the ego altogether, so as to make a series
of sketches, notes, and more or less symbolic
and schematic diagrams. Thus, however
much they place the states side by side,
\n Introduction to
mijltiplying points of contact and exploring
the intervals, the ego always escapes them,
so that they finish by seeing in it nothing
bnt a vain phantom. We might as well
deny that the Iliad had a meaning, on the
ground that we had looked in vain for that
meaning in the intervals between the letters
jof which it is composed.
;' Philosophical empiricism is born here,
jthen, of a confusion between the point of
, /view of intuition and that of analysis.
Seeldng for the original in the translation,
where naturally it cannot be, it denies the
existence of the original on the ground that
it is not found in the translation. It leada
of necessity to negations ; but on examining
the matter closely, we perceive that these
negations simply mean that analysis is not
intuition, which is self-evident. From the
original, and, one must add, very indistinct
intuition which gives positive science its
material, science passes immediately to
analysis, which multiplies to infinity its
observations of this material from outside
Metaphysics 33
points of view. It soon comes to believe
that by putting together all these diagrams
it can reconstitute the object itself. No
wonder, then, that it sees this object fly be-
fore it, like a child that would like to make
a solid plaything out of the shadows out-
lined along the wall!
But rationalism is the dupe of the same
illusion. It starts out from the same con-
fusion as empiricism, and remains equally
powerless to reach the inner self. Like
empiricism, it considers psychical states as
so many fragments detached from an egoi
that hinds them together. Like empiricism,
it tries to join these fragments together in
■order to re-create the unity of the self.
Kke empiricism, finally, it sees this unity
Bf the self, in the continually renewed effort
It makes to clasp it, steal away indefinitely
pke a phantom. But whilst empiricism,;
■freary of the struggle, ends by declaring)
that there ia nothing else but the multi-(
plicity of psychical states, rationalism per-)
3tB in affirming the "unity of the person.^
34 An Introduction to
It is true that, seeking this unity on the
level of the psychical states themselves, and
obliged, besides, to put down to the account
of these states all the qualities and deter-
minations that it finds by analysis (since
analysis by its very definition leads always
to states ) , nothing is left to it, for the unity
of personality, but something purely nega-
tive, the absence of all determination. The
psychical states having necessarily in this
analysis taken and kept for themselves
everything that can serve as matter, the
; " unity of the ego " can never be more than
a form without content. It will be abso-
lutely indeterminate and absolutely void.
To these detached psychical states, to
these shadows of the ego, the sum of which
was for the empiricists the equivalent of
the self, rationalism, in order to reconstitute
personality, adds something still more un-
real, the void in which these shadows move
— a place for shadows, one might say. How
could this " form," which is,4tf truth form-
less, serve to characterize a living, active,