[407] I find this in Bergson’s whole attribution of much of our “perceptual” and “scientific” knowledge of things to the “needs of action,” and in the detailed reasons that we attempt on pp. 236–238 to indicate for his polemic against rationalism. [408] This confirmation I find in Bergson’s whole philosophy of perception and sensation referred to on p. 236, and in his idea of a living being as a “centre of action” or “a centre of indetermination.” In fact it is obvious that he is one of the very greatest of the upholders of the “freedom” of the life of the individual, and of the fact that each new individual contributes something new of its own to the sum-total of existence, to the life of its species, and to the life of the world. Of course there is no more an explanation in his teaching of the causes of “variation” or the differences at birth between the off-spring of men and of animals, than there is in the philosophy of Darwin. [409] The idea of this necessity is confirmed in Bergson’s whole philosophy of man’s life as a life of action, as a constant surmounting of obstacles, as a life that reacts in its own way upon the life of nature, upon the life of the human species as such, upon the infinite life and energy and “love” of God--if we may soar to this great thought. See, for example, what he writes in explanation of the “discordance” of which he speaks thus: “Our freedom, in the very movements by which it is affirmed, creates the growing habits that will stifle it if it fails to renew itself by a constant effort: it is dogged by automatism. The letter kills the spirit. And our most ardent enthusiasm, as soon as it is externalised into action, is so naturally congealed into the cold calculation of interest or vanity, the one takes so easily the shape of the other, that we might confuse them together, doubt our sincerity, deny goodness and love.” The explanatory words are the following. [They are quite typical of the kind of philosophy of life that Bergson thinks of as alone worthy of the name of a philosophy of the living. And the reference to “love,” as the highest “dynamic” force in this world of ours, occurs at their close.] “The profound cause of this discordance lies in an irremediable difference of rhythm. Life is general, is mobility itself; particular manifestations of life accept this mobility reluctantly, and constantly lag behind. It is always going ahead; they want to mark time. Evolution in general would fain go on in a straight line; each special evolution is a kind of circle. Like eddies of dust raised by the wind as it passes, the living turn on themselves, borne up by the great blast of life. They are therefore relatively stable, and counterfeit immobility so well that we treat each of them as a _thing_ rather than as a _progress_, forgetting that the very permanence of their form is only the outline of a movement. At times, however, in a fleeting vision,