{"collection":"philosophy-ethics","full_text_available":true,"graph_url":"https://unchartedknowledge.5gfusion.net/v2/api/page/gutenberg_21668/graph","html_url":"https://unchartedknowledge.5gfusion.net/v2/page/gutenberg_21668","id":"gutenberg_21668","license":"Public Domain (US)","rights_basis":"gutenberg_metadata_copyright_false","source":"gutenberg","source_url":"https://www.gutenberg.org/ebooks/21668","summary":null,"tags":["Category: Philosophy & Ethics","Life","Philosophy"],"text":"[Note:  I have made the following spelling changes: Prologue:  \"methed\"\nto \"method\"; Chapter 2: \"renders imposssible\" to \"renders impossible\";\n\"which man possessses\" to \"which man possesses\"; \"absolute\nunqestionable\" to \"absolute unquestionable\"; \"loathesomeness\" to\n\"loathsomeness\"; Chapter 3: \"alllowed to distort\" to \"allowed to\ndistort\"; Chapter 4: \"itelf in its precise\" to \"itself in its precise\";\nChapter 5: \"do very considerably\" to \"do vary considerably\";\nChapter 6: \"oversoul\" to \"over-soul\"; \"its own permonition\" to \"its\nown premonition\"; \"arbitrement\" to \"arbitrament\"; \"subtratum\" to\n\"substratum\"; \"gooodeness\" to \"goodness\"; Chapter 7: \"flicherings\" to\n\"filcherings\"; \"Perapity\" to \"Peripety\"; Chapter 8: \"penerated\" to\n\"penetrated\"; Chapter 9: \"the anthropomorphic expresssion\" to\n\"the anthropomorphic expression\"; \"convuluted\" to \"convoluted\";\nChapter 10: \"a vast hierachy\" to \"a vast hierarchy\"; Chapter 11: \"to\nbe too anthromorphic\" to \"to be too anthropomorphic\"; \"strictly strictly\nspeaking\" to \"strictly speaking\"; Chapter 13: \"working in isolaton\"\nto \"working in isolation\"; \"If to this the astronomer answer\" to\n\"If to this the astronomer answers\"; \"difficult to decribe\" to\n\"difficult to describe\"; \"the asethetic sense\" to \"the aesthetic\nsense\"; \"no attentuation\" to \"no attenuation\"; \"the Complex Vision\nrepresents\" to \"the complex vision represents\"; Conclusion: \"is\neternaly divided\" to \"is eternally divided\"; \"rest of the imortals\"\nto \"rest of the immortals\"; \"elimination of the objectice mystery\" to\n\"elimination of the objective mystery\". The word \"over-soul\" is\nmostly spelled with a hyphen, so I added a hyphen to all instances of\nthis word. The word \"outflowing\" is mostly spelled without a hyphen,\nso I deleted the hyphens from all instances of this word. All other\nspelling remains the same.]\n\n\n\nTHE COMPLEX VISION\n\nBY\n\nJOHN COWPER POWYS\n\n\n\nNEW YORK\nDODD, MEAD AND COMPANY\n1920\n\n\n\nDEDICATED\nTO\nLITTLETON ALFRED\n\n\n\nPROLOGUE\n\nWhat I am anxious to attempt in this anticipatory summary of the\ncontents of this book is a simple estimate of its final conclusions, in\nsuch a form as shall eliminate all technical terms and reduce the\nmatter to a plain statement, intelligible as far as such a thing can be\nmade intelligible, to the apprehension of such persons as have not\nhad the luck, or the ill-luck, of a plunge into the ocean of\nmetaphysic.\n\nA large portion of the book deals with what might be called our\n_instrument of research_; in other words, with the problem of what\nparticular powers of insight the human mind must use, if its vision\nof reality is to be of any deeper or more permanent value than the\n\"passing on the wing,\" so to speak, of individual fancies and\nspeculations.\n\nThis instrument of research I find to be the use, by the human\nperson, of all the various energies of personality concentrated into\none point; and the resultant spectacle of things or reality of things,\nwhich this concentrated vision makes clear, I call the original\nrevelation of the complex vision of man.\n\nHaving analyzed in the earlier portions of the book the peculiar\nnature of our organ of research and the peculiar difficulties--\namounting to a very elaborate work of art--which have to be\novercome before this _concentration_ takes place, I proceed in the\nlater portions of the book to make as clear as I can what kind of\nreality it is that we actually do succeed in grasping, when this\nconcentrating process has been achieved. I indicate incidentally that\nthis desirable concentration of the energies of personality is so\ndifficult a thing that we are compelled to resort to our memory of\nwhat we experienced in rare and fortunate moments in order to\nestablish its results. I suggest that it is not to our average moments\nof insight that we have to appeal, but to our exceptional moments of\ninsight; since it is only at rare moments in our lives that we are able\nto enter into what I call the _eternal vision_.\n\nTo what, then, does this conclusion amount, and what is this\nresultant reality, in as far as we are able to gather it up and\narticulate its nature from the vague records of our memory?\n\nI have endeavoured to show that it amounts to the following series\nof results. What we are, in the first place, assured of is the\nexistence within our own individual body of a real actual living thing\ncomposed of a mysterious substance wherein what we call mind and\nwhat we call matter are fused and intermingled. This is our real and\nself-conscious soul, the thing in us which says, \"I am I,\" of which\nthe physical body is only one expression, and of which all the bodily\nsenses are only one gateway of receptivity.\n\nThe soul within us becomes aware of its own body simultaneously\nwith its becoming aware of all the other bodies which fill the visible\nuniverse. It is then by an act of faith or imagination that the soul\nwithin us takes for granted and assumes that there must be a soul\nresembling our own soul within each one of those alien bodies, of\nwhich, simultaneously with its own, it becomes aware.\n\nAnd since the living basis of our personality is this real soul within\nus, it follows that all those energies of personality, whose\nconcentration is the supreme work of art, are the energies of this real\nsoul. If, therefore, we assume that all the diverse physical bodies\nwhich fill the universe possess, each of them, an inner soul\nresembling our own soul, we are led to the conclusion that just as\nour own soul half-creates and half-discovers the general spectacle of\nthings which it names \"the universe,\" so all the alien souls in the\nworld half-create and half-discover what they feel as _their_\nuniverse.\n\nIf our revelation stopped at this point we should have to admit that\nthere was not one universe, but as many universes are there are\nliving souls. It is at this point, however, that we become aware that\nall these souls are able, in some degree or other, to enter into\ncommunication. They are able to do this both by the bodily sounds\nand signs which constitute language and by certain immaterial\nvibrations which seem to make no use of the body at all. In this\ncommunication between different souls, as far as humanity is\nconcerned, a very curious experience has to be recorded.\n\nWhen two human beings dispute together upon any important\nproblem of life, there is always an implicit appeal made by both of\nthem to an invisible arbiter, or invisible standard of arbitration, in\nthe heart of which both seem aware that the reality, upon which\ntheir opinions differ, is to be found in its eternal truth. What then\nis this invisible standard of arbitration? Whatever it is, we are\ncompelled to assume that it satisfies and transcends the deepest and\nfurthest reach of personal vision in all the souls that approach it.\nAnd what is the deepest and furthest reach of our individual soul?\nThis seems to be a projection upon the material plane of the very\nstuff and substance of the soul's inmost nature.\n\nThis very \"stuff\" of the soul, this outflowing of the substance of the\nsoul, I name \"emotion\"; and I find it to consist of two eternally\nconflicting elements; what I call the element of \"love,\" and what I\ncall the element of \"malice.\" This emotion of love, which is the\nfurthest reach of the soul, I find to be differentiated when it comes\ninto contact with the material universe into three ultimate ways of\ntaking life; namely, the way which we name the pursuit of beauty,\nthe way which we name the pursuit of goodness, and the way which\nwe name the pursuit of truth. But these three ways of taking life find\nalways their unity and identity in that emotion of love which is the\npsychic substance of them all.\n\nThe invisible standard of arbitration, then, to which an appeal is\nalways made, consciously or unconsciously, when two human\nbeings dispute upon the mystery of life, is a standard of arbitration\nwhich concerns the real nature of love, and the real nature of what\nwe call \"the good\" and \"the true\" and \"the beautiful.\"\n\nAnd since we have found in personality the one thing in existence of\nwhich we are absolutely assured, because we are aware of it, _on the\ninside_, so to speak, in the depths of our own souls, it becomes\nnecessary that in place of thinking of this invisible standard as any\nspiritual or chemical \"law\" in any stream of \"life-force\" we should\nthink of it as being as personal as we ourselves are personal. For\nsince what we call the universe has been already described as\nsomething which is half-created and half-discovered by the vision of\nsome one soul in it or of all the souls in it, it is clear that we have\nno longer any right to think of these ultimate ideas as \"suspended\" in\nthe universe, or as general \"laws\" of the universe. They are\nsuspended in the individual soul, which half-creates and\nhalf-discovers the universe according to their influence.\n\nPersonality is the only permanent thing in life; and if truth, beauty,\ngoodness, and love, are to have permanence they must depend for\ntheir permanence not upon some imaginary law in a universe\nhalf-created by personality but upon the indestructible nature of\npersonality itself.\n\nThe human soul is aware of an invisible standard of beauty. To this\ninvisible standard it is compelled to make an unconscious appeal in\nall matters of argument and discussion. This standard must therefore\nbe rooted in a personal super-human vision and we are driven to the\nconclusion that some being or beings exist, superior to man, and yet\nin communication with man. And since what we see around us is a\nworld of many human and sub-human personalities, it is, by\nanalogy, a more natural supposition to suppose that these\nsupernatural beings are many than that they are one.\n\nWhat the human soul, therefore, together with all other souls, attains\nin its concentrated moments is \"an eternal vision\" wherein what is\nmortal in us merges itself in what is immortal.\n\nBut if what we call the universe is a thing made up of all the various\nuniverses of all the various souls in space and time, we are\nforbidden to find in this visible material universe, whose \"reality\"\ndoes not become \"really real\" until it has received the \"hall-mark,\"\nso to speak, of the eternal vision, any sort of medium or link which\nmakes it possible for these various souls to communicate with one\nanother.\n\nThis material universe, thus produced by the concentrated visions of\nall the souls entering into the eternal vision, is made up of all the\nphysical bodies of all such souls, linked together by the medium of\nuniversal ether. But although the bodies which thus occupy different\npoints of space are linked together by the universal ether, we are not\npermitted to find in this elemental ether, the medium which links the\ninnumerable souls together. And we are not permitted this because\nin our original assumption such souls are themselves the\nhalf-creators, as well as the half-discoverers, of that universe whose\nempty spaces are thus filled. The material ether which links all\nbodies together cannot, since it is a portion of such an universe, be\nitself the medium from the midst of which these souls create that\nuniverse.\n\nBut if, following our method of regarding every material substance\nin the world as the body of some sort of soul, we regard this\nuniversal ether as itself the body of an universal or elemental soul,\nthen we are justified in finding in this elemental omnipresent soul\ndiffused through space, the very medium we need; out of the midst\nof which all the souls which exist project their various universes.\n\nWe are thus faced by a universe which is the half-creation and\nhalf-discovery of all living souls, a universe the truth and beauty of\nwhich depend upon the eternal vision, a universe whose material\nsubstance is entirely composed of the actual physical bodies of\nthose very souls whose vision half-creates and half-discovers it.\n\nWe thus reach our conclusion that there is nothing in the world\nexcept personality. The material universe is entirely made up of\npersonal bodies united by the personal body of the elemental ether.\nWhat we name the universe, therefore, is an enormous group of\nbodies joined together by the body of the ether; such bodies being\nthe physical expression of a corresponding group of innumerable\nsouls joined together by the soul of the ether.\n\nIn the portions of this book which deal with the creative energy of\nthe soul I have constantly used the expression \"objective mystery\";\nbut in my concluding chapter I have rejected and eliminated this\nword as a mere step or stage in human thought which does not\ncorrespond to any final reality. When I use the term \"objective\nmystery\" I am referring to the original movement of the individual\nmind when it first stretches out to what is outside itself. What is\noutside itself consists in reality of nothing but an unfathomable\ngroup of bodies and souls joined together by the body and soul of\nthe ether which fills space.\n\nBut since, in its first stretching out towards these things, all it is\naware of is the presence of a plastic something which lends itself,\nunder the universal curve of space, to the moulding and shaping and\ncolouring of its creative vision, it is natural enough to look about\nfor a name by which we can indicate this original \"clay\" or \"matter\" or\n\"world-stuff\" out of which the individual soul creates its vision of\nan universe. And the name \"objective mystery\" is the name by\nwhich, in the bulk of this book, I have indicated this mysterious\nworld-stuff, by which the soul finds itself surrounded, both in regard\nto the matter of its own body and in regard to the still more alien\nmatter of which all other bodies are composed.\n\nBut when by the use of the term objective mystery I have indicated\nthat general and universal something, not itself, by which the soul is\nconfronted, that something which, like a white screen, or a thick\nmass of darkness, waits the moving lamp of the soul to give it light\nand colour, it becomes clear that the name itself does not cover any\nactual reality other than the actual reality of all the bodies in the\nworld joined together by the universal ether.\n\nIs the term \"objective mystery,\" therefore, no more than the name\ngiven to that first solid mass of external impression which the\ninsight of the soul subsequently reduces to the shapes, colours,\nscents, sounds, and all the more subtle intimations springing from\nthe innumerable bodies and souls which fill universal space? No. It\nis not quite this. It is a little deeper than this. It is, in fact, the\nmind's recognition that _behind_ this first solid mass of external\nimpression which the soul's own creative activity creates into its\n\"universe\" there must exist \"something,\" some real substance, or\nmatter, or world-stuff, in contact with which the soul half-creates\nand half-discovers the universe which it makes its own.\n\nWhen, however, the soul has arrived at the knowledge that its own\nphysical body is the outward expression of its inner self, and when\nby an act of faith or imagination it has extended this knowledge to\nevery other bodily form in its universe, it ceases to be necessary to\nuse the term \"objective mystery\"; since that something which the\nsoul felt conscious of as existing behind the original solid mass of\nimpressions is now known by the soul to be nothing else than an\nincredible number of living personalities, each with its own body.\n\nAnd just as I make use in this book of the term \"objective mystery,\"\nand then discard it in my final conclusion, so I make an emphatic\nand elaborate use of the term \"creative\" and then discard it, or\nconsiderably modify it, in my final conclusion.\n\nMy sequence of thought, in this matter of the soul's \"creative\"\npower, may thus be indicated. In the process of preparing the\nground for those rare moments of illumination wherein we attain the\neternal vision the soul is occupied, and the person attempting to\nthink is occupied, with what I call \"the difficult work of art\" of\nconcentrating its various energies and fusing them into one balanced\npoint of rhythmic harmony. This effort of contemplative tension is a\n\"creative effort\" similar to that which all artists are compelled to\nmake. In addition to this aspect of what I call \"creation,\" there also\nremains the fact that the individual soul modifies and changes that\nfirst half-real something which I name the objective mystery, until it\nbecomes all the colours, shapes, sounds and so forth, produced by\nthe impression upon the soul of all the other personalities brought\ninto contract with it by the omnipresent personality of the universal\nether.\n\nThe words \"creation\" and \"creative\" axe thus made descriptive in\nthis book of the simple and undeniable fact that everything which\nthe mind touches is modified and changed by the mind; and that\nultimately the universe which any mind beholds is an universe\nhalf-created by the mood of the mind which beholds it. And since the\nmood of any mind which contemplates the universe is dependent\nupon the relative \"overcoming\" in that particular soul of the emotion\nof malice by love, or of the emotion of love by malice, it becomes\ntrue to say that any universe which comes into existence is\nnecessarily \"created\" by the original struggle, in the depths of some\nsoul or other, of the conflicting emotions of love and malice.\n\nAnd since the ideal of the emotion of love is life, and the ideal of\nthe emotion of hate is death, it becomes true to say that the emotion\nof love is identical with the creative energy in all souls, while the\nemotion of malice is identical with the force which resists creation\nin all souls.\n\nWhy then do I drop completely, or at least considerably modify, this\nstress upon the soul's \"creative\" power in my final chapter? I am led\nto do so by the fact that such creative power in the soul is, after all,\nonly a preparation for the eternal vision. Creative energy implies\neffort, tension, revolution, agitation, and the pain of birth. All\nthese things have to do with preparing the ground for the eternal\nvision, and with the final gesture of the soul, by which it enters\ninto that ultimate rhythm. But once having entered into that vision--\nand in these things time is nothing--the rhythm which results is a\nrhythm upon which the soul rests, even as music rests upon music, or\nlife rests upon life.\n\nAnd the eternal vision, thus momentarily attained, and hereafter\ngathered together from the deep cisterns of memory, liberates us,\nwhen we are under its influence, from that contemplative or creative\ntension whereby we reached it. It is then that the stoical pride of the\nsoul, in the strength of which it has endured so much, undergoes the\nprocess of an immense relaxation and relief. An indescribable\nhumility floods our being; and the mood with which we contemplate\nthe spectacle of life and death ceases to be an individual mood and\nbecomes an universal mood. The isolation, which was a necessary\nelement in our advance to this point, melts away when we have\nreached it. It is not that we lose our personality, it is that we merge\nourselves by the outflowing of love, in all the personalities to which\nthe procession of time gives birth.\n\nAnd the way we arrive at this identification of ourselves with all\nsouls, living or dead or unborn, is by our love for that ideal\nsymbolized in the figure of Christ in whom this identification has\nalready been achieved. This, and nothing less than this, is the eternal\nvision. For the only \"god\" among all the arbiters of our destiny, with\nwhom we are concerned, is Christ. To enter into his secret is to enter\ninto their secret. To be aware of him is to be aware of everything in\nthe world, mortality and immortality, the transitory and the eternal.\n\nLife then, as I have struggled to interpret it in this book, seems to\npresent itself as an unfathomable universe entirely made up of\npersonalities. What we call inanimate substances are all of them the\nbodies, or portions of the bodies, of living personalities. The\nimmense gulf, popularly made between the animate and the\ninanimate, thus turns out to be an unfounded illusion; and the whole\nuniverse reveals itself as an unfathomable series, or congeries, of\nliving personalities, united by the presence of the omnipresent ether\nwhich fills universal space.\n\nIt is of little moment, the particular steps or stages of thought, by\nwhich one mind, among so many, arrives at this final conclusion.\nOther minds, following other tracks across the desert, might easily\nreach it. The important thing to note is that, once reached, such a\nconclusion seems to demand from us a very definite attitude toward\nlife. For if life, if the universe, is entirely made up of personality,\nthen our instinctive or acquired attitude toward personality becomes\nthe path by which we approach truth.\n\nTo persons who have not been plunged, luckily or unluckily, in the\ntroublesome sea of metaphysical phrases, the portions of this book\nwhich will be most tiresome are the portions which deal with those\n\"half-realities\" or logical abstractions of the human reason, when\nsuch reason \"works\" in isolation from the other attributes of the\nsoul. Such reason, working in isolation, inevitably produces certain\nviews of life; and these views of life, although unreal when\ncompared with the reality produced by the full play of all our\nenergies, cannot be completely disregarded if our research is to\ncover the whole field of humanity's reactions. Since there is always\nan irresistible return to these metaphysical views of life directly the\nsoul loses the rhythm of its total being, it seems as if it were unwise\nto advance upon our road until we have discounted such views and\nplaced them in their true perspective, as unreal but inevitable\nabstractions.\n\nThe particular views of life which this recurrent movement of the\nlogical reason results in, are, first, the reduction of everything to\nan infinite stream of pure thought, outside both time and space,\nunconscious of itself as in any way personal; and, in the second\nplace, the reduction of everything to one universal self-conscious\nspirit, in whose absolute and infinite being independent of space and\ntime all separate existences lose themselves and are found to be\nillusions.\n\nWhat I try to make clear in the metaphysical portion of this book is\nthat these two views of life, while always liable to return upon us\nwith every renewed movement of the isolated reason, are in truth\nunreal projections of man's imperious mind. When we subject them\nto an analysis based upon our complete organ of research they show\nthemselves to be nothing but tyrannous phantoms, abstracted from\nthe genuine reality of the soul as it exists _within_ space and time.\n\nWhat I seek to show throughout this book is that the world resolves\nitself into an immeasurable number of personalities held together by\nthe personality of the universal ether and by the unity of one space\nand one time. Even of space and time themselves, since the only\nthing that really \"fills them,\" so to speak, to the brim, is the\nuniversal ether, it might be said that they are the expression of this\nuniversal ether in its relation to all the objects which it contains.\n\nThus the conclusion to which I am driven is that the dome of space,\nout of which the sun shines by day and the stars by night, contains\nno vast gulfs of absolute nothingness into which the soul that hates\nlife may flee away and be at rest. At the same time the soul that\nhates life need not despair. The chances, as we come to estimate\nthem, for and against the soul's survival after death, seem so\ncuriously even, that it may easily happen that the extreme longing of\nthe soul for annihilation may prove in such a balancing of forces the\nfinal deciding stroke. And quite apart from death, I have tried to\nshow in this book, how in the mere fact of the unfathomable depths\ninto which all physical bodies as well as all immaterial souls recede\nthere is an infinite opportunity for any soul to find a way of escape\nfrom life, either by sinking into the depths of its own physical being,\nor by sinking into the depths of its own spiritual substance.\n\nThe main purpose of the book reveals, however, the only escape\nfrom all the pain and misery of life which is worthy of the soul of\nman. And this is not so much an escape from life as a transfiguring\nof the nature of life by means of a newly born attitude toward it.\nThis attitude toward life, of which I have tried to catch at least the\ngeneral outlines, is the attitude which the soul struggles to maintain\nby gathering together all its diffused memories of those rare\nmoments when it entered into the eternal vision.\n\nAnd I have indicated as clearly as I could how it comes about that in\nthe sphere of practical life the only natural and consistent\nrealization of this attitude would be the carrying into actual effect\nof what I call \"the idea of communism.\"\n\nThis \"idea of communism,\" in which the human implications of the\neternal vision become realized, is simply the conception of a system\nof human society founded upon the creative instinct, instead of upon\nthe possessive instinct in humanity.\n\nI endeavour to make clear that such a reorganization of society,\nupon such a basis does not imply any radical change in human\nnature. It only implies a liberation of a force that already exists, of\nthe force in the human soul that is centrifugal, or outflowing, as\nopposed to the force that is centripetal, or indrawing. Such a force\nhas always been active in the lives of individuals. It only remains to\nliberate that force until it reaches the general consciousness of the\nrace, to make such a reconstruction of human society not only ideal,\nbut actual and effective.\n\nCONTENTS\n\nChapter I.        The Complex Vision                           1\nChapter II.       The Aspects of the Complex Vision           20\nChapter III.      The Soul's Apex-Thought                     56\nChapter IV.       The Revelation of the Complex Vision        71\nChapter V.        The Ultimate Duality                       100\nChapter VI.       The Ultimate Ideas                         120\nChapter VII.      The Nature of Art                          160\nChapter VIII.     The Nature of Love                         194\nChapter IX.       The Nature of the Gods                     214\nChapter X.        The Figure of Christ                       225\nChapter XI.       The Illusion of Dead Matter                248\nChapter XII.      Pain and Pleasure                          270\nChapter XIII.     The Reality of the Soul in Relation to\n                   Modern Thought                            293\nChapter XIV.      The Idea of Communism                      323\n                  Conclusion                                 339\n\n\n\nPREFACE\n\nThe speculative system which I have entitled \"The Philosophy of\nthe Complex Vision\" is an attempt to bring into prominence, in the\nsphere of definite and articulate thought, those scattered and chaotic\nintimations which hitherto have found expression rather in Art than\nin Philosophy.\n\nIt has come to be fatally clear to me that between the great\nmetaphysical systems of rationalized purpose and the actual shocks,\nexperiences, superstitions, illusions, disillusions, reactions, hope\nand despairs, of ordinary men and women there is a great gulf fixed.\nIt has become clear to me that the real poignant personal drama in all\nour lives, together with those vague \"marginal\" feelings which\novershadow all of us with a sense of something half-revealed and\nhalf withheld, has hardly any point of contact with these formidable\nedifices of pure logic.\n\nOn the other hand the tentative, hesitating, ambiguous hypotheses of\nPhysical Science, transforming themselves afresh with every new\ndiscovery, seem, when the portentous mystery of Life's real secret\nconfronts us, to be equally remote and elusive.\n\nWhen in such a dilemma one turns to the vitalistic and pragmatic\nspeculations of a Bergson or a William James there is an almost\nmore hopeless revulsion. For in these pseudo-scientific,\npseudo-psychological methods of thought something most profoundly\nhuman seems to us to be completely neglected. I refer to the high\nand passionate imperatives of the heroic, desperate, treasonable\nheart of man.\n\nWhat we have come to demand is some intelligible system of\n_imaginative reason_ which shall answer the exigencies not only of\nour more normal moods but of those moods into which we are\nthrown by the pressure upon us--apparently from outside the\nmechanical sequence of cause and effect--of certain mysterious\nPowers in the background of our experience, such as hitherto have\nonly found symbolic and representative expression in the ritual of\nArt and Religion.\n\nWhat we have come to demand is some flexible, malleable,\nrhythmic system which shall give an imaginative and yet a rational\nform to the sum total of those manifold and intricate impressions\nwhich make up the life of a real person upon a real earth.\n\nWhat we have come to demand is that the centre of gravity in our\ninterpretation of life should be restored to its natural point of\nvantage, namely, to the actual living consciousness of an actual\nliving human being.\n\nAnd it is precisely these demands that the philosophy of the\ncomplex vision attempts to satisfy. It seeks to satisfy them by using\nas its organ of research the balanced \"ensemble\" of man's whole\nnature. It seeks to satisfy them by using as its \"material\" the whole\nvariegated and contradictory mass of feelings and reactions to\nfeelings, which the natural human being with his superstitions, his\nsympathies, his antipathies, his loves and his hates, his surmises, his\nirrational intuitions, his hopes and fears, is of necessity bound to\nexperience as he moves through the world.\n\nIt seeks, in fact, to envisage from within and without the confused\nhurly-burly of life's drama; and to give to this contradictory and\ncomplicated spectacle the aesthetic rationality or imaginative\ninevitableness of a rhythmic work of art.\n\nIn this attempt the philosophy of the complex vision is bound to\nrecognize, and include in its _rational form_, much that remains\nmysterious, arbitrary, indetermined, organic, obstinately illogical.\nFor the illogical is not necessarily the unintelligible, so long as the\nreason which we use is that same imaginative and clairvoyant\nreason, which, in its higher measure, sustains the vision of the poets\nand the artists.\n\nBy the use of this fuller, richer, more living, more concrete\ninstrument of research, the conclusions we arrive at will have in\nthem more of the magic of Nature, and will be closer to the actual\npalpable organic mystery of Life, than either the abstract\nconclusions of metaphysic or the cautious, impersonal hypotheses of\nexperimental physical science.\n\n\nCHAPTER I.\n\nTHE COMPLEX VISION\n\nA philosophy is known by its genuine starting-point. This is also its\nfinal conclusion, often very cunningly concealed. Such a conclusion\nmay be presented to us as the logical result of a long train of\nreasoning, when really it was there all the while as one single vivid\nrevelation of the complex vision.\n\nLike travellers who have already found, by happy accident, the city\nof their desire, many crafty thinkers hasten hurriedly back to the\nparticular point from which they intend to be regarded as having\nstarted; nor in making this secret journey are they forgetful to erase\ntheir footsteps from the sand, so that when they publicly set forth it\nshall appear to those who follow them that they are guided not by\nprevious knowledge of the way but by the inevitable necessity of\npure reason.\n\nI also, like the rest, must begin with what will turn out to be the\nend; but unlike many I shall openly indicate this fact and not attempt\nto conceal it.\n\nMy starting-point is nothing less than what I call the original\nrevelation of man's complex vision; and I regard this original\nrevelation as something which is arrived at by the use of a certain\nsynthetic activity of all the attributes of this vision. And this\nsynthetic activity of the complex vision I call its apex-thought.\n\nThis revelation is of a peculiar nature, which must be grasped, at\nleast in its general outlines, before we can advance a step further\nupon that journey which is also a return.\n\nIt might be maintained that before attempting to philosophize upon\nlife, the question should be asked . . . \"why philosophize at all?\"\nAnd again . . . \"what are the motive-forces which drive us into this\nprocess which we call philosophizing?\"\n\nTo philosophize is to articulate and express our personal reaction to\nthe mystery which we call life, both with regard to the nature of that\nmystery and with regard to its meaning and purpose.\n\nMy answer to the question \"Why do we philosophize?\" is as\nfollows. We philosophize for the same reason that we move and\nspeak and laugh and eat and love. In other words, we philosophize\nbecause man is a philosophical animal. We breathe because we\ncannot help breathing and we philosophize because we cannot help\nphilosophizing. We may be as sceptical as we please. Our very\nscepticism is the confession of an implicit philosophy. To suppress\nthe activity of philosophizing is as impossible as to suppress the\nactivity of breathing.\n\nAssuming then that we _have_ to philosophize, the question\nnaturally arises . . . _how_ have we to philosophize if our\nphilosophy is to be an adequate expression of our complete reaction\nto life?\n\nBy the phrase \"man's complex vision\" I am trying to indicate the\nelaborate and intricate character of the organ of research which we\nhave to use. All subsequent discoveries are rendered misleading if\nthe total activity, at least in its general movement, of our instrument\nof research is not brought into focus. This instrument of research\nwhich I have named \"man's complex vision\" implies his possession,\nat the moment when he begins to philosophize, of certain basic\nattributes or energies.\n\nThe advance from infancy to maturity naturally means, when the\ndifference between person and person is considered an unequal and\ndiverse development of these basic energies. Nor even when the\nperson is full grown will it be found that these energies exist in him\nin the same proportion as they exist in other persons. But if they\nexisted in every person in precisely equal proportions we should not\nall, even then, have the same philosophy.\n\nWe should not have this, because though the basic activities were\nthere in equal proportion, each living concrete person whose\nactivities these were would necessarily colour the resultant vision\nwith the stain or dye of his original difference from all the rest. For\nno two living entities in this extraordinary world are exactly the\nsame.\n\nWhat is left for us, then, it might be asked, but to \"whisper our\nconclusions\" and accept the fact that all \"philosophies\" must be\ndifferent, as they are all the projection of different personalities?\nNothing, as far as pure logic is concerned, is left for us but this.\nYet it remains as an essential aspect of the process of philosophizing\nthat we should endeavour to bring over to our vision as many other\nvisions as we can succeed in influencing. For since we have the\npower of communicating our thought to one another and since it is\nof the very nature of the complex vision to be exquisitely sensitive\nto influences from outside, it is a matter of primordial necessity to\nus all that we should exercise this will to influence and this will to\nbe influenced.\n\nAnd just as in the case of persons sympathetic to ourselves the\nactivity of philosophizing is attended by the emotion of love and the\ninstinct of creation, so in the case of persons antagonistic to\nourselves the activity of philosophizing is attended by the emotion\nof hate and the instinct of destruction. For philosophy being the\nfinal articulation of a personal reaction to life, is penetrated\nthrough and through with the basic energies of life.\n\nOn the one hand there is a \"Come unto me, all ye . . .\" and on the\nother there is a \"Woe unto you, Scribes and Pharisees, hypocrites!\"\nJust because the process of philosophizing is necessarily personal, it\nis evident that the primordial aspect of it which implies \"the will to\ninfluence\" must tally with some equally primordial reciprocity,\nimplying \"the will to be influenced.\"\n\nThat it does so tally with this is proved by the existence of language.\n\nThis medium of expression between living things does not seem to\nbe confined to the human race. Some reciprocal harmony of energy,\ncorresponding to our complex vision, seems to have created\nmany mysterious modes of communication by which myriads of\nsub-human beings, and probably also myriads of super-human beings,\nact and react on one another.\n\nBut the existence of language, though it excludes the possibility of\nabsolute difference, does not, except by an act of faith, necessitate\nthat any sensation we name by the same name is really identical\nwith the sensation which another person feels. And this difficulty is\nmuch further complicated by the fact that words themselves tend in\nthe process to harden and petrify, and in their hardening to form, as\nit were, solid blocks of accretion which resist and materially distort\nthe subtle and evasive play of the human psychology behind them.\n\nSo that not only are we aware that the word which we use does not\nnecessarily represent to another what it represents to ourself, but we\nare also aware that it does not, except in a hard and inflexible\nmanner, represent what we ourselves feel. Words tend all too\nquickly to become symbolic; and it is often the chief importance of\nwhat we call \"genius\" that it takes these inflexible symbols into its\nhands and breaks them up into pieces and dips them in the wavering\nwaters of experience and sensation.\n\nEvery philosopher should be at pains to avoid as far as possible the\nuse of technical terms, whether ancient or modern, and should\nendeavour to evade and slip behind these terms. He should\nendeavour to indicate his vision of the world by means of words\nwhich have acquired no thick accretion of traditional crust but are\nfresh and supple and organic. He should use such words, in fact, as\nmight be said to have the flexibility of life, and like living plants\nto possess leaves and sap. He should avoid as far as he can such\nmetaphors and images as already carry with them the accumulated\nassociations of traditional usage, and he should select his\nexpressions so that they shall give the reader the definite impact and\nvivid shock of thoughts that leap up from immediate contact with\nsensation, like fish from the surface of a river.\n\nJust because words, in their passage from generation to generation,\ntend to become so hard and opaque, it is advisable for any one\nattempting to philosophize to use indirect as well as direct means of\nexpressing his thoughts. The object of philosophizing being to\n\"carry over\" into another person's consciousness one's personal\nreaction to things, it may well happen that a hint, a gesture, a\nsignal, a sign, made indirectly and rather by the grouping of words\nand the tone of words than by their formal content, will reach the\ndesired result more effectually than any direct argument.\n\nIt must be admitted, however, that this purely subjective view of\nphilosophy, with its implied demand for a precise subjective\ncolouring of the words, leaves some part of our philosophical\nmotive-force unsatisfied and troubled by an obscure distress. No\ntwo minds can interchange ideas without some kind of appeal, often\nso faint and unconscious as to be quite unrecognized, to an invisible\naudience of hidden attendants upon the argument, who are tacitly\nassumed in some mysterious way to be the arbiters. These invisible\ncompanions seem to gather to themselves, as we are vaguely aware\nof them, the attributes of a company of overshadowing listeners.\nThey present themselves to the half-conscious background of our\nmind as some pre-existent vision of \"truth\" towards which my\nsubjective vision is one contribution and my interlocutor's\nsubjective vision another contribution.\n\nThis vague consciousness which we both have, as we exchange our\nideas, of some comprehensive vision of pre-existent reality, to\nwhich we are both appealing, does not destroy my passionate\nconviction that I am \"nearer the truth\" than my friend; nor does it\ndestroy my latent feeling that in my friend's vision there is\n\"something of the truth\" which I am unable to grasp. I think the\nmore constantly we encounter other minds in these philosophical\ndisputes the more does there grow and take shape in our own mind\nthe idea of some mysterious and invisible watchers whose purer\nvision, exquisitely harmonious and clairvoyant, remains a sort of\ntest both of our own and of others' subjectivity; becomes, in fact, an\nobjective standard or measure or pattern of those ideas which we\ndiscover within us all, and name truth, beauty, nobility.\n\nThis objective standard of the things which are most important and\nprecious to us, this ideal pattern of all human values, attests and\nmanifests its existence by the primordial necessity of the\ninterchange of thoughts among us. I call this pattern or standard of\nideas \"the vision of the immortal companions.\" By the term \"the\nimmortal companions\" I do not mean to indicate any \"immanent\"\npower or transcendental \"over-soul.\" Nor do I mean to indicate that\nthey are created by our desire that they should exist. Although I call\nthem \"companions\" I wish to suggest that they exist quite\nindependently of man and are not the origin of these ideas in man's\nsoul but only the model, the pattern, the supreme realization of these\nideas.\n\nIt is, however, to these tacit listeners, whose vision of the world is\nthere in the background as the arbiter of our subjective encounters,\nthat in our immense loneliness we find ourselves constantly turning.\nAll our philosophy, all our struggle with life, falls into two aspects\nas we grow more and more aware of what we are doing. The whole\nstrange drama takes the form, as we feel our way, of a creation\nwhich at present is non-existent and of a realization of something\nwhich at present is hidden.\n\nThus philosophy, as I have said, is at once a setting-forth and a\nreturn; a setting-forth to something that has never been reached,\nbecause to reach it we have to create it, and a return to something\nthat has been with us from the beginning and is the very form and\nshape and image of the thing which we have set forth to create.\n\nThese hidden listeners, these tacit arbiters, these assumed and\nimplied witnesses of our life, give value to every attempt we make\nat arriving at some unity amid our differences; and their vision\nseems, as the eternal duality presses upon us, to be at once the thing\nfrom which we start and the thing towards which, moulding the\nfuture as we go, we find ourselves moving. In the unfathomable\ndepths of the past we are aware of a form, a shape, a principle, a\npremonition; and into the unfathomable depths of the future we\nproject the fulfilled reality of this. We are as gods creating\nsomething out of nothing. But when we have created it . . . behold!\nit was there from the beginning; and the nothing out of which we\nhave created it has receded into a second future from which it mocks\nand menaces us again.\n\nThe full significance of this ultimate duality would be rendered\nabortive if the future were determined in any more definite way than\nby the premonition, the hope, the dream, the passion, the prophecy,\nthe vision, of those invisible companions whose existence is implied\nwhenever two separate souls communicate their thoughts to one\nanother.\n\nIt is by our will that the future is created; but around the will hover\nintermittently many unfathomable motives. And the pre-existent\nmotive, which finally gives the shape to the future, holds the future\nalready in its hand. And this surviving motive, ultimately selected\nby our will, is of necessity purged and tested by a continual\ncomparison with that form, that idea, that dream, that vision, which\nis implied from the beginning and which I name \"the vision of the\ninvisible companions.\"\n\nThe philosophical enquiry upon which we are engaged finds its\nstarting point, then, in nothing less than that revelation of the\ncomplex vision which is also the goal of its journey. The complex\nvision, in the rhythmic play of its united attributes, makes use of a\nsynthetic power which I call its apex-thought.\n\nThe supreme activity of this apex-thought is centred about those\nprimordial ideas of truth, beauty and nobility which are the very\nstuff and texture of its being. In the ecstasy of its creative and\nreceptive \"rapport\" with these it becomes aware of the presence of\ncertain immortal companions whose vision is at once the objective\nstandard of such ideas and the premonition of their fuller realization.\n\nIn thus attempting to articulate and clarify the main outlines of our\nstarting point, a curious situation emerges. The actual _spectacle_,\nor mass of impressions to be dealt with, presents itself, we are\nforced to suppose, as more or less identical, in its general\nappearance, in every human consciousness. And this \"general\nsituation\" is strange enough.\n\nWe find ourselves, motionless or moving, surrounded by earth and\nair and space. Impressions flow past us and flow through us. We\nourselves seem at the same time able to move from point to point in\nthis apparently real universe and able to remain, as invisible\nobservers, outside all the phenomena of time and space. As the\nultimate invisible spectator of the whole panorama, or, in the logical\nphrase, as the \"a priori unity of apperception\" our consciousness\ncannot be visualized in any concrete image.\n\nBut as the empirical personal self, able to move about within the\ncircle of the objective universe, the soul is able to visualize itself\npictorially and imaginatively, although not rationally or logically.\nThese two revelations of the situation are simultaneously disclosed;\nand although the first-named of them--the \"a priori unity of\napperception\"--might seem to claim, on the strength of this \"a\npriori\" a precedence over the second, it has no real right to make\nsuch a claim. The truth of the situation is indeed the reverse of this;\nand upon this truth, more than upon anything else, our whole\nmethod of enquiry depends. For the fact that we are unable to think\nof our integral personal self _as actually_ being this \"a priori\"\nconsciousness, and are not only able but are bound to think of our\nintegral personal self as _actually being_ this individual \"soul\"\nwithin time and space, we are driven to the conclusion that this \"a\npriori\" observer outside time and space is nothing more than an\ninevitable trick or law or aspect or play of our isolated logical\nreason.\n\nOur logical reason is itself only one attribute of our real concrete\nself, the self which exists within time and space; and therefore we\nreach the conclusion that this \"a priori unity,\" which seems outside\ntime and space, is nothing but a necessary inevitable abstraction\nfrom the concrete reality of our personal self which is within time\nand space. There is no need to be startled at the apparent paradox of\nthis, as though the lesser were including the larger or the part the\nwhole, because when space and time are eliminated there can be no\nlonger any large or small or whole or part. All are equal there\nbecause all are equally nothing there.\n\nThis \"a priori\" unity of consciousness, outside time and space, is\nonly real in so far as it represents the inevitable manner in which\nreason has to work when it works in isolation, and therefore\ncompared with the reality of the personal self, within time and\nspace, it is unreal.\n\nAnd it is obvious that an unreal thing cannot be larger than a real\nthing; nor can an unreal thing be a whole of which a real thing is a\npart.\n\nThe method therefore of philosophic enquiry, which I name \"the\nphilosophy of the complex vision,\" depends upon the realization of\nthe difference between what is only the inevitable play of reason,\nworking in isolation, and what is the inevitable play of all the\nattributes of the human soul when they are held together by the\nsynthetic activity of what I name the \"apex-thought.\" But this\nlogical revelation of the \"a priori\" unity of consciousness outside of\ntime and space is not the only result of the isolated play of some\nparticular attribute of personality. Just as the isolated play of\nreason evokes this result, so the isolated play of self-consciousness\nevokes yet another result, which we have to recognize as intervening\nbetween this ultimate logical unity and the real personal self.\n\nThe abstraction evoked by the isolated play of self-consciousness is\nobviously nearer reality and less of an abstraction than the merely\nlogical one above-named, because self-consciousness has more of\nthe personal self in it than reason or logic can have. But though\nnearer reality and less of an abstraction than the other, this\nrevelation of the inevitable play of self-consciousness, working by\nitself, is also unreal in relation to the revelation of the concrete\npersonal individual soul. This revelation of self-consciousness,\nworking in isolation, has as its result the conception of one universal\n\"I am I\" or cosmic self, which is nothing more or less than the\nwhole universe, contemplating itself as its own object. To this\nconception are we driven, when in isolation from the soul's other\nattributes our self-consciousness gives itself up to its own activity.\nThe \"I am I\" which we then seek to articulate is an \"I am I\" reached\nby the negation or suppression of that primordial act of faith which\nis the work of the imagination. This act of faith, thus negated and\nsuppressed in order that this unreal cosmic self may embrace the\nuniverse, is the act of faith by which we become aware of the\nexistence of innumerable other \"selves,\" besides our own self,\nfilling the vast spaces of nature.\n\nThe difference between the sensation we have of our own body and\nthe sensation we have of the rest of the universe ceases to exist\nwhen self-consciousness thus expands; and the conceptions we\narrive at can only be described as the idea that the whole universe\nwith all the bodies which it contains--including our own body--is\nnothing but one vast manifestation of one vast mind which is our\nown \"I am I.\"\n\nIt must not be supposed that this abstraction evoked by the solitary\nactivity of self-consciousness is any more a \"whole,\" of which the\nreal self is a \"part,\" than the logical \"a priori unity\" is a whole, of\nwhich the real self is a part. Both are abstractions. Both are unreal.\nBoth are shadowy projections from the true reality, which is the\npersonal self existing side by side with \"the immortal companions.\"\nNor must it be supposed that these primordial aspects of life are of\nequal importance and that we have an equal right to make of any\none of them the starting point of our enquiry. The starting point of\nour enquiry, and the end of our enquiry also, can be nothing else\nthan the innumerable company of individual \"souls,\" mortal and\nimmortal, confronting the mystery of the universe.\n\nThe philosophy of the complex vision is not a mechanical\nphilosophy; it is a creative philosophy. And as such it includes in it\nfrom the beginning a certain element of faith and a certain element\nwhich I can only describe as \"the impossible.\" It may seem\nridiculous to some minds that the conception of the \"impossible\"\nshould be introduced into any philosophy at the very start. The\ncomplex vision is, however, essentially creative. The creation of\nsomething really new in the world is regarded by pure reason as\nimpossible. Therefore the element of \"the impossible\" must exist in\nthis philosophy from the very start. The act of faith must also exist\nin it; for the imagination is one of the primary aspects of the\ncomplex vision and the act of faith is one of the basic activities of\nthe imagination.\n\nThe complex vision does not regard history as a progressive\npredetermined process. It regards history as the projection, by\nadvance and retreat, of the creative and resistant power of individual\nsouls. That the \"invisible companions\" should be in eternal contact\nwith every living \"soul\" is a rational impossibility; and yet this\nimpossibility is what the complex vision, using the faith of its\ncreative imagination, reveals as the truth.\n\nThe imagination working in isolation is able, like reason and\nself-consciousness, to fall into curious distortions and aberrations.\n\nOne has only to survey the field of dogmatic religion to see how\ncuriously astray it may be led. It is only by holding fast to the high\nrare moments when the apex-thought attains its consummation that\nwe are able to keep such isolated acts of faith in their place and\nprevent the element of the \"impossible\" becoming the element of the\nabsurd. The philosophy of the complex vision, though far more\nsympathetic to much that is called \"materialism\" than to much that\nis called \"idealism,\" certainly cannot itself be regarded\nas materialistic. And it cannot be so regarded because its\ncentral assumption and implication is the concrete basis of\npersonality which we call the \"soul.\" And the \"soul,\" when we think\nof it as something real, must inevitably be associated with what\nmight be called \"the vanishing point of sensation.\" In other words\nthe soul must be thought of as having some kind of \"matter\" or\n\"energy\" or \"form\" as its ultimate life, and yet as having no kind of\n\"matter\" or \"energy\" or \"form.\" The soul must be regarded as\n\"something\" which is living and real and concrete, and which has a\ndefinite existence in time and space, and which is subject to\nannihilation; but the stuff out of which the soul is made is not\ncapable of analysis, and can only be accepted by such an act of faith\nas that which believes in \"the impossible.\"\n\nThe fact that the philosophy of the complex vision assumes as its\nonly axiom the concrete reality of the \"soul\" within us which is so\ndifficult to touch or handle or describe and yet which we feel to be\nso much more real than our physical body, justifies us in making an\nexperiment which to many minds will seem uncalled for and\nridiculous. I mean the experiment of trying to visualize, by an\narbitrary exercise of fancy, the sort of form or shape which this\nformless and shapeless thing may be imagined as possessing.\n\nMetaphysical discussion tends so quickly to become thin and\nabstract and unreal; words themselves tend so quickly to become\n\"dead wood\" rather than living branches and leaves; that it seems\nadvisable, from the point of view of getting nearer reality, to make\nuse sometimes of a pictorial image, even though such an image be\ncrudely and clumsily drawn.\n\nPictorial images are always treacherous and dangerous; but, as I\nhave hinted, it is sometimes necessary, considering the intricate and\ndelicately balanced character of man's complex vision, to make a\nguarded and cautious use of them, so as to arrive at truth\n\"sideways,\" so to speak, and indirectly.\n\nOne of the curious psychological facts, in connection with the\nvarious ways in which various minds function, is the fact that when\nin these days we seek to visualize, in some pictorial manner, our\nultimate view of life, the images which are called up are geometrical\nor chemical rather than anthropomorphic. It is probable that even\nthe most rational and logical among us as soon as he begins to\nphilosophize at all is compelled by the necessity of things to form in\nthe mind some vague pictorial representation answering to his\nconception of the universe.\n\nThe real inherent nature of such a philosophy would be probably\nunderstood and appreciated far better, both by the philosopher\nhimself and by his friends, if this vague pictorial projection could\nbe actually represented, in words or in a picture.\n\nMost minds see the universe of their mental conception as\nsomething quite different from the actual stellar universe upon\nwhich we all gaze. Even the most purely rational minds who find\nthe universe in \"pure thought\" are driven against their rational will\nto visualize this \"pure thought\" and to give it body and form and\nshape and movement.\n\nThese hidden and subconscious representations, in terms of sensible\nimagery, of the conclusions of philosophic thought, are themselves\nof profound philosophical interest. We cannot afford to neglect\nthem. They are at least proof of the inalienable part played, in the\nfunctioning of our complex vision, by _sensation_ as an organ of\nresearch. But they have a further interest. They are an illuminating\nrevelation of the inherent character and personal bias of the\nindividual soul who is philosophizing. I suppose to a great many\nminds what we call \"the universe\" presents itself as a colossal circle,\nwithout any circumference, filled with an innumerable number of\nmaterial objects floating in some thin attenuated ether. I suppose the\ncentre of this circle with no circumference is generally assumed to\nbe the \"self\" or \"soul\" of the person projecting this particular image.\n\nDoubtless, in some cases, it is assumed to be such a person's\nphysical body as it feels itself conscious of sensation and is aware of\nspace and time.\n\nAs I myself use the expression \"complex vision\" I suppose I call up\nin the minds of my various readers an extraordinary variety of\npictorial images. Without laying any undue stress upon this pictorial\ntendency, I should like to indicate the kind of projected image\nwhich I myself am conscious of, when I use the expression, \"the\ncomplex vision.\"\n\nI seem to visualize this thing as a wavering, moving mass of flames,\ntaking the shape of what might be called a \"horizontal pyramid,\" the\napex of which, where the flames are fused and lost in one another, is\ncontinually cleaving the darkness like the point of a fiery arrow,\nwhile the base of it remains continually invisible by reason of some\nmagical power which confuses the senses whenever they seek to\ntouch or to hold it.\n\nSometimes I seem to see this \"base\" or \"spear handle\" or \"arrow\nshaft,\" of my moving horizontal pyramid, as a kind of deeper\ndarkness; sometimes as a vibration of air; sometimes as a cloud of\nimpenetrable smoke. I am always conscious of the curious fact that,\nwhile I can most vividly see the apex-point of the thing, and while I\nknow that this moving pyramid of fire has a base, there is for ever\nsome drastic natural law or magical power at work that obscures my\nvision whenever I turn my eyes to the place where I know it exists.\n\nI have not mentioned this particular pictorial image with any wish to\nlay undue stress upon it. In all rarified and subtle experiments of\nthought pictorial images are quite as likely to hinder us in our\ngroping towards reality as they are to help us. If my image of a\nmoving, horizontal pyramid with an apex-point of many names\nfused into one and a base of impenetrable invisibility seems to any\nreader of this passage a ridiculous and arbitrary fancy I would\nmerely ask such an one to let it go, and to consider my description\nof the complex vision quite independently of it.\n\nSometimes to myself it appears ridiculous; and I only, as we put it,\n\"throw it out\" in order that, if it has the least illuminative value,\nsuch a value should not be quite lost. Any reader who regards my\nparticular picture as absurd is perfectly at liberty to form his own\npictorial image of what I am endeavouring to make clear. He may, if\nhe pleases, visualize \"the soul\" as a sort of darkened planet from\nwhich the attributes of the complex vision radiate to the right or to\nthe left, as the thing moves through immensity. All I ask is that\nthese attributes should be thought of as converging to a point and as\nfinding their \"base\" in some thing which is felt to exist but cannot\nbe described.\n\nProbably to a thorough-going empiricist, and certainly to a\nthorough-going materialist, it will appear quite unnecessary to\ntranslate the obvious spectacle of the world, with oneself as a\nphysical body in the centre of it, into mental symbols and pictorial\nrepresentations of the above character. Of such an one I would only\nask, in what sort of manner he visualizes, when he thinks of it at all,\nthe \"soul\" which he feels conscious of in his own body; and in the\nsecond place how he visualizes the connection between the will, the\ninstinct, the reason and so forth, which animate his body and endow\nit with living purpose? It will be found much easier for critics to\nreject the particular image which has commended itself to me as\nsuggestive of the mystery with which we have to deal, than for them\nto drive out and expel from their own thought the insidious human\ntendency towards pictorial representation.\n\nI would commend to any sardonic psychologist whose \"malice\"\nleads him to derive pleasure from the little weaknesses of\nphilosophers, to turn his attention to the ideal systems of supposedly\n\"pure thought.\" He will find infinite satisfaction for his spleen in\nthe crafty manner in which \"impure\" thought--that is to say thought by\nmeans of pictorial images--passes itself off as \"pure\" and conceals\nits lapses.\n\nTruth, as the complex vision clearly enough reveals to us, refuses to\nbe dealt with by \"pure\" thought. To deal with truth one has to use\n\"impure\" thought, in other words thought that is dyed in the grain by\ntaste, instinct, intuition, imagination. And every philosopher who\nattempts to round off his system by pure reason alone, and who\nrefuses to recognize that the only adequate organ of research is the\ncomplex vision, is a philosopher who sooner or later will be caught\nred-handed in the unphilosophic act of covering his tracks.\n\nNo philosopher is on safe ground, no philosopher can offer us a\nmassive organic concrete representation of reality who is shy of all\npictorial images. They are dangerous and treacherous things; but it\nis better to be led astray by them than to avoid them altogether.\n\nThe mythological symbolism of antique thought was full of this\npictorial tendency and even now the shrewdest of modern thinkers\nare compelled to use images drawn from antique mythology. Poetic\nthought may go astray. But it can never negate itself into quite the\nthin simulacrum of reality into which pure reason divorced from\npoetic imagery is capable of fading.\n\nAfter all, the most obstinate and irreducible of all pictorial\nrepresentations is the obvious one of the material universe with our\nphysical body as the centre of it. But even this is not complete. In\nfact it is extremely far from complete, directly we think closely\nabout it. For not only does such a picture omit the real centre, that\nindescribable \"something\" we call the \"soul,\" it also loses itself in\nunthinkable darkness when it considers any one of its own\nunfathomable horizons.\n\nIt cannot be regarded as a very adequate picture when both the\ncentre of it and the circumference of it baffle thought. The\nmaterialist or \"objectivist\" may be satisfied with such a result, but\nit is a result which does not answer the question of philosophy, but\nrather denies that any answer is possible. But though this obvious\nobjective spectacle of the universe, with our bodily self as a part of\nit, cannot satisfy the demands of the complex vision, it is at least\ncertain that no philosophy which does not include this and accept\nthis and continually return to this, can satisfy these demands.\n\nThe complex vision requires the reality of this objective spectacle\nbut it also requires recognition of certain basic assumptions, implicit\nin this spectacle, which the materialist refuses to consider.\n\nAnd the most comprehensive of these assumptions is nothing less\nthan the complex vision itself, with that \"something,\" which is the\nsoul, as its inscrutable base. Thus I am permitted to retain, in spite\nof its arbitrary fantasy, my pictorial image of a pyramidal arrow of\nfire, moving from darkness to darkness. My picture were false to my\nconception if it did not depict the whole pyramid, with the soul itself\nas its base, moving, in its complete totality, from mystery to\nmystery.\n\nIt may move upwards, downwards, or, as I myself seem to see it,\nhorizontally. But as long as it keeps its apex-point directed to the\nmystery in front of it, it matters little how we conceive of it as\nmoving. That it should _move_, in some way or another, is the gist\nof my demand upon it; for, if it does not move, nothing moves; and\nlife itself is swallowed up in nothingness.\n\nThis swallowing up of life in nothingness, this obliteration of life by\nnothingness is what the emotion of malice ultimately desires. The\neternal conflict between love and malice is the eternal contest\nbetween life and death. And this contest is what the complex vision\nreveals, as it moves from darkness to darkness.\n\n\nCHAPTER II.\n\nTHE ASPECTS OF THE COMPLEX VISION\n\nThe aspects of the complex vision may be separated from one\nanother according to many systems of classifications. As long as, in\nthe brief summary which follows, I include the more obvious and\nmore important of these aspects, I shall be doing all that the\nphilosophy of the complex vision demands.\n\nThe reader is quite at liberty to make a different classification from\nmine, if mine appears unconvincing to him. The general trend of my\nargument will not be in any serious way affected, as long as he\nadmits that I have followed the tradition of ordinary human\nlanguage, in the classification which I have preferred.\n\nIt seems to me, then, that the aspects of the complex vision are\neleven in number; and that they may be summarized as consisting of\nreason, self-consciousness, will, the aesthetic sense, or \"taste,\"\nimagination, memory, conscience, sensation, instinct, intuition and\nemotion.\n\nThese eleven aspects or attributes are not to be regarded as\nabsolutely separate \"functions,\" but rather as relatively separate\n\"energies\" of the one concrete soul-monad. The complex vision is\nthe vision of an irreducible living entity which pours itself as a\nwhole into every one of its various energizings. And though it pours\nitself as a whole into each one of these, and though each one of\nthese contains the latent potentiality of all the rest, the nature of\nthe complex vision is such that it necessarily takes colour and form\nfrom the particular aspect or attribute through which at the moment\nit is especially energizing.\n\nIt is precisely here that the danger of \"disproportion\" was found. For\nthe complex vision with the whole weight of all its aspects behind it\nreceives the colour and the form of only one of them. We can see\nthe result of this from the tenacity--implying the presence of\nemotion and will--with which some philosopher of pure reason\npassionately and imaginatively defends his logical conclusion.\n\nBut we are ourselves proof of it in every moment of our lives.\nConfronted with some definite external situation, of a happy or\nunhappy character, we fling ourselves upon this new intrusion with\nthe momentum of our whole being; and it becomes largely a matter\nof accident whether our reaction of the moment is coloured by\nreason or by will or by imagination or by taste. Immersed in the tide\nof experience, receiving shock after shock from alien and hostile\nforces, we struggle with the weight of our whole soul against each\nparticular obstacle, not stopping to regulate the complicated\nmachinery of our vision but just seizing upon the thing, or trying to\navoid it, with whatever energy serves our purpose best at the\nmoment.\n\nThis is especially true of small and occasional pleasures or small\nand occasional annoyances. A supreme pleasure or a supreme pain\nforces us to gather our complex vision together, forces us to make\nuse of its apex-thought, so that we can embrace the ecstasy or fling\nourselves upon the misery with a co-ordinated power. It is the little\ncasual annoyances and reliefs of our normal days which are so hard\nto deal with in the spirit of philosophic art, because these little\npleasures and pains while making a superficial appeal to the reason\nor the emotion or the will or the conscience, are not drastic or\nformidable enough to drive us into any concentration of the\napex-thought which shall harmonize our confused energies.\n\nThe fatal ease with which the whole complex vision gets itself\ncoloured by and obsessed by one of its own attributes may be\nproved by the history of philosophy itself. Individual philosophers\nhave, over and over again, plunged with furious tenacity into the\nmystery of life with a complex vision distorted, deformed and\nover-balanced.\n\nI seem to see the complex vision of such thinkers taking some\ngrotesque shape whereby the apex-point of effective thought is\nblunted and broken. The loss and misery, or the yet more ignoble\ncomfort, of such suppressions of the apex-thought, is however a\npersonal matter. Those \"invisible companions,\" or immortal\nchildren of the universe, who are implicitly present as the\nbackground of all human discussion, grow constantly more definite\nand articulate the apprehension of the general human mind by\nreason of these personal aberrations.\n\nIt is perhaps rather to the great artists of our race than to any\nphilosopher at all that these invisible ones reveal themselves, but in\ntheir gradual disclosure to the consciousness of the human race, they\nare certainly assisted by the most insane and unbalanced plunges\ninto mystery, of this and the other abnormal individual. The paradox\nmay indeed be hazarded that the madder and more abnormal are the\nindividual's attempts to dig himself into the very nerves and fibres\nof reality, the clearer and more definite as far as consciousness of\nthe race is concerned, does the revelation of these invisible ones\ngrow.\n\nThe abnormal individual whose complex vision is distorted almost\nout of human recognition by the predominance of some one\nattribute, is yet, in his madness and morbidity, a wonderful engine\nof research for the clairvoyance of humanity.\n\nThe vision of the immortals, as a background to all further\ndiscussion, is rendered richer and more rhythmical every day, or\nrather the hidden rhythm of their being is revealed more clearly\nevery day, by the eccentricities and maladies, nay! by the insanities\nand desperations, of individual victims of life.\n\nThus it comes about that, while the supreme artists, whose\napproximation, to the vision of the invisible ones is closest, remain\nour unique masters, the lower crowd of moderately sane and\nmoderately well-balanced persons are of less value to humanity than\nthose abnormal and wayward ones whose psychic distortions are the\nworld's perverted instruments of research.\n\nA philosopher of this unbalanced kind is indeed a sort of living\nsacrifice or victim of self-vivisection, out of whose demonic\ndiscoveries--bizarre and fantastic though they may seem to the\nlower sanity of the mob--the true rhythmic vision of the immortals\nis made clearer and more articulate.\n\nThe kind of balance or sanity which such average persons, as are\ncommonly called \"men of the world,\" possess is in reality further\nremoved from true vision than all the madness of these debauches of\nspecialized research. For the consummation of the complex vision is\na meeting place of desperate and violent extremes; extremes, not\nwatered down nor modified nor even \"reconciled,\" certainly not\ncancelled by one another, but held forcibly and deliberately together\nby an arbitrary act of the apex-thought of the human soul.\n\nAs I glance at these basic activities of the complex vision one by\none, I would beg the reader to sink as far as he can into the recesses\nof his own identity; so that he may discover whether what he finds\nthere agrees in substance--call it by what name he pleases and\nexplain it how he pleases--with each particular energy I name, as I\nindicate such energies in my own way.\n\nConsider the attitude of self-consciousness. That man is self-conscious\nis a basic and perhaps a tragic fact that surely requires no\nproof. The power of thinking \"I am I\" is an ultimate endowment of\npersonality, outside of which, except by an act of primordial faith,\nwe cannot pass. The phenomenon of human growth from infancy to\nmaturity proves that it is possible for this self-consciousness--this\npower of saying \"I am I\"--to become clearer and more articulate\nfrom day to day. It seems as impossible to fix upon a definite\nmoment in a child's life where we can draw a line and say \"_there_\nhe was unconscious of himself and _here_ he is conscious of\nhimself\" as it is impossible to observe as an actual visible movement\nthe child's growth in stature.\n\nBetween consciousness and self-consciousness the dividing line\nseems to be as difficult to define as it is difficult to define the\nline between sub-consciousness and consciousness. My existence as a\nself-conscious entity capable of thinking \"I am I\" is the basic\nassumption of all thought. And though it is possible for my thought\nto turn round upon itself and deny my own existence, such thought\nin the process of such a denial cuts the very ground away which is\nthe leaping point of any further advance.\n\nPhilosophy by such drastic scepticism is reduced to complete\nsilence. You cannot build up anything except illusion from a basis\nthat is itself illusion. If I were not self-conscious there would be no\ncentre or substratum or coherence or unity in any thought I had. If I\nwere not self-conscious I should be unable to think.\n\nConsider, then, the attribute of reason. That we possess reason is\nalso a fact that carries with it its own evidence. It is reason which\nat this very moment--reason of some sort, at any rate--I am bound to\nuse, in estimating the important place or the unimportant place\nwhich reason itself should occupy. You cannot derogate from the\nvalue of reason without using reason. You cannot put reason into an\ninferior category, when compared with will or instinct or emotion,\nwithout using reason itself to prove such an inferiority.\n\nWe may come to the conclusion that the universe is rather irrational\nthan rational. We may come to the conclusion that the secret of life\ntranscends and over-brims all rationality. But this very conclusion\nas to the irrational nature of the mystery with which reason is\nattempting to deal is itself a conclusion of the reason.\n\nThere is only one power which is able to put reason aside in its\nsearch for truth and that power is reason.\n\nConsider, then, the attribute of will. That we possess a definite and\ndistinct energy whose activity may be contrasted with the rest and\nmay be legitimately named \"the will\" is certainly less self-evident\nthan either of the two preceding propositions but is none the less\nimplied in both of them. For in the act of articulating to ourself the\ndefinite thought \"I am I\" we are using our will. The motive-force\nmay be anything. We may for instance will an answer to the implied\nquestion \"_what_ am I,\" and our self-consciousness may return the\nanswer \"I am I,\" leaving it to the reason to deal with this answer as\nbest it can. The motive may be anything or nothing. Both\nconsciousness and will are independent of motive.\n\nFor in all these primordial energizings of the complex vision\neverything that happens, happens simultaneously. With the\nconsciousness \"I am I\" there comes simultaneously into existence\nthe consciousness of an external universe which is, at one and the\nsame time, included in the circle of the \"I am I\" and outside the\ncircle. That is to say when we think the thought \"I am I,\" we feel\nourselves to be the whole universe thinking \"I am I,\" and yet by a\nprimordial contradiction, we feel ourselves to be an \"I am I\"\nopposed to the universe and contrasted with the universe.\n\nBut all this happens simultaneously; and the consciousness that we\nare ourselves implies, at one and the same time, the consciousness\nthat we _are_ the universe and the consciousness that we are\n_inside_ the universe.\n\nAnd precisely as the fact of self-consciousness implies the\nprimordial duality and contradiction of being at once the whole\nuniverse and something inside the universe, so the original fact of\nour thinking at all, implies the activity of the will.\n\nWe think because we are \"thinking animals\" and we will because\nwe are \"willing animals.\" The presence of what we call motive is\nsomething that comes and goes intermittently and which may or\nmay not be present from the first awakening of consciousness. We\n_may_ think \"I am I\" at the very dawn of consciousness under the\npressure of a vague motive of clearing up a confused situation. We\n_may_ use our reason at the very dawn of consciousness under the\npressure of a vague motive of alleviating the distress of disorder\nwith the comfort of order. But, on the other hand, self-consciousness\nmay play its part, reason may play its part and the will may play its\npart in the complete absence of any definite motive. There is such a\nthing--and this is the point I am anxious to make--as _motiveless_\nwill. Certain thinkers have sought to eliminate the will altogether by\nsubstituting for it the direct impact or pressure of some motive or\nmotive-force. But if the will can be proved to be a primordial energy\nof the complex vision and if the conception of a motiveless exertion\nof the will is a legitimate conception, then, although we must admit\nthe intermittent appearance and disappearance of all manner of\nmotives, we have no right to substitute motive for will. If we do\nmake such a substitution, all we really achieve is simply a change of\n_name_; and our new motive is the old will \"writ small.\"\n\nMotives undoubtedly may come and go from the beginning of\nconsciousness and the beginning of will. They may flutter like\nbutterflies round both the consciousness and the will. For instance it\nis clear that I am not _always_ articulating to myself the notable or\ntroublesome thought \"I am I.\" I may be sometimes so lost and\nabsorbed in sensation that I quite forget this interesting fact. But it\nmay easily happen at such times that I definitely experience the\n_sensation of choice_; of choice between an intensification of\nself-consciousness and a continued blind enjoyment of this external\npreoccupation. And it is from this _sensation of choice_ that we\ngather weight for our contention that the will is a basic attribute of\nthe human soul.\n\nIt is certainly true that we are often able to detach ourselves from\nourselves and to watch the struggle going on between two opposite\nmotive-forces, quite unaware, it might seem, and almost indifferent,\nas to how the contest will end.\n\nBut this struggle between opposite motives does not obliterate our\nsensation of choice. It sometimes intensifies it to an extreme point\nof quite painful suspension. The opposite motives may be engaged\nin a struggle. But the field of the struggle is what we call the will.\nAnd it may even sometimes happen that the will intervenes between\na weaker and stronger motive and, out of arbitrary pride and the\npleasure of exertion for the sake of exertion, throws its weight on\nthe weaker side.\n\nIt is a well-known psychological fact that the complex vision can\nenergize, with vigorous spontaneity, through the will alone, just as it\ncan energize through sensation alone. The will can, so to speak,\nstretch its muscles and gather itself together for attack or defence at\na moment when there is no particular necessity for its use.\n\nSome degree of self-consciousness is bound to accompany this\n\"motiveless stretching\" of the will, for the simple reason that it is\nnot \"will in the abstract\" which makes such a movement but the\ntotality of the complex vision, though in this case all other\nattributes of the complex vision, including self-consciousness and\nreason, are held in subordination to the will.\n\nMan is a philosophical animal; and he philosophizes as inevitably as\nhe breathes. He is also an animal possessed of will; and he uses his\nwill as inevitably as, in the process of breathing, he uses his lungs\nor his throat. Around him, from the beginning, all manner of motives\nmay flutter like birds on the wing. They may be completely\ndifferent motives in the case of different personalities. But in all\npersonalities there is consciousness, to grasp these motives; and in\nall personalities there is will, to accept or to reject these motives.\n\nThe question of the freedom of the will is a question which\nnecessarily enters into our discussion.\n\nThe will feels itself--or rather consciousness feels the will to be--at\nonce free and limited. The soul does not feel it is free to do anything\nit pleases. That at least is certain. For without some limitation,\nwithout something resistant to exert itself upon, the will could not\nbe known. An absolutely free will is unthinkable. The very nature of\nthe will implies a struggle with some sort of resistance.\n\nThe will is, therefore, by the terms of its original definition and by\nthe original feeling which the soul experiences in regard to it,\nlimited in its freedom. The problem resolves itself, therefore, if once\nwe grant the existence of the will, into the question of how much\nfreedom the will has or how far it is limited. Is it, for instance, when\nwe know all the conditions of its activity, entirely limited? Is the\nfreedom of the will an illusion?\n\nIt is just at this point that the logical reason makes a savage attempt\nto dominate the situation. The logical reason arrives step by step at\nthe inevitable conclusion that the will has no freedom at all but is\nabsolutely limited.\n\nOn the other hand emotion, instinct, imagination, intuition, and\nconscience, all assume that the limitation of the will is not absolute\nbut that within certain boundaries, which themselves are by no\nmeans fixed or permanent, the will is free.\n\nConsciousness itself must be added to this list. For whatever\narguments may be used in the realm of thought, when the moment\nof choice arrives in the realm of action, we are always conscious of\nthe will as free. If the reason is justified in regarding the freedom\nof the will as an illusion, we are justified in denying the existence\nof the will altogether. For a will with only an illusion of freedom is\nnot a will at all. In that ease it were better to eliminate the will\nand regard the soul as a thing which acts and reacts under the stimuli\nof motives like a helpless automaton endowed with consciousness.\n\nBut the wiser course is to experiment with the will and let it prove\nits freedom to the sceptical reason by helping that same reason to\nretire into its proper place and associate itself with the apex-thought\nof the complex vision.\n\nLeaving the will then, as a thing limited and yet free, let us pass to\na consideration of what I call \"taste.\" This is the aesthetic sense, an\noriginal activity of the human soul, associated with that universal\ntendency in life and nature which we name the beautiful. I use the\nword \"taste\" at this moment in preference to \"aesthetic sense,\"\nbecause I feel that this particular original activity of the complex\nvision has a wider field than is commonly supposed. I regard it, in\nfact, as including much more than the mere sense of beauty. I regard\nit as a direct organ of research, comparable to instinct or intuition,\nbut covering a different ground. I regard it as a mysterious\nclairvoyance of the soul, capable of discriminating between certain\neverlasting opposites, which together make up an eternal duality in\nthe very depths of existence.\n\nThese opposites imply larger and more complicated issues than are\nimplied in the words beautiful and ugly. The real and the unreal, the\ninteresting and the uninteresting, the significant and the\ninsignificant, the suggestive and the meaningless, the arresting and\nthe commonplace, the exciting and the dull, the organic and the\naffected, the dramatic and the undramatic, are only some of the\ndifferences implied.\n\nThe fact that art is constantly using what we call the ugly as well as\nwhat we call the commonplace, and turning both these into new\nforms of beauty, is a fact that considerably complicates the\nsituation. And what art, the culminating creative energy of the\naesthetic sense, can do, the aesthetic sense itself can do with its\ncritical and receptive power.\n\nSo that in the aesthetic sense, or in what I call \"taste,\" we have an\nenergy which is at once receptive and creative; at once capable of\nresponding to this eternal duality, and of creating new forms of\nbeauty and interest _out of_ the ugly and uninteresting. A new name\nis really required for this thing. A name is required for it that\nconveys a more creative implication than the word \"taste,\" a word\nwhich has an irresponsible, arbitrary, and even flippant sound, and a\nmore passionate, religious, and ecstatic implication than the word\n\"aesthetic,\" a word which suggests something calculated, cold,\nlearned, and a little tame. I use the word \"taste\" at this particular\nmoment because this word implies a certain challenge to both\nreason and conscience, and some such challenge it is necessary to\ninsist upon, if this particular energy of the soul is to defend its\nbasic integrity.\n\nThis ultimate attribute of personality, then, which I call \"taste\"\nreveals to us an aspect of the system of things quite different from\nthose revealed by the other activities of the human soul. This aspect\nof the universe, or this \"open secret\" of the universe, loses itself,\nas all the others do in unfathomable abysses. It descends to the very\nroots of life. It springs from the original reservoirs of life. It has\ndepths which no mental logic can sound; and it has horizons in the\npresence of which the mind stops baffled. When we use the term \"the\nbeautiful\" to indicate the nature of what it reveals, we are easily\nmisled; because in current superficial speech--and unless the word is\nused by a great artist--the term \"beautiful\" has a narrow and limited\nmeaning. Dropping the term \"taste\" then, as having served its\npurpose, and reverting to the more academic phrase \"aesthetic\nsense\" we must note that the unfathomable duality revealed by this\naesthetic sense covers, as I have hinted, much more ground than is\ncovered by the narrow terms \"beauty\" and \"ugliness.\"\n\nIt must be understood, moreover, that what is revealed by the aesthetic\nsense is a struggle, a conflict, a war, a contradiction, going\non in the heart of things. The aesthetic sense does not only reveal\nloveliness and distinction; it also reveals the grotesque, the bizarre,\nthe outrageous, the indecent and the diabolic. If we prefer to use the\nterm \"beauty\" in a sense so comprehensive and vast as to include\n_both sides_ of this eternal duality, then we shall be driven to regard\nas \"beautiful\" the entire panorama of life, with its ghastly contrasts,\nwith its appalling evil, with its bitter pain, and with its intolerable\ndreariness.\n\nThe \"beautiful\" will then become nothing less than the whole\ndramatic vortex regarded from the aesthetic point of view. Life with\nall its contradictions, considered as an aesthetic spectacle, will\nbecome \"beautiful\" to us. This is undoubtedly one form which the\naesthetic sense assumes; the form of justifying existence, in all its\nhorror and loathsomeness as well as in all its magical attraction.\n\nAnother form the aesthetic sense may assume is the form of \"taking\nsides\" in this eternal struggle; of using its inspiration to destroy,\nor to make us forget, the brutality of things, by concentrating our\nattention upon what in the narrow sense we call the beautiful or the\ndistinguished or the lovely. But there is yet a third form the\naesthetic sense may assume. Not only can it visualize the whole\nchaotic struggle between beauty and hideousness as itself a beautiful\ndrama; not only can it so concentrate upon beauty that we forget the\nhideousness; it is also able to see the world as a humorous spectacle.\n\nWhen the aesthetic sense regards the whole universe as \"beautiful\"\nit must necessarily regard the whole universe as tragic; for the pain\nand dreariness and devilishness in the universe is so unspeakable\nthat any \"beauty\" which includes such things must be a tragic\nbeauty. Not to recognize this and to attempt to \"accept\" the universe\nas something which is not tragic, is to outrage and insult the\naesthetic sense.\n\nBut we may regard the universe as tragic without regarding it as\n\"beautiful\" and yet remain under the power of the aesthetic energy.\nFor there exists a primordial aspect of the aesthetic vision which is\nnot concerned with the beautiful at all, or only with the beautiful in\nso wide a latitude as to transcend all ordinary usage, and this is our\nsense of humour.\n\nThe universe as the human soul perceives it, is horribly and most\ntragically humorous. Man is the laughing animal; and the \"perilous\nstuff\" which tickles his aesthetic sense with a revelation of\noutrageous comedy has its roots in the profoundest abyss. This\nhumorous aspect of the system of things is just as primordial and\nintrinsic as what we call the \"beautiful.\" The human soul is able to\npour the whole stream of its complex vision through this fantastic\ncasement. It knows how to respond to the \"diablerie\" of the abysses\nwith a reciprocal gesture. It is able to answer irony with irony; and\nto the appalling grotesqueness and indecency of the universe it has\nthe power of retorting with an equally shameless leer.\n\nBut this sardonic aspect of human humour, though tallying truly\nenough with one eternal facet of the universe, does not exhaust the\nhumorous potentiality of the aesthetic sense. There is a \"good\" irony\nas well as a \"wicked\" irony. Humour can be found in alliance with\nthe emotion of love as well as with the emotion of hate. Humour can\nbe kind as well as cruel; and there is no doubt that the aesthetic\nspectacle of the world is as profoundly humorous in a quite normal\nsense as it is beautiful or noble or horrible.\n\nTurning now to that primeval attribute of the complex vision which\nwe call emotion, we certainly enter the presence of something\nwhose existence cannot be denied or explained away. Directly we\ngrow conscious of ourselves, directly we use reason or instinct or\nthe aesthetic sense, we are aware of an emotional reaction. This\nemotional reaction may be resolved into a basic duality, the activity\nof love and the activity of the opposite of love.\n\nI say \"the opposite of love\" deliberately; because I am anxious to\nindicate, in regard to emotion, how difficult it is to find adequate\nwords to cover the actual field of what we feel.\n\nI should like to write even the word \"love\" with some such mark of\nhesitation. For, just because of the appalling importance of this\nultimate duality, it is essential to be on our guard against the use\nof words which convey a narrow, crude, rough-and-ready, and\nsuperficial meaning. By the emotion of \"love\" I do not mean the\namorous phenomenon which we call \"being in love.\" Nor do I mean\nthe calmer emotion which we call \"affection.\" The passion of\nfriendship, when friendship really becomes a passion, is nearer my\nmeaning than any of these. And yet the emotion of love, conceived\nas one side of this eternal duality, is much more than the \"passion of\nfriendship\"; because it is an emotion that can be felt in the presence\nof things and ideas as well as persons. Perhaps the emotion of love\nas symbolized in the figure of Christ, combined with the aesthetic\nand intellectual passion inherited from the Greek philosophers,\ncomes nearest to what I have in mind; though even this, without\nsome tangible and concrete embodiment, tends to escape us and\nevade analysis.\n\nAnd if it is hard to define this \"love\" which is the protagonist, so to\nspeak, in the world's emotional drama, it is still harder to define its\nopposite, its antagonist. I could name this by the name of \"hate,\" the\nordinary antithesis of love, but if I did so it would have to be with a\nvery wide connotation.\n\nThe true opposite to the sort of \"love\" I have in my mind is not so\nmuch \"hate\" as a kind of dull and insensitive hostility, a kind of\nbrutal malignity and callous aversion. Perhaps what we are looking\nfor as the true opposite of love may be best defined as malice.\n\nMalice seems to convey a more impersonal depth and a wider reach\nof activity than the word hate and has also a clearer suggestion of\ndeliberate insensitiveness about it. The most concentrated and\nenergetic opposite of love is not either hate or malice. It is\n_cruelty_; which is a thing that seems to draw its evil inspiration\nfrom the profoundest depths of conscious existence.\n\nBut cruelty must necessarily have for its \"object\" something living\nand sentient. A spiritual feeling, a work of art, an idea, a principle,\na landscape, a theory, an inanimate group of things, could not be\ncontemplated with an emotion of cruelty, though it could certainly\nbe contemplated with an emotion of malice.\n\nThere is often, if not always, a strange admixture of sensuality in\ncruelty. Cruelty, profoundly evil as it is, has a living intensity\nwhich makes it less dull, less thick, less deliberately insensitive,\nless coldly hostile, than the pure emotion of malice, and therefore\nless adapted than malice to be regarded as the true opposite of love.\n\nBut the best indication of the distinction I want to make will be\nfound in the contrast between the conceptions of creation and\ndestruction. The dull, thick, insensitive callousness which we are\nconscious of in the opposite of love is an indication that while love\nis essentially creative the opposite of love is essentially _that\nwhich resists creation_.\n\nThe opposite of love is not destructive in the sense of being an\nactive destructive force. Such an active destructive force must\nnecessarily, by reason of the passionate energy in it, be a perversion\nof creative power, not the opposite of creative power.\n\nCreative power, even in its unperverted activity, must always be\ncapable of destroying. It must be capable of destroying what is in\nthe way of further creation. Thus the true opposite of creation is not\ndestruction, but the inert, heavy, thick, callous, brutal, insensitive\n\"obscurantism\" or \"material opacity\" which resists the pressure of\nthe creative spirit.\n\nBy this analysis of the ultimate duality of emotion we are put in\npossession of a basic aspect of the complex vision, which must\nlargely shape and determine its total activity. The soul within us,\nthat mysterious \"something\" which is the living and concrete\n\"person\" whose vision the complex vision is, is a thing subject at the\nstart to this unfathomable duality, the emotion of love and the\nemotion of malice.\n\nThe emotion of love is the life-begetting, life-conceiving force, the\ncreator of beauty, the discoverer of truth, and the reconciler of\neternal contradictions.\n\nThe emotion of malice, with its frozen sneer of sardonic denial,\nraises its \"infernal fist\" against the centrifugal outflowing of the\nemotion of love. It is impossible to conceive of self-consciousness\nwithout love and hatred; or, as I prefer to say, without love and\nmalice. Self-consciousness implies from the start what we call the\nuniverse; and the universe cannot appear upon the scene without\nexciting in us the emotion of love and hate. Every man born into the\nworld loves and hates directly he is conscious of the world. This is\nthe ultimate duality. Attraction and repulsion is the material formula\nfor this contradiction.\n\nIf everything in the world were illusion except one Universal Being,\nsuch a being must necessarily be thought of as experiencing the\nemotion of self-love and of self-hatred. A condition of absolute\nindifference is unthinkable. Such indifference could not last a\nmoment without becoming either that faint hatred, which we call\n\"boredom,\" or that faint love, which we call \"interest.\" The\ncontemplation of the universe with no emotional reaction of any\nkind is an inconceivable thing. An infant at its mother's breast\ndisplays love and malice. At one and the same moment it satisfies\nits thirst and beats upon the breast that feeds it.\n\nThe primordial process of philosophizing and the primal will to\nphilosophize are both of them penetrated through and through, with\nthis ultimate duality of love and malice. Love and malice in\nalternate impulse are found latent and potent in every philosophic\neffort. Behind every philosophy, if we have the love or the malice to\nseek for it, may be found the love or malice, or both of them, side\nby side, of the individual philosopher. That pure and unemotional\ndesire for truth for its own sake which is the privilege of physical\nscience cannot retain its simplicity when confronted with the deeper\nproblems of philosophy. It cannot do so because the complex vision\nwith which we philosophize contains emotion as one of its basic\nattributes.\n\nTo consider next, the attribute of imagination. Imagination seems,\nwhen we analyse it, to resolve itself into the half-creative,\nhalf-interpretative act by which the complex personality seizes upon,\nplunges into, and moulds to its purpose, that deeper unity in any\ngroup of things which gives such a group its larger and more\npenetrating significance.\n\nImagination differs from intuition in the fact that by its creative and\ninterpretative power it dominates, possesses and moulds the material\nit works upon. Intuition is entirely receptive and it receives the\nillumination offered to it at one single indrawing, at one breath.\nImagination may be regarded as a male attribute; intuition as a\nfeminine one; although in a thousand individual cases the situation\nis actually reversed.\n\nTo realize the primary importance of imagination one has only to\nvisualize reason, will, taste, sensation, and so forth, energizing in\nits absence. One becomes aware at once that such a limited activity\ndoes not cover the field of man's complex vision. Something--a\npower that creates, interprets, illumines, gathers up into large and\nflowing outlines--is absent from such an experience.\n\nConsider, in the next place, that primordial attribute of the complex\nvision which we commonly name conscience. We are not concerned\nhere with the world-old discussion as to the \"origin\" of conscience.\nConscience, from the point of view we are now considering, is just\nas fundamental and axiomatic as will, or intuition, or sensation.\n\nThe philosophy of the complex vision retains, with regard to what is\ncalled \"evolution,\" a completely suspended judgment. The process\nof historic evolution may or may not have resulted in the particular\ndifferentiation of species which we now behold. What we are now\nassuming is that, in whatever way the differentiation of actual living\norganisms has come about, every particular living organism,\nincluding the planetary and stellar bodies, must possess in some\ndegree or other the organ of apprehension which we call the\ncomplex vision.\n\nOur assumption, in fact, is that every living thing has personality;\nthat personality implies the existence of a definite soul-monad; that\nwhere such a soul-monad exists there is a complex vision; and\nfinally that, where there is a complex vision, there must be, in some\nrudimentary or embryotic state, the eleven attributes of such a\nvision, including the attribute which the human race has come to\ncall \"conscience\" and which is, in reality, \"the power of response\" to\nthe vision which we have named \"immortal.\" When evolutionists\nretort to us that what we call personality is only a late and accidental\nphenomenon in the long process of evolution, our answer is that\nwhen they seek, according to such an assumption, to visualize the\nuniverse as it was _before personality appeared_, they really, only in\na surreptitious and illegitimate manner, project their own conscious\npersonality into \"the vast backward and abysm of time,\" to be the\ninvisible witness of this pre-personal universe.\n\nThus when evolutionists assure us that there was once a period in\nthe history of the stellar system when nothing existed but masses of\ngaseous nebulae, our reply is that they have forgotten that invisible\nand shadowy projection of their own personality which is the\npre-supposed watcher or witness of this \"nothing-but-nebulae\" state of\nthings.\n\nThe doctrine or hypothesis of evolution does not in any degree\nexplain the mystery of the universe. All it does is to offer us an\nhypothetical picture--true or false--of the manner in which the\nchanges of organic and inorganic life succeeded one another in their\nhistoric creation. Evolutionists have to make their start somewhere,\njust as \"personalists\" have; and it is much more difficult for them to\nshow how masses of utterly unconscious \"nebulae\" evoked the\nmystery of personality than it is for us to show how the primordial\nexistence of personality demands at the very start some sort of\nmaterial or bodily expression, whether of a nebular or of any other\nkind.\n\nEvolutionists, forgetting the presence of that invisible \"watcher\" of\ntheir evolutionary process which they have themselves projected\ninto the remote planetary past, assume as their axiomatic \"data\" that\nsoulless unconscious chemical elements possess \"within them\" the\nmiraculous power of producing living personalities. All one has to\ndo is to pile up thousands upon thousands of years in which the\nmiracle takes place.\n\nBut the philosophy of the complex vision would indicate that no\namount of piling up of centuries upon centuries could possibly\nproduce out of \"unconscious matter\" the perilous and curious \"stuff\"\nwhich we call \"consciousness of life.\" And we would further reply\nto the evolutionists that their initial assumption as to the objective\nexistence, suspended in a vacuum, of masses of material chemistry\nis an assumption which has been abstracted and isolated from the\ntotal volume of those sense-impressions, which are the only actual\nreality we know, and which are the impressions made, in human\nexperience, upon some living personality.\n\nThis criticism of the evolutionists' inevitable attack upon us enters\nnaturally at this point; because, while the average mind is willing\nenough to grant some sort of vague omnipresent \"will to evolve\" to\nthe primordial \"nebula\" and even prepared to allow it such obscure\nconsciousness as is implied in the phrase \"life-force\" or \"\u00e9lan vital,\"\nit is startled and shocked to a supreme degree when we assert that\nsuch \"nebula,\" if it existed, was the outward body or form of a\nliving \"soul-monad\" possessed, even as human beings are, of every\nattribute of the complex vision.\n\nThe average mind, in its vague and careless mood, is ready to accept\nour contention that some sort of will or reason or consciousness\nexisted at the beginning of things. It is only when such a mind\ncomes to realize that what we are predicating is actual personality,\nwith all the implications of that, that it cries out in protest. The\naverage mind can swallow our contention that reason and will\nexisted from the beginning because the average mind has been\npenetrated for centuries by vague traditions of an \"over-soul\" or an\nuniversal \"reason\" or \"will.\" It is only when in our analysis of the\nattributes of personality we come bolt up against the especially\nanthropomorphic attribute of \"conscience\" that it staggers and\ngasps.\n\nFor the original \"stellar gas\" to be vaguely animated by some\nobscure \"\u00e9lan vital\" seemed natural enough; but for it to be the\n\"body\" of some definite living soul seems almost humorous; and for\nsuch a living soul to possess the attribute of \"conscience,\" or the\npower of response to the vision of immortals, seems not only\nhumorous but positively absurd.\n\nThe philosophy of the complex vision, however, in its analysis of\nthe eternal elements of personality is not in the least afraid of\nreaching conclusions which appear \"absurd\" to the average\nintelligence. The philosophy of the complex vision accepts the\nelement of the \"absurd\" or of the \"outrageous\" or of the \"fantastic\"\nin its primordial assumptions; for according to its contention this\nelement of the \"apparently impossible\" is an essential ingredient in\nthe whole system of things.\n\nLife, according to this philosophy, is only one aspect of personality.\nAnother aspect of personality is the apparently miraculous creation\nof \"something\" out of \"nothing\"; for the unfathomable creative\npower of personality extends beyond and below all the organic\nphenomena which we group vaguely together under the name of\n\"life.\"\n\nThus when in our analysis of the attributes of the complex vision we\nare confronted by the evolutionary question as to how such a thing,\nas the thing we call \"conscience,\" got itself lodged in the little\ncells of the human cranium, our answer is that the question stated in\nthis manner does not touch the essential problem at all. The essential\nproblem from the point of view of the philosophy of the complex\nvision is not how \"conscience,\" or why other attribute of the soul,\ngot itself lodged in the human skull, or expressed, shall we say,\nthrough the human skull, but how it is that the whole stream of\nsense-impressions, of which the hardness and thickness of the\nhuman skull is only one impression among many, and the original\n\"star-dust\" or \"star-nebulae\" only another impression among many,\never got itself unified and synthesized into the form of \"impression\"\nat all.\n\nIn other words the problem is not how the attributes of the soul\narose from the chemistry of the brain and the nerves; but how the\nbrain and the nerves together with the whole stream of material\nphenomena from the star-dust upwards, ever got themselves unified\nand focussed into any sort of intelligibility or system. The average\nhuman mind which feels a shock of distrust and suspicion directly\nwe suggest that the thing we name \"conscience,\" defined as the\npower of response to the ideal vision, is an inalienable aspect of\nwhat we call \"the soul\" wherever the soul exists, feels no sort of\nshock or surprise when we appeal to its own \"conscience,\" or when\nit appeals to the \"conscience\" of its child or its dog or even of its\ncat, or when it displays anger with its trees or its flowers for\ntheir apparent wilfulness and errancy.\n\nKant found in the moral sense of humanity his door of escape from\nthe fatal relativity of pure reason with its confounding antinomies.\nHuxley found in the moral sense of humanity a mysterious,\nunrelated phenomenon that refused to fall into line with the rest of\nthe evolutionary-stream. But when, in one hold act of faith or of\nimagination, we project the content of our own individual soul into\nthe circle of every other possible \"soul,\" including the \"souls\" of\nsuch phenomenal vortices of matter as those from which historic\nevolution takes its start, this impossible gulf or \"lacuna\" dividing\nthe human scene from all previous \"scenes\" is immediately bridged;\nand the whole stream of material sense-impression flows forward, in\nparallel and consonant congruity, with the underlying creative\nenergy of all the complex visions of which it is the expression.\n\nTherefore, there is no need for us, in our consideration of the basic\nattribute of the soul which we call conscience, to tease ourselves\nwith the fabulous image of some prehistoric \"cave-man\" supposedly\ndevoid of such a sense. To do this is to employ a trick of the\nisolated reason quite alien from our real human imagination.\n\nOur own personality is so constructed that it is impossible for us to\nrealize with any sort of intelligent sympathy what the feelings of\nthis conscience-less cave-man would be. To contemplate his\nexistence at all we have to resort to pure rationalistic speculation.\nWe have to leave our actual human experience completely behind.\nBut the philosophy of the complex vision is an attempt to interpret\nthe mystery of the universe in terms of nothing else than actual\nhuman experience. So we are not only permitted but compelled to\nput out of court this conscience-less cave-man of pure speculation.\nIt is true that we encounter certain eccentric human beings who\ndeny that they possess this \"moral sense\"; but one has only to\nobserve them for a little while under the pressure of actual life to\nfind out how they deceive themselves.\n\nExperience certainly indicates that every human being, however\nnormal and \"good,\" has somewhere in him a touch of insanity and a\nvein of anti-social aberration. But no human being, however\nabnormal or however \"criminal,\" is born into the world without this\ninvisible monitor we call \"conscience.\"\n\nThe curious pathological experience which might be called\n\"conscience-killing\" is certainly not uncommon. But it is an\nexperiment that has never been more than approximately successful.\nIn precisely the same way we might practise \"reason-killing\" or\n\"intuition-killing\" or \"taste-killing.\" One may set out to hunt and\ntry to kill any basic attribute of our complex vision; but the proof of\nthe truth of our whole argument lies in the fact that these murderous\ncampaigns are never completely successful. The \"murdered\"\nattribute refuses to remain quiet in its grave. It stretches out an arm\nfrom beneath the earth. It shakes the dust off and comes to life\nagain.\n\nWhen we leave the question as to the existence of conscience, and\nenquire what the precise and particular \"command\" of conscience\nmay be in any individual case, we approach the edge of an\naltogether different problem.\n\nThe particular message or command of conscience is bound to differ\nin a thousand ways in the cases of different personalities. Only in its\nultimate essence it cannot differ. Because, in its ultimate essence,\nthe conscience of every individual is confronted by that eternal\nduality of love and malice which is the universal contradiction at the\nbasis of every living soul.\n\nBut short of this there is room for an infinite variety of \"categorical\nimperatives.\" The conscience of one personality is able to accept as\nits \"good\" the very same thing that another personality is compelled\nto regard as its \"evil.\" Indeed it is conceivable that a moment might\narise in the history of the race when one single solitary individual\ncalled that thing \"good\" or that thing \"evil\" which all the rest of the\nworld regarded in the opposite sense. Not only so; but it might even\nhappen that the genius and persuasiveness of such a person might\nchange into its direct opposite the moral valuation of the whole of\nhumanity. In many quite ordinary cases there may arise a clash\nbetween the conventional morality of the community and the verdict\nof an individual conscience. In such cases it would be towards what\nthe community termed \"immoral\" that the conscience of the\nindividual would point, and from the thing that the community\ntermed \"moral\" that it would turn instinctively away.\n\nA conscience of this kind would suffer the pain of remorse when in\nits weakness it let itself be swayed by the \"community-morality\"\nand it would experience the pleasure of relief when in absolute\nloneliness it defied the verdict of society.\n\nLet us consider now an attribute of man's complex vision which\nmust instantaneously be accepted as basic and fundamental by every\nliving person. I refer to what we call \"sensation.\" The impressions\nof the outward senses may be criticized. They may be corrected,\nmodified, reduced to order, and supplemented by other considerations.\nConclusions based upon them may be questioned. But whatever be done\nwith them, or made by them, they must always remain an integral\nand inveterate aspect of man's personality.\n\nThe sensations of pain and pleasure--who can deny the primordial\nand inescapable character of these? Not that the pursuit of pleasure\nor the avoidance of pain can be the unbroken motive-force even of\nthe most hedonistic among us. Our complex vision frequently flings\nus passionately upon pain. We often embrace pain in an ecstasy of\nwelcome. Nor is this fierce embracing of pain \"motivated\" by a\ndeliberate desire to get pleasure out of pain. It seems in some\nstrange way due to an attraction towards pain for its own sake--\ntowards pain, as though pain were really beautiful and desirable in\nitself. One element in all this is undoubtedly due to the desire of\nthe will to assert its freedom and the integrity of its being; in\nother words to the desire of the will towards the irrational, the\ncapricious, the destructive, the chaotic.\n\nIt has been only the least imaginative of philosophers who have\ntaken for granted that man invariably desires his own welfare. Man\ndoes not even invariably desire his own pleasure. He desires the\nreactive vibration of power; and very often this \"power\" is the\npower to rush blindly upon destruction. But, whether dominant or\nnot as a motive affecting the will, it remains that our experience of\npleasure and pain is a basic experience of the complex vision. And\nthis experience of sensation is not only a passive experience. The\nattribute of sensation has its active, its energetic, its creative\nside. No one who has suffered extreme pain or enjoyed exquisite and\nthrilling pleasures, can deny the curious fact that these things take\nto themselves a kind of independent life within us and become\nsomething very like \"entities\" or living separate objects.\n\nThis phenomenon is due to the fact that our whole personality\nincarnates itself in the pain or in the pleasure of the moment. Such\npain, such pleasure, is the quintessential attenuated \"matter\" with\nwhich our soul clothes itself. At such moments we _are_ the pain;\nwe _are_ the pleasure. Our human identity seems merged, lost,\nannihilated. Our soul seems no longer _our_ soul. It becomes the\nsoul of the overpowering sensation. We ourselves at such moments\nbecome fiery molecules of pain, burning atoms of pleasure. Just as\nthe logical reason can abstract itself from the other primal energies\nand perform strange and fantastic tricks, so the activity of sensation\ncan so absorb, obsess and overpower the whole personality that the\nrhythm of existence is entirely broken.\n\nPain at the point of ecstasy, pleasure at the point of ecstasy, are\nboth of them destructive of those rare moments when our complex vision\nresolves itself into music. Such music is indeed itself a kind of\necstasy; but it is an ecstasy intellectualized and consciously\ncreative. Pain is present there and pleasure is present there; but\nthey are there only as orchestral notes in a larger unity that has\nabsorbed them and transmuted them.\n\nWhen a work of art by reason of its sensational appeal reduces us to\nan ecstasy of pleasure or pain it renders impossible that supreme act\nof the complex vision by means of which the immortal calm of the\nideal vision descends upon the unfathomable universe.\n\nSensation carried to its extreme limit becomes impersonal; for in its\nunconscious mechanism personality is devoured. But it does not\nbecome impersonal in that magical liberating sense in which the\nimpersonal is an escape, bringing with it a feeling of large, cool,\nquiet, and unruffled space. It becomes impersonal in a thick, gross,\nopaque, mechanical manner.\n\nThere is brutality and outrage; there is bestiality and obscenity\nabout both pain and pleasure when in their voracious maw they devour\nthe magic of the unfathomable world. Thus it may be noted that most\ngreat and heroic souls hold their supreme pain at a distance from\nthem, with a proud gesture of contempt, and go down at the last\nwith their complex vision unruffled and unimpaired. There is indeed\na still deeper \"final moment\" than this; but it is so rare as to be\nout of the reach of average humanity. I refer to an attitude like that\nof Jesus upon the cross; in whose mood towards his own suffering\nthere was no element of \"pride of will\" but only an immense pity for\nthe terrible sensitiveness of all life, and a supreme heightening of\nthe emotion of love towards all life.\n\nIt will be noted that in my analysis of \"sensation\" I have said\nnothing of what are usually called \"the five senses.\" These senses\nare obviously the material \"feelers\" or the gates of material\nsentiency by which the soul's attribute of sensation feeds itself from\nthe objective world; but they are so penetrated and percolated,\nthrough and through, by the other basic activities of the soul, that it\nis extremely difficult to disentangle from our impressions of sight,\nof sound, of touch, of taste, and of smell, those interwoven threads\nof reason, imagination and so forth which so profoundly modify and\ntransmute, even in the art of seeing, hearing, touching, tasting, and\nsmelling, the various manifestations of \"the objective mystery\"\nwhich we apprehend in our sensuous grasp.\n\nBy emphasizing the feelings of pleasure and pain as the primary\ncharacteristics of the attribute of sensation we are indicating the\nfact that every sensation we experience carries with it in some\nperceptible degree or other, the feeling of \"well-being\" or the\nfeeling of distress.\n\nWe now come to consider that dim, obscure, but nevertheless\npowerful energy, which the universal tradition of language dignifies\nby the name of \"instinct.\" This \"instinct\" is the portion of the\nactivity of the soul which works more blindly and less consciously\nthan any other.\n\nThe French philosopher Bergson isolates and emphasizes this\nsubterranean activity until it seems to him to hold in its grasp a\ndeeper secret of life than any other energy which man possesses To\nsecure for instinct this primary place in the panorama of life it is\nnecessary to eliminate from the situation that silent witness which\nwe call \"the mind\" or self-consciousness; that witness which from\nits invisible watch-tower looks forth upon the whole spectacle. It is\nnecessary to take for granted the long historic stream of\nevolutionary development. It is necessary to regard this\ndevelopment in its organic totality as the sole reality with which we\nhave to deal.\n\nThe invisible mental witness being eliminated, it becomes\nnecessary, if instinct is to be thus made supreme, to regard the\nappearance of the soul as a mere stage in an evolutionary process,\nthe driving-force of which is the power of instinct itself. Planets\nand plants, men and animals, are seen in this way to be all dominated\nby instinct; and instinct is found to be so much the most important\nelement in evolution, that upon it, rather than upon anything else,\nthe whole future of the universe may be said to depend.\n\nHaving made this initial plunge into shameless objectivity, having\nput completely out of court the invisible witness of it all, we find\nourselves reduced to regarding this \"blind\" instinct as the galvanic\nbattery which moves the world. Thus isolated from the other powers\nof the soul, this mysterious energy, this subterranean driving-force,\nhas to bear the whole weight of everything that happens in space\nand time. A strange sort of \"blindness\" must its blindness be, when\nits devices can supply the place of the most passionate intellectual\nstruggles of the mind!\n\nIf it is blind, it gropes its way, in its blindness, through the\nuttermost gulfs of space and into the nethermost abysses of life. If\nit is dumb, its silence is the irresistible silence of Fate, the\nsilence of the eternal \"Mothers.\"\n\nBut the \"instinct\" which is one of the basic attributes of the complex\nvision is not quite such an awe-inspiring thing as this. To raise it\ninto such a position as this there has to be a vigorous suppression, as\nI have hinted, of many other attributes of the soul. Instinct may be\ndefined as the pressure of obscure creative desire, drawn from the\ninscrutable recesses of the soul, malleable up to a certain point by\nreason and will, but beyond that point remaining unconscious,\nirrational, incalculable, elusive. That it plays an enormous part in\nthe process of life cannot be denied; but the part it plays is not so\nisolated from consciousness as sometimes has been imagined.\n\nThere is in truth a strange reciprocity between instinct and\nself-consciousness, according to which they both play into each\nother's hands. This is above all true of great artists' work, which\nin a superficial sense might be called unconscious, but which in a\ndeeper sense is profoundly conscious. It seems as though, in great\nworks of art, a certain superficial reasoning is sacrificed to\ninstinct, but in that very sacrifice a deeper level of reason is\nreached between which and instinct there is no longer anything\nbut complete understanding.\n\nTo intellectualize instinct is one of the profoundest secrets of the\nart of life; and it is only when instinct is thus intellectualized, or\nbrought into focus with the other aspects of the soul, that it is able\nto play its proper rhythmic part in the musical synthesis of the\ncomplex vision. But although we cannot allow to instinct the\nall-absorbing part in the world-play which Bergson claims for it, it\nremains that we have to regard it as one of the most mysterious and\nincalculable of the energies of the soul. It is instinct which brings\nall living entities into relation with something sub-conscious in their\nown nature.\n\nUnder the pressure of instinct man recognizes the animal in himself,\nthe plant in himself, and even a strange affinity with the inorganic\nand the inanimate. It is instinct in us which attracts us so strangely\nto the earth under our feet. It is instinct which attracts certain\nindividual souls to certain particular natural elements, such as air,\nfire, sand, mould, rain, wind, water, and the like; a kind of remote\natavistic reciprocity in us stretching out towards that particular\nelement. It is by means of instinct that we are able to sink into that\nmysterious sub-conscious world which underlies the conscious\nlevels of every soul-monad. Under the groping and fumbling\nguidance of this strange power we seem to come into touch with the\nprofoundest reservoirs of our personal identity.\n\nConsidering what fantastic and cruel tricks the lonely thinking\npower, the abstract reason, has been allowed to play us it is no\nwonder that this French philosopher has been tempted to turn away\nfrom reason and find in instinct the ultimate solution. Instinct, as we\ngive ourselves up to it, seems to carry us into the very nerves and\ntissues and veins and pulses of life. Its verdicts seem to reach us\nwith an absolute and unquestionable authority. They seem to bear\nupon them an \"imprimatur\" more powerful than any moral sanction.\nPotent and terrible, direct and final, instinct seems to rise up out of\nthe depths and break every law.\n\nIt leaps forth from our inmost being like a second self more\npowerful than we are. It invades religion. It incarnates itself in\nlust. It obsesses taste. It masquerades as intuition. It triumphs over\nreason. With an irrationality, that seems at the same time terrible\nand beautiful, instinct moves straight to its goal. It follows its\npurpose with demonic tenacity, heedless of logic, contemptuous of\nconsequences. It cares nothing for contradictions. It forces\ncontradictions to lose themselves in one another according to some\nsecret law of its own, unknown to the law of reason.\n\nSuch, then, is instinct, the sub-conscious fatality of Nature so\ndifficult to control; whose unrestrained activity is capable of\ncompletely destroying the rhythm of the complex vision. Nothing\nbut the power of the apex-thought of man's whole concentrated\nbeing is able to dominate this thing. It may be detected lurking in\nthe droop of the Sphinx's eyelids and in the cruel smile upon her\nmouth. But the answer given to the challenge of this subterranean\nforce is not, after all, any logical judgment of the pure reason. It\nis the answer of the vision of the artist, holding its treacherous\nmaterial under his creative hand.\n\nLet us turn now to the attribute of \"intuition.\" Intuition is a thing\nmore clearly definable and more easily analysed than almost any\nother of the aspects of the soul. Intuition is the feminine counterpart\nof imagination; and, as compared with instinct, it is a power which\nacts in clearly denned, isolated, intermittent movements, each one of\nwhich has a definite beginning and a definite end. As compared\nwith imagination, intuition is passive and receptive; as compared\nwith instinct it does not fumble and grope forward, steadily and\ntenaciously, among the roots of things; but it suspends itself,\nmirror-like, upon the surface of the unfathomable waters, and\nsuspended there reflects in swift sudden glimpses the mysterious\nmovements of the great deep. In this process of reflecting, or\napprehending in sudden, intermittent glimpses, the mysterious depths\nof the life of the soul, intuition is less affected by the reason\nor by the will than any other aspect of the complex vision.\n\nInstinct, in secret sub-conscious alliance with the will, is a\npermanent automatic energy, working in the hidden darkness of the\nroots of things like an ever-flowing subterranean stream. The\nrevelations of intuition, on the other hand, are not flowing and\nconstant, but separate, isolated, distinct and detached. In the\nsubject-matter of their revelations, too, intuition and instinct are\nvery different. If the recesses of the soul be compared to a fortified\ncastle, instinct is the active messenger of the place, continually\nissuing forth on secret errands concerning the real nature of which\nhe is himself often quite ignorant. Intuition, on the contrary, is\nthe little postern gate at the back of the building, set open at\nrare moments to the wide fields and magical forests which extend to\nthe far-off horizon.\n\nInstinct is always found in close contact with sensation, groping its\nways through the midst of the mass of material impressions, acting\nand reacting as it fumbles among such impressions. Intuition seems\nto deal directly and absolutely with a clear and definite landscape\nbehind the superficial landscape, with a truth behind truth, with a\nreality within reality.\n\nTo take an instance from common experience: a stranger, an\nunknown person, enters our circle. Instinct, working automatically\nand sensationally, may attract us powerfully towards such a person,\nwith a steady, irresistible attraction. Intuition, on the contrary,\nuttering its revelation abruptly and with, so to speak, one sudden\nmysterious cry, may warn us of some dangerous quicksand or\nperilous jungle in such a stranger's nature of which instinct was\ntotally ignorant because the thing was what might be called a\n\"spiritual quality\" lying deeper than those sensational or magnetic\nlevels through which instinct feels its way.\n\nThe instinct of animals or birds for instance warns them very\nquickly with regard to the presence of some natural enemy whose\napproach they apprehend through some mysterious sense-impression\nbeyond the analysis of human reason. But when their enemy\nis the mental intention of a human being they are only too easily\ntricked.\n\nTo take quite a different instance. It may easily happen that while\nconscience has habitually driven us to a certain course of action\nagainst which instinct has never revolted because of its\npreoccupation with the senses, some sudden flash of intuition\nreaching us from the hidden substratum of our being changes our\nwhole perspective and gives to conscience itself a completely\nopposite bias. What these intermittent revelations of intuition\ncertainly do achieve is the preservation in the soul's memory of the\nclear and deep and free and unfathomable margins of the ultimate\nmystery, those wavering sea-edges and twilight-shores of our being,\nwhich the austere categories of rational logic tend to shut out as if\nby impenetrable walls.\n\nIt remains to consider the attribute of memory. Memory is the name\nwhich we give to that intrinsic susceptibility, implying an intrinsic\npermanence or endurance in the material which displays\nsusceptibility, such as makes it possible for what the soul feels or\nwhat the soul creates to write down its own record, so that it can be\nread at will, or if not \"at will,\" at least can be read, if the proper\nstimulus or shock be applied.\n\nMemory is not the cause of the soul's concrete identity. The soul's\nconcrete identity is the cause or natural ground of memory. Memory\nis the \"passive-active\" power by means of which the concrete\nidentity of the soul grows richer, fuller, more articulate, more\ncomplex and more subtle.\n\nIn looking back over these eleven attributes of the \"soul-monad,\"\nwhat we have to remark is, that two of the number differ radically in\ntheir nature from the rest. The attribute of emotion differs from the\nrest in the sense that it is the living substantial unity or ultimate\nsynthesis in which they all move. It is indeed more than this. For it\nis the actual \"stuff\" or \"material\" out of which they are all, so to\nspeak, \"made\" or upon which they all, so to speak, inscribe their\ndiverse creations.\n\nThe permanent \"surface,\" or identical susceptibility, of this ebbing\nand flowing stream of emotion is memory; but the emotion itself,\ndivided into the positive and negative \"pole,\" as we say of love and\nmalice, is an actual projection upon the objective universe of the\nintrinsic \"stuff\" or psycho-material \"substance\" of which the\nsubstratum of the soul is actually composed. The other aspects of\nthe soul are, so to speak, the various \"tongues\" of diversely coloured\nflame with which the soul pierces the \"objective mystery\"; but the\nsubstance of all these flames is one and the same. It is the soul\nitself, projected upon the plane of material impression; and thus\nprojected, becoming the conflicting duality to which I give the name of\n\"emotion.\"\n\nThe attribute of \"will,\" also, differs radically from the rest; in the\nsense that \"will\" is the power which the soul possesses of\nencouraging or suppressing, re-vivifying or letting fade, all the other\nattributes of the soul, including that attribute which is the substance\nand synthesis of them all and which I name \"emotion.\"\n\nIn regard to \"emotion\" the will can do three separate things. It can\nencourage the emotion of love and suppress that of malice. It can\nencourage the emotion of malice and suppress that of love. And\nfinally it can use its energy in the effort, an effort which can never\nbe totally successful, to suppress all emotion, of any kind at all.\n\nMan's complex vision then consists, in simple terms, of\nself-consciousness, reason, taste, imagination, conscience, instinct,\nsensation, intuition, will, memory, and emotion. These various\nactivities, differentiated clearly enough in their separate energizing,\nmust never be regarded as absolutely separate \"faculties,\" but rather\nas relatively separated \"aspects.\" Behind all of them and under all of\nthem is the complex vision itself, felt by all of us in rare moments in\nits creative totality, but constantly being distorted and obscured as\none or other of its primal energies invades the appropriate territory\nof some other.\n\nThe complex vision must not be regarded as the mere sum or\naccumulated agglomeration of all these. It is much more than this. It\nis more than a mere formal focussing of its own attributes. It is more\nthan a mere logical unity suspended in a vacuum.\n\nThe complex vision is the vision of a living self, of an organic\npersonality, of an actual soul-monad. It may be the vision of a man.\nIt may be the vision of a plant or a planet or a god. It may be the\nvision of entities undreamed of and of existences inconceivable. It\nmay be the vision, for example, of some strange \"soul of space\" or\n\"soul of the ether\" whose consciousness is extended throughout the\nvisible universe and even throughout the \"etherial medium\" which\nbinds all souls together.\n\nBut whether the vision of a plant, a man, or a god, the complex\nvision seems to bring with it its own immediate revelation that\nwhere there is any form of \"matter,\" however attenuated, such\n\"matter\" is the outward expression of some inward living soul\nwhose energies have some mysterious correspondence to the eleven\naspects of the soul of man.\n\n\nCHAPTER III.\n\nTHE SOUL'S APEX-THOUGHT\n\nIt now becomes necessary to discuss the connection between what\nI have named the soul's \"apex-thought\" and certain permanent\naspects of life with which this \"apex-thought\" has to deal.\n\nThe \"apex-thought\" is the name I give to that synthetic and\nconcentrating effort of the soul by means of which the various\nenergies of the complex vision are brought into focus and fused\nwith one another. In accordance with my favourite metaphorical\nimage, the \"apex-thought\" is the extreme point of the arrow-head\nof the soul; the point with which it pierces its ways into eternity.\n\nIt is necessary that I should indicate the connection between the\nactivity of this apex-point of the complex vision and the various\nperplexing human problems round which our controversies\nsmoulder and burn. It is advisable that I should indicate the\nconnection between the activity of this \"apex-thought\" and that\nthing which the world has agreed to call Religion.\n\nIt is advisable that I should indicate the relation of the\n\"apex-thought\" to those recurrent moods of profound human scepticism\nwherein we deny the attainability of any \"truth\" at all.\n\nIt is advisable that I should indicate the relation of the\napex-thought to any possible \"new organ of vision\" with which some\nunforeseen experiment of the soul may suddenly endow us. And it\nis above all advisable that I should show the relation between this\nfocussed synthesis of the soul's complexity and the actual physical\nbody whose material senses are part of this complexity.\n\nThe whole problem of the art of life may be said to lie in the\nquestion of co-ordination. The actual process of coordination is the\nsupreme and eternal difficulty. Only at rare moments do we\nindividually approximate to its achievement. Only once or twice, it\nmay be, in a whole life-time, do we actually achieve it. But it is by\nthe power and insight of such fortunate moments that we attain\nwhatever measure of permanent illumination adds dignity and\ncourage to our days.\n\nWe live by the memory of such moments. We live by the hope of\ntheir return. In the meanwhile our luck or our ill luck, as living\nhuman beings, depends on no outward events or circumstances but\non our success in the conscious effort of approximation to what,\nwhen it does arrive, seems to take the grace and ease and\ninevitable beauty of a free gift of the gods.\n\nThis fortunate rhythm of the primordial energies of the complex\nvision may be felt and realized without being expressed in words.\nThe curse of what we call \"cleverness\" is that it hastens to find\nfacile and fluent expression for what cannot be easily and fluently\nexpressed. Education is too frequently a mere affair of words, a\nsuperficial encouragement of superficial expression. It is for this\nreason that many totally uneducated persons achieve, unknown to\nall except their most intimate friends, a far closer approach to this\ndifficult co-ordination than others who are not only well-educated\nbut are regarded by the world as famous leaders of modern\nthought.\n\nIt will be remarked that in my list of the primordial energies of the\ncomplex vision I do not mention religion. This is not because I do\nnot recognize the passionate and formidable role played by\nreligion in the history of the human race, nor because I regard the\n\"religious instinct\" as a thing outgrown and done with. I have not\nincluded it because I cannot regard it as a distinct and separate\nattribute, in the sense in which reason, conscience, intuition and so\nforth, are distinct and separate attributes, of the complex vision.\n\nI regard it as a name given in common usage to certain premature\nand disproportioned efforts at co-ordination among these\nattributes, and I am well content to apply the word \"religion\" to\nthat sacred ecstasy, at once passionate and calm, at once personal\nand impersonal, which suffuses our being with an unutterable\nhappiness when the energies of the complex vision are brought\ninto focus. I regard the word religion as a word that has drawn and\nattracted to itself, in its descent down the stream of time, so rich\nand so intricate a cargo of human feelings that it has come to mean\ntoo many things to be any longer of specific value in a\nphilosophical analysis.\n\nAny sort of reaction against the primeval fear with which man\ncontemplates the unknown, is religion. The passionate craving of\nhuman beings for a love which changes not nor passes away, is\nreligion.\n\nThe desperate longing to find an idea, a principle, a truth, a\n\"cause,\" for the sake of which we can sacrifice our personal\npleasure and our personal selfishness, is religion.\n\nThe craving for some unity, some synthesis, some universal\nmeaning in the system of things, is religion. The desire for an\n\"over-life\" or an \"over-world,\" in which the distress, disorder,\nmisunderstandings and cruelties of our present existence are\nredeemed, is religion.\n\nThe desire to find something real and eternal behind the transient\nflow of appearance, is religion. The desire to force upon others by\nviolence, by trickery, by fire, by sword, by persecution, by magic,\nby persuasion, by eloquence, by martyrdom, an idea which is more\nimportant to us than life itself, is religion.\n\nIt will be seen from this brief survey of the immense field which\nthe word \"religion\" has come to cover, that I am justified in\nregarding it rather as a name given to the emotional thrill\nand ecstatic abandonment which accompanies any sort of co-ordination\nof the attributes of the complex vision, proportioned or\ndisproportioned, than as a distinct and separate attribute in itself.\n\nOnly when the co-ordination of our human activities rises to the\nheight of a supreme music, can we regard \"religion\" as the most\nbeautiful and most important of all human experiences. And at the\nmoment when it takes this form it resolves itself into nothing more\nthan an unutterable feeling of ecstasy produced by the sense that\nwe are in harmony with the rest of the universe. Religion, as I am\ncompelled to think of it, resolves itself into that reaction of\nunspeakable happiness produced in us, when by any kind of\nsynthetic movement, however crude, we are either saved from\nunreality or reconciled to reality.\n\nReligion is, in fact, the name we give to the ecstasy in the heart of\nthe complex vision, when, in any sort of coordination between our\ncontradictory energies, we at once escape from ourselves and\nrealize ourselves. We are forbidden to speak of the \"religious\nsense\" or the \"religious instinct\" because, truly interpreted,\nreligion is not a single activity among other activities, but the\nemotional reaction upon our whole nature when that nature is\nfunctioning in its creative fulness.\n\nReligion must therefore be regarded as the culminating ecstasy of\nthe art of life, or as a premature snatching at such an ecstasy while\nthe art of life is still discordant and inchoate. In the first instance\nit is the supreme reward of the creative act. In the second instance it\nis a tragic temptation to rest by the way in a unity which is an\nillusive unity and in a heaven from which \"the sun of the morning\"\nis excluded. It thus comes about that what we call religion is\nfrequently a hindrance to the rhythm of the apex-thought. It may\nbe a sentimental consolation. It may be an excuse for cruelty and\nobscurantism. There is always a danger when it is thus\nprematurely manifested, that it should darken, distort, deprave and\nobstruct the movement of creation.\n\nAt this point, an objection arises to our whole method of research\nwhich it is necessary to meet at once. This objection, a peculiarly\nmodern one, is based upon the theory, handed about in modern\nliterature as a kind of diploma of cleverness and repeated\nsuperficially by many who are not really sceptical at all, that it is\nimpossible in this world to arrive, under any circumstances, at any\nkind of truth.\n\nPersons who repeat this sceptical dogma are simply refusing to\nacknowledge the evidence of their own experience. However rare\nour high rhythmic moments may be, some sort of approximation\nto them, quite sufficient to destroy the validity of this absolute\nscepticism, must, if a person honestly confesses the truth, and does\nnot dissimulate out of intellectual pride, have entered into the\nexperience of every human being.\n\nLet us, however, consider the kind of dogmatic language which\nthese sceptics use. They speak of \"life\" as a thing which so\nperpetually changes, expands, diminishes, undulates, advances,\nrecedes, evolves, revolves, explodes, precipitates, lightens,\ndarkens, thins, thickens, hardens, softens, over-brims, concentrates,\ngrows shallow, grows deep, that it were ridiculous even to attempt\nto create an equilibrium, or rhythmic \"parting-of-the-ways,\"\nout of such evasive and treacherous material.\n\nMy answer to this sceptical protest is a simple one. It is an appeal\nto human experience. I maintain that this modern tendency to talk\ndogmatically and vaguely about \"the evasive fluidity of life\" is\nnothing more than a crafty pathological retreat from the\nformidable challenge of life. It is indeed a kind of mental drug or\nspiritual opiate by the use of which many unheroic souls hide\nthemselves from the sardonic stare of the eternal Sphinx. It is a\nweakness comparable to the weakness of many premature religious\nsyntheses; and it has the same soothing and disintegrating effect\nupon the creative energy of the mind.\n\nWhat, as a matter of fact, hurts us all, much more than any\ntendency of life to be over-fluid and over-evasive, is the atrocious\ntendency of life to be inflexible, rigorous, implacable, harshly\nimmobile. This vague dogmatic sentiment about \"the fluidity of\nlife,\" is one of the instinctive ways by which we try to pretend that\nour prison-walls are not walls at all, but only friendly and flowing\nvapour. None of the great works of art and poetry, the austere\nbeauty of which reflects the real nature of the universe, could\ncontinue to exercise their magical power upon us, could continue\nto sustain us and comfort us, if those tragic ultimate realities were\nnot ultimate realities.\n\nThe sublime ritual of art, which at its noblest has the character of\nreligion, could not exist for a moment in a world as softly\nfluctuating and as dimly wavering as this modern scepticism\nwould make it. Life is at once more beautiful and far more tragic.\nThough surrounded by mystery the grand outlines of the world\nremain austerely and sternly the same. The sun rises and sets. The\nmoon draws the tides. Man goes forth to his work and his labour\nuntil the evening. Man is born; man loves and hates; man dies.\nAnd over him the same unfathomable spaces yawn. And under\nhim the same unfathomable spaces yawn. Time, with its seasons,\npasses him in unalterable procession. From birth to death his soul\nwrestles with the universe; and the drama of which he is the\nprotagonist lifts the sublime monotony of its scenery from the\nzenith to the nadir.\n\nLet any man ask himself what it is that hurts him most in life and\nyet seems most real to him. He will be compelled to answer . . .\n\"the atrocious regularity of things and their obscene necessity.\"\nThe very persons who talk so glibly about the \"fluidity\" and\n\"evasiveness\" of life are persons in whose own flesh the\nwedge-like granite of fate has lodged itself with crushing finality.\nLife has indeed been too rigid and too stark for them; and in\nplace of seizing it in an embrace as formidable as its own, they go\naside muttering, \"life is evasive; life is fluid; life brims over.\"\n\nThis sceptical dogma of \"evasiveness\" is generally found in\nalliance with some vague modern \"religion\" whose chief object is\nto strip the world of the dignity of its real tragedy and endow it\nwith the indignity of some pretended assurance. This is the role of\nthat superficial optimism so inherently repugnant to the aesthetic\nsense.\n\nSuch apologists for a shallow and ignoble idealism are in the habit\nof declaring that \"the tendency of modern thought\" is to render\n\"materialism\" unthinkable; but when these people speak of\nmaterialism they are thinking of the austere limits of that vast\nobjective spectacle into which we are all born. This spectacle is\nindeed mysterious. It is indeed staggering and awful. But it is\nirrevocably _there_. And no vague talk about the \"evasiveness\"\nand \"over-brimmingness\" of life can alter one jot or tittle of its\neternal outlines.\n\nFrom the sublime terror of this extraordinary drama such persons\nare anxious to escape, because the iron of it has entered into their\nsouls. They do not see that the only \"escape\" offered by the reality\nof things is a change of attitude towards this spectacle, not an\nassertion that the form of this spectacle is unfixed and wavering.\nNo psychological or mathematical speculation has the power to\nalter the essential outlines of this spectacle.\n\nIf such speculations could alter it, then the aesthetic sense of\nhumanity would be driven to transform itself; and a new aesthetic\nsense, adapted to this new \"evasiveness of life,\" would have to\ntake its place. Attempts are indeed being made at this very hour to\n\"start fresh\" with a new aesthetic sense and only the winnowing\nprocess of time and the pressure of personal experience can refute\nsuch attempts. Meanwhile all we can do is to note the rejection of\nsuch attempts by the verdict of the complex vision; a rejection\nwhich indicates that if such attempts are to be successful they must\nimply the substitution of a new complex vision for the one which\nhumanity has used since the beginning.\n\nIn other words they must imply a radical change in the basic\nattributes of human nature. Humanity, to justify them, must\nbecome some sort of super-humanity; and a new world inhabited\nby a new race must take the place of the world we know. Such an\nattempt to substitute a new humanity for the old is already\nconscious of itself in those curious experiments of psychical\nresearch which are based upon the hypothesis that some completely\nnew organs of sense are on the point of being discovered. Philosophers\nwho believe in the inherent unchangeableness of our present instrument\nof research--the complex vision as it now exists--can only look on at\nthese experiments with an attitude of critical detachment; and wait\nuntil time and experience have justified or refuted them.\n\nPhilosophers who believe in the unchangeableness of the complex\nvision are bound to recognize that the human will, which is a basic\nattribute of this vision, must in any case play a considerable part in\nthe creation of the future. But from their point of view the will is,\nafter all, only one of these basic attributes. There is also the\naesthetic sense. And the aesthetic sense is totally averse to this\nnew kind of humanity and this new kind of world. The eternal\nvision of those invisible \"sons of the universe,\" the proof of whose\nexistence is a deduction from the encounters of all actual souls\nwith one another, would seem to be entirely irreconcilable with\nany new complex vision whose nature had been completely\nchanged.\n\nThe visible spectacle of the world with its implied \"eternal\narbiters\" would be transmuted and transfigured by such an\nupheaval. For as long as the human will, as we know it now,\nremains in association with the aesthetic sense as we know it now,\nthe creation of the future--however yielding and indetermined--\nmust depend upon the form, the shape, the principle, the prophecy,\nthe premonition, existing from the beginning in the nature of\nthings. And it is precisely this shape, this form, this principle, this\nhope, this dream, this essential motive of those sons of the\nuniverse whose existence is implied \"when two and three are\ngathered together,\" which would be destroyed and annihilated, if\nthe complex vision were transformed into something else and a\nnew world took the place of the old.\n\nIt is the existence of these real \"immortals\" confronting this real\nuniverse which makes possible the feeling we have that in spite of\nall our differences, some accumulated stream of beauty, truth and\ngoodness, does actually carry the past forward into the future, does\nactually create the future according to a premonition and a hope\nwhich have been there from the beginning.\n\nThis is the supreme act of faith of the complex vision. This is the\nsupreme act of faith which saves us at once from our subjective\nisolation and from the will towards the acceptance of a premature\n\"religion.\" This is what saves us from any psychological or\nmathematical or logical speculation, which would contradict this\nhope or destroy the reality of the universe from which this hope\nemerges.\n\nWhen we come to a general consideration of the various attributes\nof the complex vision we are struck at once by the appalling power\nthey each have, when not held in check, of cancelling one\nanother's contribution. It is for this reason that my newly-coined\nword was unavoidable if we are to emphasize the synthetic energy\nof the complex vision when it exercises its control over these\ndiverse attributes and resists their constant tendency to cancel one\nanother. It was precisely to emphasize this synthetic energy of\nthe soul that I have made use of the arbitrary expression\n\"apex-thought.\" For if we think of these various attributes as\nshooting forth like flames from the arrowhead of the individual soul,\nwe must think of this coordinating energy as the power which\ncontinually draws these flames together when they deviate from\ntheir focussed intensity, and continually restores, from its\ninharmonious dispersion, the concentration of their arrows' point.\nIf we are permitted to use this image of a horizontal pyramid of\nflames it will be seen how important a part is played by this\napex-thought in concentrating the energies of the complex vision so\nthat it can \"drive\" or \"burn\" or \"pierce\" its way into the surrounding\nmystery.\n\nFor this image of an arrow-head of focussed flame which is in\nconstant danger of being dispersed as the flames recede from one\nanother and are blown backwards is only a symbolic way of\nindicating how difficult it is to pierce with our complicated\ninstrument of research the vast mystery which surrounds us.\n\nAll this is mere pictorial metaphor; but in visualizing the human\nsoul as a moving arrow-head, composed of flickering flames that\nonly now and then combine into a sharp point, while at other times\nthe wind drives them apart and bends them back, I am suggesting\nthat the ultimate reality of things is a state of confused movement\ncontinually becoming a state of concentrated movement. I am\nsuggesting that the secrets of life only yield themselves up to a\nmovement of desperation. I am suggesting that the spirit of\ncreation is also the spirit of destruction, and that the real object\nof the energy of creation is to pierce with its burning light the\ndarkness of the objective mystery.\n\nAs proof of the necessity of keeping this apex-thought in constant\npoise, let me reiterate one or two of the philosophical disasters\nwhich result from a cessation of its rhythmic function. When the\nreason, for instance, usurps the whole field and acts in isolation\nfrom the imagination and the intuition, it tends to persuade us to\ndeny the very existence of that deepest and most vivid reality of\nall, the handle of our spear-head, the base of our pyramid, the\nmysterious entity within us, which we have come, following the\ntraditions of the centuries, to name the \"soul.\" And not only does\nthe soul disappear when the reason thus isolates itself, but another\nprimary revelation of the complex vision, I mean that half-created,\nhalf-discovered object of the senses popularly called \"matter,\"\ndisappears with it.\n\nMan's self-consciousness is thus left suspended \"in vacuo\" with no\nconcrete reality within it and no concrete reality outside it; and\n\"thought-in-the-abstract\" becomes the only truth.\n\nBut not only can reason thus set itself up in isolated usurpation\nagainst such other activities as imagination, intuition, will or taste;\nit can also divide itself against itself and emerge in completely\ncontradictory functions. In the form of mathematical logic, for\ninstance, it can dispose most drastically of that living organic\nworld which in the form of experimental science it assumes to be\nthe only truth. Again it may happen that reason will arbitrarily ally\nitself with one or the other of the other attributes and on the\nstrength of such an alliance seek to obliterate all the rest. Thus\nwhile it is impossible to avoid the admission that of all these basic\nattributes reason is the most important, because without it all the\nrest would be inarticulate and dumb, it remains true that to hold\nreason in balanced relation to all the rest and to hold its own\ncontradictory tendencies in balanced relation to one another is an\nundertaking of such extraordinary difficulty that if it were not for\nthe complex vision's possession of that co-ordinating power which\nI have named its apex-thought, one might well pardon the mood of\nthose persons who use reason to drug reason and who steer their\nboat into some unruffled backwater of dogma or mysticism.\n\nThe necessity of such an infinitely delicate poise or balance or\nrhythm in these high matters, the necessity of keeping all these\nconflicting attributes at this exquisite point of suspense between\nabysses of contradiction, is a necessity which compels us to\nrecognize that philosophy is nothing more or less than the supreme\nart, and the most difficult of all arts.\n\nCertainly, it seems as though thought has to become in a profound\nsense rhythmical, has to take to itself the nature of music, before it\ncan become the truth. For the truth does not seem to be a mere\npicture of the system of things, reflected in the mirror of the mind.\nThe truth seems to be the very system of things itself, become\nconscious and volitional, changing, growing, living, destroying,\ncreating. Thus it comes about that the thought which plunges into\nthe universe must of necessity, even in that very act, remould and\nre-fashion the universe. Thus Nature perpetually recreates herself\nby the passion of her children and is forever re-born as the child of\nher own offspring.\n\nBut if the supreme difficulty of the art of life lies in the\nmaintenance of this rhythm between these primary attributes, it\nmust never be forgotten that these \"attributes\" are, after all, only\n_aspects_ of the soul. The soul _is_ each of them, not _in_ each of\nthem. They are not \"faculties\" through which the soul acts. They\nare never absolutely distinct from one another. There is something\nof each of them in every one of them, and every attempt which\nthey make to establish themselves in an independent existence is\nonly an attempt of the soul itself to live a perverted and a\ndiscordant, instead of a natural and a harmonious life.\n\nThe rarity and difficulty of that high art which brings all these\norchestral players into harmony is sufficient cause to account for\nthe scarcity of genuine philosophical thought in this confused\nworld. The human soul, looking desperately round for some calm\nyet passionate light to save its hours from ruinous waste, turns\naway in bitter disillusion from the thin dust and the swollen\nvapour that are offered it.\n\nOut of the logical laboratories of the abstract reason this thin dust\nis offered; and out of the ideal factories of the wish for superficial\ncomfort this iridescent vapour is poured forth. That burning secret\nof life, that lovely and terrible reality for which the soul pines is\nnot to be found in any mere outward fact or in any mere subjective\nintuition.\n\nSuch a fact may crumble to pieces and give place to another. Such\nan intuition may melt into air under the shock of experience. The\ncraving of the soul is not satisfied by the discovery that \"matter\"\nresolves itself into \"energy,\" nor is the misery of the heart\nassuaged by the theory that time is an attribute of fourth-dimensional\nspace. The lamentable beating of blood-stained hands upon the\nultimate walls does not cease when we learn that two straight lines\ncan or cannot meet in infinity; nor does the knowledge that history\nis an \"ideal evolution\" heal the aching of the world-sorrow.\n\nCould we know for certain that the dead were raised up, even that\nknowledge would not reduce to silence the bitter cry of the\noutraged generations. So poisonous and so deep is the pain of life\nthat no kind of knowledge, not even the knowledge that annihilation\nmust at last, sooner or later, end it all, can really heal it.\n\nBut truth is not knowledge. Truth is not the recognition of an\nexternal fact. Truth is a creative gesture. It is a ritual, a rhythmic\npoise, a balance deliberately sustained between eternal\ncontradictions. It is the magical touch which reduces to harmony\nthe quivering vibrations of many opposites. It is the dramatic\nmovement of a supreme actor at the climax of an unfathomable\ndrama. It is music resting upon itself; music so exquisite as to\nseem like silence, music so passionate as to have become calm.\n\nThe apex-thought of that pyramid of conflicting flames which we\ncall the complex vision holds itself together at one concentrated\npoint. And this point is the arrow point of our human soul; that\nsoul which is shot across immensity in the eternal war between life\nand the opposite of life.\n\nAlthough for the purpose of emphasizing and elucidating the\nessential nature of this apex-thought it has been found advisable to\nuse such metaphorical and pictorial images as the one just\nindicated, it must be remembered that what we are actually and in\ndirect experience confronted with is the mystery of a real human\npersonality inhabiting a real human body.\n\nThis real personal soul inhabiting a real objective body and\nsurrounded on all sides by a real unfathomable universe, is the\noriginal revelation of the complex vision from which there is no\nescape except by death.\n\nThe philosophy of the complex vision finds its starting point in an\nacceptance of this situation which is nothing more than an\nacceptance of the complex vision's own harmonious activity. An\nacceptance of the reality of the human body is an essential part of\nthis harmonious activity because among the aspects of the\ncomplex vision are to be found certain attributes, such as\nsensation, instinct and imagination, which would be negated and\nrendered abortive if the human body were an illusion.\n\nIf the \"starting point\" of our philosophy demands recognition of\nthe reality of the body, the \"ideal\" of our philosophy must have a\nplace for the body also. Flesh and blood must therefore play their\npart in the resultant harmony at which we are all the while aiming;\nand no contempt for the body, no hatred of the body, no refusal to\nrecognize the supreme beauty and sacredness of the body, can be\nallowed to distort or pervert our vision.\n\nThe activity of the apex-thought, though we have a right to use\nany metaphorical image we please about it in order to elucidate its\nnature, must always be considered as using the bodily senses in its\nresultant rhythm. It must always be considered as using that\nportion of the objective universe which we name the body as an\ninevitable \"note\" in its musical flight from darkness to darkness. It\nmust always be conceived as following the attraction of an eternal\nvision, in which \"the idea of the body\" is an imperishable element.\n\nThis \"eternal vision,\" which it is the rhythmic motive of the\napex-thought to seek, carries with it the witness and \"imprimatur\" of\nthe gods; and although no man has ever \"beheld\" the gods, and\nalthough the gods by reason of their omnipresent activity, cannot\nbe thought of as being \"incarnated,\" yet since they are living souls,\neven as we are, and since every living soul has, as the substratum\nof its identity, what might be called a \"spiritual body,\" there is\nnothing in the revelation made to us through the activity of our\ncomplex vision to forbid our free and even fanciful speculation as\nto its use, by the very highest of superhuman personalities, even,\nlet us say, by the Christ himself, of this mysterious energy of the\nsoul which I have named the \"apex-thought.\"\n\n\nCHAPTER IV.\n\nTHE REVELATION OF THE COMPLEX VISION\n\nUsing then, as our instrument of research, that totality of attributes\nby which the soul in its rare moments of rhythmic consummation\nvisualizes the world, the question arises--what, in plain\nuntechnical terms, is the revelation made to us by this complex\nmedium? Here, as before, I am anxious, before I venture upon\nsuch a hazardous undertaking as an answer to this question, to\nindicate clearly that what I am attempting to state is a revelation\nwhich is common to the experience of all souls, wherever such a\nthing as the soul exists. The question as to whether or not such an\nuniversal revelation is an illusion does not concern us. To call any\nuniversal experience \"an illusion\" is no more and no less\nilluminating than to call it \"an ultimate truth.\" It is the only\nreality we are at present in possession of; and we must accept it,\nor remain in complete scepticism; which is only another name for\ncomplete chaos.\n\nThe first important discovery which the complex vision makes is\nthe fact that the revelation, thus half-offered to it and half-created\nby it, is presented simultaneously in all its various aspects. It does\nnot appear to us bit by bit or in succession but \"en masse\" and in\nits complete \"ensemble.\" It is of course unavoidable that its\naspects should be enumerated one by one and that in such an\nenumeration one aspect should be placed first and another last.\nNevertheless, this \"first\" and \"last\" must not be regarded as of any\nreasonable importance; but as nothing more than an accident of\narbitrary choice. All the aspects of this original revelation are\nlinked together. All are dependent upon one another. Among them\nthere is no \"first\" and \"last.\" All are equally real. All are equally\nnecessary. All are equally inescapable.\n\nThe activity of the complex vision, then, makes us aware that we\nhave within us an integral irreducible self, the living personal\nsubstratum of our self-consciousness, the \"I\" of our primordial \"I\nam I.\" This living personal self is the background of our complex\nvision. It is the personal \"visionary\" whose vision we are using. I\nsay we have \"within us\" such a self. This \"within us\" is one of the\ninescapable original revelations. For though our consciousness\nwill be found in its full circle to invade obscure shores and\nwavering margins, there must always be a return, however far it\nmay wander, to this definite \"something\" within us which utters\nthe happy or unhappy \"I am I.\"\n\nIt is precisely here, in regard to the nature of this \"I am I,\" that it\nis essential to let the totality of our complex vision speak, and not\none or other of its attributes. Nowhere has the fantastic and\ndesolating power of pure abstract reason left to itself done more to\ndistort the general situation than in this matter. It has distorted it\nin two opposing ways.\n\nIt has distorted it metaphysically by completely eliminating this\nrevelation of a personal self, \"within us,\" and it has distorted it\nscientifically by reducing this personal self to an automatic\nmechanical phenomenon produced by the action and interaction of\nunconscious chemical \"forces.\"\n\nTo the logic of metaphysical reason there is no concrete living self\nwhich can say \"I am I\" from that definite point in space and time\nwhich we indicate by the use of the phrase \"within us.\" According\nto such logic our \"I am I\" becomes \"an infinity of consciousness\"\nwith no local habitation. It becomes a consciousness which\nincludes both the \"within\" and the \"without,\" a consciousness in\nwhich our actual personal self is nothing but an illusory\nphenomenon, a consciousness which is outside both time and\nspace, a consciousness whose centre is everywhere and its\ncircumference nowhere, a consciousness which is pure disembodied\n\"thought,\" thought without any \"thinker,\" thought contemplating\nitself as thought, thought in an absolutely empty void.\n\nWhen to this ultimate \"unity of apperception,\" suspended\nin a vacuum, consciousness of self is added; when this\n\"consciousness-in-the-abstract\" is regarded as an universal\nself-consciousness, the resultant \"I am I\" of such an omnipresent\nbeing becomes an infinite \"I am I\" which is nothing less than the\nunfathomable universe conscious of itself in its totality. Whether\nconsciousness of self be added to this \"consciousness-in-the-abstract\"\nor not, it is hard to see how out of this unruffled ocean of identity\nthe actual multifarious world which we feel around us, this world of\nplants and planets and birds and fishes and mortal men and immortal\ngods, ever succeeded in getting itself produced at all.\n\nThe vague metaphysical phrases about the One issuing forth into\nthe Many, in order to make Itself more completely Itself than it\nwas before, seem to us, when under the influence of our complex\nvision, no other than the meaningless playing with cosmic tennis\nballs of some insane universal Juggler.\n\nThe second way in which reason, left to itself, has distorted what\nthe complex vision reveals to us about the \"I am I,\" is the scientific\nor evolutionary way. According to this view which assumes that\nthe objective process of evolution is our only knowable reality, the\nindividual personal \"I am I\" finds itself resolved into a fatal\nautomatic phenomenon of cause and effect; a phenomenon which\nhas as its \"cause\" nothing, but the prehistoric chemical movements\nof \"matter\" or \"energy.\" The personal self thus considered\nbecomes a momentary vortex in a perpetually changing stream of\n\"states of consciousness\" or \"ripples of sensation\" to each of\nwhich vast anterior tides of atavistic forces have contributed their\nmechanical quota.\n\nThe chemical fatality of our nerve-tissues, the psychological\nfatality of our motive-impulses, leave no space, when they have all\nbeen summed up, for any free arbitrary action of an independent\nself.\n\nAnd so, just as according to the metaphysical view, the soul\ndisappears in a blur of ideal fatality, according to the scientific\nview the soul disappears in a nexus of mechanical determinism.\nAs against both these errors, to the complex vision this \"soul\"\nwithin us appears to be something altogether different from the\nphysical body. The experience we have of it, the feeling we have\nof it, is that it is a definite \"something\" dwelling \"within\" the\nphysical body.\n\nThis revelation with regard to it is as unmistakable as it is difficult\nto analyze. That it is here, within us, we feel and know; but as\nsoon as we attempt to subject it to any exact scrutiny it seems to\nmelt away under our hands. The situation is indeed a kind of\nphilosophical tragic-comedy; and is only too indicative of the\nbaffling whimsicality of the whole system of things. Contradiction\nand paradox at the very basis of life mock our attempt to utter one\nintelligible word about the thing which is the most real of all\nthings to us.\n\nWe are vividly aware of this mysterious personality within us, \"the\nguest and companion of the body,\" but directly we attempt to lay\nhold upon the actual substance of it it seems to vanish into thin air.\nBut at least our complex vision, which is _its_ complex vision,\nreveals to us the fact of its existence; and with its existence once\nacknowledged, however impossible analysis of it may be, we are\nable to give a plain and unequivocal denial to all the impersonal\nconclusions reached by metaphysic and science.\n\nThis categorical pronouncement of the complex vision with regard\nto the \"I am I,\" namely that it is the voice of a living concrete soul\nwithin us, is supported historically by an immense weight of\nhuman tradition. Belief in the reality of the soul is older and more\ntenacious than any other human doctrine which our race has ever\nheld. The use of the term \"soul\" is no more than a bare recognition\nthat behind the consciousness which says \"I am I\" there is a living\nentity whose consciousness this is.\n\nWith this bare recognition the revelation of the complex vision\nabruptly stops. It stops with that peculiar and disconcerting\nsuddenness with which it seems to be its nature to stop, whenever\nit reaches the limit of its scope in any direction. It stops here,\nwith regard to the soul, just as it stops when confronted with the\nconception of limitlessness, both with regard to space and with\nregard to time. But the soul at least is ours; a fact that cannot be\nexplained away.\n\nAnd although we have no right to go a step beyond the bare\nrecognition of its existence and although all words regarding it are\nmisleading if used in any other than a symbolic sense, we must\nremember that since the complex vision is conscious of itself as a\nunity, whatever this \"something\" may be which is the centre and\ncore of our living personality, it must at least be a definite\nirreducible \"monad,\" \"something\" that cannot be resolved into\nanything else, or accounted for by anything else, or explained in\nterms of anything else, or \"caused\" by anything else; \"something\"\nthat may, perhaps, at last be annihilated; but that while it lives\nmust remain the vividest reality we know.\n\nInsanity and disease may obstruct and cloud the soul. Outward\ncircumstances may drive the soul back upon itself. But while it\nlives it lives in its totality and when it perishes, if it be its\ndestiny to perish, it perishes in its totality.\n\nWhile the soul lives we may sink into it and have no fear; and yet\nall the while we have no right to say anything about it except that\nit exists. Truly it is a tragic commentary upon the drama that we\ncall our life, that we should find our ultimate \"rest\" and \"peace\" in\nso bare, so stark, so austere, so irrational a revelation as this!\n\nBut surrounded as we are by the menace of eternal nothingness it\nis at least something to have at the background of our life a living\npower of this kind, a power which can endure unafraid the very\nbreaking point of disaster, a power which can contemplate the\npossibility of annihilation itself with equanimity and unperturbed\ncalm.\n\nIt will be noted that I have been compelled to use once and again\nthe term \"eternal nothingness.\" This is indeed an inevitable aspect\nof what the soul visualizes as possible. For since the soul is the\ncreator and discoverer of all life, when once the soul has ceased to\nexist, non-existence takes the place of existence, and nothingness\ntakes the place of life.\n\nSpeculatively we have the right, although the complex vision is\nsilent on that tremendous question, to dally with the idea of the\nsurvival of the soul after the death of the body. But this must for\never be an open question, not to be answered either negatively or\naffirmatively, not to be answered by the intelligence of any living\nman. All we can say is that it seems as if the death of the body\ndestroyed the complex vision; and if the complex vision is\ndestroyed it seems as though non-existence were bound to take the\nplace of existence, and as though nothingness were bound to take\nthe place of everything. The oriental conception of \"Nirvana\" is no\nmore than a soothing opiate administered to a soul that has grown\nweary of its complex vision and weary of its irreducible\npersonality. To imagine oneself freed from the burden of personal\nconsciousness, and yet in some mysterious way conscious of being\nfreed from consciousness, is a delicious and delicate dream of\nlife-exhausted souls.\n\nAs a speculation it has a curious attraction; as a reality it has\nnothing that is intelligible. But though the tragedy of life to all\nsensitive spirits is outrageous and obscene, at least we may say\nthat the worst conceivable possibility is not likely to occur. The\nworst conceivable possibility would be to be doomed to an\nimmortal personal life without losing the restrictions and\nlimitations of our present personal life. If the soul survives the\nbody it must do so on the strength of its possession of some\ntransforming energy which shall enable it to supply the place in its\norganic being which is at present occupied by the attribute of\nsensation. It is quite obvious that if the life of the soul depends\nupon the active functioning of all its attributes; and if one of its\nattributes, namely sensation, is entirely dependent for its active\nfunctioning upon the life of the body; the life of the soul itself\nmust also depend upon the life of the body, unless, as I have\nhinted, it can transmute its attribute of sensation into some other\nattribute suitable to some unknown plane of spiritual existence.\n\nThere are indeed certain ecstatic moments when the soul feels as if\nsuch a power of liberation from the bodily senses were actually\nwithin its grasp; but it will inevitably be found, when the great\nrhythmic concentration of the apex-thought is brought to bear\nupon such a feeling as this, that it either melts completely away, or\nis relegated to unimportance and insignificance. Such a feeling,\necstatic and intense though it may have been, has been nothing\nmore than a disproportioned activity of the attribute of intuition;\nintuition misled in favour of the immortality of the soul, even as\nthe pure reason is often misled in the direction of the denial of the\nsoul's existence.\n\nThe revelation of the complex vision has no word to say, on either\nside, with regard to whether the soul does or does not survive the\ndeath of the body; but it has a very distinct word to say as to the\nimportance of this whole question; and what it says in regard to\nthis is--that it is not important at all! The revelation of the complex\nvision implies clearly enough that what man were wise to\n\"assume\"--leaving always the ultimate question as an open\nquestion--is that the individual soul and the individual body perish\ntogether.\n\nThis assumption is in direct harmony with what we actually _see_;\neven though it is in frequent collision with what we sometimes\n_feel_. But the essence of the matter is to be found in this, that our\nassumption as to the soul's perishing, when the body perishes, is\nan assumption, untrue though it may turn out to be, which the soul\nitself, when under the power of its apex-thought, is compelled to\nmake. And it is compelled to make this assumption by reason of\nthe inherent nature of love. For it is of the nature of love when\nconfronted by two alternatives one of which lays the stress upon\npersonal advantage and the other _upon love itself_ apart from any\npersonal advantage, whether one's own or another's, to choose, as\nthe assumption upon which it shall live, the latter of these two\nalternatives. For it is the nature of love to seek love and nothing\nelse than love. And as long as the assumption which the soul\nmakes is the assumption that it survives the death of the body, that\nemotion of love which is the soul's creative essence is debarred\nfrom the full and complete integrity of its desire.\n\nFor the desire of love is not for immortality but for the eternal; and\nthe eternal is not something that depends upon the survival of any\nindividual soul, whether our own or another's. The eternal is\nsomething which can be realized in one single moment; something\nwhich completely destroys in us any desire for survival after\ndeath; something which reconciles us to existence _considered in\nthe light of love alone_; something that does not assume anything\nat all about the universe, except that love exists.\n\nThus we return to that assumption about the soul, which it is\nbetter--leaving the open question still an open question--for the\nmind to accept as its working assumption; namely that the soul\nuses the body in its own ends, is conscious of its existence through\nthe senses of the body, lives _in_ the body, and perishes when the\nbody perishes. Nor is it only the emotion of love which rejects the\ndogma of the immortality of the soul. Were the soul proved\nbeyond all possibility of doubt to be immortal, there would at once\nfall upon us a despair more appalling than any which we have\nknown. For just as the idea of the eternal satisfies the very depths\nof our soul with an infinite peace, so the idea of immortality\ntroubles the very depths of our soul with an infinite doubt.\nSomething unutterable in our aesthetic sense demands that life\nshould be surrounded by death and ended by death. Thus and not\notherwise should we ourselves have created the world at the\nbeginning. Thus and not otherwise by the rhythmic play of the\ncomplex vision, do we create the world.\n\nBut meanwhile, whatever happens, as long as we live we possess\nthe reality of the soul. This is, and always has been, the\nrallying-ground of heroic and sensitive personalities, struggling with\nthe demons of circumstance and chance. This is that unconquerable\n\"mind-within-themselves\" into which the great Stoics of Antiquity\nwithdrew at their will, and were \"happy,\" beyond the reach of\nhope and fear. This is the citadel from the security of which all the\nmartyrs for human liberty have mocked their tormentors. This is\nthe fortress from which the supreme artists of the world have\nlooked forth and moulded the outrage of life's dilemma into\nmonumental forms of imaginative beauty. This is the sanctuary\nfrom which all human personalities, however weak and helpless,\nhave been permitted to endure the cruelty and pitilessness of fate.\n\nAfter all, it does not so greatly matter that we are unable to do\nmore than know that this thing, this indescribable \"something,\"\nreally exists. Perhaps it is because its existence is more real than\nanything else that we are unable to define it. Perhaps we can only\ndefine those attributes which are the outward aspects of our real\nbeing. Perhaps it is simply because the soul is nothing less than\nour very self, that our analytical power stops, helpless, in its\npresence. _We_ are what it is; and for this very cause it\nperpetually evades and escapes us.\n\nThe reality of the soul, therefore, is the first revelation of the\ncomplex vision. The second revelation is the objective reality of\nthe outward visible universe. Left to itself, in its isolated activity,\nour logical reason is capable of throwing doubt upon this\nrevelation also. For it is logically certain that what we are actually\nconscious of is no more than a unified stream of various mental\nimpressions, reaching us through our senses, and never interrupted\nexcept in moments of unconscious sleep.\n\nIt is therefore quite easy for the logical reason, functioning in its\nisolation from the other attributes, to maintain that this stream of\nmental impressions _is all that there is_, and that we have no right\nto call the universe real and objective, except in the ambiguous\nsense of a sort of permanent illusion. But as soon as the complex\nvision, in its totality, contemplates the situation, the thing takes on\na very different aspect. The pure reason may be as sceptical as it\npleases about the static solidity of what is popularly called\n\"matter.\" It may use the term energy, or movement, or ether, or\nforce, or electricity, or any other name to describe that _permanent\nsensation of outward reality_ which our complex vision reveals.\n\nBut one thing it has no right to do. It has no right to utter the word\n\"illusion\" with regard to this objective universe. The apparent\nsolidity of matter may be rationally resolved into energy or\nmovement, just as the apparent objectivity of matter may be\nrationally resolved into a stream of mental impression. But the\ncomplex vision still persists in asserting that this _permanent\nsensation of outward reality_, which, except in dreamless sleep, is\nnever normally interrupted, represents and bears witness to the real\nexistence, outside ourselves, of \"something\" which corresponds to\nsuch a sensation. It is just at this point that the soul--helped by\ninstinct, imagination, and intuition--makes its great inevitable\nplunge into the act of primordial faith.\n\nThis act of primordial faith is the active belief of the soul not only\nin an objective universe outside itself, but also in the objective\nexistence of other individual souls. Without this primordial act of\nfaith the individual soul can never escape from itself. For the pure\nreason not only reduces the whole universe to an idea in the mind;\nbut it also reduces all _other_ minds to ideas in _our_ mind. In\nother words the logical reason imprisons us fatally and hopelessly\nin a sort of cosmic nut-shell of our own mentality.\n\nAnd there would, actually, be no escape from this appalling\nimprisonment, according to which the individual soul becomes a\nsolitary circle, the centre and circumference of all possible\nexistence, if it were not that the soul possesses other organs of\nresearch, in addition to reason and self-consciousness. Directly we\ntemper reason with these other activities the whole situation has a\ndifferent look. It is a thing of small consequence what word we\nuse to describe that external cause of the flowing stream of mental\nimpressions. The important point is that we are compelled to\nassume, as representing a real outward fact, this permanent sense\nof objectivity from which there is no escape.\n\nAnd as the existence of the objective universe is established by a\nprimordial act of faith, so it is also established that these alien\nbodily personalities, whose outward appearance stands and falls\nwith the objective universe, possess \"souls,\" or what we have\ncome to name \"complex visions,\" comparable with our own. And\nthis is the case not only with regard to other human beings, but\nwith regard to all living entities whether human or non-human. As\nto how the \"souls\" of plants, birds, and animals, or of planets or\nstars, differ in their nature from human souls we can only vaguely\nconjecture. But to refuse some degree of consciousness, some\nmeasure of the complex vision, to any living thing, is to be false to\nthat primordial act of faith into which the original revelation of the\ncomplex vision compels us to plunge.\n\nThe inevitableness of this act of faith may be perhaps more vividly\nrealized when we remember that it includes in its revelation the\nobjective reality of our own physical body. Our evidence for the\nreal outward existence of our own body is no surer and no more\nsecure than our evidence for the outward existence of other\n\"bodies.\"\n\nThey stand or fall together. If the universe is an illusion then our\nown physical body is an illusion also.\n\nAnd precisely as the \"stuff\" out of which the universe is made may\nbe named \"energy\" or \"ether\" or \"force\" or \"electricity,\" rather\nthan \"matter,\" so also the \"stuff\" out of which the body is made\nmay be named by any scientific term we please. The term used is\nof no importance as long as the thing represented by it is accepted\nas a permanent reality.\n\nWe are now able to advance a step further in regard to the\nrevelation of the complex vision. Granting, as we are compelled to\ngrant, that the other \"souls\" in the universe possess, each of them,\nits own \"vision\" of this same universe; and assuming that each\n\"vision\" is so coloured by the individuality of the \"visionary\" as to\nbe, in a measure, different from all the rest, it becomes obvious\nthat in a very important sense there is not only one universe, but\nmany universes. These many universes, however, are \"caused,\" or\nevoked, or created, or discovered, by the encounter of various\nindividual souls with that one \"objective mystery\" which confronts\nthem all.\n\nWhat a naive confession it is of the limitation of the human mind\nthat we should be driven, after all our struggles to articulate the\nsecret of life, to accept, as our final estimate of such a secret just\nthe mysterious \"something\" which is the substratum of our own\nsoul, confronted by that other mysterious \"something\" which is the\nsubstratum of all possible universes! With the complex vision's\nrevelation that the objective universe really exists comes the\nparallel revelation that time and space really exist. Here, for the\nthird time, are we faced with critical protests from the isolated\nactivity of the logical reason.\n\nMetaphysic reduces both time and space to categories of the mind.\nMathematical speculation hints at the existence of some\nmysterious fourth-dimensional space. Bergsonian dialectic regards\nordinary \"spatial\" time as an inferior category; and finds the real\nmovement of life in a species of time called \"duration,\" which can\nonly be detected by the interior feeling of intuition.\n\nBut while we listen with interest to all these curious speculations,\nthe fact remains that for the general vision of the combined\nenergies of the soul the world in which we find ourselves is a\nworld entirely dependent upon what must be recognized as a\n_permanent sensation_ of \"ordinary\" space and \"ordinary\" time.\nAnd as we have shown in the case of the objective existence of\nwhat we call Nature, when any mental impression reaches the\nlevel of becoming a _permanent sensation_ of all living souls it\nceases to be possible to speak of it as an illusion.\n\nIt is well that we should become clearly conscious of this\n\"reality-destroying\" tendency of the logical reason, so that whenever\nit obsesses us we can undermine its limited vision by an appeal to\nthe complex vision. Shrewdly must we be on our guard against\nthis double-edged trick of logic, which on the one hand seeks to\ndestroy the basis of its own activity, by disintegrating the unity of\nthe soul, and on the other hand seeks to destroy the material of its\nown activity by disintegrating the unity of the \"objective mystery.\"\n\nThe original revelation of the complex vision not only puts us on\nour guard against this disintegrating tendency of the pure reason,\nbut it also explains the motive-force behind this tendency. This\nmotive-force is the emotion of malice, which naturally and\ninevitably seeks to hand us over to the menace of nothingness; in\nthe first place of nothingness \"within\" us, and in the second place\nof nothingness \"without\" us. That the logic of the pure reason\nquickly becomes the slave of the emotion of malice may be proved\nby both introspection and observation. For we note, both in\nourselves and others, a peculiar glow of malicious satisfaction\nwhen such logic strikes its deadliest blows at what it would\npersuade us to regard as the illusion of life.\n\nLife, just because its deepest secret is not law, determined by fate,\nbut personality struggling against fate, is always found to display a\ncertain irrationality. And the complex vision becomes false to\nitself as soon as it loses touch with this world-deep irrationality.\n\nWe have now therefore reached the conception of reality as\nconsisting of the individual soul confronted by the objective\nmystery. That this objective mystery would be _practically_ the\nsame as _nothing_, if there were no soul to apprehend it, must be\nadmitted. But it would not be _really_ the same as _nothing_;\nsince as soon as any kind of soul reappeared upon the scene the\ninevitable material of the objective mystery would at once\nre-appear with it. The existence of the objective mystery as a\npermanent possibility of material for universe-building is a fact\nwhich surrounds every individual soul with a margin of\nunfathomable depth.\n\nAt its great illuminated moments the complex vision reduces the\nlimitlessness of space to a realizable sensation of liberty, and the\n\"flowingness\" of time to an eternal now; but even at these\nmoments it is conscious of an unfathomable background, one\naspect of which is the immensity of space and the other the\nflowingness of time.\n\nThe revelation of the complex vision which I have thus attempted\nto indicate will be found identical with the natural conclusions of\nman in all the ages of his history. The primeval savage, the ancient\nGreek, the mediaeval saint, the eighteenth century philosopher, the\nmodern psychologist, are all brought together here and are all\ncompelled to confess the same situation.\n\nThat we are now living personalities, possessed of soul and body,\nand surrounded by an unfathomable universe, is a revelation about\nwhich all ages and all generations agree, whenever the complex\nvision is allowed its orchestral harmony. The primeval savage\nlooking up at the sky above him might regard the sun and moon as\nliving gods exercising their influence upon a fixed unmoving\nearth. In this view of the sun and the moon and the stars such a\nsavage was perfectly within his right, because always along with it\neven to the most anthropomorphic, there came the vague sense of\nunfathomableness.\n\nThe natural Necessity of the ancient Greeks, the trinitarian God\nof the mediaeval school-man, the great First Cause of the\neighteenth-century deist, the primordial Life-Force of the modern\nman of science, are all on common ground here in regard to the\nunfathomableness of the ultimate mystery.\n\nBut the revelation of the complex vision saves us from the logical\nboredom of the word \"infinite.\" The idea of the infinite is merely a\ntedious mathematical formula, marking the psychological point\nwhere the mind finds its stopping-place. All that the complex\nvision can say about \"infinite space\" is that it is a real experience,\nand that we can neither imagine space with an end nor without an\nend.\n\nThe \"Infinite\" is the name which logic gives to this psychological\nphenomenon. The fact that the mind stops abruptly and breaks into\nirreconcilable contradictions when it is confronted with\nunfathomable space is simply a proof that space without an end is\nas unimaginable as space with an end. It is no proof that space is\nmerely a subjective category of the human mind. One, thing,\nhowever, it is a proof of. It is a proof that the universe can never\nbe satisfactorily explained on any materialistic hypothesis.\n\nThe fact that we all of us, at every hour of our common day, are\nsurrounded by this unthinkable thing, space without end, is an\neternal reminder that the forms, shapes and events of habitual\noccurrence, which we are inclined to take so easily for granted, are\npart of a staggering and inscrutable enigma.\n\nThe reality of this thing, actually there, above our heads and under\nour feet, lodges itself, like an ice cold wedge of annihilating\nscepticism, right in the heart of any facile explanation. We cannot\ninterpret the world in terms of what we call \"matter\" when what\nwe call \"matter\" has these unthinkable horizons. We may take into\nour hands a pebble or a shell or a grain of sand; and we may feel\nas though the universe were within our grasp. But when we\nremember that this little piece of the earth is part of a continuous\nunity which recedes in every direction, world without end, we are\ndriven to admit that the universe is so little within our grasp that\nwe have to regard it as something which breaks and baffles the\nmind as soon as the mind tries to take hold of it at all.\n\nThe reason does not advance one inch in explaining the universe\nwhen it utters the word \"evolution\" and it does not advance one\nthousandth part of an inch--indeed it gives up the task altogether--\nwhen it informs us that infinite space is a category of the human\nmind. We must regard it, then, as part of the original revelation of\nthe complex vision, that we are separate personal souls surrounded\nby an unfathomable mystery whose margins recede into unthinkable\nremoteness.\n\nThe ancient dilemma of the One and the Many obtrudes itself at\nthis point; and we are compelled to ask how the plurality of these\nseparate souls can be reconciled with the unity of which they form\na part. That they cannot be regarded as absolutely separate is clear\nfrom the fact that they can communicate with one another, not\nonly in human language but in a thousand more direct ways. But\ngranting this communication between them, does the mere\nexistence of myriads of independent personalities, living side by\nside in a world common to all, justify us in speaking of the\noriginal system of things as being pluralistic rather than monistic?\n\nHuman language, at any rate, founded on the fact that these\nseparate souls can communicate with one another, seems very\nreluctant to use any but monistic terms. We say \"the system of\nthings,\" not \"the systems of things.\" And yet it is only by an act of\nfaith that human language makes the grand assumption that the\ncomplex vision of all these myriad entities tells the same story.\n\nWe say \"the universe\"; yet may it not be that there are as many\n\"universes\" as there are conscious personalities in this\nunfathomable world? If there were no closer unity between the\nseparate souls which fill the universe than the fact that they are\nable, after one primordial act of faith, to communicate with one\nanother, these monistic assumptions of language might perhaps be\ndisregarded and we might have a right to reject such expressions\nas \"system of things\" and \"cosmos\" and \"universe\" and \"nature.\"\n\nBut it still remains that they are connected, in space and in time,\nby the medium, whatever it may be, which fills the gulfs between\nthe planets and the stars. As long as these separate souls are\ninvariably associated as they are, with physical bodies, and as long\nas these physical bodies are composed of the same mysterious\nforce which we may call earth, fire, water, air, ether, electricity,\nenergy, vibration, or any other technical or popular name, so long\nwill it be legitimate to use these monistic expressions with which\nhuman language is, so to speak, so deeply stained. As a matter of\nfact we are not left with only this limited measure of unity. There\nare also certain psychological experiences--experiences which I\nbelieve I have a right to regard as universal--which bring these\nseparate souls into much closer connection.\n\nSuch experiences can be, and have been, ridiculously exaggerated.\nBut the undeniable fact that they exist is sufficient to prove that in\nspite of the pluralistic appearance of things, there is still enough\nunity available to prevent the Many from completely devouring\nthe One. The experiences to which I am referring are experiences\nwhich the complex vision owes to the intuition. And though this\nexperience has been made unfair use of, by both mystics and\nmetaphysicians, it cannot be calmly disregarded.\n\nThe intuition, which is, as I have already pointed out, the feminine\ncounterpart to the imagination, is found, with regard to this\nparticular problem, uttering so frequent and impressive an oracle\nthat to neglect its voice, would be to nullify and negate the whole\nactivity of the intuition and deny it its place among the ultimate\nenergies of vision.\n\nThere is always more difficulty in putting into words a revelation\nwhich the complex vision owes to intuition than in regard to any\nother of its attributes. Reason in his matter, and sensation and\nimagination also, have an unfair advantage when it comes to\n_words_. For human language is compelled to draw its images\nfrom sensation and its logic from reason. But intuition--the\npeculiarly feminine attribute of the soul--finds itself dealing with\nwhat is barely intelligible and with what is profoundly irrational.\nThus it naturally experiences a profound difficulty in getting itself\nexpressed in words at all.\n\nAnd, incidentally, we cannot avoid asking ourselves the curious\nquestion whether it may not be that language, which is so\ndependent upon the peculiarly masculine attributes of reason and\nsensation, has not become an inadequate medium for the\nexpression of what might be called the feminine vision of the\nworld? May we not indeed go so far as to hazard the suggestion\nthat when this fact, of the masculine domination of language,\nhas been adequately recognized, there will emerge upon the\nearth women-philosophers and women-artists who will throw\ncompletely new light upon many problems? The difficulty which\nwomen experience in getting expressed in definite terms, whether\nin philosophy or art, the co-ordinated rhythm of _their_ complex\nvision, may it not be largely due to the fact that the attribute of\nintuition which is their most vital organ of research has remained\nso inarticulate? And may not the present wave of psychological\n\"mysticism,\" which just now is so prominent a psychic phenomenon,\nbe due to the vague and, in many cases, the clumsy attempt, which\nwomen are now making to get their intuitive contribution into\nline with the complex vision of the rest?\n\nWhen the universe is referred to as \"Nature,\" may it not be that it\nis this very element, this strange wisdom of the abysmal\n\"Mothers,\" which humanity thinks of as struggling to utter its\nunutterable secret?\n\nHow, then, for the sake of its contribution to the ultimate rhythm,\ndoes the complex vision articulate this mysterious oracle from the\nfeminine principle in life, as it brokenly and intermittently lifts up\nits voice?\n\nOne aspect of this oracle's voice is precisely what we are\nconcerned with now. I mean the problem of the relation of the One\nto the Many. The merely logical conception of unity is misleading\nbecause the wavering mass of impression which makes up our life\nhas a margin which recedes on every side into unfathomableness.\nThis conception has two aspects. In the first place it implies\n_continuity_, by which I mean that everything in the world is in\ntouch with everything else.\n\nIn the second place it implies _totality_, by which I mean that\neverything in the world can be considered as one rounded-off and\ncomplete \"whole.\" According to this second aspect of the case, we\nthink of the world as an integral One surrounded by nothingness,\nin the same way that the individual soul is surrounded by the\nuniverse.\n\nThe revelation of the complex vision finds the second of these two\naspects entirely misleading. It accepts the conception of\n_continuity_, and rejects the conception of _totality_. It rejects the\nconception of \"totality,\" because \"totality,\" in this cosmic sense, is\na thing of which it has no experience; and the revelation of the\ncomplex vision is entirely based on experience. The margins of the\nworld, receding without limit in every direction, prevent us from\never arriving at the conception of \"totality.\"\n\n\nWhat right have we to regard the universe as a totality, when all\nwe are conscious of is a mass of wavering impression continued\nunfathomable in every direction? In only one sense, therefore,\nhave we a right to speak of the unity of the system of things; and\nthat is in the sense of continuity. Since this mass of impression,\nwhich we name the universe, is on all sides lost in a margin of\nunfathomableness, it is, after all, only a limited portion of it which\ncomes into the scope of our consciousness. It is one of the curious\nexaggerations of our logical reason that we should be tempted to\n\"round off\" this mystery. The combined voices of imagination and\nintuition protest against such an enclosed circle.\n\nThe same revelation of the complex vision which gives objective\nreality to what is outside our individual soul insists that this\nobjective reality extends beyond the limited circle of our\nconsciousness. The device by which the logical reason \"rounds\noff\" the conception of _continuity_ by the conception of _totality_\nis the device of the mathematical formula of \"infinity.\"\n\nThe imaginative movement by which the complex vision of the\nsoul plunges into the abysses of stellar space, seeking to fathom, at\nleast in a mental act, immensity beyond immensity, and gulf\nbeyond gulf, is a definite human experience. It is the actual\nexperience of the soul itself, dropping its plummet into immensity,\nand finding immensity unfathomable. But as soon as the logical\nreason dominates the situation, in place of this palpable plunge\ninto a real concrete experience, with its accompanying sensation of\nappalling wonder and terrible freedom, we are offered nothing but\na thin, dry, barren mathematical formula called \"infinity,\" the mere\nmention of which freezes the imagination at its source.\n\nWhat, in fact, the complex vision reveals to us is that all these arid\nformulae, such as infinity, the Absolute Being, and the Universal\nCause, are conceptions projected into the real and palpable bosom\nof unfathomable life by the very enemy and antagonist of life, the\naboriginal emotion of inert malice. This is why so often in the\nhistory of the human race the conception of \"God\" has been the\nworst enemy of the soul. The conception of \"God\" by its alliance\nwith the depressing mathematical formula of \"infinity\" has indeed\ndone more than any other human perversion to obliterate the\nbeauty and truth of the emotional feeling which we name\n\"religion.\"\n\nThe revelation of the complex vision makes it clear to us that the\nidea of \"God,\" in alliance with the idea of \"Infinity,\" is a\nprojection, into religious experience, of the emotion of inert\nmalice. As soon as the palpable unfathomableness of space is\nreduced to the barren notion of a mathematical \"infinity\" all the\nfree and terrible beauty of life is lost. We have pressed our hands\nagainst our prison-gates and found them composed of a material\nmore rigid than adamant, the material of \"thought-in-the-abstract.\"\n\nNow although our chief difficulty in regard to this insistent\nproblem of the One and the Many has been got rid of by eliminating\nfrom the notion of the One all idea of totality, it is still\ntrue that something in us remains unsatisfied while our individual\nsoul is thought of as absolutely isolated from all other souls. It is\nhere, as I have already said, that the peculiarly feminine attribute\nof intuition comes to our rescue. The fact that we can\ncommunicate together by human and sub-human language, does\nnot, though it implies a basic similarity in our complex vision,\nreally satisfy us.\n\nA strange unhappiness, a vague misery, a burden of unutterable\nnostalgia, troubles the loneliness of our soul. And yet it is not, this\nvague longing, a mere desire to break the isolating circle of the \"I\nam I\" and to invade, and mingle with, other personalities. It is\nsomething deeper than this, it is a desire to break the isolation of\nall personalities, and to enter, in company with all, some larger,\nfuller, freer level of life, where what we call \"the limits of\npersonality\" are surpassed and transcended.\n\n\nThis underlying misery of the soul is, in fact, a constant\nrecognition that by the isolated loneliness of our deepest self we\nare keeping at a distance something--some unutterable flow of\nhappiness--which would destroy for us all fears and all weariness,\nand would end for ever the obscene and sickening burden of the\ncommonplace. It is precisely at this point that the intuition comes\nto the rescue; supplying our complex vision with that peculiar\n\"note,\" or \"strain of music,\" without which the orchestral harmony\nmust remain incomplete.\n\nIn seeking to recall those great moments when the \"apex-thought\"\nof the complex vision revealed to us the secret of things, we find\nourselves remembering how, when in the presence of some\nsupreme work of art, or of some action of heroic sacrifice, or of\nsome magical effect of nature, or of some heart-breaking gesture\nof tragic emotion in some simple character, we have suddenly\nbeen transported out of the closed circle of our personal life into\nsomething that was at once personal and impersonal. At such a\nmoment it seems as if we literally \"died\" to ourself, and became\nsomething \"other\" than ourself; and yet at the same time \"found\"\nourself, as we had never \"found\" ourself before.\n\nWhat the complex vision seems to reveal to us about this great\nhuman experience is that it is an initiation into an \"eternal vision,\"\ninto a \"vision of the immortals,\" into a mood, a temper, a \"music\nof the spheres,\" wherein the creative mystery of the emotion of\nlove finds its consummation. The peculiar opportunity of an\nexperience of this kind, its temporal \"occasion,\" shall we say,\nseems to be more often supplied by the intuition, than by any other\nattribute of the complex vision.\n\nIntuition having this power, it is not surprising that many souls\nshould misuse and abuse this great gift. The temptation to allow\nthe intuition to absorb the whole field of consciousness is to\ncertain natures almost irresistible. And yet, when intuition is\ndivorced from the other aspects of the rhythm of life, its tendency\ntowards what might be called \"the passion of identity\" very easily\nlapses into a sort of spiritual sensuality, destructive to the creative\nfreedom of the soul. Woe to the artist who falls into the quagmire\nof unbalanced intuition! It is as if he were drugged with a spiritual\nlust.\n\nTo escape from self-loathing, to escape from the odious monotony\nand the indecent realism of life--what a relief! How desirable to be\nconfronted no longer by that impassable gulf between one's own\nsoul and all other living souls! How desirable to cross the abyss\nwhich separates the \"something\" which is the substance of our\nbeing from the \"something\" which is the substance of the\n\"objective mystery\"!\n\nAnd yet, according to the revelation of the complex vision, this\n\"spiritual ecstasy\" is a perversion of the true art of life. The true\nart of life finds in \"the vision of the immortals,\" and in \"the vision\nof the immortals\" alone, its real escape from evil. This \"passion of\nidentity,\" offered us by the vice, by the madness of intuition, is not\nin harmony with the great moments of the soul. Its \"identity\" is but\na gross, mystical, clotted \"identity\"; and its \"heaven\" is not the\n\"heaven\" of the Christ.\n\nIf the \"ecstasy of identity,\" as the unbalanced attribute of intuition\nforces it upon us, were in very truth the purpose of life, how\ngrotesque a thing life would be! It would then be the purpose of\nlife to create personality, only in order to drown it in the\nimpersonal. In other words it would be the purpose of life to create\nthe \"higher\" in order that it should lose itself in the lower. At its\nvery best this \"ecstasy of identity\" is the expression of what might\nbe called the \"lyrical\" element in things. But the secret of life is\nnot lyrical, as many of the prophets have supposed, but dramatic,\nas all the great artists have shown. For the essence of life is\ncontradiction. And contradiction demands a \"for\" and an \"against,\"\na protagonist and an antagonist. What the revelation of the\ncomplex vision discloses is the inherent duality of all things.\nPleasure and pain, night and day, man and woman, good and evil,\nsummer and winter, life and death, personality and fate, love and\nmalice, the soul and the objective mystery, these are the threads\nout of which the texture of existence is woven; and there is no\nescape from these, except in that eternal \"_nothingness_\" which\nitself is the \"contradiction\" or \"opposite\" of that \"_all_,\" which it\nreduces to chaos and annihilation. Thus runs the revelation of the\ncomplex vision.\n\nThis integral soul of ours, made of a stuff which for ever defies\nanalysis; this objective mystery, made of a stuff which for ever\ndefies analysis; these two things perpetually confront one another\nin a struggle that only annihilation can end. The vision of the\neternal implies the passing of the transitory. For what cannot cease\nfrom being beautiful has no real beauty; and what cannot cease\nfrom being true has no real truth. The art of life according to the\nrevelation of the complex vision, consists in giving to the\ntransitory the form of the eternal. It is the art of creating a rhythm,\na music, a harmony, so passionate and yet so calm, that the mere\nfact of having once or twice attained it is sufficient \"to redeem all\nsorrows.\"\n\nThe assumption that death ends it all, is an assumption which the\nvery nature of love calls upon us to make; for, if we did not make\nit make it, something different from love would be the object and\npurpose of our life. But the revelation of the complex vision, in\nour supreme moments, discloses to us that love itself is the only\njustification for life; and therefore, by making the assumption that\nthe soul perishes, we put once and for all out of our thought that\nformidable revival of love, the idea of personal immortality.\n\nFor the idea of personal immortality, like the idea of an Absolute\nGod, is a projection of the aboriginal \"inert\" malice. It must be\nremembered that the revelation of the complex vision, by laying\nstress upon the creative energy of the soul in its grappling with the\nobjective mystery, implies an element of _indeterminism_, or free\nchoice, in regard to the ultimate nature of the world. Man, in a\nvery profound sense, perpetually creates the world according to his\nwill and desire. Nor can he ever know at what point, in the\nstruggle between personality and destiny, the latter is bound to\nwin. Such a point may _seem_ to be reached; until some astounding\n\"act of faith\" on the part of the soul flings that \"point\"\ninto a yet further remoteness. And this creative power in the soul\nof man may apply in ways which at present our own race has\nhardly dared to contemplate. It may apply, for instance, to the idea\nof personal immortality.\n\nPersonal immortality may be a thing which the soul, by a\nconcentrated act of creative will, can secure for itself, or can\nreject for itself. It may be, if we take the whole conscious and\nsubconscious purpose of a man's life, a _matter of choice_.\n\nBut when a man makes a choice of such a kind, when a man\nconcentrates his energy upon surviving the death of his body, he is\ndeliberately selecting a \"lower\" purpose for his life in place of a\n\"higher.\" In other words, instead of concentrating his will upon the\nevocation of the emotion of love, he is concentrating his will upon\nself-realization or self-continuance. What he is really doing is even\nworse than this. For since what we call \"emotion\" is an actual\nprojection into the matrix of the objective mystery, of the very\nsubstance and stuff of the soul, when the will thus concentrates\nupon personal immortality, it takes the very substance of the soul\nand perverts it to the satisfaction of inert malice. In other words it\nactually transforms the stuff of the soul from its positive to its\nnegative chemistry, and produces a relative victory of malice over\nlove.\n\nThe soul's desires for personal immortality is one of the aspects of\nthe soul's \"possessive\" instinct. The soul desires to \"possess\"\nitself--itself as it exactly is, itself in its precise and complete\n\"status quo\"--without interruption for ever. But love has a very\ndifferent desire from this. Love is not concerned with time at all--\nfor time has a \"future\"; and any contemplation of a \"future\"\nimplies the activity of something in the soul which is different\nfrom love, implies something which is concerned with outward\nevents and occurrences and chances. But love is not concerned\nwith outward events, whether past or future. Love desires eternity\nand eternity alone. Or rather it does not \"desire\" eternity. It _is_\neternity. It is an eternal Now, in which what _will_ happen and\nwhat _has_ happened are irrelevant and unimportant.\n\nAll this offers us an intelligible explanation of a very bewildering\nphenomenon in human life. I mean the instinctive disgust\nexperienced by the aesthetic sense when men, who otherwise seem\ngentle and good, display an undue and unmeasured agitation about\nthe fate of their souls.\n\nLove never so much as even considers the question of the fate of\nthe soul. Love finds, in the mere act of loving, a happiness so\nprofound that all such problems seem tiresome and insignificant.\nThe purpose of life is to attain the rhythmic ecstasy of all love's\nintrinsic potentialities. This desire for personal immortality is not\none of love's intrinsic potentialities. When a human soul has lost\nby death the one person it has loved, the strength of its love is\nmeasured by the greater or less emphasis it places upon the\nproblem of the lost one's \"survival.\"\n\nThe disgust which the aesthetic sense experiences when it\nencounters a certain sort of mystical and psychic agitation over the\nquestion as to whether the lost one \"lives still somewhere\" is a\ndisgust based upon our instinctive knowledge that this particular\nkind of inquiry would never occur to a supreme and self-forgetful\nlove. For this enquiry, this agitation, this dabbling in \"psychic\nevidences,\" is a projection of the baser nature of the soul; is, in\nfact, a projection of the \"possessive instinct,\" which is only\nanother name for the original inert malice.\n\nIn the \"ave atque vale\" of the Roman poet, there is much more of\nthe absolute quality of great love than in all these psychic\ndabblings. For in the austere reserve of that passionate cry there is\nthe ultimate acceptance, by Love itself, of the tragedy of having\nlived and loved at all. There is an acceptance of that aspect of the\n\"vision of the immortals\" which implies that the possessive\ninstinct has no part or lot in the eternal.\n\nThe inhuman cruelties which have been practised by otherwise\n\"good\" men under the motive of \"saving\" other people's souls, and\nthe inhuman cruelties which have been practised by otherwise\n\"good\" men under the motive of saving their own souls, have,\neach of them, the same evil origin. Love sweeps aside, in one great\nwave of its own nature, all these doubts and ambiguities. It lifts the\nobject of its love into its own eternity; and in its own eternity the\nultimate tragedy of personal separation is but one chord of its\nunbroken rhythm.\n\nThe tragedy of personal separation is not a thing which love\nrealizes for the first time when it loses the object of its love. It is\na thing which is of the very nature of the eternity in which love\nhabitually dwells. For the eternity in which love habitually dwells\nis its vision of the tragedy of all life.\n\nThis, then, is the original revelation of the complex vision. The\nsoul is confronted by an ultimate duality which extends through\nthe whole mass of its impressions. And because this duality\nextends through every aspect of the soul's universe and can be\nchanged and transformed by the soul's will, it is inevitable that\nwhat the world has hitherto named \"philosophy\" and has regarded\nas the effort of \"getting hold\" of a reality which exists already,\nshould be named by the complex vision the \"art of life\" and should\nbe regarded as the effort of reducing to harmony the unruly\nimpulses and energies which perpetually transform and change the\nworld.\n\n\nCHAPTER V.\n\nTHE ULTIMATE DUALITY\n\nWhat we are really, all of us, in search of, whether we know it or\nnot, is some concrete and definite symbol of life and the \"object\"\nof life which shall gather up into one living image all the broken,\nthwarted, devious, and discordant impressions which make up our\nexperience. What we crave is something that shall, in some\npermanent form and yet in a form that can grow and enrich itself,\nrepresent and embody the whole circle of the joy and pain of\nexistence. What we crave is something into which we can throw\nour personal joys and sorrows, our individual sensations and ideas,\nand know of a certainty that thrown into that reservoir, they will\nblend with all the joys and sorrows of all the dead and all the\nliving.\n\nSuch a symbol in order to give us what we need must represent the\nultimate reach of insight to which humanity has attained. It must\nbe something that, once having come into existence, remains\nindependent of our momentary subjective fancies and our passing\nmoods. It must be something of clearer outlines and more definite\nlineaments than those vague indistinct ecstasies, half-physiological\nand half-psychic, which the isolated intuition brings us.\n\nSuch a symbol must represent the concentrated struggle of the\nhuman soul with the bitterness of fate and the cruelty of fate, its\nlong struggle with the deadly malice in itself and the deadly\nmalice in nature.\n\nThere is only one symbol which serves this purpose; a symbol\nwhich has already by the slow process of anonymous creation and\ndiscovery established itself in the world. I mean the symbol of the\nfigure of Christ.\n\nThis symbol would not have sufficed to satisfy the craving of\nwhich I speak if it were only a \"discovery\" of humanity. The\n\"God-man\" may be \"discovered\" in nature; but the \"Man-god\"\nmust be \"created\" by man.\n\nWe find ourselves approaching this symbol from many points of\nview, but the point of view which especially concerns us is to note\nhow it covers the whole field of human experience. In this symbol\nthe ultimate duality receives its \"eternal form\" and becomes an\neverlasting standard or pattern of what is most natural and most\nrhythmic. As I advance in my analysis of the relation of the\nultimate duality to this symbolic figure of Christ, it becomes\nnecessary to review once more, in clear and concise order, the\nvarious stages of thought by means of which I prove the necessity\nof some sort of universal symbol, and the necessity of moulding\nthis symbol to fit the drama of One ultimate duality.\n\nA summary of the stages of thought through which we have\nalready passed will thus be inevitable; but it will be a summary of\nthe situation from the view-point of a different angle.\n\nPhilosophy then is an attempt to articulate more vividly the nature\nof reality than such \"reality\" can get itself articulated in the\nconfused pell-mell of ordinary experience. The unfortunate thing\nis that in this process of articulating reality philosophy tends to\ncreate an artificial world of its own, which in the end gets so far\naway from reality that its conclusions when they are confronted\nwith the pell-mell of ordinary experience appear remote, strange,\nfantastic, arbitrary, and even laughable.\n\nThis philosophical tendency to create an artificial world which\nwhen confronted with the real world appears strange and remote is\ndue to the fact that philosophers, instead of using as their\ninstrument of research the entire complex vision, use first one and\nthen another of its isolated attributes. But there must come\nmoments when, in the analysis of so intricate and elaborate a thing\nas \"reality\" by means of so intricate and elaborate an instrument,\nas the complex vision, the most genuine and the least artificial of\nphilosophies must appear to be following a devious and serpentine\npath.\n\nThese moments of difficulty and obscurity are not, however--as\nlong as such a philosophy attaches itself closely to \"reality\" and\nflows round \"reality\" like a tide flowing round submerged rocks or\nliquid metal flowing round the cavities of a mould--a sign that\nphilosophy has deserted reality, but only a sign that the curves and\ncontours and jagged edges of reality are so intricate and involved\nthat only a very fluid element can follow their complicated shape.\nBut these moments of difficulty and obscurity, these vague and\nimpalpable links in the chain, are only to be found in the\n_process_ by which we arrive at our conclusion. When our\nconclusion has been once reached it becomes suddenly manifest to\nus that it has been there, with us, all the while, implicit in our\nwhole argument, the secret and hidden cause why the argument\ntook the form it did rather than any other. The test of any\nphilosophy is not that it should appeal immediately and directly to\nwhat is called \"common-sense,\" for common-sense is no better\nthan a crude and premature synthesis of superficial experiences; a\nsynthesis from which the supreme and culminating experiences of\na person's life have been excluded. For in our supreme and\nculminating experiences there is always an element of what might\nbe called the \"impossible\" or of what must be recognized as a\nmatter of faith or imagination. It is therefore quite to be expected\nthat the conclusions of a philosophy like the philosophy of the\ncomplex vision, which derives its authority from the exceptional\nand supreme experiences of all souls, should strike us in our\nmoments of \"practical common-sense\" as foolish, impossible,\nridiculous and even insane. All desperate and formidable efforts\ntowards creation have struck and will strike the mood of \"practical\ncommon-sense\" as ridiculous and insane. This is true of every\ncreative idea that has ever emanated from the soul of man.\n\nFor the mood of \"practical common-sense\" is a projection of the\nbaser instinct of self-preservation and is penetrated through and\nthrough with that power of inert malice which itself might be\ncalled the instinct of self-preservation of the enemy of life.\n\"Practical common-sense\" is the name we give to that superficial\nsynthesis of our baser self-preservative instincts, which, when it is\nreinforced and inspired by \"the will of malice\" out of the evil\ndepths of the soul, is the most deadly of all antagonists of new life.\n\nWe need suffer, therefore, no surprise or pain if we find the\nconclusions of the philosophy of the complex vision ridiculous\nand \"impossible\" to our mood of practical common-sense. If on\nthe contrary they did not seem insane and foolish to such a mood\nwe might well be profoundly suspicious of them. For although\nthere are very few certainties in this world, one thing at least is\ncertain, namely that for any truth or reality to satisfy the creative\nspirit in us it must present itself as something dangerous,\ndestructive, ridiculous and insane to that instinct in us which\nresists creation.\n\nBut although \"the appeal to common-sense\" is no test of the truth\nof a philosophy, since common-sense is precisely the thing in us\nwhich has a malicious hostility to the creative spirit, yet no\nphilosophy can afford to disregard an appeal to actual experience\nas long as actual experience includes the rare moments of our life\nas well as all the rest. Here is indeed a true and authentic test of\nphilosophic validity. If we take our philosophical conclusions, so\nto speak, in our hands, and plunge with them into the very depths\nof actual experience, do they grow more organic, more palpable\nand more firm, or do they melt away into the flowing waters?\n\nWho is not able to recall the distress of bitter disillusionment\nwhich has followed the collapse of some plausible system of\n\"sweet reasonableness\" under the granite-like impact of a rock of\nreality which has knocked the bottom out of it and left it a derelict\nupon the waves? This collapse of an ordered and reasonable\nsystem under the impact of some atrocious projection of \"crass\ncasuality\" is a proof that if a philosophy has not got in it some\n\"iron\" of its own, if it has not got in it something formidable and\nunfathomable, something that can destroy as well as create, it is\nnot of much avail against the winds and storms of destiny.\n\nFor a philosophy to be a true representation of reality, for it to be\nthat reality itself, become conscious and articulate, it is necessary\nthat it should prove most vivid and actual at those supreme\nmoments when the soul of man is driven to the ultimate wall and\nis at the breaking-point.\n\nThe truth of a philosophy is not to be tested by what we feel about\nit in moods of practical common-sense; for in these moods we\nhave, for some superficial reason, suppressed more than half of the\nattributes of our soul. The truth of a philosophy can only be tested\nin those moments when the soul, driven to the wall, gathers itself\ntogether for one supreme effort. But there is, even in less stark and\ndrastic hours, an available test of a sound and organic philosophy\nwhich must not be forgotten. I refer to its capacity for being\nvividly and emphatically summed up and embodied in some\nconcrete image or symbol.\n\nIf a philosophy is so rationalistic that it refuses to lend itself to\na definite and concrete expression we are justified in being more\nthan suspicious of it.\n\nAnd we are suspicious of it not because its lack of simplicity\nmakes it intricate and elaborate, for \"reality\" is intricate and\nelaborate; but because its inability to find expression for its\nintricacy in any concrete symbol is a proof that it is too simple.\nFor the remote conclusions of a purely logical and rationalistic\nphilosophy are made to appear much less simple than they really\nare by reason of their use of remote technical terms.\n\nWhat the soul demands from philosophy is not simplicity but\ncomplexity, for the soul itself is the most complex thing we know.\nThe thin, rigid, artificial outlines of purely rationalistic systems\ncan never be expressed in ritual or symbol or drama, not because\nthey are too intricate, but because they are not intricate enough.\n\nA genuine symbol, or ritualistic image, is a concrete living organic\nthing carrying all manner of magical and subtle associations. It is\nan expression of reality which comes much nearer to reality than\nany rationalistic system can possibly do. A genuine symbolic or\nritualistic image is a concrete expression of the complexity of life.\nIt has the creative and destructive power of life. It has the\nformidable mysteriousness of life, and with all this it has the\nclear-cut directness of life's terrible and exquisite tangibility.\n\nWhen suddenly confronted, then, in the mid-stream of life, by the\nnecessity of expressing the starting-point, which is also the\nconclusion, of the philosophy of the complex vision, what\nsynthetic image or symbol or ritualistic word are we to use in\norder to sum up its concrete reality?\n\nThe revelation of life, offered to us by the complex vision, is, as\nwe have seen, no very simple or logical affair. We axe left with\nthe spectacle of innumerable \"souls,\" human, sub-human and\nsuper-human, held together by some indefinable \"medium\" which\nenables them to communicate with one another. Each one of these\n\"souls\" at once creates and discovers its own individual \"universe\"\nand then by an act of faith assumes that the various \"universes\"\ncreated and discovered by all other souls are identical with its\nown.\n\nThat they _are_ identical with its own the soul is led to assume\nwith more and more certainty in proportion as its communion with\nother souls grows more and more involved. This identity between\nthe various \"universes\" of alien souls is rendered more secure and\nmore objective by the fact that time and space are found to be\nessential peculiarities of all of them alike. For since time and space\nare found to enter into the original character of all these\n\"universes,\" it becomes a natural and legitimate conclusion that all\nthese \"universes\" are in reality the same \"universe.\"\n\nWe are left, then, with the spectacle of innumerable souls\nconfronting a \"universe\" which in their interaction with one\nanother they have half-created and half-discovered. There is no\nescape from the implication of this phrase \"half-discovered.\" The\ncreative activity of the complex vision perpetually modifies,\nclarifies and moulds the mystery which surrounds it; but that there\nis an objective mystery surrounding it, of which time and space are\npermanent aspects, cannot be denied.\n\nThe pure reason's peculiar power of thinking time and space away,\nor of lodging itself outside of time and space, is an abstraction\nwhich leads us out of the sphere of reality; because, in its resultant\nconception, it omits the activity of the other attributes of the\ncomplex vision.\n\nThe complex vision reveals to us, therefore, three aspects of\nobjective mystery. It reveals to us in the first place the presence of\nan objective \"something\" outside the soul, which the soul by its\nvarious energies moulds and clarifies and shapes. This is that\n\"something\" which the soul at one and the same moment \"half-discovers\"\nand \"half-creates.\" It reveals to us, in the second place, the presence\nof an indefinable objective \"something\" which is the medium\nthat makes possible the communion of one soul with another and with\n\"the invisible companions.\"\n\nThis is the medium which holds all these separate personalities\ntogether while each of them half-creates and half-discovers his\nown \"universe.\"\n\nIn the third place it reveals to us the presence, in each individual\nsoul, of a sort of \"substratum of the soul\" or something beyond\nanalysis which is the \"vanishing point of sensation\" and the\nvortex-point or fusion-point where the movement which we call\n\"matter\" loses itself in the movement which we call \"mind.\"\n\nIn all these three aspects of objective mystery, revealed to us by\nthe united activities of the complex vision, we are compelled, as\nhas been shown, to use the vague and obscure word \"something.\"\nWe are compelled to apply this unilluminating and tantalizing\nword to all these three aspects of \"objective mystery,\" because no\nother word really covers the complex vision's actual experience.\n\nThe soul recognizes that there is \"something\" outside itself which\nis the \"clay\" upon which its energy works in creating its\n\"universe,\" but it cannot know anything about this \"something\"\nexcept that it is \"there\"; because, directly the soul discovers it, it\ninevitably moulds it and recreates it. There is not one minutest\ndivision of time between this \"discovery\" and this \"creation\"; so\nall that one can say is that the resultant objective \"universe\" is\nhalf-created and half-discovered; and that whatever this\nmysterious \"something\" may be, apart from the complex vision, it\nat any rate has the peculiarity of being forced to submit to the\ncomplex vision's creative energy.\n\nBut not only are we compelled to apply the provoking and\nunilluminating word \"something\" to each of these three aspects of\nobjective mystery which the complex vision reveals; we are also\ncompelled to assume that each one of these is dominated by time\nand space.\n\nThis implication of \"time and space\" is necessitated in a different\nway in each of these three aspects of what was formerly called\n\"matter.\" In the first aspect of the thing we have time and space as\nessential characteristics of all the various \"universes,\" reduced by\nan act of faith to one \"universe,\" of the souls which fill the world.\n\nIn the second aspect of it we have time and space as essential\ncharacteristics of that indefinable \"medium\" which holds all these\nsouls together, and which by holding them together makes it easier\nto regard their separate \"universes\" as \"one universe,\" since they\nfind their ground or base in one universal \"medium.\"\n\nIn the third aspect of it we have time and space as essential\ncharacteristics of that \"substratum of the soul\" which is the\nvanishing-point of sensation and the fusion-point of \"mind\" and\n\"matter.\"\n\nWe are thus inevitably led to a further conclusion; namely, that all\nthese three aspects of objective reality, since they are all\ndominated by time and space, are all dominated by the _same_\n\"time\" and the same \"space.\" And since it is unthinkable that three\ncoexistent forms of objective reality should be all dominated by\nthe same time and space and remain absolutely distinct from one\nanother, it becomes evident that these three forms of objective\nmystery, these three indefinable \"somethings,\" are not separate\nfrom one another but are in continual contact with one another.\n\nThus the fact that all these three aspects of objective reality are\nunder the domination of the same time and space is a further\nconfirmation of the truth which we have already assumed by\nan act of faith, namely that all the various \"universes,\"\nhalf-discovered and half-created by all the souls in the world, are\nin reality \"one universe.\"\n\nThe real active and objective existence of this \"one universe\" is\nmade still more sure and is removed still further from all\npossibility of \"illusion,\" by the fact that we are forced to regard it\nas being not only \"our\" universe but the universe also of those\n\"invisible companions\" whose vision half-creates it and\nhalf-discovers it, even as our own vision does. It is true that to\ncertain types of mind, for whom the definite recognition of mystery is\nrepugnant, it must seem absurd and ridiculous to be driven to the\nacknowledgment of a thing's existence, while at the same time we\nhave to confess complete inability to predicate anything at all\nabout the thing except that it exists.\n\nIt must seem to such minds still more absurd and ridiculous that\nwe should be driven to recognize no less than three aspects of this\nmysterious \"something.\"\n\nBut since they are included in the same time and space, and since,\nconsequently, they are intimately connected with one another, it\nbecomes inevitable that we should take the yet further step and\nregard them as three separate aspects of one and the same mystery.\nThus we are once more confronted with the inescapable trinitarian\nnature of the system of things; and just as we have three ultimate\naspects of reality in the monistic truth of \"the one time and space,\"\nin the pluralistic truth of the innumerable company of living souls\nand the dualistic truth of the contradictory nature of all existence;\nso we have three further ultimate aspects of reality, in the\nincomprehensible \"something\" which holds all souls together; in\nthe incomprehensible \"something\" out of which all souls create the\nuniverse; and in the incomprehensible \"something\" which forms\nthe substratum both of the souls of the invisible \"companions of\nmen\" and of the soul of every individual thing.\n\nThe supreme unity, therefore, in this complicated world, thus\nrevealed to us by the activity of the complex vision is the unity of\ntime and space. This unity is eternally reborn and eternally\nre-discovered every time any living personality contemplates the\nsystem of things. And since \"the sons of the universe\" must be\nregarded as continually contemplating the system of things,\nstruggling with it, moulding it, and changing it, according to their\npre-existent ideal, we are compelled to assume that time and space\nare eternal aspects of reality and that their eternal necessity gives\nthe system of things its supreme unity.\n\nNo isolated speculation of the logical reason, functioning apart\nfrom the other attributes of the complex vision, can undermine this\nsupreme unity of time and space. The \"a priori unity of\napperception\" is an unreality compared with this reality. The\nall-embracing cosmic \"monad,\" contemplating itself as its eternal\nobject, is an unreality compared with this reality.\n\nWe are left with a pluralistic world of individual souls, finding\ntheir pattern and their ideal in the vision of the \"immortal gods\"\nand perpetually rediscovering and recreating together \"a universe\"\nwhich like themselves is dominated by time and space and which\nlike themselves is for ever divided against itself in an eternal and\nunfathomable duality.\n\nThe ultimate truth of the system of things according to the\nrevelation of the complex vision is thus found to consist in the\nmystery of personality confronting \"something\" which _seems_\nimpersonal. Over both these things, over the personal soul and\nover the primordial \"clay\" or \"energy\" or \"movement\" or \"matter\"\nout of which the personal soul creates its \"universe,\" time and\nspace are dominant. But since we can predicate nothing of this\noriginal \"plasticity\" except that it is \"plastic\" and that time and\nspace rule over it, it is in a strict sense illegitimate to say that\nthis primordial \"clay\" or \"world stuff\" is in itself divided into a\nduality. We know nothing, and can never know anything about it, beyond\nthe bare fact of its existence. Its duality comes from the duality in\nus. It is we who create the contradiction upon which its life\ndepends. It is from the unfathomable duality in the soul of the\n\"companions of men\" that the universe is brought forth.\n\nThe ultimate duality which perpetually creates the world is the\nultimate duality in all living souls and in the souls of \"the sons of\nthe universe.\" But although it is we ourselves who in the primal\nact of envisaging the world endow it with this duality, it would be\nan untrue statement to say that this duality in the material universe\nis an \"illusion.\" It is no more an illusion than the objective\nmaterial world itself is an illusion. Both are created by the\ninter-action between the mystery of personality and the mystery of what\nseems the impersonal. Thus it remains perfectly true that what we\nsometimes call \"brute matter\" possesses an element of malignant\ninertness and malicious resistance to the power of creation. This\nmalice of the impersonal, this malignant inertness of \"matter,\" is\nan ultimate fact; and is not less a fact because it depends upon the\nexistence of the same malice and the same inert resistance in our\nown souls.\n\nNor are we able to escape from the conclusion that this malignant\nelement in the indefinable \"world-stuff\" exists independently of\nany human soul. It must be thought of as dependent upon the same\nduality in the souls of \"the sons of the universe\" as that which\nexists in the souls of men. For although the primordial ideas of\ntruth and nobility and beauty, brought together by the emotion of\nlove, are realized in the \"gods\" with an incredible and immortal\nintensity, yet the souls of the \"gods\" could not be souls at all if\nthey were not subject to the same duality as that which struggles\nwithin ourselves.\n\nIt follows from this that we are forced to recognize the presence of\na potentiality of evil or malice in the souls of \"the sons of the\nuniverse.\" But although we cannot escape from the conclusion that\nevil or malice exists in the souls of the immortals as in all human\nsouls, yet in their souls this evil or malice must be regarded as\nperpetually overcome by the energy of the power of love. This\novercoming of malice by the power of love, or of evil by \"good,\"\nin the souls of \"the sons of the universe,\" must not be regarded as\na thing once for all accomplished, but as a thing eternally\nre-attained as the result of an unceasing struggle, a struggle so\ndesperate, so passionate and so unfathomable, that it surpasses all\neffort of the mind to realize or comprehend it.\n\nIt must not, moreover, be forgotten that what the complex vision\nreveals about this eternal struggle between love and malice in the\nsouls of \"the sons of the universe\" and in the souls of all living\nthings, is not that love and malice are vague independent\nelemental \"forces\" which obsess or possess or function _through_\nthe soul which is their arena, but rather that they themselves _are_\nthe very stuff and texture and essence of the individual soul itself.\n\nTheir duality is unfathomable because the soul is unfathomable.\nThe struggle between them is unfathomable because the struggle\nbetween them is nothing less than the intrinsic nature of the soul.\nThe soul is unthinkable without this unfathomable struggle in its\ninherent being between love and malice or between life and what\nresists life. We are therefore justified in saying that \"the universe\"\nis created by the perpetual struggle between love and malice or\nbetween life and what resists life. But when we say this we must\nremember that this is only true because \"the universe\" is\nhalf-discovered and half-created by the souls of \"the sons of the\nuniverse\" and by the souls of all living things which fill the\nuniverse. This unfathomable duality which perpetually re-creates\nNature, does not exist in Nature apart from living things, although\nit does exist in nature apart from any individual living thing.\n\nAll those aspects of the objective universe which we usually call\n\"inanimate,\" such as earth, water, air, fire, ether, electricity,\nenergy, movement, matter and the like, including the stellar and\nplanetary bodies and the chemical medium, whatever it may be,\nwhich unites them, must be regarded as sharing, in some\ninscrutable way, in this unfathomable struggle. We are unable to\nescape from this conception of them, as thus sharing in this\nstruggle, because they are themselves the creation and discovery\nof the complex vision of the soul; and the soul is, as we have seen,\ndependent for its every existence upon this struggle.\n\nIn the same way, all those other aspects of the universe which are\n\"animate\" but sub-human, such as grass, moss, lichen, plants,\nsea-weed, trees, fish, birds, animals and the like, must be regarded\nas sharing in a still more intimate sense in this unfathomable\nstruggle. This conception has a double element of truth. For not\nonly do these things depend for their form and shape and reality\nupon the complex vision of the soul which contemplates them; but\nthey are themselves, since they are things endowed with life,\npossessed of some measure or degree of the complex vision.\n\nAnd if the souls of men and the Souls of the \"sons of the universe\"\nare inextricably made up of the very stuff of this unfathomable\nstruggle, between life and what resists life, we cannot escape from\nthe conclusion that the souls of plants and birds and animals and\nall other living things are inextricably made up of the stuff of the\nsame unfathomable struggle. For where there is life there must be\na soul possessed of life. Life, apart from some soul possessed with\nlife, is an abstraction of the logical reason and a phantom of no\nmore genuine reality than the \"a priori unity of apperception\" or\n\"the universal self-conscious monad.\"\n\nWhat we call reality, or the truth of the system of things, is\nnothing less than an innumerable company of personalities\nconfronting an objective mystery; and while we are driven to\nregard the \"inanimate,\" such as earth and air and water and fire, as\nthe bodily expressions of certain living souls, so are we much\nmore forcibly driven to regard the \"animate,\" wherever it is found,\nas implying the existence of some measure of personality and\nsome degree of consciousness.\n\nLife, apart from a soul possessing life, is not life at all. It is an\nabstraction of the logical reason which we cannot appropriate to\nour instinct or imagination. A vague phrase, like the phrase\n\"life-force,\" conveys to us whose medium of research is the complex\nvision, simply no intelligible meaning at all. It is on a par with the\n\"over-soul\"; and, to the philosophy of the complex vision, both the\n\"life-force\" and the \"over-soul\" are vague, materialistic,\nmetaphorical expressions which do not attain to the dignity of a\nlegitimate symbolic image.\n\nThey do not attain to this, because a legitimate symbolic image\nmust appeal to the imagination and the aesthetic sense by the\npossession of something concrete and intelligible.\n\nAny individual personal soul is concrete and intelligible. The\npersonal souls of \"the sons of the universe\" are concrete and\nintelligible. But the \"over-soul\" and the \"life-force\" are neither\nconcrete nor intelligible and therefore cannot be regarded as\nlegitimate symbols. One of the most important aspects of the\nmethod of philosophical enquiry which the philosophy of the\ncomplex vision adopts is this use of legitimate symbolic images in\nplace of illegitimate metaphorical images.\n\nThis use of concrete, tangible, intelligible images is a thing which\nhas to pay its price. And the price which it has to pay is the price\nof appearing childish, absurd and ridiculous to the type of mind\nwhich advocates the exclusive use of the logical reason as the sole\ninstrument of philosophical research. This price of appearing\nnaive, childish and ridiculous has to be paid shamelessly and in\nfull.\n\nThe type of mind which exacts this price, which demands in fact\nthat the concrete intelligible symbols of the philosophy of the\ncomplex vision should be regarded as childish and ridiculous, is\nprecisely the type of mind for whom \"truth\" is a smoothly\nevolutionary affair, an affair of steady \"progress,\" and for whom,\ntherefore, the mere fact of an idea being \"a modern idea\" implies\nthat it is \"true\" and the mere fact of an idea being a classical idea\nor a mediaeval idea implies that it is crude and inadequate if not\ncompletely \"false.\"\n\nTo the philosophy of the complex vision \"truth\" does not present\nitself as an affair of smooth and steady historical evolution but as\nsomething quite different from this--as a work of art, in fact,\ndependent upon the struggle of the individual soul with itself, and\nupon the struggle of \"the souls of the sons of the universe\" with\nthemselves. And although the struggle of the souls of \"the sons of\nthe universe\" towards a fuller clarifying of the mystery of life must\nbe regarded as having its concrete tangible history in time and\nspace, yet this history is not at all synonymous with what is\nusually called \"progress.\"\n\nAn individual human soul, the apex-thought of whose complex\nvision has attained an extraordinary and unusual rhythm, must be\nregarded as having approached nearer to the vision of \"the sons of\nthe universe\" although such an one may have lived in the days of\nthe patriarchs or in the Greek days or in the days of mediaevalism\nor of the renaissance, than any modern rationalistic thinker who is\nobsessed by \"the latest tendencies of modern thought.\"\n\nThe souls of \"the immortals\" must certainly be regarded as\ndeveloping and changing and as constantly advancing towards the\nrealization of their hope and premonition. But this \"advance\" is\nalso, as we have seen, in the profoundest sense a \"return,\" because\nit is a movement towards an idea which already is implicit and\nlatent. And in the presence of this \"advance,\" which is also a\n\"return,\" all historic ages of individual human souls are equal and\nco-existent.\n\nAll real symbols are \"true,\" wherever and whenever they are\ninvoked, because all real symbols are the expression of that rare\nunity of the complex vision which is man's deepest approximation\nto the mystery of life. The symbol of the cross, for instance, has\nfar more truth in it than any vague metaphorical expression such\nas the \"over-soul.\" The symbolic ritual of the Mass, for instance,\nhas far more truth in it than any metaphorical expression such as\nthe \"life-force.\" And although both the Cross and the Mass are\ninadequate and imperfect symbols with regard to the vision of \"the\nsons of the universe,\" because they are associated with the idea of\nan historic incarnation, yet in comparison with any modern\nrationalistic or chemical metaphor they are supremely true.\n\nThe philosophy of the complex vision, just because it is the\nphilosophy of personality, must inevitably use images which\nappear to the rationalistic mind as naive and childish and\nridiculous. But the philosophy of the complex vision prefers to\nexpress itself in terms which are concrete, tangible and intelligible,\nrather than in terms which are no more than vague projections of\nphantom logic abstracted from the concrete activity of real\npersonality.\n\nIn completing this general picture of the starting point of the\nphilosophy of the complex vision there is one further implication\nwhich ought to be brought fully into the light. I refer to a doctrine\nwhich certain ancient and mediaeval thinkers adopted, and which\nmust always be constantly re-appearing in human thought because\nit is an inevitable projection of the human conscience when the\nhuman conscience functions in isolation and in disregard of the\nother attributes. I mean the doctrine of the essentially evil,\ncharacter of that phenomenon which was formerly called \"matter\"\nbut which I prefer to call the objective mystery.\n\nAccording to this doctrine--which might be called the eternal\nheresy of puritanism--this objective mystery, this world-stuff, this\neternal \"energy\" or \"movement,\" this \"flesh and blood\" through\nwhich the soul expresses itself and of which the physical body is\nmade, is \"evil\"; and the opposite of this, that is to say \"mind\" or\n\"thought\" or \"consciousness\" or \"spirit\" is alone \"good.\"\n\nAccording to this doctrine the world is a struggle between \"the\nspirit\" which is entirely good and \"the flesh\" which is entirely evil.\nTo the philosophy of the complex vision this doctrine appears\nfalse and misleading. It detects in this doctrine, as I have hinted,\nan attempt of the conscience to arrogate to itself the whole field of\nexperience and to negate all the other attributes, especially\nemotion and the aesthetic sense.\n\nSuch a doctrine negates the whole activity of the complex vision\nbecause it assumes the independent existence of \"flesh and blood\"\nas opposed to \"mind.\" But \"flesh and blood\" is a thing which has\nno existence apart from \"mind,\" because it is a thing \"half-created\"\nas well as \"half-discovered\" by \"mind.\"\n\nIt negates the aesthetic sense because the aesthetic sense requires\nthe existence of \"the body\" or of \"flesh and blood\" or of what we\ncall \"matter,\" and cannot exert its activity without the reality of\nthis thing.\n\nIt negates emotion, because the emotion of love demands, for its\nfull satisfaction, nothing less than \"the eternal idea of flesh and\nblood.\" And since love demands the \"eternal idea of flesh and\nblood,\" \"flesh and blood\" cannot be \"evil.\"\n\nThis doctrine of the evil nature of \"matter\" is obviously a\nperversion of what the complex vision reveals to us about the\neternal duality. According to this doctrine, which I call the puritan\nheresy, the duality resolves itself into a struggle between the spirit\nand the flesh. But according to the revelation of the complex\nvision the true duality is quite different from this. In the true\nduality there is an evil aspect of \"matter\" and also an evil aspect of\n\"mind.\"\n\nIn the true duality \"spirit\" is by no means necessarily good. For\nsince the true duality lies in the depths of the soul itself, what we\ncall \"spirit\" must very often be evil. According to the revelation of\nthe complex vision, evil or malice is a positive force, of malignant\ninertness, resisting the power of creation or of love. It is, as we\nhave seen, the primordial or chaotic weight which opposes itself to\nlife.\n\nBut \"flesh and blood\" or any other definite form of \"matter\" has\nalready in large measure submitted to the energy of creation and is\ntherefore both \"good\" and \"evil.\" That original shapeless \"clay\" or\n\"objective mystery\" out of which the complex vision creates the\nuniverse certainly cannot be regarded as \"evil,\" for we can never\nknow anything at all about it except that it exists and that it lends\nitself to the creative energy of the complex vision. And in so far as\nit lends itself to the creative energy of the complex vision it\ncertainly cannot be regarded as entirely evil, but must obviously\nbe both good and evil; even as the complex vision itself, being the\nvision of the soul, is both good and evil.\n\nAccording to the philosophy of the complex vision then, what we\ncall \"mind\" is both good and evil and what we call \"matter\" being\nintimately dependent upon \"mind\" is both good and evil. We are\nforced, therefore, to recognize the existence of both spiritual \"evil\"\nand spiritual \"good\" in the unfathomable depths of the soul. But\njust because personality is itself a relative triumph of good over\nevil it is possible to conceive of the existence of a personality in\nwhom evil is perpetually overcome by good, while it is impossible\nto conceive of a personality in whom good is _perpetually_\novercome by evil.\n\nIn other words, all personalities are relatively good; and some\npersonalities namely those of \"the immortals\" are, as far as we are\nconcerned, absolutely good. All personalities including even the\npersonalities of \"the immortals\" have evil in them, but no\npersonality can be the embodiment of evil, in the sense in which\n\"the sons of the universe\" are the embodiment of good.\n\nI thus reach the conclusion of this complicated summary of the\nnature of the ultimate duality and the necessity of finding a clear\nand definite symbol for it.\n\n\nCHAPTER VI.\n\nTHE ULTIMATE IDEAS\n\nIt now becomes necessary to consider in greater detail those\nprimary human conceptions of truth, beauty, and goodness, which\nI have already referred to as the soul's \"ultimate ideas.\" Let no one\nthink that any magical waving of the wand of modern psychology\ncan explain away these universal human experience. They may be\nnamed by different appellations; but considering the enormous\nweight of historical tradition behind these names it would seem\nabsurd and pedantic to attempt to re-baptize them at this late hour.\n\nHuman nature, in its essentials, has undergone no material change\nsince we have any record of it; and to use any other word than\n\"beauty\" for what we mean by beauty, or than \"goodness\" for what\nwe mean by goodness, would seem a mere superstition of originality.\nThe interpretation offered, in what follows, of the existence\nof these experiences is sufficiently startling to require no\nassistance from novelty of phrasing to give it interest and\npoignancy. That our souls are actually able to touch, in the\ndarkness which surrounds us, the souls of super-human beings,\nand that the vision of such super-human beings is the \"eternal\nvision\" wherein the mystery of love is consummated, is a doctrine\nof such staggering implications that it seems wise, in making our\nway towards it, to use the simplest human words and to avoid any\n\"stylistic\" shocks.\n\nIt seems advisable also to advance with scrupulous leisureliness in\nthis formidable matter and at certain intervals to turn round as it\nwere, and survey the path by which we have come. The existence\nof super-human beings, immeasurably superior to man, is in itself\na harmless and natural speculation. It is only when it presents itself\nas a necessary link in philosophical discussion that it appears\nstartling. And the mere fact that it does appear startling when\nintroduced into philosophy shows how, lamentably philosophy has\ngot itself imprisoned in dull, mechanical, mathematical formulae;\nin formulae so arid and so divorced from life, that the conception\nof personality, applied to man or to the gods, seems to us as\nexciting as an incredible fairy story when brought into relation\nwith them.\n\nAs the souls of men, then, each with its own complex vision, move\nside by side along the way, or across one another's path, they are\ndriven by the necessity of things to exchange impressions with\nregard to the nature of life. In their communications with one\nanother they become aware of the presence, at the back of their\nconsciousness, of an invisible standard of truth, of beauty, of\ngoodness. It is from this standard of beauty and truth and\ngoodness, from this dream, this vision, this hope, that all these\nsouls seem to themselves to draw their motive of movement.\nBut though they seem to themselves to be \"moving\" into an\nindetermined future still to be created by their wills, they also\nseem to themselves to be \"returning\" towards the discovery of that\ninvisible standard of beauty, truth and goodness, which has as their\nmotive-impulse been with them from the beginning. This implicit\nstandard, this invisible pattern and test and arbitrament of all\nphilosophizing, is what I call \"the vision of the immortals.\" Some\nminds, both philosophical and religious, seem driven to think of\nthis invisible pattern, this standard of truth and beauty, as the\n_parent_ of the universe rather than as its offspring. I cannot bring\nmyself to take this view because of the fact that the ultimate\nrevelation of the world as presented, to man's complex vision is\nessential and unfathomably _dualistic_.\n\nA \"parent\" of the universe can only be thought of as a\nstopping-place of all thought. He can only be _imagined_--for\nstrictly speaking he cannot be thought of at all--as some unutterable\nmystery out of which the universe originally sprang. From this\nunutterable mystery, to which we have no right to attribute either a\nmonistic or a pluralistic character, we may, I suppose, imagine to\nemerge a perpetual torrent of duality.\n\nTowards this unutterable mystery, about which even to say \"it is\"\nseems to be saying too much, it is impossible for the complex\nvision to have any attitude at all. It can neither love it nor hate it.\nIt can neither reject it nor accept it. It can neither worship it nor\nrevolt against it. It is only _imaginable_ in the illegitimate sense of\nmetaphor and analogy. It is simply the stopping-place of the\ncomplex vision; that stopping-place beyond which anything is\npossible and nothing is thinkable.\n\nThis thing, which is at once everything and nothing, this thing\nwhich is _no thing_ but only the unutterable limit where all things\npass beyond thought, cannot be accepted by the complex vision as\nthe parent of the universe. The universe has therefore no parent, no\norigin, no cause, no creator. Eternally it re-creates itself and\neternally it divides itself into that ultimate duality which makes\ncreation possible.\n\nThat monistic tendency of human thought, which is itself a\nnecessary projection of the monistic reality of the individual soul,\ncannot, except by an arbitrary act of faith, resolve this ultimate\nduality into unity. Such a primordial \"act of faith\" it can and must\nmake with regard to the objective reality of other souls. But such\nan \"act of faith\" is not demanded with regard to the unutterable\nmystery behind the universe. We have not, strictly speaking, even\nthe right to use the expression \"an unutterable mystery.\" All we\nhave a right to do is just to titter the final judgment--\"beyond this\nlimit neither thought nor imagination can pass.\"\n\nWhat the complex vision definitely denies to us, therefore, is the\nright to regard this thing, which is _no_ thing, with any emotion at\nall. The expression \"unutterable mystery\" is a misleading one\nbecause it appears to justify the emotions of awe and reverence.\nWe have no right to regard this thin simulacrum, this mathematical\nformula, this stopping-place of thought, with any feelings of awe\nor reverence. We have not even a right to regard it with humorous\ncontempt; for, being nothing at all, it is beneath contempt.\n\nHumanity has a right to indulge in that peculiar emotional attitude\nwhich is called \"worship\" towards either side of the ultimate\nduality. It has a right to worship, if it pleases--though to do so\nseveral attitudes of the complex vision must be outraged and\nsuppressed--the resistant power of malice. It has even a right to\nworship the universe, that turbulent arena of these primal\nantagonists. What it has no right to worship is the \"unutterable\nmystery\" _behind the universe_; for the simple reason that the\nuniverse is unfathomable.\n\nHuman thought has its stopping-place. The universe is unfathomable.\nHuman thought has a definite limit. The universe has no\nlimit. The universe is \"unutterably mysterious\"; and so also\nis the human soul; but as far as the soul's complex vision is\nconcerned there can be no reality \"behind the appearances of\nthings\" except the reality of the soul itself. Thus there is no\n\"parent\" of man and of the universe. But \"the immortal companions\"\nof men are implied from man's most intimate experiences of life.\nFor if there were no invisible watchers, no arbiters, no standards,\nno tests, no patterns, no ideals; our complex vision, in regard to\ncertain basic attributes, would be refuted and negated.\n\nEvery soul which exists must be thought of as possessing the\nattribute of \"emotion\" with its duality of love and malice, the\nattribute of \"taste\" with its duality of beauty and hideousness, of\nconscience with its duality of good and evil, and the attribute of\n\"reason\" with its duality of the true and the false. Every one of\nthese basic attributes would be reduced to a suicidal confusion of\nabsolute sceptical subjectivity if it could not have faith in some\nobjective reality to which it can appeal.\n\nSuch an appeal, to such an objective reality, it does, as a matter of\nfact, continually make, whether it makes it consciously or\nsub-consciously. And just as the soul's basic attributes of emotion,\ntaste, conscience, and reason indicate an implicit faith in the\nobjective reality of the ideas of beauty and nobility and truth; so\nthe soul's basic attribute of self-consciousness indicates an implicit\ndemand that the objective reality of these ideas should be united\nand embodied in actual living and self-conscious \"souls\" external\nto other \"souls.\"\n\nThe most dangerous mistake we can make, and the most deadly in\nits implications, is to reduce these \"companions of men\" to a\nmonistic unity and to make this unity what the metaphysicians call\n\"absolute\" in its embodiment of these ultimate ideas.\n\nIn comparison with the fitful and moody subjectivity of our\nindividual conceptions of these ideas the vision of the immortals\nmay be thought of as embodying them absolutely. But in itself it\ncertainly does not embody them absolutely; otherwise the whole\nmovement of life would end. It is unthinkable that it should ever\nembody them absolutely. For it is in the inherent nature of such a\nvision that it should be growing, living, inexhaustible. The most\nwithering and deadly of all conceivable dogmas is the dogma that\nthere is such a thing as absolute truth, absolute beauty, absolute\ngood and absolute love.\n\nThe attraction of such a dogma for the mind of man is undoubtedly\ndue to the spirit of evil or of malice. For nothing offers a more\nfrozen resistance to the creative power than such a faith.\nCompared with our human visions of these ideas the vision of\nthese \"companions of men\" must be thought of as relatively\ncomplete. And complete it is, with regard to its general synthesis\nand orientation. But it is not really complete; and can never be so.\nFor when we consider the nature of love alone, it becomes\nridiculous to speak of an absolute or complete love. If the love of\nthese \"companions of men\" became at any moment incapable of a\ndeeper and wider manifestation, at that very moment the whole\nstream of life would cease, the malice of the adversary would\nprevail, and nothingness would swallow up the universe. It is\nbecause we are compelled to regard the complex vision, including\nall its basic attributes, as the vision of a personal soul, that it is\na false and misleading conception to view these \"companions of\nmen\" as a mere ideal.\n\nAn ideal is nothing if not expressed in personality. Subjectively\nevery ideal is the ideal of \"some one,\" an ideal of a conscious,\npersonal, and living entity. Objectively every ideal must be\nembodied in \"some one\": and must be a standard, a measure, a\nrhythm, of various energies synthesized in a living soul. This is\nreally the crux of the whole matter. Vaguely and obscurely do we\nall feel the pressure of these deep and secret impulses. Profoundly\ndo we feel that these mysterious \"ideas,\" which give life its\ndramatic intensity, are part of the depths of our own soul and part\nof the depths of the souls of the immortals. And yet though they\nare so essentially part of us and part of the universe, they remain\nvague, obscure, contradictory, confused, inchoate; only gradually\nassuming coherent substance and form as the \"rapport\" between\nman and his invisible companions grows clearer and clearer.\n\nWe are confronted at this point by one of the most difficult of all\ndilemmas. If by reason of the fact that we are driven to regard\npersonality as the most real thing in the universe we are compelled\ntoward the act of faith which recognizes one side of the eternal\nduality of things as embodied in actual living souls, how is it that\nwe are not equally compelled to a similar act of faith in relation to\nthe other side of this duality? In simpler words, how is it that while\nwe are compelled to an act of faith with regard to the existence of\npowers which embody the spirit of love, we are not compelled to\nan act of faith with regard to the existence of powers which\nembody the spirit of malice?\n\nHow is it that while we have a right to regard the ideas of truth,\nbeauty, goodness as objectively embodied in living personalities\nwe have no right to regard the ideas of falseness, hideousness, evil\nand malice, as objectively embodied in living personalities? To\nanswer this question it is necessary to define more clearly the\nessential duality which we discover as the secret of the universe.\n\nOne side of this duality is the creative power of life, the other side\nis the resistant power which repels life. The emotion of love is the\nmotive-force of the power of creation, a force which we have to\nrecognize as containing in itself the power of destruction; for\ndestruction is necessary to creation and is inspired by the creative\nenergy.\n\nThe other side of the eternal duality is not a destructive force, but a\nresistant force. That is why it is necessary to define the opposite of\nlove, not as hate--but as malice, which is a resistant thing. Thus it\nbecomes clear why it is that we are not driven by the necessity of\nthe situation to any act of faith with regard to the existence of\nliving souls which embody evil and malice. We are not compelled\ntowards this act of faith because the nature of the \"other side\" of\nthe eternal duality is such that it cannot be embodied, in any\ncomplete or objective way, in a living personality. It can and it\ndoes appear in every personality that has ever existed. We are\ncompelled to assume that it exists, though in a state of\nsuppression, even in the souls of the immortals. If it did not exist,\nin some form or other, in the souls of the immortals, the ideas of\ntruth, beauty, and goodness would be absolute in them, and the life\nof the universe would cease.\n\nFor the nature of this eternal duality is such that the life of the\nuniverse depends upon this unending struggle between what\ncreates and what resists creation. The power that creates must be\nregarded as embodied in personality, for creation always implies\npersonality. But the power that resists creation--though present in\nevery living soul--cannot be embodied in personality because\npersonality is the highest expression of creation.\n\nEvery soul born into life must possess the attributes of taste,\nreason, conscience and emotion. And each of these attributes\nimplies this fundamental duality; being resolvable into a choice\nbetween hideousness, falsehood, evil, malice, and the opposites of\nthese. But the soul itself, being a living and personal thing, can\nnever, however deeply it plunges into evil, become the embodiment\nof evil, because by the mere fact of existing at all it has\nalready defeated evil.\n\nAny individual soul may give itself up to malice rather than to\nlove, and may do its utmost to resist the creative power of love.\nBut one thing it cannot do. It cannot become the embodiment of\nevil, because, by merely being alive, it is the eternal defiance of\nevil. Personality is the secret of the universe. The universe exists\nby reason of a struggle between what creates and what resists\ncreation. Therefore personality exists by reason of a struggle\nbetween what creates and what resists creation. And the existence\nof personality, however desperate the struggle within itself may\nbe, is a proof that the power of life is stronger than the power\nwhich resists life.\n\nBut we have to consider another and yet deeper dilemma. Since\nthe existence of the universe depends upon the continuance of this\nunfathomable struggle and since the absolute victory of life over\ndeath, of love over malice, of truth over falsehood, of beauty over\nhideousness and of nobility over ignobility, would mean that the\nuniverse would end, are we therefore forced to the conclusion that\nevil is necessary to the fuller manifestation of good?\n\nUndoubtedly we _are_ forced to this conclusion. Not one of these\nprimordial ideas, which find their synthesis in \"the invisible\ncompanions of men,\" can be conceived without its opposite. And\nit is in the process of their unending struggle that the fuller\nrealization of all of them is attained. And this struggle must\ninevitably assume a double character. It must assume the character\nof a struggle within the individual soul and of a struggle of the\nindividual soul with other souls and with the universe. Such a\nstruggle must be thought of as continually maintained in the soul\nof the \"invisible companions of men\" and maintained there with a\ndepth of dramatic intensity at which we can only guess.\n\nOnly less false and dangerous than the dogma that the absolute\nvictory of good over evil has already been achieved, is the dogma\nthat these two eternal antagonists are in reality one and the same\nthing. They are only one and the same thing in the sense that\nneither is thinkable without the other; and in the sense that they\ncreate the universe by their conflict.\n\nIt is important in a matter as crucial as this matter, concerning \"the\ninvisible companions of men,\" not to advance a step beyond our\nstarting-point till we have apprehended it from several different\naspects and have gone over our ground again and again--even as\nbuilders of a bridge might test the solidity of their fabric stone by\nstone and arch by arch. By that \"conscience in reason\" which\nnever allows us pleasantly to deceive ourselves, we are bound to\ntouch, as it were with our very hands, every piece of stone work\nand every patch of cement which holds this desperate bridge\ntogether over the dark waters.\n\nWe have not, then, a right to say that every energy of the complex\nvision depends for its functioning upon the existence of these\ninvisible companions. We have not a right to say--\"if there were\nno such beings these energies could not function; but they do\nfunction; therefore there are such beings.\" What we have a right to\nsay is simply this, that it is an actual experience that when two or\nmore personalities come together and seek to express their various\nsubjective impressions of these ultimate ideas there is always a\ntacit reference to some objective standard.\n\nThis objective standard cannot be thought of apart from\npersonalities capable of embodying it. For these ultimate ideas are\nonly real and living when embodied in personality. Apart from\npersonality we are unable to grasp them; although we must\nrecognize that the universe itself is composed of the very stuff of\ntheir contention. We have in the first place, then, completely\neliminated from our discussion that \"inscrutable mystery\"\nbehind the universe. In every direction we find the universe\nunfathomable; and though our power of thought stops abruptly at a\ncertain limit, we have no reason to think that the universe stops\nthere; and we have every reason to think that it continues--together\nwith the unfathomable element in our souls--into impenetrably\nreceding depths.\n\nThe universe, as we apprehend it, presents itself as a congeries of\nliving souls united by some indefinable medium. These living\nsouls are each possessed of that multiform activity which I have\nnamed the complex vision. Among the basic energies of this\nvision are some which in their functioning imply the pre-existence\nof certain primordial ideas.\n\nThese ideas are at once the eternally receding horizon and the\neternally receding starting-point--the unfathomable past and the\nunfathomable future--of this procession of souls. The crux of the\nwhole situation is found in the evasive and tantalizing problem of\nthe real nature of these primordial ideas. Can \"truth,\" can \"beauty,\"\ncan \"goodness\" be conceived of as existing in the universe apart\nfrom any individual soul?\n\nThey are clearly not completely exhausted or totally revealed by\nthe vision of any individual human soul or of any number of\nhuman souls. The sense which we all have when we attempt to\nexchange our individual feelings with regard to these things is that\nwe are appealing to some invisible standard or pattern which\nalready exists and of which we each apprehend a particular facet\nor aspect.\n\nAll human intercourse depends upon this implicit assumption; of\nwhich language is the outward proof.\n\nThe existence of language goes a long way in itself to destroy that\nisolation of individual souls which in its extreme form would\nmean the impossibility of any objective truth or beauty or nobility.\nLanguage itself is founded upon that original act of faith by which\nwe assume the independent existence of other souls. And the same\nact of faith which assumes the existence of other souls assumes\nalso that the vision of other souls does not essentially differ from\nour own vision.\n\nOnce having got as far as this, the further fact that these other\nvisions do vary considerably, though not essentially, differ from\nour own leads us by an inevitable, if not a logical, step to the\nassumption that all our different visions are the imperfect\nrenderings of one vision, wherein the ideas of truth, beauty and\nnobility exist in a harmonious synthesis.\n\nThere is no reason why we should think of this objective synthesis\nof truth, beauty, and goodness as absolute or perfect. Indeed there\nis every reason why we should think of it as imperfect and\nrelative. But it is imperfect and relative only in its relation to its\nown dream, its own hope, its own prophecy, its own premonition,\nits own struggle towards a richer and fuller manifestation. In its\nrelation to our broken, baffled, and subjective visions it is already\nso complete as to be relatively absolute. To this objective ideal of\nour aesthetic and emotional values, I have given the name \"the\nvision of the immortals\" because we are unable to disassociate it\nfrom personality; and because, while the generations of man pass\naway, this vision does not pass away.\n\nHave I, in giving to this natural human ideal, such a formidable\nname--a name with so many bold and startling implications--been\nmerely tempted into an alluring metaphorical image, or have I\nbeen driven to make use of this expression by reason of the\nintrinsic nature of life itself?\n\nI think that the latter of these two alternatives is the true one. The\n\"logic\" by which this conclusion is reached differs from the\n\"logic\" of the abstract reason in the sense of being the organic,\ndynamic, and creative \"logic\" of the complex vision itself, using\nthe very apex-thought of its pyramidal activity in apprehending a\nmystery which is at once the secret of its own being and the secret\nof the unfathomable universe into the depths of which it forces its\nway.\n\nThe expression, then, \"the vision of the immortals\" is not a mere\npictorial image but is the definite articulation of a profound reality\nfrom which there is no escape if certain attributes of the human\nsoul are to be trusted at all. We cannot get rid of this dilemma, one\nof those dilemmas which offer alternative possibilities so\nappallingly opposite, that the choice between them seems like a\nchoice between two eternities.\n\nIs the vision of these immortals, the existence of which as a\nstandard of all philosophical discussion seems to be implied by the\nvery nature of man's soul, to be regarded or not to be regarded as\nthe vision of real and living personalities?\n\nIn other words, to put the case once more in its rigid outlines, is\nthat objective vision of truth, beauty, and goodness of which our\nindividual subjective visions are only imperfect representations,\nthe real vision of actual living \"gods\" or only the projection, upon\nthe evasive medium which holds all human souls together, of such\nbeauty and such truth and such goodness as these souls find that\nthey possess in common?\n\nThis is the crux of the whole human comedy. This is the throw of\nthe dice between a world without hope and a world with hope.\nPhilosophers are capable of treating this subject with quiet\nintellectual curiosity; but all living men and women--philosophers\nincluded--come, at moments, to a pitiless and adamantine\n\"impasse\" where the eternal \"two ways\" branch off in unfathomable\nperspective.\n\nIn our normal and superficial moods we are able to find a plausible\nexcuse for our struggles with ourselves, in a simple acceptance of\nthe ultimate duality.\n\nIt is enough for us, in these moods, that we have on the one hand a\nconsciousness of \"love\" and on the other a consciousness of\n\"malice.\" It is enough for us, in these moods, that we have on the\none hand a consciousness of truth and beauty and nobility; and on\nthe other a consciousness of unreality, of hideousness, and of evil.\nBut there come other, deeper, more desperate moods, when, out of\nintolerable and unspeakable loneliness our soul sinking back into\nits own depths refuses to be satisfied with a mere recognition of\nthis ultimate duality.\n\nAt these moments the soul seems to rend and tear at the very roots\nof this duality. It takes these ideas of beauty and truth and\ngoodness and subjects them to a savage and merciless analysis. It\ntakes the emotion of love and the emotion of malice and tries to\nforce its way behind them. It turns upon itself, in its insane\ntrouble, and seeks to get itself out of its own way and to efface\nitself, so that \"something\" beyond itself may flow into its place.\n\nAt these moments the soul's complex vision is roused to a supreme\npitch of rhythmic energy. The apex-thought of its focussed\nattributes gathers itself together to pierce the mystery. Like a strain\nof indescribable music the apex-thought rests upon itself and\nbrings each element of its being into harmony with every other.\n\nThis ultimate harmony of the complex vision may be compared to\na music which is so intense that it becomes silence. And in this\n\"silence,\" wherein the apex-thought becomes at once a creator and\na discoverer, the pain and distress of the struggle seems suddenly\nto disappear and an indescribable happiness flows in upon the\nsoul. At this moment when this consummation is reached the\nsoul's complex vision becomes aware that the ideas of beauty,\ntruth and goodness are not mental abstractions or material qualities\nor evolutionary by-products, but are the very purpose and meaning\nof life. It becomes aware that the emotion of love is not a mental\nabstraction or a psychological accident or a biological necessity\nbut the secret of the whole struggle and the explanation of the\nwhole drama.\n\nIt becomes aware that this truth, this beauty, this nobility find their\nunity and harmony in nothing less than in the emotion of love. It\nbecomes aware that these three primordial \"ideas\" are only varying\nfacets and aspects of one unfathomable secret which is the activity\nof love. It becomes aware that this activity of love is the creative\nprinciple of life itself; that it alone is life, and the force which\nresists it is the enemy of life.\n\nSuch, then, is the ultimate reality grasped in its main outlines by\nthe rhythmic energy of the soul's apex-thought when, in its\ndesperate and savage struggle with itself, the complex vision\nreaches its consummation. And this reality, thus created and thus\ndiscovered by the apex-thought of the complex vision, demands\nand requires that very revelation, towards which we have been\nmoving by so long a road.\n\nIt requires the revelation, namely, that the emotion of love of\nwhich we are conscious in the depths of our being, as an emotion\nflowing through us and obsessing us, should be conceived of as\nexisting in a far greater completeness in these silent \"watchers\"\nand \"companions\" whom we name \"the immortal gods.\" It requires,\ntherefore, that these immortal ones should be regarded as\nconscious and living \"souls\"; for the ultimate reach of the complex\nvision implies the idea of personality and cannot interpret life\nexcept in terms of personality.\n\nAs I said above, there come moments in all our lives, when,\nrending and tearing at the very roots of our own existence, we seek\nto extricate ourselves from ourselves and to get ourselves out of\nthe way of ourselves, as if we were seeking to make room for\nsome deeper personality within us which is ourself and yet not\nourself. This is that impersonal element which the aesthetic sense\ndemands in all supreme works of art so that the soul may find at\nonce its realization of itself and its liberation from itself.\n\nThe \"watchers\" and \"companions\" of men must therefore be\nimmortal and living \"souls\" existing side by side with our human\n\"souls\" and side by side with all other \"souls,\" super-human or\nsub-human, which the universal medium of the world holds\ntogether. In arriving at this conclusion which seems to me to be\nthe consummation vouched for and attested by the rhythmic\nenergy of the complex vision, I have refused to allow any\nparticular attribute of this vision, such as the will or the intuition\nor the conscience, to claim for its isolated discoveries any\nuniversal assent.\n\nThe soul's emotion of love passionately craves for the real\nexistence of these \"invisible companions.\" The soul's emotion of\nmalice displays an abysmal resistance to such a reality. This is\nnaturally a fact that we cannot afford to disregard. But in our final\ndecision in so high and difficult a matter nothing can be allowed to\nclaim an universal assent except the rhythmic activity of the soul's\napex-thought in its supreme moments.\n\nAt this point in our argument it is advisable to glance backward\nover the way we have come; because the reality of this \"eternal\nvision\" depends, more than has as yet been understood, upon our\nwhole attitude to the mystery of personality, and to the place of\npersonality, as the secret of the world.\n\nThe feeling which we have about the emotion of love, as if it were\na thing pouring through us from some unfathomable depth, does\nnot imply that \"the invisible companions\" are themselves that\ndepth. The \"invisible companions\" are not in any sense connected\nwith the conception of an \"over-soul.\" That \"depth,\" from which\nthe power of creative love pours forth, is not the \"depth\" of any\n\"over-soul\" but is the depth of our own unfathomable nature.\n\nThe introduction of \"something behind the universe,\" the\nintroduction of some \"parent\" or \"first cause\" of the universe, from\nwhich we have to suppose this secret of love as emerging, is as\nunnecessary as it is unbeautiful. It does nothing but fling the\nmystery one step further back without in the least elucidating it;\nand in thus throwing it back it thins it out and cheapens it. There is\nnothing which appeals to the aesthetic sense about this hypothesis\nof an \"over-soul\" from whose universal being the ideas of beauty\nand truth and goodness may be supposed to proceed. It is a clumsy\nand crude speculation, easy to be grasped by the superficial mind,\nand with an air of profundity which is entirely deceptive.\n\nSo far from being a spiritual conception, this conception of an\nover-soul, existing just behind the material universe and pouring\nforth indiscriminately its \"truth,\" \"beauty,\" \"nobility\" and \"love,\"\nis an entirely materialistic one. It is a clumsy and crude metaphor\nor analogy drawn from the objective world and projected into that\nregion of sheer unfathomableness which lies beyond human\nthought.\n\nWhen the conception of the over-soul is submitted to analysis it is\nfound to consist of nothing else than vague images drawn from\nmaterial sensation. We think of the world for instance as a vast\nporous sponge continually penetrated by a flood of water or air or\nvapour drawn from some hidden cistern or reservoir or cosmic\nlake. The modern theological expression \"immanent\" has done\nharm in this direction. There is nothing profound about this\nconception of \"immanence.\" It is an entirely materialistic\nconception drawn from sense analogy.\n\nThe same criticism applies to much of the vague speculation\nwhich is usually called \"mysticism.\" Mysticism is not a spiritual\nattitude. It is often no more than the expression of thwarted\nsex-desire directed towards the universe instead of towards the person\nwho has repulsed it. The basic motive of mysticism, although in\nthe highest cases it springs from intuition, is very often only an\nextension into the unknown of physiological misery or of\nphysiological well-being.\n\nThe word \"spiritual\" retains, by some instinctive wisdom in human\nlanguage, a far nobler significance than the word \"mystical.\"\n\nIt is, so to speak, a purer word, and has succeeded, in its progress\ndown the ages, in keeping itself more clear of physiological\nassociations than any other human word except the word \"soul.\" It\nmust, however, be recognized, when we submit the two words to\nanalysis, that the word \"spirit\" is less free from metaphorical\nmaterialism than the word \"soul.\"\n\nThe word \"spirit\" is a metaphorical word derived from the material\nphenomenon of breath. For the purest and least tangible of all\nnatural phenomena, except perhaps \"ether\" or electricity, is\nobviously nothing less than the wind. \"The wind bloweth where it\nlisteth,\" and this elementary \"freedom of the wind,\" combined\nwith our natural association of \"breath\" and \"breathing\" with all\norganic life, accounts for the traditional nobility of the word spirit.\n\n\"Spirit\" and \"life\" have become almost interchangeable terms. The\nmodern expression \"the life-force\" is only a metaphorical\nconfusion of the idea conveyed by the word \"spirit\" or \"breath\"\nwith the idea conveyed by the word \"consciousness\" when\nabstracted from any particular conscious soul. The use of the term\n\"spirit\" as applied to what metaphysical idealists name \"the\nabsolute\" is the supreme example of this metaphorical confusion.\n\nAccording to this use of the term \"spirit\" we have an arbitrary\nassociation of the ultimate fact of self-consciousness--a fact drawn\nfrom the necessity of thought--with that attenuated and etherial\nmaterialism implied in the words \"breath\" or \"breathing\" and in\nthe elemental \"freedom of the wind.\" The word \"spiritual\" is a\npurer and nobler word than the word \"mystical\" for the same\nreason that the word \"soul\" is a purer and nobler word than the\nword \"spirit.\"\n\nThe historic fact must, however, be recognized that in the\nevolution of human thought and in the evolution of philosophical\nsystems the word \"spirit\" has in large measure usurped the\nposition that ought to belong to the word \"soul\" as the highest and\npurest expression of what is most essential and important in life.\n\nThe history of this usurpation is itself a curious psychological\ndocument. But I cannot help feeling that the moment has arrived\nfor reinstating the word \"soul\" in its rightful place and altering this\nfalse valuation.\n\nThe word \"soul\" is the name given by the common consent of\nlanguage to that original \"monad\" or concrete unity or living \"self\"\nwhich exists, according to universal experience, \"within\" the\nphysical body and is the indescribable \"substratum\" of\nself-consciousness and the unutterable \"something\" which gives a\nreal concrete permanence to what we call \"personality.\"\n\nHere also we are confronted by the metaphorical danger, which is\na danger springing from the necessity of thought itself; the\nnecessity under which thought labours of being compelled to use\nsense-impressions if it is to function at all. But though thought\ncannot exist as thought without the use of sense-impressions it can\nat least concentrate its attention upon this primal necessity and be\naware of it and cautious of it and hypercritical in its use. It can do\nmore than this. It can throw back, so to speak, the whole weight of\nthe mystery and drive it so rigorously to the ultimate wall, that the\nmaterialistic and metaphorical element is reduced to a mere gap or\nspace or lacuna in the mind that only a material element can fill\nand yet that we cannot imagine being filled by any material\nelement which we are able to define.\n\nThis is precisely what we have to do with regard to that\n\"vanishing-point of sensation\" which is the substratum of the soul.\nThe situation resolves itself into this. The highest, deepest, most\nprecious thing we know or can imagine is _personality_.\nPersonality is and must be our ultimate synthesis, our final ideal,\nand the origin of all our ideals. Nothing can be conceived more\ntrue, more real, more spiritual than personality.\n\nAll conceptions, qualities, principles, forces, elements, thoughts,\nideas, are things which we abstract from personality, and project\ninto the space which surrounds us, as if they could be independent\nof the personal unity from which they have been taken. We are\ncompelled by the inevitable necessity of thought itself, which\ncannot escape from the world of sense-impressions, to think of\npersonality as possessing for its \"substratum\" \"something\" which\ngives it concrete reality. This \"something\" which is utterly\nindefinable, is the last gesture, so to speak, made by the\nsense-world before it vanishes away.\n\nThis \"something\" which is the substratum of the soul and the thing\nwhich gives unity and concreteness to the soul is the thinnest and\nremotest attenuation of the world of sense-impression. It is far\nthinner and more remote than the sense-element in our conception\nof spirit. Why, it may be asked, can we not get rid of this\n\"something\" which fills that gap or lacuna in the identity of the\nsoul which can only be thought of in material terms?\n\nWe cannot get rid of it because directly we attempt to do so we are\nleft with that vague idealistic abstraction upon our hands which we\ncall \"thought-in-the-abstract\"--or \"pure thought\" or \"pure\nself-consciousness.\" But it may be asked--\"Why cannot the physical\nbody serve this necessary purpose of giving personality a local and\nconcrete identity?\"\n\nFirst--and this is the psychological reason--it cannot do so because\nour feeling of the soul as \"something within\" our physical body is\nan ultimate fact of experience which would then remain as an\nexperience denied and contradicted.\n\nSecondly--and this is the metaphysical reason--it cannot do so\nbecause our physical body is itself only a part of that objective\nuniverse of sense-impressions which the soul is conscious of as\nessentially distinct from its own inmost identity.\n\nMetaphysical idealism seems to hold that the ultimate monad of\nself-consciousness is not this personal micro-cosmic monad which\nI am conscious of as the empirical self or \"soul\" but an impersonal\nmacrocosmic monad or \"unity of apperception\" which underlies\nthe whole field of impressions and is unable, by reason of its\ninherent nature, to contemplate itself as an \"object\" at all.\n\nWhat the complex vision seems to me to disclose, is a revelation\nwhich includes at one and the same moment \"the universal\nmonad\" and the \"personal monad\"; but it indicates clearly enough\nthat the former is an abstraction from the latter. My thought can\ncertainly think of the whole universe, including time and space, as\none enormous mass of impressions or ideals presenting itself\ninside the circle of my mind.\n\nOf this mass of impressions, including time and space, my\nthought, thus abstracted from my personal soul, becomes the\ncircumference. Outside my thought there is nothing at all. Inside\nmy thought there is all that is. The metaphysical reason insists that\nthis all-comprehensive thought or all-embracing consciousness\ncannot contemplate itself as an object but is compelled to remain\nan universal subject whose object can only be the mass of\nimpressions which it contains.\n\nIf it is possible to speak of this \"a priori\" background of all\npossible perception as a \"monad\" at all, it is a monad which\ncertainly lacks the essential power of the individual monad which\nwe know as our real self, for this latter can and does contemplate\nitself as an object.\n\nBut as I have hinted before, the complex vision's attribute of\nself-consciousness projects a second abstraction, which takes its place\nbetween this ultimate monad which is pure \"subject\" and our real\npersonal self which is so much more than subject and object\ntogether.\n\nThis second abstraction, \"thrown off\" by our pure self-consciousness\njust as the first one is \"thrown off\" by our pure reason,\nbecomes therefore an intervening monad which exists midway\nbetween the monad which is pure \"subject\"--if that can be\ncalled a monad at all--and the actual individual soul which is the\nliving reality of both these thought-projections.\n\nThe whole question resolves itself into a critical statement of the\npeculiar play of thought when thought is considered in its own\ninherent nature apart from concrete objects of thought. This\noriginal play of thought, apart from what it may think, can result in\nnothing better than isolated abstractions; because thought, apart\nfrom concrete objects of thought, is itself nothing more than one\nattribute of the complex vision, groping about in a vacuum and\nfinding nothing. We are, however, bound by the \"conscience of\nreason,\" and by what might be called reason's sense of honour to\narticulate as clearly as we can all these movements of pure thought\nworking in the void; but we certainly are forbidden by the original\nrevelation of the complex vision to accept them as the starting\npoint of our philosophical enquiry. And we cannot accept them as\na starting point, because the complex vision includes much more\nthan self-consciousness and reason. It includes indeed so much\nmore than these, that these, when indulging in their isolated\nconjuring-tricks, seem like irrelevant and tiresome clowns who\ninsist upon interrupting with their fantastic pedantry the great\ntragic-comedy wherein the soul of man wrestles with its fate.\n\nAs I have already indicated, it is necessary in dealing with a matter\nas dramatic and fatal as this whole question of ultimate reality, to\nrisk the annoyance of repetition. It is important to go over our\ntracks again so that no crevice should be left in this perilous bridge\nhung across the gulf. Reason, then, working in isolation, provides\nus with the recognition of an ultimate universal \"subject\" or, in\nmetaphysical language, with an \"a priori unity of apperception.\"\nSimultaneously with this recognition, self-consciousness, also\nworking in isolation, provides us with the recognition of an\nuniversal self-conscious \"monad\" or \"cosmic self\" which is not\nonly able but is compelled to think of itself as its own object.\n\nBoth these recognitions imply a consciousness which is outside\ntime and space; but while the first, the outer edge of thought, can\nonly be regarded as \"pure subject,\" the second can be regarded as\nnothing else than the whole universe contemplating itself as its\nown object.\n\nIn the third place the complex vision, working with all its\nattributes together, provides us with the recognition of a personal\nor empirical self which is the real \"I am I\" of our integral soul.\nThis personal self, or actual living soul, must be thought of as\npossessing some \"substratum\" or \"vanishing point of sensation\" as\nthe implication of its permanence and continuous identity. This\n\"vanishing point of sensation,\" or in other words this attenuated\nform of \"matter\" or \"energy\" or \"movement,\" must not be allowed\nto disappear from our conception of the soul. If it _were_ allowed\nto disappear, one of the basic attributes of the soul's complex\nvision, namely its attribute of sensation, would be negated and\nsuppressed.\n\nDirectly we regarded the \"I am I\" within us as independent of such\na \"vanishing point of sensation\" and as being entirely free from\nany, even from the most attenuated form, of what is usually called\n\"matter,\" then, at that very moment, the complex vision's\nrevelation would be falsified. Then, at that very moment, the\nintegrity of the soul would dissolve away, and we should be\nreduced to a stream of sensations with nothing to give them\ncoherence and unity, or to that figment of abstract self-consciousness,\n\"thought-in-itself,\" apart from both the thing \"thinking\"\nand the thing \"thought.\" The soul, therefore, must be conceived\nif we are to be true to the original revelation of the complex\nvision, as having an indefinable \"something\" as its substratum\nor implication of identity. And this something, although\nimpossible to be analysed, must be regarded as existing\nwithin that mysterious medium which is the uniting force of the\nuniverse. The soul must, in fact, be thought of as possessing some\nsort of \"spiritual body\" which is the centre of its complex vision\nand which, therefore, expresses itself in reason, self-consciousness,\nwill, sensation, instinct, intuition, memory, emotion, conscience,\ntaste, and imagination. All this must necessarily imply that the\nsoul is within, and not outside, time and space. It must further\nimply that although the physical body, which the soul uses at its\nwill, is only one portion of the objective universe which confronts\nit, this physical body is more immediately connected with the soul's\ncomplex vision and more directly under the influence of it than\nany other portion of the external universe.\n\nThe question then arises, can it be said that this \"vanishing point of\nsensation,\" this \"substratum\" composed of \"something\" which we\nare only able to define as the limit where the ultimate attenuation\nof what we call \"matter\" or \"energy\" passes into unfathomableness,\nthis centre of the soul, this \"spiritual body,\" this invisible\n\"pyramid base\" of the complex vision, is also, just as the physical\nbody is, a definite portion of that objective universe which we\napprehend through our senses?\n\nThe physical body is entirely and in all its aspects a portion of this\nobjective universe. Is the substratum of the soul a portion of it\nalso? I think the answer to this question is that it _is_ and also _is\nnot_ a portion of this universe. This \"spiritual body,\" this\n\"vanishing point of sensation,\" which is the principle of\npermanence and continuity and identity in the soul, is obviously\nthe very centre and core of reality. Being this, it must necessarily\nbe a portion of that objective world whose reality, after the reality\nof the soul itself, is the most vivid reality which we know.\n\nThe complex vision demands and exacts the reality of the\nobjective world. The whole drama of its life depends upon this.\nWithout this the complex vision would not exist. And just as the\ncomplex vision could not exist without the reality of the objective\nworld, so the objective world could not exist without the reality of\nthe complex vision. These two depend upon one another and\nperpetually recreate one another.\n\nAny metaphysical system which denies the existence of the\nobjective world, or uses the expression \"illusion\" with regard to it,\nis a system based, not upon the complex vision in its entirety, but\nupon some isolated attribute of it. The \"substratum\" of the soul,\nthen, must be a portion of the objective world so as to give\nvalidity, so to speak, and assurance that this objective world with\nits mysterious medium crowded with living bodies and inanimate\nobjects is not a mere illusion. But the \"substratum\" of the soul\nmust be something else in addition to this. Being the essential\nmeeting-point between what we call thought on the one hand, and\nwhat we call \"matter\" or \"energy\" on the other, the \"substratum\" of\nthe soul must be a point of perpetual movement where the life of\nthought passes into the life of sensation.\n\nThe \"substratum\" of the soul must be regarded as the ultimate\nattenuation of \"matter\" on the one hand, and on the other as\nperpetually passing into \"mind.\" For since it is the centre-point of\nlife it must be composed of a stuff woven, so to speak, out all the\nthreads of life. That is to say it must be the very centre and vortex\nof all the contradictions in the universe.\n\nSince the \"substratum\" or \"spiritual body\" of the soul is the most\nreal thing in the universe it must, in its own nature, partake of\nevery kind of reality which exists in the universe. It must therefore\nbe, quite definitely, a portion of the objective world existing\nwithin time and space. But it must also be the ultimate unity of\n\"the life of thought.\" And since, as we have seen, it is within the\npower of reason and self-consciousness to isolate themselves from\nthe other attributes of the soul and to project themselves outside of\nspace and time, it must be the perpetual fatality of the\n\"substratum\" of the soul to recall these wanderers back to the true\nreality of things, which does not lie outside of space and time but\nwithin space and time, and which must justify time and space as\nsomething very different from illusion.\n\nBut because, within time and space, the universe is unfathomable,\nand because, also within time and space, personality is\nunfathomable, the \"substratum\" of the soul, which is the point\nwhere the known and the unknown meet, must be unfathomable\nalso, and hence must sink away beyond the limit of our thought\nand beyond the limit of our sensation.\n\nSince it does this, since it sinks away beyond the limit of our\nthought, it must be regarded as \"something\" whose reality is partly\nknown and partly unknown. Thus it is true to say that the\n\"substratum\" of the soul _is_ and _is not_ a portion of the\nobjective universe. The substratum of the soul is, in fact, the\nessential and ultimate reality, where all that we know loses itself in\nall that we do not know. Because we are compelled to admit that\nonly one aspect of the \"substratum\" of the soul is a portion of the\nobjective universe as we know it, this does not justify us in\nasserting that the \"substratum\" of the soul is at once within space\nand time and outside of space and time.\n\nNothing is outside of space and time. This conception of \"outside\"\nis, as we have seen, an abstraction evoked by the isolated activity\nof the logical reason. The fact that only one aspect of the\n\"substratum\" of the soul--and even that one with the barest limit of\ndefinition--can be regarded as a portion of the objective universe\ndoes not give the soul any advantage over the universe. For the\nuniverse, like the soul, has also its unfathomable depths. That\nindefinable medium, for instance, which we are compelled to think\nof as making it possible that various souls should touch one\nanother and communicate with one another, is in precisely the\nsame position as regards any ultimate analysis as is the soul itself.\nIt also sinks away into unfathomableness. It also becomes a\nportion of that part of reality which we do _not_ know.\n\nAt this point in our enquiry it is not difficult to imagine some\nmaterialistic objector asking the question how we can conceive\nsuch a vaguely denned entity as the soul possessing such very\ndefinite attributes as those which make up the complex vision.\n\nIs it not, such an one might ask, a fantastic and ridiculous\nassumption to endow so obscure a thing as this \"soul\" with such\nvery definite powers as reason, instinct, will, intuition,\nimagination, and the rest? Surely, such an one might protest, it is\nin the physical body that these find their unity? Surely, if we must\nhave a meeting-place where thought and the objects of thought\nlose themselves in one another, such a meeting-place can be\nnothing else than the cells of the brain?\n\nThe answer to this objection seems to me quite a final one. The\nphysical body cannot supply us with the true meeting-place\nbetween \"the life of thought\" and \"the life of sensation\"\nbecause the physical body does not _in itself_ sink away into\nunfathomablenesss as does the substratum of the soul. The\nphysical body can only be regarded as unfathomable when\ndefinitely included in the whole physical universe. But the\nsubstratum of the soul is doubly unfathomable. It is unfathomable\nas being the quintessence or vanishing-point of \"matter\" or\n\"energy,\" and it is unfathomable as being the quintessence of that\npersonal self which confronts not only the objective universe but\nthe physical body also as part of that universe. It is undoubtedly\ntrue that this real self which is the centre of its own universe is\nbound to contemplate itself as occupying a definite point in space\nand time.\n\nThis is one of its eternal contradictions; that it should be at the\nsame time the creator of its universe and an unfathomable portion\nof the very universe it creates. The answer which the philosophy\nof the complex vision makes to the materialistic questioner who\npoints to the \"little cells of the brain\" may be briefly be put thus.\n\nThe soul functions through the physical body and through the cells\nof the brain. The soul is so closely and so intimately associated\nwith the physical body that it is more than possible that the death\nof the physical body implies the annihilation of the soul. But when\nit comes to the question as to where we are to look for the essential\nself in us which is able to say \"I am I\" it is found to be much more\nfantastic and ridiculous to look for it in the \"little cells of the\nbrain\" than in some obscure \"something,\" or \"vanishing point of\nsensation,\" where mind and matter are fused together. That this\n\"something\" which is able to say \"I am I\" should possess instinct,\nreason, will, intuition, conscience and the rest, may be hard to\nimagine. But that the \"little cells of the brain\" should possess these\nis not only hard to imagine--it is unimaginable. The mysterious\nrelation which exists between our soul and our body lends itself to\nendless speculation; and much of this speculation tends to become\nfar more fantastic and ridiculous than any analysis of the attributes\nof the soul. Experiment and experience alone can teach us how far\nthe body is actually malleable by the soul and amenable to the\nsoul's purpose.\n\nThe arbitrary symbol which I have made use of to indicate the\nnature of the soul's essential reality, the image of a pyramidal\nwedge of flames, is certainly felt to be but a thin and rigid fancy\nwhen we consider how in the actual play of life the soul expresses\nitself through the body.\n\nAs I have already indicated, the original revelation of the complex\nvision accepts without scruple the whole spectacle of natural life.\nThe philosophy of the complex vision insists that no rationalistic\nnecessity of pure logic gives it the right to reject this natural\nobjective spectacle. The philosophy of the complex vision insists\nthat this obvious, solid, external, so-called \"materialistic\" spectacle\nof common life, be accepted, included and continually returned to.\nIt insists that the word \"illusion\" be no more used about this\nspectacle. It insists that this vast unfathomable universe of time\nand space be recognized as an ultimate reality, and that all these\nprojected images of the pure reason, all these circles, cubes,\nsquares and straight lines, all these \"unities of apperception,\"\nuniversal \"monads\" and the like, be recognized as by-products of\nthe abstracting energy of human logic and as entirely without\nreality when compared with this objective spectacle. My own\nsymbolic or pictorial image of the activity of the complex vision,\nthis pyramidal wedge or arrow-head of concentrated and focussed\nflames, must be recognized as no more adequate or satisfactory\nthan any of these.\n\nThe complex vision, with its rhythmic apex-thought, is not really a\n\"pyramid\" or a \"wedge of flame\" any more than it is a circle or a\ncube or a square or an \"a priori synthetic unity of apperception\" or\n\"an universal self-conscious monad.\" It is the vision of a living\npersonality, surrounded by an unfathomable universe.\n\nTo keep our thoughts firmly and harmoniously fixed on the real\nobjective spectacle of life and on the real subjective \"soul,\" or\npersonality, contemplating this spectacle, it is advisable to revert\nto the magical and mysterious associations called up by the\nclassical word _Nature_. The mere utterance of the word \"Nature\"\nserves to bring us back to the things which are essential and\norganic, and to put into their proper place of comparative unreality\nall these \"unities\" and circles, all these pyramids and \"monads.\"\nWhen we think of the astounding beauty and intricacy of the\nactual human body; when we think of the astounding beauty and\nintricacy of the actual living soul which animates this body, and\nwhen we think of the magical universe which surrounds them\nboth, we are compelled to recognize that in the last resort Nature\nherself is the great mystery. The word \"Nature\" conveys a more\nliving and less metaphysical connotation than the word \"universe,\"\nand may be regarded as implying more of that in-determined\nfuture of all living souls, which is still in the process of creation.\n\nThe \"universe\" is a static conception. Nature is a dynamic\nconception. When we speak of Nature we think of the whole\nstruggle towards a fuller life of all the living entities which the\nindefinable medium of the universe contains. Nature from this\npoint of view becomes the whole unfathomable spectacle, seen as\nsomething living and growing and changing.\n\nThe \"invisible companions\" of men who supply the pattern and\nstandard of all human ideas, become in this way the immortal\nchildren of Nature. The creative energy of the complex vision is\nitself an integral portion of the creative energy of Nature; for\n\"Nature\" is no more than the beautiful and classical word which\nrecalls us to the objective spectacle which is the ultimate\nrevelation of the complex vision. Nature is the supreme artist; but\nthe apex-point of her artistry is nothing less than the apex-point of\nthe artistry of the immortal gods.\n\nThe artistry of the human soul, when its rhythm is most\nharmonious and complete, implies the magical artistry of Nature,\nfor \"Nature\" is nothing more than the whole objective spectacle\nfinding its myriad creative centres of new life in all living souls.\nThe value of the word Nature, the value of the conception of\nNature, is that it reminds us that, held together by the indefinable\nmedium which fills the universe, there are innumerable entities\nboth subhuman and super-human, all of whom, in their various\ndegrees, possess living souls.\n\nNature's supreme art is nothing more than the natural impulses of\nall these, as they are thus held together, and to \"return to Nature\" is\nnothing more than to return to the objective spectacle of real life,\nand to the objective ideal of real life as it is embodied in \"the\ninvisible companions.\"\n\nThese \"invisible companions\" just because they are the most\n\"natural\" of all living personalities, are the supreme manifestation\nof the secret of Nature. It is because the objective spectacle of life,\nthe spectacle which includes the stars, the planets, plants, trees,\ngrass, moss, lichen, earth, birds, fish, animals, is a spectacle\ncontinually shifting and changing under the pressure of\ninnumerable conscious and sub-conscious souls, that we find\nourselves turning to these invisible companions whose supreme\n\"naturalness\" is the test and pattern of all Nature.\n\nAnd it is because our physical bodies in their magical mysteriousness\nare so much more real than any rationalistic symbols, such as\ncircles, cubes, squares, wedges, pyramids, and the like, that\nwhen we seek to visualize the actual appearance of these\n\"invisible companions,\" it seems much more appropriate to\nimage their souls as clothed, like the souls of plants, trees, grass,\nplanets, animals and men, in some tangibleness of physical form,\nthan in nothing but the insubstantial stuff of air or wind or vapour,\nor \"spirit.\"\n\nBut since all that we call \"Nature\" continually changes, passes\naway in dissolution and is reborn again in other forms; and since\nno physical body is exempted from death, it is apparent that if the\n\"immortals\" possessed physical bodies such as our own, they also\nwould be subject to this law along with the rest of the universe.\nBut the generations of mankind come and go and the \"invisible\ncompanions\" of men remain; therefore the \"invisible companions\"\ncannot be supposed, except pictorially and in a symbolic sense, to\nbe subject to the laws which govern our mortal bodies.\n\nIt is this freedom from the laws which govern the physical body\nand from all the intimate and intricate relations which exist\nbetween our human soul and our human body, which makes it\npossible for these companions of men to remain in perpetual\ncontact with every living soul born into the world. The difficulty\nwe experience in realizing the nearness to our individual souls of\nthese invisible companions, is due to a false and exaggerated\nemphasis laid upon the material spectacle of nature.\n\nThis spectacle of the objective universe is undoubtedly one of the\nultimate realities revealed to us by the complex vision; but it is\nonly one of these ultimate realities. The complex vision is itself\nanother one of these; and the real existence of the soul is implied\nin the activity of the complex vision. The reality of the external\nuniverse, the reality of Nature, is so closely associated with the\nactivity of the soul that it is impossible to think of the one apart\nfrom the other.\n\nThe soul's attribute of sensation is alone responsible for the greater\nportion of this objective spectacle; for apprehended through any\nother senses than the ones we possess the whole universe would be\ntransformed. It is only when the soul's essential part in the creation\nof Nature is fully realized that we see how false and exaggerated\nan emphasis we are placing upon this \"externality\" when we\npermit it to hinder our recognition of the nearness of the immortal\ngods.\n\nThe laws which govern the physical body and \"the thousand ills\nthat flesh is heir to\" obstruct, confuse, conceal, and distort the soul\nand hold the gods at a distance. But although the brain and the\nsenses may be tortured, atrophied, perverted; and although the soul\nmay be driven back into its unfathomable depths and held there as\nif in prison; and although madness intervene between the soul's\nvision and the world, and sleep may fling it into oblivion, and\ndeath may destroy it utterly; tortured or perverted or atrophied or\nsemi-conscious or unconscious, while the soul _lives_, the\n\"invisible companions of men\" remain nearer to it than any\noutward accident, chance, circumstance, fatality or destiny, and\nare still the arbiters of its hope.\n\nRetracing once more our steps over this perilous bridge of ultimate\nthought, we may thus indicate the situation. Our starting-point\ncannot be the \"a priori synthetic unity of apperception,\" because\nthis is an abstraction of the pure reason, and if accepted as a real\nfact would contradict and negate all the other attributes of the soul.\n\nOur starting-point cannot be the universal \"monad\" of\nself-consciousness, because this is an abstraction of the \"I am I\" and\nif accepted as a real fact would negate and suppress every attribute\nof the soul except the attributes of self-consciousness and emotion.\n\nOur starting-point cannot be the objective world, considered in its\nevolutionary externality, because this external world depends for\nits very existence upon the attributes of the soul, especially upon\nthe attribute of sensation.\n\nOur starting-point can therefore be nothing less than the complex\nvision, which on the one hand implies the reality of the soul and\non the other the reality of the external world, and which itself is\nthe vision of a real concrete personality. The individual is thus\ndisclosed as something more than the universal, the microcosm as\nsomething more than the macrocosm, and any living personality as\nsomething more than any conceivable absolute being.\n\nBy an original act of faith, towards which we are helped by the\nsoul's attribute of imagination, we are compelled to conceive of\nevery other soul in the world as being the centre of a universe\nmore or less identical in character with the universe of which our\nown soul is the centre. These separate universes we have to\nconceive as being subjective impressions of the same objective\nreality, the beauty, truth, and goodness of which are guaranteed for\nus by those \"invisible companions of men\" in whose eternal vision\nthey find their synthesis.\n\nThe tragedy of our life consists in the fact that it is only in rare\nexalted moments, when the rhythmic harmony of the complex\nvision is most intense and yet most calm, that the individual soul\nfeels the presence of those supreme companions whose real and\npersonal existence I have attempted to indicate. These ideal and\nyet most real companions of humanity make their presence felt by\nthe soul in just the same immediate, direct and equivocal way in\nwhich we feel the influence of a friend or lover whose spirit, in his\nbodily absence, is concentrated upon our spirit, even as ours is\nupon his.\n\nTo the larger vision of these \"invisible companions\" we find\nourselves consciously and sub-consciously turning whenever the\nburden of our flesh oppresses us more than we can bear. We are\ncompelled to turn to them by reason of the profound instinct in us\nwhich recognizes that our ideas of truth, of beauty, and goodness\nare not mere subjective fancies but are actual objective realities.\nThese ideas do not spring from these \"companions\" or find their\norigin and cause in them, any more than they spring from some\nimaginary \"parent\" of the universe and find their origin and cause\nin something \"behind life.\" They do not \"spring\" from anything at\nall; but are the very stuff and texture of our own unfathomable\nsouls, just as they are the very stuff and texture of the\nunfathomable souls of the immortal gods. What we are conscious\nof, when our complex vision gathers itself together, is the fact that\nthe inevitable element of subjectivity in our individual feeling\nabout these things is transcended and supplemented by an invisible\npattern or standard or ideal in which these things are reconciled\nand fused together at a higher pitch of harmony than we individually,\nor even in contact with one another, are capable of attaining.\n\nThe vision of these \"invisible companions\"--absolute enough in\nrelation to our own tragic relativity--is itself relative to its own\nhope, its own dream, its own prophecy, its own premonition. The\nreal evolution of the world, the real movement of life, takes\ntherefore a double form. It takes the form of an individual _return_\nto the fulness of ideas which have always been implicit and latent\nin our individual souls. And it takes the form of a co-operative\n_advance_ towards the fulness of ideas which are foreshadowed\nand prophesied in the vision of these immortals' companions. Thus\nfor us, as well as for them, the eternal movement is at once an\nadvance and a return. Thus for us, as well as for them, the eternal\ninspiration is at once a hope and a reminiscence.\n\nIt will be seen from what I have said that this philosophy of the\ncomplex vision finds a place for all the nobler and more desperate\nstruggles of the human race towards a solution of the mystery of\nlife. It accepts fully the fact that the human reason playing isolated\ngames with itself, is driven by its own nature to reduce \"all objects\nof all thought\" to the circle of one \"synthetic unity\" which is the\nimplied \"a priori\" background of all actual vision. It accepts fully\nthe fact that human self-consciousness, playing isolated games\nwith itself, is driven by the necessity of its own nature to reduce all\nseparate \"selves\" to one all embracing \"world self\" which is the\nuniverse conscious of itself as the universe.\n\nIt accepts fully the fact that we have to regard the apparent\nobjectivity of the external universe, with its historic process, as an\nessential and unalterable aspect of reality, so grounded in truth that\nto call it an \"illusion\" is a misuse of language. But although it\naccepts both the extreme \"materialistic\" view and the extreme\n\"idealistic\" view as inevitable revelations of reality, it does not\nregard either of them as the true starting-point of enquiry, because\nit regards both these extremes as the result of the isolated play of\none or the other of the complex vision's attributes.\n\nThe philosophy of the complex vision refuses to accept as its\nstarting-point any \"synthetic unity\" other than the synthetic unity\nof personality; because any other than this it is compelled to\nregard as abstracted from this by the isolated play of some\nparticular attribute of the mind. The philosophy of the complex\nvision refuses to accept as its starting-point any attenuated\nmaterialistic hypothesis, such as may be indicated by the arbitrary\nwords \"life\" or \"movement\" or \"ether\" or \"force\" or \"energy\" or\n\"atoms\" or \"molecules\" or \"electrons\" or \"vortices\" or \"evolutionary\nprogress,\" because it recognizes that all these hypothetical\norigins of life are only projected and abstracted aspects\nof the central reality of life, which is, and always must be,\npersonality.\n\nBut what is the relation of the philosophy of the complex vision to\nthat modern tendency of thought which calls itself \"pragmatism\"\nand which also finds in personality its starting-point and centre?\nThe philosophy of the complex vision seems to detect in the\npragmatic attitude something which is profoundly unpleasing to its\ntaste. Its own view of the art of life is that it is before everything\nelse a matter of rhythm and harmony and it cannot help discerning\nin \"pragmatism\" something piece-meal, pell-mell and \"hand-to-mouth.\"\nIt seems conscious of a certain outrage to its aesthetic\nsense in the method and the attitude of this philosophy. The\npragmatic attitude, though it would be unfair to call it superficial,\ndoes not appeal to the philosophy of the complex vision as being\none of the supreme, desperate struggles of the human race to\novercome the resistance of the Sphinx. The philosophy of the\ncomplex vision implies the difficult attainment of an elaborate\nharmony. It regards \"philosophy\" as the most difficult of all\n\"works of art.\" What it seems to be suspicious of in pragmatism is\na tendency to seek mediocrity rather than beauty, and a certain\nhumorous opportunism rather than the quiet of an eternal vision. It\nseems to look in vain in \"Pragmatism\" for that element of the\n_impossible_, for that strain of Quixotic faith, in which no high\nwork of art is found to be lacking. It seems unable to discover in\nthe pragmatic attitude that \"note of tragedy\" which the fatality of\nhuman life demands.\n\nIt certainly shares with the pragmatic philosophy a tendency to lay\nmore stress upon the freedom of the will than is usual among\nphilosophies. But the \"will\" of the complex vision moves in closer\nassociation with the aesthetic sense than does the \"will\" of\npragmatism. It is perhaps as a matter of \"taste\" that pragmatism\nproves most unsatisfactory to it. It seems to be conscious of\nsomething in pragmatism, which, though itself perhaps not\nprecisely \"commercial,\" seems curiously well adapted to a\ncommercial age. It is aware, in fine, that certain high and\npassionate intimations are roused to unmitigated hostility by the\nwhole pragmatic attitude. And it refuses to outrage these\nintimations for the sake of any psychological contentment.\n\nIn regard to the particular kind of \"truth\" championed by\npragmatists, the \"truth\" namely which gives one on the whole the\ngreatest amount of practical efficiency, the philosophy of the\ncomplex vision remains unconvinced. The pragmatic philosophy\njudges the value of any \"truth\" by its effective application to\nordinary moments. The philosophy of the complex vision judges\nthe value of any \"truth\" by its relation to that rare and difficult\nharmony which can be obtained only in extraordinary moments.\nTo the pragmatic philosopher a shrewd, efficient and healthy-minded\nperson, with a good \"working\" religion, would seem the lucky\none, while to the philosophy of the complex vision some\ndesperate, unhappy suicidal wastrel, who by the grace of the\nimmortals was allowed some high unutterable moment, might\napproach much more closely to the vision of those \"sons of the\nuniverse\" who are the pattern of us all.\n\nThis comparison of the method we are endeavouring to follow\nwith the method of \"pragmatism\" helps to throw a clear light upon\nwhat the complex vision reveals about these \"ultimate ideas\" in the\nflow of an indiscriminate mass of mental impression.\n\nTo the passing fashion of modern thought there is something stiff,\nscholastic, archaic, rigid, and even Byzantine, about the words\n\"truth,\" \"beauty,\" \"goodness,\" thus pedestalled side by side. But\njust as with the old-fashioned word \"matter\" and the old-fashioned\nword \"soul,\" we must not be misled by a mere \"superstition of\nnovelty\" in these things.\n\nModern psychology has not been able, and never can be able, to\nescape from the universal human experiences which these\nold-fashioned words cover; and as long as the experiences are\nrecognized as real, it surely does not make much difference what\n_names_ we give to them. It seems, indeed, in a point so human\nand dramatic as this, far better to use words that have already\nacquired a clear traditional and natural connotation than to invent\nnew words according to one's own arbitrary fancy. It would not be\ndifficult to invent such words. In place of \"truth\" one could say\n\"the objective reality of things\" rhythmically apprehended by the\ncomplex vision. Instead of \"beauty\" one could say \"the world seen\nunder the light of a peculiar creative power in the soul which\nreveals a secret aspect of things otherwise concealed from us.\"\nInstead of \"goodness\" one could say \"the power of the conscious\nand living _will_, when directed towards love.\" And in place of\n\"love\" itself one could say \"the projection of the essence of the\nsoul upon the objective plane; when such an essence is directed\ntowards life.\"\n\nBut it would be futile to continue this \"fancy-work,\" of definition\nby an individual temperament. The general traditional meaning of\nthese words is clear and unmistakable; though there may be\ninfinite minute shades of difference between one person's\ninterpretation of such a meaning and another's. What it all really\namounts to is this. No philosophic or scientific interpretation of\nlife, which does not include the verdict of life's own most\nconcentrated moments, can possibly be adequate.\n\nHuman nature can perfectly well philosophize about its normal\nstream of impressions in \"cold blood,\" so to speak, and according\nto a method that discounts all emotional vision. But the resultant\nconclusions of such philosophizing, with their easy-going\nassumption that what we call \"beauty\" and \"goodness\" have no\nconnection with what we call \"truth,\" are conclusions so\nunsatisfying to more than half of our being that they carry their\nrefutation on the face of them.\n\nTo be an \"interpretation of life\" a philosophical theory cannot\nafford to disregard the whole turbulent desperate dramatic content\nof emotional experience. It cannot disregard the fact, for instance,\nthat certain moments of our lives bring to us certain reconciliations\nand revelations that change the whole perspective of our days. To\n\"interpret life\" from the material offered by the uninspired\nunconcentrated unrhythmical \"average\" moods of the soul is like\ntrying to interpret the play of \"Hamlet\" from a version out of\nwhich every one of Hamlet's own speeches have been carefully\nremoved. Or, to take a different metaphor, such pseudo-psychological\nphilosophy is like an attempt to analyse the nature of fire\nby a summary of the various sorts of fuel which have been\nflung into the flame.\n\nThe act of faith by which these ultimate ideas are reduced to the\nvision of living personalities is a legitimate matter for critical\nscepticism. But that there are such ultimate ideas and that life\ncannot be interpreted without considering them is not a matter for\nany sort of scepticism. It is a basic assumption, without which\nthere could be no adequate philosophy at all. It is the only\nintelligible assumption which covers the undeniable human\nexperience which gathers itself together in these traditional words.\n\n\nCHAPTER VII.\n\nTHE NATURE OF ART\n\nThe only adequate clue to the historic mystery of that thing which\nthe human race has come to call \"beauty,\" and that other thing--the\nre-creation of this through individual human minds--which we\nhave come to call \"art\"--is found, if the complex vision is to be\ntrusted at all, in the contact of the emotion of love with the\n\"objective mystery,\" and its consequent dispersion, as the other\naspects of the soul are brought to bear upon it, into the three\nprimordial ideas of goodness, beauty, and truth.\n\nThe reason why this one particular aspect of the soul which we\ncall emotion is found to be the synthesis of what is discovered by\nall the other aspects of the soul functioning together is that the\nnature of emotion differs radically from reason, conscience, will,\nimagination, taste, and the rest, in that it is not only a clarifying,\ndirecting and discriminating activity but is also--as none of these\nothers are--an actual mood, or temper, or state of the soul,\npossessing certain definite vibrations of energy and a certain sort\nof psychic fluidity or outflowing which seems perpetually to\nspring up from an unfathomable depth.\n\nThis synthetic role played by emotion in unifying the other\nactivities of the complex vision and preparing the psychic material\nfor the final activity of the apex-thought may perhaps be\nunderstood better if we think of emotion as being an actual\noutflowing of the soul itself, springing up from unfathomable\ndepths. Thinking of it in this way we may conceive the actual size\nor volume of the \"soul monad\" to be increased by this centrifugal\nexpansion.\n\nBy such an increase of the soul's volume we do not mean an actual\nincrease; because the depths of all souls are equally unfathomable\nwhen their recession inwards is considered. By such an increase\nwe refer to the forth-flowing of the soul as it manifests itself\nthrough the physical body. Thus our theory brings us back, as all\ntheories must if they are consonant with experience, to the\ntraditional language of the human race. For in ordinary language\nthere is nothing strange about the expression \"a great soul.\" Such\nan expression simply refers to the volume of the soul's outflowing\nthrough the body. And this outflowing is the fulness, more or less,\nof the soul's well-spring of emotion.\n\nA \"great soul\" is thus a soul whereof the outflowing emotion--on\nboth sides of its inherent duality--is larger in volume as it\nmanifests itself through the body than in normal cases; and a\n\"small soul\" is a soul whose volume of outflowing emotion is less\nthan in normal cases.\n\nIt must be remembered, however, when we speak of the outflowing\nemotion of the soul that we do not mean that there _pours through_\nthe soul from some exterior source a stream of emotion distinct\nfrom the integral being of the soul itself. What we mean is that\nthe soul itself finds itself divided against itself in an eternal\ncontradiction which may be compared to the positive and negative\npole of electricity.\n\nThis outflowing of emotion is not, therefore, the outflowing of\nsomething which emerges from the soul but is the outflowing, or\nthe expansion and dilation through the body, or the soul itself.\nWhat we are now indicating, as to the less or greater degree of\nvolume in the soul's manifestation through the body, is borne\nwitness to in the curious fact that the bodies of persons under\nstrong emotion--whether it be the emotion of love or the emotion\nof malice--do actually seem to dilate in bulk and stature.\n\nAll that we have been saying has a clear bearing upon the problem\nof the relation between the emotional aspect of the soul and the\nother aspects. The emotion of the soul is the outflowing of the soul\nitself, on one side or other of its inherent duality; while the other\naspects of the soul--such as will, taste, imagination, reason, and so\nforth--are the directing, selecting, clarifying, interpreting\nactivities of the soul as it flings itself upon the objective mystery.\nThus, while it is by means of that activity of the soul which we call\nconscience that we distinguish between good and evil; and by\nmeans of that activity called the aesthetic sense that we distinguish\nbetween beauty and hideousness; and by means of that activity\ncalled reason that we distinguish between reality and unreality; it\nis all the while from its own emotional outflowing that the soul\ndirected and guided by these critical energies, creates the universe\nwhich becomes its own, and then discovers that the universe\nwhich it has created is also the universe of the immortals.\n\nIt is because this emotional duality of love and malice is the\ninherent \"psychic stuff\" of all living souls whether mortal or\nimmortal that the soul of man comes at last to comprehend that\nthose primordial ideas of goodness, beauty and truth, out of which\nthe universe is half-created and half-discovered, draw, so to speak\nthe sanction of their objective reality from the eternal vision of the\nimmortals.\n\nThe distinction we have thus insisted upon between the nature of\nemotion and the nature of the other aspects of the soul makes it\nnow clear how it is that we are compelled to regard these three\nprimordial ideas of beauty, truth and goodness as finding their\nunity and their original identity in the emotion of love.\n\nIt has been necessary to consider these ultimate movements of the\nsoul in order that we may be in a position to understand the\ngeneral nature of this mysterious thing we call \"art,\" and be able to\ntrack its river-bed, so to speak, up to the original source. From a\nconsideration of the fact that the outflowing of the soul takes the\nform of emotion, and that this emotion is at perpetual war within\nitself and is for ever contradicting itself, we arrive at our first\naxiomatic principle with regard to art, namely that art is, and must\nalways be, penetrated through and through by the spirit of\ncontradiction. Whatever else art may become, then, one thing we\ncan predicate for certain with regard to it, namely that it springs\nfrom an eternal conflict between two irreconcilable opposites.\n\nWe are, further than this, able to define the nature of these\nopposites as the everlasting conflict between creation and what\nresists creation, or between love and malice. It is just here, in\nregard to the character of these opposites, that the philosophy of\nthe complex vision differs from the Bergsonian philosophy of the\n\"\u00e9lan vital.\"\n\nAccording to Bergson's monistic system the only genuine reality is\nthe flux of spirit The spirit of some primordial self-expansion\nprojects what we call \"matter\" as its secondary manifestation and\nthen is condemned to an unending and exhausting struggle with\nwhat it has projected.\n\nSpirit, therefore, is pure energy and movement and matter is pure\nheaviness and resistance. Out of the necessity of this conflict\nemerge all those rigid logical concepts and mathematical\nformulae, of which space and time, in the ordinary sense of those\nwords, are the ultimate generalization.\n\nOur criticism of this theory is that both these things--this \"spirit\"\nand this spirit-evoked \"matter\"--are themselves meaningless\nconcepts, concepts which, in spite of Bergson's contempt for\nordinary metaphysic, are in reality entirely metaphysical, being in\nfact, like the old-fashioned entities whose place they occupy,\nnothing but empty bodiless generalizations abstracted from the\nconcrete living reality of the soul. But quite apart from our\ncriticism of the Bergsonian \"spirit\" and \"matter\" on the ground of\ntheir being unreal conceptions illegitimately abstracted from real\npersonality we are compelled to note a second vivid difference\nbetween our point of view and his in regard to this matter of\nopposites and their contradiction. Bergson's monism, as we have\nseen, resolves itself into a duality which may be defined as\nconscious activity confronted by unconscious inertness.\n\nOur duality, on the contrary, which has behind it, not monism, but\npluralism, may be denned as conscious creation, or conscious love,\nconfronted by conscious resistance to creation, or conscious inert\nmalice. Thus while Bergson finds his ultimate axiomatic \"data\" in\nphilosophical abstractions, we find our ultimate axiomatic \"data\"\nin the realities of human experiences. Bergson seeks to interpret\nhuman life in terms of the universe. We seek to interpret the\nuniverse in terms of human life. And we contend that we are\njustified in doing this since what we call \"the universe,\" as soon as\nit is submitted to analysis, turns out to be nothing but an act of\nfaith according to which an immense plurality of separate personal\nuniverses find a single universe of inspiration and hope in the\nvision of the immortal gods.\n\nThe ultimate duality revealed by the complex vision is a\nduality on both sides of which we have unfathomable abysses of\nconsciousness. On the one side this consciousness is eternally\ncreative. On the other side this consciousness is eternally\nmalicious, in its deliberate inert resistance to creation. It is\nnatural enough, therefore, that while Bergson's \"creative evolution\"\nresolves itself into a series of forward-movements which are as\neasy and organic as the growth of leaves on a tree, our advance\ntoward the real future which is also a return to the ideal past,\nresolves itself in a series of supremely difficult rhythms, wherein\neternally conscious \"good\" overcomes eternally conscious \"evil.\"\n\nOur philosophy, therefore, may, in the strictest sense, be called\na \"human\" philosophy in contra-distinction to a \"cosmic\"\nphilosophy; or, if you please, it may be called a \"dramatic\"\nphilosophy in contra-distinction to a \"lyric\" philosophy. From all\nthis it will be clearly seen that it would be impossible for us to\nhypostasize a super-moral or sub-moral universe in complete\ndisregard of the primordial conscience of the human soul. It will\nbe equally clearly seen that it would be impossible for us to project\na theoretical universe made up of \"cosmic streams of tendency,\"\nwhether \"spiritual\" or \"material,\" in complete disregard of the\nsoul's primordial aesthetic sense.\n\nThe logical scrupulosity and rationalistic passion which drive a\ncosmic philosopher forward, in his attempt to construct a universe\nin disregard of the human conscience and the human aesthetic\nsense, are themselves evidence that while he has suppressed in\nhimself the first two of the three primordial ideas of which we\nspeak, he has become an all-or-nothing slave of the last of these\nthree ideas--namely, the idea of truth. He has sacrificed his\nconscience and his taste to this isolated and abstracted \"truth,\" the\nquest of pure reason alone, and, as a result of this fanaticism, the\nreal \"true truth,\" that is to say the complete rhythmic vision of the\ntotality of man's nature, has been suppressed and destroyed.\n\nIt must be fully admitted at this point that the fanaticism of the\nso-called \"pure saint\" and the so-called \"pure artist\" who suppress,\nthe one for the sake of \"goodness\" and the other for the sake of\n\"beauty,\" the third great primordial idea which we have called\n\"truth,\" is a fanaticism just as one sided and just as destructive of\nthe complete harmonious vision as those other kinds.\n\nThat this is the case can easily be proved by recalling how thin,\nhow strained, how morbid, how ungracious, how inhuman, those\nso-called \"saints\" and \"artists\" become, when, in their neglect of\nreason and truth, they persist in following their capricious,\nsubjective, fantastic, individual dreams, out of all concrete relation\nto the actual world we live in.\n\nWe arrive, therefore, at a point from which we are able to detect\nthe true inner spirit of the nature of art; and what we discover may\nthus be stated. Art is the expression, through the medium of an\nindividual temperament, of a beauty which is one of the primordial\naspects of this pluralistic world. The eternal duality of things\nimplies that this beauty is always manifested as something in\nperpetual conflict with its opposite, namely with that antagonistic\naspect of the universe which we name the hideous or the ugly.\n\nThis duality exists as the eternal condition of each one of the three\nprimordial ideas out of which the universe is evoked. Each of\nthese three ideas is only known to us as the result of a relative\nvictory over its opposite. Beauty is known to us as a relative\nvictory over hideousness. Goodness is known to us as a relative\nvictory over evil. Truth is known to us as a relative victory over\nthe false and the unreal. The fact that each of these ideas can only\nbe known in a condition of conflict with its opposite and in a\ncondition of relative victory over its opposite is due to the fact that\nall three of them are in their own nature only clarifying, selecting,\nand value-giving activities; whereas the actual material upon\nwhich they have to work, as well as the energy from which they\nderive their motive-power, is nothing else but that mysterious\noutflowing of the soul itself which we call emotion.\n\nFor since emotion is eternally divided against itself into love and\nmalice, the three primordial ideas which deal this emotion are also\neternally divided against themselves, into beauty and hideousness,\ninto goodness and evil, into reality and unreality. And since the\nvery existence of emotion depends upon the struggle between love\nand malice, in the same way the very existence of our aesthetic\nsense depends upon the struggle between beauty and hideousness;\nand the very existence of reason depends upon the struggle\nbetween reality and unreality. The only love we can possibly have\nto deal with is a love which is for ever overcoming malice. The\nonly beauty we can possibly have to deal with is a beauty which is\nfor ever overcoming hideousness.\n\nAnd the same assertion must be made both with regard to\ngoodness and with regard to truth. If any one of them absolutely\novercame the other, so as completely to destroy it, the ebb and\nflow of life would at that moment cease.\n\nA world where all minds could apprehend all truth without any\nillusion or admixture of unreality, would not be a world at all, as\nwe know the world. It would be the colourless dream of an\nimmobile plurality of absolutes. As far as we are concerned it\nwould be synonymous with death. Thus the ultimate nature of the\nworld is found to be unfathomably dualistic. A sharp dividing line\nof irreconcilable duality intersects every living soul; and the secret\nof life turns out to be the relatively victorious struggle of\npersonality with the thing that in itself resists its fuller life.\n\nThis verdict of the complex vision is in unison with the natural\nfeeling of ordinary humanity and it is also in unison with the\nsupreme illuminated moments when we seem to apprehend the\nvision of the gods. When once we have apprehended the inherent\nnature of beauty, we are in a position to understand what the spirit\nof art must be, whose business it is to re-create this beauty in terms\nof personality. The idea of beauty itself is profoundly personal\neven before art touches it, since it is one of the three primordial\nideas with which every conscious soul sets forth.\n\nBut it is not only personal. It is also objective and impersonal. For\nit is not only the reaction of a particular soul to its own universe;\nit is also felt, in the rare moments when the apex-thought of the\ncomplex vision is creating its world rhythm, to be nothing less\nthan the vision of the immortals.\n\nArt, therefore, which is the representation in terms of some\nparticular personal temperament, of that sense of beauty which is\nthe inheritance of all souls born into the world, must be profoundly\npenetrated by the victorious struggle of the emotion of love with\nthe emotion of malice. For although the human sense of the beauty\nof the world, which may be called the objective sense of the\nbeauty of the world, since the vision of the immortals lies behind\nit, is the thing which art expresses, it must be remembered that this\nsense is not an actual substance or concrete entity, but is only a\nprinciple of selection or a process of mental reaction, in regard to\nlife.\n\nThe thing which may be called an actual substance is that outflowing\nof the soul itself in centrifugal waves of positive and\nnegative vibration which we have chosen to name by the name\n\"emotion.\" This may indeed be called an actual concrete extension\nof the psychic-stuff of the substantial soul. None of the three\nprimordial ideas resemble it in this. They are all attitudes of the\nsoul; not conscious enlargements or lessenings of the very stuff; of\nthe soul.\n\nThe idea of beauty is a particular reaction to the universe. The idea\nof truth is a particular reaction to the universe. The idea of\ngoodness is a particular act of the will with regard to our relation\nto the universe. But the emotion of love, in its struggle with the\nemotion of malice, is much more than this. It is the actual outflowing\nof the soul itself; and it offers, as such, the very stuff and\nmaterial out of which truth and beauty and goodness are\ndistinguished and discerned.\n\nSome clear hints and intimations as to the nature of art may be\narrived at from these considerations. We at any rate reach a\ngeneral criterion, applicable to all instances, as to the presence or\nabsence in any particular case of the authentic and objective \"note\"\nof true art. This \"note\" is the presence in a work of art of the\ndecisive relative victory of love over malice. When, on the\ncontrary, in any work of art, the original struggle of love with\nmalice issues in a relative overcoming of love by malice, then such\na work of art belongs, ipso facto, to an inferior order of excellence.\n\nThis criterion is one of easy intuitive application, although any\nexact analysis of it, in a particular case, may be difficult and\nobscure. Roughly and generally expressed it amounts to this. In\nthe great works of art of the world, wherein the subjective vision\nof the artist expresses itself in mysterious reciprocity with the\nobjective vision of the immortals, there is always found a certain\nlarge \"humanity.\" This humanity, wherein an infinite pity never\nfor a moment degenerates into weak sentiment, reduces the\nco-existence of cruelty and malice to the lowest possible minimum,\nconsonant with the ebb and flow of life.\n\nSome residuum of such malice and cruelty there must be, even in\nthe supremest work of art, else the eternal contradictions upon\nwhich life depends would be destroyed. But the emotion of love,\nin such works, will always be found to have its fingers, as it were,\nfirmly upon the throat of its antagonist, so that the resultant\nrhythm shall be felt to be the ultimate rhythm of life itself, wherein\nthe eternal struggle of love with malice issues in the relative\novercoming of the latter by the former.\n\nIt would be invidious perhaps to name, in this place, any particular\nworks of art in which the predominant element is malice rather\nthan love. But such works of art exist in considerable number, and\nthe lacerated and distorted beauty of them remains as a perpetual\nwitness to what they have missed. In speaking of these inferior\nworks of art the aesthetic psychologist must be on his guard\nagainst the confusion of such moods as the creative instinct of\ndestruction or the creative instinct of simple sensuality with the\ninert malice we are considering.\n\nThe instinct of destruction is essentially connected with the\ninstinct of creation and indeed must be regarded as an indirect\nexpression of that instinct; for, as one can clearly understand,\nalmost every creative undertaking implies some kind of destructive\nor at least some kind of suppressive or renunciant act which\nrenders such an undertaking possible.\n\nIn the same way it is not difficult to see that the simple impulse of\nnatural sensuality, or direct animal lust, is profoundly connected\nwith the creative instinct, and is indeed the expression of the\ncreative instinct on the plane of purely material energy. But it must\nbe understood, however, that neither the will to destruction nor the\nwill to sensuality are by any means always as innocent as the\nforms of them I have indicated above.\n\nIt often happens indeed that this destructive instinct is profoundly\npenetrated by malice and derives the thrill of its activity from\nmalice; and this may easily be observed in certain famous but not\nsupreme works of art. It must also be understood that the impulse\nto sensuality or lust is not always the direct simple animal instinct\nto which I have referred. What has come to be called \"Sadism\" is\nan instance of this aberration of an innocent impulse.\n\nThe instinct of \"sadism,\" or the deriving of voluptuous pleasure\nfrom sensual cruelty, has its origin in the legitimate association of\nthe impulse to destroy with the impulse to create, as these things\nare inseparably linked together in the normal \"possession\" of a\nwoman by a man. In such \"possession\" the active masculine\nprinciple has to exercise a certain minimum of destruction with a\nview to a certain maximum of creation; and the normal resistance\nof the female is the mental corollary of this.\n\nThe normal resistance of the artist's medium to the activity of his\nenergy is a sort of aesthetic parallel to this situation; and it is\neasy to see how, in the creation of a work of art, this aesthetic\novercoming of resistance may get itself mentally associated with\nthe parallel sensation experienced on the sensual plane. The point\nwe have to make is this: that while in normal cases the impulse to\nsensuality is perfectly direct, innocent, animal, and earth-born; in\nother cases it becomes vitiated by the presence in it of a larger\namount of destructive energy than can be accounted for by the\noriginal necessity.\n\nThus in a great many quite famous works of art there will be found\nan element of sadism. But it will always remain that in the\nsupreme works of art this sadistic element has been overcome and\ntransformed by the pressure upon it of the emotion of love. There\nexists, however, other instances, when the work of art in question\nis obviously inferior, in which we are confronted by something\nmuch more evil than the mere presence of the sadistic impulse.\nWhat I refer to is a very subtle and complicated mood wherein the\nsimple sadistic impulse to derive sensual pleasure from the\ncontemplation of cruelty has been seized upon and taken\npossession of by the emotion of malice.\n\nThe complicated mood resulting from this association of sadistic\ncruelty with inert malice is perhaps the most powerful engine of\nevil that exists in the world; although a pure unmitigated condition\nof unsensualized, unimpassioned, motiveless malice is, in its\ninmost self, more essentially and profoundly evil. For while the\nenergy of sadism renders the actual destructive power of malice\nmuch more formidable, we must remember that what really\nconstitutes the essence of evil is never the energy of destruction\nbut always the malicious inertness of resistance to creation. We\nhave thus arrived at some measure of insight as to the nature of art\nand we find that whatever else it may be it must be penetrated\nthrough and through by the overcoming of malice by love. It must,\nin other words, have the actual outflowing of the soul as the\ninstrument of its expression and as the psycho-material medium\nwith which it inscribes its vision upon the objective mystery that\nconfronts it.\n\nWe have at least arrived at this point in our search for a definite\ncriterion: that when in any work of art a vein of excessive cruelty\nor, worse still, a vein of sneering and vindictive malice, dominates\nthe emotional atmosphere, such a work of art, however admirable\nit may be in other respects, falls below the level of the most\nexcellent. The relation between the idea of beauty as expressed by\nthe aesthetic sense and those other ideas, namely of truth and\ngoodness, which complete the circle of human vision, is a relation\nwhich may be suggested thus.\n\nSince all three of these primordial ideas are unified by the emotion\nof love it is clear that the emotion of love is the element in which\neach of them severally moves. And since it is impossible that love\nshould be antagonistic to itself we must conclude that the love\nwhich is the element or substratum of beauty is the same love that\nis the element or substratum of goodness and truth. And since all\nthese three elements are in reality one element, which is indeed\nnothing less than the dominant outflowing of the soul itself, it\nfollows that those portions of the soul's outflowing which have\nbeen directed by reason and by conscience, which we call the idea\nof truth and the idea of goodness, must have an ultimate identity\nwith that portion of the soul's outflowing which has been directed\nby the aesthetic sense and which we call the idea of beauty.\n\nThis identity between truth and goodness on the one hand and\nbeauty on the other cannot be regarded as an absolute identity. The\nidea of truth continues to represent one facet of the universe, the\nidea of goodness another, and the idea of beauty another or a third.\nWhat we mean by the use of the term \"identity\" is simply this: that\nthe universe revealed by each one of these three ideas is the same\nuniverse as is revealed by the others, and the emotional\nout-flowing of the individual soul, which reveals each of these\nseparate facets or aspects of the universe, is the same in each of\nthe three ideas which govern its direction.\n\nIt is, however, only at their supreme point, when they are fused\ntogether by the apex-thought of the complex vision, that the\nactivity of these separate ideas is found to be in complete\nharmony. Short of this extreme limit they tend to deviate from\neach other and to utter contradictory oracles. We may therefore lay\nit down as an unalterable law of their activity that when any one of\nthese ideas contradicts another it does so because of a weakness\nand imperfection in its own intensity or in the intensity of the idea\nit contradicts.\n\nThus if an idea of goodness is found irreconcilable with an idea of\nbeauty, something is wrong with one or the other of these ideas, or\nperhaps with both of them. And we are not only able to say that\nsomething is wrong with such ideas when they contradict one\nanother, we are able to predicate with certainty as to what\nprecisely is wrong. For the \"something wrong\" which leads to this\ncontradiction, the \"something wrong\" which stands in the way of\nthe rhythmic activity of the soul's apex-thought, will invariably be\nfound to be a weakening of the outflowing of the emotion of love\nin one or other or perhaps all three of the implicated ideas.\n\nFor the outflowing of the soul's emotion is not only the life of the\nroot of this \"tree of knowledge\"; it is also the life of the sap of the\nuttermost branches; it is the force that makes the fragrance of each\ntopmost leaf mingle with that of all the rest, in that unified breath\nof the whole tree which loses itself in the air.\n\nThus we arrive at our final conclusion as to the nature of art. And\nwhen we apply our criterion to any of the supreme works of art of\nthe world we find it does not fail us. The figure of Christ, for\ninstance, remains the supreme incarnation of the idea of goodness\nin the world; and few will deny that the figure of Christ represents\nnot only the idea of goodness but the ideas of truth and beauty\nalso. If one contemplates many another famous \"good man\" of\nhistory, such as easily may be called to mind, one is at once\nconscious that the \"goodness\" of these admirable persons is a thing\nnot altogether pleasing to the aesthetic taste, and a thing which in\nsome curious way seems to obscure our vision of the real truth of\nlife.\n\nA great work of art, such as Leonardo's \"Virgin of the Rocks,\" or\nDostoievsky's \"Idiot,\" is intuitively recognized as being not only\nentirely satisfying to the aesthetic sense but also entirely satisfying\nto our craving for truth and our longing for the inmost secret of\ngoodness. Every great work of art is the concentrated essence of a\nman's ultimate reaction to the universe. It has an undertone of\nimmense tragedy; but in the depths of this tragedy there is no\ndespair, because an infinite pity accompanies the infinite sorrow,\nand in such pity love finds itself stronger than fate. No work of art,\nhowever appealing or magical, can carry the full weight of what it\nmeans to be an inheritor of human tradition, of what it means to be\na living soul, until it has arrived at that rhythm of the apex-thought\nwhich is a fusion of what we call the \"good\" with what we call the\n\"beautiful\" and the \"true.\"\n\nIt is only when our notion of what _is_ good and what is true falls\nshort of the austere demands of the aesthetic sense that a certain\nuneasiness and suspicion enters into a discussion of this kind. And\nsuch an uneasiness is justified by reason of the fact that the\npopular notion both of goodness and truth does so often fall\nlamentably short of such demands. The moral conscience of\naverage humanity is a thing of such dull sensibility, of such\nnarrow and limited vision, that it is inevitable that its \"goodness\"\nshould clash with so exacting a censor as the aesthetic sense.\n\nThe rational conscience of average humanity is a thing of such\ndense and rigid and unimaginative vision that it is inevitable that\nits \"truth\" should clash with the secrets revealed by the aesthetic\nsense. The cause, why the aesthetic sense seems to come on the\nscene with an apparatus of valuation so much more advanced and\nrefined than that possessed by the conscience or by the reason, is\nthat both conscience and reason are continually being applied to\naction, to conduct, to the manipulation of practical affairs, and are\nbound in this commerce with superficial circumstance to grow a\nlittle blunt and gross and to lose something of their fine edge.\n\nConscience and reason, in the hurly-burly and pell-mell of life, are\ndriven to compromise, to half-measures, to the second-best.\n\nConscience is compelled to be satisfied with something less than\nits own rigid demands. Reason is compelled to accept something\nless than its own rigid demands. Both of these things tend\nto become, under the pressure of the play of circumstance,\npragmatical, time-serving, and opportunist. But the aesthetic\nsense, although in itself it has always room for infinite growth, is\nin its inherent nature unable to compromise; unable to bend this\nway and that; unable to dally with half-measures.\n\nAny action, in a world of this kind, necessarily implies\ncompromise; and since goodness is so largely a matter of action,\ngoodness is necessarily penetrated by a spirit of compromise.\nIndeed it may be said that a certain measure of common-sense is\nof the very essence of goodness. But what has common-sense to\ndo with art? Common-sense has never been able, and never will be\nable, to understand even the rudiments of art. For art is the\nhalf-discovery of something that must always seem an impossibility to\ncommon-sense; and it is the half-creation of something that must\nalways render common-sense irrelevant and unimportant. Truth,\nagain, in a world of so infinite a complication, must frequently\nhave to remain an open question, a suspended judgment, an\nantinomy of opposites. The agnostic attitude--as, for instance, in\nthe matter of the immortality of the soul--may in certain cases\ncome to be the ultimate gesture of what we call the truth.\n\nBut with the aesthetic sense there can never be any suspension of\njudgment, never any open question, never any antinomy of\nopposites, never the least shadow of the pragmatic, or \"working\"\ntest. It is therefore natural enough that when persons possessed of\nany degree of cultivated taste hear other persons speak of\n\"goodness\" or \"truth\" they grow distrustful and suspicious, they\nfeel uneasy and very much on guard. For they know well that the\nconscience of the ordinary person is but a blunt and clumsy\ninstrument, quite as likely to distort and pervert the essential spirit\nof \"goodness\" as to reveal it, and they know well that the \"truth\"\nof the ordinary person's reason is a sorry compound of logical\nrigidity and practical opportunism; with but small space left in it\nfor the vision of imagination.\n\nIt is because of their primary importance in the sphere of practical\naction that the conscience and the reason have been developed out\nof all proportion to the aesthetic sense. And it is because the\ndeplorable environment of our present commercial system has\nemphasized action and conduct, out of all proportion to\ncontemplation and insight, that it is so difficult to restore the\nbalance. The tyranny of machinery has done untold evil in\nincreasing this lack of proportion; because machinery, by placing\nan unmalleable and inflexible material--a material that refuses to\nbe humanized--between man's fingers and the actual element he\nworks in, has interrupted that instinctive aesthetic movement of\nthe human hands, which, even in the midst of the most utter\nclumsiness and grossness, can never fail to introduce some touch\nof beauty into what it creates.\n\nWe have thus arrived at a definite point of view from which we\nare able to observe the actual play of man's aesthetic sense as, in\nits mysterious fusion with the energy of reason and conscience, it\ninterprets the pervading beauty of the system of things, according\nto the temperament of the individual. It remains to note how in the\nsupreme works of art this human temperamental vision is caught\nup and transcended in the high objectivity of a greater and more\nuniversal vision; a vision which is still personal, because\neverything true and beautiful in the universe is personal, but\nwhich, by the rhythm of the apex-thought, has attained a sort of\nimpersonal personality or, in other words, has been brought into\nharmony with the vision of the immortals.\n\nThe material upon which the artist works is that original \"objective\nmystery,\" confronting every individual soul, out of which every\nindividual soul creates its universe. The medium by means of\nwhich the artist works is that outflowing of the very substance of\nthe soul itself which we name by the name of emotion. This actual\npassing of the substantial substance of the soul into whatever form\nor shape of objective mystery the soul's vision has half-discovered\nand half-created is the true secret of what happens both in the case\nof the original creation of the artist and in case of the reciprocal\nre-creation of the person enjoying the work of art.\n\nFor Benedetto Croce, the Italian philosopher, is surely right when\nhe asserts that no one can enter into the true spirit of a work of art\nwithout exercising upon it something of the same creative impulse\nas that by the power of which it originally came into existence. In\nthe contemplation of a statue or a picture or a piece of bric-a-brac,\nin the enjoyment of a poem or an exquisite passage of prose, just\nas much as in the hearing of music, the soul of the recipient is\nprojected beyond its normal limitation in the same way as the soul\nof the creator was projected beyond its normal limitation.\n\nThe soul which thus gives itself up to Beauty is actually extended\nin a living ecstasy of vibration until it flows into, and through, and\naround, the thing it loves. But even this is an inadequate\nexpression of what happens; for this outflowing of the soul is the\nvery force and energy which actually is engaged in re-creating this\nthing out of what at present I confine myself to calling the\n\"objective mystery.\"\n\nThe emotion of the soul plays therefore a double part. It\nhalf-discovers and half-creates the pervading beauty of things; and it\nalso loses itself in receptive ecstasy, in embracing what it has\nhalf-created and half-found.\n\nWe have now reached a point from which we are able to advance\nyet another step.\n\nSince what we call beauty is the evocation of these two confronted\nexistences, the existing thing which we call the soul and the\nexisting thing which we call the objective mystery, it follows that\nthere resides, as a potentiality, in the nature of the objective\nmystery, the capacity for being converted into Beauty at the touch\nof the soul. There is thus a three-fold complication of reality in\nthis thing we call the beauty of the universe.\n\nThere is the individual, human, subjective reality of it, dependent\nupon the temperament of the observer. There is the universal\npotential reality of it, existing in the objective mystery. And finally\nthere is the ideal reality of it, objective and absolute as far as we\nare concerned, in the vision that I have called \"the vision of the\nimmortals.\" If it be asked why, in all these ultimate problems, it is\nnecessary to introduce the vision of the immortals, my answer is\nthat the highest human experience demands and requires it.\n\nAt those rare moments when the \"apex-thought\" reaches its\nrhythmic consummation the soul is conscious that its subjective\nvision of Truth and Beauty merges itself and loses itself in an\nobjective vision which carries the \"imprimatur\" of eternity. This is\na definite universal experience which few introspective minds will\ndare to deny.\n\nBut since, as we have already proved, the ultimate reality of things\nis personality, or, to be more exact, is personality, confronting the\nobjective mystery, it is clear that if the subjective vision of the\nsoul is to correspond with an objective reality outside the soul, that\nobjective reality outside the soul must itself be the vision of\npersonality. It may be asked, at this point, why it is that the\npotentiality or the capacity for being turned into beauty at the\ntouch of the soul, which resides in the objective mystery is not\nenough to explain this recognition by the soul of an eternal\nobjective validity in its ultimate ideas.\n\nIt is not enough to explain it, because this potentiality remains\nentirely unrecognized until it is touched by personality, and it is\ntherefore quite as much a potentiality of inferior beauty,\ninadequate truth, and second-rate goodness, as it is a potentiality\nof the rarest of these things.\n\nThe objective mystery by itself cannot explain the soul's\nexperience of an eternal validity in its deepest ideas because the\nobjective mystery in its role of pure potentiality is capable of\nbeing moulded into the form of _any_ ideas, whether deep or\nshallow. Thus our proof of the real existence of \"the vision of the\nimmortals\" depends upon two facts.\n\nIt depends upon the fact that the soul experiences an intuitive\nassurance of objective reality in its ideas. And it depends upon the\nfact that there is no other reality in the world, with any definite\nform or outline, except the reality of personality. For an idea to be\neternal, therefore, it must be the idea of a personality, or of many\npersonalities, which themselves are eternal; and since we have no\nevidence that the human soul is eternal and does not perish with\nthe body we are compelled to assume that somewhere in the\nuniverse there must exist beings whose personality is able to resist\ndeath and whose vision is an immortal vision.\n\nIt might be objected at this point, by such as follow the philosophy\nof Epicurus, that, even though such beings exist, we have no right\nto assume that they have any regard for us. My answer to this is\nthat in such moments as I have attempted to describe, when the\nrhythmic activity of the soul is at its highest, we become directly\nand intuitively conscious of an immense unutterable harmony\npervading all forms of life, whether mortal or immortal; a\nharmony which could not be felt if there were not some mysterious\nlink binding all living souls together.\n\nWe become aware at such moments that not only are all living\nsouls thus bound together but that all are bound together by the\nfact that the ideal vision of them all is one and the same. This is\nnot only my answer to such as maintain that though there may be\nBeings in the system of things superior to man, such Beings have\nno necessary connection with man; it is also my answer to the\nquestion as to how, considering the capricious subjectivity of our\nhuman vision, we can be assured that the ideal vision of the\nimmortals does not vary in the same way among themselves. We\nare assured against both these possibilities; against the possibility\nof the immortals being indifferent to humanity, and against the\npossibility of the immortals being divided among themselves, by\nthe fact that, according to the very basic revelation of the complex\nvision, wherever there is a living soul, that living soul is dependent\nfor its continued existence upon the overcoming of malice by love.\n\nThis duality is so much the essence of what we call personality\nthat we cannot conceive of personality without it. If, therefore, the\nimmortals are possessed of personality they must be subject to this\nduality; and the fact that they are subject to it puts them\nnecessarily in at least a potential \"rapport\" with all other living\nsouls, since the essence of every living soul is to be found in the\nsame unfathomable struggle.\n\nBut granting that there _are_ superior Beings, worthy to be called\nGods, who in their essential nature resemble humanity, how can\nwe be assured that there is any contact between them and\nhumanity? We are assured of this in the intuitive revelation of a\nmost definite human experience, an experience which few\nphilosophers have been sceptical enough to deny, although their\nexplanations of it may have been different from mine.\n\nWilliam James, for instance, whose psychological investigations\ninto the phenomena of religious feeling are so thorough and\noriginal, describes the sense we have of the presence of these\nunseen Powers in a very interesting and curious way. He points\nout that the feeling we experience at such moments is that there\nexists below the level of our ordinary consciousness a deep and\nlimitless reservoir or cistern containing \"more\" of the same stream\nof spiritual emotion which we are conscious of as being our very\ninmost self or soul of our soul.\n\nOn the waves of this subconscious ocean of deeper life we are, so\nto speak, able to \"ride\"; if once, in a sudden revolution of absolute\nhumility, we can give ourselves up to it.\n\nIt is needless to indicate how the Ideas of Plato, the \"sub specie\naeternitatis\" of Spinoza, the \"Liberation\" from \"the Will\" of\nSchopenhauer, the \"Beatific Vision\" of the Catholic saints are all\nanalogues and parallels, expressed under different symbols, of the\nsame universal feeling. The difference between these philosophic\nstatements of the situation and mine, is that, whereas these are\ncontent, with the doubtful exception of Plato, to eliminate from\nthis subconscious \"more\" of what is \"best\" in our own soul, every\ntrace and element of personality, I am unable to escape from the\nconviction that compared with personality no power in the\nuniverse, whether it be called \"Idea\" or \"Substance\" or a \"Will to\nannihilate Will\" or \"Life Force\" or \"Stream of consciousness\" or\nany other name, is worthy to be regarded as the cause and origin of\nthat intimation of \"something more\" by which our soul comes into\ncontact with the secret of the system of things.\n\nTo assume that the vision of unutterable truth which is reached in\nthe supreme works of art is anything less than the vision of\nsuper-human Personality is to assume that something other than\nPeripety is the secret of life. And how can man, who feels so\nprofoundly conscious that his own personal \"I am I\" is the inmost\nessence of his being, when it comes to the question of the cause of\nhis sensation of \"riding on the waves\" of this something \"more,\" be\ncontent to find the cause in mere abstractions from personality,\nsuch as \"streams of consciousness\" or \"life-force\" or \"Absolute\nSubstance\"?\n\nWhat we _know for certain_, in this strange imbroglio, is that\nwhat we call Beauty is a complex of two mysteries, the mystery of\nour own \"I am I\" and the mystery of the \"objective something\"\nwhich this \"I am I\" confronts. And if, as is the case, our most\nintense and passionate experience, when the rhythm of our nature\nis at the fullest, is the intuition of some world-deep authority or\nsanction giving an eternal validity to our ideas, this authority or\nsanction cannot be interpreted in mere metaphors or similes\nabstracted from personality, or in any material substance without a\nmind, or in any \"stream of thought\" without a thinker: but can only\nbe interpreted in terms of what alone we have an inside\nconsciousness of, namely in terms of personality itself.\n\nTo some temperaments it might seem as though this reduction of\nthe immense unfathomable universe to a congeries of living\nsouls were a strangling limitation. There are certain human\ntemperaments, and my own is one of them, whose aesthetic sense\ndemands the existence of vast interminable spaces of air, of water,\nof earth, of fire, or even of blank emptiness. To such a\ntemperament it might seem as though to be jostled throughout\neternity by other living souls were to be shut up in an unescapable\nprison. And when to this unending population of fellow-denizens\nof space we add this doctrine that our deepest ideas of Beauty\nremain subjective and ephemeral until they have received the\n\"imprimatur\" of some mysterious superhuman Being or Beings,\nsuch rebellious temperaments as I am speaking of might\nconceivably cry aloud for the Psalmist's \"wings of a dove.\"\n\nBut the aspect of things which I have just suggested is after all\nonly a superficial aspect of the situation. Those hollow spaces\nof unplumbed darkness, those gulfs filled with primordial\nnothingness, those caverns of midnight where the hoary chemistry\nof matter swirls and ferments in eternal formlessness; these indeed\n_are_ taken away from us. But as I have indicated again and again,\nno movement of human logic, no energy of human reason, can\ndestroy the unfathomableness of Nature. The immense spectacle\nof the material universe, with its perpetually receding background\nof objective mystery, is a thing that cannot be destroyed. Those\namong us who reluct at every human explanation of this panorama\nof shadows, are only too easily able to \"flee away and be at rest\" in\nthe bottomless gulf they crave.\n\nThe fact that man's apex-thought reveals the presence of an\nunending procession of living souls, each of whose creative energy\nmoulds this mystery to its own vision, does not remove the\nunfathomableness of the world-stuff whereof they mould it. As we\nhave already seen, this aboriginal world-stuff, so impenetrable to\nall analysis, assumes as far as we are concerned a three-fold form.\nIt assumes the form of the material element in that fusion of matter\nand consciousness which makes up the substance of the soul. It\nassumes the form of the universal medium which binds all souls\ntogether. And it assumes the form of the objective mystery which\nconfronts the vision of all souls. Over these three forms of the\n\"world-stuff\" hangs irrevocably the great \"world-curve\" or\n\"world-circle\" of omnipresent Space, which gives the final and\nultimate unity to all possible universes.\n\nThe temperamental revolt, however, which I am endeavouring to\ndescribe, against our doctrine of personality, does not stop with a\ndemand for de-humanized air and space. It has a passionate\n\"penchant\" for the projection of such vague imaginative images as\n\"spirit\" and \"life.\" Forgetful that no man has ever seen or touched\nthis \"spirit,\" apart from a personal soul, or this \"life,\" apart from\nsome living thing, the temperament I am thinking of loves to make\nimaginative excursions into what it supposes to be vast receding\nabysses of pure \"spirit\" and of impersonal inhuman \"life.\"\n\nIt gains thus a sense of liberation from the boundaries of its own\npersonality and a sense of liberation from the boundaries of all\npersonality. The doctrine, therefore, that the visible universe\nis a mysterious complex of many concentrated mortal visions,\nstamped, so to speak, with the \"imprimatur\" of an ideal immortal\nvision, is a doctrine that seems to impede and oppose such a\ntemperament in this abysmal plunge into the ocean of existence.\nBut my answer to the protest of this temperament--and it is an\nanswer that has a certain measure of authority, since this\ntemperament is no other than my own--is that this feeling of\n\"imprisonment\" is due to a superficial understanding of the\ndoctrine against which it protests. It is superficial because it does\nnot recognize that around, above, beneath, within, every form of\npersonality that the \"curve of space\" covers, there is present the\naboriginal \"world-stuff,\" unfathomable and inexplicable, out of\nwhich all souls draw the material element of their being, in which\nall souls come into contact with one another, and from which all\nsouls half-create and half-discover their personal universe.\n\nIt was necessary to introduce this question of temperamental\nreaction just here, because in any conclusion as to the nature of\nBeauty it is above all things important to give complete\nsatisfaction to every great recurrent exigency of human desire.\nAnd this desire for liberation from the bonds of personality is one\nof the profoundest instincts of personality.\n\nWe have now arrived at a point of vantage from which it is\npossible to survey the outlines of our final problem; the problem,\nnamely as to what it really is which renders one object in nature\nmore beautiful than another object, and one work of art more\nbeautiful than another work of art. We know that in the intuitive\njudgment which affixes these relative valuations there must be the\nthree elements of mortal subjective vision, of immortal objective\nvision, and of the original \"world-stuff\" out of which all visions\nare made.\n\nBut upon what criteria, by what rules and standards, do we\nbecome aware that one tree is more beautiful than another tree,\none landscape than another landscape, one poem or person or\npicture than another of the same kind? The question has already\nbeen lifted out of the sphere of pure subjective taste by what has\nbeen said with regard to the eternal Ideal vision. But are there any\npermanent laws of Beauty by which we may analyse the verdict of\nthis objective vision? Or are we made aware of it, in each\nindividual case, by a pure intuitive apprehension?\n\nI think there _are_ such laws. But I think the \"science,\" so to say,\nof the aesthetic judgment remains at present in so rudimentary a\nstage that we are not in a position to do more than indicate their\ngeneral outline. The following principles seem, as far as I am able\nto lay hold upon this evasive problem, of more comprehensive\napplication than any others.\n\nA thing to be beautiful must form an organic totality, even though\nin some other sense it is only a portion of a larger totality.\n\nIt must carry with it the impression, illusive or otherwise, that it\nis the outward form or shape of a living personal soul.\n\nIt must satisfy, at least by symbolic association, the physical\ndesires of the body.\n\nIt must obey certain hidden laws of rhythm, proportion, balance,\nand harmony, both with regard to colour and form, and with\nregard to magical suggestiveness.\n\nIt must answer, in some degree, the craving of the human mind for\nsome symbolic expression of the fatality of human experience.\n\nIt must have a double effect upon us. It must arouse the excitement\nof a passion of attention, and it must quiet us with a sense of\neternal rest.\n\nIt must thrill us with a happiness which goes beyond the pleasure\nof a passing physical sensation.\n\nIt must convey the impression of something unique and yet\nrepresentative; and it must carry the mind through and beyond\nitself, to the very brink and margin of the ultimate objective\nmystery.\n\nIt must suggest inevitableness, spontaneity, a certain monumental\nease, and a general feeling of expansion and liberation.\n\nIt must, if it belong to nature, convey that magical and world-deep\nsadness which springs from an inarticulate appeal; or, if it belong\nto art, that wistful loneliness which springs from the creation of\nimmortality by the hands of mortality.\n\nThe above principles are not offered as in any way exhaustive.\nThey are outlined as a temporary starting point and suggestion for\nthe more penetrating analysis which the future will surely provide.\nAnd I have temporally excluded from them, as can be seen, all\nreferences to those auxiliary elements drawn from reason and\nconscience which, according to the philosophy of the complex\nvision, must be included in the body of art, if art is to be the final\nexpression of human experience.\n\nBut after gathering together all we have accumulated among these\nvarious paths leading to the edge of the mystery of art, what we\nare compelled to recognize, when we confront the palpable thing\nitself, is that, in each unique embodiment of it, it arrests and\nentrances us, as with a sudden transformation of our entire\nuniverse.\n\nOut of the abysses of personality--human or super-human--every\nnew original work of art draws us, by an irresistible magnetism,\ninto itself, until we are compelled to become _what it is_, until we\nare actually transformed into its inmost identity.\n\nWhat hitherto has seemed to us mere refuse and litter and\ndreariness and debris--all the shards and ashes and flints and\nexcrement of the margins of our universe--take upon themselves,\nas they are thus caught up and transfigured, a new and ineffable\nmeaning.\n\nThe terrible, the ghastly, the atrocious, the abominable, the\napparently meaningless and dead, suddenly gather themselves\ntogether and take on strange and monumental significance.\n\nWhat has hitherto seemed to us floating jetsom and blind\nwreckage, what has hitherto seemed to us mere brutal lumps of\nprimeval clay tossed to and fro by the giant hands of chaos, what\nhas hitherto seemed to us slabs of inhuman chemistry, suddenly\nassumes under the pressure of this great power out of the abyss a\nstrange and lovely and terrible expressiveness.\n\nDeep calls to Deep; and the mysterious oceans of Personality\nmove and stir in a terrific reciprocity.\n\nThe unfathomable gulfs of the eternal duality within us are roused\nto undreamed-of response in answer to this abysmal stirring of the\npowers that create the world.\n\nWhat is good in us is enlarged and heightened; what is evil in us is\nenlarged and deepened; while, under the increasing pressure of\nthis new wave of the perilous stuff \"of emotion,\" slowly, little by\nlittle, as we give ourselves up to the ecstasy of contemplation, the\nintensified \"good\" overcomes the intensified \"evil.\"\n\nIt is then that what has begun in agitation and disturbance sinks by\ndegrees into an infinite peace; as, without any apparent change or\nconfusion, the waves roll in, one after another, upon our human\nshore, and we are lifted up and carried out on that vast tide into the\ngreat spaces, beneath the morning and the evening, where the\neternal vision awaits us with its undescribable calm.\n\nLet art be as bizarre, as weird, as strange, as rare, as fantastic, as\nyou please, if it be true art it must spring from the aboriginal\nduality in the human soul and thus must remain indestructibly\npersonal. But since the two elements of personality wrestle\ntogether in every artist's soul, the more personal a work of art\nbecomes the more comprehensive is its impersonality.\n\nFor art, by means of the personal and the particular, attains the\nimpersonal and the universal. By means of sinking down into the\ntransitory and the ephemeral, by means of moulding chance and\naccident to its will, it is enabled to touch the eternal and the\neternally fatal.\n\nFrom agitation to peace; from sound to silence; from creation to\ncontemplation; from birth and death to that which is immortal;\nfrom movement to that which is at rest--such is the wayfaring of\nthis primordial power.\n\nIt is from the vantage-ground of this perception that we are able\nto discern how the mysterious beauty revealed in apparently\n\"inhuman\" arrangements of line and colour and light and shade is\nreally a thing springing from the depths of some personal and\nindividual vision.\n\nThe controversy as to the superior claims of an art that is just \"art,\"\nwith an appeal entirely limited to texture and colour and line and\npure sound, and an art that is imagistic, symbolic, representative,\nreligious, philosophical, or prophetic, is rendered irrelevant and\nmeaningless when we perceive that all art, whether it be a thing of\npure line and colour or a thing of passionate human content, must\ninevitably spring from the depths of some particular personal\nvision and must inevitably attain, by stressing this personal\nelement to the limit, that universal impersonality which is implied\nin the fact that every living soul is composed of the same\nelements.\n\nIt may require no little subtlety of vision to detect in the pure\nbeauty of line, colour, and texture that compose, say, some lovely\npiece of bric-a-brac, the hidden presence of that primordial duality\nout of which all forms of beauty emerge, but the metaphysical\nsignificance latent in the phrase \"the sense of difficulty overcome\"\npoints us towards just this very interpretation. The circumstantial\nand the sexual \"motifs\" in art, so appealing to the mob, may or\nmay not play an aesthetic part in the resultant rhythm. If they do,\nthey do so because such \"interest\" and such \"eroticism\" were an\nintegral portion of the original vision that gave unity to the work\nin question. If they do not, but are merely dragged in by the\nun-aesthetic observer, it is easy enough for the genuine virtuoso to\ndisregard such temptation and to put \"story,\" \"message,\"\n\"sentiment,\" and \"sex-appeal\" rigidly aside, as he seeks to respond\nto the primordial vision of an \"unstoried\" non-sexual beauty\nspringing from those deeper levels of the soul where \"story,\"\n\"sentiment,\" and sex have no longer any place.\n\nMore dangerous, however, to art, than any popular craving for\n\"human interest\" or for the comfort of amorous voluptuousness, is\nthe unpardonable stupidity of puritanical censorship. Such\ncensorship, in its crass impertinence, assumes that its miserable\nand hypocritical negations represent that deep, fierce, terrible\n\"imperative\" uttered by the soul's primordial conscience.\n\nThey represent nothing of the sort.\n\nThe drastic revelations of \"conscience\" are, as I have pointed out\nagain and again, fused and blended in their supreme moments with\nthe equally drastic revelations of reason and the aesthetic sense.\n\nThey are inevitably blended with these, because, as we have\nproved, they are all three nothing less than divergent aspects of the\none irresistible projection of the soul itself which I have named\n\"creative love.\"\n\nThus it comes about that in the great, terrible moments of tragic art\nthere may be an apparent catastrophic despair, which in our\nnormal moods seems hopeless, final, absolute.\n\nIt is only when the complex rhythm of the apex-thought is brought\nto bear upon these _moments of midnight_ that a strange and\nunutterable healing emerges from them, a shy, half-hinted whisper\nor something deeper than hope, a magical effluence, a \"still, small\nvoice\" from beneath the disastrous eclipse, which not only \"purges\nour passions by pity and terror\" but evokes an assured horizon,\nbeyond truth, beyond beauty, beyond goodness, where the mystery\nof love, in its withdrawn and secret essence, transforms all things\ninto its own likeness.\n\nThe nature of art is thus found to be intimately associated with the\nuniversal essence of every personal life. Art is not, therefore, a\nthing for the \"coteries\" and the \"cliques\"; nor is it a thing for the\nexclusive leisure of any privileged class. It is a thing springing\nfrom the eternal \"stuff of the soul,\" of every conceivable soul,\nwhether human, sub-human, or super-human.\n\nArt is nearer than \"philosophy\" or \"morality\" to the creative\nenergy; because, while it is impossible to think of art as\n\"philosophy\" or \"morality,\" it is inevitable that we should think of\nboth of these as being themselves forms and manifestations of art.\n\nAll that the will does, in gathering together its impressions of life\nand its reactions to life, must, even in regard to the most vague,\nshadowy, faint and obscure filcherings of contemplation, be\nregarded as a kind of intimate \"work of art,\" with the soul as the\n\"artist\" and the flow of life as the artist's material.\n\nEvery personal soul, however \"inartistic,\" is an artist in this sense;\nand every personal life thus considered is an effective or\nineffective \"work of art.\"\n\nThe primal importance of what in the narrow and restricted sense\nwe have come to call \"art\" can only be fully realized when we\nthink of such \"art\" as concentrating upon a definite material\nmedium the creative energy which is for ever changing the world\nin the process of changing our attitude to the world.\n\nThe deadly enemy of art--the power that has succeeded, in these\ncommercial days, in reducing art to a pastime for the leisured and\nwealthy--is the original inert malice of the abyss.\n\nThis inert malice assumes, directly it comes in contact with\npractical affairs, the form of the possessive instinct. And the\nattitude towards art of the \"collector\" or the leisured \"epicurean,\"\nfor whom it is merely a pleasant sensation among other sensations,\nis an attitude which undermines the basis of its life. The very\nessence of art is that it should be a thing common to all, within the\nreach of all, expressive of the inherent and universal nature of all.\nAnd that this is the nature of art is proved by the fact that art is\nthe personal expression of the personal centrifugal tendency in all\nliving souls; an expression which, when it goes far enough,\nbecomes _impersonal_, because, by expressing what is common to\nall, it reaches the point where the particular becomes the\nuniversal.\n\nIt thus becomes manifest that the true nature of art will only be\nincidentally and occasionally manifested, and manifested among\nus with great difficulty and against obstinate resistance, until the\nhour comes when, to an extent as yet hardly imaginable, the\ncentripetal tendency of the possessive instinct in the race shall\nhave relinquished something of its malicious resistance to the\nout-flowing force which I have named \"love.\" And this yielding of the\ncentripetal power to that which we call centrifugal can only take\nplace in a condition of human society where the idea of\ncommunism has been accepted as the ideal and, in some effective\nmeasure, realized in fact.\n\nFor every work of art which exists is the rhythmic articulation, in\nterms of any medium, of some personal vision of life. And the\nmore entirely \"original\" such a vision is, the more closely--such is\nthe ultimate _paradox_ of things--will it be found to approximate\nto a re-creation, in this particular medium, of that \"eternal vision\"\nwherein all souls have their share.\n\n\nCHAPTER VIII.\n\nTHE NATURE OF LOVE\n\nThe secret of the universe, as by slow degrees it reveals itself to\nus, turns out to be personality. When we consider, further, the\nform under which personality realizes, itself, we find it to consist\nin the struggle of personality to grapple with the objective\nmystery. When, in a still further movement of analysis, we\nexamine the nature of this struggle between the soul and the\nmystery which surrounds the soul, we find it complicated by the\nfact that the soul's encounter with this mystery reveals the\nexistence, in the depths of the soul itself, of two conflicting\nemotions, the emotion of love and the emotion of malice.\n\nThe word \"love\" has been used so indiscriminately in its surprising\nhistory that it becomes necessary to elucidate a little the particular\nmeaning I give to it in connection with this ultimate duality. A\nstrange and grotesque commentary upon human life, these various\ncontradictory feelings that have covered their \"multitude of sins\"\nunder this historic name!\n\nThe lust of the satyr, the affectionate glow of the domestic\nhabitu\u00e9, the rare exalted passion of the lover, the cold, clear\nattraction of the intellectual platonist, the will to possession of the\nsex-maniac, the will to voluptuous cruelty of the sex-pervert, the\nmaternal instinct, the race-instinct, the instinct towards\nfetish-worship, the instinct towards art, towards nature, towards the\nultimate mystery--all these things have been called \"love\" that we\nshould follow them and pursue them; all these things have been\ncalled \"love\" that we should avoid them and fly from them.\n\nThe emotion of love in which we seem to detect the ultimate\ncreative force is not precisely any of these things. Of all normal\nhuman emotions it comes nearest to passionate sympathy. But it is\nmuch more than this. The emotion of love is not a simple nor an\neasily defined thing. How should it be that, when it is one aspect\nof the outpouring of the very stuff of the soul itself? How should it\nbe that when it is the projection, into the heart of the objective\nmystery, of the soul's manifold and complicated essence?\n\nThe best definition of love is that it is the creative apprehension of\nlife, or of the objective mystery, under the form of an eternal\nvision. At first sight this definition might seem but a cold and\nintellectual account of love; an account that has omitted all\nfeeling, all passion, all ecstasy.\n\nBut when we remember that what we call \"the eternal vision\" is\nnothing less than the answer of love to love, nothing less than the\nreciprocal rhythm of all souls, in so far as they have overcome\nmalice, with one another and with the mystery which surrounds\nthem, it will be seen that the thing is something in which what we\ncall \"intellect\" and what we call \"feeling\" are both transcended.\nLove, in this sense, is an ecstasy; but it is an ecstasy from which\nall troubling, agitating, individual exactions have been obliterated.\nIt is an ecstasy completely purged of the possessive instinct. It is\nan ecstasy that brings to us a feeling of indescribable peace and\ncalm. It is an ecstasy in which our personal self, in the fullest\nrealization of its inmost identity, loses itself, even at the moment\nof such realization, in something which cannot be put into\nwords. At one moment our human soul finds itself harassed by a\nthousand vexations, outraged by a thousand miseries. Physical\npain torments it, spiritual pain torments it; and a great darkness\nof thick, heavy, poisonous obscurity wraps it round like a\ngrave-cloth. Then, in a sudden movement of the will, the soul cries\naloud upon love; and in one swift turn of the ultimate wheel, the\nwhole situation is transformed.\n\nThe physical pain seems to have no longer any hold upon the soul.\nThe mental misery and trouble falls away from it like an\nunstrapped load. And a deep, cool, tide--calm and still and full of\ninfinite murmurs--rolls up around it, and pours through it, and\nbrings it healing and peace. The emotion of love in which\npersonality, and therefore in which the universe, finds the secret of\nits life, has not the remotest connection with sex. Sexual passion\nhas its place in the world'; but it is only when sexual passion\nmerges itself in the sort of love we are now considering that it\nbecomes an instrument of real clairvoyance.\n\nThere is a savage instinct of cruel and searching illumination in\nsexual passion, but such an instinct is directed towards death\nrather than towards life, because it is dominated, through all its\nmasks and disguises, by the passion of possession.\n\nLike the passion of hate, to which it is so closely allied, sexual\npassion has a kind of furious intensity which is able to reveal\nmany deep levels of human obliquity. But one thing it cannot\nreveal, because of the strain of malice it carries with it, and that is\nthe spring of genuine love. \"Like unto like\" is the key to the\nsituation; and the deeper the clairvoyance of malice digs into the\nsubterranean poison of life, the more poison it finds. For in finding\npoison it creates poison, and in finding malice it doubles malice.\n\nThe great works of art are not motivated by the clairvoyance of\nmalice; they are motivated by the clairvoyance of love. It is only\nin the inferior levels of art that malice is the dominant note; and\neven there it is only effective because, mixed with it, there is an\nelement of destructive hatred springing from some perversion of\nthe sexual instinct. Whatever difficulty we may experience in\nfinding words wherewith to define this emotion of love, there is\nnot one of us, however sceptical and malign, who does not\nrecognize it when it appears in the flesh. Malice displays its\nrecognition of it by a passion of furious hatred; but even this\nhatred cannot last for ever, because in every personality that exists\nthere must be a hidden love which answers to the appeal of love.\n\nThe feeling which love has, at its supreme moments, is the feeling\nof \"unity in difference\" with all forms of life. Love may\nconcentrate itself with a special concentration upon one person or\nupon more than one; but what it does when it so concentrates itself\nis not to make an alliance of \"attack and defence\" with the person\nit loves, but to flow outwards, through them and beyond them,\nuntil it includes every living thing. Let it not, however, be for a\nmoment supposed that the emotion of love resembles that vague\n\"emotion of humanity\" which is able to satisfy itself in its own\nremote sensationalism without any contact with the baffling and\ndifficult mystery of real flesh and blood.\n\nThe emotion of love holds firmly and tightly to the pieces and\nfragments of humanity which destiny has thrown in its way. It\ndoes not ask that these should be different from what they are,\nexcept in so far as love inevitably makes them different. It accepts\nthem as its \"universe,\" even as it accepts, without ascetic dismay,\nthe weakness of the particular \"form of humanity\" in which it\nfinds _itself_ \"incarnated.\"\n\nBy gradual degrees it subdues these weaknesses of the flesh,\nwhether in its own \"form\" or in the \"form\" of others; but it is quite\ncontrary to the emotion of love to react against such weaknesses of\nthe flesh with austere or cruel contempt. It is humorously\nindulgent to them in the form of its own individual \"incarnation\"\nand it is tenderly indulgent to them in the form of the \"incarnation\"\nof other souls.\n\nThe emotion of love does not shrink back into itself because in the\nconfused pell-mell of human life the alien souls which destiny has\nchosen for its companions do not satisfy, in this detail or the other\ndetail, the desire of its heart. The emotion of love is always\ncentrifugal, always outflowing. It concentrates itself upon this\nperson or the other person, as the unaccountable attractions of\nlikeness and difference dictate or as destiny dictates; but the\ndeepest loyalty of love is always directed to the eternal vision; for\nin the eternal vision it not only becomes one with all living souls\nbut it also becomes one--though this is a high and difficult\nmystery--with all the dead that have ever loved and with all the\nunborn that will ever love. For the apprehension of the eternal\nvision is at once the supreme creation and the supreme discovery\nof the soul of man; and not of the soul of man alone, but of all\nsouls, whether of beasts or plants or demi-gods or gods, who fill\nthe unfathomable circle of space.\n\nThe secret of this kind of love, when it comes to the matter of\nhuman relationships, may perhaps best be expressed in those\nwords of William Blake which imply the difficulty which love\nfinds in overcoming the murderous exactions of the possessive\ninstinct and the cruel clairvoyance of malice. \"And throughout all\neternity, I forgive you: you forgive me: As our dear Redeemer\nsaid--This is the wine: this is the bread.\"\n\nThis \"forgiveness\" of love does not imply that love, as the old\nsaying runs, is \"blind.\" Love sees deeper than malice; for malice\ncan only recognize its own likeness in everything it approaches. It\nmust be remembered too that this process of laying bare the faults\nof others is not a pure process of discovery. Like all other forms of\napprehension it is also a reproduction of itself. The situation, in\nfact, is never a static one. These \"faults\" which malice, in its\nreproductive \"discoveries\" lays bare, are not fixed, immobile,\ndead. They are organic and psychic conditions of a living soul.\nThey are themselves in a perpetual state of change, of growth, of\nincrease, of withering, of fading. They are affected at every\nmoment by the will and by the emotion of the subject of them.\nThey project themselves; they withdraw themselves. They dilate;\nthey diminish. Thus it happens that at the very touch of this\n\"discovering,\" the malice which is thus \"discovered\" dilates with\nimmediate reciprocity to meet its \"discoverer\"; and this can\noccur--such is the curious telepathic vibration between living\nthings--without any articulate act of consciousness.\n\nThe art of psychological investigation is therefore a very\ndangerous organ of research in the hands of the malicious; for it\ngoes like a reproductive scavenger through the field of human\nconsciousness increasing the evil which it is its purpose to collect.\nThe apostolic definition of \"charity\" as the thing which \"thinketh\nno evil\" is hereby completely justified; and the profound Goethean\nmaxim, that the way to enlarge the capacities of human beings is\nto \"assume\" that such capacities are larger than they really are, is\njustified also.\n\nMalice naturally assumes that the \"faults\" of people are \"static,\"\nimmobile, and unchanging. It assumes this even in the very act of\nincreasing these faults. For the I static and unchanging is precisely\nwhat malice desires and seeks to find; for death is its ideal; and,\nshort of pure nothingness, death is the most static thing we know.\n\nLove is not blind or fooled or deluded when it waives aside the\nfaults of a person and plunges into the unknown depths of such a\nperson's soul. It is not blind, when, in the energy of the creative\nvision, such faults subside and fall away and cease to exist. It is\ncompletely justified in its declaration that what it sees and feels in\nsuch a person is a hidden reservoir of unsatisfied good. It does see\nthis; it does feel this; because there arises, in answer to its\napproach, an upward-flowing wave of its own likeness; because in\nsuch a person's inmost soul love, after all, remains the creative\nimpulse which is the life of that soul and the very substance of that\nsoul's personality.\n\nThe struggle between the emotion of love and the emotion of\nmalice goes on perpetually, in the depths of life, below a thousand\nshifting masks and disguises. What we call the \"universe\" is\nnothing but a congeries of innumerable \"souls,\" manifested in\ninnumerable \"bodies,\" each one confronted by the objective\nmystery, each one surrounded by an indescribable ethereal\n\"medium.\"\n\nWhat we call the emotion of love is the outflowing of any one of\nthese souls towards the body and soul of any other, or again, in a\nstill wider sense, towards all bodies and souls covered by the\nunfathomable circle of space.\n\nI will give a concrete example of what I mean. Suppose a man to\nbe seated in the yard of a house with a few patches of grass in\nfront of him and the trunk of a solitary tree. The slanting sunshine,\nwe will suppose, throws the shadows of the leaves of the tree and\nthe shadows of the grass-blades upon a forlorn piece of trodden\nearth-mould or dusty sand which lies at his feet. Something about\nthe light movement of these shadows and their delicate play upon\nthe ground thrills him with a sudden thrill; and he finds he \"loves\"\nthis barren piece of earth, these grass-blades, and this tree. He does\nnot only love their outward shape and colour. He loves the \"soul\"\nbehind them, the \"soul\" that makes them what they are. He loves\nthe \"soul\" of the grass, the \"soul\" of the tree, and that dim,\nmysterious, far-off \"soul\" of the planet, of whose \"body\" this\nbarren patch of earth is a living portion.\n\nWhat does this \"love\" of his actually imply? It implies an\noutflowing of the very stuff and substance of his own towards the\nthing he loves. It implies, by a mysterious vibration of reciprocity,\nan indescribable response to his love from the \"soul\" of the tree,\nthe plant, and the earth. Let an animal enter upon the scene, or a\nbird, or a windblown butterfly, or a flickering flight of midges or\ngnats, their small bodies illumined by the sun. These new comers\nhe also loves; and is obscurely conscious that between their\n\"souls\" and his own there vibrates a strange reciprocity. Let a\nhuman being enter, familiar or unfamiliar, and if his will be set\nupon \"love,\" the same phenomenon will repeat itself, only with a\nmore conscious interchange.\n\nBut what of \"malice\" all this time? Well! It is not difficult to\nindicate what \"malice\" will seek to do. Malice will seek to find its\naccount in some physical or mental annoyance produced in us by\neach of these living things. This annoyance, this jerk or jolt to our\nphysical or mental well-being, will be what to ourselves we name\nthe \"fault\" of the offending object.\n\nThe shadows will tease us by their incessant movement. The tree\nwill vex us by the swaying of its branches. The grass will present\nitself to us as an untidy intruder. The barren patch of earth will fill\nus with a profound depression owing to its desolate lack of life and\nbeauty. The dog will worry us by its fuss, its solicitation, its desire\nto be petted. The gnats or midges will stir in us an indignant\nhostility; since their tribe have been known to poison the blood of\nman. The human invader, above all; how loud and unpleasing his\nvoice is! The eternal malice in the depths of our soul pounces upon\nthis tendency of grass to be \"a common weed,\" of gnats to bite, of\ndogs to bark, of shadows to flicker, of a man to have an evil\ntemper, of a woman to have an atrocious shrewishness, or an\nappalling sluttishness; and out of these annoyances or \"faults\" it\nfeeds its desire; it satisfies its necrophilistic lust; and it rouses\nin the grass, in the earth, in the tree, in the dog, in the human\nintruder, strange and mysterious vibrations of response which add\nto the general poison of the world. But the example I have selected\nof the activity of emotion may be carried further than this. All\nthese individual \"souls\" of human, animal, vegetable, planetary\nembodiment, are confronted by the same objective mystery and\nsurrounded by the same ethereal \"medium.\"\n\nBy projecting a vision poisoned by malice into the matrix of the\nobjective mystery, the resultant \"universe\" becomes itself a\npoisoned thing, a thing penetrated by the spirit of evil. It is\nbecause the universe is always penetrated by the malice of the\nvarious visions whose \"universe\" it is, that we suffer so cruelly\nfrom its ironic \"diablerie.\" A universe entirely composed of the\nbodies and souls of beings whose primordial emotion is so largely\nmade up of malice is naturally a malicious universe. The age-old\ntradition of the witchery and devilry of malignant Nature is a proof\nas to how deep this impression of the system of things has sunk.\nCertain great masters of fiction draw the \"motive\" of their art from\nthis unhappy truth.\n\nAnd just as the universe is penetrated through and through by the\nmalice of those whose universe it is, so we may suppose that the\nethereal \"medium\" which surrounds all souls, before they have\nvisioned their various \"universes\" and found them to be one, is a\nthing which also may be affected by malice. It is an open question\nand one which, in the words of Sir Thomas Browne, \"admits a\nwide solution,\" whether or not this ethereal \"medium,\" which in a\nsense is of one stuff both with the objective mystery and with the\nsubstratum of the soul, is itself the \"elemental body,\" as it were, of\na living ubiquitous soul.\n\nIf this should be the case--and it is no fantastic hypothesis--we are\nthen provided with an explanation of the curious malignant\nimpishness of those so-called \"elementals\" who tease, with their\nenigmatic oracles, the minds of unwise dabblers in \"psychic\nmanifestations.\"\n\nBut what we are concerned with noting now is that just as the\nprimordial malice of all the souls it contains continually poisons\nthe universe, so the primordial love of all the souls it contains\ncontinually redeems and transforms the universe. In other words it\nis no exaggeration to say that the unfathomable universe is\ncontinually undergoing the same ebb and flow between love and\nmalice, as are the souls and bodies of all the living things whereof\nit is composed.\n\nAnd what precisely is the attitude of love towards the physical\nbody? Does it despise the physical body? Does its activity imply\nan ascetic or a puritanical attitude towards the body and the\nappetites of the body? The truth is quite the contrary of this. What\nthe revelation of the complex vision indicates is that this loathing\nof the body, this revulsion against the body, this craving to escape\nfrom the body, is a mood which springs up out of the eternal\nmalice. It is from the emotion of love in its attitude to the body\nthat we arrive at the idea of the sacredness of the body and at the\nidea of what might be called \"the eternal reality of the body.\"\n\nThis idea of the eternal reality of the body springs directly from\nthose ideas of truth, beauty and goodness which are pre-existent in\nthe universe and therefore springs directly from that emotion of\nlove which is the synthesis of these.\n\nThe forms and shapes of stars and plants and rivers and hills are\nall realized and consummated in the form and shape of the human\nbody. The magic of the elements, the mystery of earth and air and\nwater and fire, are incarnated in this miracle of flesh and blood. In\nthe countenance of a human child, in the countenance of a man or\na woman, the whole unfathomable drama of life is expressed. The\nmost evil of the children of men, asleep or dead, has in his face\nsomething more tragic and more beautiful than all the waters and\nall the land.\n\nNot to \"love\" flesh and blood, not to will the eternal existence of\nflesh and blood, is not to know \"love\" at all. To loathe flesh and\nblood, to will the annihilation of flesh and blood, is to be a victim\nof that original \"motiveless malignity\" which opposes itself to the\ncreative force.\n\nThis insistence upon \"the eternal idea of the body\" does not\nnecessarily limit \"the idea of the body\" to the idea of the human\nbody; but practically it does so. And it practically does so because\nthe human body evidently incarnates the beauty and the nobility of\nall other forms and shapes and appearances which make up our\nexisting universe.\n\nThere may be other and different bodies in the unfathomable\nspaces of the world; but for those among us who are content to\ndeal with the actual experiences which we have, the human body,\nsumming up the magical qualities of all other terrestrial forms and\nshapes, must, as far as we are concerned, remain our permanent\nstandard of truth and beauty.\n\nThe substitution in art, in philosophy, and in religion, of other\nsymbols, for this natural and eternal symbol of the human body is\nalways a sign of a weakening of the creative impulse. It is a sign\nof a relative disintegration of the power of \"love\" and a relative\nconcentration of the power of \"malice.\" Thus when, by an abuse of\nthe metaphysical reason, \"thought-in-the-abstract\" assumes the\nrights of a personality the principle of love is outraged, because\nthe eternal idea of the body is denied.\n\nAnd when, by an abuse of the psychological reason, the other\nactivities of the soul are so stressed and emphasized that the\nattribute of sensation is forgotten, the principle of love is outraged,\nbecause the eternal idea of the body is denied. The principle of\nlove, by the necessity of its own nature, demands that the\nphysiological aspect of reality should retain its validity.\n\nWhen, therefore, we come to consider the relation of this \"eternal\nidea of the body\" to those invisible \"sons of the universe\" whose\npower of love is inconceivably greater than our own, we are\ncompelled, by the necessity of the complex vision, to encounter\none of those ultimate dilemmas from which there appears to be no\nescape. The dilemma to which we are thus led may be defined in\nthe following manner.\n\nBecause the secret of the universe and the ultimate harmony\nbetween the pre-existent ideas by which all souls must live can be\nnothing less than what, in this rarified and heightened sense, we\nhave named \"love\" and because the objective pattern and standard\nof this love is the creative energy of those personal souls we have\nnamed \"the sons of the universe,\" therefore \"the sons of the\nuniverse\" must be regarded as directing their desire and their will\ntowards what satisfies the inherent nature of such love. And\nbecause the inherent nature of such love demands nothing less\nthan the eternalizing of the idea of flesh and blood, therefore the\n\"sons of the universe\" must be regarded as directing their desire\nand their will towards the eternalizing of the idea of flesh and\nblood.\n\nAnd just as the will and desire of these \"invisible companions of\nmen\" must be regarded as directed towards the eternalizing of this\nidea whose magical \"stuff of dreams\" is one of the objects of their\nlove, so the will and desire of all living souls must be directed\ntowards the eternalizing of this same reality. And because the love\nof all living souls remains restless and unsatisfied when directed to\nany object except the \"eternal vision\" and because when directed\nto the \"eternal vision\" such love loses the misery of its craving and\nbecomes satisfied, therefore the \"eternal vision\" must be regarded\nas the only object which can ultimately and really satisfy the\neternal restlessness of the love of all living souls.\n\nBut the inherent nature of love demands, as we have seen, the\npermanent reality of the physiological aspect of the universe. That\nis to say, the inherent desire of the love of all living souls is\ndirected towards the eternalizing of the idea of flesh and blood.\nFrom this it follows that since the \"eternal vision\" satisfies the\ndesire of love \"the eternal vision\" must include within it the\neternal idea of the body.\n\nBoth \"the sons of the universe,\" therefore, and all other living\nsouls are compelled, in so far as they give themselves up to the\ncreative energy, to direct their will towards the eternalization of\nthis idea. But is there not an inevitable frustration and negation of\nthis desire and this will?\n\nAre not both the \"companions of men\" and men themselves denied\nby the very nature of things the realization of this idea? Is not the\nlove of man for \"the sons of the universe\" frustrated in its desire in\nso far as \"the sons of the universe\" cannot be embodied in flesh\nand blood? And is not the love of \"the sons of the universe\" for\nman frustrated in its desire in so far as the physical form of each\nindividual soul is destroyed by death?\n\nIt seems to me that this dilemma cannot be avoided. Love insists\non the eternity of the idea of the body. Therefore every soul who\nloves \"the sons of the universe\" desires their incarnation. But if\n\"the sons of the universe\" could appear in flesh and blood for the\nsatisfaction of any one of their lovers, all other souls in the wide\nworld would lose them as their invisible companions. But although\nthis dilemma cannot in its literal outlines be avoided, it seems that\nthe same inherent nature of love which leads to this dilemma leads\nalso to the vanishing point or gap or lacuna in thought where the\nsolution, although never actually realized, may conceivably exist.\n\nWhat love desires is the eternalizing of the idea of flesh and blood.\nIt desires this because the idea of flesh and blood is a necessary\naspect of the fulness and completeness of personality. But though\nthe idea of flesh and blood is a necessary aspect of personality,\nevery actual incarnation of personality leaves us aware that the\nparticular soul we love has something more of beauty and nobility\nthan is expressed.\n\nThis \"something more\" is not a mere hypothetical quality but is an\nactual and real quality which we must assume to exist in the very\nstuff and texture of the soul. It exists, therefore, in that\n\"vanishing-point of sensation,\" as I called it, which we have to think\nof, although we cannot define it, as constituting the soul's essential\nself. Those pre-existed ideas which find their synthesis in the\nemotion of love are undoubtedly part of the unfathomable\nuniverse. But they are this only because they are interwoven\nwith the unfathomable soul which exists in each of us. The\n\"something,\" therefore, which is the substratum of the soul and its\ncentre of identity is a thing woven out of the very stuff of these\nideas.\n\nThis is the \"vanishing point of sensation\" to which I have referred,\nthe point namely where what we call \"mind\" blends indissolubly\nwith what we call \"matter.\" The emotion of love which desires the\neternalization of the idea of flesh and blood would be on the way\nto satisfaction, even if it never altogether reached it, if it were able\nto feel that this beauty and nobility and reality which exist in this\n\"vanishing point of sensation\" which is the very self of the soul\nwere actually the living essence of flesh and blood, were, in fact, a\nreal \"spiritual body,\" of which the material body was the visible\nexpression.\n\nIt is the inherent nature of love itself, with its craving for reality,\nwhich leads us to the verge of this conception; and although this\nconception can never, as we have seen, become more than a\n\"vanishing-point of sensation\" we have at least the satisfaction of\nknowing that if we were able to define the thing more clearly it\nwould cease at once to be the object of love; because it would\ncease to be that mysterious fusion of \"mind\" and \"matter\" which it\nis the nature of love to crave.\n\nWithout the necessity then that these immortal ones whom I call\nthe \"sons of the universe\" should satisfy the love of human souls\nby any physical incarnation, they may be considered as leading\nsuch love upon the true way by simply being what they are; that is\nby being living souls. For, as living souls, they also must possess\nas the centre of their being, a \"spiritual body,\" or fusion-point of\n\"mind\" and \"matter,\" which is the inner reality of flesh and blood.\n\nThis \"spiritual body\" of \"the gods\" or the \"sons of the universe\"\nmust necessarily be more noble and more beautiful than any\nvisible embodiment of them could possibly be; though human\nimagination and human art have a profound right to attempt to\nvisualize such an impossible embodiment; and the purest and most\nnatural form of \"religion\" would be the form which struggled most\nsuccessfully to appropriate such a visualization.\n\nAnd just as the human soul can satisfy something, though not all,\nof its desire for the eternalizing of flesh and blood in the \"spiritual\nbodies\" of these \"invisible companions,\" so the gods can\nthemselves satisfy something, though not all, of their love for the\nindividual soul in the reality of the soul's \"spiritual body.\"\n\nAll this may carry to certain minds an ambiguous and even\ndistasteful association; but I think it will only do so to such minds\nas are reluctant to analyse, to the furthest limit, their own capacity\nfor the kind of \"love\" I have attempted to describe; and possibly\nalso such minds as are debarred, by some sub-conscious element\nof \"malice\" in them, from even desiring to develop such a\ncapacity.\n\nThe ambiguity and unsatisfactory vagueness in what I have been\nattempting to indicate may perhaps be in a measure dissipated by a\ndirect appeal to concrete experience. When one analyses this\nemotion of love in relation to any actual human object I think it\nbecomes clear that in our attitude to the physical body of the\nperson we love there is a profound element of pity.\n\nThe sexual emotion may destroy this pity; and any emotion which\nis sensual as well as sexual may not only destroy it but turn it into\na very different kind of pity; into the \"pity,\" namely, of a torturer\nfor his victim. But I feel I am not wrong in my analysis of the kind\nof \"love\" I have in my mind, when I say that the element of pity\nenters profoundly into our attitude towards the body of the person\nwe love.\n\nIt enters into it for this reason; namely because the physical body\nof the person we love does so inadequately and so imperfectedly\nexpress the beauty of such a person's soul. \"Love is not love\"\nwhen the blemishes and defects and maladies of the physical form\nof the person loved interfere with our love and cause it to\ndiminish. And such blemishes and defects and maladies _would_\ninterfere with love if love were not in its essence profoundly\npenetrated by pity.\n\nIt may be asked--\"how can love, which is naturally associated with\nbeauty and nobility, endure for a moment in the presence of such\nlamentable hideousness and repulsiveness and offensiveness, as\nexists in some degree in the physiological aspects of us all?\" It is\nable to endure because in the presence of this what it desires is, as\nI have said, not so much the actual physical body of the object of\nits love as the \"eternal idea\" of such a body.\n\nWhen the individual soul allows itself to demand with too\ndesperate a craving the actual incarnation of these \"sons of the\nuniverse\" it is in reality false to its desire for the \"eternal idea of\nthe body,\" because no actual incarnation of these immortal ones\ncould realize in any complete sense this \"eternal idea.\"\n\nIn the same way when we feel the emotion of love towards any\nhuman soul, our attitude towards the physical form of such a soul\nmust of necessity be profoundly penetrated by pity and by a tender\nand humorous recognition that such a physical form only\nexpresses a very limited portion of the unfathomable soul which\nwe love.\n\nIf, with a desperate craving to contradict the essential nature of\nlove, we insist upon regarding the physical body as the complete\nexpression of the soul, we fall into the same fatal weakness as that\ninto which those fall who demand a physical incarnation of the\n\"companions of men,\" and along with such as these we are false to\nlove's true craving for the \"eternal idea of flesh and blood.\"\n\nIn other words, this craving of love for \"the eternal idea of the\nbody\" does not imply that we are false to love when we are unable\nto change our natural repugnance in the presence of the repulsive\nand the offensive into attraction to these things. Love certainly\ndoes not mean a morbid attraction to what is unattractive. The\nsexual emotion, the emotion which we call \"being in love,\" does\nsometimes include this morbidity, just because, by reason of its\nphysiological origin, it tends to remain the slave of the\nphysiological. But although love does not imply a morbid\nattraction to the repulsive and the offensive, and although the\npresence of the repulsive and offensive in connection with those\nwe love is a proof to us that \"the eternal idea of the body,\" is not\nrealized in the actual body, it is clear that \"love is not love\" when\nit allows itself to be diminished or destroyed by the presence of\nthese things.\n\nWhat love really demands, both with regard to the universe and\nwith regard to any individual soul in the universe, is not so much\nthe retention of the physiological aspect of these things, _as we\nknow them now_, but of the physiological aspect of them implied\nin such a phrase as \"the eternal idea of matter\" or \"the eternal idea\nof flesh and blood.\"\n\nIt may be put still more simply by saying that what love demands\nis the existence of something in what we call \"matter\" or the\n\"body\" which guarantees the eternal reality of these aspects of life.\nIt does not demand that we should love the repulsive, the\noffensive, the false, or the evil, because these exist in the bodies\nand the souls of those we love.\n\nEverything in the universe partakes of the eternal duality. The\nhideous, the false and the evil are not confined to what we call\n\"mind\" but exist in what we call \"matter\" also. Consequently love,\nwhen in its craving for complete reality it demands \"the eternal\nidea of the body\" does not demand that this eternal idea should be\nrealized in any actual body.\n\nWhen a demand of this kind is made, it is not made by love but by\nthe sexual instinct, and it is invariably doomed to a ghastly\ndisillusion. For it is just this very craving, namely that in some\nactual human body \"the eternal idea of the body\" should be\nrealized, that the sweet and terrible madness of sexual love\ncontinually implies. But real love, the love which is the supreme\nsynthesis of those ideas which represent the creative power in the\nultimate duality, can never be disillusioned.\n\nAnd it cannot be disillusioned because it is able to see, beneath the\nchaotic litter and unessential debris of \"matter,\" the eternal idea of\n\"matter\" and because it is able to see, under the lamentable\nrepulsiveness and offensiveness of so much actual flesh and\nblood, \"the eternal idea of flesh and blood.\"\n\nLove's attitude toward this element of litter and chaos in the\nuniverse is sometimes an attitude of humorous toleration and\nsometimes an attitude of destructive fire. Love's attitude towards\nthe repulsive and the offensive in human souls and bodies is\nsometimes an attitude of humorous toleration and sometimes an\nattitude of destructive fire.\n\nBut along with this passion of destruction, which is so essential a\npart of the passion of creation, and along with this humorous\nindulgence, there necessarily mingles, where human beings are\nconcerned, an element of profound pity. The best concrete\nexample of the mood I am trying to indicate is the emotion which\nany one would naturally feel in the presence of some torturer or\ntyrant whom he had slain, or even whom he had surprised asleep.\nFor the prerogative of both sleep and death is that they obliterate\nthe repulsive elements of flesh and blood and set free its eternal\nidea.\n\nAnd this is true of death even after the ghastly process of chemical\ndissolution has actually begun. A loathing of matter as matter, a\nhatred and contempt for the body as the body, is therefore a\nmanifestation not of love but of the opposite of love. Such a\nloathing of the physiological is a sign of a weakening of the\ncreative energy. It is also a sign of the stiffening of the resistant\n\"malice,\" or \"motiveless malignity,\" which opposes creation. What\nthe energy of love directs its desire and its will towards, is first the\n\"eternal idea of the soul,\" the idea of the rhythmic harmony of\n\"mind\" and \"matter\" fused and lost in one another, and then \"the\neternal idea of the body,\" the idea of the rhythmic projection of\nthis invisible harmony upon the visible fabric of the world.\n\nThus we arrive at the only definition of the nature of love which is\nsatisfactory to the deepest moments of feeling experienced by the\nhuman soul. In such moments the soul gathers itself together on\nthe verge and brink of the unknown. Something beyond the power\nof our will takes possession then of all that we are. In our\nmomentary and transitory movement of the complex vision we are\npermitted to pass across the ultimate threshold.\n\nWe enter then that mysterious rhythm which I have called \"The\nEternal Vision\"; and in place of our desire for personal\nimmortality, in place of our desire for the possession of any person\nor thing, in place of our contemplation of \"forces\" and \"energies\"\nand \"evolution\" or \"dissolution,\" in place of our struggle for\n\"existence\" or for \"power,\" we become suddenly aware that in the\noutflowing and reciprocal inter-action of the emotion of love there\nis something that reduces all these to insignificance, something\nthat out of the very depths of the poisonous misery of the world\nand the irony of the world and the madness of the world utters its\ndefiant Rabelaisian signal, \"Bon espoir y gist au fond.\"\n\n\nCHAPTER IX.\n\nTHE NATURE OF THE GODS\n\nWe must now return to our original definition of the true\nphilosophical instrument of research in order to see if we can\nsecure from it a clearer notion as to the nature of the Gods. Such\nan instrument is, as we have seen, the apex-thought of the complex\nvision using all its attributes in rhythmic unison. For the complex\nvision using all its attributes in unison is only another name for the\nsoul using the body and using something more than the body.\n\nIf the soul could use no attributes except those given to it by the\nbody, it might, or it might not, arrive at the idea of the \"sons of the\nuniverse.\" It certainly could not enter into any relation with such\nimmortal beings. But since it has arrived at such a conception \"it is\nimpossible for it ever to fall entirely away from what it has\nreached.\" For the same unfathomable duality which gave birth to\nthe sons of the universe has given birth to men; and between these\ntwo, between the ideal figures who cannot perish and the\ngenerations of souls who for ever appear and for ever pass away\nthere is an eternal understanding. And the understanding between\nthese two depends upon the fact that they are both children of the\nsame unfathomable duality.\n\nBut this duality which is the cause why the universe is the universe\nand not something other than the universe, must remain as great a\nmystery to the souls of the \"companions of men\" as it is to all the\nsouls in the world who recognize them as their ideal.\n\nWe cannot escape the impression that this complex vision of\nours, which is our instrument of research and which leaves us in\nthe presence of an unfathomable duality, finds a parallel in the\ncomplex vision of the sons of the universe which is their\ninstrument of research and which leaves them also in the presence\nof an unfathomable duality. We cannot escape from the impression\nthat to these children of the eternal duality the mystery of this\nduality is as dark as it is to ourselves.\n\nThey find themselves struggling to overcome malice with love,\neven as we find ourselves struggling to overcome malice with\nlove. They find themselves driven to creation and destruction. The\ncomplex vision, which is their instrument of research, is baffled in\nthe same way as the complex vision which is our instrument of\nresearch.\n\nIf, therefore, in our desperate struggle with the unfathomable\nnature of this duality, we demand why it is that the gods have\nfailed, in spite of their love, to give us any clue to some ultimate\nreconciliation, the answer must be that such an ultimate\nreconciliation is as much beyond the reach of their vision as it is\nbeyond the reach of ours. The attainment of such a reconciliation\nwould seem to mean the absolute end of life as we know it and of\ncreation as we know it. Such a reconciliation would seem to mean\nnothing less than the swallowing up of the universe in unthinkable\nnothingness.\n\nThe truth is that in this ultimate revelation of the complex vision\nwe are confronted with an inevitable triad, or trinity, of primordial\naspects. We are compelled to think of a plurality of living souls\nof which our own is one; of certain ideal companions of all souls\nwhose vision gives to our vision its objective value; and of an\nexternal universe which is the creation of this vision.\n\nWhat the complex vision indicates, therefore, is a system of things\nwhich has a monistic aspect, for there is only one space and only\none succession of time; a pluralistic aspect, for the system of\nthings gives birth continually to innumerable individual souls; and\na dualistic aspect, for the universe itself is created by the struggle\nbetween love and malice.\n\nWhat the complex vision does not indicate is any ultimate\nprinciple which reduces this complex system of things to the\nunbroken mass of one integral unity. The nearest approach to such\nan unbroken, integral unity is to be found in that indefinable\n\"medium\" which makes it possible for the innumerable souls\nwhich compose the universe to communicate with one another and\nwith their invisible pre-existent companions. It is only the\nexistence of this indefinable medium which makes it possible for\nus to speak of a universe at all. For this medium is the objective\nground, or basis, so to say, from the midst of which each\nindividual vision creates its own universe, always appealing as it\ndoes so to that objective standard or pattern of truth offered by the\nvision of man's invisible companions. What we roughly and\nloosely call \"the universe\" or \"nature\" is therefore an accumulated\nprojection or creation of all the souls which exist, held together by\nthis pervading medium which enables them to communicate with\none another. In this eternal process of creating the universe by\ntheir united visions, all these souls must inevitably appeal,\nconsciously or unconsciously, to the vision of their pre-existent\ncompanions.\n\nThe best justification which can be offered for the expression\n_sons_ of the universe as applied to these invisible companions is\nto be found in the inevitable anthropomorphism of all human\nthought. The breaking point, so to speak, of man's vision, that\necstasy of comprehension which I call his apex-thought, is the\nmoment which makes him aware of these companions' existence.\nAnd, at this ecstatic moment, all individual souls find their\npersonality deepened to such a point that they feel themselves\npossessed of the very secret of the ultimate duality, feel\nthemselves to be, in fact, unfathomable personifications of that\nduality. And their intimation or vision with regard to the gods\npresents itself to them at that moment as the very nature and true\nbeing of the gods. Yet it must be remembered that this intimation\nis a thing which we reach only by pain and exquisite effort; is a\nthing, in fact, which is the culminating point of an elaborate and\ndifficult \"work of art\" requiring a rhythm and a harmony in our\nnature attained by no easy road.\n\nSince, therefore, the reality of these invisible companions though\nimplied in all our intercourse with one another, is only visualized\nas actual and authentic when our subjective vision is at its highest\npoint, and since when our subjective vision is at its highest point it\nconveys the sensation, rightly or wrongly, that what we call our\n\"universe\" is _their_ universe also, it is not without justification\nthat we use the anthropomorphic expression \"the sons of the\nuniverse\" to describe these invisible companions.\n\nThis expression, the sons of the universe, this idea of an objective\nstandard of all ideas, is something that we attain with difficulty\nand not something that we just pick up as we go along. The\n\"objective,\" in this sense, is the supreme attainment of the\n\"subjective.\" And although when we have found these companions\nthey become real and actual, we must not forget that, in the long\nprocess of escaping from the subjectivity of ourselves into the\nobjectivity of their existence, it was our own subjective vision\nwith the rhythmic ecstasy of its apex-thought which led us to the\nbrink of this discovery. Thus the expression \"the sons of the\nuniverse\" finds its justification. For they are the objective\ndiscovery, as well as the objective implication, of all our human\nand subjective visions. We and they together create the universe\nand together become the \"children\" of the world we create.\n\nAnd although the universe when thus created remains the creation\nof man, assisted by the gods, it now presents itself to us, in its\nacquired and attained objectivity, as a pre-existent thing which is\nrather our parent than our creation. This objective reality of it,\nwith the inevitable implication that it existed before we came on\nthe scene at all, and will exist after we have disappeared from the\nscene, is a truth towards which our subjective vision has led us,\nbut which, when once we reach it, seems to become independent\nof our subjective vision.\n\nHere again, therefore, in connection with the universe as in\nconnection with the gods, the creation of our subjectivity is found\nto be something independent of our subjectivity and something\nthat, all the while, has been implicit in the energy of our subjective\nvision. And precisely as the subjective vision of man creates the\ncompanions of men and then discovers them to be an objective\nreality, so the subjective vision of man creates the universe and\nthen discovers the universe to be an objective reality. And in both\ncases this discovering finds its justification in a recognition that\nthe idea of this resultant objectivity was implicit in the subjective\nenergy from the beginning. But the universe once created or\ndiscovered, is found to be the eternal manifestation of that ultimate\nduality which is the essence of our own souls and of the souls of\nthe immortals.\n\nIn no other way can we think of the objectivity of the universe; for\nin no other way can we think of ourselves. And because it is the\nevocation of that ultimate duality which is the very stuff and\ntexture of our creative vision, the universe becomes naturally the\nparent of man's invisible companions as it becomes the parent of\nman himself. And thus are we justified in speaking of these\nmysterious ones as the \"sons of the universe.\"\n\nIt is out of pain and grief that we arrive at the conception of the\nnature of the gods. \"Those who have not eaten their bread with\ntears, they know them not, the Heavenly Powers!\" Pain and\nsorrow, both physical and mental, seem to soften the porous shell,\nso to speak, of the human intelligence, seem to throw back certain\nshutter-like shards or scales with which it protects its malignant\nignorance.\n\nIt is when our loneliness becomes intolerable, it is when the\npoisonous teeth of the eternal malice in Nature have us by the\nthroat, it is when our malice rises up, in the miserable torture of\nhatred, to answer the malice of the system of things, that, out of\nthe depths, we cry to the darkness which surrounds us for some\nvoice or some signal that shall give us an intimation of help.\nMerely to know that our wretched pain is known to some one\nbesides ourselves is an incredible relief. Merely to know that some\nsort of superhuman being, even without special preoccupation\nwith human fate, can turn an amused or an indulgent clairvoyance\ntowards our wretchedness, can \"note\" it with dispassionate\nsympathy, as we note the hurts of animals or plants, is a sort of\nconsolation. It is a relief to know that what we feel when we are\nhurt to the breaking-point is not absolutely wasted and lost in the\nvoid, but is stored up in an immortal memory along with many\nother pains of the same kind. That cry, \"Only He do know what I\ndo suffer\" of the Wessex peasant is a cry natural to the whole\nhuman race. It is not that we ask to be confronted and healed by\nour immortal friend. We ask merely that our sorrows should not\nbe altogether drowned in the abyss as though they had never been.\nThere is a certain outrage about this annihilation of the very\nmemory of pain against which humanity protests.\n\nBut it is necessary at this point to beware of the old pathetic\nfallacy of human thought, the fallacy of assuming that to be true,\nwhich we desire to be true. What our complex vision reveals as to\nthe nature of the gods does not satisfy in any obvious or facile\nmanner this bitter need of humanity. If it did so satisfy it, then for\nsome profound and mysterious reason man's own aesthetic sense\nwould revolt against it, would indignantly reject it, as too smooth\nan answer to life's mystery.\n\nFor man's aesthetic sense seems in some strange way to be in\nleague with a certain inveterate tragedy in things, which no facile\noptimism can ever cajole or melt.\n\nThat the gods are aware of our existence can hardly be doubted. That\nthey feel pity for us, in this or that significant hour, can easily\nbe imagined. That the evil in us draws towards us what is evil in\nthem seems likewise a not unnatural possibility. That the love in\nus draws towards us the love in them is a thing in complete\naccordance with our own relation to forms of life lower than\nourselves. That even at certain moments the gods may, by a kind\nof celestial vampirizing, use the bodily senses of men to \"fill out,\"\nas it were, what is lacking in their own materiality, is a\nconceivable speculation.\n\nBut it is not in any definite relation between the individual soul of\nman and the individual soul of any one of the immortals that our\nhope lies. If this were all that we could look for, our condition\nwould be as miserable as the condition of those unhappy ones who\nseek intermittent and fantastic relief in attempted intercourse with\nthe psychic and the occult.\n\nOur hope lies in that immemorial and traditional human gesture\nwhich has, in the unique figure of Christ, gathered up and focussed,\nas it were, all the vague and floating intimations of super-human\nsympathy, all the shadowy rumours and intimations of super-human\nhelp, which move to and fro in the background of our apprehension.\n\nThe figure of Christ has thus become something more than a mere\nname arbitrarily given by us to some nameless god. The figure of\nChrist has become a symbol, an intermediary, a kind of cosmic\nhigh-priest, standing between all that is mortal and all that is\nimmortal in the world, and by means of the love and pity that is in\nhim partaking of the nature of every living thing.\n\nWhen, therefore, out of the bitterness of our fate we cry aloud\nupon the Unknown, the answer to our cry comes from the heart\nof Christ. In other words it comes from the epitome and\npersonification of all the love in the universe. For to the figure of\nChrist has been brought, down the long ages of the world, all the\nbaffled, thwarted, broken, unsatisfied love in every soul that has\never lived. It is in the heart of Christ that all the nameless sorrows\nand miseries, of the innumerable lives that Nature gives birth to,\nare stored up and remembered. Not one single pang, felt by plant\nor animal or bird or fish or man or planet, but is embalmed for\never in that mysterious store-house of the universal pity. Thus, if\nthere were no other superhuman Beings in the world and if apart\nfrom the creative energy of all souls Christ would never have\nexisted, as it is now He _does_ exist because He _has_ been\ncreated by the creative power of all souls.\n\nBut while in one sense the figure of Christ is the supreme work of\nart of the world, the culminating achievement of the anonymous\ncreative energy of all souls, the turning of the transitory into the\neternal, of the mortal into the immortal, of the human into the\ndivine; in another sense the figure of Christ is a real and living\npersonality, the one personality among the gods, whose nature we\nmay indeed assume that we understand and know.\n\nHow should we not understand it, when it has been in so large a\nmeasure created by our sorrow and our desire?\n\nBut the fact that the anonymous striving of humanity with the\nobjective mystery has in a sense created the figure of Christ does\nnot reduce the figure of Christ to a mere Ideal. As we have seen\nwith regard to the primordial ideas of truth, beauty, and goodness,\nnothing can be an Ideal which has not already, in the eternal\nsystem of things, existed as a reality.\n\nWhat we call the pursuit of truth, or the creation of truth, what we\ncall the pursuit of beauty or the creation of beauty, is always a\n_return_ to something which has been latent in the eternal nature\nof the system of things. In other words, in all creation there is a\nrediscovery, just as in all discovery there is creation.\n\nThe figure of Christ, therefore, the everlasting intermediary\nbetween mortality and immortality, has been at once created and\ndiscovered by humanity. When any living soul approaches the\nfigure of Christ, or cries aloud upon Christ out of the depths of its\nmisery, it cries aloud upon all the love that has ever existed in the\nworld. It enters at such a moment into definite communion with all\nthe suffering of all the dead and with all the suffering of all the\nunborn.\n\nFor in the heart of Christ all the dead are gathered up into\nimmortality, and all their pain remembered. In the heart of Christ\nall the unborn live already, in their pain and in their joy; for such\npain and such joy are latent in the ultimate duality of love and\nmalice, and in the heart of Christ this ultimate duality struggles\nwith such terrible concentration that all the antagonisms which the\nprocession of time evokes, all the \"moments\" of this abysmal\ndrama, in the past, in the present, in the future, are summed up and\ncomprehended in what that heart feels.\n\nThe ancient human doctrine of \"vicarious suffering,\" the doctrine\nthat upon the person of Christ all the sins and sorrows of the world\nare laid, is not a mere logical conclusion of a certain set of\ntheological axioms; but is a real and true secret of life, discovered\nby our most intimate experience.\n\nThe profoundest of all the oracles, uttered out of the depths, is that\nsaying of Jesus about the \"losing\" of life to \"save\" it. This \"losing\nof life\" for Christ's sake is that ultimate act of the will by which\nthe lusts of the flesh, the pride of life, the possessive instinct, the\nhatred of the body, the malice which resists creation, the power of\npride, are all renounced, in order that the soul may enter into that\nsupreme vision of Christ, wherein by a mysterious movement of\nsympathy, all the struggles of all living things are comprehended\nand shared.\n\nThus it is true to say that the object of life for all living souls is\nthe eternal vision. Towards the attainment of the eternal vision the\nlove in all living souls perpetually struggles; and against the\nattainment of the eternal vision the malice in all living souls\nperpetually struggles. We arrive, therefore, at the only adequate\nconception of the nature of the gods which the complex vision\npermits us.\n\nThe nature of the gods, or of the immortals, or, as I have preferred\nto call them, the sons of the universe, is a nature which\ncorresponds to our nature, even as our nature corresponds to the\nnature of animals or of plants. The ultimate duality is embodied in\nthe nature of the gods more richly, more beautifully, more terribly,\nin a more dramatic and articulate concentration, than it is\nembodied in our nature. Between us and the gods there must be a\nreciprocal vibration, as there is a reciprocal vibration between us\nand plants and beasts and oceans and hills. The precise nature of\nsuch reciprocity may well be left a matter for vague and\nunphilosophical speculation; because the important aspect of it, in\nregard to the mystery of life and the object of life, is not the\nmethod or manner of its functioning but the issue and the result of\nits functioning. And this issue and result of the reciprocity\nbetween mortal and immortal, between man and his invisible\ncompanions, is the eternal vision which they both share, the vision\nin which love attains its object.\n\nAnd the eternal vision, which was, and is, and is to come, is the\nvision in which Christ, the Intermediary between the transitory and\nthe permanent, contemplates the spectacle of the unfathomable\nworld; and is able to endure that spectacle, by reason of the\ncreative power of love.\n\n\nCHAPTER X.\n\nTHE FIGURE OF CHRIST\n\nIn considering the figure of that great Intermediary between\nmortality and immortality whom we have come to name Christ,\nthe question arises, in view of the historic existence of other\nworld-saviours, such as the Indian Buddha, whether it would not\nbe better to invent, out of our arbitrary fancy, some completely\nnew symbol for the eternal vision which should be entirely free\nfrom those merely geographical associations which have limited\nthe acceptance of this Figure to so much less than one-half of the\ninhabitants of our planet.\n\nThe question arises--can there be invented any concrete, tangible\nsymbol which shall appeal to every attribute of the complex vision\nand be an accumulated image of that side of the unfathomable\nduality from which we draw our ideas of truth, beauty, and\ngoodness?\n\nFor the complex vision itself I have projected my own arbitrary\nimage of an arrow-head of many concentrated flames; but when\nwe approach a matter as important as the choice of a symbolic\nimage for the expression of the ultimate synthesis of the good as\ncontrasted with the evil something very different from a mere\nsubjective fancy is required.\n\nIf it were possible for me, the present writer, to give myself up so\ncompletely to the creative spirit as to become suddenly inspired\nwith the true idea of such a symbolic image, even then my image\nwould remain detached, remote and individualistic. If it were\npossible for me to gather up, as it were, and to bring into focus all\nthe symbolic images used by all the supreme prophets and artists\nand poets of the world, my synthetic symbol, including all these\ndifferent symbols, would still remain remote and distant from the\nfeelings and experiences of the mass of humanity.\n\nBut the ideas of truth, beauty, goodness, together with that\nemotion of love which is their synthesis, are not confined to the\ngreat artists and prophets of the world. They are felt and\nexperienced by the common mass of humanity. They have indeed\nan even wider scope than this, since they exist in the depths of the\nsouls of the sons of the universe, and in the depths of that\nunfathomable universe whose objective reality depends upon their\nenergy. They have the widest scope which it is possible for the\ncomplex vision to grasp. Wherever time and space are, they are;\nand, as we have seen, time and space make up the ultimate unity\nwithin whose limits the drama of life proceeds.\n\nAlthough the universe depends for its objective reality upon the\nvision of the immortals and incidentally upon all the visions of all\nthe souls born into the world, it is not true to say that either the\nvision of the immortals or the visions of all souls, or even both of\nthese together, exhaust the possibilities of the universe and sound\nthe depths of its unfathomableness. The complex vision of man\nstops at a certain point; but the unfathomable nature of the\nuniverse goes on beyond that point. The complex vision, of the\nimmortals stops at a definite point; but the unfathomable nature of\nthe universe goes on beyond that point.\n\nIf it be asked, \"how can it be said that an universe, which depends\nfor its objective reality upon the complex vision, goes on beyond\nthe point where the complex vision stops?\" I would answer that\nthe complex vision does not only create reality; it discovers\nreality. There is always the primordial objective mystery outside\nthe complex vision; that objective mystery, or world-stuff, or\nworld-clay, out of which, in its process of half-creation and\nhalf-discovery, the complex vision evokes the universe.\n\nAnd although apart from the activity of the complex vision this\nprimordial world-clay or objective mystery is almost nothing\nbecause it is only of its bare existence that we are aware, yet it is\nnot altogether nothing, because it is, in a sense, the origin of\neverything we discover. When, therefore, we speak of the\nunfathomable as receding into depths beyond the point where the\nvision of man stops and beyond the point where the vision of the\nimmortals stops, we do not contradict the statement that the vision\nof man and the vision of the immortals create the universe. They\ncreate the universe in so far as they discover the universe; but the\nuniverse must be thought of as always capable of being further\ndiscovered and further created. Perhaps the most adequate way of\nputting the situation would be to image the objective mystery as a\nkind of colourless screen across which a coloured picture is slowly\nmoved. This coloured picture is the universe as we know it.\nWithout the white screen as a background there could be no picture.\nAll the colours of the picture are latent and potential in the\nwhiteness of the screen; but they require the focussed lime-light of\nthe magic-lantern to call them forth. The lantern from which the\nlight comes, half-creates, so to speak, and half-discovers the\nresultant colours.\n\nWhen we say, therefore, that the universe, although created by the\ncomplex vision, recedes into unfathomable depths beyond the\nreach of the complex vision, what we mean is that the boundary\nline between the moving colour-picture, which is the universe, and\nthe original whiteness of the screen across which the picture is\nmoved, which is the objective mystery, is capable of endless\nrecession. The blank whiteness of the part of the screen over\nwhich the picture has not yet moved is capable of revealing every\nkind of colour as soon as the focussed lime-light of the complex\nvision reaches it. The colours are in the whiteness of the screen as\nwell as in the lime-light which is thrown upon the screen; but\nneither the lantern which throws the light nor the screen upon\nwhich the light is thrown, can, in isolation from one another,\nproduce colour.\n\nThe universe, therefore, is half-created and half-discovered by the\ncomplex vision; and it may be said to go on beyond the point\nwhere the complex vision stops, although strictly speaking what\ngoes on beyond the stopping place of the complex vision is not the\nuniverse as we know it but a potential universe as we may come to\nknow it; a universe, in fact, which is at present held in suspense in\nthe unfathomable depths of the objective mystery.\n\nThis potential universe, this universe which will come into\nexistence as soon as the complex vision discovers it and creates it,\nthis universe across which gathers already the moving shadow of\nthe complex vision, is not a new universe but only an extension\ninto a further depth of the objective mystery, of the universe which\nwe already know.\n\nWe are not justified in saying of this objective mystery or of this\nwhite screen across which the colours will presently flow, that it is\noutside time and space. We are not justified in saying anything at\nall about it, except that it exists and that it lends itself to the\nadvance of the complex vision. If in place of a white screen we\ncould figure to ourselves this objective mystery as a mass of\nimpenetrable darkness, we should thus be able to envisage the\ncomplex vision as I have tried to envisage it, namely as a moving\narrow-head of focussed flames with the point of it, or what I have\nnamed the apex-thought of it, illuminating that mass of darkness\nwith all the colours of life.\n\nBut, as I have said, none of these subjective images can serve as\nthe sort of symbol we are in search of, because by reason of their\nbeing arbitrary and individualistic they lack the organic and\nmagical associations which cling round such symbols as have\nbecome objective and historical. We can content ourselves with\nsuch fanciful symbols as white screens and arrow-heads and\npyramids of fire in regard to the organ of our research and the\noriginal protoplasmic stuff out of which this organ of research\ncreates the world; but when it comes to the purpose of life and the\nmeaning of life, when it comes to that unfathomable duality which\nis the essence of life, we require for our symbol something that has\nalready gathered about it the whole desperate stream of life's tears\nand blood and dreams and ecstasies and memories and hopes.\n\nWe can find no symbol for the adversary of life, no symbol for the\nmalignant obscurantism and the sneering malice that resist\ncreation. To endow this thing which is in the way, this unfathomable\ndepth of spiritual evil, with the vivid and imaginative life\nof a symbolic image would be to change its inherent nature.\nNo adequate symbol can be found for evil, any more than a\ncomplete embodiment can be found for evil. Directly evil\nbecomes personal it ceases to be evil, because personality\nis the supreme achievement of life. And directly evil is expressed in\na living, objective, historic, mythological image it ceases to be\nevil, because such an image instantaneously gathers to itself some\npotency of creative energy. Evil is a positive thing, a spiritual\nthing, an eternal thing; but it is positive only in its opposition to\ncreation, in its corruption of the soul, and in its subtle undermining\nof the divine moments of the soul by the power of eternal\ndreariness and disillusion.\n\nWhat we need above everything is a symbolic image which shall\nrepresent the creative energy of life, the creative power of love,\nand those eternal ideas of truth and beauty and nobility which\nseem in some mysterious way derogated from, rendered less\nformidable and unfathomable, by being named \"the good.\"\n\nThe desire for a symbol of this kind, which shall gather together\nall the tribes and nations of men and all conflicting ideals of\nhumanity, is a desire so deep and universal as to be perhaps the\nsupreme desire of the human race. No symbol arbitrarily invented\nby any one man, even though he were the greatest genius that ever\nlived, could supply this want or satisfy this desire. And it could not\ndo so because it would lack the organic weathering and bleaching,\nso to speak, of the long panorama of time. An individual\ngenius might hit upon a better symbolic image, an image more\ncomprehensive, more inclusive, more appealing to the entire\nnature of the complex vision; but without having been subjected to\nthe sun and rain of actual human experience, without having\nendured the passion of the passing of the generations, such an\nimage would remain, for all its appropriateness, remote,\nintellectual and barren of magical suggestiveness.\n\nI do not mean to indicate that there is necessarily any determined\nor fatalistic process of natural selection in these things by which\none symbol rather than another gathers about it the hopes and fears\nof the generations. Chance no doubt plays a strange part in all this.\nBut the concrete necessities of living human souls play a greater\npart than chance; and without believing in any steady evolutionary\nprocess or even in any law of natural selection among the\nevocations of human desire, it must still remain that the symbol\nwhich survives will be the symbol adapted to the deepest instincts\nof complicated souls and at the same time palpable and tangible to\nthe touch of the crudest and most simple.\n\nIt cannot be denied that there are serious difficulties in the way of\nthe acceptance of any historic symbol, the anonymous evocation\nof the generations of men. Just because it has a definite place in\nhistory such a symbol will necessarily have gathered to itself much\nthat is false and much that is accidental and unessential. It will\nhave entered into bitter controversies. It will have been hardened\nand narrowed by the ferocious logic of rationalistic definition. It\nwill have been made the rallying cry of savage intolerances and\nthe mask for strange perversions. Evil will naturally have attached\nitself to it and malice will have left its sinister stain upon it.\nBecause chance and accident and even evil have had much to do\nwith its survival, it may easily happen that some primary attribute\nof the complex vision, such for instance as the aesthetic sense with\nits innate awareness of the humorous and the grotesque, will have\nbeen forgotten altogether in the stuff out of which it is made.\n\nConsidering such things, considering above all this final fact that it\nmay not satisfy every attribute of the complex vision, and may\neven completely suppress and negate some essential attribute, it\nremains still a perilous question whether it were not, after all,\nbetter to invent a new symbol that shall be deliberately adapted to\nthe entire complex vision, than to accept an already existing\nsymbol, which in the shocks and jolts and casualties, of history has\nbeen narrowed, limited and stiffened by the malice of attack and\ndefence.\n\nThis narrowing and hardening process by which such a symbol,\nthe anonymous creation of humanity under the shocks of circumstance,\nbecomes limited and inadequate, is a process frequently assisted\nby those premature and violent syntheses of the ultimate\ncontradiction which we name dogmatic religions. To make such\na symbol once more fluid and flexible, to restore it to its\nplace in the organic life of the soul, it is necessary to extricate it\nfrom the clutch of any dogmatic religion. I do not say that it is\nnecessary to extricate it from religion, or even from every aspect\nof dogma; for it is of the very essence of such symbol to be a\nstimulus to the religious ecstasy and there are many dogmas which\nare full of imaginative poetry.\n\nBut it is necessary to extricate it from dogmatic religion because\ndogmatic religion may be defined as a premature metaphysical\nsynthesis, masquerading beneath a system of imaginative ritual.\nThe truth of religion is in its ritual and the truth of dogma is in its\npoetry. Where a dogmatic religion becomes dangerous to any\nhuman symbol is when it tries to rationalize it and interpret it\naccording to a premature metaphysical synthesis. In so far as it\nremains purely symbolic and does not attempt to rationalize its\nsymbolism, a dogmatic religion must always contain within the\ncircle of its creed many profound and illuminating secrets. The\nfalse and ephemeral portion of a dogmatic religion is its\nmetaphysical aspect, because the whole science of metaphysics is\nan ambiguity from the start, since it is a projection of one isolated\nattribute of the complex vision.\n\nWhat the apex-thought of the complex vision does is to undermine\nmetaphysic; not by the use of metaphysic but by the use of the\nrhythmic totality of all the attributes of the soul. The philosophy of\nthe complex vision has its metaphysical, as it has its psychological\nand its physiological aspect, but its real starting point must\ntranscend all these, because it must emanate from personality. And\npersonality is something super-metaphysical; as it is something\nsuper-psychological, and super-physiological.\n\nThe creed of a dogmatic religion is not to be condemned because it\ncalls upon us to believe the impossible. Some sort of belief in the\nimpossible, some primordial act of faith is an essential part of the\nprocess of life and, without it, life could not continue. It is where\ndogmatic religion attempts to justify its belief in the impossible by\nthe use of metaphysical reason that we must regard it as an enemy\nof the truth of its own symbolism.\n\nThe supreme example of the evil and dangerous influence of\nmetaphysic upon religion is to be found in connection with that\ninscrutable nothingness behind the universe, and also behind the\nobjective mystery out of which the soul creates the universe. I\nrefer to that ambiguous and unbeautiful phantom, which has\nacquired for itself the name of \"the absolute,\" or the parent or first\ncause of life.\n\nThat the conception of \"the sons of the universe,\" to which certain\nbasic facts and experiences in regard to the intercourse between\nliving human souls has led humanity, is not a metaphysical\nconception, is proved by the fact that it is a conception of a reality\nexisting inside and not outside the ultimate unity of time and\nspace. Any pure metaphysical conception must, as we have seen,\nremain outside the categories of time and space, and remaining\nthere bear perpetual witness to its essential unreality.\n\nThe sons of the universe are living personal souls; and being this,\nthey must be, as all personalities are, super-metaphysical,\nsuper-psychological, and super-physiological.\n\nThe perilous choice between the invention of an arbitrary symbol\nwhich shall represent in its full complexity this idea of the sons of\nthe universe, and the acceptance of a symbol already supplied by\nthat chaotic mixture of accident and human purpose which we call\nhistory is a choice upon which more than we can imagine or\nsurmise may ultimately depend. It is necessary in all matters of\nthis kind, wherein the rhythmic totality of the complex vision is\ninvolved, to remain rigorous in our suppression of any particular\nusurpation of the whole field by any isolated attribute of the soul.\nIt is a most evil usurpation, for instance, an usurpation of which\nthe sinister history of dogmatic religion is full, when the\nconscience is allowed to introduce the conception of a \"duty,\" of\nan \"ought,\" of a \"categorical\" imperative, into such a choice as\nthis. There is no ought in philosophy. There is no ought in faith.\nAnd there can be, in no possible way, any ought of the usurping\nconscience, in regard to this choice of an appropriate symbol\nwhich shall represent a thing so entirely beyond the conception of\nany single attribute, as this eternal protagonist of the ultimate\nstruggle. The risk of choosing for our symbol a mere arbitrary\ninvention is that it should remain thin and cold and unappealing.\n\nThe risk of choosing for our symbol a form, a figure, a gesture, a\nname, offered us by history, is that it should carry with it too many\nof the false accretions of accident, chance, the passions of\ncontroversy and the hypocrisies of malice. But after all the\nanonymous creative spirit of the generations is so full of the\nwisdom of the earth and so involved with the rhythmic inspiration\nof innumerable souls, that it would seem better to risk the presence\nof certain sinister accretions, than to risk the loss of so much\nmagical suggestiveness.\n\nIf we do select for our symbol such a form, such a shape, such a\ngesture and such a name, as history may offer, we shall at any rate\nbe always free to keep it fluid and malleable and organic. We shall\nbe free to plunge it, so to speak, again and again into the living\nreality which it has been selected to represent. We shall be free to\nextricate it completely from all its accretions of chance and\ncircumstance and material events. We shall be free to extricate it\nfrom all premature metaphysical syntheses. We shall be free to\ndraw it from the clutches of dogmatic religion. We shall be free\nto make it, as all such symbols should be made, poetical\nand mythological and, in the aesthetic sense, shamelessly\nanthropomorphic. Above all we shall be completely free, since it\nrepresents for us those sons of the universe who are the\nembodiment of the creative energy, to associate it with every\naspect of the life of the soul. We shall be free to associate it with\nthose aspects of the soul which in the process of its slow invention\nby the generations have, it may be, been disassociated from it and\nseparated from it. We shall be free to use it as a symbol for the\nfuller, complete life of the future, and for every kind of revolt,\ninto which the spirit of creation may drive us, against the evil\nobscurantism and malicious inertness which resist the power of\nlove. The conclusion to which we are thus led, the choice which\nwe are thus compelled to make, is one that has been anticipated\nfrom the beginning. No other name except the name of Christ, no\nother figure except the figure of Christ, can possibly serve, if we\nare to make any use of history at all, as our symbol for the sons of\nthe universe.\n\nThe choice of Christ as our symbol for these invisible companions\ndoes not imply that we are forced to accept in their entirety the\nscriptural accounts of the life of Jesus, or even that we are forced\nto assume that the historic Jesus ever lived at all. The desire which\nthe soul experiences for the incarnation of Christ does not prove\nthat Christ has already been incarnated, or ever will be incarnated.\nAnd it does not prove this because, in the greater, nobler, and\nmore spiritual moods of the soul, there is no need for the\nincarnation of Christ. In these rare and indescribable moments,\nwhen the past and future seem annihilated and we experience the\nsensation of eternity, Christ is felt to be so close to us that no\nmaterial incarnation could make him any closer.\n\nThe association of Christ with the figure of Jesus is a sublime\naccident which has had more influence upon the human soul than\nany other historic event; and it must be confessed that the idea of\nChrist has been profoundly affected by this association. It has been\nso deepened and enlarged and clarified by it that the substitution\nof the religion of Jesus for the religion of Christ has been an\nalmost entirely fortunate event, since it has furnished the soul with\na criterion of the true nature of love which otherwise it might\nnever have gained.\n\nJesus undoubtedly came so much nearer than any other to the\nunderstanding of the nature of love, and consequently of the nature\nof \"the immortals,\" that the idea of the incarnation--that beautiful\nconcession to the weakness of the flesh--emanated with an almost\ninevitable naturalness from their association. Jesus himself felt in\nhis own soul the presence of the invisible companions; although he\nwas led, by reason of his peculiar religious bent, and by reason of\nthe influences that surrounded him, to speak of these companions\nas a \"heavenly father.\"\n\nBut the words of Jesus which carry with them the very magic of\ntruth are not the words in which he speaks of his \"father,\" but the\nwords in which he speaks of himself as if he were the very\nincarnation of Love itself. There is no doubt that the sons of the\nuniverse found in Jesus a soul so uniquely harmonious with\ntheir own that there existed between them a sympathy and an\nunderstanding without parallel in the history of humanity.\n\nIt is this sympathy which is the origin of those unequalled words\nused by the son of Mary in which he speaks as if he were himself\nin very truth an incarnation of the vision of the immortals. The\nwhole situation is one which need have little mystery for those\nwho understand the nature of love. In moment after moment of\nsupreme ecstasy Jesus felt himself so given up to the will of the\ninvisible companions that this own identity became lost. In\nspeaking for himself he spoke for them; in suffering for himself he\nsuffered for them, and in the great hours of his tragic wayfaring he\nfelt himself so close to them that, by reason of his love, he knew\nhimself able to speak of the secret of life even as the immortals\nthemselves would speak.\n\nWe are permitted indeed in reading the divine narrative to\ndistinguish between two moods in the soul of Jesus. In one of\nthese moods he refers to his \"father\" as if his father were distinct\nand separate from him and even very distant. In the other mood he\nspeaks as if he himself were in very truth a god; and were able,\nwithout any appeal to any other authority, to heal the wounds of\nthe world and to reveal to mankind the infinite pity of the love\nwhich is beyond analysis.\n\nIt is towards the words and gestures of the son of Mary, when he\nspoke of himself rather than of his \"father\" that we are inevitably\ndrawn, in our search for an adequate symbol for the eternal vision.\nIt is when he speaks with authority as if he himself were an\nimmortal god, as if he himself were one of the invisible\ncompanions, that his words and gestures carry the very breath and\nfragrance of truth.\n\nAs the drama of his life unfolds itself before us we seem to grow\nmore and more aware of these two aspects of his soul. It was his\nreason, brooding upon the traditions of his race, that led him into\nthat confusion of the invisible witnesses with the jealous tribal\nGod of his father David. It was the rhythmic harmony of his soul,\nrising up out of the depths of his struggle with himself, that led\nhim, in his passionate submission to the will of his invisible\nfriends, to feel as if he were identical with those friends, as if he\nwere himself the \"son of man\" and the incarnation of man's\nsupreme hope.\n\nIt is the emphasis laid by Jesus upon his identity with his \"father\"\nwhich has produced the tragic results we know. For although this\nwas the personal conception of the noblest of all human souls, it\nremains a proof of how much even the soul of Jesus was limited\nand restricted by the malicious power which opposes itself to love.\n\nThe living companions of men are as we have seen a necessary\nanswer to the craving of the complex vision for some objective\nstandard of beauty and reality, which shall give these things an\neternal unity and purpose. Such a vision is an answer to our desire\nthat the spirit of creative love, which is one side of the\nunfathomable duality, should be embodied in personality.\n\nAnd we have a right to use the name of Christ in this sense; and to\nassociate it with all that immortal anonymous company, so\nbeautiful, so pitiful, so terrible, which the name of \"_the gods_\"\nhas, in its turbulent and dramatic history, gathered about itself.\n\nThe idea of Christ is older than the life of Jesus; nor does the life\nof Jesus, as it has come down to us in ecclesiastical tradition,\nexhaust or fulfil all the potentialities latent in the idea of Christ.\nWhat the complex vision seems to demand is that the invisible\ncompanions of men should be regarded as immortal gods. If,\ntherefore, we throw all hesitancy and scruple aside and risk the\napplication of the name of Christ to this vision of the sons of the\nuniverse, then we shall be compelled to regard Christ as an\nimmortal God.\n\nThe fact that there must be some objective standard which shall\nsatisfy all the passionate demands of the complex vision is the\npath by which we reach this conception of Christ. But once having\nreached him he ceases to be a mere conception of the intellect, and\nbecomes an objective reality which we can touch and appeal to\nwith our emotion, our imagination, and our aesthetic sense.\nBut although Christ as our symbolic image of the invisible\ncompanions, must be assumed to be the objective standard of all\nour ideas of truth, it is obvious that we cannot escape from\nsubjectivity in our individual interpretation of his deeper and truer\nvision.\n\nThus there are two parallel streams of growth and change. There is\ngrowth and change in the soul of Christ as he continually\napproximates nearer and nearer to his eternally receding ideal.\nAnd there is growth and change in the accumulated harmony of\nour individual ideas about his ideal, as each human soul and each\ngeneration of human souls restates this ideal in terms of its own\nlimited vision.\n\nEach new restatement of this accumulated interpretation of the\nideal of the son of man brings necessarily with it an innate\nconviction of its truth because it finds an immediate response in\nevery individual soul in so far as such individual souls are able to\novercome their intrinsic evil or malice.\n\nWhat Jesus did for the universe was to recognize in it the peculiar\nnature of that love which is its essential life. He would have done\nyet more for it had he been able to disassociate his vision from the\nconception of an imaginary father of the universe and from his\ntraditional interest in the tribal god of his ancestors. But Jesus\nremains the one human soul who has revealed to us in his own\nsubjective vision the essential secret of the vision of the\nimmortals. And that he has done so is proved by the fact that all\nhis words and actions have come to be inextricably associated with\nthe Christ-idea.\n\nIn this way Jesus remains the profoundest of all human philosophers\nand the subtlest of all human psychologists; and although\nwe have the right to disassociate the Christ-idea from the\nsublime illusion of Jesus which led him to confuse the invisible\ncompanions of humanity with the tribal God of the Hebrews, we\nare compelled to recognize that Jesus has done so much for\nhumanity by the depth of his psychological insight that we do not\nexperience any shock when in the ritual of the Church the name of\nthe son of David becomes identical with the name of Christ.\n\nThe essential thing to establish is that there are greater depths in\nthe Christ-idea than even Jesus was able to fathom; and that\ncompared with the soul of Jesus or with the soul of any other man\nor god or spiritual entity, the figure of Christ has come now at last\nto be for humanity the only god we need; for he is the only god\nwhose love for all living things is beyond question and dispute,\nand whose existence is assumed and implied when any soul in the\nuniverse loves any other soul.\n\nIt is necessary then to do two things. To accept without reserve the\nvision which Jesus had as to the secret of love; because to nothing\nless than this does the love which we possess in our own souls\nrespond. And in the second place to be merciless and drastic, even\nat the risk of pain to the weakness of our human flesh, in\nseparating the personality of Christ, the immortal god, from the\nhistoric figure of the traditional Jesus. By doing these two things,\nand by this alone, we establish what the complex vision desires,\nupon a firm ground. For we retain what the vision of Jesus has\nrevealed to us as to the inherent nature of the invisible companions\nand we are saved from all controversy as to the historic reality of\nthe life of Jesus.\n\nIt does not matter to us whether Jesus \"really lived\"; or whether,\nlike other great figures, his personality has been created by the\nanonymous instinct of humanity. What matters to us is that\nhumanity itself, using the vision of Jesus as its organ of research\nor as the focus point of its own passionate clairvoyance has in\nsome way or another recognized that the secret of the universe is\nto be found in the unfathomable duality of love and malice. From\nthis point, now it has been once reached, the intrinsic nature of all\nhuman souls makes sure that humanity cannot go back. And it is\nbecause, either by his own sublime insight or by the accident and\nchance of history, the figure of Jesus has become associated with\nthe reality of the immortal gods that we are justified in using for\nour symbol of these sons of the universe no other name than the\nname of Christ.\n\nWe shall, however, be doing wrong to our conception of Christ, if,\nwhile recognizing that the kind of love, of which Jesus revealed\nthe secret, is the essence of Christ's soul, we refuse to find in him\nalso many aspects and attributes of life which occupy but little\nplace or no place at all in the traditional figure of Jesus.\n\nAll that is most beautiful and profound, all that is most magical\nand subtle, in the gods of the ancient world, must be recognized as\nexistent in the soul of Christ who is our true \"Son of the Morning.\"\nThe earth-magic of the ancient gods must be in him; and the\nTitanic spirit which revolted against such gods must be in him\nalso. The mystery of the elements must be interwoven with the\nvery stuff of his being and the unfathomable depths of Nature\nmust be a path for his feet. In him all mythologies and all religions\nmust meet and be transcended. He is Prometheus and Dionysus.\nHe is Osiris and Balder. He is the great god Pan. \"All that we have\nbeen, all that we are, and all that we hope to be, is centred in him\nalone.\" His spirit is the creative spirit which moves for ever upon\nthe face of the waters. In him all living souls find the object of\ntheir love. Against him the unfathomable power of evil struggles\nwith eternal demonic malice. In his own soul it struggles against\nhim; and in the universe which confronts him it struggles against\nhim. His inmost being is made up of the duality of this struggle\neven as is the inmost being of all that exists. If it were not for the\npresence of evil in him his passion of love would be as nothing.\nFor without evil there can be no good, and without malice there\ncannot be love. His soul and our human souls remain the ultimate\nreality. These alone are concrete, definite, actual and personal. All\nexcept these is ambiguous, half-real and unstable as water. These\nand the universe which they create are the true truth; and\ncompared with these every other \"truth\" is dubious, shadowy and\nunsubstantial.\n\nThese are the true truth, because these are personal; and we know\nnothing in life, and can know nothing, with the interior\ncompleteness with which we know personality. And the essence of\nthat interior knowledge with which we know personality is our\nrecognition of the unfathomable duality within ourselves. We\ncannot imagine the good in us as existing without the evil in us;\nand we cannot imagine the evil in us as existing without the good\nin us.\n\nAnd this ultimate essence of reality must apply to the soul of\nChrist. And this duality has no reconciliation except the\nreconciliation that it is a duality in ourselves and a duality in him.\nFor both the good and the evil in us recede into unfathomable\ndepths. So that the ultimate reality of the universe is to be found in\nthe two eternal emotions which perpetually contradict and oppose\none another; of which the only unity and reconciliation is to be\nfound in the fact that they both belong to every separate soul; and\nare the motive power which brings the universe into existence; and\nin bringing the universe into existence find themselves under the\ndomination of time and space.\n\nEvery individual soul in the world is composed of two unfathomable\nabysses. From the limitless depths of each of these emanates\nan emotion which is able to obsess and preoccupy the whole\nfield of consciousness. Every individual soul has depths,\ntherefore, which descend into unfathomable recesses; and we are\nforced into the conclusion that the unfathomable recesses in the\nsoul of Christ are subject to the same eternal duality as the souls of\nmen.\n\nEvery movement of thought implies an evocation of the opposing\npassion of these two emotions. For no movement of thought can\ntake place without the activity of the complex vision; and since\none of the basic attributes of the complex vision is divided into\nthese two primary emotions, we are compelled to conclude that it\nis impossible to think any thought at all without some evocation of\nthe emotion of love and some evocation of the emotion of malice.\n\nThe emotion of love is the power that brings together and\nsynthesizes those eternal ideas of truth and beauty and nobility\nwhich find their objective standard in the soul of Christ. The\nemotion of malice is the power that brings together and\nsynthesizes and harmonizes those eternal ideas of unreality and\nhideousness and evil with which the love of Christ struggles\ndesperately in the unfathomable depths of his soul. It matters to us\nlittle or nothing that we have no name to give to any among the\ngods except to this god; for in this god, in this companion of men,\nin this immortal helper, the complex vision of man finds all it\nneeds, the embodiment of Love itself.\n\nWe arrive, therefore, at the very symbol we desire, at the symbol\nwhich in tangible and creative power satisfies the needs of the\nsoul. We owe this symbol to nothing less than the free gift\nof the gods themselves; and to the anonymous strivings of\nthe generations. And once having reached this symbol, this\nname of Christ, the same phenomenon occurs as occurs in the\nestablishment of the real existence of the external universe.\n_That_, like this, was at first only a daring hypothesis, only a\nsupreme act of faith, reached by the subjective effort of the\ninnumerable individual souls. But once having been reached, it\nbecame, as this has become, a definite objective fact, whose reality\nturns out to have been implicit from the beginning.\n\nThus the name, the word, which we arrive at as the only possible\nsymbol of our hope is found to be, as soon as we reach it, no\nlonger merely a symbol but the outward sign of an invisible and\neternal truth. And thus although it remains that we are forced to\nrecognize that the world is full of gods and that the Person we\nname Christ is only one of an innumerable company of invisible\ncompanions to whom in our loneliness we have a right to turn, yet\njust because the vision of humanity has found in Christ a\ncompleter, subtler, more beautiful, more revolutionary figure upon\nwhich to fix its hope than it has found in Buddha or Confucius or\nMahomet, or any other name, the figure of Christ has become the\nsupreme and solitary embodiment of the Ideal to which we look,\nand about this figure has come to gather itself and focus itself all\nthe hopeless longing with which the soul of man turns to the souls\nof the immortals.\n\nThese divine people of the abyss, these sons of the universe, are\nfor us henceforth and must be now for us for ever summed up and\nembodied in this one figure, the only one among them all whose\nnature and being has been drawn so near to us that we can\nappropriate it to ourselves.\n\nIt remains that the unity of time and space contains an\nimmeasurable company of immortals; but of these immortals only\none has been articulated and outlined, and so to speak \"touched\nwith the hand,\" by the troubled passion of humanity. Henceforth,\ntherefore, while the necessity of the complex vision compels us to\nthink of the invisible company of the sons of the universe as a vast\nhierarchy of supernatural beings, the necessity of the complex\nvision compels us also to recognize, that of this company, only\none--only one until the end of time--can be the true symbol of\nwhat our heart desires.\n\nIt is better to think of the evocation of this figure as due to the pity\nof the gods themselves and to the anonymous craving of humanity\nthan to think of him as dependent upon the historic evidence as to\nthe personality of Jesus. The soul requires something more certain\nthan historic evidence upon which to base its faith. It requires\nsomething closer and more certain even than the divine \"logoi\"\nattributed to the historic Jesus. It requires a living and a personal\nsoul for ever present to the depths of its own nature. It requires a\nliving and a personal soul for ever ready to answer the cry of its\nlove. The misery and unhappiness, the restlessness and pain of all\nour human \"loves,\" is due to the fact that the only eternal response\nto Love as it beats its hands against the barriers set up against it,\nis the embodiment of Love itself as we feel it present with us in the\nfigure of Christ.\n\nThe love which draws two human souls together can only become\neternal and indestructible when it passes beyond the love of the\ntwo for one another into the love of both of them for the Lover\nwho is immortal. This merging of the love of human lovers into\nthe love of the immortal Lover does not imply the lessening or\ndiminishing of the love which draws them together. The nature of\nthis love cries out against their separation, cries out that they two\nshall become one. And yet if they actually and in very truth\nbecame one, that unity in difference which is the very essence of\nlove would be destroyed. But though they know this well enough\nthere still remains the desperate craving of the two that they\nshould become one; and this is of the very nature of love itself.\nThus it may be seen that the only path by which human lovers can\nbe satisfied is by merging their love for one another into their love\nfor Christ. In this way, in a sense profounder than mortal flesh can\nknow, they actually do become one. They become so completely\none that no power on earth or above the earth can ever separate\nthem. For they are bound together by no mortal link but by the\neternal love of a soul beyond the reach of death. Thus when one of\nthem comes to die the love which was of the essence of that soul\nlives on in the soul of Christ; and when both of them are dead it\ncan never be as though their love had not been, for in the eternal\nmemory of Christ their love lives on, increasing the love of Christ\nfor others like themselves and continually drawing the transitory\nand the mortal nearer to the eternal and the immortal.\n\nIt therefore becomes evident why it is that the vision of the\ninvisible companions which remains our standard of reality and of\nbeauty is not broken up into innumerable subjective visions but is\nfixed and permanent and sure. All the unfathomable souls of the\nworld, and all souls are unfathomable whether they are the souls of\nplants or animals or planets or gods or men, are found, the closer\nthey approach one another, to be in possession of the same vision.\nFor this immortal vision, in which what we name beauty, and what\nwe name \"reality,\" finds its synthesis, is found to be nothing less\nthan the secret love. And while the great company of the immortal\ncompanions are only known to us by the figure of one among\nthem, namely by the figure of Christ, this figure alone is sufficient\nto contain all that we require of life; for being the embodiment of\nlove this figure is the embodiment of life, of which love is the\ncreator and the sustainer.\n\nThus what the apex-thought of man's complex vision reveals is not\nonly the existence of the gods but the fact that the vision of the\ngods is not broken up and divided but is one and the same; and is\nyet for ever growing and deepening. And the only measure of the\nvision of the gods which we possess is the figure of Christ; for it\nhas come about by reason of the anonymous instinct of humanity,\nby reason of the compassion of the immortals, and by reason of\nthe divine insight of Jesus, that the figure of Christ contains within\nit every one of those primordial ideas from which and towards\nwhich, in a perpetual advance which is also a perpetual return, the\nsouls of all living things are for ever journeying.\n\nWhether the souls of men and of beasts, of plants and of planetary\nspheres survive in any form after they are dead we know not and\ncan never know. But this at least the revelation of the complex\nvision makes clear, that the secret of the whole process is to be\nfound in the mystery of love; and to the mystery of love we can, at\nthe worst, constantly appeal; for the mystery of love has been at\nlast embodied for us in a living figure over whom Death has no\ncontrol.\n\n\nCHAPTER XI.\n\nTHE ILLUSION OF DEAD MATTER\n\nThe philosophy of the complex vision is based, as I have shown,\nupon nothing less than the whole personality of man become\nconscious of itself in the totality of its rhythmic functioning. This\npersonality, although capable of being analysed in its constituent\nelements, is an integral and unfathomable reality. And just because\nit is such a reality it descends and expands on every side into\nimmeasurable depths and immeasurable horizons.\n\nWe know nothing as intimately and vividly as we know personality\nand every knowledge that we have is either a spiritual or\na material abstraction from this supreme knowledge. This\nknowledge of personality which is our ultimate truth, implies a\nbelief in the integral and real existence of what we call the soul.\nAnd because personality implies the soul and because we have no\nultimate conception of any other reality in the world except the\nreality of personality, therefore we are compelled to assume that\nevery separate external object in Nature is possessed of a soul.\n\nThe peculiar psychological melancholy which sometimes seizes us\nin the presence of inanimate natural objects, such as earth and\nwater and sand and dust and rain and vapour, objects whose\nexistence may superficially appear to be entirely chemical or\nmaterial, is accounted for by the fact that the soul in us is baffled\nand discouraged and repulsed by these things because by reason of\ntheir superficial appearance they convey the impression of\ncomplete soullessness. In the presence of plants and animals and\nall animate things we are also vaguely conscious of a strange\npsychological melancholy. But this latter melancholy is of a\nless poignant character than the former because what we seem\nsuperficially conscious of is not \"soullessness\" but a psychic life\nwhich is alien from our life, and therefore baffling and obscure.\n\nIn both of these cases, however, as soon as we are bold enough to\napply the conclusions we have arrived at from the analysis of the\nknowledge which is most vivid and real to us, namely, the\nknowledge of our own soul, this peculiar psychological melancholy\nis driven away. It is a melancholy which descends upon us\n when in any disintegrated moment the creative energy in\nus, the energy of love in us, is overcome by the evil and inertness\nof the aboriginal malice. Under the influence of this inert malice,\nwhich takes advantage of some lapse or ebb of the creative energy\nin us, the rhythmic activity of our complex vision breaks down;\nand we visualize the world through the attributes of reason and\nsensation alone. And the world, visualized through reason and\nsensation alone, becomes a world of uniform, and homogeneous\nmonotony, made up either of one all-embracing material substance,\nor of one all-embracing spiritual substance. In either case\nthat living plurality of real separate \"souls\" which correspond\nto our own soul vanishes away, and a dreary and devastating\noneness, whether spiritual or chemical, fills the whole field. The\nworld which is the emanation of this atrophied and distorted vision\nis a world of crushing dreariness; but it is an unreal world because\nthe only vivid and unfathomable reality we know is the reality of\ninnumerable souls. The curious thing about this world of\nsuperficial chemical or spiritual uniformity is that it seems the\nsame _identical_ world in the case of all separate souls whose\ncomplex vision is thus distorted by the prevalence of that which\nopposes itself to creation and by the consequent ebb and\nweakening of the energy of love. It is impossible to be assured that\nthis is the case; but all evidence of language points towards such\nan _identity of desolation_ between the innumerable separate\n\"universes\" of the souls which fill the world, when such souls\nvisualize existence through reason and sensation alone.\n\nThis also is a portion of the same \"illusion of impersonality\" into\nwhich the inert malice of the ultimate \"resistance\" betrays us with\ndemonic cunning. What man is there among us who does not\nrecall some moment of visionary disintegration, when, in the\npresence of both these mysteries, an unspeakable depression of\nthis kind has overtaken him? He has stood, perhaps, on some wet\nautumn evening, watching the soulless reflection of a dead moon\nin a pond of dead water; while above him the motionless distorted\ntrunk of some goblinish tree mocks him with its desolate\nremoteness from his own life.\n\nAt that moment, with his abortive and atrophied complex vision,\nall he sees is the eternal soullessness and deadness of matter; dead\nmoonlight, dead water, dead mud and slime and refuse, dead mist\nand vapour, dead earth-mould and dead leaves. And while the\ndesolate chemistry of nothingness grips him with its dead fingers\nand he turns hopelessly to the silent tree-trunk at his side, that also\nrepels him with the chill breath of psychic remoteness; and it\nseems to him that that also is strange and impersonal and\nunconscious; that that also is only a blind pre-determined portion\nof some huge planetary life-process that has no place for a living\nsoul, but only a place for automatic impersonal chemistry.\nBrooding in this way, with the eternal malice of the system of\nthings conquering the creative impulse in the depths of his soul, he\nbecomes obsessed with the idea that not only these isolated\nportions of Nature, but the whole of Nature, is thus alien and\nremote and thus given up to a desolate and soulless uniformity.\nUnutterable loneliness takes possession of him and he feels\nhimself to be an exile in a dark and hostile assemblage\nof elemental forces. If at such a moment by means of some\npassionate invocation of the immortal gods, or by means of some\ndesperate sinking into his own soul and gathering together of the\ncreative energy in him, he is able to resist this desolation, how\nstrange and sudden a shifting of mood occurs! He then, by a bold\nmovement of imagination, restores the balance of his complex\nvision; and in a moment the spectacle is transfigured.\n\nThe apparently dead pond takes to itself the lineaments of some\nindescribable living soul, of which that particular portion of\nelemental being is the outward expression. The apparently dead\nmoonlight becomes the magical influence of some mysterious\n\"lunar soul\" of which the earth's silent companions is the external\nform. The apparently dead mud of the pond's edge becomes a\nliving portion of that earth-body which is the visible manifestation\nof the soul of the earth. The motionless tree-trunk at his side seems\nno longer the desolate embodiment of some vague \"psychic life\"\nutterly alien from his own life but reveals to him the immediate\nmagical presence of a real soul there, whose personality, though\nnot conscious in the precise manner in which he is conscious, has\nyet its own measure of complex vision and is mutely struggling\nwith the cruel inertness and resistance which blocks the path of the\nenergy of life. When once, by the bold synthesis of reason and\nsensation with those other attributes of the complex vision which\nwe name instinct, imagination, intuition, and the like, the soul\nitself comes to be regarded as the substratum of personal\nexistence, that desolating separation between humanity and Nature\nceases to baffle us. As long as the substratum of personal life is\nregarded as the physical body there must always be this desolating\ndifference and this remoteness.\n\nFor in such a case the stress is inevitably laid upon the\nphysiological and biological difference between the body of a man\nand the body of the earth or the moon or the sun or any plant or\nanimal. But as soon as the substratum of personal life is regarded\nnot as the body but as the sour it ceases to be necessary to lay so\nmerciless a stress upon the difference between man's elaborate\nphysiological constitution and the simpler chemical constitution of\norganic or inorganic objects.\n\nIf the complex vision is the vision of the soul, if the soul uses its\nbodily sensation as only one among its other instruments of\ncontact with life, then it is obvious that between the soul of a man\nand the soul of a planet or a plant there need be no such appalling\nand desolating gulf as that which fills us with such profound\nmelancholy when we refuse to let the complex vision have its\ncomplete rhythmic play and insist on sacrificing the revelations\nmade by instinct and intuition to the falsifying conclusions of\nreason and sensation, energizing in arbitrary solitude.\n\nThe \"mort-main\" or \"dead-hand\" of that aboriginal malice which\nresists life is directly responsible for this illusion of \"unconscious\nmatter\" through the midst of which we grope like outlawed\nexiles. Reason and the bodily senses, conspiring together, are\nperpetually tempting us to believe in the reality of this desolate\nphantom-world of blind material elements; but the unreality of this\ncorpse-life becomes evident directly we consider the revelation of the\ncomplex vision.\n\nFor the complex vision reveals to us that what we call \"the\nuniverse\" is a thing which is for ever coming newly and freshly\ninto life, for ever being re-born and re-constituted by the interplay\nbetween the individual soul and the \"objective mystery.\" Of the\nobjective mystery itself, apart from the individual soul, we are able\nto say nothing. But since the \"universe\" is the discovery and\ncreation of the individual soul, there must be as many different\n\"universes\" as there are living souls.\n\nOur belief in \"one universe,\" whose characteristics are relatively\nidentical in the case of all the souls which contemplate it, is a\nbelief which in part results from an original act of faith and in part\nresults from an implicit appeal to those \"invisible companions\"\nwhose concentrated will towards \"reality\" and \"beauty\" and\n\"nobility\" offers us our only objective standard of these ideas.\nFrom the ground, therefore, of this trinity of incomprehensible\nsubstances, namely the substance which is the substratum of the\nindividual soul, the substance which is \"the objective mystery\" out\nof which the individual soul creates its universe, and the substance\nwhich is the \"medium\" or \"link\" which enables these individual\nsouls to communicate with one another, emerge the only realities\nwhich we can know. And since this trinity of incomprehensible\nsubstances, thus divided one from another, must be thought of as\ndominated by the same unity of time and space, it is inconceivable\nthat they should be anything else than three aspects of one and the\nsame incomprehensible substance. From this it follows that from\nthe ground of one incomprehensible substance which in its first\naspect is the substratum of the soul, in its second aspect is the\nobjective mystery confronting the soul, in its third aspect is the\nmedium which holds all souls together, there must be evoked all\nthe reality which we can conceive.\n\nAnd this reality must, from the conclusions we have already\nreached, take two forms. It must take the form of a plurality of\nsubjective \"universes\" answering to the plurality of living souls.\nAnd it must take the form of one objective \"universe,\" answering\nto the objective standard of truth, beauty, and nobility, together\nwith the opposites of these, which is implied in the tacit appeal of\nall individual souls to their \"invisible companions.\"\n\nIn this double reality; the reality of one objective universe\nidentical in its appearance to all souls but dependent for its identity\nupon an implicit reference to the \"invisible companions,\" and the\nreality of as many subjective universes as there are living souls; in\nthis double reality there is obviously no place at all for that\nphantom-world of unconscious \"matter,\" which in the form of\nsoulless elements, or soulless organic automata, fills the human\nmind with such devastating melancholy.\n\nThe dead pond with its dead moonlight, with its dead mud and its\ndead snow, is therefore no better than a ghastly illusion when\nconsidered in isolation from the soul or the souls which look forth\nfrom it. To the soul of which those elements are the \"body\" neither\nmud nor water nor rain nor earth-mould can appear desolate or\ndead. To the soul which contemplates these things there can be no\nother way of regarding them, as long as the rhythm of its vision is\nunimpeded, than as the outward manifestation of a personal life, or\nof many personal lives, similar in creative energy to its own.\n\nBetween the soul, or the souls, of the elements of the earth, and the\nsoul of the human spectator there must be, if our conclusions are\nto be held good at all, a natural and profound reciprocity. The\napparent \"deadness,\" the apparent automatism of \"matter,\" which\nprojects itself between these two and resists with corpse-like\nopacity their reciprocal understanding, must be one of the ghastly\nillusions with which the sinister side of the eternal duality\nundermines the magic of life.\n\nBut although in its objective isolation, as an absolute entity, this\n\"material deadness\" of earth and water and rain and snow and of\nall disintegrated organic chemistry must be regarded as an\n\"illusion,\" it would be a falsifying of the reality of things to deny\nthat it is an \"illusion\" to which the visions of all souls are\nmiserably subject. They are for ever subject to it because it is\nprecisely this \"illusion\" which the unfathomable power hostile to\nlife for ever evokes.\n\nNor must we for a moment suppose that this material objectivity,\nthis pond, these leaves, this mud, this snow, are altogether unreal.\nTheir reality is demanded by the complex vision and to deny their\nreality would be the gesture of madness. They are only unreal,\nthey are only an \"illusion,\" when they are considered as existing\nindependently of the \"souls\" of which they are the \"body.\" As the\nexpression and manifestation of such \"souls\" they are entirely real.\nThey are indeed, in this sense, as real as our own human body.\n\nThe human soul, when it suffers from that malignant power which has\nits positive and external existence in the soul itself, feels itself\nto be absolutely alone in the midst of a dark chaotic welter of\nmonstrous elemental forces. In a mood of this kind the thought of\nthe huge volumes of soulless water which we call \"oceans\" and\n\"seas\" crushes us with a devastating melancholy. The thought of\nthe interminable deserts of \"dead\" sand and the vast polar ice\nfields and the monstrous excrescences that we call \"mountains\"\nhave the same effect. But the supreme example of the kind of\nmaterial ghastliness which I am trying to indicate, is, as may easily\nbe surmised, nothing less than the appalling thought of the\nunfathomable spatial gulfs through which our whole stellar system\nmoves. Here also, in this supreme insistence of objective\n\"deadness,\" the situation is relieved when we realize that this\nunthinkable space is nothing more than the material expression of\nthat indefinable \"medium\" which holds all souls together.\n\nMoreover we must remember that these stellar gulfs cannot be\nthought of except as the habitation of innumerable living souls,\neach one of which is using this very \"space\" as the ground of its\ncreation of the many-coloured impassioned \"universe\" which is its\nown dwelling. In all these instances of \"objective deadness,\"\nwhether great or small, we must not forget that the thing which\ndesolates us and fills us with so intolerable a nostalgia is a thing\nonly half real, a thing whose full reality depends upon the soul\nwhich contemplates it and upon the soul's implicit assumption that\nits truth is the truth of those \"invisible companions\" who supply us\nwith our perpetually renewed and reconstituted standard of what is\n\"good\" and what is \"evil.\"\n\nThere is an abominably vivid example of the kind of melancholy\nI have in my mind, which, although obviously less common to\nnormal human experience than the forms of it I have so far\nattempted to suggest, is as a rule even more crushing in its cruelty.\nI refer to the sight of a dead human body; and in a less degree to\nthe sight of a dead animal or a dead plant.\n\nA human corpse laid out in its coffin, or nailed down in its coffin,\nhow exactly does the particular attitude towards life, which for\nconvenience sake I name the philosophy of the complex vision,\nfind itself regarding _that_? Such a body, deserted by its living\nsoul, is obviously no longer the immediate and integral expression\nof a personal life. Is it therefore no more than a shred or shard or\nhusk or remnant of inconceivably soulless matter? The gods\nforbid! Certainly and most assuredly it is more than that.\n\nAn isolated heterogeneous mass of dead chemistry is a monstrous\nillusion which only exists for us when the weakness of our\ncreative energy and the power of the original malice in the soul\ndestroys our vision. This dead body lying in its wooden coffin is\ncertainly possessed of no more life than the inanimate boards of\nthe coffin in which it lies. But the inanimate boards of the coffin,\ntogether with the inanimate furniture of the house or room that\ncontains it, and the bricks and stones and mortar of such a house,\nare themselves nothing less than inevitable portions of the vast\nearth-body of our planetary globe.\n\nAnd this planetary globe, this earth upon which we live, cannot\nunder any conceivable kind of reasoning to which imagination has\ncontributed its share, be regarded as a dead or a soulless thing. In\nits isolated integrity, as a separate integral personality, the soul\nhas deserted the body and left it \"dead.\" But it is only \"dead\" when\nconsidered in isolation from the surrounding chemistry of\nplanetary life. And to consider it in this way is to consider it\nfalsely. For from the moment it ceases to be the expression of the\nlife of an individual human soul, it becomes the expression--\nthrough every single phase of its chemical dissolution--of the life\nof the planet.\n\nIn so far as the human soul, which has deserted it, is concerned it\nis assuredly no better than a dead husk; but in so far as the soul of\nthe planet is concerned it is an essential portion of that planet's\nliving body and in this sense is not dead at all.\n\n\nIts chemical elements, as they resolve themselves slowly back into\ntheir planetary accomplices, are part and parcel of that general\n\"body of the earth\" which is in a state of constant movement, and\nwhich has the \"soul of the earth\" as its animating principle of\npersonality. And just as the human corpse, when the soul has\ndeserted it, becomes a portion of those chemical elements which\nare the body of the planet's \"personal soul,\" so do the dead bodies\nof animals and plants and trees become portions of the same\nterrestrial bodies.\n\nThus strictly speaking there is no single moment when any\nmaterial form or body can be called \"dead.\" Instantaneously with\nthe departure of its own individual soul it is at once \"possessed\" by\nthe soul of that planetary globe from whose chemistry it drew its\nelemental life and from whose chemistry, although the form of it\nhas changed, it still draws its life. For it is no fantastic\nspeculation to affirm that every living thing whether human or\notherwise plays, while it lives, a triple part upon the world stage.\n\nIt is in the first place the vehicle of the individual soul. It is in\nthe second place the medium of the \"spiritual vampirizing\" of the\ninvisible planetary spirits. And it is in the third place a living\nportion of that organic elemental chemistry which is the body of\nthe terrestrial soul. Thus it becomes manifest that that \"illusion of\ndead matter\" which fills the human soul with so profound a\nmelancholy is no more than an everlasting trick of the malice of\nthe abyss.\n\nAnd the despair which sometimes results from it is a despair\nwhich issues from no \"dead matter\" but from the terrible living\ndepths of the soul itself. It is from a consideration of the especial\nkind of melancholy evoked in us by the illusion of \"objective\ndeadness\" that we are enabled to analyse those peculiar\nimaginative feelings which sometime or another affect us all. I\nrefer to the extraordinary tenacity with which we cling to our\nbodily form, however grotesque it may be, and the difficulty we\nexperience in disassociating our living soul from its particular\nenvelope or habitation; and the tendency which we have, in spite\nof this, to imagine ourselves transferred to an alien body. For the\nsoul in us has the power of \"thinking itself\" into any other body it\nmay please to select.\n\nAnd there is no reason why we should be alarmed at such an\nimaginative power; or even associate its fantastic realization with\nany terror of madness. The invisible entity within us which says \"I\nam I\" can easily be conceived as suddenly awakening out of sleep\nand discovering, to its astonishment, that its visible body has\nsuffered a bewildering transformation.\n\nSuch a transformation can be conceived as almost unlimited in\nits humorous and disconcerting possibilities. But no such\ntransformation of the external envelope of the soul, whether into\nthe form of an animal or a plant or a god, need be conceived of as\nnecessarily driving us into insanity. The \"I am I\" would remain the\nsame in regard to its imagination, instinct, intuition, emotion,\nself-consciousness and the rest. It would be only \"changed\" in regard\nto sensation, which is a thing immediately dependent upon the\nparticular and special senses of the human body.\n\nThis is a truth to the reality of which the wandering fancies of\nevery human child bear ample witness; not to speak of the dreams\nof those childlike tribes of the race, who in our progressive\ninsolence we are pleased to name \"uncivilized.\" The deeper we dig\ninto the tissue of convoluted impressions that make up our\nuniverse the more vividly do we become aware that our only\nredemption from sheer insanity lies in \"knowing ourselves\"; in\nother words, in keeping a drastic and desperate hold upon what, in\nthe midst of ambiguity and treachery, we are definitely assured of.\n\nAnd the only thing we are definitely assured of, the only thing\nwhich we really know \"on the inner side,\" and with the kind of\nknowledge which is unassailable, is the reality of our soul. We\nknow this with a vividness completely different from the vividness\nof any other knowledge because this is not what we feel or see or\nimagine or think but what we _are_. And all feeling, all seeing, all\nimagining and all thinking are only attributes of this mysterious\n\"something\" which is our integral self.\n\nTo the superficial judgment there is always something weird and\narbitrary about this belief in our own soul. And this apparent\nweirdness arises from the fact that our superficial judgments are\nthe work of reason and sensation arrogating to themselves the\nwhole field of consciousness.\n\nBut directly we bring to bear upon this mass of impressions which\nis our \"universe\" the full rhythmic play of our complete identity\nthis weirdness and arbitrariness disappear and we realize that we\n_are_, not this thought or this sensation or even this stream of\nthoughts and sensations, but the definite living \"monad\" which\ngives these things their only link of continuity and permanence.\nAnd it is better to accept experience, even though it refuses to\nresolve itself into any rational unity, rather than to leave\nexperience in the distance and permit our reason to evolve its\ndesired unity out of its own rules and limitations.\n\nWe must readily admit that to take all the attributes of personality\nand to make them adhere in the mysterious substratum of the soul\nrather than in the little cells of the brain, seems to the superficial\njudgment a weird and arbitrary act. But the more closely we think\nof what we are doing when we make this assumption the more\ninevitable does such an assumption appear.\n\nWe are driven by the necessity of the case to find some \"point,\" or\nat least some \"gap\" in thought and the system of things, where\nmind and matter meet and are fused with one another. Absolute\nconsciousness does not help us to explain the facts of experience;\nbecause \"facing\" absolute consciousness, directly it isolates itself,\nwe are compelled to recognize the presence of \"something else,\"\nwhich is the material or object of which absolute consciousness is\nconscious.\n\nAnd what we do when we assume the little cells of the physical\nbrain to be the point in space or \"the gap in thought\" where mind\nand matter meet and become one is simply to place these two\nworlds in close juxtaposition and then assert that they are one. But\nthis placing them side by side and asserting that they are one does\nnot make them one. They are just as far apart as ever. The cells of\nthe brain remain material and the phenomenon of consciousness\nremains immaterial and they are still as remote from one another\nand as \"unfused\" as if consciousness were outside of time and\nspace altogether.\n\nIt is only when we come to regard the \"fusion-point\" of these two\nthings as being itself a living and personal thing; it is only when\nwe come to regard the substratum of the soul as a mysterious\n\"something\" which is, at one and the same time, both what we call\n\"mind\" and what we call \"matter,\" that the difficulty I have\ndescribed disappears. For in this case we are dealing with\nsomething which, unlike the little cells of the brain, is totally\ninvisible and totally beyond all scientific analysis; and yet with\nsomething which, because it is affected by bodily sensations and\nbecause it is under the sway of time and space, cannot be regarded\nas utterly outside the realm of material substance. We are in fact,\nin this case, dealing with something which we feel to be the\nintegral and ultimate reality of ourselves, as we certainly do not\nfeel the little cells of the brain to be; and we are dealing with\nsomething that is no mere stream of impressions, but is the\nconcrete permanent reality which gives to all impressions, whether\nmaterial or immaterial, their unity and coherence.\n\nWhen once we are put into possession of this, when once we come\nto recognize our invisible soul as the reality which is our true self,\nit is found to be no longer ridiculous and arbitrary to endow this\nsoul with all those various attributes, which, after all, are only\nvarious aspects of that unique personality which is the personality\nof the soul. To say \"the soul has imagination,\" or \"the soul has\ninstinct,\" or \"the soul has an aesthetic sense,\" has only a ridiculous\nsound when under the pressure of the abysmal malice which\nopposes itself to life we fall into the habits of permitting those\nusurping accomplices, pure reason and pure sensation, to destroy\nthe rhythmic harmony of the complex vision.\n\nWhen once we are in full possession of our own soul it is no mere\nfanciful speculation but an inevitable act of faith which compels us\nto envisage the universe as a thing crowded with invisible souls,\nwho in some degree or other resemble our own. If this is\n\"anthropomorphism,\" though strictly speaking it ought to be\ncalled \"pan-psychism,\" then it is impossible for us to be\ntoo anthropomorphic. For in this way we are doing the only\nphilosophical thing we have a right to do--namely, interpreting the\nless known in the terms of the more known.\n\nWhen we seek to interpret the soul, which we vividly know, in\nterms of chemical or spiritual abstractions of which we have no\ndirect knowledge but which are merely rationalized symbols, we\nare proceeding in an illegitimate and unphilosophical manner to\ninterpret the more known in terms of the less known, which is in\nthe true sense ridiculous.\n\nThe only escape from that profound melancholy so easily engulfed\nin sheer insanity, which is the result of submission to \"the illusion\nof dead matter,\" lies in this tenacious hold upon the concrete\nidentity of the soul. So closely are we linked, by reason of the\nchemistry of our mortal body, to every material-element; that it is\nonly too easy for us to merge our personal life by a perverted use\nof the imagination in that phantom-world of supposedly \"dead\nmatter\" which is the illusive projection of the abysmal malice.\n\nThus just as the soul is driven by extreme physical pain to\nrelinquish its identity and to become \"an incarnate sensation,\" so\nthe soul is driven by the power of malice to relinquish its\ncentrifugal force and to become the very mud and slime and\nexcremental debris which it has endowed with an illusive\nsoullessness.\n\nThe clue to the secret pathology of these moods, to whose brink\nreason and sensation have led us and into whose abyss perverted\nimagination has plunged us, is therefore to be found in the\nunfathomable duality of good and evil. If it seems to the kind of\nmind that demands \"rational unity\" at all costs, even at the cost of\ntruth to experience, that this duality cannot be left unreconciled,\nthe answer which the philosophy of the complex vision must\nmake, is that any reconciliation of such a sort, any reduction to\nmonistic unity of the eternal adversaries out of whose struggle life\nitself springs, would bring life itself back to nothingness.\n\nThe argument that because, in the eternal process of destruction\nand creation, life or love or what we call \"the good\" depends for\nits activity upon death or malice or what we call \"evil,\" these\nopposites are one and the same, is shown to be utterly false when\none thinks of the analogy of the struggle between the sexes.\nBecause the activity of the male depends upon the existence of the\nfemale, that is no reason for concluding that the male and the\nfemale are one and the same thing.\n\nBecause \"good\" becomes more \"good\" out of its conflict with\n\"evil,\" that does not mean that \"good\" is responsible for the\nexistence of \"evil\"; any more than because \"evil\" becomes more\n\"evil\" out of its conflict with \"good\" does it mean that \"evil\" is\nresponsible for the existence of \"good.\" Neither is responsible for\nthe existence of the other. They are both positive and real and they\nare both eternal. They are both unfathomable elements in every\npersonal individual soul, whether of man or plant or animal or god\nor demi-god that has ever existed or will ever come to exist.\n\nThe prevalent idea that because good \"in the long run\" and over\nvast spaces of time shows itself to be a little--just a little--more\npowerful than evil, evil must be regarded as only a form of good\nor a necessary negation of good is a fallacy derived from the\nillusion that life is the creation of a \"parent\" of the universe whose\nnature is absolutely \"good.\" Such a fallacy takes for granted that\nsomewhere and somehow \"Good\" will finally triumph over \"evil.\"\n\nThe revelation of the complex vision destroys this fallacy. Such a\ncomplete triumph of \"good\" over \"evil\" would mean the end of\neverything that exists because everything that exists depends upon\nthis abysmal struggle. But for personalities who are able to\nrecognize that the mere fact of their being alive is already a\nconsiderable victory of \"good\" over \"evil,\" there is nothing\noverwhelming in the thought that \"good\" can never completely\novercome \"evil.\" It is enough that life has given them life; and that\nin the perpetually renewed struggle between love and malice they\nfind at the rare moments when love overcomes malice a flood of\nhappiness which, brings with it \"the sensation of eternity.\"\n\nFor such souls eternity is here and now; and no anticipated\nabsolute triumph of the \"good\" in the world over the \"evil\" can\ncompare for a moment with the indescribable happiness which this\n\"sensation of eternity\" brings. It is this happiness, evoked by the\nrhythmic play of the soul's apex-thought in its supreme hours,\nwhich alone, even in memory, can destroy \"the illusion of dead\nmatter.\"\n\nThe psychological situation brought about by the fact that this\nillusion is a perpetually recurrent one and a thing that is always\nliable to return whenever reason and sensation are driven to isolate\nthemselves is a situation a good deal more complicated than I have\nso far indicated. It is complicated by the fact that although in\ncertain moods the contemplation of \"the illusion of dead matter\"\nproduces profound melancholy, in other moods it produces a kind\nof demonic joy. It seems as though the melancholy mood, which\ncarried to an extreme limit borders on absolute despair, comes\nabout when the creative energy in our soul, although under the\nmomentary dominance of what resists creation, is still, so to speak,\nthe master of our will.\n\nUnder such circumstances the will, still resolutely turned towards\nlife, is confronted by what appears to be the very embodiment of\ndeath. Under these conditions the will is baffled, perplexed,\ndefeated and outraged. It beats in vain against the \"inert mass\"\nwhich malice has projected; and feels itself powerless to overcome\nit. It then turns furiously round upon the very substratum of the\nsoul and rends and tears at that, in a mad effort to reach the secret\nof a phantom-world which seems to hold no secret. If some sort of\nrelief does not come, such relief for instance as physical sleep, the\ninert misery of the submission of the will, following upon such a\ndesperate struggle, may easily drift into a deadly apathy, may\neasily approach the borders of insanity.\n\nBut there is another condition under which the soul may confront\n\"the illusion of dead matter.\" This condition comes about when the\nwill, instead of being turned towards creation, is definitely turned\ntowards the opposite of creation. It is impossible for the will to\nremain in this condition for more than a limited time. Some\noutward or inward shock, some drastic swing of the psychic\npendulum, must sooner or later restore the balance and bring the\nwill back to that wavering and indecisive state--poised like the\npoint of a compass between the two extremes--which seems to be\nits normal attitude.\n\nAny human will unchangeably directed towards \"the good\" would\nbe the will of a soul that in its inherent depths were already\n\"absolutely good\"; and this, as we have seen, is an impossible\nphenomenon. The utmost reach of \"wickedness\" that any soul,\nwhether it be the soul of a man or of a god, can attain to, is a\nrecurrent concentration of the will upon evil and a recurrent\novercoming, for relatively increasing spaces of time, of the power\nof love. This incomplete and constantly interrupted concentration\nupon evil is the nearest approach to \"the worship of Satan\" which\nany will is able to reach. The exquisite pleasure, therefore,\nculminating in a kind of insane ecstasy, which the soul can enjoy\nwhen, in the passion of its evil will, it leaps to welcome \"the\nillusion of dead matter,\" is a pleasure that in the nature of things\ncannot last. And the condition of inert malignant apathy which\nfollows such an \"ecstasy of evil\" is perhaps the nearest approach to\na consciousness of \"eternal death\" which the soul can know.\n\nAnd it is in this malignant apathy, rather than in the demonic\nexultation of the mood that preceded it, that the extreme opposite\nof love finds its culmination. For in its hour of demonic exultation,\nwhen the will to evil buries itself with insane joy in \"the illusion of\ndead matter,\" it is drawing savagely upon the energy of life. It\ncorrupts such energy as it draws upon it and distorts it from its\nnatural functions; but the energy itself, although \"possessed\" by\nthe abysmal malice, is living and intense; and therefore cannot be\nregarded as so entirely the opposite of love as that inert condition\nof malignant lifelessness which inevitably succeeds it.\n\nThe demonic ecstasy, full of invincible magnetism, which looks\nforth from the countenance of a soul obsessed with, evil, has much\nmore in common with the magnetic exultation of a soul possessed\nwith love than has that ghastly inertness, with its insane malignant\nattraction to death. For out of the countenance of this latter looks\nforth everything that is hostile to life; and its expression has in it\nthe obscene cunning, mixed with frozen despair, of a corpse which\nhas become utterly dehumanized.\n\nIt is frequently a matter of surprise to minds whose view of what is\n\"good\" has excluded the concept of energy that persons obviously\nunder the obsession of \"evil\" are able to display such immense\nreserves of inexhaustible power. But this surprise disappears when\nit is realized that such \"worshippers of Satan\" are drawing upon\nthe creative energy and corrupting it, in the process of drawing\nupon it, by the malignant power which resists creation.\n\nThe \"illusion of dead matter\" conceived as we have conceived it,\nas a thing made up of unconscious chemical elements, is after all\nonly one aspect of the phantom-world of illusive soullessness\nwhich the abysmal malice delights to project. It is only to\nparticular sensitive natures that this peculiar \"despair of the\ninanimate\" takes the form of mud or sand or refuse or water or\ndead planetary bodies or empty space.\n\nTo other natures it may take the form of those innumerable\noff-shoots of economic necessity, which are not themselves necessary\neither to human life or human welfare but which are the arbitrary\ncreations of economic avarice divorced from necessity and\nindulged in out of an inert hatred of what is beautiful and real. Any\nlabour, whether mental or physical, which directly satisfies the\neconomic needs of humanity carries with it the unfathomable thrill\nof creative happiness. But when we come to consider those\ninnumerable forms of financial and commercial enterprise which\nin no way satisfy human needs but exist only for the sake of\nexploitation we find ourselves confronted by a weight of unreal\nsoulless hideousness which by reason of the fact that it is\ndeliberately protected by organized society is a more devastating\nexample of \"the thing which is in the way\" than any amount of\nmud and litter and refuse and excremental debris. For this\nunproductive commercialism, this \"unreal reality\" projected by the\nmalignant power which resists creation, is not only an obscene\noutrage to the aesthetic sense; it is actually an assassination of\nlife. When, therefore, a philosopher who uses the complex vision of\nthe soul as his organ of research is asked the question, \"where are we\nto look for the type of human being most entirely evil?\" the\nanswer which he is compelled to give is not a little surprising to\nmany minds.\n\nFor there are many minds whose physiological timidity corrupts\ntheir judgment, and who lack the clairvoyance to unmask with\ninfallible certainty that look of sneering apathy which is the pure\nexpression of malice. And to such minds some wretched devil of a\ncriminal, driven to crime by an insane perversion of the creative\ninstinct--for creation and destruction are not the true opposites--\nmight easily seem the ultimate embodiment of evil.\n\nWhereas the particular type of human being from whom the\nphilosopher of the complex vision would draw his standard of evil\nwould be a type very different from any perverted type even from\nthose whose mania might take the form of erotic cruelty. It would\nbe a type whose recurrent \"evil\" would take the form of a sneering\nand malignant inertness, the form of a cold and sarcastic\ndisparagement of all intense feeling. It would be a type entirely\nobsessed by \"the illusion of dead matter\"; not so much the\n\"illusion of dead matter\" where Nature is concerned, but where the\neconomic struggle has resulted in some unnecessary and purely\ncommercial activity, altogether divorced from the basic necessities\nof human life. A person of this type would, in his evil moods, be\nmore completely dominated by a malignant resistance to every\nmovement of the creative spirit than any other type, unless it were\nperhaps one whom the heavy brutality of \"officialdom\" had\nblunted into inhuman callousness.\n\nCompared with persons such as these, by whom no actual positive\n\"wickedness\" may have ever been perpetrated, the confessed\ncriminal or the acknowledged pervert remains far less committed\nto the depths of evil. For in persons who have habitually lent\nthemselves to \"the illusion of dead matter,\" whether in regard to\nNature or in regard to commercial or financial exploitation, there\noccurs a kind of \"death-in-life\" which gives the sneering malignity\nof the abyss its supreme opportunity, whereas in the souls of those\nwho have committed \"crimes,\" or have been guilty of passionate\ncruelty, there may easily remain a vivid and sensitive response to\nsome form of reality or beauty, or self-annihilating love.\n\nFor \"the illusion of dead matter\" is the most formidable expression\nof evil which we know; and it can only be destroyed by the magic\nof that creative spirit whose true \"opposite\" is not hatred or cruelty\nor violence or destruction, but the motiveless power of a deadly\nobscurantism.\n\n\nCHAPTER XII.\n\nPAIN AND PLEASURE\n\nSince neither pleasure nor pain can be experienced without\nconsciousness; and since consciousness finds its substratum not in\nthe body but in the soul; we are driven to the conclusion that what\nwe call the capacity of the body for pleasure and pain is really the\ncapacity of the soul for pleasure and pain. But the capacity of the\nsoul for pleasure and pain is not confined to its functioning\nthrough the body. Sensation, that is to say, the use of the bodily\nsenses, gives the soul one particular form of pain and one\nparticular form of pleasure; but that the soul possesses other forms\nof pleasure and pain independently of the body is proved by the\npsychological fact that intense bodily pain is sometimes\naccompanied by intense spiritual pleasure and intense bodily\npleasure is sometimes accompanied by intense spiritual pain.\n\nWhat is called \"the pursuit of pleasure,\" that rationalistic\nabstraction from our real psychological experience, that\nabstraction which has been made the basis of the false philosophy\ncalled \"hedonism,\" cannot stand for a moment against the\nrevelation of the complex vision. Under certain rare and morbid\nconditions, when reason and sensation, in their conspiracy of\nassassination, have usurped for a while the whole field\nof consciousness, such a \"pursuit of pleasure\" may become\na dominant motive. But even under these conditions there\noften comes a shifting of the stage according to which the\npleasure-seeker, sick to death of pleasure, deliberately\n\"pursues\" pain.\n\nIf it be said that this change is no real change because what is then\npursued is the pleasure of \"contrast\" or even \"the pleasure of\npain,\" the retort to such reasoning can only be that in this case the\nwhole hedonistic theory has been given up; for what is really then\n\"pursued\" is neither pleasure nor pain but the sensation of novelty\nor the sensation of new experience.\n\nPleasure and pain are emotionalized sensations accompanying\nvarious physical and mental states. The psychological truth about\ntheir \"pursuit\" is simply that we \"pursue\" certain objects or\nconditions because of their immediate attractiveness or \"attractive\nterribleness,\" and that the accompanying pleasure becomes first a\nkind of orchestral background to our pursuit; and then, later,\nbecomes, by the action of the law of association, part and parcel of\nthe thing's attractiveness or \"attractive terribleness.\" Thus what\nreally occurs is precisely opposite to the hedonist's contention. For\nthe thing \"pursued\" swallows up and appropriates to itself the\npleasure and pain of the pursuit; and, by the law of association,\nbecomes more vividly, even than at the start the motive force\nwhich lures us.\n\nThe most ghastly, the most obscene, the most intolerable thing in\nthe world is when the pain of pure sensation, the pain of the body,\nis accentuated to such a pitch of atrocious suffering that the other\nattributes of the soul are annihilated; and the humanity of the\nperson thus suffering is temporarily destroyed; so that what \"lives\"\nat such a moment is not a person at all but an incarnate pain.\n\nThat this ultimate ghastliness, this dehumanization by pain, can\nonly occur where the aboriginal malice of the soul has previously\nweakened the soul's independent life, is proved by the fact that the\nmost atrocious tortures have been successfully endured, even unto\nthe point of death, by such as have been martyrs for an idea. And\nthe reason of this endurance, the reason why, in the case of such\nmartyrizing, the victim has been able to resist dehumanization is\nfound in the fact that the soul's creative energy or the power of\nlove has been so great that it has been able to assert its\nindependence of bodily torment, even to the last moment of\nhuman identity.\n\nSince pain and pleasure, although so often the direct evocation of\nthe soul's attribute of bodily sensation, are always composed of the\nprimordial \"stuff\" of emotion; and since emotion is a projection of\nthe soul independently of the body, it is natural that the soul\nshould, in the reverse manner, colour its emotion with the memory\nof sensation. Thus it follows that although it is possible for the\nsoul, when its emotional feeling is outraged or excited, to\nexperience pain or pleasure apart from sensation, there is usually\npresent in such an emotional pain or pleasure a residual element of\nsensation; for the soul is not a thing which simply \"possesses\"\ncertain functions; but a thing which is present in some degree or\nother in all its various aspects of energy.\n\nWhat we call \"memory\" is nothing more than the plastic consciousness\nof personal identity and continuity. And when once the pain\nor pleasure of a bodily sensation has been lodged in the\nsoul, that pain or pleasure becomes an integral portion of the soul's\nlife, to be worked upon and appropriated for good or evil by the\nsoul's intrinsic duality.\n\nThus although the creative energy in the soul, emerging from\nfathomless abysses, can enable the soul to endure until death the\nmost infernal torments, the fact remains that since the attribute of\nsensation, which depends entirely upon the existence of the bodily\nsenses, is one of the soul's basic attributes and has its ground in the\nvery substratum of the soul, the sensations of pain and pleasure\nwhether coloured by emotion and imagination or left \"pure\" in\nthe clear element of consciousness, are sensations from which the\nsoul cannot escape.\n\nFrom this we are forced to conclude that to affirm that the soul can\nremain wholly untouched and unaffected by bodily pain or\npleasure is ridiculous. Bodily pain and pleasure are the soul's pain\nand pleasure; because the attribute of sensation, through which the\nbodily senses feed the soul, is not the body's attribute of sensation\nbut the soul's attribute of sensation.\n\nTo say, therefore, that the soul can \"conquer\" the body or be\n\"indifferent\" to the body is as ridiculous as to say that the body\ncan \"conquer\" the soul or be \"indifferent\" to the soul. The fact that\nthe attribute of sensation is a basic attribute of the soul and that\nthe attribute of sensation is dependent upon the bodily senses must\ninevitably imply that the pressure or impact of the bodily senses\ndescend to the profoundest depths of the soul.\n\nThe thing that \"conquers\" pain in the invincible martyr is love, or\n\"the energy of creation,\" in the soul. The abysmal struggle is not\nbetween the soul and the body or between the flesh and the spirit,\nbut between the power of life and love, in the body and the soul\ntogether, and the power of death or malice, in the body and the\nsoul together.\n\nWhat we are compelled to assume with regard to those \"sons of\nthe universe,\" whose existence affords a basis for the objectivity of\nthe \"ultimate ideas,\" is that, with them, what I have called \"the\neternal idea of the body\" takes the place in their complex vision of\nour actual physical body. Their complex vision must be regarded,\nif our philosophy is to remain boldly and shamelessly anthropomorphic,\nas possessing, even as our own, the basic attribute of sensation.\n\nBut since their essential invisibility, and consequent upon this their\nubiquity under the dominant categories of time and place,\nprecludes any possibility of their incarnation, we are compelled to\npostulate that their complex vision's attribute of sensation, in the\nabsence of any bodily senses, finds its contact with \"the objective\nmystery\" and with the objective \"universe\" in some definite and\npermanent \"intermediary\" which serves in their case the same\nprimal necessity as is served in our case by the human body.\n\nIf no such \"intermediary\" existed for them, we should be\ncompelled to relinquish the idea that they possessed a complex\nvision at all, for not only the attribute of sensation, but the\nattribute of emotion also, demands for its activity something that\nshall represent the human body and occupy in their objective\n\"universe\" the place occupied by our physical bodies in our\n\"universe.\"\n\nAs we have already shown, this primary demand for the \"eternalizing\nof flesh and blood\" is a demand which springs from the profoundest\ndepths of the soul, for it is a demand which springs from\nthe creative energy itself, the eternal protagonist in the\nworld-drama. We must conclude, therefore, that although\nthese super-human children of Nature cannot in the ordinary sense\nincarnate themselves in flesh and blood they can and do\nappropriate to themselves out of the surrounding body of the ether,\nand out of the body of any other living thing they approach, a\ncertain attenuated essence of flesh and blood which, though\ninvisible to us, supplies with them the place of our human body.\nThis, therefore, is the \"intermediary\" which, in the \"invisible\ncompanions\" of our planetary struggle, occupies the place which is\noccupied by the physical element in our human life. And this is\nevoked by nothing less than that \"eternal idea of the body,\" or\n\"that eternal idea of flesh and blood,\" which the creative energy of\nlove demands. A very curious and interesting possibility follows\nfrom this assumption; namely, that by a process which might be\ncalled a process of \"spiritual vampirizing\" the same creative\npassion which demands satisfaction in the eternalizing of \"the idea\nof the body\" actually suffers, by means of its vivid sympathy with\nliving bodies, the very pains and pleasures through which these\nbodies pass.\n\nThe possibility that \"the invisible companions,\" or in more\ntraditional language that the \"immortal gods,\" should be driven by\nthe passion of their creative love, to suffer vicarious pain and\npleasure through the living bodies of all organic existences, is a\npossibility that derives a certain support from two considerations,\nboth of which are drawn directly from human experiences. It is\ncertainly a matter of common human experience to be conscious,\nfor good and for evil, of a kind of obsession of one's body by\nsome sort of spiritual power. We may regard these moments of\nobsession, with their consequent exhilaration or profound gloom,\nas due purely to the activity of our own soul; and doubtless very\noften this is the explanation of them. But it is conceivable also that\nsuch obsessions are actually due to the presence near us and\naround us of the \"high immortal ones.\"\n\nThat when we experience this \"spiritual vampirizing\" of our\nmortal bodies by immortal companions, such an obsession is not\nnecessarily \"for good,\" is a thing inevitably implied in our\nprimary conception of personality. For although a purely demonic\npersonality is an impossibility, owing to the fact that personality\nis, in itself, an achieved triumph over evil, it must still remain true\nthat the eternal duality of creation and \"what resists creation\" must\nfind an arena in the soul of an \"immortal\" even as it finds an arena\nin the soul of a \"mortal.\"\n\nTherefore we are driven to regard it as no fantastic speculation but\nas only too reasonable a possibility, that when a physical\ndepression takes possession of us it is due to this \"spiritual\nvampirizing,\" in an evil sense, by the power of some immortal\nwhose \"malice\" at that particular moment has overcome \"love.\"\nBut just as the power of physical pain may be dominated and\novercome by the energy of love arising from the depths of our own\nsoul, so this vampirizing by the malice of an \"invisible\ncompanion,\" may be dominated and overcome by the energy of\nlove from the depths of our own soul.\n\nIt may indeed be regarded as certain that it is when the malice in\nour own soul is in the ascendant, rather than the love, that we fall\nvictims to this kind of obsession. For evil eternally attracts evil;\nand it is no wild nor erratic fancy to maintain that the malice in the\nhuman soul naturally draws to itself by an inevitable and tragic\nreciprocity the malice in the souls of the \"immortal companions.\"\n\nThe second consideration derived from human experience which\nsupports this view of the vicarious pain and pleasure experienced\nby the gods through the bodies of all organic entities is the\npsychological fact of our own attitude towards plants and animals.\nAny sensitive person among us will not hesitate to admit that in\nwatching animals suffer, he has suffered _with_ such animals; or\nagain, that in watching a branch torn from its trunk, leaving an\nopen wound out of which the sap oozes, he has suffered _with_\nthe suffering of the tree. And just as the phenomenon of bodily\nobsession by some immortal god may be either \"for good\" or \"for\nevil\" as our own soul dictates, so the sympathy which we feel for\nplants and animals may be either \"for good\" or \"for evil.\"\n\nAnd this also applies to the relation between these bodiless\n\"immortals\" and the bodies of all organic planetary life. According\nto the revelation of the complex vision, with its emphasis upon the\nultimate duality as the supreme secret of life, both pain and\npleasure are instruments, in the hands of love, for rousing the soul\nout of that sleep of death or semi-death which is the abysmal\nenemy.\n\nThe philosophies which oppose pain to pleasure, and insist upon\nthe \"good\" of pain and the \"evil\" of pleasure, are no less\nmisleading than the philosophies which oppose flesh to spirit, or\nmatter to mind, calling the one \"good\" and the other \"evil.\" Such\nphilosophies have permitted that basic attribute of the complex\nvision which we call conscience to usurp the place occupied, in the\ntotal rhythm, by imagination; with the result of a complete\nfalsifying of the essential values.\n\nIn a question of such deadly import as this, we have, more than\never, to make our appeal to those rare moments of illumination\nwhich we have attained when the rhythmic intensity of the\narrow-point of thought was most concentrated and piercing. And the\ntestimony of these moments is given with no uncertain sound. In\nthe great hours of our life, and I think all human experiences\njustify this statement, both pain and pleasure are transcended and\nflung into a subordinate and irrelevant place. Something which it\nis very difficult to describe, a kind of emotion which resembles\nhappiness, flows through us; so that pain and pleasure seem to\ncome and go almost unremarked, like dark and light shadows\nflung upon some tremendous water-fall.\n\nWhat we are compelled to recognize, therefore, is that pain and\npleasure are both instruments of the creative power of life. They\nonly become evil or are used for purposes of evil, when, by reason\nof some fatal weakening in the other attributes of the soul, the\npurely sensational element in them dominates the emotional and\nthey become something most horribly like living entities--entities\nwith bodies composed of the vibrations of torment and souls\ncomposed of the substance of torment--and succeed in annihilating\nthe very features of humanity.\n\nPain and pleasure are not identical with the unfathomable duality\nwhich descends into the abyss; for pain and pleasure are definitely\nand quite unmistakenly fathomable; though, as the gods know\nwell, few enough of the sons of mortals reach the limit of them.\nThey are fathomable; for carried to a certain pitch of intensity they\nend in ecstasy or they end in death. They are fathomable; for even\nin the souls of \"the immortals\" they are only instruments of life\nwarring against death. They are fathomable; because they have\none identical root; and this root is the ecstasy of the rhythm of the\ncomplex vision which transcends and surpasses them both.\n\nThe hideous symbol of \"hell\" is the creation of the false\nphilosophy which makes the eternal duality resolve itself into flesh\nand spirit or into soul and body. The power of love renders this\nsymbol meaningless and abortive; for personality is the supreme\nvictory of life over what resists life; and consequently where\npersonality exists \"hell\" cannot exist; for personality is the scope\nand boundary of all we know. The symbol of \"Satan\" also is\nrendered meaningless by the philosophy of the complex vision;\nunless such a symbol is used to express those appalling moments\nwhen the evil in the soul attracts to itself and associates with itself\nthe evil in the soul of some immortal god.\n\nBut just as no mortal can be more evil than good, so also no\nimmortal can be more evil than good, that is to say intrinsically\nand over a vast space of time. Momentarily and for a limited space\nof time it is obvious that the human soul can be more evil than\ngood; and by a reasonable analogy it is only too probable that the\nsame thing applies to the invisible sons of the universe. But the\nphilosophy of the complex vision has no place for devils or\ndemons in its world; for the simple reason that at the very moment\nany soul did become intrinsically and unchangeably evil, at that\nsame moment it would vanish into nothingness, since existence is\nthe product of the struggle between good and evil.\n\nIf any soul, whether mortal or immortal, became entirely and\nabsolutely good, it would instantaneously vanish into nothingness.\nFor the life of no kind of living soul is thinkable or conceivable\napart from the unfathomable duality. The false philosophy which\nfinds its ideal in an imaginary \"parent\" of the universe whose\ngoodness is absolute is a philosophy conceived under the furtive\ninfluence of the power of evil. For the essence of the power of evil\nis opposition to the movement of life; and no false ideal has ever\ndone so much injury to the free expansion of life as has been done\nby this conception of a \"parent\" of the universe who is a spirit of\n\"absolute goodness.\"\n\nIt is entirely in accordance with the unfathomable cunning of the\npower of malice that the supreme historic obstacle to the power of\nlove in the human soul should be this conception of a \"parent\" of\nthe universe, possessed of absolute goodness. In the deepest and\nmost subtle way does this conception oppose itself to the\ncreative energy of love. The creative energy of love demands an\nindetermined and malleable future. It demands an enemy with\nwhich to struggle. It demands the freedom of the individual will.\nDirectly that ancient and treacherous phantom, the \"inscrutable\nmystery\" _behind_ the \"universe,\" is allowed to become an object\nof thought; directly this mystery is allowed to take the shape of a\n\"parent of things\" who is to be regarded as \"absolutely good,\"\nthen, at that very moment, the eternal duality ceases to be \"eternal\"\nand ceases to be a \"duality.\"\n\nGood and evil become the manifestations of the same inscrutable\npower. Love and malice become interchangeable names of little\nmeaning. Satan becomes as significant a figure as Christ. All\ndistinctions are then blurred and blotted out. The aesthetic sense is\nmade of no account; or becomes a matter of accidental fancy.\nImagination is left with nothing to work upon. The rhythm of the\ncomplex vision is broken to pieces. All is permitted. Nothing is\nforbidden. The universe is reduced to an indiscriminate and\nformless mass of excremental substance. Indiscriminately we have\nto swallow the \"universe\" or indiscriminately we have to let the\n\"universe\" alone. There is no longer a protagonist in the great\ndrama, for there is no longer an antagonist. Indeed there is no\nlonger any drama. Tragedy is at an end; and Comedy is at an end.\nAll is equal. Nothing matters. Everything is at once good and evil,\nbeautiful and hideous, true and false. Or rather nothing is\nbeautiful, nothing is true. The \"parent of the universe\" has satisfied\nhis absolute \"goodness\" by swallowing up the universe; and there\nis nothing left for the miserable company of mortal souls to do but\nto bow their resigned heads and cry \"Om! Om!\" out of the belly of\nthat unutterable \"universal,\" which by becoming \"everything\" has\nbecome nothing.\n\nThis conception of a universal being of \"absolute goodness\" looms\nlike a colossal corpse in front of all living movement. If instead of\n\"absolute goodness\" we say \"absolute love,\" the falseness and\ndeadliness of this conception appears even more unmistakable. For\nlove is the prerogative of personality alone. Apart from\npersonality we cannot conceive of love. And we cannot conceive of\npersonality without the struggle between love and malice.\n\"Absolute love\" is a contradiction in terms; for it is the nature of\nlove to be perpetually overcoming malignant opposition; and, in\nthis overcoming, to be perpetually approximating to a far-off ideal\nwhich can never be completely reached.\n\nDevils and demons, or elemental entities of unredeemed evil, are\nunreal enough; and in their unreality dangerous enough to the\ncreative spirit; but far more unreal and far more dangerous than\nany devil, is this conception of an absolute being whose\n\"goodness\" is of so spurious a nature that it obliterates all\ndistinction. This conception of \"a parent of the universe\" who is\nresponsible for the \"eternal duality,\" but in whom the \"eternal\nduality\" is reconciled, blots out all hope for mortal or immortal\nsouls. Between the soul of a man and the soul of an immortal god,\nas for instance between the soul of a man and the soul of Christ,\nthere may be passionate and enduring love. But between the soul\nof a man, in whom love is desperately struggling with malice, and\nthis monstrous being in whom love and malice have arrived at\nsome unthinkable reconciliation, there can be no love. There can\nbe nothing but indignant unbelief alternating with profound\naversion. Towards any being in whose nature love has been\nreconciled to malice, the true to the false, the beautiful to the\nhideous, the good to the evil, there can be no alternative to\nunbelief, except unmitigated hostility.\n\nIt is especially in connection with the atrocious cruelty of physical\npain that our conscience and our tastes--unless perverted by some\npremature metaphysical synthesis or by some morbid religious\nemotion--reluct at the conception of a \"parent\" of the universe.\nPersonal love, since it is continually being roused to activity by\npain and is continually being expressed through pain and in spite\nof pain, has come to find in pain, perhaps even more than in\npleasure, its natural accomplice. Through the radiant well-being\nwhich results from pleasure, love pours forth its influence with a\nsun-like sweetness and profusion. But from the profound depths of\npain, love rises like silence out of a deep sea; and no path of\nmoonlight upon any ocean reaches so far an horizon.\n\nAnd it is because of this intimate association of love with pain that\nit is found to be impossible to love any living being who has not\nexperienced pain. Pain can be entirely sensational; and in this case\nit needs a very passion of love to prevent it becoming obscene and\nhumiliating. But it also can be entirely emotional; in which case it\nresults directly from the struggle of malice with love. When pain is\na matter of sensation or of sensationalized emotion, it depends for\nits existence upon the body. But when pain is entirely emotional it\nis independent of the body and is a condition of the soul.\n\nAs a condition of the soul pain is inevitably associated with the\nstruggle between love and malice. For in proportion as love\novercomes malice, pain ceases, and in proportion as malice\novercomes love, pain ceases. A human being entirely free from\nemotional pain is a human being in whom love has for the moment\ncompletely triumphed; or a human being in whom malice has for\nthe moment completely triumphed. There is an exultation of love\nwhich fills the soul with irresistible magnetic power, so that it can\nredeem the universe. There is also an exultation of malice which\nfills the soul with irresistible magnetic power, so that it can corrupt\nthe universe. In both these extreme cases--and they are cases of no\nunfrequent occurrence in all deep souls--emotional pain ceases to\nexist.\n\nEmotional pain is the normal condition of the human soul; because\nthe normal condition of the human soul is a wavering and\nuncertain struggle between love and malice; but although love\nmay overcome malice, or malice may overcome love, with relative\ncompleteness, they neither of them can overcome the other with\nabsolute completeness. There must always remain in the depths of\nthe soul a living potentiality; which is the love or the malice which\nhas been for the moment relatively overcome by its opposite. And\njust as pain can be both emotional and sensational so pleasure can\nbe both emotional and sensational. Pleasure, like pain, can be a\nthing of bodily sensation alone; in which case it tends to become a\nthing of degrading and humiliating reality. A human entity entirely\nobsessed by physical pleasure is a revolting and obscene spectacle.\nEven with animals it is only when their sensation of pleasure is in\nsome degree emotionalized that we can endure to contemplate it\nwith sympathy.\n\nThe soul of an animal is capable of being \"de-animalized\" in just\nas horrible a way by a pure sensation as the soul of a man is\ncapable of being \"de-humanized\" by a pure sensation. The sexual\nsensation of pleasure carried to the extreme limit \"de-animalizes\"\nanimals as it \"de-humanizes\" human beings; because it drowns the\nconsciousness of personality. There is an ecstasy when personality\nloses itself and finds itself again in a deeper personality. There is\nalso an ecstasy where personality loses itself in pure sensation. In\nthe region of sexual sensation, just as in the region of sexual\nemotion, it is love alone which is able to hold fast to personality in\nthe midst of ecstasy; or which is able to merge personality in a\ndeeper personality.\n\nIt is because of love's intimate association with pain that we are\nunable, except under the morbid pressure of some metaphysical or\nreligious illusion, to regard the imaginary \"parent of the universe\"\nwith anything but hostility. Both pain and pleasure are associated\nwith the unfathomable duality. And although the unfathomable\nduality descends into abysses beyond the reach of both of these,\nyet we cannot conceive of either of them existing apart from this\nstruggle.\n\nBut there can be no duality, as there can be no struggle, in the\nsoul of a being in whom love has absolutely overcome malice.\nTherefore in such a soul there can be no pain. And for a soul\nincapable of feeling pain we can feel no love. It is of course\nobvious that this whole problem is an imaginary one. We are not\nreally confronted with the alternative of loving or hating the\nunruffled soul of this absolute one. And we are not confronted\nwith this problem for the simple reason that such a soul does not\nexist. And it does not exist because every soul, together with the\n\"universe\" created by every soul, depends for its existence upon\nthis ultimate struggle.\n\nIt is from a consideration of the nature of pain and pleasure that\nwe attain the clue to the ultimate duality. Pain and pleasure are\nconditions of the soul; conditions which have a definite and quite\nfathomable limit. Malice and love are conditions of the soul;\nconditions which have no definite limit, but which descend into\nunfathomable depths. Extremity of malice sinks down to an abyss\nwhere pain and pleasure are lost and merged in one another.\nExtremity of love sinks down to an abyss where pain and pleasure\nare lost and merged in one another. But just as, apart from the\nindividual soul which is their possessor, pain and pleasure have no\nexistence at all; so, apart from the individual soul which is the\narena of their struggle, malice and love have no existence at all.\nBecause we speak of pain and pleasure as if they were \"things in\nthemselves\" and of malice and love as if they were \"things in\nthemselves\" this can never mean more than that they are eternal\nconditions of the soul which is their habitation.\n\nApart from a personal soul, \"love\" has no meaning and cannot be\nsaid to exist. Apart from a personal soul, \"life\" has no meaning\nand cannot be said to exist. There is no such thing as the\n\"love-force\" or the \"life-force,\" any more than there is such a thing\nas the \"malice-force\" or the \"death-force,\" apart from some personal\nsoul. The \"life-force\" is a condition of the soul which carried to an\nextreme limit results in ecstasy. The \"death-force\" is a condition of\nthe soul which carried to an extreme limit results in ecstasy.\nBeyond these two ecstasies there is nothing but total annihilation;\nwhich would simply mean that the soul had become absolutely\n\"good\" or absolutely \"evil.\"\n\nWhat we call the \"death-force\" in the soul does not imply real\ndeath, until it has reached a limit beyond ecstasy. It implies a\nmalignant resistance to life which may be carried to a point of\nindescribable exultation. As I have already hinted there is a\nprofound association between the duality of love and malice and\nthe duality of pain and pleasure. But it would be false to our\ndeepest experience to say that love implies pleasure and that\nmalice implies pain. As a matter of fact, they both imply a thrilling\nand ecstatic pleasure, in proportion as the equilibrium between\nthem, the balance of the wavering struggle between them, is\ninterrupted by the relative victory of either the one or the other.\n\nThe relative victory of malice or of the \"death-force\" over love or\nover the \"life-force\" is attended by exquisite and poignant\npleasure, a pleasure which culminates in unutterable ecstasy. The\nshallow ethical thinkers who regard \"evil\" as a negation are\nobviously thinkers whose consciousness has never penetrated into\nthe depths of their own souls. Pain and pleasure for such thinkers\nmust be entirely sensationalized. They cannot have experienced, to\nany profound depth, the kind of pain and pleasure which are\npurely emotional.\n\nThe condition of the soul which gives itself up to the \"death-force\"\nor to the malignant power which resists creation may be sometimes\na condition of thrilling and exultant pleasure. As we have\nalready indicated, the normal condition of the soul, wavering\nand hesitating between good and evil, is liable to be changed into a\nprofound melancholy, when it is confronted by the \"illusion of\ndead matter.\" But, as we have also discovered, if, in the soul thus\ncontemplating the \"illusion of dead matter,\" evil is more potent\nthan good, there may be a thrilling and exquisite pleasure.\n\nThe \"death-force\" in our own soul leaps in exultation to welcome\nthe \"death illusion\" in material objects. Upon this illusion, which it\nhas itself projected, it rejoices to feed. There is a \"sweet pain\" in\nthe melancholy it thus evokes; a \"sweet pain\" that is more delicate\nthan any pleasure; and it is a mistake to assume that even the\ninsanity which this aberration may result in is necessarily an\ninsanity of distress. It may be an insanity of ecstasy. All this is\nprofoundly associated with the aesthetic sense; and we may note\nthat the diabolical exultation with which many great artists and\nwriters fling themselves upon the obscene, the atrocious, the\ncruel and the abominable, and derive exquisite pleasure from\nrepresenting these things is not an example of the love in them\novercoming the malice but an example of the \"death-force\" in\nthem leaping to respond to the death-force in the universe.\n\nIt is just here that we touch one of the profoundest secrets of the\naesthetic sense. I refer to that condition of the soul when the\ncreative energy which is life and love, suffers an insidious\ncorruption by the power which resists creation and which is malice\nand death. This psychological secret, although assuming an\naesthetic form, is closely associated with the sexual instinct.\n\nThe sexual instinct, which is primarily creative, may easily, by the\ninsidious corruption of the power which resists creation, become a\nvampirizing force of destruction. It may indeed become something\nworse than destruction. It may become an abysmal and unutterable\n\"death-in-life.\" That voluptuous \"pleasure in cruelty\" which is an\nintrinsic element of the sexual instinct may attach itself to \"the\npleasure in death\" which is the intrinsic emotion of the aboriginal\ninert malice; or rather the \"pleasure in death\" of the adversary of\ncreation may insidiously associate itself with the \"pleasure in\ncruelty\" of the sexual instinct and make of \"this energy of cruelty\"\na new and terrible emotion which is at once cruel and inert.\n\nAll this were mere fantastic speculation if it lacked touch with\ndirect experience. But direct experience, if we have any\npsycho-clairvoyance at all, bears unmistakable witness to what I have\nbeen saying. If one glances at the expression in the countenance of\nany human soul who is deriving pleasure from the spectacle of\nsuffering and who, under the pressure of this queer fusion of the\naesthetic sense with the abysmal malice, is engaged in vampirizing\nthe victim of such suffering one will observe a very curious and\nvery illuminating series of revelations.\n\nOne will observe, for instance, the presence of demonic energy\nand of magnetic dominance in such a countenance; but parallel\nwith this and simultaneously with this, one will observe an\nexpression of unutterable sadness, a sadness which is inert and\ndeath-like, a sadness which has the soulless rigidity and the frozen\nimmobility of a corpse. We are thus justified, by an impression of\ndirect experience, in our contention that the peculiar pleasure\nwhich many artists derive from the contemplation of suffering and\nfrom the contemplation of what is atrocious, obscene, monstrous\nand revolting, is the result of a corruption of both the sexual\ninstinct and the aesthetic sense by the abysmal malice.\n\nFor the pleasure which such souls derive from the contemplation\nof suffering is identical with the pleasure they derive from\ncontemplating the \"illusion of dead matter.\" Philosophers who\ngive themselves up to the profoundest pessimism do not do so, as\na rule, under the influence of love. The only exceptions to this are\nrare cases when preoccupation with suffering does not spring from\na furtive enjoyment of the spectacle of suffering but from an\nincurable pity for the victims of suffering. Such exceptions are far\nmore rare than is usually supposed, because the self-preservative\nhypocrisy of most pessimists enables them to conceal their\nvoluptuousness under the mask of pity.\n\nNor must we hide from ourselves the fact that even pity, which in\nits pure form is the very incarnation of love, has a perverted form\nin which it lends itself to every kind of subterranean cruelty. Our\npsychological insight does not amount to very much if it does not\nrecognize that there is a form of pity which enhances the pleasure\nof cruelty. There may indeed be discovered, when we dig deep\nenough into the abysses of the soul, an aspect of pity which thrills\nus with a most delicate sensation of tenderness and yet which\nremains an aspect of pity by no means incompatible with the fact\nthat we continue the process of causing pain to the object of such\ntenderness.\n\nOf all human emotions the emotion of pity is capable of the most\ndivergent subtleties. The only kind of pity which is entirely free\nfrom the ambiguous element of \"pleasure in cruelty\" is the pity\nwhich is only another name for love, when love is confronted by\nsuffering. There is such a thing as a suppressed envy of \"the\npleasure of cruelty\" manifested in the form of moral indignation\nagainst the perpetrator of such cruelty.\n\nSuch moral indignation, with its secret impulse of suppressed\nunconscious jealousy, is a very frequent phenomenon when any\nsexual element enters into the cruelty in question. But the\npsychologist who has learnt his art from the profoundest of all\npsychologists--I mean the Christ of the gospels--is not deceived by\nthis moral gesture. He is able to detect the infinite yearning of the\nsatyr under the righteous fury of the moral avenger.\n\nAnd he has an infallible test at hand by which to ascertain whether\nthe emotion he feels is pure or impure pity; whether in other words\nit is merely a process of delicate vampirizing, or whether it is the\ncreative sympathy of love. And the test which he has at his\ndisposal is nothing less than his attitude towards the perpetrator of\nthe particular cruelty under discussion. If his attitude is one of\nimplacable revenge he may be sure that his pity is something else\nthan the emotion of love. If his attitude is one which implies pity\nnot only for the victim but also for the victim's torturer--who\nwithout question has more need for pity--then he may be sure that\nhis attitude is an attitude of genuine love.\n\nThe mood of implacable revenge need not necessarily imply a\nsuppressed jealousy or envy; but it certainly implies the presence\nof an element which has its origin in the sinister side of the\ngreat duality. The pleasure which certain minds derive from a\ncontemplation of the \"deadness of matter\" is closely associated\nwith the voluptuousness of cruelty drawn from the recesses of the\nsexual instinct. Such cruelty finds one of its most insidious\nincentives in the phenomenon of humiliation; and when the\nphilosopher contemplates the \"deadness of matter\" with exquisite\nsatisfaction, the pleasure which he experiences, or the \"sweet pain\"\nwhich he experiences, is very closely connected with the cruel\nidea of humiliating the pride of the human soul.\n\nThe duality of pleasure and pain helps us to understand the nature\nof the duality of good and evil, for it helps us to realize that good\nand evil are not separate independent existences; but are--like\npleasure and pain--emotional conditions of the soul. Thus when\nwe say that the ultimate duality of good and evil, or of creation\nand what resists creation, is the thing upon which the whole\nuniverse depends, we must not for a moment be supposed to mean\nthat the ultimate reality of the universe consists of two opposed\n\"forces\" who, like blind chemical energies, struggle with one\nanother in unconscious darkness.\n\nThe ultimate reality of the universe is personality, or rather, let us\nsay, is the existence of an innumerable company of personal souls,\nvisible and invisible, each of whom half-creates and half-discovers\nhis own universe; each of whom finds, sooner or later, in the\nobjective validity of the \"eternal ideas,\" a universe which is\ncommon to them all. The unfathomable duality upon which this\nobjective world, common to them all, depends for its existence is a\nduality which exists in every separate soul. Without such a duality\nit is impossible to conceive any soul existing. And directly such a\nduality were resolved into unity such a soul would cease to exist.\nBut because, without the presence of evil, good would cease to\nexist, we have no right to say that evil is an aspect of good. We\nhave no right to say this because, if good is dependent for its\nexistence upon evil, it is equally true that evil is dependent for its\nexistence upon good.\n\nThe whole question of ultimate issues is a purely speculative one\nand one that does not touch the real situation. The real situation,\nthe real fact of our personal experience--which is the only\nexperience worth anything--lies undoubtedly in this impression of\nunfathomable duality. It cannot be regarded as a reconciliation\nbetween love and malice merely to recognize that love and malice\nare not independent \"forces,\" such as can be compared to chemical\n\"forces,\" but are states of the soul.\n\nIt is true that they both exist within the soul, just as the soul\nexists within time and space; but since the soul is unfathomable these\ntwo conditions of the soul are also unfathomable. The struggle\nupon which the universe depends is a struggle which goes on\nwithin the circle of personality; but since personality is\nunthinkable without this struggle, it may truly be said that the\nexistence of personality \"depends\" upon the existence of this\nstruggle. When we speak of pain and pleasure as if they were\nindependent entities we are forgetting that it is merely as \"states of\nthe soul\" that pain and pleasure exist. When we speak of love and\nmalice as independent entities we are forgetting that it is merely as\n\"states of the soul\" that love and malice exist. Love and malice,\nthe life-force and the death-force, these are merely abstractions\nwhen separated from the soul which is their arena.\n\nIt is certainly not in harmony with the revelation of the complex\nvision to seek to imagine some vague \"beginning of things\"; when\nsome inscrutable chemical or spiritual \"energy,\" called \"life,\"\nrushed into objective existence and proceeded to create living\npersonalities through which it might be able to function.\n\nThe revelation of the complex vision is a revelation of a world\nmade up of unfathomable personalities. Of this world, of these\nunfathomable personalities, we are unable to postulate any\n\"beginning.\" They have always existed. They seem likely to\nremain always in existence. Our knowledge stops at that point;\nbecause our knowledge is the knowledge of personality. The\nrevelation of the complex vision is constantly warning us against\nany tendency to evade the whole question of the original mystery\nby the use of meaningless abstractions.\n\nThe word \"energy\" is such an abstraction. So also is the word\n\"movement.\" So also are those logical formulae of the pure reason,\nsuch as the \"a priori unity of apperception\" and the \"absolute\nspirit.\" Apart from personality, apart from the complex vision of\nthe individual soul, there is no such thing as \"energy\" or\n\"movement\" or \"transcendental unity\" or \"absolute spirit.\" In\nthe same way we are compelled to recognize that apart from\npersonality the unfathomable duality has no meaning. But in so far\nas it represents the eternal struggle between life and death which\ngoes on all the while in every living soul, the unfathomable duality\nis the permanent condition of our deepest knowledge.\n\nIt is just here that the mystery of pain and pleasure helps\nus to understand the mystery of love and malice, the same\ninsensitiveness in certain souls that prevents their feeling any vivid\npain or any vivid pleasure, also prevents their feeling any intense\nmalice. But this insensitiveness which prevents their feeling any\nintense malice is, more than anything else, the especial evocation\nof the power of malice. For intensity, even in malice, is a proof\nthat malice has been appropriating to its use the energy of life. The\nreal opposite of intense love is not intense malice but inert malice.\n\nFor malignant inertness is the true adversary of creation. From this\nit necessarily follows that the soul which is insensitive to pain and\npleasure and to malice and love is a soul in whom the profound\nopposite of love has already won a relative victory. It is certainly\npossible, as we have seen, for the victory of malice over love to be\naccompanied by thrilling pleasure; but, when this happens malice\nhas lost something of its \"inertness\" by drawing to itself and\ncorrupting for its own use the dynamic energy of love. When\nmalice displays itself in an intense and vivid activity of destruction\nit is less \"evil\" and less purely \"malignant\" than when it remains\ninsensitive and inert. For this reason it is undeniably true that an\ninsensitive person, although he may cause much less positive pain\nthan a passionately cruel person, is in reality a more complete\nincarnation of the power of \"evil\" than the latter; for the latter, in\nthe very violence of his passion, has appropriated to himself\nsomething of the creative energy. It is true that in appropriating\nthis he has corrupted it, and it is true that by the use of it he can\ncause far more immediate pain; but it remains that in himself he is\nless purely \"evil\" than the person whose chief characteristic is a\nmalignant insensitiveness.\n\n\nCHAPTER XIII.\n\nTHE REALITY OF THE SOUL IN RELATION TO MODERN THOUGHT\n\nIt ought not to be forgotten, as at least an important historical fact,\nin regard to what we have asserted as the revelation of the\ncomplex vision concerning the reality of the soul, that the two\nmost influential modern philosophers deny this reality altogether. I\nrefer to Bergson and William James.\n\nIn the systems of thought of both these writers there is no place\nleft for that concrete, real, actual \"monad,\" with its semi-mental,\nsemi-material substratum of unknown hyper-physical, hyper-psychic\nsubstance, which is what we mean, in philosophical as well as\nin popular language when we talk of the \"soul.\"\n\nAccording to the revelation of man's complex vision this\nhyper-physical, hyper-psychic \"something,\" which is the concrete centre\nof will and consciousness and energy, is also the invisible core or\nbase of what we term personality, and, without its real existence,\npersonality can have no permanence. Without the assumption of\nits real existence personality cannot hold its own or remain\nintegral and identical in the midst of the process of life.\n\nThis then being the nature and character of the soul, what weight\nis there in the arguments used against the soul's concrete existence\nby such thinkers as James and Bergson? The position of the\nAmerican philosopher in regard to this matter seems less plausible\nand less consistent than that of his French master.\n\nJames is prepared to give his adherence to a belief in a soul of the\nearth and in planetary souls and stellar souls. He quotes with\napproval on this point the writings of Gustav Theodor Fechner, the\nLeipzig chemist. He is also prepared to find a place in his\npluralistic world for at least one quite personal and quite finite\ngod.\n\nIf he is not merely exercising his philosophical fancy in all this,\nbut is actually prepared to assume the real concrete existence of an\nearth-soul and of planetary souls and of at least one beneficent and\nquite personal god, why should he find himself unable to accept\nthe same sort of real concrete soul in living human beings? Why\nshould he find himself compelled to say--\"the notion of the\nsubstantial soul, so freely used by common men and the more\npopular philosophers has fallen upon evil days and has no prestige\nin the eyes of critical thinkers . . . like the word 'cause' the word\n'soul' is but a theoretic stop-gap . . . it marks a place and claims it\nfor a future explanation to occupy . . . let us leave out the soul,\nthen, and confront the original dilemma\"?\n\nThis scepticism of the pragmatic philosophy in regard to the\n\"substantial soul\" is surely an unpardonable inconsistency. For in\nall other problems the fact of an idea being \"freely used by\ncommon men\" is, according to pragmatic principles, an enormous\npiece of evidence in its favour. The further fact that all the great \"a\npriori\" metaphysical systems have been driven by their pure logic\nto discredit the \"substantiality\" of the soul, just as they have been\ndriven to discredit the personality of God, ought, one would think,\nwhere \"radical empiricism\" is concerned, to be a still stronger\npiece of evidence on the soul's side.\n\nJames has told us that he has found it necessary to throw away\n\"pure reason\" and to assume an inherent \"irrationality\" in the\nsystem of things. Why then, when it comes to this particular axiom\nof irrational common-sense, does he balk and sheer off?\n\nOne cannot resist the temptation of thinking that just here the great\nPragmatist has been led astray by that very philosophical pride he\ncondemns in the metaphysicians. One cannot help suspecting that\nit is nothing less than the fact of the soul's appeal to ordinary\ncommon-sense that has prejudiced this philosopher of common-sense\nso profoundly against it.\n\nWhat James does not seem to see is that his pseudo-scientific\nreduction of the integral soul-monad into a wavering and fitful\nseries of compounded vortex-consciousness is really a falling back\nfrom the empirical data of human reality into the thin abstracted\nair of conceptual truth. The concrete substantial soul, just because\nit is the permanent basis of personality and the only basis of\npersonality which common sense can apprehend, is precisely one\nof those obstinate original particular \"data\" of consciousness\nwhich it is the proud role of conceptual and intellectual logic to\nexplain away, and to explain away in favour of attenuated\nrationalistic theories which are themselves \"abstracted\" or, shall\nwe say, pruned and shaved off from the very thing they are\nsupposed to explain.\n\nAll these \"flowing streams,\" and \"pulses of consciousness\" and\nmultiple \"compoundings of consciousness\" and overlappings of\nsub-consciousness are in reality, for all their pseudo-scientific air,\nnothing more or less than the old-fashioned metaphysical\nconceptions, such as \"being\" and \"becoming,\" under a new name.\n\nNor is the new \"irrational reason\" by which the pragmatist arrives\nat these plausible theories really in the least different from the\nimaginative personal vision which, as James himself clearly\nshows, was at the back of all that old-fashioned dialectic.\n\nThe human mind has not changed its inherent texture; nor can it\nchange it. We may talk of substituting intuition for reason. But the\n\"new intuition,\" with its arrogant claims of getting upon the \"inner\nside\" of reality, is after all only \"the old reason\" functioning with a\nfranker admission of its reliance upon that immediate personal\nvision and with less regard for the logical rules.\n\nIt is not, in fact, because of any rule of \"logical identity with\nitself\" that the human mind clings so tenaciously to the notion of an\nintegral soul-monad. It is because of its own inmost consciousness\nthat such a monad, that such a substantial integral soul, is in the\ndeepest sense its very self, and a denial of it a denial of its very\nself.\n\nThe attitude of Bergson in this matter is much more consistent\nthan that of James. Bergson is frankly and confessedly not a\npluralist at all, but a spiritual monist. As a spiritual monist he is\ncompelled to regard what we call \"matter,\" including in this term\nthe mechanical or chemical resistance of body and brain, as\nsomething which is produced or evolved or \"thrown off\" by spirit\nand as something which, when once it has been evolved, spirit has\nto penetrate, permeate, and render porous and submissive.\n\nThe complexity of Bergson's speculations with regard to memory\nand the \"\u00e9lan vital,\" with regard above all to the \"true time,\" has\ndone much to distract popular attention away from his real attitude\ntowards the soul. But Bergson's attitude towards the existence of a\nsubstantial soul-monad is consistently and inevitably hostile.\n\nIt could not be anything else as long as the original personal\n\"fling\" into life which gives each one of us his peculiar angle of\nvision remained with him a question of one unified _spirit_--\"a\ncontinuum of eternal shooting-forth\"--which functioned through\nthe brain and through all personal life and perpetually created a\nnew unforeseen universe.\n\nIn the flux of this one universal \"spirit,\" whereof \"duration,\" in the\nmysterious Bergsonian sense, is the functional activity, there can\nobviously be no place for an actual substantial soul. \"The\nconsciousness we have of our own self in its continual flux\nintroduces us to the interior of a reality on the model of which we\nmust represent other realities. All reality, therefore, is a tendency,\nif we agree to mean by tendency an incipient change in any\ndirection.\" And when we enquire as to the nature of this \"continual\nflux\" of which the positive and integral thing we have come to call\nthe soul is but a ripple, or swirling whirlpool of centripetal ripples,\nthe answer which Bergson gives is definite enough. \"We approach\na duration which _strains_, contracts, and intensifies itself more\nand more; at the limit would be eternity. No longer conceptual\neternity, which is an eternity of death, but an eternity of life. A\nliving, and therefore still moving eternity in which our own\nparticular duration would be included, as the vibrations are in\nlight; an eternity which would be the concentration of all duration,\nas materiality is its dispersion. Between these two extreme limits\nintuition moves, and this movement is the very essence of\nmetaphysics.\"\n\nThus according to Bergson the essential secret of life is to be\nfound in some peculiar movement of what he calls spirit; a\nmovement which takes place in some unutterable medium, or upon\nsome indescribable plane, the name of which is \"pure time\" or\n\"duration.\"\n\nAnd listening to all this we cannot resist a sigh of dismay. For\nhere, in these vague de-humanized terms--\"tendency,\" \"flux,\"\n\"eternity,\" \"vibration,\" \"duration,\" \"dispersion\"--we are once\nmore, only with a different set of concepts, following the old\nmetaphysical method, that very method which Bergson himself\nsets out to confine to its inferior place. \"Tendency\" or \"flux\" or\n\"duration\" is just as much a metaphysical concept as \"being\" or\n\"not being\" or \"becoming.\"\n\nThe only way in which we can really escape from the rigid\nconceptualism of rational logic is to accept the judgment of the\ntotality of man's nature. And the judgment of the totality of man's\nnature points unmistakably to the existence of a real substantial\nsoul. Such a soul is the indispensable implication of personality.\nAnd the most interior and intimate knowledge that we are in\npossession of, or shall ever be in possession of, is the knowledge\nof personality.\n\nBergson is perfectly right when he asserts that \"the consciousness\nwhich we have of our own self\" introduces us \"to the interior of a\nreality, on the model of which we must represent other realities.\"\nBut Bergson is surely departing both from the normal facts of\nordinary introspection and from the exceptional facts of abnormal\nillumination when he appends to the words \"the consciousness\nwhich we have of our own self\" the further words in its continual\n\"flux.\" For in our normal moods of human introspection, as well\nas in our abnormal moods of superhuman illumination, what we\nare conscious of most of all is a sense of integral continuity in the\nmidst of change, and of identical permanence in the midst of ebb\nand flow.\n\nThe flux of things does most assuredly rush swiftly by us; and we,\nin our inmost selves, are conscious of life's incessant flow. But\nhow could we be conscious of any of this turbulent movement\nacross the prow of our voyaging ship, if the ship itself--the\nsubstantial base of our living consciousness--were not an\norganized and integral reality, of psycho-chemical material, able to\nexert will and to make use of memory and reason in its difficult\nstruggle with the waves and winds?\n\nThe revelation of man's complex vision with regard to the\npersonality of the soul is a thing of far-reaching issues and\nimplications. One of these implications is that while we have the\nright to the term \"the eternal flux\" in regard to the changing waves\nof sensations and ideas that pass across the horizon of the soul's\nvision we have no right to think of this \"eternal flux\" as anything\nelse than the pressure upon us of the universe of our own vision\nand the pressure upon us of the universe of other visions, as they\nseem, for this or that passing moment, to be different from our\nown.\n\nThe kind of world to which we are thus committed is a world\ncrowded with living personalities. Each of these personalities\nbrings with it its own separate universe. But the fact that all these\nseparate universes find their ideal synthesis or teleological\norientation in \"the vision of the immortals,\" justifies us in\nassuming that in a certain eternal sense all these apparently\nconflicting universes are in reality one. This unity of ideas, with its\npredominant aesthetic idea--the idea of beauty--and its\npredominant emotional idea--the idea of love--helps us towards a\nsynthesis which is after all only a dynamic one, a thing of\nmovement, growth and creation.\n\nSuch a teleological unity, forever advancing to a consummation\nnever entirely to be attained, demands however some sort of static\n\"milieu\" as well as some sort of static \"material\" in the midst of\nwhich and out of which it moulds its premeditated future. It is\nprecisely this static \"milieu\" or \"medium,\" and this static\n\"material\" or formless \"objective mystery,\" which Bergson's\nphilosophy, of the _\"\u00e9lan vital\" of pure spirit_, spreading out into\na totally indetermined future, denies and eliminates.\n\nIn order to justify this double elimination--the elimination\nof an universal \"medium\" and the elimination of a formless\n\"thing-in-itself\"--Bergson is compelled to reduce _space_ to a quite\nsecondary and merely logical conception and to substitute for our\nordinary stream of time, measurable in terms of space, an\naltogether new conception of time, measurable in terms of feeling.\n\nWhen however we come to analyse this new Bergsonian time, or\nas he prefers to call it \"intuitively-felt duration,\" we cannot avoid\nobserving that it is merely a new \"mysterious something\"\nintroduced into the midst of the system of things, in order to\nenable us to escape from those older traditional \"mysterious\nsomethings\" which we have to recognize as the \"immediate data\"\nof human consciousness.\n\nIt might be argued that Bergson's monistic \"spirit,\" functioning in\na mysterious indefinable \"time,\" demands neither more nor less of\nan irrational act of faith than our mysterious psycho-material\n\"soul\" surrounded by a mysterious hyper-chemical \"medium\" and\ncreating its future out of an inexplicable \"objective mystery.\"\n\nWhere however the philosophy of the complex vision has the\nadvantage over the philosophy of the \"\u00e9lan vital\" is in the fact that\neven on Bergson's own admission what the human consciousness\nmost intensely _knows_ is not \"pure spirit,\" whether shaped like a\nfan or shaped like a sheaf, but simply its own integral identity.\nAnd this integral identity of consciousness can only be visualized\nor felt in the mind itself under the form of a living concrete\nmonad.\n\nIt will be seen, however, when it comes to a \"showing up\" of what\nmight be called the \"trump cards\" of axiomatic mystery, that the\ncomplex vision has in reality fewer of these ultimate irrational\n\"data\" than has the philosophy of the \u00e9lan vital.\n\nSpace itself, whether we regard it as objective or subjective, is\ncertainly not an irrational axiom but an entirely rational and indeed\nan entirely inevitable assumption. And what the complex vision\nreveals is that the trinity of \"mysterious somethings\" with which\nwe are compelled to start our enquiry, namely the \"something\"\nwhich is the substratum of the soul, the \"something\" which is the\n\"medium\" binding all souls together, and the \"something\" which is\nthe \"objective mystery\" out of which all souls create their\nuniverse, is, in fact, a genuine trinity in the pure theological sense;\nin other words is a real \"three-in-one.\" And it is a \"three-in-one\"\nnot only because it is unthinkable that three \"incomprehensible\nsubstances\" should exist in touch with one another without being\nin organic relation, but also because all three of them are\ndominated, in so far as we can say anything about them at all, by\nthe same universal space.\n\nIt is true that the unappropriated mass of \"objective mystery\" upon\nwhich no shadow of the creative energy of any soul has yet been\nthrown must be considered as utterly \"formless and void\" and thus\nin a sense beyond space and time, yet since immediately we try to\n_imagine_ or _visualize_ this mystery, as well as just logically\n\"consider\" it, we are compelled to extend over it our conception of\ntime and space, it is in a practical sense, although not in a logical\nsense, under the real dominion of these.\n\nWhen therefore the philosophy of the complex vision places its\ntrump-cards of axiomatic mystery over against the similar cards of\nthe philosophy of the \"\u00e9lan vital\" it will be found that in actual\nnumber Bergson has one more \"card\" than we have. For Bergson\nhas not only his \"pure spirit\" and his \"intuitively-felt time,\" but has\nalso--for he cannot really escape from that by just asserting that\nhis \"spirit\" produces it--the opposing obstinate principle of\n\"matter\" or \"solid bodies\" or \"mechanical brains\" upon which his\npure spirit has to work.\n\nIt is indeed out of its difficulties with \"matter,\" that is to say with\nbodies and brains, that Bergson's \"spirit\" is forced to forego its\nnatural element of \"intuitive duration\" and project itself into the\nrigid rationalistic conceptualism of ordinary science and\nmetaphysic.\n\nThe point of our argument in this place is that since the whole\npurpose of philosophy is articulation or clarification and\nsince in this process of clarification the fewer \"axiomatic\nincomprehensibles\" we start with the better; it is decidedly to the\nadvantage of any philosophy that it should require at the start\nnothing more than the mystery of the individual soul confronting\nthe mystery of the world around it. And it is to the disadvantage of\nBergson's philosophy that it should require at the start, in addition\nto \"pure spirit\" with its assumption of memory and will, and \"pure\nmatter\" with its assumption of ordinary space and ordinary time, a\nstill further axiomatic trump-card, in the theory of intuitive\n\"durational\" time, in which the real process of the life-flow\ntranscends all reason and logic.\n\nPutting aside however the cosmological aspect of our controversy\nwith the \"radical empirical\" school of thought, we still have left\nunconsidered our most serious divergence from their position.\nThis consists in the fact that both Bergson and James have entirely\nomitted from their original instrument of research that inalienable\naspect of the human soul which we call the aesthetic sense.\n\nWith only a few exceptions--notably that of Spinoza--all the great\nEuropean philosophers from Plato to Nietzsche have begun their\nphilosophizing from a starting-point which implied, as an essential\npart of their \"organum\" of enquiry, the possession by the human\nsoul of some sort of aesthetic vision.\n\nTo these thinkers, whether rationalistic or mystic, no interpretation\nof the world seemed possible that did not start with the aesthetic\nsense, both as an instrument of research and as a test of what\nresearch discovered.\n\nThe complete absence of any discussion of the aesthetic sense in\nBergson and James is probably an historic confession of the\ntyranny of commercialism and physical science over the present\ngeneration. It may also be a spiritual reflection, in the sphere of\nphilosophy, of the rise to political and social power of that\nbourgeois class which, of all classes, is the least interested in\naesthetic speculation.\n\nThe philosophy of the complex vision may have to wait for its\nhour of influence until the proletariat comes into its own. And it\ndoes indeed seem as if between the triumph of the proletariat and\nthe triumph of the aesthetic sense there were an intimate\nassociation. It is precisely because these two philosophers have so\ncompletely neglected the aesthetic sense that their speculations\nseem to have so little hold upon the imagination. When once it is\nallowed that the true instrument of research into the secret of the\nuniverse is the rhythmic activity of man's complete nature, and not\nmerely the activity of his reason or the activity of his intuition\nworking in isolation, it then becomes obvious that the universal\nrevelations of the aesthetic sense, if they can be genuinely\ndisentangled from mere subjective caprices, are an essential part of\nwhat we have to work with if we are to approach the truth.\n\nThe philosophy of the complex vision bases its entire system upon\nits faith in the validity of these revelations; and, as we have\nalready shown, it secures an objective weight and force for this\nideal vision by its faith in certain unseen companions of humanity,\nwhom it claims the right to name \"the immortals.\"\n\nThis is really the place where we part company with Bergson and\nJames. We agree with the former in his distrust of the old\nmetaphysic. We agree with the latter in many of his pluralistic\nspeculations. But we feel that any philosophy which refuses to\ntake account, at the very beginning, of those regions of human\nconsciousness which are summed up by the words \"beauty\" and\n\"art,\" is a philosophy that in undertaking to explain life has begun\nby eliminating from life one of its most characteristic products.\n\nIn Bergson's interpretation of life the stress is laid upon \"spirit\"\nand \"intuition.\" In James' interpretation of life the stress is laid\nupon those practical changes in the world and in human nature\nwhich any new idea must produce if it is to prove itself true.\n\nIn the view of life we are now trying to make clear, philosophy is\nso closely dependent upon the activity of the aesthetic sense that it\nmight itself be called an art, the most difficult and the most\ncomprehensive of all the arts, the art of retaining the rhythmic\nbalance of all man's contradictory energies. What this rhythmic\nbalance of man's concentrated energies seems to make clear is the\nprimary importance of the process of discrimination and valuation.\n\nFrom the profoundest depths of the soul rises the consciousness of\nthe power of choice; and this power of choice to which we give,\nby common consent, the name of \"will,\" finds itself confronted at\nthe start by the eternal duality of the impulse to create and the\nimpulse to resist creation. The impulse to create we find, by\nexperience, to be identical with the emotion of love. And the\nimpulse to resist creation we find, by experience, to be identical\nwith the emotion of malice.\n\nBut experience carries us further than this. The impulse to create,\nor the emotion of love, is found, as soon as it begins a function, to\nbe itself a living synthesis of three primordial reactions to life,\nwhich, in philosophic language, we name \"ideas.\" These three\nprimordial ideas may be summed up as follows: The idea of\nbeauty, which is the revelation of the aesthetic sense. The idea of\ngoodness or nobility, which is the revelation of conscience. The\nidea of truth, or the mind's apprehension of reality, which is the\nrevelation of reason, intuition, instinct, and imagination,\nfunctioning in sympathic harmony. Now it is true that by laying so\nmuch stress upon the \"\u00e9lan vital\" or flowing tide of creative\nenergy, Bergson has indicated his acceptance of one side of the\nultimate duality. But for Bergson this creative impulse is not\nconfronted by evil or by malice as its opposite, but simply by the\nnatural inertness of mechanical \"matter.\"\n\nAnd once having assumed his \"continuum\" of pure spirit, he deals\nno further with the problem of good and evil or with the problem\nof the aesthetic sense.\n\nFrom our point of view he is axiomatically unable to deal with\nthese problems for the simple reason that his \u00e9lan vital or flux of\npure spirit, being itself a mere metaphysical abstraction from\nliving personality, can never, however hard you squeeze it,\nproduce either the human conscience or the human aesthetic sense.\n\nThese things can only be produced from the concrete activity of a\nreal living individual soul. In the same way it is true that William\nJames, by his emphasis upon conduct and action and practical\nefficiency as the tests of truth, is bound to lay enormous stress at\nthe very start upon the ethical problem.\n\nWhat a person believes about the universe becomes itself an\nethical problem by the introduction on the one hand of the\nefficiency of the will to believe and on the other of the assumption\nthat a person \"ought\" to believe that which it is \"useful\" to him to\nbelieve, as long as it does not conflict with other desirable truths.\nBut this ethical element in the pragmatic doctrine, though it is so\ndominant as almost to reduce philosophy itself to a sub-division of\nethics, is not, when one examines it, at all the same thing as what\nthe philosophy of the complex vision means by the revelation of\nconscience.\n\nEthics with William James swallows up philosophy and in\nswallowing up philosophy the nature of Ethics is changed and\nbecomes something different from the clear unqualified mandate\nof the human conscience. With the philosophy of the complex\nvision the revelations of conscience are intimately associated with\nthe revelations of the aesthetic sense; and these again, in the\nrhythmic totality of man's nature, with the revelations of emotion,\ninstinct, intuition, imagination.\n\nThus when it comes to conduct and the question of choice the kind\nof \"imperative\" issued by conscience has been already profoundly\nchanged. It is still the mandate of conscience. But it is the mandate\nof a conscience whose search-light has been taken possession of\nby the aesthetic sense and has been fed by imagination, instinct\nand intuition.\n\nIt must be understood when we speak of these various \"aspects\" or\n\"attributes\" of the human soul we do not imply that they exist as\nseparable faculties independently of the unity of the soul which\npossesses them.\n\nThe soul is an integral and indivisible monad and throws its whole\nstrength along each of these lines of contact with the world. As\nwill, the soul flings itself upon the world in the form of choice\nbetween opposite valuations. As conscience, it flings itself upon\nthe world in the form of motive force of opposite valuations. As\nthe aesthetic sense, it flings itself upon the world in the form of yet\nanother motive-force of opposite valuations. As imagination, it\nhalf-creates and half-discovers the atmospheric climate, so to\nspeak, of this valuation. As intuition, it feels itself to be in\npossession of a super-terrestrial, super-human authority which\ngives objective definiteness and security to this valuation. As\ninstinct, it feels its way by an innate clairvoyance into the organic\nor biological vibrations of this valuation.\n\nThus we return to the point from which we started, namely that the\nwhole problem of philosophy is the problem of valuation. And this\nis the same thing as saying that philosophy, considered in its\nessential nature, is nothing less than art--the art of flinging itself\nupon the world with all the potentialities of the soul functioning in\nrhythmic harmony.\n\nWhen Bergson talks of the \"\u00e9lan vital\" and suggests that the acts\nof choice of the human personality are made as naturally and\ninevitably, under the pressure of the \"shooting out\" of the spirit, as\nleaves grow upon the tree, he is falling into the old traditional\nblunder of all pantheistic and monistic thinkers, the blunder\nnamely of attributing to a universal \"God\" or \"life-force\" or\n\"stream of tendency\" the actual personal achievements of\nindividual souls.\n\nBergson's \"apologia\" for free-will is therefore rendered ineffective\nby reason of the fact that it does not really leave the individual\nfree. The only \"free\" thing is the aboriginal \"spirit,\" pouring forth\nin its \"durational\" stream, and moulding bodies and brains as it\ngoes along.\n\nThe philosophy of the complex vision does not believe in \"spirit\"\nor \"life-force\" or \"durational streams of tendency.\" Starting with\npersonality it is not incumbent upon it to show how personality\nhas been evolved. It is no more incumbent upon it to show how\npersonality has been evolved than it is incumbent upon pantheistic\nidealism to show how God or how the Absolute has been evolved.\nPersonality with its implication of separate concrete psycho-material\nsoul-monads is indeed our Absolute or at any rate is as much\nof an Absolute as we can ever get while we continue to recognize\nthe independent existence of one universal space, of one universal\nethereal medium, and of on universal objective mystery.\n\nPerhaps the correct metaphysical statement of our philosophic\nposition would be that our Absolute is a duality from the very\nstart--a duality made up on one side of innumerable soul-monads\nand on the other side of an incomprehensible formless mass of\nplastic material, itself subdivided into the two aspects of a medium\nbinding the soul-monads together, and an objective mystery into\nwhich they pierce their way.\n\nWhen the evolutionists tell us that personality is a thing of late\nappearance in the system of things and a thing of which we are\nable to note the historic or prehistoric development, out of the\n\"lower\" forms of life, our answer is that we have no right to\nassume that the life of the earth and of the other planetary and\nstellar bodies is a \"lower\" form of life.\n\nIf to this the astronomer answer that he is able to carry the history\nof evolution further back than any planet or star, as far back as a\nvast floating mass of homogeneous fiery vapour, even then we\nshould still maintain that this original nebular mass of fire was the\nmaterial \"body\" of an integral soul-monad; and that in surrounding\nimmensities of space there were other similar masses of nebular\nfire--possibly innumerable others--who in their turn were the\nbodily manifestations of integral soul-monads.\n\nWhen evolutionists argue that personality is a late and accidental\nappearance on the world scene, they are only thinking of human\npersonalities; and our contention is that while man has a right to\ninterpret the universe in terms of his soul, he has no right to\ninterpret the universe in terms of his body; and that it is therefore\nquite possible to maintain that the \"body\" of the earth has been\nfrom the beginning animated by a soul-monad whose life can in no\nsense be called \"lower\" than the life of the soul-monad which\nat present animates the human body. And in support of our\ncontention just here we are able to quote not only the authority of\nFechner but the authority of Professor James himself approving of\nFechner.\n\nWhat the philosophy of the complex vision really does is to take\nlife just as it is--the ordinary multifarious spectacle presented to\nour senses and interpreted by our imagination--and regard this, and\nnothing more recondite than this, as the ultimate Absolute, or as\nnear an Absolute as we are ever likely to get.\n\nFrom our point of view it seems quite uncalled for to summon up\nvague and remote entities, like streams of consciousness and\nshootings forth of spirit, in order to interpret this immediate\nspectacle. Such streams of consciousness and shootings forth of\nspirit seem to us just as much abstractions and just as much\nconceptual substitutions for reality as do the old-fashioned\nmetaphysical entities of \"being\" and \"becoming.\"\n\nNo one has ever _seen_ a life-stream or a life-force. No one has\never _seen_ a compounded congeries of conscious states. But\nevery one of us has seen a living human soul looking out of a\nliving human body; and most of us have seen a living soul looking\nout of the mysterious countenance of earth, water, air and fire.\n\nThe philosophy of the soul-monad has at any rate this advantage\nover every other: namely, that it definitely represents human\nexperience and can always be verified by human experience. Any\nhuman being can try the experiment of sinking into the depths of\nhis own identity. Let the reader of this passage try such an\nexperiment here and now; and let him, in the light of what he\nfinds, decide this question. Does he find himself flowing\nmysteriously forth, along some indescribable \"durational\" stream,\nand, as he flows, feeling himself to be that stream? Or does he feel\nhimself to be a definite concrete actual \"I am I,\" \"the guest and\ncompanion of his body\" and, as far as the mortal weakness of flesh\nallows, the motive-principle of that body?\n\nIf the philosophy of the complex vision is able to make an appeal\nof this kind with a certain degree of assurance as to the answer, it\nis able to make a yet more convincing appeal, when--the soul's\nexistence once admitted--it becomes a question as to that soul's\ninherent quality. No human being, unless in the grasp of some\nmegalomania of virtue, can deny the existence, in the depths of his\nnature, of a struggle between the emotion of love and the emotion\nof malice.\n\nOut of this ultimate duality under the pressure of the forms and\nshapes of life and the reaction against these of the imagination and\nthe aesthetic sense, spring into existence those primordial ideas of\ntruth and beauty and goodness which, are the very stuff and\ntexture of our fate. But these ideas, primordial though they are, are\nso confused and distorted by their contact with circumstances and\naccident, that it may well be that no clear image of them is found\nin the recesses of the soul when the soul turns its glance inward.\n\nNo soul, however, can turn its glance inward without recognizing\nin its deepest being this ultimate struggle between love and malice.\nHow then can any philosophy be regarded as a transcript and\nreflection of reality when at the very start it refuses to take\ncognizance of this fact? If the only knowledge, which is in any\nsense certain, is our knowledge of ourselves, and if our knowledge\nof ourselves implies our knowledge of a definite \"soul-monad\" for\never divided against itself in this abysmal struggle, how then may\na philosophy be regarded as covering the facts of experience,\nwhen in place of this personal contradiction it predicates, as its\nexplanation of the system of things, some remote, thin, abstract\ntendency, such as the \"shooting forth of spirit\" or the\ncompounding of states of consciousness?\n\nThe whole matter may be thus summed up. The modern tendencies\nof thought which we have been considering, get rid of the\nold metaphysical notion of the logical Absolute only to\nsubstitute vague psychological \"states of consciousness\" in its\nplace. But what philosophy requires if the facts of introspective\nexperience are to be trusted is neither an Absolute in whose\nidentity all difference is lost nor a stream of \"states of\nconsciousness\" which is suspended, as it were, in a vacuum.\n\nWhat philosophy requires is the recognition of real actual persons\nwhose original revelation of the secret of life implies that abysmal\nduality of good and evil beyond the margin of which no living soul\nhas ever passed. Whether or not this concrete \"monad\" or living\nsubstratum of personality survives the death of the body is quite a\ndifferent question; is in fact a question to which the philosophy of\nthe complex vision can make no definite response. In this matter\nall we can say is that those supreme moments of rhythmic ecstasy,\nwhose musical equilibrium I have indicated in the expression\n\"apex-thought,\" establish for us a conclusive certainty as to the\neternal continuance, beyond the scope of all deaths, of that\nindestructible aspect of personality we have come to name the\nstruggle between love and malice.\n\nWith the conclusive consciousness of this there necessarily arises\na certain attitude of mind which is singularly difficult to describe\nbut which I can hint at in the following manner. In the very act of\nrecognition, in the act by which we apprehend the secret of the\nuniverse to consist in this abysmal struggle of the emotion of love\nwith the emotion of malice, there is an implication of a complete\nacceptance of whatever the emotion of love or the principle of\nlove is found to demand, as the terms of its relative victory over its\nantagonist. Whether this demand of love, or to put it more exactly\nthis demand of \"all souls\" in whom love is dominant, actually\nissues in a personal survival after death we are not permitted to\nfeel with any certainty. But what we feel with certainty, when the\napex-thought of the complex vision reaches its consummation, is\nthat we find our full personal self-realization and happiness in a\ncomplete acceptance of whatever the demand of love may be. And\nthis is the case because the ultimate happiness and fulfilment of\npersonality does not depend upon what may have happened to\npersonality in the past or upon what may happen to personality in\nthe future but solely and exclusively upon what personality\ndemands here and now in the apprehension of the unassailable\nmoment.\n\nThis suspension of judgment therefore in regard to the question of\nthe immortality of the soul is a suspension of judgment implicit in\nthe very nature of love itself. For if there were anything in the\nworld nearer the secret of the world than is this duality of love and\nmalice, then that alien thing, however we thought of it, would be\nthe true object of the soul's desire and the victory of love over\nmalice would fall into the second place.\n\nIf instead of the soul's desire being simply the victory of love over\nmalice it were, so to speak, the \"material fruit\" of such a victory--\nnamely, the survival of personality after death--then, in place of\nthe struggle between love and malice, we should be compelled to\nregard _personality in itself_, apart from the nature of that\npersonality, as the secret of the universe. But as we have\nrepeatedly shown, it is impossible to think of any living\npersonality apart from this abysmal dualism, the ebb and flow of\nwhich, with the relative victory of love over malice, is our ultimate\ndefinition of what living personality _is_. The emotion of love\nabstracted from personality is not the secret of the universe,\nbecause personality in its concrete living activity is the secret of\nthe universe. It is this very abstraction of love, isolated from any\nperson who loves, and projected as an abstract into the void, that\nhas done so much to undermine religious thought, just as that other\nabsolute of \"pure being\" has done so much to undermine\nphilosophic thought.\n\nLove and malice are unthinkable apart from personality; but\npersonality divorced from the struggle between love and malice is\nsomething worse than unthinkable. It is something most tragically\nthinkable. It is in fact the plain reality of death. A dead body\nis a body in which the struggle between love and malice has\ncompletely ceased. A dead planet would be a planet in which the\nstruggle between love and malice had ceased. We cannot speak of\na \"dead soul\" because the soul is, according to our original\ndefinition, the very fusion-point and vortex-point where not only\nconsciousness and energy meet but where love and malice meet\nand wage their eternal struggle.\n\nStrictly speaking it is not true to say that the ultimate secret of the\nuniverse is the emotion of love. The emotion of love, just because\nit is an _emotion_, is the emotion of a personality. It is personality,\nnot the emotion of love, which is the secret of the universe, which\nis, in fact, the very universe itself. But it is personality considered\nin its true concrete life, not as a mere abstraction devoid of all\ncharacteristics, which is this basic thing. And personality thus\nconsidered is, as we have seen, a living battleground of two\nultimate emotions. The complete triumph of love over malice\nwould mean the extinction of personality and following from this\nthe extinction of the universe.\n\nThus what the soul's desire really amounts to, in those rhythmic\nmoments when its diverse aspects are reduced to harmonious\nenergy, is not the complete victory of love over malice but only a\nrelative victory. What it really desires is that malice should still\nexist, but that it should exist in subordination to love.\n\nThe ideal of the soul therefore in its creative moments is _the\nprocess of the overcoming of malice_, not the completion of this\nprocess. In order to be perpetually overcome by love, malice must\nremain existent, must remain \"still there.\" If it ceased to be there,\nthere would be nothing left for love to overcome; and the ebb and\nflow of the universe, its eternal contradictions, would be at an end.\nThe soul's desire, according to this view, is not a life after death\nwhere malice, shall we say, is completely overcome and \"good\"\ncompletely triumphant. The soul's desire is that malice, or evil,\nshould continue to exist; but should continue to exist under the\ntriumphant hand of love. The desire of the soul, in such ultimate\nmoments, has nothing to do with the survival of the soul after\ndeath. It has to do with an acceptance of the demand of love. And\nwhat love demands is not that malice should disappear; but that it\nshould for ever exist, in order that love should for ever\nbe overcoming it. And the ecstasy of this process, of this\n\"overcoming,\" is a thing of single moments, moments which, as\nthey pass, not only reduce both past and future to an eternal \"now\"\nbut annihilate everything else but this eternal \"now.\" This\nannihilation of the past does not mean the extinction of memory or\nthe extinction of hope. It only means that the profoundest of our\nmemories are \"brought over\" as it were from the past into the\npresent. It only means that a formless horizon of immense hope,\nindefinite and vague, hovers above the present, to give it\nspaciousness and freedom.\n\nThe revelation of the complex vision does not therefore answer the\nquestion of the immortality of the soul. What it does is to indicate\nthe degree of importance of any answer to this question. And this\ndegree of importance is much smaller than in our less harmonious\nmoments we are inclined to suppose. At certain complacent\nmoments the soul finds itself praying for some final assurance of\npersonal survival. At certain other moments the soul is tempted to\npray for complete annihilation. But at the moments when it is most\nentirely itself it neither prays for annihilation nor for immortality.\nIt does not pray for itself at all. It prays that the will of the gods\nmay be done. It prays that the power of love in every soul in the\nuniverse may hold the power of malice in subjection.\n\nThe soul therefore, revealed as a real substantial living thing by\nthe complex vision, is not revealed as a thing necessarily exempt\nfrom death, but as a thing whose deepest activity renders it free\nfrom the fear of death.\n\nIn considering the nature of the contrast between the philosophy of\nthe complex vision and the most dominant philosophic tendencies\nof the present time it is important to make clear what our attitude\nis towards that hypothetical assumption usually known as the\nTheory of Evolution.\n\nIf what is called Evolution means simply _change_, then we have\nnot the least objection to the word. The universe obviously\nchanges. It is undergoing a perpetual series of violent and\nrevolutionary changes. But it does not necessarily improve or\nprogress. On the contrary during enormous periods of time it\ndeteriorates. Both progress and deterioration are of course purely\nhuman valuations. But according to our valuation of good and evil\nit may be said that during those epochs when the malicious, the\npredatory, the centripetal tendency in life predominates over the\ncreative and centrifugal tendency, there is deterioration and\ndegeneracy; and during the epochs when the latter overcomes the\nformer there is growth and improvement.\n\nIt is quite obvious that from our point of view, there is no such\nthing as inanimate chemical substance, no such isolated\nevolutionary _phases_ of \"matter,\" such as the movements from\n\"solids\" to \"liquids,\" from \"liquids\" to \"gases,\" from \"gases\" to\n\"ether,\" from \"ether\" to \"electro-magnetism.\" All these apparent\nchanges must be regarded as nothing less than the living organic\nchanges taking place in the living bodies of actual personal souls.\n\nAccording to our view the real and important variations in the\nmultiform spectacle of the universe are the variations brought\nabout by the perpetual struggle between life and death, in other\nwords between the personal energy of creation and the personal\nresistance of malice.\n\nFor us the universe of bodies and souls is perpetually re-creating\nitself by the mysterious process of birth, perpetually destroying\nitself by the mysterious process of death.\n\nIt is this eternal struggle between the impulse to create new life\nand the impulse to resist the creation of life, and to destroy or to\npetrify life, which actually causes all movement in things and all\nchange; movement sometimes forward and sometimes backward\nas the great pendulum and rhythm of existence swings one way or\nthe other.\n\nAnd even this generalization does not really cover what we regard\nas the facts of the case, because this backward or forward\nmovement, though capable of being weighed and estimated \"en\nmasse\" in the erratic and violent changes of history, is in reality a\nthing of particular and individual instances, a thing that ultimately\naffects nothing but individuals and personalities, in as much as it is\nthe weighing and balancing of a struggle which takes place\nnowhere else except in the arena of concrete separate and personal\nsouls.\n\nWhat is usually called Evolution then, and what may just as\nreasonably be called Deterioration, is as far as we are concerned\njust a matter of perpetual movement and change.\n\nThe living personalities that fill the circle of space are perpetually\nreproducing themselves in a series of organic births, and\nperpetually passing away in the process of death.\n\nWe have also to remember that every living organism whether\nsuch an organism resemble that of a planet or a human being, is\nitself the dwelling-place of innumerable other living organisms\ndependent on it and drawing their life from it, precisely as their\nparent organism depends on, and draws its life from, the\nomnipresent universal ether.\n\nWhat the philosophy of the complex vision denies and refutes is\nthe modern tendency to escape from the real mystery of existence\nby the use of such vague hypothetical metaphors, all of them really\nprofoundly anthropomorphic, such as \"life-force\" or \"hyper-space\"\nor \"magnetic energy\" or \"streams of sub-consciousness.\"\n\nThe philosophy of the complex vision drives these pseudo-philosophers\nto the wall and compels them to confess that ultimately all\nthey are aware of is the inner personal activity of their\nown individual souls; compels them to confess that when it\ncomes to the final analysis their \"life-force\" and \"pure\nthought\" and \"hyper-space\" and \"radio-magnetic activity\" are all\nnothing but one-sided hypothetical abstractions taken from the\nconcrete movements of concrete individual bodies and souls which\nby an inevitable act of the imagination we assume to reproduce in\ntheir interior reactions what we ourselves experience in ours.\n\nTo introduce such a conception as that of those mysterious super\nhuman beings, whom I have named \"the gods,\" into a serious\nphilosophic system, may well appear to many modern scientific\nminds the very height of absurdity.\n\nBut the whole method of the philosophy of the complex vision is\nbased upon direct human experience; and from my point of view\nthe obscure and problematic existence of some such beings has\nbehind it the whole formidable weight of universal human feeling--\na weight which is not made less valid by the arrogant use of mere\nphrases of rationalistic contempt such as that which is implied in\nthe word \"superstition.\"\n\nFrom our point of view a philosophy which does not include and\nsubsume and embody that universal human experience covered by\nthe term \"superstition\" is a philosophy that has eliminated from its\nconsideration one great slice of actual living fact. And it is in this\naspect of the problem more than in any other that the philosophy\nof the complex vision represents a return to certain revelations of\nhuman truth--call them mythological if you please--which modern\nphilosophy seems to have deliberately suppressed. In the final\nresult it may well be that we have to choose, as our clue to the\nmystery of life, either \"mathematica\" or \"mythology.\"\n\nThe philosophy of the complex vision is compelled by the very\nnature of its organ of research to choose, in this dilemma, the latter\nrather than the former. And the universe which it thus dares to\npredicate is at least a universe that lends itself, as so many\n\"scientific\" universes do not, to that synthetic activity of the\n_imaginative reason_ which in the long run alone satisfies the\nsoul. And such a universe satisfies the soul, as these others cannot,\nbecause it reflects, in its objective spectacle of things, the\nprofoundest interior consciousness of the actual living self which\nthe soul in its deepest moments of introspection is able to grasp.\n\nModern science, under the rhetorical spell of this talismanic word\n\"evolution,\" seems to imply that it can explain the multiform\nshapes and appearances of organic life by deducing them, in all\ntheir vivid heterogeneity, from some hypothetical monistic\nsubstance which it boldly endows with the mysterious energy\ncalled the \"life-force\" and which it then permits to project out of\nitself, by some sort of automatic volition, the whole long historic\nprocession of living organisms.\n\nThis purely imaginative assumption gives it, in the popular mind, a\nsort of vague right to make the astounding claim that it has\n\"explained\" the origin of things. Little further arrogance is needed\nto give it, in the popular mind, the still more astounding right to\nclaim that it has indicated not only the nature of the \"beginning\" of\nthings but the nature of their \"end\" also; this \"end\" being nothing\nless than some purely hypothetical \"equilibrium\" when the\nmovement of \"advance,\" coming full circle, rounds itself off into\nthe movement of \"reversion.\"\n\nThe philosophy of the complex vision makes no claim to deal\neither with the beginning of things or with the end of things. It\nrecognizes that \"beginnings\" and \"ends\" are not things with which\nwe can intelligibly deal; are, on the contrary, things which are\ncompletely unthinkable.\n\nWhat we actually see, feel, divine, imagine, love, hate, detest,\ndesire, dream, create and destroy--these living, dying, struggling,\nrelaxing, advancing and retreating things--this space, this ether,\nthese stars and suns, these animals, fishes, birds, plants, this earth\nand moon, these men and these trees and flowers, these high and\nunchanging eternal ideas of the beautiful and the good, these\ntransitory perishing mortal lives and these dimly discerned\nimmortal figures that we name \"gods,\" all these, as far as we are\nconcerned, have for ever existed, all these, as far as we are\nconcerned, must for ever exist.\n\nIn the immense procession of deaths and births, it is indeed certain\nthat the soul and body of the Earth have given birth to all the souls\nand bodies which struggle for existence upon her living flesh\nand draw so much of their love and their malice from the\nunfathomable depths of her spirit. But when once we accept as our\nbasic axiom that where the \"soul-monad\" exists, whether such a\n\"monad\" be human, sub-human, or super-human, it exists in actual\nconcrete organic personal integrity, we are saved from the\nnecessity of explaining how, and by what particular series of births\nand deaths and change and variation, the living spectacle of things,\nas we visualize it today, has \"evolved\" or has \"deteriorated\" out of\nthe remote past.\n\nIt is in fact by their constant preoccupation with the immediate and\nmaterial causes of such organic changes, that men of science have\nbeen distracted from the real mystery. This real mystery does not\nlimit itself to the comparatively unimportant \"How,\" but is\nconstantly calling upon us to deal with the terrible and essential\nquestions, the two grim interrogations of the old Sphinx, the\n\"_What_\" and the \"_Wherefore_.\"\n\nIt is by its power to deal with these more essential riddles that any\nphilosophy must be weighed and judged; and it is just because\nwhat we name Science stops helplessly at this unimportant \"How,\"\nthat it can never be said to have answered Life's uttermost\nchallenge.\n\nMaterialistic and Evolutionary Hypotheses must always, however\nfar they may go in reducing so-called \"matter\" to so-called \"spirit,\"\nremain outside the real problem. No attenuation of \"matter\" into\nmovement or energy or magnetic radio-activity can reach the\nimpregnable citadel of life. For the citadel of life is to be found in\nnothing less than the complex of personality--whether such\npersonality be that of a planet or a plant or an animal or a man or a\ngod--must always be recognized as inherent in an actual living\nsoul-monad, divided against itself in the everlasting duality.\n\nAlthough the most formidable support to our theory of an \"eternal\nvision,\" wherein all the living entities that fill space under the\nvibration of an unspeakable cosmic rhythm and brought into focus\nby one supreme act of contemplative \"love,\" is drawn from the\nrare creative moments of what I have called the \"apex-thought,\" it\nstill remains that for the normal man in his most normal hours the\npurely scientific view is completely unsatisfying.\n\nI do not mean that it is unsatisfying because, with its mechanical\ndeterminism, it does not satisfy his desires. I mean that it does not\nsatisfy his imagination, his instinct, his intuition, his emotion, his\naesthetic sense; and in being unable to satisfy these, it proves\nitself, \"ipso-facto,\" false and equivocal.\n\nIt is equally true that, except for certain rare and privileged\nnatures, the orthodox systems of religion are equally unsatisfying.\n\nWhat is required is some philosophic system which is bold enough\nto include the element of so-called \"superstition\" and at the same\ntime contradicts neither reason nor the aesthetic sense.\n\nSuch a system, we contend, is supplied by the philosophy of the\ncomplex vision; a philosophy which, while remaining frankly\nanthropomorphic and mythological, does not, in any narrow or\nimpudent or complacent manner, slur over the bitter ironies of this\ncruel world, or love the clear outlines of all drastic issues in a\nvague, unintelligible, unaesthetic idealism.\n\nWhat our philosophy insists upon is that the modern tendency to\nreduce everything to some single monistic \"substance,\" which, by\nthe blind process of \"evolution,\" becomes all this passionate drama\nthat we see, is a tendency utterly false and misleading. For us the\nuniverse is a much larger, freer, stranger, deeper, more\ncomplicated affair than that.\n\nFor us the universe contains possibilities of real ghastly, incredible\n_evil_, descending into spiritual depths, before which the normal\nmind may well shudder and turn dismayed away.\n\nFor us the universe contains possibilities of divine, magical,\nmiraculous _good_, ascending into spiritual heights and\nassociating itself with immortal super-human beings, before which\nthe mind of the merely logical intelligence may well pause,\nbaffled, puzzled, and obscurely indignant.\n\nThe \"fulcrum\" upon which the whole issue depends, the \"pivot\"\nupon which it turns, is the existence of actual living souls filling\nthe immense spaces of nature.\n\nIf there is no \"soul\" in any living thing, then our whole system\ncrumbles to pieces. If there are living \"souls\" in every living thing,\nthen the universe, as revealed by the complex vision, is more real\nthan the universe as revealed by the chief exponents of modern\nthought.\n\n\nCHAPTER XIV.\n\nTHE IDEA OF COMMUNISM\n\nThe philosophy of the complex vision inevitably issues, when it is\napplied to political and economic conditions, in the idea of\ncommunism. The idea of communism is inherent in it from the\nbeginning; and in communism, and in communism alone, does it\nfind its objective and external expression.\n\nThe philosophy of the complex vision reveals, as we have seen, a\ncertain kind of ultimate duality as the secret of life. This ultimate\nduality remains eternally unreconciled; for it is a duality within the\ncircle of every personal soul; and the fact that every personal soul\nis surrounded by an incomprehensible substance under the\ndominion of time and space, does not reconcile these eternal\nantagonists; because these eternal antagonists are for ever\nunfathomable, even as the personal soul, of which they are the\nconflicting conditions, is itself for ever unfathomable.\n\nIt is therefore a perpetual witness to the truth that the idea of\ncommunism is the inevitable expression of the complex vision that\nthis idea should, more than other idea in the world, divide the\nsouls of men into opposite camps. If the idea of communism were\nnot the inevitable expression of the philosophy of the complex\nvision as applied to human life it would be an idea with regard to\nwhich all human souls would hold infinitely various opinions.\n\nBut this is not the case. In regard to the idea of communism we do\nnot find this infinite variety of opinion. We find, on the contrary, a\ndefinite and irreconcilable duality of thought. Human souls are\ndivided on this matter not, as they are on other matters, into a\nmotley variety of convictions but into two opposite and\nirreconcilable convictions, unfathomably hostile to one another.\n\nThere is no other question, no other issue, about which the souls of\nmen are divided so clearly and definitely into two opposite camps.\nThe question of the existence of a \"parent of the universe\" does\nnot divide them so clearly; because it always remains possible for\nany unbeliever in a spiritual unity of this absolute kind to use the\nterm \"parent,\" if he pleases, for that incomprehensible \"substance\"\nunder the dominion of space and time which takes the triple form\nof the \"substance\" out of which the substratum of the soul is made,\nthe \"substance\" out of which the \"objective mystery\" is made, and\nthe substance out of which is made the surrounding \"medium\"\nwhich holds all personal souls together.\n\nThe question of the mortality or the immortality of the soul does\nnot divide them so clearly; because such a question is entirely\ninsoluble; and a vivid consciousness of its insolubility\naccompanies all argument. The question of race does not divide\nthem so clearly; because both with regard to race and with regard\nto class the division is very largely a superficial thing, dependent\nupon public opinion and upon group-consciousness and leaving\nmany individuals on each side entirely unaffected.\n\nThe question of sex does not divide them so clearly; because there\nare always innumerable examples of noble and ignoble treachery\nto the sex-instinct; not to speak of a certain intellectual neutrality\nwhich refuses to be biased. The idea of communism is on the\ncontrary so profoundly associated with the original revelation of\nthe complex vision that it must be regarded as the inevitable\nexpression of all the attributes of this vision when such attributes\nare reduced to a rhythmic harmony.\n\nThat this is no speculative hypothesis but a real fact of experience\ncan be proved by any sincere act of personal introspection.\n\nThe philosophy of the complex vision is based upon those rare and\nsupreme moments when the soul's \"apex-thought\" quivers like an\narrow in the very heart of the surrounding darkness. By any honest\nact of introspection we can recall to memory the world-deep\nrevelations which are thus obtained. And among these revelations\nthe one most vivid and irrefutable, as far as human association is\nconcerned, is the revelation of the idea of communism.\n\nSo vivid and so dominant is this idea, that it may be said that no\nmotive which drives or obsesses the will in the sphere of external\nrelations can approach or rival it in importance. And that this is so\ncan be proved by the fact that the opposite of this idea, namely the\nidea of private property, is found when we analyse the content of\nour profoundest instincts to be in perpetual conflict with the idea\nof communism.\n\nAnd the inevitableness of the world-deep struggle between these\ntwo ideas is proved by the fact that in no other way, as soon as the\nobjective world is introduced at all, can we conceive of love and\nmalice as expressing themselves. Love must naturally express\nitself in the desire to \"have all things in common\"; and malice\nmust naturally express itself in the desire to have as little as\npossible in common and as much as possible for ourselves alone.\n\nThe \"possessive instinct,\" although it may often be found\naccompanying like an evil shadow some of the purest movements\nof love, must be recognized as eternally arising out of the depths\nof the power opposed to love. If we have any psychological\nclairvoyance we can disentangle this base element from some of\nthe most passionate forms of the sexual instinct and from some of\nthe most passionate forms of the maternal instinct. It is undeniable\nthat the possessive instinct does accompany both these emotions\nand we are compelled to recognize that, whenever or wherever it\nappears, it is the expression of the direct opposite of love.\n\nSo inevitably does the complex vision manifest itself in the idea of\ncommunism that it would be legitimate to say that the main object\nof human life as we know it at present is the realization of the\nideas of truth and beauty and nobility in a world-wide\ncommunistic state.\n\nAs far as the human soul in our present knowledge of it is\nconcerned there is no other synthesis possible except this\nsynthesis. And there is no other synthesis possible except this,\nbecause this and this alone realizes the ideal which the abysmal\npower of love implies. And the power of love implies this ideal\nbecause the power of love is the only unity which fuses together\nthe ideas of reality and beauty and nobility; and because it is\nimpossible to conceive the power of love as embodying itself in\nthese ideas except in a world-wide communistic state.\n\nWe are able to prove that this is no speculative hypothesis but a\nfact based upon experience, by a consideration of the opposite\nideal. For evil, as we have hinted in many places, _has_ its ideal.\nThe ideal of evil, or of what I call \"malice,\" is the annihilation of\nthe will to creation. This ideal of malice is in fact an obstinate and\ncontinuous resistance to the power of creation; a resistance carried\nso far as to reduce everything that exists to eternal non-existence.\nThe profoundest experience of the human soul is to be found in the\nunfathomable struggle that goes on in the depths between \"the\nideal of evil\" which is universal death and \"the ideal of love\"\nwhich is universal life.\n\nReason and sensation are used in turn by this abysmal malice of\nthe soul, to establish and make objective \"the idea of nothingness.\"\nThus reason, driven on by the power of malice, derives exquisite\nsatisfaction from the theory of the automatism of the will.\n\nThe theory of the automatism of the will, the theory that the will is\nonly an illusive name for a pre-determined congeries of irresistible\nmotives, is a theory that lends itself to the ideal of universal death.\nIt is a theory that diminishes, and reduces to a minimum, the\nidentity of the personal soul. And therefore it is a theory which the\nisolated reason, divorced from imagination and instinct, fastens\nupon and exults in.\n\nThe isolated reason, in league with pure sensation and divorced\nfrom instinct, becomes very quickly a slave of the abysmal\npower of malice; and the pleasure which it derives from the\ncontemplation of a mechanical universe predestined and pre-determined,\na universe out of which the personal soul has been completely\nexpurgated, is a pleasure derived directly from the power of malice,\nexulting in the idea of eternal death.\n\nPhilosophers are very crafty in these things; and it is necessary to\ndiscriminate between that genuine passion for reality which\nderived from the power of love and that exultant pleasure in a\n\"frightful\" reality which is derived from intellectual sadism and\nfrom the unfathomable malice of the soul.\n\nBetween a philosophic pessimism which springs from a genuine\npassion for reality and from a pure \"pity\" for tortured sentient\nthings, and a philosophic pessimism which springs from a cruel\npleasure in atrocious situations and an ambiguous \"pity\" for\ntortured sentient things there is an eternity of difference.\n\nIt needs however something almost like a clairvoyance to\nrecognize this difference; and such a clairvoyance can only be\nobtained when, as in the case of Christ, the soul becomes aware of\nits own unfathomable possibilities of good and evil.\n\nA careful and implacable analysis of the two camps of opinion\ninto which the idea of communism divides the world reveals to us\nthe fact that the philosophical advocates of private property draw a\ncertain malignant pleasure from insisting that the possessive\ninstinct is the strongest instinct in humanity.\n\nThis is tantamount to saying that the power of malice is the\nstrongest instinct in humanity; whereas, if the power of malice had\nnot already been relatively overcome by the power of love there\nwould be no \"humanity\" at all. But the philosophical advocates of\nprivate property do not confine themselves to this malign\ninsistence upon the basic greediness of human nature. They are in\nthe habit of twisting their arguments completely around and\nspeaking of the \"rights\" of property and of the \"wholesome\" value\nof the \"natural instinct\" to possess property.\n\nThis \"natural instinct to possess property\" becomes, when they so\ndefend it, something which we assume to be \"good\" and \"noble,\"\nand not something which we are compelled to recognize as \"evil\"\nand \"base.\"\n\nIt is necessary to keep these two arguments quite separate in our\nminds and not to allow the philosophical advocates of private\nproperty to confuse them. If the assumption is that the instinct to\npossess property is a \"good\" instinct, an instinct springing from\nthe power of love in the human soul, then what we have to do is to\nsubject this \"good instinct\" to an inflexible analysis; under the\nprocess of which such \"goodness\" will be found to transform itself\ninto the extreme opposite of goodness.\n\nIf the assumption is that the instinct to possess property is an evil\ninstinct, but an instinct which is the strongest of all human\ninstincts and therefore one which it is insane to attempt to resist,\nthen what we have to do is to prove that the instinct or the emotion\nof love is stronger than the instinct or the emotion of malice and so\nessential to the life of the soul that if it had not already relatively\novercome the emotion of malice, the personal soul would never\nhave become what it has become; in fact would never have existed\nat all, since its mere existence depends upon the relative victory of\nlove over malice.\n\nIn dealing with the former of these two arguments, namely that the\ninstinct to possess property is a \"good\" instinct, it is advisable to\nsearch for some test of \"goodness\" which shall carry a stronger\nconviction to the mind of such biassed philosophers than any\nappeal to the conscience or even to the aesthetic sense. The\nconscience and the aesthetic sense speak with uncompromising\nfinality upon this subject and condemn the possessive instinct or\nthe instinct to possess property with an unwavering voice. As\neternal aspects of the complex vision, both conscience and the\naesthetic sense, when their power is exercised in harmony with all\nthe other aspects of the soul, indicate with an oracular clearness\nthat the possessive instinct is not good but evil.\n\nThe person obsessed by the idea of \"nobility\" and the person\nobsessed by the idea of \"beauty\" are both of them found to be\nextraordinarily suspicious of the possessive instinct and fiercely\nanxious to destroy its power. But the test more likely to appeal to\nthe type of philosopher whose business it is to defend the\ninstitution of private property is the simple test of reality. Reality\nor \"truth,\" much more than nobility or beauty, is the idea in the\nsoul which is outraged by the illusion of the value of private\nproperty.\n\nFor the illusion of the value of private property is like the \"illusion\nof dead matter.\" It is a half-truth projected by the power of malice.\nThe inherent unreality of the illusion of the value of private\nproperty can be proved by the simplest examination of the facts.\nThe illusion draws its strength from a false appeal to the genuine\nand basic necessities of the human mind and the human body.\n\nThese necessities demand adequate food, adequate clothing,\nadequate shelter and adequate leisure. They also demand freedom,\nbeauty, happiness, a considerable degree of solitude, and final\nrelief from the intolerable fear of poverty. But the economic and\nintellectual resources of the human race are perfectly capable of\nproviding all these things for all human beings within the limits of\na communistic society. These things and the legitimate demand for\nthese things must not be confused with the illusion of the value of\nprivate property. Nor must the illusion of the value of private\nproperty be permitted to fortify its insecure position by a false\nappeal to these real values.\n\nThe astounding achievements of modern science have brought to\nlight two things. They have brought to light the fact that no human\nor social unit short of the international unit of the whole race can\nadequately deal with the resources of the planet. And they have\nbrought to light the fact that this inevitable internationalizing of\neconomic production must be accompanied by a co-operative\ninternationalizing of economic distribution, if murderous chaotic\nconflict is to be avoided.\n\nThe real values of sufficient food, clothing, shelter, leisure,\nand solitude can be secured for every human being inhabiting\nthis planet, under _a far from perfect_ organization of\nworld-production and world-distribution. The astounding achievements\nof modern science have made this possible. It only requires a\nreasonable and not by any means an ideal co-operation to make it\nactual.\n\nThe achievements of modern science, especially in the sphere of\nindustrial machinery, have made it possible for every human being\nto have sufficient food, clothing, shelter, leisure and solitude. Man,\nin this sense, has already conquered Nature; and has secured for\nhis progeny however indefinitely increased, and for the frail and\nincompetent ones of his race, however indefinitely increased, a\nmore than sufficient supply of these primal necessities.\n\nThe extraordinary power of international co-operation has been\nrecently displayed during the years of the war in the production of\nengines of destruction. Far less cooperation applied to the\nproblems of production could secure for an indefinitely multiplied\npopulation, including all derelicts and all incompetents, such\nprimal necessities of life as normal persons demand. The resources\nof this planet, as long as scientific distribution follows close upon\nscientific production, are sufficient to maintain in food, in shelter,\nin clothing, in leisure, in reasonable comfort, any human progeny.\n\nWhat then is the principal cause why, as things are now, such\nlamentable poverty and such huge fear of lamentable poverty\ndominate the human situation? The cause is not far to seek. It lies\nin the very root and ground of our existing commercial and\nindustrial system. It lies in the fact that economic production by\nreason of the illusive value of private enterprise, is directed not\ntowards the satisfaction of such universal and primary necessities\nas food, shelter, clothing, leisure and reasonable comfort, but\ntowards the creation of unnecessary luxury and artificial frippery,\ntowards the piling up, by means of advertisement, monopoly,\nexploitation and every kind of chicanery of unproductive\naccumulation of private property.\n\nOur present commercial and industrial system is based upon what\nis called \"free competition.\" In other words it is based upon the\nright of private individuals to make use of the resources of nature\nand the energy of labour to produce unnecessary wealth, wealth\nwhich does little or nothing to increase the food, shelter, clothing,\nleisure and comfort of the masses of mankind, wealth which is\nartificially maintained by artificial values and by the fantastic\nprocess of advertisement.\n\nIn order to make clear and irrefutable the statement that the\nillusive value of private property is, like \"the illusion of dead\nmatter,\" a thing conceived, projected and maintained by the\naboriginal power of evil, it is necessary to prove two things. It is\nnecessary to prove in the first place that the idea of private\nproperty is neither beautiful nor noble nor real. And it is necessary\nto prove in the second place that the defence of the idea of private\nproperty arouses the most evil and most malignant passions which\nit is possible for the human soul to feel.\n\nThat private property is neither beautiful nor noble can be deduced\nfrom the fact that in proportion as human souls become attuned\nto finer, more distinguished, and more intellectual levels\nthey become more and more indifferent to the \"sensation of\nownership.\" That private property is an unreal thing can be\ndeduced from the fact that no human being can actually \"possess,\"\nin a definite, positive, and exhaustive manner, more than he can\neat or drink or wear or otherwise personally enjoy.\n\nHis \"sensation of ownership,\" over lands, houses, gardens,\npictures, statues, books, animals and human beings, is really and\nactually restricted to the immediate and direct enjoyment which he\nis able in person to derive from such things. Beyond this\nimmediate and personal enjoyment the extension of his \"sensation\nof ownership\" can do no more than increase his general sense of\nconventional power and importance. His real \"possession\" of his\nland is actually restricted to his capacity for appreciating its\nbeauty. His real \"possession\" of his books is actually restricted to\nhis personal capacity for entering into the living secrets of these\nthings. Without such capacity, though he may call himself the\n\"possessor\" or \"owner,\" he is really no better than an official\n\"care-taker,\" whose province it is to preserve certain objects for\nother people to enjoy, or, shall we say, for the permanent\nprevention of any people ever enjoying them. And just as the\n\"sensation of ownership\" or \"the idea of private property\" is unreal\nand illusive with regard to land, houses, pictures, books, and the\nlike so it is unreal and illusive with regard to human beings. No\none, however maliciously he may hug to himself his possessive\ninstinct, can ever actually and truly \"possess\" another living\nperson.\n\nOne's wife, one's paramour, one's child, one's slave, are only\napparently and by a conventional illusion of language one's real\nand actual \"possession.\" That this is the case can be proved by the\nfact that any of these \"human possessions\" has only to commit\nsuicide, to escape for ever from such bondage.\n\nThe illusion of private property derives its vigour and its obstinate\nvividness from two things; from the apparent increase of power\nand importance which accompanies it, and from its association\nwith that necessary minimum of food, shelter, clothing, leisure,\ncomfort, freedom, solitude, and happiness, which is certainly real,\nessential and indispensable.\n\nThe universal wisdom of the ages bears witness to the fact that a\n\"moderate poverty\" or a \"moderate competence\" is the ideal\noutward state for a man to find himself in. And this \"moderate\nenjoyment\" of food, shelter, clothing, comfort, leisure and\nemotional happiness, is a thing which, in a scientifically organized\ncommunistic society, would be within the reach of even the least\nefficient.\n\nThe gloomy and melancholy argument brought forward by the\nenemies of \"communism\" that under such a condition \"the\nincentive of private initiative would disappear\" and that no other\nmotive could take its place, is an argument based upon the\nassumption that human nature derives more inspiration from the\nidea of dishonourable greed than it derives from the idea of\nhonourable and useful labour; which is an assumption so wholly\nopposed to true psychology that it has only to be nakedly stated to\nbe seen in its complete absurdity.\n\nWhat the psychologist, interested in this abysmal struggle between\nthe idea of communism and the idea of private property, has to\nnote is the nature and character of the particular individual who\nbrings forward this argument of the \"incentive of greed\" or the\n\"initiative\" produced by greed. Such an individual will never be\nfound to be a great man of science, or a great artist or scholar or\ncraftsman, or a first-rate engineer, or a highly trained artisan or\nfarmer or builder.\n\nThe individual bringing forward this argument of the \"initiative of\ngreed\" will invariably be found to be a member of what might be\ncalled the \"parasitic class.\" He will either be an intellectually\nsecond-rate minister or politician or lawyer or professor, or he will\nbe a commercial and financial \"middleman,\" whose activities are\nentirely absorbed in the art of exploitation and who has never\nexperienced the sensation of creative work.\n\nIf he does not himself belong to the unproductive and parasitic\nclass it will be easy to detect in him the unmistakable presence of\nthe emotion of malice. Nowhere is the emotion of malice more\nentirely in harmony with itself than when it is engaged in\nattributing base and sordid motives to the energy of human nature.\n\nThis monstrous doctrine that human beings _require_ \"the\nincentive of greed\" and that without that incentive or \"initiative\"\nno one would engage in any kind of creative work, is a doctrine\nspringing directly from the aboriginal malice of the soul; and a\ndoctrine which is refuted every day by every honest, healthy and\nhonourable man and woman.\n\nBut all these are, after all, only negative proofs of the inevitable\nrise, out of the very necessity of love's nature, of the idea of\ncommunism. Of all mortal instincts, the possessive instinct is the\nmost insidious and most evil. Love is for ever being perverted and\npolluted by this thing, and turned from its true essence into\nsomething other than itself. This is equally true of love whether\nsuch love is directed towards persons or towards ideas or things.\n\nThe possessive instinct springing directly from the aboriginal\nmalice is perpetually deceiving itself. Apparently and superficially\nwhat it aims at is the eternally \"static.\" In other words what it aims\nat is the retention in everlasting immobility of the person or the\nidea or the thing into which it has dug its claws.\n\nThus the maternal instinct, in its evil mood, aims at petrifying and\nrendering immobile that helpless youthfulness in its offspring\nwhich the possessive passion finds so provocative and exciting.\nThus the lover in his evil mood, desires that the object of his love\nshould remain in everlasting immobility, an odalisque of eternal\nreciprocity. That this evil desire takes the form of a longing that\nthe object of his love should eternally escape and eternally be\nrecaptured makes no difference in the basic feeling.\n\nThus the collector of \"works of art\"--a being divided from the real\nlover of art by an impassable gulf--derives no pleasure from the\nbeauty of anything until it has become _his_, until he has hidden it\naway from all the rest of the world. Thus the lover of \"nature,\" in\nhis evil mood, derives no pleasure from the fitful magic of grass\nand bowers and trees, until he feels happy in the mad illusion that\nthe very body of the earth, even to the centre of the planet, where\nthese things grow, is his \"private\" property and is something fixed,\npermanent, static, unchanging. But all this desire for the eternally\n\"static\" is superficial and self-deceiving.\n\nAnalysed down to its very depth, what this evil possessive instinct\ndesires is what all malice desires, namely the annihilation of life.\nPretending to itself that it desires to hug to itself, in eternal\nimmobility, the thing it loves, what in its secret essence it really\ndesires is that thing's absolute annihilation. It wants to hug that\nthing so tightly to itself that the independence of the thing\ncompletely vanishes. It wants to destroy all separation between\nitself and the thing, and all liberty and freedom for the thing. It\nwants \"to eat the thing up\" and draw the thing into its own being.\n\nIts evil desire can never find complete satisfaction until it has\n\"killed the thing it loves\" and buried it within its own identity. It\nis this evil possessive element in sexual love, whether of a man for a\nwoman or a woman for a man, which is the real evil in the sexual\npassion. It is this possessive instinct in maternal love which is the\nevil element in the love of a mother for a child. Both these evil\nemotions tend to make war upon life.\n\nThe mother, in her secret sub-conscious passion, desires to draw\nback her infant into her womb, and restore it to its pre-natal\nphysiological unity with herself. The lover in his secret evil\nsub-consciousness, desires to draw his beloved into ever-increasing\nunity with himself, until the separation between them is at an end\nand her identity is lost in his identity.\n\nThe final issue, therefore, of this evil instinct of possession, this\nevil instinct of private property, can never be anything else than\ndeath. Death is what the ultimate emotion of malice desires; and\ndeath is an actual result of the instinct of possession carried to an\nextreme limit.\n\nThe static immobility and complete \"unchangeableness\" which the\npossessive instinct pretends to itself is all it desires is really\ntherefore nothing but a mask for its desire to destroy. The\npossessive instinct is, in its profoundest abyss, an amorist of death.\nWhat it secretly loves is the dead; for the dead alone can never\ndefraud it of its satisfaction. Wherever love exercises its creative\nenergy the possessive instinct relaxes its hold. Love expands and\ndiffuses itself. Love projects itself and merges itself The creative\nimpulse is always centrifugal. The indrawing movement, the\ncentripetal movement, is a sign of the presence of that inert malice\nwhich would reduce all life to nothingness.\n\nThe creative energy of love issues inevitably in the idea\nof communism. The idea of communism implies the complete\nabolition of private property; because private property, whether it\nbe property in persons or in things, is essentially evil, is indeed the\nnatural expression of the primordial inert malice, in its hostility to\nlife. Under any realization, in actual existence, of the idea of\ncommunism the creative energy finds itself free to expand and\ndilate. All that heavy clogging burden of \"the personally\npossessed\" being shaken off, the natural fresh shoots of living\nbeauty rise to the surface like the new green growths of spring\nwhen the winter's rubble has been washed away by the rain.\n\nThe accursed system of private property, rooted in the abysmal\nmalice of the human heart, lies like a dead weight upon every\ncreative impulse. Everything is weighed and judged, everything is\nvalued and measured, in relation to this.\n\nModern Law is the system of restriction by which we protect\nprivate property.\n\nModern religion is the system of compensation by which we\nsoften the difference between inequalities in private property.\nModern politics is the system of compromise by which public\nopinion registers its devotion to private property. Modern morality\nis the system of artificial inhibitions by which the human\nconscience is perverted into regarding private property as the\nsupreme good.\n\nModern science is the system by which private property is\nincreased and the uses of it made more complicated. Modern\n\"truth\" is the system of traditional opinion by which the illusion of\nprivate property is established as \"responsible\" thinking, and\n\"serious\" thinking, and \"ethical\" thinking.\n\nModern art is the system by which what is most gross and vulgar\nin the popular taste is pandered to in the interests of private\nproperty.\n\nThe creative energy in modern life is therefore restricted and\nopposed at almost every point by the evil instinct to possess. Of\nevery new idea the question is asked, \"does it conflict with private\nproperty?\"\n\nOf every new aesthetic judgment the question is asked, \"does it\nconflict with private property?\"\n\nOf every new moral valuation the question is asked, \"does it\nconflict with private property?\" And the instinct which puts these\nquestions to every new movement of the creative energy is the\ninstinct of inert malice. The object of life can be regarded as\nnothing less than the realization of the vision of the Immortals;\nand it is only under a communistic state that the vision of the\nImmortals can be realized; because only in such a state is that\npetrified illusion of inert malice which we name \"private property\"\nthoroughly got rid of and destroyed.\n\n\nCONCLUSION\n\nNo attempted articulation of the mystery, life, can be worthy of\nbeing named a \"philosophy\" unless it has a definite bearing upon\nwhat, in the midst of that confused \"manifold\" through which we\nmove, we call the problem of conduct.\n\nThe mass of complicated impression, which from our first dawn of\nconsciousness presses upon us, falls into two main divisions--the\nportion of it which comes under the power of our will and the\nportion of it which is supplied by destiny or circumstance, and\nover which our will is impotent.\n\nSuperficially speaking what we call conduct only applies to action;\nbut in a deeper sense it applies to that whole division of our\nsensations, emotions, ideas, and energies, whether it take the form\nof action or not, which comes in any measure under the power of\nthe will. Such acts of the mind therefore, as are purely intellectual\nor emotional--as for instance what we call \"acts of faith\"--are as\nmuch to be considered forms of conduct as those outer visible\nmaterial gestures which manifest themselves in action.\n\nThis is no fantastic or extravagant fancy. It is the old classical and\ncatholic doctrine, to which not only such thinkers as Plato and\nSpinoza have affixed their seal, but which is at the root of the\ndeepest instincts of Buddhists, Christians, Epicureans, Stoics, and\nthe mystics of all ages. It may be summed up by the statement that\nlife is an art towards which the will must be directed; and that the\nlarger portion of life manifests itself in interior contemplation and\nonly the smaller part of it in overt action.\n\nIn both these spheres, in the sphere of contemplation as much as in\nthe sphere of action, there exists that \"given element\" of destiny or\ncircumstance, in the presence of which the will is powerless. But\nin regard to this given element it must be remembered that no\nindividual soul can ever, to the end of time, be absolutely certain\nthat in any particular case, whether his own or another's, he has\nfinally arrived at this irreducible fatality.\n\nThe extraordinary phenomenon of what religious people call\n\"conversion,\" a phenomenon which implies a change of heart so\nunexpected and startling as to seem miraculous, is a proof of how\nunwise it is to be in any particular case rigidly dogmatic as\nto where the sunken rock of destiny really begins. So many\nappearances have taken the shape of this finality, so many mirages\nof \"false fate\" have paralysed our will, that it is wisest to believe\nto the very end of our days that our attitude to destiny can change\nand modify destiny.\n\nAssuming then that the articulation of the mystery of life which\nhas been outlined in this book, under the name of \"the philosophy\nof the complex vision,\" must remain the barest of intellectual\nhypotheses until it has manifested itself in \"conduct\"; and\nassuming further that this \"conduct\" includes the whole of that\nportion of life, whether contemplative or active, which can be\nreduced to a fine art by the effort of the will; the question\nemerges--what kind of effort must the will make, both interiorally\nand exteriorally, if it desire to respond, by a rhythmic reciprocity,\nto the vision which the intellect has accepted?\n\nIt must be remembered that the vision upon which this philosophy\ndepends and from which it derives its primordial assumptions is\nnot the normal vision of the human soul. The philosophy of the\ncomplex vision rejects the normal vision of the human soul on\nbehalf of the abnormal vision of the human soul. Its point of view,\nin this matter, is that the human soul only arrives at the secret of\nthe universe in those exalted, heightened, exceptional and rare\nmoments, when all the multiform activities of the soul's life\nachieve a musical consummation. Its point of view is that since\nphilosophy, at its deepest and highest, necessarily becomes art;\nand since art is a rare and difficult thing requiring infinite\nadjustments and reconciliations; what philosophy has really to use,\nin formulating any sort of adequate system, is the memory of such\nrare moments after they have passed away. The point of view from\nwhich we have made all our basic assumptions is the point of view\nthat the secret of the universe is only revealed to man in rare\nmoments of ecstasy; and that what man's reason has to do is to\ngather together in memory the broken and scattered fragments of\nthese moments and out of this residuum build up and round off, as\nbest it may, some coherent interpretation of life.\n\nFrom all this it follows that the first rhythmic reply of the human\nwill to the vision to serve is a passionate act of what might be\ncalled \"contemplative tension,\" in the direction of the reviving of\nsuch memories, and in the direction of preparing the ground for\nthe return of another \"moment of vision\" similar in nature to those\nthat have gone before.\n\nThe secret of this act of inward contemplative tension we have\nalready analysed. We have found it to consist in a \"complex\" of all\nthe primordial energies of the soul, focussed and concentrated into\nwhat we have compared to a pyramidal apex-point by the power of\na certain synthetic movement of the soul itself which we have\nnamed the apex-thought.\n\nThe reply of the will, therefore, to the vision it desires to serve\nconsists of a gathering together of all the energies of the soul into\na rhythmic harmony. It may well be that this premeditated and\ndeliberately constructed harmony will have to wait for many days\nand years without experiencing the magic touch of the soul's\napex-thought. For though we may passionately desire the touch of\nthis--aye, and pray for it with a most desperate prayer!--it is of the\nvery nature of this mysterious thing to require for the moment of its\nactivity something else than the contemplative tension which\nhas prepared the ground for its appearance. For this synthetic\napex-thought, which is the soul's highest power, is only in a very\nlimited sense within the power of the will.\n\nThe whole matter is obscure and perhaps inexplicable; but it seems\nas if a place were required here for some philosophic equivalent of\nthat free gift of the Gods which, in theological language, goes by\nthe name of \"grace.\" Long and long may the soul wait--with the\nhardly won rhythm of its multiform \"complex\" poised in vibrant\nexpectation--before the moment arrives in which the apex-thought\ncan strike its note of ecstasy.\n\nIn the time and place of such a moment, in the accumulation of\nconditions which render such a moment eternal, chance and\ncircumstance may play a prominent part. There is, however, an\ninveterate instinct in humanity--not perhaps to be altogether\ndisregarded--according to the voice of which this unaccountable\nelement of chance and circumstance, or, shall we say, of destiny,\nis itself the result of the interposed influence of the invisible\ncompanions. But whether this be so or not, the fact remains that\nsome alien element of indeterminable chance or circumstance or\ndestiny does frequently enter into that accumulation of obscure\nconditions which seem to be necessary before the magic of the\napex-thought is roused.\n\nThis preparing of the ground, this deliberate concentration of the\nsoul's energies, is the first movement of the will in answer to the\nattraction of the eternal vision discerned so far only as a remote\nideal. The second movement of the will has been already implied\nin the first, and is only a lifting into clear consciousness of what\nled the soul to make its initial effort. I speak of the part played by\nthe will in the abysmal struggle between love and malice. This\nstruggle was really implicit, in the beginning, in the effort the will\nmade to focus the multiform energies of the complex vision. But\ndirectly some measure of insight into the secret of life has\nfollowed upon this effort, or directly, if the soul's good fortune has\nbeen exceptional, its great illuminative moment has been reached,\nthe will finds itself irresistibly plunged into this struggle, finds\nitself inevitably ranged, on one side or the other, of the ultimate\nduality.\n\nThat the first effort of the will was largely what might be called an\nintellectual one, though its purpose was to make use of all the\nsoul's attributes together, is proved by the fact that it is possible\nfor human souls to be possessed of formidable insight into the secret\nof life and yet to use that insight for evil rather than for good.\n\nBut the second movement of the will, of which I am now speaking,\nreveals without a shadow of ambiguity on which side of the\neternal contest the personality in question has resolved to\nthrow its weight. If, in this second movement, the will answers,\nwith a reciprocal gathering of itself together, the now far clearer\nattraction of the vision attained by its original effort, it will be\nfound to range itself on the side of love against the power of\nmalice.\n\nIf, on the contrary, having made use of its original vision to\nunderstand the secret of this struggle, it allies itself with the power\nof malice against love, it will be found to produce the spectacle of\na soul of illuminated intellectual insight deliberately concentrated\non evil rather than good.\n\nBut once irrevocably committed to the power of that creative\nenergy which we call love, the will, though it may have\ninnumerable lapses and moments of troubled darkness, never\nceases from its abysmal struggle. For this is the conclusion of the\nwhole matter. When we speak of the eternal duality as consisting\nin a struggle between love and malice, what we really mean is that\nthe human soul, concentrated into the magnet-point of a\npassionately conscious will, is found varying and quivering\nbetween the pole of love and the pole of malice.\n\nThe whole drama is contained within the circle of personality; and\nit would be of a similar nature if the personality in question were\nconfronted by no other thing in the universe except the objective\nmystery. I mean that the soul would be committed to a struggle\nbetween its creative energy and its inert malice even if there were\nno other living persons in the world towards whom this love and\nthis malice could be directed.\n\nI have compared the substance of the soul to an arrowhead of\nconcentrated flames, the shaft of which is wrapped in impenetrable\ndarkness while the point of it pierces the objective mystery. From\nwithin the impenetrable darkness of this invisible arrow-shaft the\nvery substance of the soul is projected; and in its projection it\nassumes the form of these flames; and the name I have given to\nthis mysterious outpouring of the soul is _emotion_, whereof the\nopposing poles of contending force are respectively love and\nmalice. The psycho-material substance of the invisible soul-monad\nis itself divided into this eternally alternating duality, of which the\nprojected \"flames,\" or manifested \"energies\" are the constant\nexpression. Each of these energies has as its concrete \"material,\"\nso to speak, the one projected substance of the soul; and is thus\ncomposed of the very stuff of emotion.\n\nThe eternal duality of this emotion takes various forms in these\nvarious manifestations of its one substance. Thus the energy or\nflame of the aesthetic sense resolves itself into the opposed\nvibrations of the beautiful and the hideous. Thus the energy, or\nflame, of the pure reason resolves itself into the opposed\nvibrations of the true and the false. Thus the energy, or flame, of\nconscience resolves itself into the opposed vibrations of the good\nand the evil.\n\nAlthough the remaining energies of the soul, beyond those I have\njust named--such as instinct, intuition, imagination, and the like--\nare less definitely divided up among those three \"primordial ideas\"\nwhich we discern as \"truth,\" \"beauty,\" and \"goodness,\" they are\nsubject, nevertheless, since their substance is the stuff of emotion,\nto the same duality of love and malice.\n\nIt is not difficult to see how this duality turns upon itself in human\ninstinct, in human imagination, and in human intuition for the\ncreative impulse in all these energies finds itself opposed by the\nimpulse to resist creation. It is when the will is in question that we\nare compelled to notice a difference. For the will, although itself a\nprimal energy or projection of the soul, is in its inherent nature set\napart from the other activities of the soul.\n\nThe will is that particular aspect of the soul-monad by means of\nwhich it consciously intensifies or relaxes the outward pressure of\nemotion. From the point of view of the complex vision, the will,\nalthough easily differentiated from both consciousness and\nemotion, cannot be imagined as existing apart from these.\n\nEvery living organism possesses consciousness in some degree,\nemotion in some degree, and will in some degree; and the part\nplayed by the will in the complicated \"nexus\" of the soul's life may\nbe compared to that of a mechanical spring in some kind of a\nmachine. In this case, however, the spring of the machine is fed by\nthe oil of consciousness and releases its force upon the cogs and\nwheels of contradictory emotion.\n\nNo theory of psychology which attempts to eliminate the will by\nthe substitution of pure \"motive\" playing upon pure \"action\" is\nacceptable to us. And such an elimination is unacceptable,\nbecause, in the ultimate insight of the complex vision turned round\nupon itself, the soul is aware of a definite recognizable\nphenomenon which although present to consciousness is different\nfrom consciousness, and although intensifying and lessoning\nemotion is different from emotion.\n\nIn regard to this \"problem of conduct,\" which I refuse to interpret\nas anything short of the whole art of life, contemplative as well as\nactive, the will, being, so to say, the main-spring of the soul,\nnaturally plays the most important part. The prominence given, in\nmoral tradition, to the struggle of the will with sexual desire is one\nof the melancholy evidences as to how seldom the complex vision\nof the soul has been allowed full play.\n\nWhat is called \"asceticism\" or \"puritanism\" is the result of an\nover-balanced concentration of the will upon the phenomena of\nsensation alone. Whereas in the rhythmic balance of the soul's\ncomplete faculties, what the ideal vision calls upon the will to do,\nis not to concentrate upon repressing sensation but to concentrate\nupon repressing malice and intensifying love.\n\nSensation is only, after all, one of the energies, or projected\nflames, of the soul, in its reaction to the objective mystery. But\nemotion is, as we have seen, the very soul itself, poured forth in its\nprofoundest essence, and eternally divided against itself in the\nultimate duality. Emotion is the psychic element which is the real\nsubstratum of sensation, just as it is the real substratum of reason\nand taste. So that when the will concentrates itself, as it\nhas so often done and so often been commended for doing, upon\nsensation alone, it is neglecting and betraying its main function,\nwhich is the repressing of malice and the liberation of love.\n\nThe deliberate repression of sensation does, it is true, sometimes\ndestroy our response to sensation; but it more often intensifies the\nsoul's sensational life. It is only when the will is concentrated upon\nthe intensifying of love and the suppression of malice that\nsensation falls into its right place in the resultant rhythm. There is\nthen no question of either suppressing it or of indulging it. It\ncomes and goes as naturally, as easily, as inevitably, as the rain or\nthe snow.\n\nWhen the will is concentrated upon the suppression of malice and\nthe intensifying of love all those cults of sensation which we call\nvice naturally relinquish their hold upon us. The fact that women\nso rarely indulge in the worst excesses of these cults is due to the\nfact that in their closeness to nature they follow more easily the\nrhythmic flow of life and are less easily tempted to isolate and\ndetach from the rest any particular feeling. But women pay the\npenalty for this advantage when it comes to the question of the\nilluminative moments of the apex-thought. For in these high, rare\nand abnormal moments, the ordinary ebb and flow of life is\ninterrupted; and something emerges which resembles the final\neffluence of a work of art that has touched eternity. The rhythmic\nmovement of the apex-thought, when under such exceptional\nconditions it evokes this effluence, rises for a moment out of the\nflux of nature and gathers itself into a monumental vision, calm\nand quiet and immortal. It is more difficult for women to attain\nthis vision than for men; because, while under normal conditions\nthe play of their energies is better balanced and more harmonious\nthan man's, it is harder for them to detach themselves from the ebb\nand flow of nature's chemistry, harder for them to attain the\npersonal isolation which lends itself to the supreme creative\nact. But while such exceptional moments seem to come more\nfrequently to men than to women, and while a greater number of\nthe supreme artists and prophets of the world are of the male sex,\nit cannot be denied that the average woman, in every generation,\nleads a more human and a more dignified life than the average\nman. And she does this because the special labours which occupy\nher, such as the matter of food, of cleanliness, of the making and\nmending of clothes, of the care of children and animals and\nflowers, of the handling of animate and inanimate things with a\nview to the increase of life and beauty upon the earth, are labours\nwhich have gathered about them, during their long descent of the\ncenturies, a certain symbolic and poetic distinction which nothing\nbut immemorial association with mankind's primal necessities is\nable to give.\n\nThe same dignity of immemorial association hangs, it is true,\nabout such masculine labours as are connected with the tilling of\nthe earth and the sailing of the sea. Certain ancient and eternally\nnecessary handicrafts, such as cannot be superseded by machinery,\ntake their place with these. But since man's particular power of\nseparating himself from Nature and dominating Nature by means\nof logical reason, physical science and mechanical devices, puts\nhim in the position of continuity breaking up those usages of the\nages upon which the ritualistic element in life depends, he has\ncome, by inevitable evolution, to be much more the child of the\nnew and the arbitrary than woman is; and in his divorce from\nimmemorial necessity has lost much of that symbolic distinction\nwhich the life of woman retains.\n\nIt may thus be said that while the determining will in the soul of\nthe average woman ought to be directed towards that exceptional\ncreative energy which lifts the soul out of the flux of Nature and\ngives it a glimpse of the vision of the immortals, the determining\nwill in the soul of the average man ought to be directed towards\nthe heightening of his ordinary consciousness so as to bring this up\nto the level of the flux of nature and to penetrate it with the\nmemory of the creative moments which he has had.\n\nIn both cases the material with which the will has to work is the\nemotions of love and of malice; but in the case of man this malice\ntends to destroy the poetry of common life, while in the case of\nwoman it tends to obstruct and embarrass her soul when the magic\nof the apex-thought stirs within her and an opportunity arises for\nthat creative act which puts the complex vision in touch with the\nvision of the Gods.\n\nThe philosophy of the complex vision does not discover in its\nexamination of the psycho-material organism of the soul any\ndifferentiated \"faculties\" which can be paralleled by the\ndifferentiated \"members\" of the human body. The organic unity of\nthe soul is retained, in undissipated concentration, throughout\nwhatever movement or action or stress of energy it is led to make.\nThe totality of the soul becomes will, or the totality of the soul\nbecomes reason, or the totality of the soul becomes intuition, in\nthe same way as a falling body of water, or the projected stream of\na fountain _becomes_ whatever dominant colour of sky or air or\natmosphere penetrates it and transforms it. What we have called\nemotion, made up of the duality of love and malice, is something\nmuch more integral than this. For the totality of the soul, which\n_becomes_ reason, consciousness, intuition, conscience, and the\nlike, is always composed of the very stuff and matter of emotion.\nWhen we say \"the totality of the soul becomes imagination or\nintuition\" it is the same thing as though we said \"the emotion of\nthe soul becomes imagination or intuition.\"\n\nEmotion is our name, in fact, for the psycho-material \"stuff\" out of\nwhich the organic substratum of the soul is made. And since this\n\"stuff\" is eternally divided against itself into a positive and a\nnegative \"pole\" we are compelled to assert that our ultimate\nanalysis of the system of things is dualistic, in spite of the fact\nthat the whole drama takes place under the one comprehensive unity of\nspace.\n\nWhen we say that the totality of the soul becomes will, reason,\nimagination, conscience, intuition and so forth, we do not mean\nthat by becoming any one of these single things it is prevented\nfrom becoming others. We are confronted here by a phenomenon\nof organic life which, however inexplicable, is of frequent\noccurrence in human experience. The ecclesiastical dogma of the\nTrinity is no fantastic invention of this or the other theologian. It\nis an inevitable definition of a certain body of human experience to\nwhich it affords a plausible explanation.\n\nWhat the philosophy of the complex vision attempts to do is\nto analyse into its component parts that confused mass of\ncontradictory impressions to which the soul awakens as soon as it\nbecomes conscious of itself at all. The older philosophers begin\ntheir adventurous journey by the discovery and proclamation of\nsome particular clue, or catchword, or general principle, out of the\nrational necessity of whose content they seek to evoke that living\nand breathing universe which impinges upon us all. Modern\nphilosophy tends to reject these Absolute \"clues,\" these\nsimplifying \"secrets\" of the system of things; but in rejecting these\nit either substitutes its own hypothetical generalizations, such as\n\"spirit,\" \"life-force,\" or \"cosmic energy,\" or it contents itself with\nnoting, as William James does, the more objective grouping of\nstates of consciousness, as they weave their pattern on the face of\nthe swirling waters, without regard to any \"substantial soul\" whose\nbackground of organic life gives these \"states\" their concrete\nunity.\n\nThe philosophy of the complex vision differs from the older\nphilosophies in that it frankly and confessedly starts with that\ngeneral situation which is also its goal. Its movement is therefore a\nperpetual setting-forth and a perpetual return; a setting forth\ntowards a newly created vision of the world, and a return to that\nideal of such a vision which has been implicit from the beginning.\nAnd this general situation from which it starts and to which it\nreturns is nothing less than the huge spectacle of the visible\nuniverse confronting the individual soul and implying the kindred\nexistence of innumerable other souls. The fact that what the\ncomplex vision reveals is the primary importance of personality\ndoes not detract in the least degree from the unfathomable\nmysteriousness of the objective universe And it does not detract\nfrom this because the unfathomableness of the universe is not a\nrational deduction drawn from the logical idea of what an\nobjective universe would be like if it existed, but is a direct human\nexperience verified at every movement of the soul. The universe\nrevealed to us by the complex vision is a universe compounded of\nthe concentrated visions of all the souls that compose it, a universe\nwhich in its eternal beauty and hideousness has received the\n\"imprimatur of the immortal Gods.\"\n\nThe fact that such a universe is in part a creation of the mind, and\nin part a discovery made by the mind when it flings itself upon\nthe unknown, does not lessen or diminish the strangeness or\nunfathomableness of life. The fact that the ultimate reality of such\na universe is to be found in the psycho-material substratum--where\nmind and matter become one--of the individual soul, does not\nlessen or diminish the magical beauty or cruel terribleness of life.\n\nWhat we name by the name of \"matter\" is not less a permanent\nhuman experience, because apart from the creative energy of some\npersonal soul we are not able to conceive of its existence.\n\nThe philosophy of the complex vision reduces everything that\nexists to an eternal action and re-action between the individual\nsoul and the objective mystery. This action and reaction is itself\nreproduced in the eternal duality, or ebb and flow, which\nconstitutes the living soul itself. And because the psycho-material\nsubstance of the soul must be considered as identical, on its\npsychic side, with the \"spiritual substance\" of the universe\n\"medium\" through which all souls come into contact with one\nanother, and identical on its material side with the objective\nmystery which is expressed in all bodies, it is impossible to avoid\nthe conclusion that the individual personality is surrounded by an\nelemental and universal \"something\" similar to itself, dominated\nas itself is dominated by the omnipresent circle of Space.\n\nThis universal \"something\" must be regarded, in spite of its double\nnature, as one and the same, since it is dominated by one and\nthe same space. The fact that the material aspect of this\npsycho-material element is constantly plastic to the creative energy of\nthe soul does not reduce it to the level of an \"illusion.\" The mind\nrecreates everything it touches; but the mind cannot work in a\nvacuum. There must be something for the mind to \"touch.\" What\nthe soul touches, therefore, as soon as it becomes conscious of\nitself is, in the first place, the \"material element\" of its own inmost\nnature; in the second place the \"material element\" which makes it\npossible for all bodies to come in contact with one another; and in\nthe third place the \"material element\" which is the original\npotentiality of all universes and which has been named \"the\nobjective mystery.\"\n\nTo call this universal material element, thus manifested in a\nthree-fold form, an illusion of the human mind is to destroy the\nintegrity of language. Nothing can justly be called an illusion which\nis a permanent and universal human experience. The name we select\nfor this experience is of no importance. We can name it _matter_,\nor we can name it _energy_, or _movement_, or _force_. The\nexperience remains the same, by whatever name we indicate it to\none another.\n\nThe philosophy of the complex vision opposes itself to all\nmaterialistic systems by its recognition of personality as the\nultimate basis of life; and it opposes itself to all idealistic systems\nby its recognition of an irreducible \"material element\" which is the\nobject of all thought but which is also, in the substratum of the\nsoul-monad, fused and blended with thought itself.\n\nWe now arrive at the conclusion of our philosophical journey; and\nwe find it to be the identical point or situation from which we\noriginally started. Once and for all we are compelled to ask\nourselves the question, whether since personality is the ultimate\nsecret of life and since all individual personalities, whether human,\nsub-human, or super-human, are confronted by one \"material\nelement\" dominated by one universal material space, it is not\nprobable that this \"material element\" should itself be, as it were,\nthe \"outward body\" of one \"elemental soul\"? Such an elemental\nsoul would have no connexion with the \"Absolute Being\" of the\ngreat metaphysical systems. For in those systems the Absolute\nBeing is essentially impersonal, and can in no sense be regarded as\nhaving anything corresponding to a body.\n\nBut this hypothetical soul of the ethereal element would be just as\ndefinitely expressed in a bodily form as are the personalities of\nmen, beasts, plants and stars. It is impossible to avoid, now we are\nat the end of our philosophic journey, one swift glance backward\nover the travelled road; and it is impossible to avoid asking\nourselves the question whether this universal material element\nwhich confronts every individual soul and surrounds every\nindividual body may not itself be the body of an universal living\npersonality? Is such a question, so presented to us for the last time,\nas we look back over our long journey, a kind of faint and\ndespairing gesture made by the phantom of \"the idea of God,\" or is\nit the obscure stirring of such an idea, from beneath the weight of\nall our argument, as it refuses to remain buried? It seems to me\nmuch more than this.\n\nThe complex vision seems to indicate in this matter that we have a\nright to make the hypothetical outlines of this thing as clear and\nemphatic as we can; as clear and emphatic, and also, by a rigid\nmethod of limitation, as little overstressed and as little\noverpowering as we can.\n\nThe question that presses upon us, therefore, as we glance\nbackward over our travelled road, is whether or not, by the logic of\nour doctrine of personality, we are bound to predicate some sort of\n\"elemental soul\" as the indwelling personal monad belonging to\nthe universal material element even as any other soul belongs to its\nbody.\n\nDoes it not, we might ask, seem unthinkable that any portion of\nthis universal element should remain suspended in a vacuum\nwithout the indwelling presence of a definite personality of which\nit is the expression? Are we not led to the conclusion that the\nwhole mass and volume of this material element, namely the\nmaterial element in every living soul, the material element which\nbinds all bodies together, and the material element which\ncomposes the objective mystery, must make up in its total weight\nand pressure the _body_, so to speak, of some sort of universal\nelemental soul?\n\nAnd because no personality, whether universal or individual, can\nbe regarded as absolute, since perpetual creation is the essence of\nlife, must it not follow that this elemental personality must itself\neternally confront and be confronted by an unfathomable depth of\nobjective mystery which it perpetually invades with its creative\nenergy but which it can never exhaust, or touch the limit of? The\nbody of this being would be in fact its own \"objective mystery,\"\nwhile our \"objective mystery\" would be recognized as disappearing\nin the same reality. Does this hypothesis reduce the tragedy\nof life to a negligible quantity, or afford a basis upon\nwhich any easy optimism could be reared? It does not appear so.\nWherever personality existed, there the ultimate duality would\ninevitably reign. And just as with \"the invisible companions\" what\nis evil and malicious in us attracts towards us what is evil and\nmalicious in them so with the elemental personality, whatever\nwere evil and malicious in us would attract towards us whatever\nwere evil and malicious in it. The elemental personality would not\nnecessarily be better, or nobler, or wiser than we are. There would\nbe no particular reason why we should worship it, or give it praise.\nFor if it really existed it could no more help being what it is than\nwe can help being what we are, or the immortal gods can help\nbeing what they are.\n\nThat such an elemental personality would have to be regarded as a\nkind of demi-god can hardly be denied; but there would be no\nreason for asserting that our highest moments of inspiration were\ndue to its love for us. As with the rest of the \"immortals\" it would\nbe sometimes possessed by love and sometimes possessed by\nmalice, and we should have not the least authority for saying that\nour supreme moments of insight were due to its inspiration.\nSometimes they would be so. On the other hand sometimes our\nmost baffled, clouded, inert, moribund, and wretched moments\nwould be due to its influence. Such an elemental personality\nwould have no advantage over any other personality, except in the\nfact of being elemental; and this would give it no absolute\nadvantage, since its universality would be eternally challenged by\nthe unfathomable element in its own being. The \"body\" of such an\nelemental personality would have to be regarded as the actual\nobjective mystery which confronts both men and gods. It would\nhave to be regarded as possessing a complex vision even as every\nother personality possesses it; and its soul-monad would have to\nbe as concrete, actual, and real, as every other soul monad. An\nethereal Being of this kind, whose body were composed of the\nwhole mass of the material element which binds all bodies\ntogether, would have no closer connexion with the soul of man\nthan any other invisible companion. The soul of man could be\ndrawn to it in love or could be repelled from it by malice, just as it\ncan be drawn to any other living thing or repelled by any other\nliving thing.\n\nThat the human race should have sometimes made the attempt to\nassociate such an universal personality with the ideal figure of\nChrist is natural enough. But such an association wins no sanction\nor authority from the revelation of the complex vision. In one\nsense the figure of Christ, as the life of Jesus reveals it, is a pure\nsymbol. In another sense, as we become aware of his love in the\ndepths of our own soul, he is the most real and actual of all living\nbeings. But neither as a symbol of the immortal vision, nor as\nhimself an immortal God, have we any right to regard Christ as\nidentical with this elemental personality. Christ is far more\nimportant to us and precious to us than such a being could possibly\nbe.\n\nAnd just as this hypothetical personality, whose body is the\nmaterial element which binds all bodies together, must not be\nconfused with the figure of Christ, so also it is not to be confused\nwith either of those primordial projections of pure reason, working\nin isolation, which we have noted as the \"synthetic unity of\napperception\" and the \"universal self,\" The elemental personality,\nif it existed, would be something quite different from the universal\nself of the logical reason. For the universal self of the logical\nreason includes and transcends all the other selves, whereas the\nelemental personality which has the whole weight of the world's\nmaterial element as its body could not transcend, or in any way\n\"subsume\" the least of individual things except in so far as the\nmaterial element which is its body would surround all living things\nand bring them into contact with one another.\n\nThe elemental personality could in no sense be called an\nover-soul, because, so far from being an universal self made up of\nparticular individual selves, it would be a completely detached\nsoul, only related to other souls in the sense that all other souls\ncome into contact with one another through the medium of its\nspiritual substance.\n\nAccording to the revelation of the complex vision the question of\nthe existence or non-existence of an elemental soul of this kind has\nno relation to the problem of human conduct. For the material\nelement in the individual soul is fused in individual consciousness;\nand therefore the spiritual medium which surrounds the individual\nsoul cannot impinge upon or penetrate the soul which it surrounds.\nAnd this conclusion is borne witness to in all manner of common\nhuman experience. For although we all feel dimly aware of vast\ngulfs of spiritual evil and vast gulfs of spiritual beauty in the world\nabout us, this knowledge only becomes definite and concrete when\nwe think of such gifts as being entirely made up of personal\nmoods, the moods of mortal men, of immortal gods, and the\nmoods, it may be, of this elemental personality.\n\nBut the problem of conduct is not the problem of getting into\nharmony with any particular individual soul. It is the problem of\ngetting into harmony with the creative vision in our own soul,\nwhich when attained turns out to be identical with the creative\nvision of every other soul in the universe. The conception of the\nelemental personality does not depend, as does the existence of the\nimmortals, upon our consciousness of something objective and\neternal in our primordial ideas. It depends upon our suspicion that\nno extended mass of what we call matter, however attenuated and\nethereal, can exist suspended in soulless space.\n\nSome attenuated form of matter our universe demands, as the\nuniversal medium by means of which all separate bodies come\ninto touch with each other; but it is hard to imagine an universal\nmedium hung, as it were, in an enormous vacuum. Such a medium\nwould seem to demand, as a reason for its existence, some living\ncentre of energy such as that which a personal soul can alone\nsupply. It is in this way we arrive at the hypothetical conception of\nthe elemental soul.\n\nAnd our hypothesis is borne out by one very curious human\nexperience. I mean the experience which certain natures have of a\ndemonic or magnetic force in life which can be drawn upon either\nfor good or for evil, and which seems in some strange sense to be\ndiffused round us in the universal air. Goethe frequently refers to\nthis demonic element; and others, besides Goethe, have had\nexperience of it. If our hypothetical, elemental personality is to be\nregarded as a sort of demi-god, lower than the immortals and\nperhaps lower than man, we may associate it with those vague\nintimations of a sub-human life around us which seems in some\nweird sense distinct from the life of any particular thing we know.\n\nThe elemental personality, in this case, would be the cause of\nthose various \"psychic manifestations\" which have sometimes\nbeen fantastically accounted for as the work of so-called\n\"elementals.\"\n\nBut the supreme moments of human consciousness, when the\napex-thought of the complex vision is shooting its arrows of flame\ninto the darkness, are but slightly concerned with the demonic\nsub-human life of hypothetical elemental personalities. They are\nconcerned with the large, deep, magical spectacle of the great\ncosmic drama as it unrolls itself in infinite perspective. They are\nconcerned with the unfathomable struggle, more terrible, more\nbeautiful, more real, than anything else in life, between the\nresistant power of malice and the creative power of love. Nor do\nthey see, these moments, the end of this long drama. The soul\ncreates and is baffled in its creations. The soul loves and is baffled\nin its loving. Good and evil grow strangely mingled as they\nwrestle in the bottomless abyss. And ever, above us and beneath\nus, the same immense space spreads out its encircling arms. And\never, out of the invisible, the beckoning of immortal beauty leads\nus forward. Pain turns into pleasure; and pleasure turns into pain.\nMisery, deep as the world, troubles the roots of our being.\nHappiness, deep as the world, floods us with a flood like the\nwaves of the ocean. All our philosophy is like the holding up of a\nlittle candle against a great wind. Soon, soon the candle is blown\nout: and the immense Perhaps rolls its waters above our heads.\n\nThe aboriginal malice against which the Gods struggle is never\novercome. But who can resist asking the question--supposing that\ndrama once ended, that eternal duality once reconciled, would\nannihilation be the last word or would something else, something\nundreamed of, something unguessed at, something \"impossible,\"\nirrational, contrary to every philosophy that has ever sprung from\nthe human brain, take the place of what we call life and substitute\nsome new organ of research for the vision which we have called\ncomplex?\n\nWho can say? The world is still young and the immortal Gods are\nstill young; and our business at present is with life rather than\nbeyond-life. Confused and difficult are the ways of our mortality;\nand after much philosophizing we seem to be only more conscious\nthan ever that the secret of the world is in something else than\nwisdom.\n\nThe secret of the world is not in something that one can hold in\none's hand, or about which one can say \"Lo, here!\" or \"Lo, there!\"\nThe secret of the world is in the whole spectacle of the world, seen\nunder the emotion of one single moment. But the memory of such\na moment may be diffused over all the chances and accidents of\nour life and may be restored to us in a thousand faint and shadowy\nintimations. It may be restored to us in broken glimpses, in little\nstirrings and ripples on the face of the water, in rumours and\nwhispers among the margin-reeds, in sighings of the wind across\nthe sea-bank. It may be restored to us in sudden flickerings of\nunearthly light thrown upon common and familiar things. It may\nbe restored to us when the shadow of death falls upon the path we\nhave to follow. It may be restored to us when the common ritual\nand the ordinary usages of life gather to themselves a sudden\ndignity from the presence of great joy or of tragic grief. For the\nstream of life flows deeper than any among us realize or know;\ndeeper, and with more tragic import; deeper, and with more secret\nhope. We are all born, even the most lucky among us, under a\ndisastrous eclipse. We all contain something of that perilous\ningredient which belongs to the unplumbed depths. Deep calls\nunto deep within us; and in the circle of our mortal personality an\nimmortal drama unrolls itself. Waves of unredeemed chaos roll\nupward from the abysses of our souls, and like a brackish tide\ncontend with the water-springs of life.\n\nOver the landscape of our vision lies a shadow, a rarely lifted\nshadow, the shadow of our own malice. But the human race has\nnot been destined to carry on the unending struggle alone. Its\nsubjective human vision has touched in the darkness a subjective\nsuper-human vision; and the symbol of the encounter of these two\nis the lonely figure of Christ.\n\nLooking backward, as we thus reach our conclusion, we see how\nsuch a conclusion was implicit all the while in the first movement\nwith which we started. For since the truth we seek is not a thing\nwe just put out our hand and take, but is a mood, an attitude, a\ngesture of our whole being, it follows that whenever, and by\nwhatever means, we reach it, this \"truth\" will always be the same,\nand will not be affected, when once it is reached, by the slowness\nor the speed of the method with which we approach it. Nor will it\nbe changed or transformed by the vision that finally grasps it as it\nwould necessarily be if it were an objective fact which we could\neach of us take into our hands. Such an objective fact or series of\nfacts would, of necessity, \"look differently\" to every individual\nvision that seized upon it. But by making our truth, down to the\nvery depths, a gesture, an attitude, a mood, we have already\nanticipated and discounted that fatal relativity which inserts itself\nlike a wedge of distorting vapour, between any objective fact and\nany subjective mind.\n\n\"Truth\" cannot get blurred and distorted by the subjective mind\nwhen truth is regarded as that subjective mind's own creation.\nAccording to the conclusion we have reached, every subjective\nmind in the universe, when it is rhythmically energizing, attains\nthe same truth. For when subjectivity is carried to the furthest\npossible limit of rhythm and harmony, it transforms itself, of\nnecessity, into objectivity. The subjective vision of all mortal\nminds, thus rendered objective by the intensity of the creative\nenergy, is nothing less than the eternal vision. For as soon as the\nrhythmic harmony of the creative act has thus projected such a\ntruth, such a truth receives the \"imprimatur of the Gods\" and turns\nout to be the truth which was implicit in us from the beginning.\n\nThus, the reality which we apprehend is found to be identical with\nthe pursuit of the ideal which we seek; for what we name beauty\nand truth and goodness are of the essence of the mystery of life,\nand it is of _their_ essence that they should ever advance and\ngrow.\n\nThe eternal vision includes in its own inmost rhythm the idea and\nspectacle of inexhaustible growth; for, although it beholds all\nthings \"under the form of eternity,\" its own nature is the nature of\na creative gesture, of a supreme \"work of art,\" whereby it\napproximates to the ideal even in the midst of the real. The \"form\nof eternity\" under which it visualizes the world is not a dead or\nstatic eternity but an eternity of living growth. The peace and quiet\nwhich it attains is not the peace and quiet of the equilibrium which\nmeans \"nothingness\" but the peace and quiet of the equilibrium\nwhich means the rhythmic movement of life. The truth which it\ncreates is a truth which lends itself to infinite development upon\nlines already laid down from the beginning. The beauty which it\ncreates is a beauty which lends itself to infinite development upon\nlines laid down from the beginning.\n\nAnd this truth, this beauty, this goodness, are all of them nothing\nless than the projection of the soul itself--of all the souls which\nconstitute the system of things--in the mysterious outflowing of\nthe ultimate duality. And when we make use of the expression\n\"from the beginning\" we are using a mere metaphorical sign-post.\nThere is no beginning of the system of things and there is no end.\n\"From the beginning\" means nothing except \"from eternity\"; and\nin the immortal figure of Christ the beginning and the end are one.\n\nIn my analysis of the ultimate duality which is the secret of the soul\nI have said little about sex. The modern tendency is to over-emphasize\nthe importance of this thing and to seek its influence in\nregions it can never enter. Many attributes of the soul are sexless;\nand since only one attribute of the soul, namely sensation, is\nentirely devoted to the body and unable to function except through\nthe body, it is ridiculous and unphilosophical to make sex the\nprofoundest aspect of truth which we know. The tendency to lay\nstress upon sex, at the expense of all sexless aspects of the soul, is\na tendency which springs directly from the inert malice of the\nabyss What the instinct of sex secretly desires is that the very\nfountains of life should be invaded by sex and penetrated by sex.\nBut the fountains of life can never be invaded by sex; because the\nfountains of life sink into that eternal vision which transcends all\nsex and reduces sex to its proper place as one single element in the\nrhythm of the universe.\n\nIt is only by associating itself with love and malice--it is only by\ngetting itself transformed into love and malice that the sexual\ninstinct is able to lift itself up, or to sink itself down, into the\nsubtler levels of the soul's vision. The secret of life lies far deeper\nthan the obvious bodily phenomena of sex. The fountains from\nwhich life springs _may flow through that channel_ but they flow\nfrom a depth far below these physical or magnetic agitations. And\nit is only the abysmal cunning of the inert malice, which opposes\nitself to creation that tempts philosophers and artists to lay such a\ndisproportionate stress upon this thing. The great artists are always\nknown by their power to transcend sex and to reduce sex to its\nrelative insignificance. In the greatest of all sculpture, in the\ngreatest of all music, in the greatest of all poetry, the difference\nbetween the sexes disappears.\n\nThe inert malice delights to emphasize this thing, because its\nnormal functioning implies the most desperate exertion of the\npossessive instinct known to humanity. The sexual instinct unless\ntransfigured by love, tends towards death; because the sexual\ninstinct desires to petrify into everlasting immobility what the\ncreative instinct would change and transform. What the sexual\ninstinct secretly desires is the eternal death of the object of its\npassion. It would strike its victim if it could into everlasting\nimmobility so that it could satiate its lust of possession upon it\nwithout limit and without end. Any object of sexual desire,\nuntransformed by love, is, for the purposes of such desire, already\nturned into a living corpse.\n\nBut although, according to the method we have been following,\nthe difference between men and women is but of small account in\nthe real life of the soul, it remains that humanity has absurdly and\noutrageously neglected the especial vision of the woman, as, in her\nbodily senses and her magnetic instincts, she differs from man we\nmay well hope that with the economic independence of women,\nwhich is so great and desirable a revolution in our age, individual\nwomen of genius will arise, able to present, in philosophy and art,\nthe peculiar and especial reaction to the universe which women\npossess as women we may well desire such a consummation in\nview of the fact that all except the very greatest of men have\npermitted their vision of the world to be perverted and distorted by\ntheir sex-instinct.\n\nCould women of genius arise in sufficient numbers to counteract\nthis tendency, such sex-obsessed masculine artists would be\nshamed into recognizing the narrowness of their perverted\noutlook. As it is, what normal women of talent do is simply to\ncopy and imitate, in a diluted form, the sex-distortions of man's\nnarrower vision. Sex-obsessed male artists have seduced the\nnatural intelligence of the most talented women to their own\nnarrow and limited view of life.\n\nBut it still remains that what the true artists of the world for ever\nseek--whether they be male or female--is not the partial and\ndistorted vision of man as _a man_, or of woman _as a woman_,\nbut the rhythmic and harmonious vision of, the human soul as it\nallies itself with the vision of the immortals. Women in private\nlife, and in private conversation, disentangle themselves from the\nprejudices of men, but, as soon as they touch philosophy and art,\nthey tend to deny their natural instincts and imitate the\nsex-obsessed instincts of man. But this tendency is already beginning\nto collapse under the freer atmosphere of economic independence;\nand in the future we may expect such a fierce conflict between the\nsex-vision of woman and the sex-vision of man, that the human\nsoul will revolt against both such partialities and seek the \"ampler\nether and diviner air\" of a vision that has altogether transcended\nthe difference of sex.\n\nAs we look back over the travelled road of our attempt to\narticulate the ultimate secret, there arises one last stupendous\nquestion, not to meet which would be to shirk the heaviest weight\nof the problem. We have reached the conclusion that the secret of\nNature is to be found in personality. We have reached the further\nconclusion that personality demands, for the integrity of its inmost\nself, an actual \"soul-monad.\" We are faced with a \"universe,\" then,\nmade up entirely of living souls, manifested in so-called animate,\nor so-called inanimate bodies. Everything that our individual mind\napprehends is therefore the body of a soul, or a portion of the body\nof a soul, or the presence of a soul that needs no incarnation. The\nsoul itself is composed of a mysterious substance wherein what we\ncall mind and what we call matter are fused and merged. What I\nhave named throughout this book by the name of the _objective\nmystery_ is therefore, when we come to realize the uttermost\nimplications of our method, nothing more than the appearance of\nall the bodies of all the souls in the world _before_ the creative act\nof our own particular soul has visualized such a spectacle. We can\nnever see the objective mystery as _it is_, because directly we\nhave seen it, that is to say, the appearance of all the adjacent\nbodies of all the souls within our reach, it ceases to be the\nobjective mystery and becomes the universe we know.\n\nThe objective mystery is therefore no real thing at all, but only the\npotentiality of all real things, before the \"real thing\" which is our\nindividual soul comes upon the scene to create the universe. It is\nonly the potentiality of the \"universe\" which we have thus named,\nonly the idea of the general spectacle of such an universe,\n_before_ any universe has actually appeared.\n\nAnd since the final conclusion of our attempt at articulation should\nrigorously eliminate from our picture everything that is relatively\nunreal, in favour of what is relatively real, it becomes necessary,\nnow at the end, to eliminate from our vision of reality any\nsubstantial basis for this, \"potentiality of all universes,\" and to\nsee how our actual universe appears when this thing has been\nwithdrawn as nothing but an unreal thing. The substantial basis for\nwhat we actually see becomes therefore no mere potential\nuniverse, or objective mystery, but something much more definite\nthan either of these. The spectacle of Nature, as we behold it,\nbecomes nothing else than the spectacle of all the living bodies\nthat compose the universe, each one of them with its corresponding\ninvisible soul-monad.\n\nThe movement of thought to which I have throughout this book\ngiven the name of \"the struggle with the objective mystery\"\nremains the same. In these cases, _names_ are of small account.\nBut since it is a movement of thought which itself culminates in\nthe elimination of the \"objective mystery,\" it becomes necessary to\n\"think through\" the stage of thought which this term covered, and\narticulate the actual cause of this movement of the mind.\n\nThe cause of the spectacle of the universe, as it presents itself to us\nin its manifold variety, is the presence of innumerable visible\nbodies which are themselves the manifestation of innumerable\ninvisible souls. Everything that we see and touch and taste and\nsmell and hear is a portion of some material body, which is the\nexpression of some spiritual soul.\n\nThe universe is an immense congeries of bodies, moved and\nsustained by an immense congeries of souls. But it remains that\nthese souls, inhabiting these bodies, are linked together by\nsome mysterious medium which makes it possible for them to\ncommunicate with one another. What is this mysterious medium?\nWhat we have already indicated, here and there in this book, leads\nus at this point to our natural conclusion. Such a medium may well\nbe nothing less than that elemental soul, with the universal ether as\nits bodily expression, the existence of which we have already\nsuggested as a more than probable hypothesis. If the omnipresent\nbody of this elemental soul is the material atmosphere or medium\nwhich unites all material bodies, surely we are justified in\nassuming that the invisible primordial medium which binds all\nsouls together, which hypothetically binds them together even\n_before_ they have, by the interaction of their different visions,\ncreated the universe, is this universal \"soul of the elements.\" Only\na spiritual substance is able to unite spiritual substances. And only\na material substance is able to unite material substances. Thus we\nare justified in assuming that while the medium which unites all\nbodies is the universal body of the elemental soul, the medium\nwhich unites all souls is the omnipresent soul-monad of this\nelemental being. It must however be remembered that this uniting\ndoes not imply any sort of spiritual _including_ or subsuming of\nthe souls thus united. They communicate with one another by\nmeans of this medium; but the integrity of the medium which\nunites them does not impinge at any point upon their integrity.\n\nThus, at the end of our journey, we are able, by this final process\nof drastic elimination, to reduce the world in which we live to a\ncongeries of living souls. Some of these souls possess what we\nname animate bodies, others possess what we name inanimate\nbodies. For us, these words, animate and inanimate, convey but\nslight difference in meaning. Between a stone, which is part of the\nbody of the earth, and a leaf which is part of the body of a plant,\nand a lock of hair which is part of the body of a man, there may be\ncertain unimportant chemical differences, justifying us in using the\nterms animate and inanimate. But the essential fact remains that all\nwe see and taste and touch and smell and hear, all, in fact, that\nmakes up the objective universe which surrounds us, is a portion\nof some sort of living body, corresponding to some sort of living\nsoul.\n\nOur individual soul-monad, then, able to communicate with other\nsoul-monads, whether mortal or immortal, through the medium of\nomnipresent soul-monads of the universal ether finds itself\ndominated, as all the rest are dominated, by one inescapable circle\nof unfathomable space. Under the curve of this space we all of us\nlive, and under the curve of this space those that are mortal among\nus, die. When we die, if it be our destiny not to survive death, our\nsouls vanish into nothingness; and our bodies become a portion of\nthe body of the earth. But if we have entered into the eternal vision\nwe have lost all fear of death; for we have come to see that the\nthing which is most precious to us, the fact that love remains\nundying in the heart of the universe, does not vanish with our\nvanishing. Once having attained, by means of the creative vision\nof humanity and by means of the grace of the immortals, even a\nfaint glimpse into this mystery, we are no longer inclined to lay\nthe credit of our philosophizing upon the creative spirit in our\nindividual soul. The apex-thought of the complex vision has given\nus our illuminated moments. But the eternal vision to which those\nmoments led us has filled us with an immense humility.\n\nAnd in the last resort, when we turn round upon the amazing\nspectacle of life it is of the free gift of the gods, or of the magical\nlove hidden in the mystery of nature, that we are led to think,\nrather than of any creative activity in ourselves. The word\n\"creative\" like the word \"objective mystery,\" has served our\npurpose well in the preceding pages. But now, as we seek to\nsimplify our conclusion to the uttermost, it becomes necessary to\nreject much of the manifold connotation which hangs about this\nword; although in this case also, the stage of thought which it\ncovers is a real movement of the mind.\n\nBut the creative activity in the apex-thought of our complex vision\nis, after all, only a means, a method, a gesture which puts us into\npossession of the eternal vision. When once the eternal vision has\nbeen ours, the memory of it does not associate itself with\nany energy of our own. The memory of these eternal moments\nassociates itself with a mood in which the creative energy rests\nupon its own equipoise, upon its own rhythm; a mood in which the\nspectacle of the universe, the magic of Nature, the love in all\nliving souls, the contact of mortality with immortality, become\nthings which blend themselves together; a mood in which what is\nmost self-assertive in our personality seems to lose itself in what is\nleast self-assertive, and yet in thus losing itself is not rendered\nutterly void.\n\nFor all action, even the ultimate act of faith, must issue in\ncontemplation; and this is the law of life, that what we\ncontemplate, _that_ we become. He who contemplates malice\nbecomes malicious. He who contemplates hideousness becomes\nhideous. He who contemplates unreality becomes unreal.\n\nIf the universe is nothing but a congeries of souls and bodies,\nunited by the soul and the body which fill universal space, then it\nfollows that \"the art of philosophy\" consists in the attempt to attain\nthe sort of \"contemplation\" which can by the power of its love\nenter into the joy and the suffering of all these living things.\n\nThus in reaching a conclusion which tallies with our rarest\nmoments of super-normal insight we discover that we have\nreached a conclusion which tallies with our moments of profoundest\nself-abasement. In these recurrent moods of humiliation\nit seems ridiculous to speak of the creative or the destructive\nenergy of the mind. What presents itself to us in such moods\nis a world of forms and shapes that we can neither modify\nnor obliterate. All we can do is to reflect their impact upon us and\nto note the pleasure of it or the pain. But when even in the depths\nof our weakness we come to recognize that these forms and shapes\nare, all of them, the bodily expressions of souls resembling our\nown, the nostalgia of the great darkness is perceptibly lifted and a\nstrange hope is born, full of a significance which cannot be put\ninto words. The world-stuff, or the objective mystery, out of which\nthe eternal vision has been created is now seen to be the very flesh\nand blood of a vast company of living organisms; and it has\nbecome impossible to contemplate anything in the world without\nthe emotion of malice or the emotion of love. If ever the universe,\nas we know it now, is dissolved into nothingness, such an end of\nthings will be brought about either by the complete victory of\nmalice or by the complete victory of love.\n\nTHE END","title":"The Complex Vision","tradition":"philosophy-ethics","translated_text":null,"word_count":121660}