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+Project Gutenberg's Essay on the Creative Imagination, by Th. Ribot
+
+This eBook is for the use of anyone anywhere at no cost and with
+almost no restrictions whatsoever.  You may copy it, give it away or
+re-use it under the terms of the Project Gutenberg License included
+with this eBook or online at www.gutenberg.org
+
+
+Title: Essay on the Creative Imagination
+
+Author: Th. Ribot
+
+Translator: Albert H. N. Baron
+
+Release Date: August 25, 2008 [EBook #26430]
+
+Language: English
+
+Character set encoding: ISO-8859-1
+
+*** START OF THIS PROJECT GUTENBERG EBOOK ESSAY ON THE CREATIVE IMAGINATION ***
+
+
+
+
+Produced by Clare Boothby and the Online Distributed
+Proofreading Team at http://www.pgdp.net
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+  +------------------------------------------------------------+
+  | Transcriber's Note:                                        |
+  |                                                            |
+  | Obvious typographical errors have been corrected in        |
+  | this text. For a complete list, please see the bottom of   |
+  | this document.                                             |
+  |                                                            |
+  | The children's letters on page 108 have been reproduced in |
+  | this text as diagrams.                                     |
+  +------------------------------------------------------------+
+
+
+
+
+ESSAY ON THE CREATIVE IMAGINATION
+
+BY
+
+TH. RIBOT
+
+
+TRANSLATED FROM THE FRENCH
+
+BY
+
+ALBERT H. N. BARON
+FELLOW IN CLARK UNIVERSITY
+
+
+LONDON
+KEGAN PAUL, TRENCH, TRÜBNER & CO., LTD.
+1906
+
+COPYRIGHT BY
+THE OPEN COURT PUBLISHING CO.
+CHICAGO, U. S. A.
+1906
+_All rights reserved._
+
+
+TO THE MEMORY OF MY TEACHER
+AND FRIEND,
+
+Arthur Allin, Ph. D.,
+
+PROFESSOR OF PSYCHOLOGY AND EDUCATION,
+UNIVERSITY OF COLORADO,
+
+WHO FIRST INTERESTED ME IN THE PROBLEMS OF PSYCHOLOGY,
+THIS BOOK IS DEDICATED, WITH REVERENCE
+AND GRATITUDE, BY
+
+THE TRANSLATOR.
+
+
+
+
+TRANSLATOR'S PREFACE.
+
+
+The name of Th. Ribot has been for many years well known in America, and
+his works have gained wide popularity. The present translation of one of
+his more recent works is an attempt to render available in English what
+has been received as a classic exposition of a subject that is often
+discussed, but rarely with any attempt to understand its true nature.
+
+It is quite generally recognized that psychology has remained in the
+semi-mythological, semi-scholastic period longer than most attempts at
+scientific formulization. For a long time it has been the "spook
+science" _per se_, and the imagination, now analyzed by M. Ribot in such
+a masterly manner, has been one of the most persistent, apparently real,
+though very indefinite, of psychological spooks. Whereas people have
+been accustomed to speak of the imagination as an entity _sui generis_,
+as a lofty something found only in long-haired, wild-eyed "geniuses,"
+constituting indeed the center of a cult, our author, Prometheus-like,
+has brought it down from the heavens, and has clearly shown that
+_imagination is a function of mind common to all men in some degree_,
+and that it is shown in as highly developed form in commercial leaders
+and practical inventors as in the most bizarre of romantic idealists.
+The only difference is that the manifestation is not the same.
+
+That this view is not entirely original with M. Ribot is not to his
+discredit--indeed, he does not claim any originality. We find the view
+clearly expressed elsewhere, certainly as early as Aristotle, that the
+greatest artist is he who actually embodies his vision and will in
+permanent form, preferably in social institutions. This idea is so
+clearly enunciated in the present monograph, which the author modestly
+styles an essay, that when the end of the book is reached but little
+remains of the great imagination-ghost, save the one great mystery
+underlying all facts of mind.
+
+That the present rendering falls far below the lucid French of the
+original, the translator is well aware; he trusts, however, that the
+indulgent reader will take into account the good intent as offsetting in
+part, at least, the numerous shortcomings of this version.
+
+I wish here to express my obligation to those friends who encouraged me
+in the congenial task of translation.
+
+A. H. N. B.
+
+
+
+
+AUTHOR'S PREFACE
+
+
+Contemporary psychology has studied the purely reproductive imagination
+with great eagerness and success. The works on the different
+image-groups--visual, auditory, tactile, motor--are known to everyone,
+and form a collection of inquiries solidly based on subjective and
+objective observation, on pathological facts and laboratory experiments.
+The study of the creative or constructive imagination, on the other
+hand, has been almost entirely neglected. It would be easy to show that
+the best, most complete, and most recent treatises on psychology devote
+to it scarcely a page or two; often, indeed, do not even mention it. A
+few articles, a few brief, scarce monographs, make up the sum of the
+past twenty-five years' work on the subject. The subject does not,
+however, at all deserve this indifferent or contemptuous attitude. Its
+importance is unquestionable, and even though the study of the creative
+imagination has hitherto remained almost inaccessible to experimentation
+strictly so-called, there are yet other objective processes that permit
+of our approaching it with some likelihood of success, and of continuing
+the work of former psychologists, but with methods better adapted to
+the requirements of contemporary thought.
+
+The present work is offered to the reader as an essay or first attempt
+only. It is not our intention here to undertake a complete monograph
+that would require a thick volume, but only to seek the underlying
+conditions of the creative imagination, showing that it has its
+beginning and principal source in the natural tendency of images to
+become objectified (or, more simply, in the motor elements inherent in
+the image), and then following it in its development under its manifold
+forms, whatever they may be. For I cannot but maintain that, at present,
+the psychology of the imagination is concerned almost wholly with its
+part in esthetic creation and in the sciences. We scarcely get beyond
+that; its other manifestations have been occasionally mentioned--never
+investigated. Yet invention in the fine arts and in the sciences is only
+a special case, and possibly not the principal one. We hope to show that
+in practical life, in mechanical, military, industrial, and commercial
+inventions, in religious, social, and political institutions, the human
+mind has expended and made permanent as much imagination as in all other
+fields.
+
+The constructive imagination is a faculty that in the course of ages has
+undergone a reduction--or at least, some profound changes. So, for
+reasons indicated later on, the mythic activity has been taken in this
+work as the central point of our topic, as the primitive and typical
+form out of which the greater number of the others have arisen. The
+creative power is there shown entirely unconfined, freed from all
+hindrance, careless of the possible and the impossible; in a pure state,
+unadulterated by the opposing influence of imitation, of ratiocination,
+of the knowledge of natural laws and their uniformity.
+
+In the first or analytical part, we shall try to resolve the
+constructive imagination into its constitutive factors, and study each
+of them singly.
+
+The second or genetic part will follow the imagination in its
+development as a whole from the dimmest to the most complex forms.
+
+Finally, the third or concrete part, will be no longer devoted to the
+imagination, but to imaginative beings, to the principal types of
+imagination that observation shows us.
+
+May, 1900.
+
+
+
+
+ANALYTICAL TABLE OF CONTENTS.
+
+
+
+                                                              PAGE
+
+Translator's Preface                                             v
+
+Author's Preface                                               vii
+
+
+INTRODUCTION.
+
+THE MOTOR NATURE OF THE CONSTRUCTIVE IMAGINATION.
+
+  Transition from the reproductive to the creative
+  imagination.--Do all representations contain motor
+  elements?--Unusual effects produced by images: vesication,
+  stigmata; their conditions; their meaning for our
+  subject.--The imagination is, on the intellectual side,
+  equivalent to will. Proof: Identity of development;
+  subjective, personal character of both; teleologic
+  character; analogy between the abortive forms of the
+  imagination and abulias.                                       3
+
+
+FIRST PART.
+
+ANALYSIS OF THE IMAGINATION.
+
+
+CHAPTER I.
+
+THE INTELLECTUAL FACTOR.
+
+  Dissociation, preparatory work.--Dissociation in complete,
+  incomplete and schematic images.--Dissociation in series.
+  Its principal causes: internal or subjective, external or
+  objective.--Association: its rôle reduced to a single
+  question, the formation of new combinations.--The principal
+  intellectual factor is thinking by analogy. Why it is an
+  almost inexhaustible source of creation. Its mechanism. Its
+  processes reducible to two, viz.: personification,
+  transformation.                                               15
+
+
+CHAPTER II.
+
+THE EMOTIONAL FACTOR.
+
+  The great importance of this element.--All forms of the
+  creative imagination imply affective elements. Proofs: All
+  affective conditions may influence the imagination. Proofs:
+  Association of ideas on an emotional basis; new combinations
+  under ordinary and extraordinary forms.--Association by
+  contrast.--The motor element in tendencies.--There is no
+  creative instinct; invention has not _a_ source, but
+  _sources_, and always arises from a need.--The work of the
+  imagination reduced to two great classes, themselves
+  reducible to special needs.--Reasons for the prejudice in
+  favor of a creative instinct.                                 31
+
+
+CHAPTER III.
+
+THE UNCONSCIOUS FACTOR.
+
+  Various views of the "inspired state." Its essential
+  characteristics; suddenness, impersonality.--Its relations
+  to unconscious activity.--Resemblances to hypermnesia, the
+  initial state of alcoholic intoxication and somnambulism on
+  waking.--Disagreements concerning the ultimate nature of
+  unconsciousness: two hypotheses.--The "inspired state" is
+  not a cause, but an index.--Associations in unconscious
+  form.--Mediate or latent association: recent experiments and
+  discussions on this subject.--"Constellation" the result of
+  a summation of predominant tendencies. Its mechanism.         50
+
+
+CHAPTER IV.
+
+THE ORGANIC CONDITIONS OF THE IMAGINATION.
+
+  Anatomical conditions: various hypotheses. Obscurity of the
+  question. Flechsig's theory.--Physiological conditions: are
+  they cause, effect, or accompaniment? Chief factor: change
+  in cerebral and local circulation.--Attempts at
+  experimentation.--The oddities of inventors brought under
+  two heads: the explicable and inexplicable. They are helpers
+  of inspiration.--Is there any analogy between physical and
+  psychic creation? A philosophical hypothesis on the
+  subject.--Limitation of the question. Impossibility of an
+  exact answer.                                                 65
+
+
+CHAPTER V.
+
+THE PRINCIPLE OF UNITY.
+
+  Importance of the unifying principle. It is a fixed idea or
+  a fixed emotion.--Their equivalence.--Distinction between
+  the synthetic principle and the ideal, which is the
+  principle of unity in motion: the ideal is a construction in
+  images, merely outlined.--The principal forms of the
+  unifying principles: unstable, organic or middle, extreme or
+  semi-morbid.--Obsession of the inventor and the sick:
+  insufficiency of a purely psychological criterion.            79
+
+
+SECOND PART.
+
+THE DEVELOPMENT OF THE IMAGINATION.
+
+
+CHAPTER I.
+
+IMAGINATION IN ANIMALS.
+
+  Difficulties of the subject.--The degree of imagination in
+  animals.--Does creative synthesis exist in them? Affirmation
+  and denials.--The special form of animal imagination is
+  motor, and shows itself through play: its numerous
+  varieties.--Why the animal imagination must be above all
+  motor: lack of intellectual development.--Comparison with
+  young children, in whom the motor system predominates: the
+  rôles of movements in infantile insanity.                     93
+
+
+CHAPTER II.
+
+IMAGINATION IN THE CHILD.
+
+  Division of its development into four principal
+  periods.--Transition from passive to creative imagination:
+  perception and illusion.--Animating everything: analysis of
+  the elements constituting this moment: the rôle of
+  belief.--Creation in play: period of imitation, attempts at
+  invention.--Fanciful invention.                              103
+
+
+CHAPTER III.
+
+PRIMITIVE MAN AND THE CREATION OF MYTHS.
+
+  The golden age of the creative imagination.--Myths:
+  hypotheses as to the origin: the myth is the psycho-physical
+  objectification of man in the phenomena that he perceives.
+  The rôle of imagination.--How myths are formed. The moment
+  of creation: two operations--animating everything,
+  qualifying everything. Romantic invention lacking in peoples
+  without imagination. The rôle of analogy and of association
+  through "constellation."--The evolution of myths: ascension,
+  acme, decline.--The explanatory myths undergo a radical
+  transformation: the work of depersonification of the myth.
+  Survivals.--The non-explanatory myths suffer a partial
+  transformation: Literature is a fallen and rationalized
+  mythology.--Popular imagination and legends: the legend is
+  to the myth what illusion is to hallucination.--Unconscious
+  processes that the imagination employs in order to create
+  legends: fusion, idealization.                               118
+
+
+CHAPTER IV.
+
+THE HIGHER FORMS OF INVENTION.
+
+  Is a psychology of great inventors possible? Pathological
+  and physiological theories of genius.--General characters of
+  great inventors. Precocity: chronological order of the
+  development of the creative power. Psychological reasons
+  for this order. Why the creator commences by
+  imitating.--Necessity or fatalism of vocation.--The
+  representative character of great creators. Discussion as to
+  the origin of this character--is it in the individual or in
+  the environment?--Mechanism of creation. Two principal
+  processes--complete, abridged. Their three phases; their
+  resemblances and differences.--The rôle of chance in
+  invention: it supposes the meeting of two factors--one
+  internal, the other external.--Chance is an occasion for,
+  not an agent of, creation.                                   140
+
+
+CHAPTER V.
+
+LAW OF THE DEVELOPMENT OF THE IMAGINATION.
+
+  Is the creative imagination, in its evolution, subject to
+  any law?--It passes through two stages separated by a
+  critical phase.--Period of autonomy; critical period; period
+  of definite constitution. Two cases: decay or transformation
+  through logical form, through deviation.--Subsidiary law of
+  increasing complexity.--Historical verification.             167
+
+
+THIRD PART.
+
+THE PRINCIPAL TYPES OF IMAGINATION.
+
+PRELIMINARY.
+
+  The need of a concrete study.--The varieties of the creative
+  imagination, analogous to the varieties of character.        179
+
+
+CHAPTER I.
+
+THE PLASTIC IMAGINATION.
+
+  It makes use of clear images, well determined in space, and
+  of associations of objective relations.--Its external
+  character.--Inferiority of the affective element.--Its
+  principal manifestations: in the arts dealing with form; in
+  poetry (transformation of sonorous into visual images); in
+  myths with clear outline; in mechanical invention.--The dry
+  and rational imagination its elements.                       184
+
+
+CHAPTER II.
+
+THE DIFFLUENT IMAGINATION.
+
+  It makes use of vague images linked according to the least
+  rigorous modes of association. Emotional abstractions; their
+  nature.--Its characteristic of inwardness.--Its principal
+  manifestations: revery, the romantic spirit, the chimerical
+  spirit; myths and religious conceptions, literature and the
+  fine arts (the symbolists), the class of the marvelous and
+  fantastic.--Varieties of the diffluent imagination: first,
+  numerical imagination; its nature; two principal forms,
+  cosmogonic and scientific conceptions; second, musical
+  imagination, the type of the affective imagination. Its
+  characteristics; it does not develop save after an interval
+  of time.--Natural transposition of events in
+  musicians.--Antagonism between true musical imagination and
+  plastic imagination. Inquiry and facts on the subject.--Two
+  great types of imagination.                                  195
+
+
+CHAPTER III.
+
+MYSTIC IMAGINATION.
+
+  Its elements; its special characteristics.--Thinking
+  symbolically.--Nature of this symbolism.--The mystic changes
+  concrete images into symbolic images.--Their obscurity;
+  whence it arises.--Extraordinary abuse of analogy.--Mystic
+  labor on letters, numbers, etc.--Nature and extent of the
+  belief accompanying this form of imagination: it is
+  unconditional and permanent.--The mystic conception of the
+  world a general symbolism.--Mystic imagination in religion
+  and in metaphysics.                                          221
+
+
+CHAPTER IV.
+
+THE SCIENTIFIC IMAGINATION.
+
+  It is distinguishable into genera and species.--The need for
+  monographs that have not yet appeared.--The imagination in
+  growing sciences--belief is at its maximum; in the organized
+  sciences--the negative rôle of method.--The conjectural
+  phase; proof of its importance.--Abortive and dethroned
+  hypotheses.--The imagination in the processes of
+  verification.--The metaphysician's imagination arises from
+  the same need as the scientist's.--Metaphysics is a
+  rationalized myth.--Three moments.--Imaginative and
+  rationalist.                                                 236
+
+
+CHAPTER V.
+
+THE PRACTICAL AND MECHANICAL IMAGINATION.
+
+  Indetermination of this imaginative form.--Inferior forms:
+  the industrious, the unstable, the eccentric. Why people of
+  lively imagination are changeable.--Superstitious beliefs.
+  Origin of this form of imagination--its mental mechanism and
+  its elements.--The higher form--mechanical imagination.--Man
+  has expended at least as much imagination there as in
+  esthetic creation.--Why the contrary view
+  prevails.--Resemblances between these two forms of
+  imagination.--Identity of development. Detail
+  observation--four phases.--General characters. This form, at
+  its best, supposes inspiration; periods of preparation, of
+  maturity, and of decline.--Special characters: invention
+  occurs in layers. Principal steps of its development.--It
+  depends strictly on physical conditions.--A phase of pure
+  imagination--mechanical romances. Examples.--Identical
+  nature of the imagination of the mechanic and that of the
+  artist.                                                      256
+
+
+CHAPTER VI.
+
+THE COMMERCIAL IMAGINATION.
+
+  Its internal and external conditions.--Two classes of
+  creators--the cautious, the daring.--The initial moment of
+  invention.--The importance of the intuitive
+  mind.--Hypotheses in regard to its psychologic nature.--Its
+  development: the creation of increasingly more simple
+  processes of substitution.--Characters in common with the
+  forms of creation already studied.--Characters peculiar to
+  it--the combining imagination of the tactician; it is a form
+  of war.--Creative intoxication.--Exclusive use of schematic
+  representations.--Remarks on the various types of
+  images.--The creators of great financial systems.--Brief
+  remarks on the military imagination.                         281
+
+
+CHAPTER VII.
+
+THE UTOPIAN IMAGINATION.
+
+  Successive appearances of ideal conceptions.--Creators in
+  ethics and in the social realm.--Chimerical forms. Social
+  novelists.--Ch. Fourrier, type of the great
+  imaginer.--Practical invention--the collective
+  ideal.--Imaginative regression.                              299
+
+
+CONCLUSION.
+
+I. _The foundations of the creative imagination._
+
+  Why man is able to create: two principal
+  conditions.--"Creative spontaneity," which resolves itself
+  into needs, tendencies, desires.--Every imaginative creation
+  has a motor origin.--The spontaneous revival of images.--The
+  creative imagination reduced to three forms: outlined,
+  fixed, objectified. Their peculiar characteristics.          313
+
+II. _The imaginative type._
+
+  A view of the imaginative life in all its stages.--Reduction
+  to a psychologic law.--Four stages characterized: 1, by the
+  _quantity_ of images; 2, by their _quantity and intensity_;
+  3, by quantity, intensity and duration; 4, by the complete
+  and permanent systematization of the imaginary
+  life.--Summary.                                              320
+
+
+APPENDICES.
+
+
+OBSERVATIONS AND DOCUMENTS.
+
+  A. The various forms of inspiration.                         335
+
+  B. On the nature of the unconscious factor. Two
+  categories--static unconscious, dynamic
+  unconscious.--Theories as to the nature of the
+  unconscious.--Objections, criticisms.                        338
+
+  C. Cosmic and human imagination.                             346
+
+  D. Evidence in regard to musical imagination.                350
+
+  E. The imaginative type and association of ideas.            353
+
+
+
+
+INTRODUCTION
+
+
+
+
+INTRODUCTION
+
+THE MOTOR NATURE OF THE CONSTRUCTIVE IMAGINATION
+
+I
+
+
+It has been often repeated that one of the principal conquests of
+contemporary psychology is the fact that it has firmly established the
+place and importance of movements; that it has especially through
+observation and experiment shown the representation of a movement to be
+a movement begun, a movement in the nascent state. Yet those who have
+most strenuously insisted on this proposition have hardly gone beyond
+the realm of the passive imagination; they have clung to facts of pure
+reproduction. My aim is to extend their formula, and to show that it
+explains, in large measure at least, the origin of the creative
+imagination.
+
+Let us follow step by step the passage from reproduction pure and simple
+to the creative stage, showing therein the persistence and preponderance
+of the motor element in proportion as we rise from mere repetition to
+invention.
+
+First of all, do all representations include motor elements? Yes, I
+say, because every perception presupposes movements to some extent, and
+representations are the remnants of past perceptions. Certain it is
+that, without our examining the question in detail, this statement holds
+good for the great majority of cases. So far as visual and tactile
+images are concerned there is no possible doubt as to the importance of
+the motor elements that enter into their composition. The eye is very
+poorly endowed with movements for its office as a higher sense-organ;
+but if we take into account its intimate connection with the vocal
+organs, so rich in capacity for motor combinations, we note a kind of
+compensation. Smell and taste, secondary in human psychology, rise to a
+very high rank indeed among many animals, and the olfactory apparatus
+thus obtains with them a complexity of movements proportionate to its
+importance, and one that at times approaches that of sight. There yet
+remains the group of internal sensations that might cause discussion.
+Setting aside the fact that the vague impressions bound up with chemical
+changes within the tissues are scarcely factors in representation, we
+find that the sensations resulting from changes in respiration,
+circulation, and digestion are not lacking in motor elements. The mere
+fact that, in some persons, vomiting, hiccoughs, micturition, etc., can
+be caused by perceptions of sight or of hearing proves that
+representations of this character have a tendency to become translated
+into acts.
+
+Without emphasizing the matter we may, then, say that this thesis rests
+on a weighty mass of facts; that the motor element of the image tends to
+cause it to lose its purely "inner" character, to objectify it, to
+externalize it, to project it outside of ourselves.
+
+It should, however, be noted that what has just been said does not take
+us beyond the reproductive imagination--beyond memory. All these revived
+images are _repetitions_; but the creative imagination requires
+something _new_--this is its peculiar and essential mark. In order to
+grasp the transition from reproduction to production, from repetition to
+creation, it is necessary to consider other, more rare, and more
+extraordinary facts, found only among some favored beings. These facts,
+known for a long time, surrounded with some mystery, and attributed in a
+vague manner "to the power of the imagination," have been studied in our
+own day with much more system and exactness. For our purpose we need to
+recall only a few of them.
+
+Many instances have been reported of tingling or of pains that may
+appear in different parts of the body solely through the effect of the
+imagination. Certain people can increase or inhibit the beating of their
+hearts at will, i.e., by means of an intense and persistent
+representation. The renowned physiologist, E. F. Weber, possessed this
+power, and has described the mechanism of the phenomenon. Still more
+remarkable are the cases of vesication produced in hypnotized subjects
+by means of suggestion. Finally, let us recall the persistent story of
+the stigmatized individuals, who, from the thirteenth century down to
+our own day, have been quite numerous and present some interesting
+varieties--some having only the mark of the crucifix, others of the
+scourging, or of the crown of thorns.[1] Let us add the profound changes
+of the organism, results of the suggestive therapeutics of
+contemporaries; the wonderful effects of the "faith cure," i.e., the
+miracles of all religions in all times and in all places; and this brief
+list will suffice to recall certain creative activities of the human
+imagination that we have a tendency to forget.
+
+It is proper to add that the image acts not altogether in a positive
+manner. Sometimes it has an inhibitory power. A vivid representation of
+a movement arrested is the beginning of the stoppage of that movement;
+it may even end in complete arrest of the movement. Such are the cases
+of "paralysis by ideas" first described by Reynolds, and later by
+Charcot and his school under the name of "psychic paralysis." The
+patient's inward conviction that he cannot move a limb renders him
+powerless for any movement, and he recovers his motor power only when
+the morbid representation has disappeared.
+
+These and similar facts suggest a few remarks.
+
+First, that we have here creation in the strict sense of the word,
+though it be limited to the organism. What appears is _new_. Though one
+may strictly maintain that from our own experience we have a knowledge
+of formication, rapid and slow beating of the heart, even though we may
+not be able ordinarily to produce them at will, this position is
+absolutely untenable when we consider cases of vesication, stigmata, and
+other alleged miraculous phenomena: _these are without precedent in the
+life of the individual_.
+
+Second, in order that these unusual states may occur, there are required
+additional elements in the producing mechanism. At bottom this mechanism
+is very obscure. To invoke "the power of the imagination" is merely to
+substitute a word where an explanation is needed. Fortunately, we do not
+need to penetrate into the inmost part of this mystery. It is enough for
+us to make sure of the facts, to prove that they have a representation
+as the starting point, and to show that the representation by itself is
+not enough. What more then is needed? Let us note first of all that
+these occurrences are rare. It is not within the power of everybody to
+acquire stigmata or to become cured of a paralysis pronounced incurable.
+This happens only to those having an ardent faith, a strong desire _that
+it shall come to pass_. This is an indispensable psychic condition. What
+is concerned in such a case is not a single state, but a double one: an
+image followed by a particular emotional state (desire, aversion, etc.).
+In other words, there are two conditions: In the first are concerned the
+motor elements included in the image, the remains of previous
+perceptions; in the second, there are concerned the foregoing, _plus_
+affective states, tendencies that sum up the individual's energy. It is
+the latter fact that explains their power.
+
+To conclude: This group of facts shows us the existence, beyond images,
+of another factor, instinctive or emotional in form, which we shall have
+to study later and which will lead us to the ultimate source of the
+creative imagination.
+
+I fear that the distance between the facts here given and the creative
+imagination proper will seem to the reader very great indeed. And why
+so? First, because the creative activity here has as its only material
+the organism, and is not separated from the creator. Then, too, because
+these facts are extremely simple, and the creative imagination, in the
+ordinary sense, is extremely complex; here there is one operating cause,
+a single representation more or less complex, while in imaginative
+creation we have several co-operating images with combinations,
+coördination, arrangement, grouping. But it must not be forgotten that
+our present aim is simply to find _a transition stage_[2] between
+reproduction and production; to show the common origin of the two forms
+of imagination--the purely representative faculty and the faculty of
+creating by means of the intermediation of images;--and to show at the
+same time the work of separation, of severance between the two.
+
+
+II
+
+Since the chief aim of this study is to prove that the basis of
+invention must be sought in motor manifestations, I shall not hesitate
+to dwell on it, and I take the subject up again under another, clearer,
+more precise, and more psychological form, in putting the following
+question: Which one among the various modes of mind-activity offers the
+closest analogy to the creative imagination? I unhesitatingly answer,
+_voluntary activity_: Imagination, in the intellectual order, is the
+equivalent of will in the realm of movements. Let us justify this
+comparison by some proof.
+
+1. Likeness of development in the two instances. Growth of voluntary
+control is progressive, slow, crossed and checked. The individual has to
+become master of his muscles and by their agency extend his sway over
+other things. Reflexes, instinctive movements, and movements expressive
+of emotion constitute the primary material of voluntary movements. The
+will has no movements of its own as an inheritance: it must coördinate
+and associate, since it separates in order to form new associations. It
+reigns by right of conquest, not by right of birth. In like manner, the
+creative imagination does not rise completely armed. Its raw materials
+are images, which here correspond to muscular movements. It goes through
+a period of trial. It always is, at the start (for reasons indicated
+later on), an imitation; it attains its complex forms only through a
+process of growth.
+
+2. But this first comparison does not go to the bottom of the matter;
+there are yet deeper analogies. First, the completely subjective
+character of both instances. The imagination is subjective, personal,
+anthropocentric; its movement is from within outwards toward an
+objectification. The understanding, i.e., the intellect in the
+restricted sense, has opposite characteristics--it is objective,
+impersonal, receives from outside. For the creative imagination the
+inner world is the regulator; there is a preponderance of the inner over
+the outer. For the understanding, the outside world is the regulator;
+there is a preponderance of the outer over the inner. The world of my
+imagination is _my_ world as opposed to the world of my understanding,
+which is the world of all my fellow creatures. On the other hand, as
+regards the will, we might repeat exactly, word for word, what we have
+just said of the imagination. This is unnecessary. Back of both, then,
+we have our true cause, whatever may be our opinion concerning the
+ultimate nature of causation and of will.
+
+3. Both imagination and will have a teleological character, and act only
+with a view toward an end, being thus the opposite of the understanding,
+which, as such, limits itself to proof. We are always wanting something,
+be it worthless or important. We are always inventing for an
+end--whether in the case of a Napoleon imagining a plan of campaign, or
+a cook making up a new dish. In both instances there is now a simple end
+attained by immediate means, now a complex and distant goal
+presupposing subordinate ends which are means in relation to the final
+end. In both cases there is a _vis a tergo_ designated by the vague term
+"spontaneity," which we shall attempt to make clear later, and a _vis a
+fronte_, an attracting movement.
+
+4. Added to this analogy as regards their nature, there are other,
+secondary likenesses between the abortive forms of the creative
+imagination and the impotent forms of the will. In its normal and
+complete form will culminates in an act; but with wavering characters
+and sufferers from abulia deliberation never ends, or the resolution
+remains inert, incapable of realization, of asserting itself in
+practice. The creative imagination also, in its complete form, has a
+tendency to become objectified, to assert itself in a work that shall
+exist not only for the creator but for everybody. On the contrary, with
+dreamers pure and simple, the imagination remains a vaguely sketched
+inner affair; it is not embodied in any esthetic or practical invention.
+Revery is the equivalent of weak desires; dreamers are the abulics of
+the creative imagination.
+
+It is unnecessary to add that the similarity established here between
+the will and the imagination is only partial and has as its aim only to
+bring to light the rôle of the motor elements. Surely no one will
+confuse two aspects of our psychic life that are so distinct, and it
+would be foolish to delay in order to enumerate the differences. The
+characteristic of novelty should by itself suffice, since it is the
+special and indispensable mark of invention, and for volition is only
+accessory: The extraction of a tooth requires of the patient as much
+effort the second time as the first, although it is no longer a novelty.
+
+After these preliminary remarks we must go on to the analysis of the
+creative imagination, in order to understand its nature in so far as
+that is accessible with our existing means. It is, indeed, a tertiary
+formation in mental life, if we assume a primary layer (sensations and
+simple emotions), and a secondary (images and their associations,
+certain elementary logical operations, etc.). Being composite, it may be
+decomposed into its constituent elements, which we shall study under
+these three headings, viz., the intellectual factor, the affective or
+emotional factor, and the unconscious factor. But that is not enough;
+the analysis should be completed by a synthesis. All imaginative
+creation, great or small, is organic, requires a unifying principle:
+there is then also a synthetic factor, which it will be necessary to
+determine.
+
+FOOTNOTES:
+
+[1] A. Maury, in his book _L'Astronomie et la Magie_, enumerates
+fifty cases.
+
+[2] There are still others, as we shall see later on.
+
+
+
+
+PART ONE
+
+ANALYSIS OF THE IMAGINATION
+
+
+
+
+CHAPTER I
+
+THE INTELLECTUAL FACTOR.
+
+I
+
+
+Considered under its intellectual aspect, that is, in so far as it
+borrows its elements from the understanding, the imagination presupposes
+two fundamental operations--the one, negative and preparatory,
+dissociation; the other, positive and constitutive, association.
+
+Dissociation is the "abstraction" of the older psychologists, who well
+understood its importance for the subject with which we are now
+concerned. Nevertheless, the term "dissociation" seems to me preferable,
+because it is more comprehensive. It designates a genus of which the
+other is a species. It is a spontaneous operation and of a more radical
+nature than the other. Abstraction, strictly so-called, acts only on
+isolated states of consciousness; dissociation acts, further, on series
+of states of consciousness, which it sorts out, breaks up, dissolves,
+and through this preparatory work makes suitable for entering into new
+combinations.
+
+Perception is a synthetic process, but dissociation (or abstraction) is
+already present in embryo in perception, just because the latter is a
+complex state. Everyone perceives after an individual fashion, according
+to his constitution and the impression of the moment. A painter, a
+sportsman, a dealer, and an uninterested spectator do not see a given
+horse in the same manner: the qualities that interest one are unnoticed
+by another.[3]
+
+The image being a simplification of sensory data, and its nature
+dependent on that of previous perceptions, it is inevitable that the
+work of dissociation should go on in it. But this is far too mild a
+statement. Observation and experiment show us that in the majority of
+cases the process grows wonderfully. In order to follow the progressive
+development of this dissolution, we may roughly differentiate images
+into three categories--complete, incomplete, and schematic--and study
+them in order.
+
+The group of images here termed _complete_ comprises first, objects
+repeatedly presented in daily experience--my wife's face, my inkstand,
+the sound of a church bell or of a neighboring clock, etc. In this class
+are also included the images of things that we have perceived but a few
+times, but which, for additional reasons, have remained clean-cut in our
+memory. Are these images complete, in the strict sense of the word? They
+cannot be; and the contrary belief is a delusion of consciousness that,
+however, disappears when one confronts it with the reality. The mental
+image can contain all the qualities of an object in even less degree
+than the perception; the image is the result of selection, varying with
+every case. The painter Fromentin, who was proud that he found after two
+or three years "an exact recollection" of things he had barely noticed
+on a journey, makes elsewhere, however, the following confession: "My
+memory of things, although very faithful, has never the certainty
+admissible as documentary evidence. The weaker it grows, the more is it
+changed in becoming the property of my memory and the more valuable is
+it for the work that I intend for it. In proportion as the exact form
+becomes altered, another form, partly real, partly imaginary, which I
+believe preferable, takes its place." Note that the person speaking thus
+is a painter endowed with an unusual visual memory; but recent
+investigations have shown that among men generally the so-called
+complete and exact images undergo change and warping. One sees the truth
+of this statement when, after a lapse of some time, one is placed in the
+presence of the original object, so that comparison between the real
+object and its image becomes possible.[4] Let us note that in this group
+_the image always corresponds to certain individual objects_; it is not
+the same with the other two groups.
+
+The group of _incomplete_ images, according to the testimony of
+consciousness itself, comes from two distinct sources--first, from
+perceptions insufficiently or ill-fixed; and again, from impressions of
+like objects which, when too often repeated, end by becoming confused.
+The latter case has been well described by Taine. A man, says he, who,
+having gone through an avenue of poplars wants to picture a poplar; or,
+having looked into a poultry-yard, wishes to call up a picture of a hen,
+experiences a difficulty--his different memories rise up. The experiment
+becomes a cause of effacement; the images canceling one another decline
+to a state of imperceptible tendencies which their likeness and
+unlikeness prevent from predominating. Images become blunted by their
+collision just as do bodies by friction.[5]
+
+This group leads us to that of _schematic_ images, or those entirely
+without mark--the indefinite image of a rosebush, of a pin, of a
+cigarette, etc. This is the greatest degree of impoverishment; the
+image, deprived little by little of its own characteristics, is nothing
+more than a shadow. It has become that transitional form between image
+and pure concept that we now term "generic image," or one that at least
+resembles the latter.
+
+The image, then, is subject to an unending process of change, of
+suppression and addition, of dissociation and corrosion. This means
+that it is not a dead thing; it is not at all like a photographic plate
+with which one may reproduce copies indefinitely. Being dependent on the
+state of the brain, the image undergoes change like all living
+substance,--it is subject to gains and losses, especially losses. But
+each of the foregoing three classes has its use for the inventor. They
+serve as material for different kinds of imagination--in their concrete
+form, for the mechanic and the artist; in their schematic form, for the
+scientist and for others.
+
+Thus far we have seen only a part of the work of dissociation and,
+taking it all in all, the smallest part. We have, seemingly, considered
+images as isolated facts, as psychic atoms; but that is a purely
+theoretic position. Images are not solitary in actual life; they form
+part of a chain, or rather of a woof or net, since, by reason of their
+manifold relations they may radiate in all directions, through all the
+senses. Dissociation, then, works also upon _series_, cuts them up,
+mangles them, breaks them, and reduces them to ruins.
+
+The ideal law of the recurrence of images is that known since Hamilton's
+time under the name of "law of redintegration,"[6] which consists in the
+passing from a part to the whole, each element tending to reproduce the
+complete state, each member of a series the whole of that series. If
+this law existed alone, invention would be forever forbidden to us; we
+could not emerge from repetition; we should be condemned to monotony.
+But there is an opposite power that frees us--it is dissociation.
+
+It is very strange that, while psychologists have for so long a time
+studied the laws of association, no one has investigated whether the
+inverse process, dissociation, also has not laws of its own. We can not
+here attempt such a task, which would be outside of our province; it
+will suffice to indicate in passing two general conditions determining
+the association of series.
+
+First, there are the internal or subjective causes. The revived image of
+a face, a monument, a landscape, an occurrence, is, most often, only
+partial. It depends on various conditions that revive the essential part
+and drop the minor details, and this "essential" which survives
+dissociation depends on subjective causes, the principal ones of which
+are at first practical, utilitarian reasons. It is the tendency already
+mentioned to ignore what is of no value, to exclude that from
+consciousness. Helmholtz has shown that in the act of seeing, various
+details remain unnoticed because they are immaterial in the concerns of
+life; and there are many other like instances. Then, too, emotional
+reasons governing the attention orientate it exclusively in one
+direction--these will be studied in the course of this work. Lastly,
+there are logical or intellectual reasons, if we understand by this term
+the law of mental inertia or the law of least resistance by means of
+which the mind tends toward the simplification and lightening of its
+labor.
+
+Secondly, there are external or objective causes which are variations in
+experience. When two or more qualities or events are given as constantly
+associated in experience we do not dissociate them. The uniformity of
+nature's laws is the great opponent of dissociation. Many truths (for
+example, the existence of the antipodes) are established with
+difficulty, because it is necessary to break up closely knit
+associations. The oriental king whom Sully mentions, who had never seen
+ice, refused to credit the existence of solid water. A total impression,
+the elements of which had never been given us separately in experience,
+would be unanalyzable. If all cold objects were moist, and all moist
+objects cold; if all liquids were transparent and all non-liquids
+opaque, we should find it difficult to distinguish cold from moisture
+and liquidity from transparency. On his part, James adds further that
+what has been associated sometimes with one thing and sometimes with
+another tends to become dissociated from both. This might be called a
+law of association by concomitant variations.[7]
+
+In order to thoroughly comprehend the absolute necessity for
+dissociation, let us note that total redintegration is _per se_ a
+hindrance to creation. Examples are given of people who can easily
+remember twenty or thirty pages of a book, but if they want a particular
+passage they are unable to pick it out--they must begin at the beginning
+and continue down to the required place. Excessive ease of retention
+thus becomes a serious inconvenience. Besides these rare cases, we know
+that ignorant people, those intellectually limited, give the same
+invariable story of every occurrence, in which all the parts--the
+important and the accessory, the useful and the useless--are on a dead
+level. They omit no detail, they cannot select. Minds of this kind are
+inapt at invention. In short, we may say that there are two kinds of
+memory: one is completely systematized, e.g., habits, routine, poetry
+or prose learned by heart, faultless musical rendering, etc. The
+acquisition forms a compact whole and cannot enter into new
+combinations. The other is not systematized; it is composed of small,
+more or less coherent groups. This kind of memory is plastic and capable
+of becoming combined in new ways.
+
+We have enumerated the spontaneous, natural causes of association,
+omitting the voluntary and artificial causes, which are but their
+imitations. As a result of these various causes, images are taken to
+pieces, shattered, broken up, but made all the readier as materials for
+the inventor. This is a process analogous to that which, in geologic
+time, produces new strata through the wearing away of old rocks.
+
+
+II
+
+Association is one of the big questions of psychology; but as it does
+not especially concern our subject, it will be discussed in strict
+proportion to its use here. Nothing is easier than limiting ourselves.
+Our task is reducible to a very clear and very brief question: What are
+the forms of association that give rise to new combinations and under
+what influences do they arise? All other forms of association, those
+that are only repetitions, should be eliminated. Consequently, this
+subject can not be treated in one single effort; it must be studied, in
+turn, in its relations to our three factors--intellectual, emotional,
+unconscious.
+
+It is generally admitted that the expression "association of ideas" is
+faulty.[8] It is not comprehensive enough, association being active also
+in psychic states other than ideas. It seems indicative rather of mere
+juxtaposition, whereas associated states modify one another by the very
+fact of their being connected. But, as it has been confirmed by long
+usage, it would be difficult to eliminate the phrase.
+
+On the other hand, psychologists are not at all agreed as regards the
+determination of the principal laws or forms of association. Without
+taking sides in the debate, I adopt the most generally accepted
+classification, the one most suitable for our subject--the one that
+reduces everything to the two fundamental laws of contiguity and
+resemblance. In recent years various attempts have been made to reduce
+these two laws to one, some reducing resemblance to contiguity; others,
+contiguity to resemblance. Putting aside the ground of this discussion,
+which seems to me very useless, and which perhaps is due to excessive
+zeal for unity, we must nevertheless recognize that this discussion is
+not without interest for the study of the creative imagination, because
+it has well shown that each of the two fundamental laws has a
+characteristic mechanism.
+
+Association by contiguity (or continuity), which Wundt calls external,
+is simple and homogeneous. It reproduces the order and connection of
+things; it reduces itself to habits contracted by our nervous system.
+
+Is association by resemblance, which Wundt calls internal, strictly
+speaking, an elementary law? Many doubt it. Without entering into the
+long and frequently confused discussions to which this subject has given
+rise, we may sum up their results as follows: In so-called association
+by resemblance it is necessary to distinguish three moments--(a) That of
+the presentation; a state _A_ is given in perception or
+association-by-contiguity, and forms the starting point. (b) That of the
+work of assimilation; _A_ is recognized as more or less like a state _a_
+previously experienced. (c) As a consequence of the coëxistence of _A_
+and _a_ in consciousness, they can later be recalled reciprocally,
+although the two original occurrences _A_ and _a_ have previously never
+existed together, and sometimes, indeed, may not possibly have existed
+together. It is evident that the crucial moment is the second, and that
+it consists of an act of active assimilation. Thus James maintains that
+"it is a relation that the mind perceives after the fact, just as it may
+perceive the relations of superiority, of distance, of causality, of
+container and content, of substance and accident, or of contrast between
+an object, and some second object which the associative machinery calls
+up."[9]
+
+Association by resemblance presupposes a joint labor of association and
+dissociation--it is an active form. Consequently it is the principal
+source of the material of the creative imagination, as the sequel of
+this work will sufficiently show.
+
+After this rather long but necessary preface, we come to the
+intellectual factor rightly so termed, which we have been little by
+little approaching. The essential, fundamental element of the creative
+imagination in the intellectual sphere is the capacity of thinking by
+analogy; that is, by partial and often accidental resemblance. By
+analogy we mean an imperfect kind of resemblance: like is a genus of
+which analogue is a species.
+
+Let us examine in some detail the mechanism of this mode of thought in
+order that we may understand how analogy is, by its very nature, an
+almost inexhaustible instrument of creation.
+
+1. Analogy may be based solely on the _number of attributes compared_.
+Let _a b c d e f_ and _r s t u d v_ be two beings or objects, each
+letter representing symbolically one of the constitutive attributes. It
+is evident that the analogy between the two is very weak, since there is
+only one common element, _d_. If the number of the elements common to
+both increases, the analogy will grow in the same proportion. But the
+agreement represented above is not infrequent among minds unused to a
+somewhat severe discipline. A child sees in the moon and stars a mother
+surrounded by her daughters. The aborigines of Australia called a book
+"mussel," merely because it opens and shuts like the valves of a
+shellfish.[10]
+
+2. Analogy may have for its basis the _quality_ or _value_ of the
+compound attributes. It rests on a variable element, which oscillates
+from the essential to the accidental, from the reality to the
+appearance. To the layman, the likeness between cetacians and fishes are
+great; to the scientist, slight. Here, again, numerous agreements are
+possible, provided one take no account either of their solidity or their
+frailty.
+
+3. Lastly, in minds without power, there occurs a semi-unconscious
+operation that we may call a transfer through the omission of the middle
+term. There is analogy between _a b c d e_ and _g h a i f_ through the
+common letter _a_; between _g h a i f_ and _x y f z q_ through the
+common letter _f_; and finally an analogy becomes established between _a
+b c d e_ and _x y f z q_ for no other reason than that of their common
+analogy with _g h a i f_. In the realm of the affective states,
+transfers of this sort are not at all rare.
+
+Analogy, an unstable process, undulating and multiform, gives rise to
+the most unforeseen and novel groupings. Through its pliability, which
+is almost unlimited, it produces in equal measure absurd comparisons and
+very original inventions.
+
+After these remarks on the mechanism of thinking by analogy, let us
+glance at the processes it employs in its creative work. The problem is,
+apparently, inextricable. Analogies are so numerous, so various, so
+arbitrary, that we may despair of finding any regularity whatever in
+creative work. Despite this it seems, however, reducible to two
+principal types or processes, which are personification, and
+transformation or metamorphosis.
+
+Personification is the earlier process. It is radical, always identical
+with itself, but transitory. It goes out from ourselves toward other
+things. It consists in attributing life to everything, in supposing in
+everything that shows signs of life--and even in inanimate
+objects--desires, passions, and acts of will analogous to ours, acting
+like ourselves in view of definite ends. This state of mind is
+incomprehensible to an adult civilized man; but it must be admitted,
+since there are facts without number that show its existence. We do not
+need to cite them--they are too well known. They fill the works of
+ethnologists, of travelers in savage lands, of books of mythology.
+Besides, all of us, at the commencement of our lives, during our
+earliest childhood, have passed through this inevitable stage of
+universal animism. Works on child-psychology abound in observations that
+leave no possible room for doubt on this point. The child endows
+everything with life, and he does so the more in proportion as he is
+more imaginative. But this stage, which among civilized people lasts
+only a brief period, remains in the primitive man a permanent
+disposition and one that is always active. This process of
+personification is the perennial fount whence have gushed the greater
+number of myths, an enormous mass of superstitions, and a large number
+of esthetic productions. To sum up in a word, all things that have been
+invented _ex analogia hominis_.
+
+Transformation or metamorphosis is a general, permanent process under
+many forms, proceeding not from the thinking subject towards objects,
+but from one object to another, from one thing to another. It consists
+of a transfer through partial resemblance. This operation rests on two
+fundamental bases--depending at one time on vague resemblances (a cloud
+becomes a mountain, or a mountain a fantastic animal; the sound of the
+wind a plaintive cry, etc.), or again, on a resemblance with a
+predominating emotional element: A perception provokes a feeling, and
+becomes the mark, sign, or plastic form thereof (the lion represents
+courage; the cat, artifice; the cypress, sorrow; and so on). All this,
+doubtless, is erroneous or arbitrary; but the function of the
+imagination is to invent, not to perceive. All know that this process
+creates metaphors, allegories, symbols; it should not, however, be
+believed on that account that it remains restricted to the realm of art
+or of the development of language. We meet it every moment in practical
+life, in mechanical, industrial, commercial, and scientific invention,
+and we shall, later, give a large number of examples in support of this
+statement.
+
+Let us note, briefly, that analogy, as an imperfect form of
+resemblance--as was said above, if we assume among the objects compared a
+totality of likenesses and differences in varying proportions--necessarily
+allows all degrees. At one end of the scale, the comparison is made
+between valueless or exaggerated likenesses. At the other end, analogy is
+restricted to exact resemblance; it approaches cognition, strictly so
+called; for example, in mechanical and scientific invention. Hence it is
+not at all surprising that the imagination is often a substitute for, and
+as Goethe expressed it, "a forerunner of," reason. Between the creative
+imagination and rational investigation there is a community of
+nature--both presuppose the ability of seizing upon likenesses. On the
+other hand, the predominance of the exact process establishes from the
+outset a difference between "thinkers" and imaginative dreamers
+("visionaries").[11]
+
+FOOTNOTES:
+
+[3] Cf. the well-known aphorism, "_Apperception ist alles_." (Tr.)
+
+[4] See especially J. Philippe, "La déformation et les
+transformations des images" in _Revue Philosophique_, May and
+November, 1897. Although these investigations had in view only
+visual representations, it is not at all doubtful that the results
+hold good for others, especially those of hearing (voice, song,
+harmony).
+
+[5] _On Intelligence_, Vol. I, Bk. ii, Chap. 2.
+
+[6] In his recent history of the theories of the imagination, _La
+psicologia dell' immaginazione, nella storia filosofia_ (Rome, 1898)
+Ambrosi shows that this law is found already formulated in the
+_Psychologia Empirica_ of Christian Wolff [d. 1754]: "_Perceptio
+præterita integra recurrit cujus præsens continet partem._"
+
+[7] Sully, _Human Mind_, I, p. 365; James, _Psychology_, I, p. 502.
+
+[8] For a good criticism of the term, consult Titchener, _Outlines
+of Psychology_ (New York, 1896), p. 190.
+
+[9] For the discussions on the reduction to a unity, a detailed
+bibliography will be found in Jodl, _Lehrbuch der Psychologie_
+(Stuttgart, 1896), p. 490. On the comparison of the two laws, James,
+_op. cit._, I, 590; Sully, _op. cit._, I, 331 ff; Höffding,
+_Psychologie_, 213 ff. (Eng. ed. _Outlines of Psychology_, pp. 152
+ff.).
+
+[10] Note here a characteristically naïve working of the primitive
+intellect in explaining the unknown in terms of the known. Cf. Part
+II, Chap. iii, below. (Tr.)
+
+[11] It is yet, and will probably long remain, an open question
+whether we can draw any clear distinction between the two kinds of
+mind here discussed. The author is careful to base his distinction
+on the "predominance" of the "rational" or of the "imaginative"
+process. So-called "thinkers," who _do_ nothing, can not, certainly,
+be ranked with the persons of great intellectual attainment through
+whose efforts the progress of the world is made; on the other hand,
+the author seeks to make _results_ or accomplishments the crucial
+test of true imagination (see Introduction).
+
+As regards the relative value or rank of the two bents of mind there
+has ever been, and probably forever will be, great difference of
+opinion. Even in this intensely "practical" age there is an
+undercurrent of feeling that the narrowly "practical" individual is
+not the final ideal, and the innermost conviction of many is the
+same as that of the poet who declares that "a dreamer lives forever,
+but a thinker dies in a day." (Tr.)
+
+
+
+
+CHAPTER II
+
+THE EMOTIONAL FACTOR.
+
+
+The influence of emotional states on the working of the imagination is a
+matter of current observation. But it has been studied chiefly by
+moralists, who most often have criticised or condemned it as an endless
+cause of mistakes. The point of view of the psychologist is altogether
+different. He does not need at all to investigate whether emotions and
+passions give rise to mental phantoms--which is an indisputable
+fact--but _why_ and _how_ they arise. For, the emotional factor yields
+in importance to no other; it is the ferment without which no creation
+is possible. Let us study it in its principal forms, although we may not
+be able at this moment to exhaust the topic.
+
+
+I
+
+It is necessary to show at the outset that the influence of the
+emotional life is unlimited, that it penetrates the entire field of
+invention with no restriction whatever; that this is not a gratuitous
+assertion, but is, on the contrary, strictly justified by facts, and
+that we are right in maintaining the following two propositions:
+
+1. _All forms of the creative imagination imply elements of feeling._
+
+This statement has been challenged by authoritative psychologists, who
+hold that "emotion is added to imagination in its esthetic aspect, not
+in its mechanical and intellectual form." This is an error of fact
+resulting from the confusion, or from the imperfect analysis, of two
+distinct cases. In the case of non-esthetic creation, the rôle of the
+emotional life is simple; in esthetic creation, the rôle of emotional
+element is double.
+
+Let us consider invention, first, in its most general form. The
+emotional element is the primal, original factor; for all invention
+presupposes a want, a craving, a tendency, an unsatisfied impulse, often
+even a state of gestation full of discomfort. Moreover, it is
+concomitant, that is, under its form of pleasure or of pain, of hope, of
+spite, of anger, etc., it accompanies all the phases or turns of
+creation. The creator may, haphazard, go through the most diverse forms
+of exaltation and depression; may feel in turn the dejection of repulse
+and the joy of success; finally the satisfaction of being freed from a
+heavy burden. I challenge anyone to produce a solitary example of
+invention wrought out _in abstracto_, and free from any factors of
+feeling. Human nature does not allow such a miracle.
+
+Now, let us take up the special case of esthetic creation, and of forms
+approaching thereto. Here again we find the original emotional element
+as at first motor, then attached to various aspects of creation, as an
+accompaniment. But, _in addition, affective states become material for
+the creative activity_. It is a well-known fact, almost a rule, that the
+poet, the novelist, the dramatist, and the musician--often, indeed, even
+the sculptor and the painter--experience the thoughts and feeling of
+their characters, become identified with them. There are, then, in this
+second instance, two currents of feeling--the one, constituting emotion
+as material for art, the other, drawing out creative activity and
+developing along with it.
+
+The difference between the two cases that we have distinguished consists
+in this and nothing more than this. The existence of an emotion-content
+belonging to esthetic production changes in no way the psychologic
+mechanism of invention generally. Its absence in other forms of
+imagination does not at all prevent the necessary existence of affective
+elements everywhere and always.
+
+2. _All emotional dispositions whatever may influence the creative
+imagination._
+
+Here, again, I find opponents, notably Oelzelt-Newin, in his short and
+substantial monograph on the imagination.[12] Adopting the twofold
+division of emotions as sthenic and asthenic, or exciting and
+depressing, he attributes to the first the exclusive privilege of
+influencing creative activity; but though the author limits his study
+exclusively to the esthetic imagination, his thesis, even understood
+thus, is untenable. The facts contradict it completely, and it is easy
+to demonstrate that all forms of emotion, without exception, act as
+leaven for imagination.
+
+No one will deny that fear is the type of asthenic manifestations. Yet
+is it not the mother of phantoms, of numberless superstitions, of
+altogether irrational and chimerical religious practices?
+
+Anger, in its exalted, violent form, is rather an agent of destruction,
+which seems to contradict my thesis; but let us pass over the storm,
+which is always of short duration, and we find in its place milder
+intellectualized forms, which are various modifications of primitive
+fury, passing from the acute to the chronic state: envy, jealousy,
+enmity, premeditated vengeance, and so forth. Are not these dispositions
+of the mind fertile in artifices, stratagems, inventions of all kinds?
+To keep even to esthetic creation, is it necessary to recall the saying
+_facit indignatio versum_?
+
+It is not necessary to demonstrate the fecundity of joy. As for love,
+everyone knows that its work consists of creating an imaginary being,
+which is substituted for the beloved object; then, when the passion has
+vanished, the disenchanted lover finds himself face to face with the
+bare reality.
+
+Sorrow rightly belongs in the category of depressing emotions, and yet,
+it has as great influence on invention as any other emotion. Do we not
+know that melancholy and even profound sorrow has furnished poets,
+musicians, painters, and sculptors with their most beautiful
+inspirations? Is there not an art frankly and deliberately pessimistic?
+And this influence is not at all limited to esthetic creation. Dare we
+hold that hypochondria and insanity following upon the delirium of
+persecution are devoid of imagination? Their morbid character is, on the
+contrary, the well whence strange inventions incessantly bubble.
+
+Lastly, that complex emotion termed "self-feeling," which reduces itself
+finally to the pleasure of asserting our power and of feeling its
+expansion, or to the pitiable feeling of our shackled, enfeebled power,
+leads us directly to the motor elements that are the fundamental
+conditions of invention. Above all, in this personal feeling, there is
+the satisfaction of being a causal factor, i.e., a creator, and every
+creator has a consciousness of his superiority over non-creators.
+However petty his invention, it confers upon him a superiority over
+those who have invented nothing. Although we have been surfeited with
+the repeated statement that the characteristic mark of esthetic creation
+is "being disinterested," it must be recognized, as Groos has so truly
+remarked,[13] that the artist does not create out of the simple pleasure
+of creating, but in order that he may behold a mastery over other
+minds.[14] Production is the natural extension of "self-feeling," and
+the accompanying pleasure is the pleasure of conquest.
+
+Thus, on condition that we extend "imagination" to its full sense,
+without limiting it unduly to esthetics, there is, among the many forms
+of the emotional life, not one that may not stimulate invention. It
+remains to see this emotional factor at work,--to note how it can give
+rise to new combinations; and this brings us to the association of
+ideas.
+
+
+II
+
+We have said above that the ideal and theoretic law of the recurrence of
+images is that of "total redintegration," as e.g., recalling all the
+incidents of a long voyage in chronological order, with neither
+additions nor omissions. But this formula expresses what ought to be,
+not what actually occurs. It supposes man reduced to a state of pure
+intelligence, and sheltered from all disturbing influences. It suits the
+completely systematized forms of memory, hardened into routine and
+habit; but, outside of these cases, it remains an abstract concept.
+
+To this law of ideal value, there is opposed the real and practical law
+that actually obtains in the revival of images. It is rightly styled the
+"law of interest" or the affective law, and may be stated thus: In every
+past event the interesting parts alone revive, or with more intensity
+than the others. "Interesting" here means _what affects us in some way
+under a pleasing or painful form_. Let us note that the importance of
+this fact has been pointed out not by the associationists (a fact
+especially worth remembering) but by less systematic writers, strangers
+to that school,--Coleridge, Shadworth Hodgson, and before them,
+Schopenhauer. William James calls it the "ordinary or mixed
+association."[15] The "law of interest" doubtless is less exact than the
+intellectual laws of contiguity and resemblance. Nevertheless, it seems
+to penetrate all the more in later reasoning. If, indeed, in the problem
+of association we distinguish these three things--facts, laws,
+causes--the practical law brings us near to causes.
+
+Whatever the truth may be in this matter, the emotional factor brings
+about new combinations by several processes.
+
+There are the ordinary, simple cases, with a natural, emotional
+foundation, depending on momentary dispositions. They exist because of
+the fact that representations that have been accompanied by the same
+emotional state tend later to become associated: the emotional
+resemblance reunites and links disparate images. This differs from
+association by contiguity, which is a repetition of experience, and from
+association by resemblance in the intellectual sense. The states of
+consciousness become combined, not because they have been previously
+given together, not because we perceive the agreement of resemblance
+between them, but because they have a common _emotional_ note. Joy,
+sorrow, love, hatred, admiration, ennui, pride, fatigue, etc., may
+become a center of attraction that groups images or events having
+otherwise no rational relations between them, but having the same
+emotional stamp,--joyous, melancholy, erotic, etc. This form of
+association is very frequent in dreams and reveries, i.e., in a state
+of mind in which the imagination enjoys complete freedom and works
+haphazard. We easily see that this influence, active or latent, of the
+emotional factor, must cause entirely unexpected grouping to arise, and
+offers an almost unlimited field for novel combinations, the number of
+images having a common emotional factor being very great.
+
+There are unusual and remarkable cases with an exceptional emotional
+base. Of such is "colored hearing." We know that several hypotheses have
+been offered in regard to the origin of this phenomenon.
+Embryologically, it would seem to be the result of an incomplete
+separation between the sense of sight and that of hearing, and the
+survival, it is said, from a distant period of humanity, when this state
+must have been the rule; anatomically, the result of supposed
+anastamoses between the cerebral centers for visual and auditory
+sensations; physiologically, the result of nervous irradiation;
+psychologically, the result of association. This latter hypothesis seems
+to account for the greater number of instances, if not for all; but, as
+Flournoy has observed, it is a matter of "affective" imagination. Two
+sensations absolutely unlike (for instance, the color blue and the
+sound _i_) may resemble one another through the equal retentive quality
+that they possess in the organism of some favored individuals, and this
+emotional factor becomes a bond of association. Observe that this
+hypothesis explains also the much more unusual cases of "colored" smell,
+taste, and pain; that is, an abnormal association between given colors
+and tastes, smells, or pains.
+
+Although we meet them only as exceptional cases, these modes of
+association are susceptible to analysis, and seem clear, almost
+self-evident, if we compare them with other, subtle, refined, barely
+perceptible cases, the origin of which is a subject for supposition, for
+guessing rather than for clear comprehension. It is, moreover, a sort of
+imagination belonging to very few people: certain artists and some
+eccentric or unbalanced minds, scarcely ever found outside the esthetic
+or practical life. I wish to speak of the forms of invention that permit
+only fantastic conceptions, of a strangeness pushed to the extreme
+(Hoffman, Poe, Baudelaire, Goya, Wiertz, etc.), or surprising,
+extraordinary thoughts, known of no other men (the symbolists and
+decadents that flourish at the present time in various countries of
+Europe and America, who believe, rightly or wrongly, that they are
+preparing the esthetics of the future). It must be here admitted that
+there exists an altogether special manner of _feeling_, dependent on
+temperament at first, which many cultivate and refine as though it were
+a precious rarity. There lies the true source of their invention.
+Doubtless, to assert this pertinently, it would be necessary to
+establish the direct relations between their physical and psychical
+constitution and that of their work; to note even the particular states
+at the moment of the creative act. To me at least, it seems evident that
+the novelty, the strangeness of combinations, through its deep
+subjective character, indicates an emotional rather than an intellectual
+origin. Let us merely add that these abnormal manifestations of the
+creative imagination belong to the province of pathology rather than to
+that of psychology.
+
+Association by contrast is, from its very nature, vague, arbitrary,
+indeterminate. It rests, in truth, on an essentially subjective and
+fleeting conception, that of contrariety, which it is almost impossible
+to delimit scientifically; for, most often, contraries exist only by and
+for us. We know that this form of association is not primary and
+irreducible. It is brought down by some to contiguity, by most others to
+resemblance. These two views do not seem to me irreconcilable. In
+association by contrast we may distinguish two layers,--the one,
+superficial, consists of contiguity: all of us have in memory associated
+couples, such as large-small, rich-poor, high-low, right-left, etc.,
+which result from repetition and habit; the other, deep, is resemblance;
+_contrast exists only where a common measure between two terms is
+possible_. As Wundt remarks, a wedding may be compared to a burial (the
+union and separation of a couple), but not to a toothache. There is
+contrast between two colors, contrast between sounds, but not between a
+sound and a color, at least in that there may not be a common basis to
+which we may relate them, as in the previously given instances of
+"colored" sound. In association by contrast, there are conscious
+elements opposed to one another, and below, an unconscious element,
+resemblance,--not clearly and logically perceived, but felt--that evokes
+and relates the conscious elements.
+
+Whether this explanation be right or not, let us remark that association
+by contrast could not be left out, because its mechanism, full of
+unforeseen possibilities, lends itself easily to novel relations.
+Otherwise, I do not at all claim that it is entirely dependent upon the
+emotional factor. But, as Höffding observes,[16] the special property of
+the emotional life is moving among contraries; it is altogether
+determined by the great opposition between pleasure and pain. Thus, the
+effects of contrasts are much stronger than in the realm of sensation.
+This form of association predominates in esthetic and mythic creation,
+that is to say, in creation of the free fancy; it becomes dimmed in the
+precise forms of practical, mechanical, and scientific invention.
+
+
+III
+
+Hitherto we have considered the emotional factor under a single aspect
+only--the purely emotional--that which is manifested in consciousness
+under an agreeable or disagreeable or mixed form. But thoughts,
+feelings, and emotions include elements that are deeper--motor, i.e.,
+impulsive or inhibitory--which we may neglect the less since it is in
+movements that we seek the origin of the creative imagination. This
+motor element is what current speech and often even psychological
+treatises designate under the terms "creative instinct," "inventive
+instinct;" what we express in another form when we say that creators are
+guided by instinct and "are pushed like animals toward the
+accomplishment of certain acts."
+
+If I mistake not, this indicates that the "creative instinct" exists in
+all men to some extent--feeble in some, perceptible in others, brilliant
+in the great inventors.
+
+For I do not hesitate to maintain that the creative instinct, taken in
+this strict meaning, compared to animal instinct, is a mere figure of
+speech, an "entity" regarded as a reality, an abstraction. There are
+needs, appetites, tendencies, desires, common to all men, which, in a
+given individual at a given moment can result in a creative act; but
+there is no special psychic manifestation that may be the "creative
+instinct." What, indeed, could it be? Every instinct has its own
+particular end:--hunger, thirst, sex, the specific instincts of the bee,
+ant, beaver, consist of a group of movements adapted for a determinate
+end that is always the same. Now, what would be a creative instinct _in
+general_ which, by hypothesis, could produce in turn an opera, a
+machine, a metaphysical theory, a system of finance, a plan of military
+campaign, and so forth? It is a pure fancy. Inventive genius has not _a_
+source, but _sources_.
+
+Let us consider from our present viewpoint the human duality, the _homo
+duplex_:
+
+Suppose man reduced to a state of pure intelligence, that is, capable of
+perceiving, remembering, associating, dissociating, reasoning, and
+nothing else. All creative activity is then impossible, because there is
+nothing to solicit it.
+
+Suppose, again, man reduced to organic manifestations; he is then no
+more than a bundle of wants, appetites, instincts,--that is, of motor
+activities, blind forces that, lacking a sufficient cerebral organ, will
+produce nothing.
+
+The coöperation of both these factors is indispensable: without the
+first, nothing begins; without the second, nothing results. I hold that
+it is in needs that we must seek for the primary cause of all
+inventions; it is evident that the motor element alone is insufficient.
+If the needs are strong, energetic, they may determine a production, or,
+if the intellectual factor is insufficient, may spoil it. Many want to
+make discoveries but discover nothing. A want so common as hunger or
+thirst suggests to one some ingenious method of satisfying it; another
+remains entirely destitute.
+
+In short, in order that a creative act occur, there is required, first,
+a need; then, that it arouse a combination of images; and lastly, that
+it objectify and _realize_ itself in an appropriate form.
+
+We shall try later (in the Conclusion) to answer the question, _Why_ is
+one imaginative? In passing, let us put the opposite question, Why is
+one _not_ imaginative? One may possess in the mind an inexhaustible
+treasure of facts and images and yet produce nothing: great travelers,
+for example, who have seen and heard much, and who draw from their
+experiences only a few colorless anecdotes; men who were partakers in
+great political events or military movements, who leave behind only a
+few dry and chilly memoirs; prodigies of reading, living encyclopedias,
+who remain crushed under the load of their erudition. On the other hand,
+there are people who easily move and act, but are limited, lacking
+images and ideas. Their intellectual poverty condemns them to
+unproductiveness; nevertheless, being nearer than the others to the
+imaginative type, they bring forth childish or chimerical productions.
+So that we may answer the question asked above: The non-imaginative
+person is such from lack of materials or through the absence of
+resourcefulness.
+
+Without contenting ourselves with these theoretical remarks, let us
+rapidly show that it is thus that these things actually happen. All the
+work of the creative imagination may be classed under two great
+heads--esthetic inventions and practical inventions; on the one hand,
+what man has brought to pass in the domain of art, and on the other
+hand, all else. Though this division may appear strange, and
+unjustifiable, it has reason for its being, as we shall see hereafter.
+
+Let us consider first the class of non-esthetic creations. Very
+different in nature, all the products of this group coincide at one
+point:--they are of practical utility, they are born of a vital need, of
+one of the conditions of man's existence. There are first the inventions
+"practical" in the narrow sense--all that pertains to food, clothing,
+defense, housing, etc. Every one of these special needs has stimulated
+inventions adapted to a special end. Inventions in the social and
+political order answer to the conditions of collective existence; they
+arise from the necessity of maintaining the coherence of the social
+aggregate and of defending it against inimical groups. The work of the
+imagination whence have arisen the myths, religious conceptions, and the
+first attempts at a scientific explanation may seem at first
+disinterested and foreign to practical life. This is an erroneous
+supposition. Man, face to face with the higher powers of nature, the
+mystery of which he does not penetrate, has a _need_ of acting upon it;
+he tries to conciliate them, even to turn them to his service by magic
+rites and operations. _His_ curiosity is not at all theoretic; he does
+not aim to know for the sake of knowing, but in order to act upon the
+outside world and to draw profit therefrom. To the numerous questions
+that necessity puts to him his imagination alone responds, because his
+reason is shifting and his scientific knowledge _nil_. Here, then,
+invention again results from urgent needs.
+
+Indeed, in the course of the nineteenth century and on account of
+growing civilization all these creations reach a second moment when
+their origin is hidden. Most of our mechanical, industrial and
+commercial inventions are not stimulated by the immediate necessity of
+living, by an urgent need; it is not a question of existence but of
+better existence. The same holds true of social and political inventions
+which arise from the increasing complexity and the new requirements of
+the aggregates forming great states. Lastly, it is certain that
+primitive curiosity has partially lost its utilitarian character in
+order to become, in some men at least, the taste for pure
+research--theoretical, speculative, disinterested. But all this in no
+way affects our thesis, for it is a well-known elementary psychological
+law that upon primitive wants are grafted acquired wants fully as
+imperative. The primitive need is modified, metamorphosed, adapted;
+there remains of it, nonetheless, the fundamental activity toward
+creation.
+
+Let us now consider the class of esthetic creations. According to the
+generally accepted theory which is too well known for me to stop to
+explain it, art has its beginning in a superfluous, bounding activity,
+useless as regards the preservation of the individual, which is shown
+first in the form of play. Then, through transformation and
+complication, play becomes primitive art, dancing, music, and poetry at
+the same time, closely united in an apparently indissoluble unity.
+Although the theory of the absolute inutility of art has met some strong
+criticism, let us accept it for the present. Aside from the true or
+false character of inutility, the psychological mechanism remains the
+same here as in the preceding cases; we shall only say that in place of
+a vital need it is a need of _luxury_ acting, but it acts only because
+it is in man.
+
+Nevertheless, the inutility of play is far from proven biologically.
+Groos, in his two excellent works on the subject,[17] has maintained
+with much power the opposite view. According to him the theory of
+Schiller and Spencer, based on the expenditure of superfluous activity
+and the opposite theory of Lazarus, who reduces play to a
+relaxation--that is, a recuperation of strength--are but partial
+explanations. Play has a positive use. In man there exist a great number
+of instincts that are not yet developed at birth. An incomplete being,
+he must have education of his capacities, and this is obtained through
+play, _which is the exercise of the natural tendencies of human
+activities_. In man and in the higher animals plays are a preparation, a
+prelude to the active functions of life. _There is no instinct of play
+in general, but there are special instincts that are manifested under
+the forms of play._ If we admit this explanation, which does not lack
+potency, the work of the esthetic imagination itself would be reduced
+to a biological necessity, and there would be no reason for making a
+separate category of it. Whichever view we may adopt, it still remains
+established that any invention is reducible, directly or indirectly, to
+a particular, determinate need, and that to allow man a special
+instinct, the definite specific character of which should be stimulation
+to creative activity, is a fantastic notion.
+
+Whence, then, comes this persistent and in some respects seductive idea
+that creation is an instinctive result? Because a happy invention has
+characteristics that evidently relate it to instinctive activity in the
+strict sense of the word. First, precocity, of which we shall later give
+numerous examples, and which resembles the innateness of instinct.
+Again, orientation in a single direction: the inventor is, so to speak,
+polarized; he is the slave of music, of mechanics, of mathematics; often
+inapt at everything outside his own particular sphere. We know the
+witticism of Madame du Deffant on Vaucanson, who was so awkward, so
+insignificant when he ventured outside of mechanics. "One should say
+that this man had manufactured himself." Finally, the ease with which
+invention often (not always) manifests itself makes it resemble the work
+of a pre-established mechanism.
+
+But these and similar characteristics may be lacking. They are necessary
+for instinct, not for invention. There are great creators who have been
+neither precocious nor confined in a narrow field, and who have given
+birth to their inventions painfully, laboriously. Between the mechanism
+of instinct and that of imaginative creation there are frequently great
+analogies but not identity of nature. Every tendency of our
+organization, useful or hurtful, may become the beginning of a creative
+act. Every invention arises from a particular need of human nature,
+acting within its own sphere and for its own special end.
+
+If now it should be asked why the creative imagination directs itself
+preferably in one line rather than in another--toward poetry or physics,
+trade or mechanics, geometry or painting, strategy or music, etc.--we
+have nothing in answer. It is a result of the individual organization,
+the secret of which we do not possess. In ordinary life we meet people
+visibly borne along toward love or good cheer, toward ambition, riches
+or good works; we say that they are "so built," that such is their
+character. At bottom the two questions are identical, and current
+psychology is not in a position to solve them.
+
+FOOTNOTES:
+
+[12] _Ueber Phantasievorstellungen_, Graz, 1889, p. 48.
+
+[13] _Die Spiele der Thiere_, Jena, 1896. The subject has been very
+well treated by this author, pp. 294-301.
+
+[14] The "disinterested" view is found widely advocated or hinted at
+in literature. Cf. Goethe's "Der Sänger" (Tr.).
+
+[15] _Psychology_, I, 571 ff.
+
+[16] Höffding, _Psychologie_, p. 219; _Eng. trans._, p. 161.
+
+[17] Groos, _Die Spiele der Thiere_, 1896, and _Die Spiele der
+Menschen_, 1899 (Eng. trans., Appletons, New York, 1898, 1901).
+
+
+
+
+CHAPTER III
+
+THE UNCONSCIOUS FACTOR
+
+I
+
+
+By this term I designate principally, not exclusively, what ordinary
+speech calls "inspiration." In spite of its mysterious and
+semi-mythological appearance, the term indicates a positive fact, one
+that is ill-understood in a deep sense, like all that is near the roots
+of creation. This concept has its history, and if it is permissible to
+apply a very general formula to a particular case we may say that it has
+developed according to the law of the three states assumed by the
+positivists.
+
+In the beginning, inspiration is literally ascribed to the
+gods--among the Greeks to Apollo and the Muses, and in like manner
+under various polytheistic religions. Later, the gods become
+supernatural spirits, angels, saints, etc. In one way or another it
+is always regarded as external and superior to man. In the
+beginnings of all inventions--agriculture, navigation, medicine,
+commerce, legislation, fine arts--there is a belief in revelation;
+the human mind considers itself incapable of having discovered all
+that. Creation has arisen, we do not know how, in a total ignorance
+of the processes.
+
+Later on these higher beings become empty formulas, mere survivals;
+there remain only the poets to invoke their aid, through the force of
+tradition, without believing in them. But side by side with these formal
+survivals there remains a mysterious ground which is translated by vague
+expressions and metaphors, such as "enthusiasm," "poetic frenzy,"
+"possession by a spirit," "being overcome," "having the devil inside
+one," "the spirit whispers as it lists," etc. Here we have come out of
+the supernatural without, however, attempting a positive (i.e., a
+scientific) explanation.
+
+Lastly, in the third stage, we try to sound this unknown. Psychology
+sees in it a special manifestation of the mind, a particular,
+semi-conscious, semi-unconscious state which we must now study.
+
+At first sight, and considered in its negative aspect, inspiration
+presents a very definite character. It does not depend on the individual
+will. As in the case of sleep or digestion, we may try to call it forth,
+encourage it, maintain it; but not always with success. Inventors, great
+and small, never cease to complain over the periods of unproductiveness
+which they undergo in spite of themselves. The wiser among them watch
+for the moment; the others attempt to fight against their evil fate and
+to create despite nature.
+
+Considered in its positive aspect, inspiration has two essential
+marks--suddenness and impersonality.
+
+(a) It makes a sudden eruption into consciousness, but one presupposing
+a latent, frequently long, labor. It has its analogues among other
+well-known psychic states; for example, a passion that is forgotten,
+which, after a long period of incubation, reveals itself through an act;
+or, better, a sudden resolve after endless deliberation which did not
+seem able to come to a head. Again, there may be absence of effort and
+of appearance of preparation. Beethoven would strike haphazard the keys
+of a piano or would listen to the songs of birds. "With Chopin," says
+George Sand, "creation was spontaneous, miraculous; he wrought without
+foreseeing. It would come complete, sudden, sublime." One might pile up
+like facts in abundance. Sometimes, indeed, inspiration bursts forth in
+deep sleep and awakens the sleeper, and lest we may suppose this
+suddenness to be especially characteristic of artists we see it in all
+forms of invention. "You feel a little electric shock striking you in
+the head, seizing your heart at the same time--that is the moment of
+genius" (Buffon). "In the course of my life I have had some happy
+thoughts," says Du Bois Reymond, "and I have often noted that they would
+come to me involuntarily, and when I was not thinking of the subject."
+Claude Bernard has voiced the same thought more than once.
+
+(b) Impersonality is a deeper character than the preceding. It reveals a
+power superior to the conscious individual, strange to him although
+acting through him: a state which many inventors have expressed in the
+words, "I counted for nothing in that." The best means of recognizing it
+would be to write down some observations taken from the inspired
+individuals themselves. We do not lack them, and some have the virtue of
+good observation.[18] But that would lead us too far afield. Let us only
+remark that this unconscious impulse acts variously according to the
+individual. Some submit to it painfully, striving against it just like
+the ancient pythoness at the time of giving her oracle. Others,
+especially in religious inspiration, submit themselves entirely with
+pleasure or else sustain it passively. Still others of a more analytic
+turn have noted the concentration of all their faculties and capacities
+on a single point. But whatever characteristics it takes on, remaining
+impersonal at bottom and unable to appear in a fully conscious
+individual, we must admit, unless we wish to give it a supernatural
+origin, that inspiration is derived from the unconscious activity of the
+mind. In order to make sure of its nature it would then be necessary to
+make sure first of the nature of the unconscious, which is one of the
+enigmas of psychology.
+
+I put aside all the discussions on the subject as tiresome and useless
+for our present aim. Indeed, they reduce themselves to these two
+principal propositions: for some the unconscious is a purely
+physiological activity, a "cerebration"; for others it is a gradual
+diminution of consciousness which exists without being bound to me--i.e.,
+to the principal consciousness. Both these are full of difficulties
+and present almost insurmountable objections.[19]
+
+Let us take the "unconscious" as a fact and let us limit ourselves to
+clearing it up, relating inspiration to mental states that have been
+judged worthy of explaining it.
+
+1. Hypermnesia, or exaltation of memory, in spite of what has been said
+about it, teaches us nothing in regard to the nature of inspiration or
+of invention in general. It is produced in hypnotism, mania, the excited
+period of "circular insanity," at the beginning of general paralysis,
+and especially under the form known as "the gift of tongues" in
+religious epidemics. We find, it is true, some observations (among
+others one by Regis of an illiterate newspaper vender composing pieces
+of poetry of his own), indicating that a heightened memory sometimes
+accompanies a certain tendency toward invention. But hypermnesia, pure
+and simple, consists of an extraordinary flood of memories totally
+lacking that essential mark of creation--new combinations. It even
+appears that in the two instances there is rather an antagonism since
+heightened memory comes near to the ideal law of total redintegration,
+which is, as we know, a hindrance to invention. They are alike only with
+respect to the great mass of separable materials, but where the
+principle of unity is wanting there can be no creation.
+
+2. Inspiration has often been likened to the state of excitement
+preceding intoxication. It is a well-known fact that many inventors have
+sought it in wine, alcoholic liquors, toxic substances like hashish,
+opium, ether, etc. It is unnecessary to mention names. The abundance of
+ideas, the rapidity of their flow, the eccentric spurts and caprices,
+novel ideas, strengthening of the vital and emotional tone, that brief
+state of bounding fancy of which novelists have given such good
+descriptions, make evident to the least observing that under the
+influence of intoxication the imagination works to a much greater extent
+than ordinarily. Yet how pale that is compared to the action of the
+intellectual poisons above mentioned, especially hashish. The
+"artificial paradise" of DeQuincy, Moreau de Tours, Théophile Gautier,
+Baudelaire and others have made known to all an enormous expansion of
+the imagination launched into a giddy course without limits of time and
+space.
+
+Strictly, these are facts representing only a stimulated, artificial,
+temporary inspiration. They do not take us into its true nature; at the
+most they may teach us concerning some of their physiological
+conditions. It is not even an inspiration in the strict sense, but
+rather a beginning, an embryo, an outline, analogous to the creations
+produced in dreams which are found very incoherent when we awake. One of
+the essential conditions of creation, a principal element--the directing
+principle that organizes and unifies--is lacking. Under the influence
+of alcoholic drinks and of poisonous intoxicants attention and will
+always fall into exhaustion.
+
+3. With greater reason it has been sought to explain inspiration by
+comparison with certain forms of somnambulism, and it has been said that
+"it is only the lowest degree of the latter state, somnambulism in a
+waking state. In inspiration it is as though a strange personality were
+speaking to the author; in somnambulism it is the stranger himself who
+talks or holds the pen, who speaks or writes--in a word, does the
+work."[20] It would thus be the modified form of a state that is the
+culmination of subconscious activity and a state of double personality.
+As this last explanatory expression is wonderfully abused, and is called
+upon to serve in all conditions, preciseness is indispensable.
+
+The inspired individual is like an awakened dreamer--he lives in his
+dream. (Of this we might cite seemingly authentic examples: Shelly,
+Alfieri, etc.) Psychologically, this means that there is in him a double
+inversion of the normal state.
+
+To begin with, consciousness monopolized by the number and intensity of
+its images is closed to the influences of the outside world, or else
+receives them only to make them enter the web of its dream. The internal
+life annihilates the external, which is just the opposite of ordinary
+life.
+
+Further, the unconscious or subconscious activity passes to the first
+plane, plays the first part, while preserving its impersonal character.
+
+This much allowed, if we would go further, we are thrown into increasing
+difficulties. The existence of an unconscious working is beyond doubt;
+facts in profusion could be given in support of this obscure elaboration
+which enters consciousness only when all is done. But what is the nature
+of this work? Is it purely physiological? Is it psychological? We come
+to two opposing theses. Theoretically, we may say that everything goes
+on in the realm of the unconscious just as in consciousness, _only
+without a message to me_; that in clear consciousness the work may be
+followed up step by step, while in unconsciousness it proceeds likewise,
+but unknown to us. It is evident that all this is purely hypothetical.
+
+Inspiration resembles a cipher dispatch which the unconscious activity
+transmits to the conscious process, which translates it. Must we admit
+that in the deep levels of the unconscious there are formed only
+fragmentary combinations and that they reach complete systematization
+only in clear consciousness, or, rather, is the creative labor identical
+in both cases? It is difficult to decide. It seems to be accepted that
+genius, or at least richness, in invention depends on the subliminal
+imagination,[21] not on the other, which is superficial in nature and
+soon exhausted. The one is spontaneous, true; the other, artificial,
+feigned. "Inspiration" signifies unconscious imagination, and is only a
+special case of it. Conscious imagination is a kind of perfected state.
+
+To sum up, inspiration is the result of an underhand process existing in
+men, in some to a very great degree. The nature of this work being
+unknown, we can conclude nothing as to the ultimate nature of
+inspiration. On the other hand, we may in a positive manner fix the
+value of the phenomenon in invention, all the more as we are inclined to
+over-value it. We should, indeed, note that inspiration is not a cause
+but an effect--more exactly, a moment, a crisis, a critical stage; it is
+an _index_. It marks either the end of an unconscious elaboration which
+may have been very short or very long, or else the beginning of a
+conscious elaboration which will be very short or very long (this is
+seen especially in cases of creation suggested by chance). On the one
+hand, it never has an absolute beginning; on the other hand, it never
+delivers a finished work; the history of inventions sufficiently proves
+this. Furthermore, one may pass beyond it; many creations long in
+preparation seem without a crisis, strictly so called; such as Newton's
+law of attraction, Leonardo da Vinci's "Last Supper," and the "Mona
+Lisa." Finally, many have felt themselves really inspired without
+producing anything of value.[22]
+
+
+II
+
+What has been said up to this point does not exhaust the study of the
+unconscious factor as a source of new combinations. Its rôle can be
+studied under a simpler and more limited form. For this purpose we need
+to return for the last time to association of ideas. The final reason
+for association (outside of contiguity, in part at least) must be sought
+in the temperament, character, individuality of the subject, often even
+in the _moment_; that is, in a passing influence, hardly perceptible
+because it is unconscious or subconscious. These momentary dispositions
+in latent form can excite novel relations in two ways--through mediate
+association and through a special mode of grouping which has recently
+received the name "constellation."
+
+1. Mediate association has been well known since the time of Hamilton,
+who was the first to determine its nature and to give a personal example
+that has become classic. Loch Lomond recalled to him the Prussian system
+of education because, when visiting the lake, he had met a Prussian
+officer who conversed with him on the subject. His general formula is
+this: _A_ recalls _C_, although there is between them neither contiguity
+nor resemblance, but because a middle term, _B_, which does not enter
+consciousness, serves as a transition between _A_ and _C_. This mode of
+association seemed universally accepted when, latterly, it has been
+attacked by Münsterberg and others. People have had recourse to
+experimentation, which has given results only in slight agreement.[23]
+For my own part, I count myself among those contemporaries who admit
+mediate association, and they are the greater number. Scripture, who has
+made a special study of the subject, and who has been able to note all
+the intermediate conditions between almost clear consciousness and the
+unconscious, considers the existence of mediate association as proven.
+In order to pronounce as an illusion a fact that is met with so often in
+daily experience, and one that has been studied by so many excellent
+observers, there is required more than experimental investigations (the
+conditions of which are often artificial and unnatural), some of which,
+moreover, conclude for the affirmative.
+
+This form of association is produced, like the others, now by
+contiguity, now by resemblance. The example given by Hamilton belongs to
+the first type. In the experiments by Scripture are found some of the
+second type--e.g., a red light recalled, through the vague memory of a
+flash of strontium light, a scene of an opera.
+
+It is clear that by its very nature mediate association can give rise to
+novel combinations. Contiguity itself, which is usually only repetition,
+becomes the source of unforeseen relations, thanks to the elimination of
+the middle term. Nothing, moreover, proves that there may not sometimes
+be several latent intermediate terms. It is possible that _A_ should
+call up _D_ through the medium of _b_ and _c_, which remain below the
+threshold of consciousness. It seems even impossible not to admit this
+in the hypothesis of the subconscious, where we see only the two end
+links of the chain, without being able to allow a break of continuity
+between them.
+
+2. In his determination of the regulating causes of association of
+ideas, Ziehen designates one of these under the name of "constellation,"
+which has been adopted by some writers. This may be enunciated thus: The
+recall of an image, or of a group of images, is in some cases the result
+of a sum of predominant tendencies.
+
+An idea may become the starting point of a host of associations. The
+word "Rome" can call up a hundred. Why is one called up rather than
+another, and at such a moment rather than at another? There are some
+associations based on contiguity and on resemblance which one may
+foresee, but how about the rest? Here is an idea _A_; it is the center
+of a network; it can radiate in all directions--_B, C, D, E, F, etc._
+Why does it call up now _B_, later _F_?
+
+It is because every image is comparable to a force, which may pass from
+the latent to the active condition, and in this process may be
+reinforced or checked by other images. There are simultaneous and
+inhibitory tendencies. _B_ is in a state of tension and _C_ is not; or
+it may be that _D_ exerts an arresting influence on _C_. Consequently
+_C_ cannot prevail. But an hour later conditions have changed and
+victory rests with _C_. This phenomenon rests on a physiological basis:
+the existence of several currents diffusing themselves through the brain
+and the possibility of receiving simultaneous excitations.[24]
+
+A few examples will make plainer this phenomenon of reinforcement, in
+consequence of which an association prevails. Wahle reports that the
+Gothic _Hôtel de Ville_, near his house, had never suggested to him the
+idea of the Doges' Palace at Venice, in spite of certain architectural
+likenesses, until a certain day when this idea broke upon him with much
+clearness. He then recalled that two hours before he had observed a lady
+wearing a beautiful brooch in the form of a gondola. Sully rightly
+remarks that it is much easier to recall the words of a foreign language
+when we return from the country where it is spoken than when we have
+lived a long time in our own, because the tendency toward recollection
+is reinforced by the recent experience of the words heard, spoken,
+read, and a whole array of latent dispositions that work in the same
+direction.
+
+In my opinion we would find the finest examples of "constellation,"
+regarded as a creative element, in studying the formation and
+development of myths. Everywhere and always man has had for material
+scarcely anything save natural phenomena--the sky, land, water, stars,
+storms, wind, seasons, life, death, etc. On each of these themes he
+builds thousands of explanatory stories, which vary from the grandly
+imposing to the laughably childish. Every myth is the work of a human
+group which has worked according to the tendencies of its special genius
+under the influence of various stages of intellectual culture. No
+process is richer in resources, of freer turn, or more apt to give what
+every inventor promises--the novel and unexpected.
+
+To sum up: The initial element, external or internal, excites
+associations that one cannot always foresee, because of the numerous
+orientations possible; an analogous case to that which occurs in the
+realm of the will when there are present reasons for and against, acting
+and not acting, one direction or another, now or later--when the final
+resolution cannot be predicted, and often depends on imperceptible
+causes.
+
+In conclusion, I anticipate a possible question: "Does the unconscious
+factor differ in nature from the two others (intellectual and
+emotional)?" The answer depends on the hypothesis that one holds as to
+the nature of the unconscious itself. According to one view it would be
+especially physiological, consequently different; according to another,
+the difference can exist only _in the processes_: unconscious
+elaboration is reducible to intellectual or emotional processes the
+preparatory work of which is slighted, and which enters consciousness
+ready made. Consequently, the unconscious factor would be a special form
+of the other two rather than a distinct element in invention.
+
+FOOTNOTES:
+
+[18] Several of them will be found in Appendix A at the end of this
+work.
+
+[19] On this subject see Appendix B.
+
+[20] Dr. Chabaneix, _Le subconscient sur les artistes, les savants,
+et les écrivains_, Paris, 1897, p. 87.
+
+[21] The recent case, studied with so much ability by M. Flournoy in
+his book, "_Des Indes à la planète Mars_" (1900), is an example of
+the subliminal creative imagination, and of the work it is capable
+of doing by itself.
+
+[22] We shall return to this point in another part of this work. See
+Part II, chapter iv.
+
+[23] Thus Howe (_American Journal of Psychology_, vi, 239 ff.), has
+published some investigations in the negative. One series of 557
+experiments gave him eight apparently mediate associations; after
+examination, he reduced them to a single one, which seemed to him
+doubtful. Another series of 961 experiments gives 72 cases, for
+which he offers an explanation other than mediate association. On
+the other hand, Aschaffenburg admits them to the extent of four per
+cent.; the association-time is longer than for average associations
+(_Psychologische Arbeiten_, I and II). Consult especially Scripture,
+_The New Psychology_, chapter xiii, with experiments in support of
+his conclusion.
+
+[24] Ziehen, _Leitfaden der physiologischen Psychologie_, 4th
+edition, 1898, pp. 164, 174. Also, Sully, _Human Mind_, I, 343.
+
+
+
+
+CHAPTER IV
+
+THE ORGANIC CONDITIONS OF THE IMAGINATION
+
+
+Whatever opinion we may hold concerning the nature of the unconscious,
+since that form of activity is related more than any other to the
+physiological conditions of the mental life, the present time is
+suitable for an exposition of the hypotheses that it is permissible to
+express concerning the organic bases of the imagination. What we may
+regard as positive, or even as probable, is very little.
+
+
+I
+
+First, the anatomical conditions. Is there a "seat" of the imagination?
+Such is the form of the question asked for the last twenty years. In
+that period of extreme and closely bounded localization men strained
+themselves to bind down every psychic manifestation to a strictly
+determined point of the brain. Today the problem presents itself no
+longer in this simple way. As at present we incline toward scattered
+localization, functional rather than properly anatomical, and as we
+often understand by "center" the synergic action of several centers
+differently grouped according to the individual case, our question
+becomes equivalent to: "Are there certain portions of the brain having
+an exclusive or preponderating part in the working of the creative
+imagination?" Even in this form the question is hardly acceptable.
+Indeed, the imagination is not a primary and relatively simple function
+like that of visual, auditory and other sensations. We have seen that it
+is a state of tertiary formation and very complex. There is required,
+then, (1) that the elements constituting imagination be determined in a
+rigorous manner, but the foregoing analysis makes no pretense of being
+definitive; (2) that each of these constitutive elements may be strictly
+related to its anatomic conditions. It is evident that we are far from
+possessing the secret of such a mechanism.
+
+An attempt has been made to put the question in a more precise and
+limited form by studying the brains of men distinguished in different
+lines. But this method, in avoiding the difficulty, answers our question
+indirectly only. Most often great inventors possess qualities besides
+imagination indispensable for success (Napoleon, James Watt, etc.). How
+draw a dividing line so as to assign to the imagination only its
+rightful share? In addition, the anatomical determination is beset with
+difficulties.
+
+A method flourishing very greatly about the middle of the nineteenth
+century consisted of weighing carefully a large number of brains and
+drawing various conclusions as to intellectual superiority or
+inferiority from a comparison of the weights. We find on this point
+numerous documents in the special works published during the period
+mentioned. But this method of weights has given rise to so many
+surprises and difficulties in the way of explanation that it has been
+quite necessary to give it up, since we see in it only another element
+of the problem.
+
+Nowadays we attribute the greatest importance to the morphology of the
+brain, to its histological structure, the marked development of certain
+regions, the determination not only of centers but of connections and
+associations between centers. On this last point contemporary anatomists
+have given themselves up to eager researches, and, although the cerebral
+architecture is not conceived by all in the same way, it is proper for
+psychology to note that all with their "centers" or "associational
+system" try to translate into their own language the complex conditions
+of mental life. Since we must choose from among these various anatomical
+views let us accept that of Flechsig, one of the most renowned and one
+having also the advantage of putting directly the problem of the organic
+conditions of the imagination.
+
+We know that Flechsig relies on the embryological method--that is, on
+the development--in the order of time, of nerves and centers. For him
+there exist on the one hand sensitive regions (sensory-motor), occupying
+about a third of the cortical surface; on the other hand,
+association-centers, occupying the remaining part.
+
+So far as the sensory centers are concerned, development occurs in the
+following order: Organic sensations (middle of cerebral cortex), smell
+(base of the brain and part of the frontal lobes), sight (occipital
+lobe), hearing (first temporal). Whence it results that in a definite
+part of the brain the body comes to proper consciousness of its
+impulses, wants, appetites, pains, movements, etc., and that this part
+develops first--"knowledge of the body precedes that of the outside
+world."
+
+In what concerns the associational centers, Flechsig supposes three
+regions: The great posterior center (parieto-occipito-temporal);
+another, much smaller, anterior or frontal; and a middle center, the
+smallest of all (the Island of Reil). Comparative anatomy proves that
+the associational centers are more important than those of sensation.
+Among the lower mammals they develop as we go up the scale: "That which
+makes the psychic man may be said to be the centers of association that
+he possesses." In the new-born child the sensitive centers are isolated,
+and, in the absence of connections between them, the unity of the self
+cannot be manifested; there is a plurality of consciousness.
+
+This much admitted, let us return to our special question, which
+Flechsig asks in these words: "On what does genius rest? Is it based on
+a special structure in the brain, or rather on special irritability?
+that is, according to our present notions, on chemical factors? We may
+hold the first opinion with all possible force. Genius is always united
+to a special structure, to a particular organization of the brain." All
+parts of this organ do not have the same value. It has been long
+admitted that the frontal part may serve as a measure of intellectual
+capacity; but we must allow, contrariwise, that there are other regions,
+"principally a center located under the protuberance at the top of the
+head, which is very much developed in all men of genius whose brains
+have been studied down to our day. In Beethoven, and probably also in
+Bach, the enormous development of this part of the brain is striking. In
+great scientists like Gauss the centers of the posterior region of the
+brain and those of the frontal region are strongly developed. The
+scientific genius thus shows proportions of brain-structure other than
+the artistic genius."[25] There would then be, according to our author,
+a preponderance of the frontal and parietal regions--the former obtain
+especially among artists; the latter among scientists. Already, twenty
+years before Flechsig, Rüdinger had noted the extraordinary development
+of the parietal convolutions in eminent men after a study of eighteen
+brains. All the convolutions and fissures were so developed, said he,
+that the parieto-occipital region had an altogether peculiar character.
+
+By way of summary we must bear in mind that, as regards anatomical
+conditions, even when depending on the best of sources, we can at
+present give only fragmentary, incomplete, hypothetical views.
+
+Let us now go on to the physiology.
+
+
+II
+
+We might have rightly asked whether the physiological states existing
+along with the working of the creative imagination are the cause,
+effect, or merely the accompaniment of this activity. Probably all the
+three conditions are met with. First, concomitance is an accomplished
+fact, and we may consider it as an organic manifestation parallel to
+that of the mind. Again, the employment of artificial means to excite
+and maintain the effervescence of the imagination assigns a causal or
+antecedent position to the physiologic conditions. Lastly, the psychic
+activity may be initial and productive of changes in the organism, or,
+if these already exist, may augment and prolong them.
+
+The most instructive instances are those indicated by very clear
+manifestations and profound modifications of the bodily condition. Such
+are the moments of inspiration or simply those of warmth from work which
+arise in the form of sudden impulses.
+
+The general fact of most importance consists of changes in the blood
+circulation. Increase of intellectual activity means an increase of work
+in the cortical cells, dependent on a congested, sometimes a temporarily
+anæmic state. Hyperæmia seems rather the rule, but we also know that
+slight anæmia increases cortical excitability. "Weak, contracted pulse;
+pale, chilly skin; overheated head; brilliant, sunken, roving eyes,"
+such is the classic, frequently quoted description of the physiological
+state during creative labor. There are numerous inventors who, of their
+own accord, have noted these changes--irregular pulse, in the case of
+Lagrange; congestion of the head, in Beethoven, who made use of cold
+douches to relieve it, etc. This elevation of the vital tone, this
+nervous tension, translates itself also into motor form through
+movements analogous to reflexes, without special end, mechanically
+repeated and always the same in the same man--e.g., movement of the
+feet, hands, fingers; whittling the table or the arms of a chair (as in
+the case of Napoleon when he was elaborating a plan of campaign), etc.
+It is a safety-valve for the excessive flow of nervous impulse, and it
+is admitted that this method of expenditure is not useless for
+preserving the understanding in all its clearness. In a word, increase
+of the cerebral circulation is the formula covering the majority of
+observations on this subject.
+
+Does experimentation, strictly so called, teach us anything on this
+point? Numerous and well-known physiological researches, especially
+those of Mosso, show that all intellectual, and, most of all, emotional,
+work, produces cerebral congestion; that the brain-volume increases, and
+the volume of the peripheral organs diminishes. But that tells us
+nothing particularly about the imagination, which is but a special case
+under the rule. Latterly, indeed, it has been proposed to study
+inventors by an objective method through the examination of their
+several circulatory, respiratory, digestive apparatus; their general
+and special sensibility; the modes of their memory and forms of
+association, their intellectual processes, etc. But up to this time no
+conclusion has been drawn from these individual descriptions that would
+allow any generalization. Besides, has an experiment, in the strict
+sense of the word, ever been made at the "psychological moment"? I know
+of none. Would it be possible? Let us admit that by some happy chance
+the experimenter, using all his means of investigation, can have the
+subject under his hand at the exact moment of inspiration--of the
+sudden, fertile, brief creative impulse--would not the experiment itself
+be a disturbing cause, so that the result would be _ipso facto_
+vitiated, or at least unconvincing?
+
+There still remains a mass of facts deserving summary notice--the
+oddities of inventors. Were we to collect only those that may be
+regarded as authentic we could make a thick volume. Despite their
+anecdotal character these evidences do not seem to be unworthy of some
+regard.
+
+It is impossible to enter here upon an enumeration that would be
+endless. After having collected for my own information a large number of
+these strange peculiarities, it seems to me that they are reducible to
+two categories:
+
+(1) Those inexplicable freaks dependent on the individual constitution,
+and more often probably also on experiences in life the memory of which
+has been lost. Schiller, for example, kept rotten apples in his work
+desk.
+
+(2) The others, more numerous, are easy to explain. They are
+physiological means consciously or unconsciously chosen to aid creative
+work; they are auxiliary helpers of the imagination.
+
+The most frequent method consists of artificially increasing the flow of
+blood to the brain. Rousseau would think bare-headed in full sunshine;
+Bossuet would work in a cold room with his head wrapped in furs; others
+would immerse their feet in ice-cold water (Grétry, Schiller). Very
+numerous are those who think "horizontally"--that is, lying stretched
+out and often flattened under their blankets (Milton, Descartes,
+Leibniz, Rossini, etc.)
+
+Some require motor excitation; they work only when walking,[26] or else
+prepare for work by physical exercise (Mozart). For variety's sake, let
+us note those who must have the noise of the streets, crowds, talk,
+festivities, in order to invent. For others there must be external pomp
+and a personal part in the scene (Machiavelli, Buffon). Guido Reni would
+paint only when dressed in magnificent style, his pupils crowded about
+him and attending to his wants in respectful silence.
+
+On the opposite side are those requiring retirement, silence,
+contemplation, even shadowy darkness, like Lamennais. In this class we
+find especially scientists and thinkers--Tycho-Brahé, who for twenty-one
+years scarcely left his observatory; Leibniz, who could remain for
+three days almost motionless in an armchair.
+
+But most methods are too artificial or too strong not to become quickly
+noxious. Every one knows what they are--abuse of wine, alcoholic
+liquors, narcotics, tobacco, coffee, etc., prolonged periods of
+wakefulness, less for increasing the time for work than to cause a state
+of hyperesthesia and a morbid sensibility (Goncourt).
+
+Summing up: The organic bases of the creative imagination, if there are
+any specially its own, remain to be determined. For in all that has been
+said we have been concerned only with some conditions of the general
+working of the mind--assimilation as well as invention. The
+eccentricities of inventors studied carefully and in a detailed manner
+would finally, perhaps, be most instructive material, because it would
+allow us to penetrate into their inmost individuality. Thus, the
+physiology of the imagination quickly becomes pathology. I shall not
+dwell on this, having purposely eliminated the morbid side of our
+subject. It will, however, be necessary to return thereto, touching upon
+it in another part of this essay.
+
+
+III
+
+There remains a problem, so obscure and enigmatic that I scarcely
+venture to approach it, in the analogy that most languages--the
+spontaneous expression of a common thought--establish between
+physiologic and psychic creation. Is it only a superficial likeness, a
+hasty judgment, a metaphor, or does it rest on some positive basis?
+Generally, the various manifestations of mental activity have as their
+precursor an unconscious form from which they arise. The sensitiveness
+belonging to living substance, known by the names heliotropism,
+chemotropism, etc., is like a sketch of sensation and of the reactions
+following it; organic memory is the basis and the obliterated form of
+conscious memory. Reflexes introduce voluntary activity; appetitions and
+hidden tendencies are the forerunners of effective psychology. Instinct,
+on several sides, is like an unconscious and specific trial of reason.
+Has the creative power of the human mind also analogous antecedents, a
+physiological equivalent?
+
+One metaphysician, Froschammer, who has elevated the creative
+imagination to the rank of primary world-principle, asserts this
+positively. For him there is an objective or cosmic imagination working
+in nature, producing the innumerable varieties of vegetable and animal
+forms; transformed into subjective imagination it becomes in the human
+brain the source of a new form of creation. "The very same principle
+causes the living forms to appear--a sort of objective image--and the
+subjective images, a kind of living form."[27] However ingenious and
+attractive this philosophical theory may be, it is evidently of no
+positive value for psychology.
+
+Let us stick to experience. Physiology teaches that generation is a
+"prolonged nutrition," a surplus, as we see so plainly in the lower
+forms of agamous generation (budding, division). The creative
+imagination likewise presupposes a superabundance of psychic life that
+might otherwise spend itself in another way. Generation in the physical
+order is a spontaneous, natural tendency, although it may be stimulated,
+successfully or otherwise, by artificial means. We can say as much of
+the other. This list of resemblances it would be easy to prolong. But
+all this is insufficient for the establishment of a thorough identity
+between the two cases and the solution of the question.
+
+It is possible to limit it, to put it into more precise language. Is
+there a connection between the development of the generative function
+and that of the imagination? Even in this form the question scarcely
+permits any but vague answers. In favor of a connection we may allege:
+
+(1) The well-known influence of puberty on the imagination of both
+sexes, expressing itself in day-dreams, in aspirations toward an
+unattainable ideal,[28] in the genius for invention that love bestows
+upon the least favored. Let us recall also the mental troubles, the
+psychoses designated by the name hebephrenia. With adolescence coincides
+the first flowering of the fancy which, having emerged from its
+swaddling-clothes of childhood, is not yet sophisticated and
+rationalized.
+
+It is not a matter of indifference for the general thesis of the present
+work to note that this development of the imagination depends wholly on
+the first effervescence of the emotional life. That "influence of the
+feelings on the imagination" and of "the imagination on the feelings" of
+which the moralists and the older psychologists speak so often is a
+vague formula for expressing this fact--that the motor element included
+in the images is reinforced.
+
+(2) _Per contra_, the weakening of the generative power and of the
+constructive imagination coincide in old age, which is, in a word, a
+decay of nutrition, a progressive atrophy. It is proper not to omit the
+influence of castration. According to the theory of Brown-Séquard, it
+produces an abatement of the nutritive functions through the suppression
+of an internal stimulus; and, although its relations to the imagination
+have not been especially studied, it is not rash to admit that it is an
+arresting cause.
+
+However, the foregoing merely establishes, between the functions
+compared, a concomitance in the general course of their evolution and in
+their critical periods; it is insufficient for a conclusion. There
+would be needed clear, authentic and sufficiently numerous observations
+proving that individuals bereft of imagination of the creative type have
+acquired it suddenly through the sole fact of their sexual influences,
+and, inversely, that brilliant imaginations have faded under the
+contrary conditions. We find some of these evidences in Cabanis,[29]
+Moreau de Tours and various alienists; they would seem to be in favor of
+the affirmative, but some seem to me not sure enough, others not
+explicit enough. Despite my investigations on this point, and inquiry of
+competent persons, I do not venture to draw a definite conclusion. I
+leave the question open; it will perhaps tempt another more fortunate
+investigator.
+
+FOOTNOTES:
+
+[25] Flechsig, _Gehirn und Seele_, 1896.
+
+[26] Is it possible that this would explain the fact of Aristotle
+lecturing to his pupils while walking about, thus giving the name
+"peripatetic" to his school and system? (Tr.)
+
+[27] _Die Phantasie als Grundprincip der Weltprocesses_, München,
+1877. For other details on the subject, see Appendix C.
+
+[28] A passage from Chateaubriand (cited by Paulhan, _Rev. Philos._,
+March, 1898, p. 237) is a typical description of the situation: "The
+warmth of my (adolescent) imagination, my shyness, and solitude,
+caused me, instead of casting myself on something without, to fall
+back upon myself. Wanting a real object, I evoked through the power
+of my desires, a phantom, which thenceforth never left me; I made a
+woman, composed of all the women that I had already seen. That
+charming idea followed me everywhere, though invisible; I conversed
+with her as with a real being; she would change according to my
+frenzy. Pygmalion was less enamored of his statue."
+
+[29] Cabanis, _Rapports du Physique et du Moral_, édition Peisse,
+pp. 248-249, an anecdote that he relates after Buffon. Analogous,
+but less clear, facts may also be found in Moreau de Tours'
+_Psychologie morbide_.
+
+
+
+
+CHAPTER V
+
+THE PRINCIPLE OF UNITY
+
+
+The psychological nature of the imagination would be very imperfectly
+known were we limited to the foregoing analytical study. Indeed, all
+creation whatever, great or small, shows an organic character; it
+implies a unifying, synthetic principle. Every one of the three
+factors--intellectual, emotional, unconscious--works not as an isolated
+fact on its own account; they have no worth save through their union,
+and no signification save through their common bearing. This principle
+of unity, which all invention demands and requires, is at one time
+intellectual in nature, i.e., as a fixed idea; at another time
+emotional, i.e., as a fixed emotion or passion. These terms--fixed
+idea, fixed emotion--are somewhat absolute and require restrictions and
+reservations, which will be made in what follows.
+
+The distinction between the two is not at all absolute. Every fixed idea
+is supported and maintained by a need, a tendency, a desire; i.e., by
+an affective element. For it is idle fancy to believe in the
+_persistence_ of an idea which, by hypothesis, would be a purely
+intellectual state, cold and dry. The principle of unity in this form
+naturally predominates in certain kinds of creation: in the practical
+imagination wherein the end is clear, where images are direct
+substitutes for things, where invention is subjected to strict
+conditions under penalty of visible and palpable check; in the
+scientific and metaphysical imagination, which works with concepts and
+is subject to the laws of rational logic.
+
+Every fixed emotion should realize itself in an idea or image that gives
+it body and systematizes it, without which it remains diffuse; and all
+affective states can take on this permanent form which makes a unified
+principle of them. The simple emotions (fear, love, joy, sorrow, etc.),
+the complex or derived emotions (religious, esthetic, intellectual
+ideas) may equally monopolize consciousness in their own interests.
+
+We thus see that these two terms--fixed idea, fixed emotion--are almost
+equivalent, for they both imply inseparable elements, and serve only to
+indicate the preponderance of one or the other element.
+
+This principle of unity, center of attraction and support of all the
+working of the creative imagination--that is, a subjective principle
+tending to become objectified--is the ideal. In the complete sense of
+the word--not restrained merely to esthetic creation or made synonymous
+with perfection as in ethics--the ideal is a construction in images that
+should become a reality. If we liken imaginative creation to
+physiological generation, the ideal is the ovum awaiting fertilization
+in order to begin its development.
+
+We could, to be more exact, make a distinction between the synthetic
+principle and the ideal conception which is a higher form of it. The
+fixation of an end and the discovery of appropriate means are the
+necessary and sufficient conditions for all invention. A creation,
+whatever it be, that looks only to present success, can satisfy itself
+with a unifying principle that renders it viable and organized, but we
+can look higher than the merely necessary and sufficient.
+
+The ideal is the principle of unity in motion in its historic evolution;
+like all development, it advances or recedes according to the times.
+Nothing is less justified than the conception of a fixed archetype (an
+undisguised survival of the Platonic Ideas), illuminating the inventor,
+who reproduces it as best he can. The ideal is a nonentity; it arises in
+the inventor and through him; its life is a _becoming_.
+
+Psychologically, it is a construction in images belonging to the merely
+sketched or outlined type.[30] It results from a double activity,
+negative and positive, or dissociation and association, the first cause
+and origin of which is found in a _will that it shall be so_; it is the
+motor tendency of images in the nascent state engendering the ideal.
+The inventor cuts out, suppresses, sifts, according to his temperament,
+character, taste, prejudices, sympathies and antipathies--in short, his
+_interest_. In this separation, already studied, let us note one
+important particular. "We know nothing of the complex psychic production
+that may simply be the sum of component elements and in which they would
+remain with their own characters, with no modification. The nature of
+the components disappears in order to give birth to a novel phenomenon
+that has its own and particular features. The construction of the ideal
+is not a mere grouping of past experiences; in its totality it has its
+own individual characteristics, among which we no more see the composing
+lines than we see the components, oxygen and hydrogen, in water. In no
+scientific or artistic production, says Wundt, does the whole appear as
+made up of its parts, like a mosaic."[31] In other words, it is a case
+of mental chemistry. The exactness of this expression, which is due, I
+believe, to J. Stuart Mill, has been questioned. Still it answers to
+positive facts; for example, in perception, to the phenomena of contrast
+and their analogues; juxtaposition or rapid succession of two different
+colors, two different sounds, of tactile, olfactory, gustatory
+impressions different in quality, produces a particular state of
+consciousness, similar to a combination. Harmony or discord does not,
+indeed, exist in each separate sound, but only in the relations and
+sequence of sounds--it is a _tertium quid_. We have heretofore, in the
+discussion of association of ideas, very frequently represented the
+states of consciousness as fixed elements that approach one another,
+cohere, separate, come together anew, but always unalterable, like
+atoms. It is not so at all. Consciousness, says Titchener, resembles a
+fresco in which the transition between colors is made through all kinds
+of intermediate stages of light and shade.... The idea of a pen or of an
+inkwell is not a stable thing clearly pictured like the pen or inkwell
+itself. More than any one else, William James has insisted on this point
+in his theory of "fringes" of states of consciousness. Outside of the
+given instances we could find many others among the various
+manifestations of the mental life. It is not, then, at all chimerical to
+assume in psychology an equivalent of chemical combination. In a complex
+state there is, in addition to the component elements, the result of
+their reciprocal influences, of their varying relations. Too often we
+forget this resultant.
+
+At bottom the ideal is an individual concept. If objection is offered
+that an ideal common to a large mass of men is a fact of common
+experience (e.g., idealists and realists in the fine arts, and even
+more so religious, moral, social and political concepts, etc.), the
+answer is easy: There are families of minds. They have a common ideal
+because, in certain matters, they have the same way of feeling and
+thinking. It is not a transcendental idea that unites them; but this
+result occurs because from their common aspirations the collective ideal
+becomes disengaged; it is, in scholastic terminology, a _universale post
+rem_.
+
+The ideal conception is the first moment of the creative act, which is
+not yet battling with the conditions of the actual. It is only the
+internal vision of an individual mind that has not yet been projected
+externally with a form and body. We know how the passage from the
+internal to the external life has given rise among inventors to
+deceptions and complaints. Such was the imaginative construction that
+could not, unchanged, enter into its mould and become a reality.
+
+Let us now examine the various forms of this coagulating[32] principle
+in advancing from the lowest to the highest, from the unity vaguely
+anticipated to the absolute and tyrannical masterful unity. Following a
+method that seems to me best adapted for these ill-explained questions I
+shall single out only the principal forms, which I have reduced to
+three--the unstable, the organic or middle, and the extreme or
+semi-morbid unity.
+
+(1) The unstable form has its starting point directly and immediately in
+the reproductive imagination without creation. It assembles its
+elements somewhat by chance and stitches together the bits of our life;
+it ends only in beginnings, in attempts. The unity-principle is a
+momentary disposition, vacillating and changing without cessation
+according to the external impressions or modifications of our vital
+conditions and of our humor. By way of example let us recall the state
+of the day-dreamer building castles in the air; the delirious
+constructions of the insane, the inventions of the child following all
+the fluctuations of chance, of its caprice; the half-coherent dreams
+that seem to the dreamer to contain a creative germ. In consequence of
+the extreme frailty of the synthetic principle the creative imagination
+does not succeed in accomplishing its task and remains in a condition
+intermediate between simple association of ideas and creation proper.
+
+(2) The organic or middle form may be given as the type of the unifying
+power. Ultimately it reduces itself to attention and presupposes nothing
+more, because, thanks to the process of "localization," which is the
+essential mark of attention, it makes itself a center of attraction,
+grouping about the leading idea the images, associations, judgments,
+tendencies and voluntary efforts. "Inspiration," the poet Grillparzer
+used to say, "is a concentration of all the forces and capacities upon a
+single point which, for the time being, should represent the world
+rather than enclose it. The reinforcement of the state of the mind comes
+from the fact that its several powers, instead of spreading themselves
+over the whole world, are contained within the bounds of a single
+object, touch one another, reciprocally help and reinforce each
+other."[33] What the poet here maintains as regards esthetics only is
+applicable to all the _organic_ forms of creation--that is to those
+ruled by an immanent logic, and, like them, resembling works of Nature.
+
+In order to leave no doubt as to the identity of attention and
+imaginative synthesis, and in order to show that it is normally the true
+unifying principle, we offer the following remarks:
+
+Attention is at times spontaneous, natural, without effort, simply
+dependent on the interest that a thing excites in us--lasting as long as
+it holds us in subjection, then ceasing entirely. Again, it is
+voluntary, artificial, an imitation of the other, precarious and
+intermittent, maintained with effort--in a word, laborious. The same is
+true of the imagination. The moment of inspiration is ruled by a perfect
+and spontaneous unity; its impersonality approaches that of the forces
+of Nature. Then appears the personal moment, the detailed working and
+long, painful, intermittent resumptions, the miserable turns of which so
+many inventors have described. The analogy between the two cases seems
+to me incontestable.
+
+Next let us note that psychologists always adduce the same examples when
+they wish to illustrate on the one hand, the processes of the
+persistent, tenacious attention, and, on the other hand, the
+developmental labor without which creative work does not come to pass:
+"Genius is only long patience," the saying of Newton; "always thinking
+of it," and like expressions of d'Alembert, Helmholtz and others,
+because in the one case as in the other the fundamental condition is the
+existence of a fixed, ever-active idea, notwithstanding its relaxations
+and its incessant disappearances into the unconscious with return to
+consciousness.
+
+(3) The extreme form, which from its nature is semi-morbid, becomes in
+its highest degree plainly pathological; the unifying principle changes
+to a condition of obsession.
+
+The normal state of our mind is a plurality of states of consciousness
+(polyideism). Through association there is a radiation in every
+direction. In this totality of coexisting images no one long occupies
+first place; it is driven away by others, which are displaced in turn by
+still others emerging from the penumbra. On the contrary, in attention
+(relative monoideism) a single image retains first place for a long time
+and tends to have the same importance again. Finally, in a condition of
+obsession (absolute monoideism) the fixed idea defies all rivalry and
+rules despotically. Many inventors have suffered painfully this tyranny
+and have vainly struggled to break it. The fixed idea, once settled,
+does not permit anything to dislodge it save for the moment and with
+much pain. Even then it is displaced only apparently, for it persists in
+the unconscious life where it has thrust its deep roots.
+
+At this stage the unifying principle, although it can act as a stimulus
+for creation, is no longer normal. Consequently, a natural question
+arises: Wherein is there a difference between the obsession of the
+inventor and the obsession of the insane, who most generally destroys in
+place of creating?
+
+The nature of fixed ideas has greatly occupied contemporary alienists.
+For other reasons and in their own way they, too, have been led to
+divide obsession into two classes, the intellectual and emotional,
+according as the idea or the affective state predominates. Then they
+have been led to ask: Which of these two elements is the primitive one?
+For some it is the idea. For others, and it seems that these are the
+more numerous, the affective state is in general the primary fact; the
+obsession always rests on a basis of morbid emotion and in a retention
+of impressions.[34]
+
+But whatever opinion we may hold on this point, the difficulty of
+establishing a dividing line between the two forms of obsession above
+mentioned remains the same. Are there characters peculiar to each one?
+
+It has been said: "The physiologically fixed idea is normally longed
+for, often sought, in all cases accepted, and it does not break the
+unity of the self." It does not impose itself fatally on consciousness;
+the individual knows the value thereof, knows where it leads him, and
+adapts his conduct to its requirements. For example, Christopher
+Columbus.
+
+The pathological fixed idea is "parasitic," automatic, discordant,
+irresistible. Obsession is only a special case of psychic
+disintegration, a kind of doubling of consciousness. The individual
+becomes a person "possessed," whose self has been confiscated for the
+sake of the fixed idea, and whose submission to his situation is wrought
+with pain.
+
+In spite of this parallel the distinguishing criterion between the two
+is very vague, because from the sane to the delirious idea the
+transitions are very numerous. We are obliged to recognize "that with
+certain workers--who are rather taken up with the elaboration of their
+work, and not masters directing it, quitting it, and resuming it at
+their pleasure--an artistic, scientific, or mechanical conception
+succeeds in haunting the mind, imposing itself upon it even to the
+extent of causing suffering." In reality, pure psychology is unable to
+discover a positive difference between obsession leading to creative
+work and the other forms, because in both cases the mental mechanism is,
+at bottom, the same. The criterion must be sought elsewhere. For that we
+must go out of the internal world and proceed objectively. We must judge
+the fixed idea not in itself but by its effects. What does it produce in
+the practical, esthetic, scientific, moral, social, religious field? It
+is of value according to its fruits. If objection be made to this change
+of front we may, in order to stick to a strictly psychological point of
+view, state that it is certain that as soon as it passes beyond a middle
+point, which it is difficult to determine, the fixed idea profoundly
+troubles the mechanism of the mind. In imaginative persons this is not
+rare, which partly explains why the pathological theory of genius (of
+which we shall speak later) has been able to rally so many to its
+support and to allege so many facts in its favor.
+
+FOOTNOTES:
+
+[30] For the distinction between this form of imagination and the
+two others (fixed, objectified), I refer the reader to the
+Conclusion of this work, where the subject will be treated in
+detail.
+
+[31] Colozza, _L'immaginazione nella Scienza_, Rome, 1900, pp. 111
+ff.
+
+[32] This unifying, organizing, creative principle is so active in
+certain minds that, placed face to face with any work whatever--novel,
+picture, monument, scientific or philosophic theory, financial or
+political institution--while believing that they are merely
+considering it, they spontaneously remake it. This characteristic of
+their psychology distinguishes them from mere critics.
+
+[33] Oelzelt-Newin, _op. cit._, p. 49.
+
+[34] Pitres et Régis, _Séméiologie des obsessions et des idées
+fixes_, 1878. Séglas, _Leçons cliniques sur les maladies mentales_,
+1895. Raymond et Janet, _Névroses et idées fixes_, 1898.
+
+
+
+
+SECOND PART
+
+THE DEVELOPMENT OF THE IMAGINATION.
+
+
+
+
+CHAPTER I
+
+IMAGINATION IN ANIMALS
+
+
+Up to this point the imagination has been treated analytically only.
+This process alone would give us but a very imperfect idea of its
+essentially concrete and lively nature were we to stop here. So this
+part continues the subject in another shape. I shall attempt to follow
+the imagination in its ascending development from the lowest to the most
+complex forms, from the animal to the human infant, to primitive man,
+thence to the highest modes of invention. It will thus be exhibited in
+the inexhaustible variety of its manifestations which the abstract and
+simplifying process of analysis does not permit us to suspect.
+
+
+I
+
+I shall not dwell at length on the imagination of animals, not only
+because the question is much involved but also because it is hardly
+liable to a positive solution. Even eliminating mere anecdotes and
+doubtful observations, there is no lack of verified and authentic
+material, but it still remains to interpret them. As soon as we begin to
+conjecture we know how difficult it is to divest ourselves of all
+anthropomorphism.
+
+The question has been formulated, even if not treated, with much system
+by Romanes in his _Mental Evolution in Animals_.[35] Taking
+"imagination" in its broadest sense, he recognizes four stages:
+
+1. Provoked revival of images. For example, the sight of an orange
+reminds one of its taste. This is a low form of memory, resting on
+association by contiguity. It is met with very far down in the animal
+scale, and the author furnishes abundant proof of it.
+
+2. Spontaneous revival. An object present calls up an absent object.
+This is a higher form of memory, frequent in ants, bees, wasps, etc.,
+which fact explains the mistrustful sagacity of wild animals. At night,
+the distant baying of a hound stops the fox in his course, because all
+the dangers he has undergone are represented in his mind.
+
+These two stages do not go beyond memory pure and simple, i.e.,
+reproductive imagination. The other two constitute the higher
+imagination.
+
+3. The capacity of associating absent images, without suggestion derived
+from without, through an internal working of the mind. It is the lower
+and primitive form of the creative imagination, which may be called a
+passive synthesis. In order to establish its existence, Romanes reminds
+us that dreams have been proven in dogs, horses, and a large number of
+birds; that certain animals, especially in anger, seem to be subject to
+delusions and pursued by phantoms; and lastly, that in some there is
+produced a condition resembling nostalgia, expressing itself in a
+violent desire to return to former haunts, or in a wasting away
+resulting from the absence of accustomed persons and things. All these
+facts, especially the latter, can hardly be explained without a vivid
+recollection of the images of previous life.
+
+4. The highest stage consists of intentionally reuniting images in order
+to make novel combinations from them. This may be called an active
+synthesis, and is the true creative imagination. Is this sometimes found
+in the animal kingdom? Romanes very clearly replies, no; and not without
+offering a plausible reason. For creation, says he, there must first be
+capacity for abstraction, and, without speech, abstraction is very weak.
+One of the conditions for creative imagination is thus wanting in the
+higher animals.
+
+We here come to one of those critical moments, so frequent in animal
+psychology, when one asks, Is this character exclusively human, or is it
+found in embryo in lower forms? Thus it has been possible to support a
+theory opposing that of Romanes. Certain animals, says Oelzelt-Newin,
+fulfill all the conditions necessary for creative imagination--subtle
+senses, good memory, and appropriate emotional states.[36] This
+assertion is perhaps true, but it is purely dialectic. It is equivalent
+to saying that the thing is possible; it does not establish it as a
+fact. Besides, is it very certain that all the conditions for creative
+imagination are present here, since we have just shown that there is
+lack of abstraction? The author, who voluntarily limits his study to
+birds and the construction of their nests, maintains, against Wallace
+and others, that nest-building requires "the mysterious synthesis of
+representations." We might with equal reason bring the instances of
+other building animals (bees, wasps, white ants, the common ants,
+beavers, etc.). It is not unreasonable to attribute to them an
+anticipated representation of their architecture. Shall we say that it
+is "instinctive," consequently unconscious? At least, may we not group
+under this head, changes and adaptations to new conditions which these
+animals succeed in applying to the typical plans of their construction?
+Observations and even systematic experiments (like those of Huber,
+Forel, _et al._) show that, reduced to the alternative of the
+impossibility of building or the modification of their habits, certain
+animals modify them. Judging from this, how refuse them invention
+altogether? This contradicts in no way the very just reservation of
+Romanes. It is sufficient to remark that abstraction or dissociation has
+stages, that the simplest are accessible to the animal intelligence. If,
+in the absence of words, the logic of concepts is forbidden it, there
+yet remains the logic of images,[37] which is sufficient for slight
+innovations. In a word, animals can invent according to the extent that
+they can dissociate.
+
+In our opinion, if we may with any truthfulness attribute a creative
+power to animals, we must seek it elsewhere. Generally speaking, we
+attribute only a mediocre importance to a manifestation that might very
+well be the proper form of animal fancy. It is purely motor, and
+expresses itself through the various kinds of play.
+
+Although play may be as old as mankind, its psychology dates only from
+the nineteenth century. We have already seen that there are three
+theories concerning its nature--it is "expenditure of superfluous
+activity," "a mending, restoring of strength, a recuperation," "an
+apprenticeship, a preliminary exercise for the active functions of life
+and for the development of our natural gifts."[38] The last position,
+due to Groos, does not rule out the other two; it holds the first valid
+for the young, the second for adults; but it comprehends both in a more
+general explanation.
+
+Let us leave this doctrinal question in order to call attention to the
+variety and richness of form of play in the animal world. In this
+respect the aforementioned book of Groos is a rich mine of evidence to
+which I would refer the reader. I limit myself to summing up his
+classification. He distinguishes nine classes of play, viz.: (1) Those
+that are at bottom experimental, consisting of trials at hazard without
+immediate end, often giving the animal a certain knowledge of the
+properties of the external world. This is the introduction to an
+experimental physics, optics, and mechanics for the brood of animals.
+(2) Movements or changes of place executed of their own accord--a very
+general fact as is proven by the incessant movements of butterflies,
+flies, birds, and even fishes, which often appear to play in the water
+rather than to seek prey; the mad running of horses, dogs, etc., in free
+space. (3) Mimicry of hunting, i.e., playing with a living or dead
+prey: the dog and cat following moving objects, a ball, feather, etc.
+(4) Mimic battles, teasing and fighting without anger. (5) Architectural
+art, revealing itself especially in the building of nests: certain birds
+ornament them with shining objects (stones, bits of glass), by a kind of
+anticipation of the esthetic feeling. (6) Doll-play is universal in
+mankind, whether civilized or savage. Groos believes he has found its
+equivalent in certain animals. (7) Imitation through pleasure, so
+familiar in monkeys (grimaces); singing-birds which counterfeit the
+voices of a large number of beasts. (8) Curiosity, which is the only
+mental play one meets in animals--the dog watching, from a wall or
+window, what is going on in the street. (9) Love-plays, "which differ
+from the others in that they are not mere exercises, but have in view a
+real object." They have been well-known since Darwin's time, he
+attributing to them an esthetic value which has been denied by Wallace,
+Tylor, Lloyd Morgan, Wallaschek, and Groos.
+
+Let us recapitulate in thought the immense quantity of motor expressions
+included in these nine categories and let us note that they have the
+following characters in common: They are grouped in combinations that
+are often new and unforeseen; they are not a repetition of daily life,
+acts necessary for self-preservation. At one time the movements are
+combined simultaneously (exhibition of beautiful colors), again (and
+most often) successively (amorous parades, fights, flight, dancing,
+emission of noises, sounds or songs); but, under one form or another,
+there is _creation_, _invention_. Here, the imagination acts in its
+purely motor character; it consists of a small number of images that
+become translated into actions, and serve as a center for their
+grouping; perhaps even the image itself is hardly conscious, so that all
+is limited to a spontaneous production and a collection of motor
+phenomena.
+
+It will doubtless be said that this form of imagination belongs to a
+very shallow, poor psychology. It cannot be otherwise. It is necessary
+that imaginative production be found reduced to its simplest expression
+in animals, and the motor form must be its special characteristic mark.
+It cannot have any others for the following reasons: incapacity for the
+work that necessarily precedes abstraction or dissociation, breaking
+into bits the data of experience, making them raw material for the
+future construction; lack of images, and especially fewness of possible
+combinations of images. This last point is proven alike from the data of
+animal psychology and of comparative anatomy. We know that the nervous
+elements in the brain serving as connections between sensory
+regions--whether one conceive of them as centers (Flechsig), or as
+bundles of commisural fibers (Meynert, Wernicke)--are hardly outlined in
+the lower mammalia and attain only a mediocre development in the higher
+forms.
+
+By way of corroboration of the foregoing, let us compare the higher
+animals with young children: this comparison is not based on a few
+far-fetched analogies, but in a thorough resemblance in nature. Man,
+during the first years of his life, has a brain but slightly
+differentiated, especially as regards connections, a very poor supply of
+images, a very weak capacity for abstraction. His intellectual
+development is much inferior to that of reflex, instinctive, impulsive,
+and imitative movements. In consequence of this predominance of the
+motor system, the simple and imperfect images, in children as in
+animals, tend to be immediately changed into movements. Even most of
+their inventions in play are greatly inferior to those enumerated above
+under nine distinct heads.
+
+A serious argument in favor of the prevalence of imagination of the
+motor type in the child is furnished by the principal part taken by
+movements in infantile insanity: a remark made by many alienists. The
+first stage of this madness, they say, is found in the convulsions that
+are not merely a physical ailment, but "a muscular delirium." The
+disturbance of the automatic and instinctive functions of the child is
+so often associated with muscular disturbances that at this age the
+mental disorders correspond to the motor ganglionic centers situated
+below those parts that later assume the labor of analysis and of
+imagination. The disturbances are in the primary centers of organization
+and according to the symptoms lack those analytic or constructive
+qualities, those ideal forms, that we find in adult insanity. If we
+descend to the lowest stage of human life--to the baby--we see that
+insanity consists almost entirely of the activity of a muscular group
+acting on external objects. The insane baby bites, kicks, and these
+symptoms are the external measure of the degree of its madness.[39] Has
+not chorea itself been called a muscular insanity?
+
+Doubtless, there likewise exists in the child a sensorial madness
+(illusions, hallucinations); but by reason of its feeble intellectual
+development the delirium causes a disorder of movements rather than of
+images; its insane imagination is above all a motor insanity.
+
+To hold that the creative imagination belonging to animals consists of
+new combinations of movements is certainly an hypothesis. Nevertheless,
+I do not believe that it is merely a mental form without foundation, if
+we take into account the foregoing facts. I consider it rather as a
+point in favor of the motor theory of invention. It is a singular
+instance in which the original form of creation is shown bare. If we
+wanted to discover it, it would be necessary to seek it where it is
+reduced to the greatest simplicity--in the animal world.
+
+FOOTNOTES:
+
+[35] Chapter X.
+
+[36] _Op. cit._, Appendix.
+
+[37] For a more detailed study of this subject, the reader is
+referred to the author's _Evolution of General Ideas_ (English
+trans., Open Court Publishing Co., Chicago), chapter I, section I.
+
+[38] A rather extended study of the subject by H. A. Carr will be
+found in the _Investigations of the Department of Psychology and
+Education of the University of Colorado_, vol. I, Number 2, 1902.
+The late Professor Arthur Allin devoted much time to the
+investigation of play. See his brief article entitled "Play" in the
+_University of Colorado Studies_, vol. I, 1902, pp. 58-73. (Tr.)
+
+[39] Hack Tuke, "Insanity of Children," in _Dictionary of
+Psychological Medicine_.
+
+
+
+
+CHAPTER II
+
+THE CREATIVE IMAGINATION IN THE CHILD
+
+
+At what age, in what form, under what conditions does the creative
+imagination make its appearance? It is impossible to answer this
+question, which, moreover, has no justification. For the creative
+imagination develops little by little out of pure reproduction by an
+evolutionary process, not by sudden eruption. Nevertheless, its
+evolution is very slow on account of causes both organic and
+psychological.
+
+We could not dwell long on the organic causes without falling into
+tiresome repetitions. The new-born infant is a spinal being, with an
+unformed diffluent brain, composed largely of water. Reflex life itself
+is not complete in him, and the cortico-motor system only hinted at; the
+sensory centers are undifferentiated, the associational systems remain
+isolated for a long time after birth. We have given above Flechsig's
+observation on this point.
+
+The psychological causes reduce themselves to the necessity for a
+consolidation of the primary and secondary operations of the mind,
+without which the creative imagination cannot take form. To be precise,
+we might distinguish, as does Baldwin, four epochs in the mental
+development of the child: (1) affective (rudimentary sensory processes,
+pleasures and pains, simple motor adaptations); (2) and (3) objective,
+in which the author establishes two grades, (a) appearance of special
+senses, of memory, instincts primarily defensive, and imitation; (b)
+complex memory, complicated movements, offensive activities, rudimentary
+will; (4) subjective or final (conscious thought, constitutive will,
+ideal emotions). If we accept this scheme as approximately correct, the
+_moment_ of imagination must be assigned to the third period (the second
+stage of the objective epoch) which fulfills all the sufficient and
+necessary conditions for its origination and for its rise above pure
+reproduction.
+
+Whatever the propitious age may be, the study of the child-imagination
+is not without difficulties. In order to enter into the child-mind, we
+must become like a child; as it is, we are limited to an interpretation
+of it in terms of the adult, with much false interpretation possible,
+agreeing too much or too little with the facts. Furthermore, the
+children studied live and grow up in a civilized environment. The result
+is that the development of their imagination is rarely unhampered and
+complete; for as soon as their fancy passes the middle level, the
+rationalizing education of parents and teachers is eager to master and
+control it. In truth it gives its full measure and reveals itself in
+the fulness of growth only among primitive peoples. With us it is
+checked in its flight by an antagonistic power, which treats it as a
+harbinger of insanity. Finally, children are not equally well-suited for
+this study; we must make a distinction between the imaginative and
+non-imaginative, and the latter should be eliminated.
+
+When we have thus chosen suitable subjects, observation shows from the
+start sufficiently distinct varieties, different orientations of the
+imagination depending on intellectual causes, such as the predominance
+of visual or acoustic or tactile-motor images making for mechanical
+invention; or dependent on emotional causes, that is, of character,
+according as the latter is timid, joyous, exuberant, retired, healthy,
+sickly, etc.
+
+If we now attempt to follow the development of the child-imagination, we
+may distinguish four principal stages, without assigning them,
+otherwise, a rigorous chronological order.
+
+1. The first stage consists of the passage from passive to creative
+imagination. Its history would be long were we to include all the hybrid
+forms that are made up partly of memories, partly of new groupings,
+being at the same time repetition and construction. Even in the adult,
+they are very frequent. I know a person who is always afraid of being
+smothered, and for this reason urgently asks that in his coffin his
+shirt be not tight at the neck: this odd prepossession of the mind
+belongs neither to memory nor to imagination. This particular case
+illustrates in a very clear form the nature of the first flights of the
+mind attempting to exercise its imaginative powers. Without enumerating
+other facts of this kind, it is more desirable to follow the
+imagination's development, limiting ourselves to two forms of the
+psychic life--perception and illusion. The necessary presence of the
+image in these two forms has been so often proven by contemporary
+psychology that a few words to recall this to mind will be sufficient.
+
+There seems to be a radical difference between perception, which seizes
+reality, and imagination. Nevertheless, it is generally admitted that in
+order to rise above sensation to perception, there must be a synthesis
+of images. To put it more simply, two elements are required--one, coming
+from without, the physiological stimulus acting on the nerves and the
+sensory centers, which becomes translated in consciousness through the
+vague state that goes by the name "sensation"; the other, coming from
+within, adds to the sensations present appropriate images, remnants of
+former experiences. So that perception requires an apprenticeship; we
+must feel, then imperfectly perceive, in order to finally perceive well.
+The sensory datum is only a fraction of the total fact; and in the
+operation we call "perceiving," that is, apprehending an object
+directly, a part only of the object is represented.
+
+This, however, does not go beyond reproductive imagination. The decisive
+step is taken in illusion. We know that illusion has as a basis and
+support a modification of the external senses which are metamorphosed,
+amplified by an immediate construction of the mind: a branch of a tree
+becomes a serpent, a distant noise seems the music of an orchestra.
+Illusion has as broad a field as perception, since there is no
+perception but may undergo this erroneous transformation, and it is
+produced by the same mechanism, but with interchange of the two terms.
+In perception, the chief element is the sensory, and the representative
+element is secondary; in illusion, we have just the opposite condition:
+what one takes as perceived is merely imagined--the imagination assumes
+the principal rôle. Illusion is the type of the transitional forms, of
+the mixed cases, that consist of constructions made up of memories,
+without being, in the strict sense, creations.
+
+2. The creative imagination asserts itself with its peculiar
+characteristics only in the second stage, in the form of animism or the
+attributing of life to everything. This turn of the mind is already
+known to us, though mentioned only incidentally. As the state of the
+child's mind at that period resembles that which in primitive man
+creates myths, we shall return to it in the next chapter. Works on
+psychology abound in facts demonstrating that this primitive tendency to
+attribute life and even personality to everything is a necessary phase
+that the mind must undergo--long or short in duration, rich or poor in
+inventions, according to the level of the child's imagination. His
+attitude towards his dolls is the common example of this state, and
+also the best example, because it is universal, being found in all
+countries without exception, among all races of men. It is needless to
+pile up facts on an uncontroverted point.[40] Two will suffice; I choose
+them on account of their extravagance, which shows that at this
+particular moment animism, in certain minds, can dare anything. "One
+little fellow, aged one year eight months, conceived a special fondness
+for the letter W, addressing it thus: 'Dear old boy W.' Another little
+boy well on in his fourth year, when tracing a letter L, happened to
+slip, so that the horizontal limb formed an angle, thus:
+
+    |
+    |
+    +---+
+        |
+
+He instantly saw the resemblance to the sedentary human form, and said:
+'Oh, he's sitting down.' Similarly, when he made an F turn the wrong way
+and then put the correct form to the left, thus,
+
+    +---   ---+
+    |         |
+    +--     --+
+    |         |
+
+he exclaimed, 'They're talking together!'" One of Sully's correspondents
+says: "I had the habit of attributing intelligence not only to all
+living creatures ... but even to stones and manufactured articles. I
+used to feel how dull it must be for the pebbles in the causeway to lie
+still and only see what was round about. When I walked out with a basket
+for putting flowers in, I used sometimes to pick up a pebble or two and
+carry them out to have a change."
+
+Let us stop a moment in order to try to determine the nature of this
+strange mental state, all the more as we shall meet it again in
+primitive man, and since it presents the creative imagination at its
+beginning.
+
+a. The first element is a fixed idea, or rather, an image, or group of
+images, that takes possession of consciousness to the exclusion of
+everything else:--it is the analogue of the state of suggestion in the
+hypnotized subject, with this sole difference--that the suggestion does
+not come from without, from another, but from the child itself--it is
+auto-suggestion. The stick that the child holds between his legs becomes
+for him an imaginary steed. The poverty of his mental development makes
+all the easier this contraction of the field of his consciousness, which
+assures the supremacy of the image.
+
+b. This has as its basis a reality that it includes. This is an
+important detail to note, because this reality, however tiny, gives
+objectivity to the imaginary creation and incorporates it with the
+external world. The mechanism is like that which produces illusion, but
+with a stable character excluding correction. The child transforms a bit
+of wood or paper into another self, because he perceives only the
+phantom he has created; that is, the images, not the material exciting
+them, haunt his brain.
+
+c. Lastly, this creative power investing the image with all its
+attributes of real existence is derived from a fundamental fact--the
+state of belief, i.e., adherence of the mind founded on purely
+subjective conditions. It does not come within my province to treat
+incidentally such a large question. Neglected by the older physiology,
+whose faculty-method inclined it toward this omission, belief or faith
+has recently become the object of numerous studies.[41] I necessarily
+limit myself to remarking that but for this psychic state, the nature of
+the imagination is totally incomprehensible. The peculiarity of the
+imagination is the production of a reality of human origin, and it
+succeeds therein only because of the faith accompanying the image.
+
+Representation and belief are not completely separated; it is the nature
+of the image to appear at first as a real object. This psychological
+truth, though proven through observation, has made itself acceptable
+only with great difficulty. It has had to struggle on the one hand
+against the prejudices of common-sense for which imagination is
+synonymous with sham and vain appearance and opposed to the real as
+non-being to being; on the other hand, against a doctrine of the
+logicians who maintain that the idea is at first merely conceived with
+no affirmation of existence or non-existence (_apprehensio simplex_).
+This position, legitimate in logic, which is an abstract science, is
+altogether unacceptable in psychology, a concrete science. The
+psychological viewpoint giving the true nature of the image has
+prevailed little by little. Spinoza already asserts "that
+representations considered by themselves contain no errors," and he
+"denies that it is possible to perceive [represent] without affirming."
+More explicitly, Hume assigns belief to our subjective dispositions:
+Belief does not depend on the nature of the idea, but on the manner in
+which we conceive it. Existence is not a quality added to it by us; it
+is founded on habit and is irresistible. The difference between fiction
+and belief consists of a feeling added to the latter but not to the
+former. Dugald Stewart treats the question purely as a psychologist
+following the experimental method. He enumerates very many facts whence
+he concludes that imagination is always accompanied by an act of belief,
+but for which fact the more vivid the image, the less one would believe
+it; but just the contrary happens--the strong representation commands
+persuasion like sensation itself. Finally, Taine treats the subject
+methodically, by studying the nature of the image and its primitive
+character of hallucination.[42] At present, I think, there is no
+psychologist who does not regard as proven that the image, when it
+enters consciousness, has two moments. During the first, it is
+objective, appearing as a full and complete reality; during the second,
+which is definitive, it is deprived of its objectivity, reduced to a
+completely internal event, through the effect of other states of
+consciousness which oppose and finally annihilate its objective
+character. There is an affirmation, then negation; impulse, then
+inhibition.
+
+Faith, being only a mode of existence, an attitude of the mind, owes its
+creative and vivifying power to general dispositions of our
+constitution. Besides the intellectual element which is its content, its
+material--the thing affirmed or denied--there are tendencies and other
+affective factors (desire, fear, love, etc.) giving the image its
+intensity, and assuring it success in the struggle against other states
+of consciousness. There are active faculties that we sometimes designate
+by the name "will," understanding by the term, as James says, not only
+deliberate volition, but all the factors of belief (hope, fear,
+passions, prejudices, sectarian feeling, and so forth),[43] and this has
+justly given rise to the truthful saying that the test of belief is
+action.[44] This explains how in love, religion, in the moral life, in
+politics, and elsewhere, belief can withstand the logical assaults of
+the rationalizing intelligence--its power is found everywhere. It lasts
+as long as the mind waits and consents; but, as soon as these affective
+and active dispositions disappear in life's experience, faith falls with
+them, leaving in its place a formless content, an empty and dead
+representation.
+
+After this, is it necessary to remark that belief depends peculiarly on
+the motor elements of our organization and not on the intellectual? As
+there is no imagination without belief, nor belief without imagination,
+we return by another route to the thesis supported in the first part of
+this essay, that creative activity depends on the motor nature of
+images.
+
+Insofar as concerns the special case of the child, the first of the two
+moments (the affirming) that the image undergoes in consciousness is all
+in all for him, the second (the rectifying) is nothing: there is
+hypertrophy of one, atrophy of the other. For the adult the contrary is
+true--in many cases, indeed, in consequence of experience and habit, the
+first moment, wherein the image should be affirmed as a reality, is only
+virtual, is literally atrophied. We must, however, remark that this
+applies only partially to the ignorant and even less to the savage.
+
+We might, nevertheless, ask ourselves if the child's belief in his
+phantoms is complete, entire, absolute, unreserved. Is the stick that he
+bestrides perfectly identified with a horse? Was Sully's child, that
+showed its doll a series of engravings to choose from, completely
+deceived? It seems that we must rather admit an intermittence, an
+alteration between affirmation and negation. On the one hand, the
+skeptical attitude of those who laugh at it displeases the child, who is
+like a devout believer whose faith is being broken down. On the other
+hand, doubt must indeed arise in him from time to time, for without
+this, rectification could never occur--one belief opposes the other or
+drives it away. This second work proceeds little by little, but then,
+under this form, imagination retreats.
+
+3. The third stage is that of play, which, in chronological order,
+coincides with the one just preceding. As a form of creation it is
+already known to us, but in passing from animals to children, it grows
+in complexity and becomes intellectualized. It is no longer a simple
+combination of images.
+
+Play serves two ends--for experimenting: as such it is an introduction
+to knowledge, gives certain vague notions concerning the nature of
+things; for creating: this is its principal function.
+
+The human child, like the animal, expends itself in movements, forms
+associations new to it, simulates defence, flight, attack; but the child
+soon passes beyond this lower stage, in order to construct by means of
+images (ideally). He begins by imitating: this is a physiological
+necessity, reasons for which we shall give later (see chapter iv.
+_infra_). He constructs houses, boats, gives himself up to large plans;
+but he imitates most in his own person and acts, making himself in turn
+soldier, sailor, robber, merchant, coachman, etc.
+
+To the period of imitation succeed more serious attempts--he acts with a
+"spirit of mastery," he is possessed by his idea which he tends to
+realize. The personal character of creation is shown in that he is
+really interested only in a work that emanates from himself and of
+which he feels himself the cause. B. Perez relates that he wanted to
+give a lesson to his nephew, aged three and a half years, whose
+inventions seemed to him very poor. Perez scratched in the sand a trench
+resembling a river, planted little branches on both banks, and had water
+flow through it; put a bridge across, and launched boats. At each new
+act the child would remain cool, his admiration would always have to be
+waited for. Out of patience, he remarked shortly that "this isn't at all
+entertaining." The author adds: "I believed it useless to persist, and I
+trampled under foot, laughing at myself, my awkward attempt at a
+childish construction."[45] "I had already read it in many a book, but
+this time I had learned from experience that the free initiative of
+children is always superior to the imitations we pretend to make for
+them. In addition, this experience and others like it have taught me
+that their creative force is much weaker than has been said."
+
+4. At the fourth stage appears romantic invention, which requires a more
+refined culture, being a purely internal, wholly imaginative (i.e.,
+cast in images) creation. It begins at about three or four years of age.
+We know the taste of imaginative children for stories and legends, which
+they have repeated to them until surfeited: in this respect they
+resemble semi-civilized people, who listen greedily to rhapsodies for
+hours at a time, experiencing all the emotions appropriate to the
+incidents of the tale. This is the prelude to creation, a semi-passive,
+semi-active state, an apprentice period, which will permit them to
+create in their own turn. Thus the first attempts are made with
+reminiscences, and imitated rather than created.
+
+Of this we find numerous examples in the special works. A child of three
+and a half saw a lame man going along a road, and exclaimed: "Look at
+that poor ole man, mamma, he has dot [got] a bad leg." Then the romance
+begins: He was on a high horse; he fell on a rock, struck his poor leg;
+he will have to get some powder to heal it, etc. Sometimes the invention
+is less realistic. A child of three often longed to live like a fish in
+the water, or like a star in the sky. Another, aged five years nine
+months, having found a hollow rock, invented a fairy story: the hole was
+a beautiful hall inhabited by brilliant mysterious personages, etc.[46]
+
+This form of imagination is not as common as the others. It belongs to
+those whom nature has well endowed. It forecasts a development of mind
+above the average. It may even be the sign of an inborn vocation and
+indicate in what direction the creative activity will be orientated.
+
+Let us briefly recall the creative rôle of the imagination in language,
+through the intervening of a factor already studied--thinking by
+analogy, an abundant source of often picturesque metaphors. A child
+called the cork of a bottle "door;" a small coin was called by a little
+American a "baby dollar;" another, seeing the dew on the grass, said,
+"The grass is crying."
+
+The extension of the meaning of words has been studied by Taine, Darwin,
+Preyer, and others. They have shown that its psychological mechanism
+depends sometimes on the perception of resemblance, again on association
+by contiguity, processes that appear and intermingle in an unforeseen
+manner. Thus, a child applies the word "mambro" at first to his nurse,
+then to a sewing machine that she uses, then by analogy to an organ that
+he sees on the street adorned with a monkey, then to his toys
+representing animals.[47] We have elsewhere given more similar cases,
+where we perceive the fundamental difference between thought by imagery
+and rational thought.
+
+To conclude: At this period the imagination is the master-faculty and
+the highest form of intellectual development. It works in two
+directions, one principal--it creates plays, invents romances, and
+extends language; the other secondary--it contains a germ of thought and
+ventures a fanciful explanation of the world which can not yet be
+conceived according to abstract notions and laws.
+
+FOOTNOTES:
+
+[40] One will find a large number of examples in Sully's work,
+_Studies of Childhood_, Chapter ii, entitled "The Age of
+Imagination." Most of the observations given in the present chapter
+have been borrowed from this author.
+
+[41] Apropos of this subject compare especially the recent studies
+by William James, _Varieties of Religious Experience_. (Tr.)
+
+[42] Spinoza, _Ethics_, II, 49, _Scholium_; Hume, _Human
+Understanding_, Part III, Section VII ff.; Dugald Stewart, _Elements
+of the Philosophy of the Human Mind_, Vol. I, Ch. III; Taine, _On
+Intelligence_, Part II.
+
+[43] James, _The Will to Believe and Other Essays_, p. 10.
+
+[44] Payot, _De la croyance_, 139 ff.
+
+[45] B. Perez, _Les trois premières années de l'enfant_, p. 323.
+
+[46] Sully, _op. cit._, pp. 59-61. Compayré, _L'évolution
+intellectuelle et morale de l'enfant_, p. 145.
+
+(Some time ago the writer was riding on a train, when the engine,
+for some reason or other, began to slow up, jerking, puffing, almost
+groaning, until it finally came to a full stop. The groaning
+continued. A little girl of about three called to her mother,
+"Too-too sick, too-too sick," and when finally the train started on
+again, the child was overjoyed that "too-too" was well again. (Tr.))
+
+[47] Sully, _op. cit._, p. 164.
+
+
+
+
+CHAPTER III
+
+PRIMITIVE MAN AND THE CREATION OF MYTHS
+
+
+We come now to a unique period in the history of the development of the
+imagination--its golden age. In primitive man, still confined in
+savagery or just starting toward civilization, it reaches its full bloom
+in the creation of myths; and we are rightly astonished that
+psychologists, obstinately attached to esthetics, have neglected such an
+important form of activity, one so rich in information concerning the
+creative imagination. Where, indeed, find more favorable conditions for
+knowing it?
+
+Man, prior to civilization, is a purely imaginative being; that is, the
+imagination marks the summit of his intellectual development. He does
+not go beyond this stage, but it is no longer an enigma as in animals,
+nor a transitory phase as in the civilized child who rapidly advances to
+the age of reason; it is a fixed state, permanent and lasting throughout
+life.[48] It is there revealed to us in its entire spontaneity: it has
+free rein; it can create without imitation or tradition; it is not
+imprisoned in any conventional form; it is sovereign. As primitive man
+has knowledge neither of nature nor of its laws, he does not hesitate to
+embody the most senseless imaginings flitting through his brain. The
+world is not, for him, a totality of phenomena subject to laws, and
+nothing limits or hinders him.
+
+This working of the pure imagination, left to itself and unadulterated
+by the intrusion and tyranny of rational elements, becomes translated
+into one form--the creation of myths; an anonymous, unconscious work,
+which, as long as its rule lasts, is sufficient in every way,
+comprehends everything--religion, poetry, history, science, philosophy,
+law.
+
+Myths have the advantage of being the incarnation of pure imagination,
+and, moreover, they permit psychologists to study them objectively.
+Thanks to the labors of the nineteenth century, they offer an almost
+inexhaustible content. While past ages forgot, misunderstood,
+disfigured, and often despised myths as aberrations of the human mind,
+as unworthy of an hour's attention, it is no longer necessary in our
+time to show their interest and importance, even for psychology, which,
+however, has not as yet drawn all the benefit possible from them.
+
+But before commencing the psychological study of the genesis and
+formation of myths considered as an objective emanation of the creative
+imagination, we must briefly summarize the hypotheses at present offered
+for their origin. We find two principal ones--the one, etymological,
+genealogical, or linguistic; the other, ethno-psychological, or
+anthropological.[49]
+
+The first, whose principal though not sole champion is Max Müller, holds
+that myths are the result of a disease of language--words become things,
+"nomina numina." This transformation is the effect of two principal
+linguistic causes--(a) Polynomy; several words for one thing. Thus the
+sun is designated by more than twenty names in the Vedas; Apollo,
+Phaethon, Hercules are three personifications of the sun; _Varouna_
+(night) and _Yama_ (death) express at first the same conception, and
+have become two distinct deities. In short, every word tends to become
+an entity having its attributes and its legends. (b) Homonomy, a single
+word for several things. The same adjective, "shining," refers to the
+sun, a fountain, spring, etc. This is another source of confusion. Let
+us also add metaphors taken literally, plays upon words, wrong
+construction, etc.
+
+The opponents of this doctrine maintain that in the formation of myths,
+words represent scarcely five per cent. Whatever may be the worth of
+this assertion, the purely philological explanation remains without
+value for psychology: it is neither true nor false--it does not solve
+the question; it merely avoids it. The word is only an occasion, a
+vehicle; without the working of the mind exciting it, nothing would
+change. Moreover, Max Müller himself has recently recognized this.[50]
+
+The anthropological theory, much more general than the foregoing,
+penetrates further to psychological origins--it leads us to the first
+advances of the human mind. It regards the myth not as an accident of
+primitive life, but as a natural function, a mode of activity proper to
+man during a certain period of his development. Later, the mythic
+creations seem absurd, often immoral, because they are survivals of a
+distant epoch, cherished and consecrated through tradition, habits, and
+respect for antiquity. According to the definition that seems to me best
+adapted for psychology, the myth is "the psychological objectification
+of man in all the phenomena that he can perceive."[51] It is a
+humanization of nature according to processes peculiar to the
+imagination.
+
+Are these two views irreconcilable? It does not seem so to me, provided
+we accept the first as only a partial explanation. In any event, both
+schools agree on one point important for us--that the material for myths
+is furnished by the observation of natural phenomena, including the
+great events of human life: birth, sickness, death, etc. This is the
+objective factor. The creation of myths has its explanation in the
+nature of human imagination--this is the subjective factor. We can not
+deny that most works on mythology have a very decided tendency to give
+the greater importance to the first factor; in which respect they need a
+little psychology. The periodic returns of the dawn, the sun, the moon
+and stars, winds and storms, have their effect also, we may suppose, on
+monkeys, elephants, and other animals supposedly the most intelligent.
+Have they inspired myths? Just the opposite: "the surprising monotony of
+the ideas that the various races have made final causes of phenomena, of
+the origin and destiny of man, whence it results that the numberless
+myths are reduced to a very small number of types,"[52] shows that it is
+the human imagination that takes the principal part and that it is on
+the whole perhaps not so rich as we are pleased to say--that it is even
+very poor, compared to the fecundity of nature.
+
+Let us now study the psychology of this creative activity, reducing it
+to these two questions: How are myths formed? What line does their
+evolution follow?
+
+
+I
+
+The psychology of the origin of the myth, of the work that causes its
+rise, may theoretically, and for the sake of facilitating analysis, be
+regarded as two principal moments--that of creation proper, and that of
+romantic invention.
+
+a. The moment of creation presupposes two inseparable operations which,
+however, we have to describe separately. The first consists of
+attributing life to all things, the second of assigning qualities to all
+things.
+
+Animating everything, that is attributing life and action to everything,
+representing everything to one's self as living and acting--even
+mountains, rocks, and other objects (seemingly) incapable of movement.
+Of this inborn and irresistible tendency there are so many facts in
+proof that an enumeration is needless: it is the rule. The evidence
+gathered by ethnologists, mythologists, and travelers fills large
+volumes. This state of mind does not particularly belong to long-past
+ages. It is still in existence, it is contemporary, and if we would see
+it with our own eyes it is not at all necessary to plunge into virgin
+countries, for there are frequent reversions even in civilized lands. On
+the whole, says Tylor, it must be regarded as conceded that to the lower
+races of humanity the sun and stars, the trees and rivers, the winds and
+clouds, become animated creatures living like men and beasts,
+fulfilling their special function in creation--or rather that what the
+human eye can reach is only the instrument or the matter of which some
+gigantic being, like a man, hidden behind the visible things, makes use.
+The grounds on which such ideas are based cannot be regarded as less
+than a poetic fancy or an ill-understood metaphor; they depend on a vast
+philosophy of nature, certainly rude and primitive, but coherent and
+serious.
+
+The second operation of the mind, inseparable, as we have said, from the
+first, attributes to these imaginary beings various qualities, but all
+important to man. They are good or bad, useful or hurtful, weak or
+powerful, kind or cruel. One remains stupefied before the swarming of
+these numberless genii whom no natural phenomenon, no act of life, no
+form of sickness escapes, and these beliefs remain unbroken even among
+the tribes that are in contact with old civilizations.[53] Primitive man
+lives and moves among the ceaseless phantoms of his own imagination.[54]
+
+Lastly, the psychological mechanism of the creative moment is very
+simple. It depends on a single factor previously studied--thinking by
+analogy. It is a matter first of all--and this is important--of
+conceiving beings analogous to ourselves, cast in our mould, cut after
+our pattern; that is, feeling and acting; then qualifying them and
+determining them according to the attributes of our own nature. But the
+logic of images, very different from that of reason, concludes an
+objective resemblance; it regards as alike, what seem alike; it
+attributes to an internal linking of images, the validity of an
+objective connection between things. Whence arises the discord between
+the imagined world and the world of reality. "Analogies that for us are
+only fancies were for the man of past ages real" (Tylor).
+
+b. In the genesis of myths, the second moment is that of fanciful
+invention. Entities take form; they have a history and adventures: they
+become the stuff for a romance. People of poor and dry imagination do
+not reach the second period. Thus, the religion of the Romans peopled
+the universe with an innumerable quantity of genii. No object, no act,
+no detail, but had its own presiding genius. There was one for
+germinating grain, for sprouting grain, for grain in flower, for
+blighted grain; for the door, its hinges, its lock, etc. There was a
+myriad of misty, formless entities. This is animism arrested at its
+first stage; abstraction has killed imagination.
+
+Who created those legends and tales of adventure constituting the
+subject-matter of mythology? Probably inspired individuals, priests or
+prophets. They came perhaps from dreams, hallucinations, insane
+attacks--they are derived from several sources. Whatever their origin,
+they are the work of imaginative minds _par excellence_ (we shall study
+them later) who, confronted with any event whatever, must, because of
+their nature, construct a romance.
+
+Besides analogy, this imaginative creation has as its principal source
+the associational form already described under the name "constellation."
+We know that it is based on the fact that, in certain cases, the
+arousing of an image-group is the result of a tendency prevailing at a
+given instant over several that are possible. This operation has already
+been expounded theoretically with individual examples in support.[55]
+But in order to gauge its importance, we must see it act in large
+masses. Myths allow us to do this. Ordinarily they have been studied in
+their historical development according to their geographical
+distribution or ethnic character. If we proceed otherwise, if we
+consider only their content--i.e., the very few themes upon which the
+human imagination has labored, such as celestial phenomena, terrestrial
+disturbances, floods, the origin of the universe, of man, etc.--we are
+surprised at the wonderful richness of variety. What diversity in the
+solar myths, or those of creation, of fire, of water! These variations
+are due to multiple causes, which have orientated the imagination now in
+one direction, now in another. Let us mention the principal ones: Racial
+characteristics--whether the imagination is clear or mobile, poor or
+exuberant; the manner of living--totally savage, or on a level of
+civilization; the physical environment--external nature cannot be
+reflected in the brain of a Hindoo in the same way as in that of a
+Scandinavian; and lastly, that assemblage of considerable and unexpected
+causes grouped under the term "chance."
+
+The variable combinations of these different factors, with the
+predominance of one or the other, explain the multiplicity of the
+imaginative conceptions of the world, in contrast to the unity and
+simplicity of scientific conceptions.
+
+
+II
+
+The form of imagination now occupying our attention by reason of its
+non-individual, anonymous, collective character, attains a long
+development that we may follow in its successive phases of ascent,
+climax, and decline. To begin with, is it necessarily inherent in the
+human mind? Are there races or groups of men totally devoid of myths?
+which is a slightly different question from that usually asked, "Are
+there tribes totally devoid of religious thoughts?" Although it is very
+doubtful that there are such now, it is probable that there were in the
+beginning, when man had scarcely left the brute level--at least if we
+agree with Vignoli[56] that we already find in the higher animals
+embryonic forms of animism.
+
+In any event, mythic creation appears early. We can infer this from the
+signs of puerility of certain legends. Savages who could not know
+themselves--the Iroquois, the Australian aborigines, the natives of the
+Andaman Islands--believed that the earth was at first sterile and dry,
+all the water having been swallowed by a gigantic frog or toad which was
+compelled, by queer stratagems, to regurgitate it. These are little
+children's imaginings. Among the Hindoos the same myth takes the form of
+an alluring epic--the dragon watching over the celestial waters, of
+which he has taken possession, is wounded by Indra after a heroic
+battle, and restores them to the earth.
+
+Cosmogonies, Lang remarks, furnish a good example of the development of
+myths; it is possible to mark out stages and rounds according to the
+degree of culture and intelligence. The natives of Oceania believe that
+the world was created and organized by spiders, grasshoppers, and various
+birds. More advanced peoples regard powerful animals as gods in disguise
+(such are certain Mexican divinities). Later, all trace of animal worship
+disappears, and the character of the myth is purely anthropomorphic.[57]
+Kühn, in a special work, has shown how the successive stages of social
+evolution express themselves in the successive stages of mythology--myths
+of cannibals, of hunters, of herders, land-tillers, sailors. Speaking of
+pure savagery, Max Müller[58] admits at least two periods--pan-Aryan and
+Indo-Iranian--prior to the Vedic period. In the course of this slow
+evolution the work of the imagination passes little by little from
+infancy, becomes more and more complex, subtle and refined.
+
+In the Aryan race, the Vedic epoch, despite its sacerdotal ritualism, is
+considered as the period _par excellence_ of mythic efflorescence. "The
+myth," says Taine, "is not here (in the Vedas) a disguise, but an
+expression; no language is more true and more supple: it permits a
+glimpse of, or rather causes us to discern, the forms of mist, the
+movements of the air, change of seasons, all the accidents of sky, fire,
+storm: external nature has never found a mode of thought so graceful and
+flexible for reflecting itself thereby in all the inexhaustible variety
+of her appearances. However changeable nature may be, the imagination is
+equally so."[59] It animates everything--not only fire in general,
+_Agni_, but also the seven forms of flame, the wood that lights it, the
+ten fingers of the sacrificing priest, the prayer itself, and even the
+railing surrounding the altar. This is one example among many others.
+The partisans of the linguistic theory have been able to maintain that
+at this moment every word is a myth, because every word is a name
+designating a quality or an act, transformed by the imagination into
+substance. Max Müller has translated a page of Hesiod, substituting the
+analytic, abstract, rational language of our time for the image-making
+names. Immediately, all the mythical material vanishes. Thus, "Selene
+kisses the sleeping Endymion" becomes the dry formula, "It is night."
+The most skilled linguists often declare themselves unable to change the
+pliant tongue of the imaginative age into our algebraic idioms.[60]
+Thought by imagery cannot remain itself and at the same time take on a
+rational dress.
+
+The mental state that marks the zenith of the free development of the
+imagination, is at present met with only in mystics and in some poets.
+Language has, however, preserved numerous vestiges of it in current
+expressions, the mythic signification of which has been lost--the sun
+rises, the sea is treacherous, the wind is mad, the earth is thirsty,
+etc.
+
+To this triumphant period there succeeds among the races that have made
+progress in evolution, i.e., that have been able to rise above the age
+of (pure) imagination, the period of waning, of regression, of decline.
+In order to understand it and perceive the how and why of it, let us
+first note that myths are reducible to two great categories:
+
+a. The explicative myths, arising from utility, from the necessity of
+knowing. _These undergo a radical transformation._
+
+b. The non-explicative myths, resulting from a need of luxury, from a
+pure desire to create: these undergo only a _partial_ transformation.
+
+Let us follow them in the accomplishment of their destinies.
+
+a. The myths of the first class, answering the various needs of knowing
+in order afterwards to act, are much the more numerous.... Is primitive
+man by nature curious? The question has been variously answered; thus,
+Tylor says yes; Spencer, no.[61] The affirmative and negative answers
+are not, perhaps, irreconcilable, if we take account of the differences
+in races. Taking it generally, it is hard to believe that he is not
+curious--he holds his life at that price. He is in the presence of the
+universe just as we are when confronted with an unknown animal or fruit.
+Is it useful or hurtful? He has all the more need for a conception of
+the world since he feels himself dependent on everything. While our
+subordination as regards nature is limited by the knowledge of her laws,
+he is on account of his animism in a position similar to ours before an
+assembly of persons whom we have to approach or avoid, conciliate or
+yield to. It is necessary that he be _practically_ curious--that is
+indispensable for his preservation. There has been alleged the
+indifference of primitive man to the complicated engines of civilization
+(a steamboat, a watch, etc.). This shows, not lack of curiosity, but
+absence of intelligence or interest for what he does not consider
+immediately useful for his needs.
+
+His conception of the world is a product of the imagination, because no
+other is possible for him. The problem is imperatively set, he solves it
+as best he can; the myth is a response to a host of theoretical and
+practical needs. For him, the imaginative explanation takes the place of
+the rational explanation which is yet unborn, and which for great
+reasons can not arise--first, because the poverty of his experience,
+limited to a small circle, engenders a multitude of erroneous
+associations, which remain unbroken in the absence of other experiences
+to contradict and shatter them; secondly, because of the extreme
+weakness of his logic and especially of his conception of causality,
+which most often reduces itself to a _post hoc, ergo propter hoc_.
+Whence we have the thorough subjectivity of his interpretation of the
+world.[62] In short, primitive man makes without exception or reserve,
+and in terms of images, what science makes provisionally, with reserves,
+and by means of concepts--namely, hypotheses.
+
+Thus, the explicative myths are as we see, an epitome of a practical
+philosophy, proportioned to the requirements of the man of the earliest,
+or slightly-cultured ages. Then comes the period of critical
+transformation: a slow, progressive substitution of a rational
+conception of the world for the imaginative conception. It results from
+a work of _depersonification_ of the myth, which little by little loses
+its subjective, anthropomorphic character in order to become all the
+more objective, without ever succeeding therein completely.
+
+This transformation occurs thanks to two principal supports: methodical
+and prolonged observation of phenomena, which suggests the objective
+notion of stability and law, opposed to the caprices of animism
+(example: the work of the ancient astronomers of the Orient); the
+growing power of reflection and of logical rigor, at least in
+well-endowed races.
+
+It does not concern the subject in hand to trace here the fortunes of
+the old battle whereby the imagination, assailed by a rival power, loses
+little by little its position and preponderance in the interpretation of
+the world. A few remarks will suffice.
+
+To begin with, the myth is transformed into philosophic speculation, but
+without total disappearance, as is seen in the mystic speculations of
+the Pythagoreans, in the cosmology of Empedocles, ruled by two
+human-like antitheses, Love and Hate. Even to Thales, an observing,
+positive spirit that calculates eclipses, the world is full of
+_daemons_, remains of primitive animism.[63] In Plato, even leaving out
+his theory of Ideas, the employment of myth is not merely a playful
+mannerism, but a real survival.
+
+This work of elimination, begun by the philosophers, is more firmly
+established in the first attempts of pure science (the Alexandrian
+mathematicians; naturalists like Aristotle; certain Greek physicians).
+Nevertheless, we know how imaginary concepts remained alive in physics,
+chemistry, biology, down to the sixteenth century; we know the bitter
+struggle that the two following centuries witnessed against occult
+qualities and loose methods. Even in our day, Stallo has been able to
+propose to write a treatise "On Myth in Science." Without speaking at
+this time of the hypotheses admitted as such and on account of their
+usefulness, there yet remain in the sciences many latent signs of
+primitive anthropomorphism. At the beginning of the nineteenth century
+people believed in several "properties of matter" that we now regard as
+merely modes of energy. But this latter notion, an expression of
+permanence underneath the various manifestations of nature, is for
+science only an abstract, symbolical formula: if we attempt to embody
+it, to make it concrete and representable, then, whether we will or no,
+it resolves itself into the feeling of muscular effort, that is, takes
+on a human character. To produce no other examples, we see that so far
+as concerns the last term of this slow regression, the imagination is
+not yet completely annulled, although it may have had to recede
+incessantly before a more solid and better armed rival.
+
+b. In addition to the explanatory myths, there are those having no claim
+to be in this class, although they have perhaps been originally
+suggested by some phenomenon of animate or inanimate nature. They are
+much less numerous than the others, since they do not answer multiple
+necessities of life. Such are the epic or heroic stories, popular tales,
+romances (which are found as early as ancient Egypt): it is the first
+appearance of that form of esthetic activity destined later to become
+literature. Here, the mythic activity suffers only a superficial
+metamorphosis--the essence is not changed. Literature is mythology
+transformed and adapted to the variable conditions of civilization. If
+this statement appear doubtful or disrespectful, we should note the
+following.
+
+Historically, from myths wherein there figure at first only divine
+personages, there arise the epics of the Hindoos, Greeks, Scandinavians,
+etc., in which the gods and heroes are confounded, live in the same
+world, on a level. Little by little the divine character is rubbed out;
+the myth approaches the ordinary conditions of human life, until it
+becomes the romantic novel, and finally the realistic story.
+
+Psychologically, the imaginative work that has at first created the gods
+and superior beings before whom man bows because he has unconsciously
+produced them, becomes more and more humanized as it becomes conscious;
+but it cannot cease being a projection of the feelings, ideas, and
+nature of man into the fictitious beings upon whom the belief of their
+creator and of his hearers confers an illusory and fleeting existence.
+The gods have become puppets whose master man feels himself, and whom he
+treats as he likes. Throughout the manifold techniques, esthetics,
+documentary collections, reproductions of the social life, the creative
+activity of the earliest time remains at bottom unchanged. Literature is
+a decadent and rationalized mythology.
+
+
+III
+
+Does the mythic activity of ancient times still exist among civilized
+peoples, unmodified as in literary creation, but in its pure form, as a
+non-individual, collective, anonymous, unconscious, work? Yes; as the
+popular imagination, when creating legends. In passing from natural
+phenomena to historic events and persons, the constructive imagination
+takes a slightly different position which we may characterize thus:
+legend is to myth what illusion is to hallucination.
+
+The psychological mechanism is the same in both cases. Illusion and
+legend are partial imaginations, hallucination and myth are total
+imaginations. Illusion may vary in all shades between exact perception
+and hallucination; legend can run all the way from exact history to pure
+myth. The difference between illusion and hallucination is sometimes
+imperceptible; the same is sometimes true of legend and myth. Sensory
+illusion is produced by an addition of images changing perception;
+legend is also produced by an addition of images changing the historic
+personage or event. The only difference, then, is in the material used;
+in one case, a datum of sense, a natural phenomenon; in the other, a
+fact of history, a human event.
+
+The psychological genesis of legends being thus established in general,
+what, according to the facts, are the unconscious processes that the
+imagination employs for creating them? We may distinguish two principal
+ones.
+
+The first process is a fusion or combination. The myth precedes the
+fact; the historical personage or event enters into the mould of a
+pre-existing myth. "It is necessary that the mythic form be fashioned
+before one may pour into it, in a more or less fluid state, the historic
+metal." Imagination had created a solar mythology long before it could
+be incarnated by the Greeks in Hercules and his exploits. "There was
+historically a Roland, perhaps even an Arthur, but the greater part of
+the great deeds that the poetry of the Middle Ages attributes to them
+had been accomplished long before by mythological heroes whose very
+names had been forgotten."[64] At one time the man is completely hidden
+by the myth and becomes absolutely legendary; again, he assumes only an
+aureole that transfigures him. This is exactly what occurs in the
+simpler phenomenon of sensory illusion: now the real (the perception) is
+swamped by the images, is transformed, and the objective element reduced
+to almost nothing; at another time, the objective element remains
+master, but with numerous deformations.
+
+The second process is idealization, which can act conjointly with the
+other. Popular imagination incarnates in a real man its ideal of
+heroism, of loyalty, of love, of piety, or of cowardice, cruelty,
+wickedness, and other abnormalities. The process is more complex. It
+presupposes in addition to mythic creation a labor of abstraction,
+through which a dominating characteristic of the historic personage is
+chosen and everything else is suppressed, cast into oblivion: the ideal
+becomes a center of attraction about which is formed the legend, the
+romantic tale. Compare the Alexander, the Charlemagne, the Cid of the
+Middle Age traditions to the character of history.
+
+Even much nearer to us, this process of extreme simplification--which
+the law of mental inertia or of least effort is sufficient to
+explain--always persists: Lucretia Borgia remains the type of
+debauchery, Henry IV of good fellowship, etc. The protests of historians
+and the documentary evidence that they produce avail nothing: the work
+of the imagination resists everything.
+
+To conclude: We have just passed over a period of mental evolution
+wherein the creative imagination reigns exclusively, explains
+everything, is sufficient for everything. It has been said that the
+imagination is "a temporary derangement." It seems so to us, although it
+is often an effort toward wisdom, i.e., toward the comprehension of
+things. It would be more correct to say, with Tylor, that it represents
+a state intermediate between that of a man of our time, prosaic and
+well-to-do, and that of a furious madman, or of a man in the delirium of
+fever.
+
+FOOTNOTES:
+
+[48] Primitive man has been defined as "he for whom sensuous data
+and images surpass in importance rational concepts." From this
+standpoint, many contemporary poets, novelists, and artists would be
+primitive. The mental state of the human individual is not enough
+for such a determination; we must also take account of the
+(comparative) simplicity of the social environment.
+
+[49] Let us mention the euhemeristic theory of Herbert Spencer,
+taken up recently by Grant Allen (_The Evolution of the Idea of
+God_, 1897), who brings down all religious and mythic concepts from
+a single origin--the worship of the dead.
+
+[50] "When I tried to briefly characterize mythology in its inner
+nature, I called it a disease of language rather than a disease of
+thought. The expression was strange but intentionally so, meant to
+arouse attention and to provoke opposition. For me, language and
+thought are inseparable." _Nouvelles études de Mythologie_, p. 51.
+
+[51] Vignoli, _Mito e Scienza_, p. 27.
+
+[52] Marillier, Preface to the French translation of Andrew Lang's
+_Myth, Ritual, and Religion_.
+
+[53] On this point consult a work very rich in information, W.
+Crooke's book, _Popular Religion and Folk-lore of Northern India_,
+1897.
+
+[54] "The Indian traversing the Montaña never feels himself alone.
+Legions of beings accompany him. All of the nature to whom he owes
+his soul speaks to him through the noise of the wind, in the roaring
+of the waterfall. The insect like the bird--everything, even to the
+bending twig wet with dew--for him has language, distinct
+personality. The forest is alive in its depths, has caprices,
+periods of anger; it avoids the thicket under the tread of the
+huntsman, or again presses him more closely, drags him into infected
+swamps, into closed bogs, where miserable goblins exhaust all their
+witchcraft upon him, drink his blood by attaching their lips to the
+wounds made by briers. The Indian knows all that; he knows those
+dread genii by name." Monnier, _Des Andes au Para_, p. 300.
+
+[55] See Part I, Chapter IV.
+
+[56] _Op. cit._, pp. 23-24.
+
+[57] Lang, _op. cit._, I, 162, and _passim_.
+
+[58] Max Müller, _op cit._, p. 12.
+
+[59] _Nouveaux Essais_, p. 320.
+
+[60] See Lang, _Myth, Ritual and Religion_, I, p. 234, a passage
+from the _Rig-Veda_, with four very different translations by Max
+Müller, Wilson, Benfrey, and Langlois.
+
+[61] On curiosity as the beginning of knowledge, compare the
+position held by Plato. (Tr.)
+
+[62] On this general subject consult the interesting though somewhat
+general article by Professor John Dewey, "The Interpretation of the
+Savage Mind," in the _Psychological Review_, May, 1903. The author
+justly criticises the current description of savages in negative
+terms, and contends that there is general misunderstanding of the
+true nature of the savage and of his activities. (Tr.)
+
+[63] It is now well accepted that Thales cannot be regarded as
+propounding a materialistic theory when he declares that everything
+is derived from water; for with him, "water" stands not merely for
+the substance that we call chemically "H2O," but for the "spirit
+that is in water" as well--the water-spirit is the _Grundprincip_.
+(Tr.)
+
+[64] Max Müller, _op. cit._, 39, 47-48, 59-60.
+
+
+
+
+CHAPTER IV
+
+THE HIGHER FORMS OF INVENTION
+
+
+We now pass from primitive to civilized man, from collective to
+individual creation, the characters of which it remains for us to study
+as we find them in great inventors who exhibit them on a large scale.
+Fortunately, we may dismiss the treatment of the oft-discussed,
+never-solved problem of the psychological nature of genius. As we have
+already noted, there enter into its composition factors other than the
+creative imagination, although the latter is not the least among them.
+Besides, great men being exceptions, anomalies, or as the current
+expression has it, "spontaneous variations," we may ask _in limine_
+whether their psychology is explicable by means of simple formulæ, as
+with the average man, or whether even monographs teach us no more
+concerning their nature than general theories that are never applicable
+to all cases. Taking genius, then, as synonymous with great inventor,
+accepting it _de facto_ historically and psychologically, our task is
+limited to the attempt to separate characters that seem, from
+observation and experiment, to belong to it as peculiarly its own.
+
+Putting aside vague dissertations and dithyrambics in favor of theories
+with a scientific tendency as to the nature of genius, we meet first the
+one attributing to it a pathological origin. Hinted at in antiquity
+(Aristotle, Seneca, etc.), suggested in the oft-expressed comparison
+between inspiration and insanity, it has reached, as we know--through
+timid, reserved, and partial statements (Lélut)--its complete expression
+in the famous formula of Moreau de Tours, "Genius is a neurosis."
+
+Neuropathy was for him the exaggeration of vital properties and
+consequently the most favorable condition for the hatching of works of
+genius. Later, Lombroso, in a book teeming with doubtful or manifestly
+false evidence, finding his predecessor's theory too vague, attempts to
+give it more precision by substituting for neurosis in general a
+specific neurosis--larvated epilepsy. Alienists, far from eagerly
+accepting this view, have set themselves to combat it and to maintain
+that Lombroso has compromised everything in wanting to make the term too
+precise. There are several possible hypotheses, they say: either the
+neuropathic state is the direct, immediate cause of which the higher
+faculties of genius are effects; or, the intellectual superiority,
+through the excessive labor and excitation it involves, causes
+neuropathic disturbances; or, there is no relation of cause and effect
+between genius and neurosis, but mere coëxistence, since there are found
+very mediocre neuropaths, and men above the average without a neurotic
+blemish; or, the two states--the one psychic, the other
+physiological--are both effects, resulting from organic conditions that
+produce according to circumstances genius, insanity, and divers nervous
+troubles. Every one of these hypotheses can allege facts in its favor.
+We must, however, recognize that in most men of genius are found so many
+peculiarities, physical eccentricities and disorders of all kinds that
+the pathologic theory retains much probability.
+
+There remain for consideration the sane geniuses who, despite many
+efforts and subtleties, have not yet been successfully brought under the
+foregoing formula, and who have made possible the enunciation of another
+theory. Recently, Nordau, rejecting the theory of his master Lombroso,
+has maintained that it is just as reasonable to say that "genius is a
+neurosis" as that "athleticism is a cardiopathy" because many athletes
+are affected with heart disease. For him, "the essential elements of
+genius are judgment and will." Following this definition, he establishes
+the following hierarchy of men of genius: At the highest rung of the
+ladder are those in whom judgment and will are equally powerful; men of
+action who make world-history (Alexander, Cromwell, Napoleon)--these are
+masters of men. On the second level are found the geniuses of judgment,
+with no hyper-development of will--these are masters of matter (Pasteur,
+Helmholtz, Röntgen). On the third step are geniuses of judgment without
+energetic will--thinkers and philosophers. What then shall we do with
+the emotional geniuses--the poets and artists? Theirs is not genius in
+the strict sense, "because it creates nothing new and exercises no
+influence on phenomena." Without discussing the value of this
+classification, without examining whether it is even possible,--since
+there is no common measure between Alexander, Pasteur, Shakespeare, and
+Spinoza,--and whether, on the other hand, common opinion is not right in
+putting on the same level the great creators, whoever they be, solely
+because they are far above the average, this remark is absolutely
+necessary: In the definition above cited the creative faculty _par
+excellence_--imagination--necessary to all inventors, is entirely left
+out.
+
+We can, however, derive some benefit from this arbitrary division.
+Although it is impossible to admit that "emotional geniuses" create
+nothing new and have no influence on society, they do form a special
+group. Creative work requires of them a nervous excitability and a
+predominance of affective states that rapidly become morbid. In this way
+they have provided the pathological theory with most of its facts. It
+would perhaps be necessary to recognize distinctions between the various
+forms of invention. They require very different organic and psychic
+conditions in order that some may profit by morbid dispositions that are
+far from useful to others. This point should deserve a special study
+never made hitherto.
+
+
+I
+
+We shall reduce to three the characters ordinarily met in most great
+inventors. No one of them is without exception.
+
+1. _Precocity_, which is reducible to innateness. The natural bent
+becomes manifest as soon as circumstances allow--it is the sign of the
+true vocation. The story is the same in all cases: at one moment the
+flash occurs; but this is not as frequent as is supposed. False
+vocations abound. If we deduct those attracted through imitation,
+environmental influence, exhortations and advice, chance, the attraction
+of immediate gain, aversion to a career imposed from without which they
+shun and adoption of an opposite one, will there remain many natural and
+irresistible vocations?
+
+We have seen above that[65] the passage from reproductive to
+constructive imagination takes place toward the end of the third year.
+According to some authors, this initial period should be followed by a
+depression about the fifth year; thenceforward the upward progress is
+continuous. But the creative faculty, from its nature and content,
+develops in a very clear, chronological order. Music, plastic arts,
+poetry, mechanical invention, scientific imagination--such is the usual
+order of appearance.
+
+In music, with the exception of a few child-prodigies, we hardly find
+personal creation before the age of twelve or thirteen. As examples of
+precocity may be cited: Mozart, at the age of three; Mendelssohn, five;
+Haydn, four; Handel, twelve; Weber, twelve; Schubert, eleven; Cherubini,
+thirteen; and many others. Those late in developing--Beethoven, Wagner,
+etc.--are fewer by far.[66]
+
+In the plastic arts, vocation and creative aptitude are shown
+perceptibly later, on the average about the fourteenth year: Giotto, at
+ten; Van Dyck, ten; Raphael, eight; Guerchin, eight; Greuze, eight;
+Michaelangelo, thirteen; Albrecht Dürer, fifteen; Bernini, twelve;
+Rubens and Jordaens being also precocious.
+
+In poetry we find no work having any individual character before
+sixteen. Chatterton died at that age, perhaps the only example of so
+young a poet leaving any reputation. Schiller and Byron also began at
+sixteen. Besides this, we know that the talent for versification, at
+least as imitation, is very early in developing.
+
+In mechanical arts children have early a remarkable capacity for
+understanding and imitating. At nine, Poncelet bought a watch that was
+out of order in order to study it, then took it apart and put it
+together correctly. Arago tells that at the same age Fresnel was called
+by his comrades a "man of genius," because he had determined by correct
+experiments "the length and caliber of children's elder-wood toy cannon
+giving the longest range; also, which green or dry woods used in the
+manufacture of bows have most strength and lasting power." In general,
+the average of mechanical invention is later, and scarcely comes earlier
+than that of scientific discovery.
+
+The form of abstract imagination requisite for invention in the sciences
+has no great personal value before the twentieth year: there are a
+goodly number, however, who have given proof of it before that
+age--Pascal, Newton, Leibniz, Gauss, Auguste Comte, etc. Almost all are
+mathematicians.
+
+These chronological variations result not from chance, but from
+psychological conditions necessary for the development of each form of
+imagination. We know that the acquisition of musical sounds is prior to
+speech: many children can repeat a scale correctly before they are able
+to talk. On the other hand, as dissolution follows evolution in inverse
+order,[67] aphasic patients lacking the most common words, can
+nevertheless sing. Sound-images are thus organized before all others,
+and the creative power when acting in this direction finds very early
+material for its use. For the plastic arts a longer apprenticeship is
+necessary for the education of the senses and movements. To acquire
+manual dexterity one must become skilled in observing form, combinations
+of lines and colors, and apt at reproducing them. Poetry and first
+attempts at novel-writing presuppose some experience of the passions of
+human life and a certain reflection of which the child is incapable.
+Invention in the mechanic arts, as in the plastic arts, requires the
+education of the senses and movements; and, further, calculation,
+rational combination of means, rigorous adaptation to practical
+necessities. Lastly, scientific imagination is nothing without a high
+development of the capacity for abstraction, which is a matter of slow
+growth. Mathematicians are the most precocious because their material is
+the most simple; they have no need, as in the case of the experimental
+sciences, of an extended knowledge of facts, which is acquired only with
+time.
+
+At this period of its development the imagination is in large part
+imitation. We must explain this paradox. The creator begins by
+imitating: this is such a well-known fact that it is needless to give
+proof of it, and it is subject to few exceptions. The most original mind
+is, at first, consciously or unconsciously somebody's disciple. It is
+necessarily so. Nature gives only one thing, "the creative instinct;"
+that is, the need of producing in a determined line. This internal
+factor alone is insufficient. Aside from the fact that the imagination
+at first has at its disposal only a very limited material, it lacks
+technique, the processes indispensable for realizing itself. As long as
+the creator has not found the suitable form into which to cast his
+creation he must indeed borrow it from another; his ideas must suffer
+the necessity of a provisional shelter. This explains how it is that
+later the inventor, reaching full consciousness of himself, in order to
+complete mastery of his methods, often breaks with his models, and burns
+what he at first adorned.
+
+
+II
+
+A second character consists of the necessity, the fatality of creation.
+Great inventors feel that they have a task to accomplish; they feel that
+they are charged with a mission. On this point we have a large number of
+testimonials and avowals. In the darkest days of his life Beethoven,
+haunted by the thought of suicide, wrote, "Art alone has kept me back.
+It seemed to me that I could not leave the world before producing all
+that I felt within me." Ordinarily, inventors are apt in only one line;
+even when they have a certain versatility, they remain bound to their
+own peculiar manner--they have their mark--like Michaelangelo; or, if
+they attempt to change it, if they try to be unfaithful as respects
+their vocation, they fall much below themselves.
+
+This characteristic of irresistible impulsion which makes the genius
+create not because he wants to, but because he must do it, has often
+been likened to instinct. This very widespread view has been examined
+before (Part I, Chapter ii).
+
+We have seen that there is no creative instinct in general, but
+_particular_ tendencies, orientated in a definite direction, which in
+most respects resemble instinct. It is contrary to experience and logic
+to admit that the creative genius follows any path whatever at his
+choice--a proposition that Weismann, in his horror of inheritance of
+acquired characters (which are a kind of innateness) is not afraid to
+support. That is true only of the man of talent, a matter of education
+and circumstances. The distinction between these two orders of
+creators--the great and the ordinary--has been made too often to need
+repetition, although it is proper to recognize that it is not always
+easy in practice, that there are names that cause us to hesitate, which
+we class somewhat at hazard. Yet genius remains, as Schopenhauer used to
+say, _monstrum per excessum_; excessive development in one direction.
+Hypertrophy of a special aptitude often makes genius fall, as far as the
+others are concerned, below the average level. Even those exceptional
+men who have given proof of multiple aptitudes, such as Vinci,
+Michaelangelo, Goethe, etc., always have a predominating tendency which,
+in common opinion, sums them up.
+
+
+III
+
+A third characteristic is the clearly defined _individuality_ of the
+great creator. He is the man of his work; he has done this or that: that
+is his mark. He is "representative." There is no other opinion as to
+this; what is a subject of discussion is the _origin_, not the nature of
+this individuality. The Darwinian theory as to the all-powerful action
+of environment has led to the question whether the representative
+character of great inventors comes from themselves, and from them alone,
+or must not rather be sought in the unconscious influence of the race
+and epoch of which they are at a given instant only brighter sparks.
+This debate goes beyond the bounds of our subject. To decide whether
+social changes are due mostly to the accumulated influences of some
+individuals and their initiative, or to the environment, to
+circumstances, to hereditary transmission, is not a problem for
+psychology to solve. We can not, however, totally avoid this discussion,
+for it touches the very springs of creation.
+
+Is the inventive genius the highest degree of personality or a synthesis
+of masses?--the result of himself or of others?--the expression of an
+individual activity or of a collective activity? In short, should we
+look for his representative character within him or without? Both these
+alternatives have authoritative supporters.
+
+For Schopenhauer, Carlyle (_Hero-worship_), Nietzsche, _et al._, the
+great man is an autonomous product, a being without a peer, a demigod,
+"_Uebermensch_." He can be explained neither by heredity, nor by
+environment.
+
+For others (Taine, Spencer, Grant, Allen, _et al._), the important
+factor is seen in the race and external conditions. Goethe held that a
+whole family line is summarized some day in a single one of its members,
+and a whole people in one or several men. For him, Louis XIV and
+Voltaire are respectively the French king and writer _par excellence_.
+"The alleged great men," says Tolstoi, "are only the labels of history,
+they give their names to events."[68]
+
+Each party explains the same facts according to its own principle and in
+its own peculiar way. The great historic epochs are rich in great men
+(the Greek republics of the fourth century B. C., the Roman Republic,
+the Renaissance, French Revolution, etc.). Why? Because, say some,
+periods put into ferment by the deep working of the masses make this
+blossoming possible. Because, say the others, this flowering modifies
+profoundly the social and intellectual condition of the masses and
+raises their level. For the former the ferment is deep down; for the
+latter it is on top.
+
+Without presuming to solve this vexed question, I lean toward the view
+of individualism pure and simple. It seems to me very difficult to admit
+that the great creator is only the result of his environment. Since this
+influence acts on many others, it is very necessary that, in great men,
+there should be in addition a personal factor. Besides, in opposition to
+the exclusively environmental theory we may bring the well-known fact
+that most innovators and inventors at first arouse opposition. We know
+the invariable sentence on everything novel--it is "false" or "bad;"
+then it is adopted with the statement that it had been known for a long
+time. In the hypothesis of collective invention, it seems that the mass
+of people should applaud inventors, recognizing itself in them, seeing
+its confused thought take form and body: but most often the contrary
+happens. The misoneism of crowds seems to me one of the strongest
+arguments in favor of the individual character of invention.
+
+We can doubtless distinguish two cases--in the first, the creator sums
+up and clearly translates the aspirations of his _milieu_; in the
+second, he is in opposition to it because he goes beyond it. How many
+innovators have been disappointed because they came before their time!
+But this distinction does not reach to the bottom of the question, and
+is not at all sufficient as an answer.
+
+Let us leave this problem, which, on account of its complexity, we can
+hardly solve through peremptory reasoning, and let us try to examine
+_objectively_ the relation between creation and environment in order
+that we may see to what extent the creative imagination, without losing
+its individual character--which is impossible--depends on the
+intellectual and social surrounding.
+
+If, with the American psychologists,[69] we term the disposition for
+innovating a "spontaneous variation"--a Darwinian term explaining
+nothing, but convenient--we may enunciate the following law:
+
+_The tendency toward spontaneous variation (invention) is always in
+inverse ratio to the simplicity of the environment._
+
+The savage environment is in its nature very simple, consequently
+homogeneous. The lower races show a much smaller degree of
+differentiation than the higher; in them, as Jastrow says, physical and
+psychic maturity is more precocious, and as the period just before the
+adult age is the plastic period _per se_, this diminishes the chances of
+a departure from the common type. Thus comparison between whites and
+blacks, between primitive and civilized peoples, shows that, for equal
+populations, there is an enormous disproportion as to the number of
+innovators.
+
+The barbarian environment is much more complex and heterogeneous: it
+contains all the rudiments of civilized life. Consequently, it favors
+more individual variations and is richer in superior men. But these
+variations are rarely produced outside of a very restricted
+field--political, military, religious. So it seems impossible to agree
+with Joly[70] that neither primitive nor barbarian peoples produce
+superior minds, "unless," as he says, "by this name we mean those that
+simply surpass their congeners." But is there a criterion other than
+that? I see none. Greatness is altogether a relative idea; and would not
+our great creators seem, to beings better endowed than we, very small?
+
+The civilized environment, requiring division of labor and consequently
+a constantly growing complexity of heterogeneous elements, is an open
+door for all vocations. Doubtless, the social spirit always retains
+something of that tendency toward stagnation that is the rule in lower
+social orders; it is more favorable to tradition than to innovation. But
+the inevitable necessity of a warm competition between individuals and
+peoples is a natural antidote for that natural inertia; it favors useful
+variations. Moreover, civilization means evolution; consequently the
+conditions under which the imagination is active change with the times.
+Let us suppose, Weismann justly says, that in the Samoan Islands there
+were born a child having the singular and extraordinary genius of
+Mozart. What could he accomplish? At the most, extend the gamut of three
+or four tones to seven, and create a few more complex melodies; but he
+would be as unable to compose symphonies as Archimedes would have been
+to invent an electric dynamo. How many creators have been wrecked
+because the conditions necessary for their inventions were lacking?
+Roger Bacon foresaw several of our great discoveries; Cardan, the
+differential calculus; Van Helmont, chemistry; and it has been possible
+to write a book on the forerunners of Darwin.[71] We talk so much of the
+free flight of imagination, of the all-comprehensive power of the
+creator, that we forget the sociological conditions--not to mention
+others--on which they are every moment dependent. In this respect, no
+invention is personal in the strict sense; there always remains in it a
+little of that anonymous collaboration the highest expression of which,
+as we have seen, is the mythic activity.
+
+By way of summary, and whatever be the causes, we may say that there is
+a universal tendency in all living matter toward variation, whether we
+consider vegetables, animals, or the physical and mental man. The need
+of innovating is only a special case, rare in the lower races, frequent
+in the higher. This tendency toward variation is fundamental or
+superficial: As fundamental, it corresponds to genius, and survives
+through processes analogous to natural selection, i.e., by its own
+power. As superficial, it corresponds to talent, survives and prospers
+chiefly through the help of circumstances and environment. Here, the
+orientation comes from without, not from within. According as the spirit
+of the time inclines rather to poetry or painting, or music, or
+scientific research, or industry, or military art, minds of the second
+order are dragged into the current--showing that a goodly part of their
+power is in the aptness, not for invention, but for _imitation_.
+
+
+IV
+
+The determination of the characters belonging to the inventive genius
+has necessitated some seemingly irrelevant remarks on the action of the
+environment. Let us return to invention, strictly so-called.
+
+For inventing there is always required a natural aptitude, sometimes, a
+happy chance.
+
+The natural disposition should be accepted as a fact. Why does a man
+create? Because he is capable of forming new combinations of ideas.
+However naïve this answer may be, there is no other. The only thing
+possible, is the determination of the conditions necessary and
+sufficient for producing novel combinations: this has been done in the
+first part of this book, and there is no occasion for going over it
+again. But there is another aspect in creative work to be
+considered--its psychological _mechanism_, and the form of its
+development.
+
+Every normal person creates little or much. He may, in his ignorance,
+invent what has been already done a thousand times. Even if this is not
+a creation as regards the species, it is none the less such for the
+individual. It is wrong to say, as has been said, that an invention "is
+a new and important idea." _Novelty_ only is essential--that is the
+psychological mark: importance and utility are accessory, merely social
+marks. Invention is thus unduly limited when we attribute it to great
+inventors only. At this moment, however, we are concerned only with
+these, and in them the mechanism of invention is easier to study.
+
+We have already seen how false is the theory that holds that there is
+always a sudden stroke of inspiration, followed by a period of rapid or
+slow execution. On the contrary, observation reveals many processes
+that apparently differ less in the _content_ of invention than according
+to individual temperament. I distinguish two general processes of which
+the rest are variations. In all creation, great or small, there is a
+directing idea, an "ideal"--understanding the word not in its
+transcendental sense, but merely as synonymous with end or goal--or more
+simply, a problem to solve. The _locus_ of the idea, of the given
+problem, is not the same in the two processes. In the one I term
+"complete" the ideal is at the beginning: in the "abridged" it is in the
+middle. There are also other differences which the following tables will
+make more clear:
+
+  _First Process_ (_complete_).
+
+  1st phase                 2nd phase        3d phase
+  IDEA                      INVENTION,       VERIFICATION,
+  (commencement)             or                or
+  Special incubation        DISCOVERY        APPLICATION
+  of more or less           (end)
+  duration
+
+The idea excites attention and takes a fixed character. The period of
+brooding begins. For Newton it lasted seventeen years, and at the time
+of definitely establishing his discovery by calculation he was so
+overcome with emotion that he had to assign to another the task of
+completing it. The mathematician Hamilton tells us that his method of
+quaternians burst upon him one day, completely finished, while he was
+near a bridge in Dublin. "In that moment I had the result of fifteen
+years' labor." Darwin gathers material during his voyages, spends a
+long time observing plants and animals, then through the chance reading
+of Malthus' book, hits upon and formulates his theory. In literary and
+artistic creation similar examples are frequent.[72]
+
+The second phase is only an instant, but essential--the moment of
+discovery, when the creator exclaims his "Eureka!"[73] With it, the work
+is virtually or really ended.
+
+  _Second Process_ (_abridged_).
+
+  1st phase                 2nd phase                 3rd phase
+  General preparation       IDEA (commencement)       CONSTRUCTIVE
+  (unconscious)             INSPIRATION                 and
+                            ERUPTION                  DEVELOPING
+                                                      period.
+
+This is the process in intuitive minds. Such seems to have been the case
+of Mozart, Poe, etc. Without attempting what would be a tedious
+enumeration of examples, we may say that this form of creation comprises
+two classes--those coming to maturity through an internal impulse, a
+sudden stroke of inspiration, and those who are suddenly illumined by
+chance. The two processes differ superficially rather than essentially.
+Let us briefly compare them.
+
+With some, the first phase is long and fully conscious; in others it
+seems negligible, equal to zero--there is nothing of it because there
+exists a natural or acquired tendency toward equilibrium. "For a long
+time," says Schumann, "I had the habit of racking my brain, and now I
+scarcely need to scratch my forehead. Everything runs naturally."[74]
+
+The second phase is almost the same in both cases: it is only an
+instant, but it is essential--it is the moment of imaginative synthesis.
+
+Lastly, the third phase is very short for some, because the main labor
+is already done, and there remains only the finishing touch or the
+verification. It is long for others, because they must pass from the
+perceived idea to complete realization, and because the preparatory work
+is faulty; so that for these the second creative process is shortened in
+appearance only.
+
+Such seem to me the two principal forms of the mechanism of creation.
+These are genera; they include species and varieties that a patient and
+minute study of the processes peculiar to various inventors would reveal
+to us. We must bear in mind that this work makes no claim of being a
+monograph on invention, but merely a sketch.[75]
+
+The two processes above described seem to correspond on the whole to
+the oft-made distinction between the intuitive or spontaneous, and the
+combining or reflective imagination.
+
+The intuitive, essentially synthetic form, is found principally in the
+purely imaginative types, children and savages. The mind proceeds from
+the whole to details. The generative idea resembles those concepts
+which, in the sciences, are of wide range because they condense a
+generalization rich in consequences. The subject is at first
+comprehended as a whole; development is organic, and we may compare it
+to the embryological process that causes a living being to arise from
+the fertilized ovum, analogous to an immanent logic. As a type of this
+creative form there has often been given a letter wherein Mozart
+explains his mode of conception. Recently (and that is why I do not
+reprint it here) it has been suspected of being apocryphal. I regret
+this--it was worthy of being authentic. According to Goethe,
+Shakespeare's _Hamlet_ could have been created only through an intuitive
+process, etc.
+
+The combining, discursive imagination proceeds from details to the
+vaguely-perceived unity. It starts from a fragment that serves as a
+matrix, and becomes completed little by little. An adventure, an
+anecdote, a scene, a rapid glance, a detail, suggests a literary or
+artistic creation; but the organic form does not appear in a trice. In
+science, Kepler furnishes a good example of this combining imagination.
+It is known that he devoted a part of his life trying strange
+hypotheses, until the day when, having discovered the elliptical orbit
+of Mars, all his former work took shape and became an organized system.
+Did we want to make use once more of an embryological comparison, it
+would be necessary to look for it in the strange conceptions of ancient
+cosmogonies: they believed that from an earthly slime arose parts of
+bodies and separate organs which through a mysterious attraction and
+happy chance ended by sticking together, and forming living bodies.[76]
+
+It is an accepted view that of these two modes, one, the abridged or
+intuitive process, is superior to the other. I confess to having held
+this prejudice. On examination, I find it doubtful, even false. There is
+a _difference_, not any "higher" and "lower."
+
+First of all, both these forms of creation are necessary. The intuitive
+process can suffice for an invention of short duration: a rhyme, a
+story, a profile, a _motif_, an ornamental stroke, a little mechanical
+contrivance, etc. But as soon as the work requires time and development
+the discursive process becomes absolutely necessary: with many inventors
+one easily perceives the change from one form to the other. We have seen
+that in the case of Chopin, "creation was spontaneous, miraculous,"
+coming complete and sudden. But George Sand adds: "The crisis over, then
+commenced the most heartrending labor at which I have ever been
+present," and she pictures him to us agonized, for days and weeks,
+running after the bits of lost inspiration. Goethe, likewise, in a
+letter to Humboldt regarding his Faust, which occupied him for sixty
+years, full of interruptions and gaps: "The difficulty has been to get
+through strength of will what is really to be gotten only by a
+spontaneous act of nature." Zola, according to his biographer, Toulouse,
+"imagines a novel, always starting out with a general idea that
+dominates the work; then, from induction to induction, he draws out of
+it the characters and all the story."
+
+To sum up: Pure intuition and pure combination are exceptional;
+ordinarily, it is a mixed process in which one of the two elements
+prevails and permits its qualification. If we note, in addition, that it
+would be easy to group under these two headings names of the first rank,
+we shall conclude that the difference is altogether in the _mechanism_,
+not in the _nature_ of creation, and is consequently accessory; and that
+this difference is reducible to natural dispositions, which we may
+contrast as follows:
+
+Ready-witted minds,          Logically-developing
+  excelling in conception,     minds, excelling in
+  making the whole almost      elaboration.
+  out of one piece.
+
+Work primarily unconscious.  Patience the preponderating
+                               rôle.
+
+                             Work primarily conscious.
+
+Actions quick.               Actions slow.
+
+
+V
+
+"Were we to raise monuments to inventors in the arts and sciences, there
+would be fewer statues to men than to children, animals, and especially
+_fortune_." In this wise expressed himself one of the sage thinkers of
+the eighteenth century, Turgot. The importance of the last factor has
+been much exaggerated. Chance may be taken in two senses--one general,
+the other narrow.
+
+(1) In its broad meaning, chance depends on entirely internal, purely
+psychic circumstances. We know that one of the best conditions for
+inventing is abundance of material, accumulated experience,
+knowledge--which augment the chances of original association of ideas.
+It has even been possible to maintain that the nature of memory implies
+the capacity of creating in a special direction. The revelations of
+inventors or of their biographers leave no doubt as to the necessity of
+a large number of sketches, trials, preliminary drawings, no matter
+whether it is a matter of industry, commerce, a machine, a poem, an
+opera, a picture, a building, a plan of campaign, etc. "Genius for
+discovery," says Jevons, depends on the number of notions and chance
+thoughts coming to the inventor's mind. To be fertile in
+hypotheses--that is the first requirement for finding something new. The
+inventor's brain must be full of forms, of melodies, of mechanical
+agents, of commercial combinations, of figures, etc., according to the
+nature of his work. "But it is very rare that the ideas we find are
+exactly those we were seeking. In order to find, _we must think along
+other lines_."[77] Nothing is more true.
+
+So much for chance within: it is indisputable, whatever may have been
+said of it, but it depends finally on individuality--from it arises the
+non-anticipated synthesis of ideas. The abundance of memory-ideas, we
+know, is not a sufficient condition for creation; it is not even a
+necessary condition. It has been remarked that a relative ignorance is
+sometimes useful for invention: it favors assurance. There are
+inventions, especially scientific and industrial, that could not have
+been made had the inventors been arrested by the ruling and presumably
+invincible dogmas. The inventor was all the more free the more he was
+unaware of them. Then, as it was quite necessary to bow before the
+accomplished fact, theory was broadened to include the new discovery and
+explain it.
+
+(2) Chance, in the narrow sense, is a fortunate occurrence stimulating
+invention: but to attribute to it the greater part, is a partial,
+erroneous view. Here, what we call chance, is the meeting and
+convergence of _two_ factors--one internal (individual genius), the
+other, external (the fortuitous occurrence).
+
+It is impossible to determine all that invention owes to chance in this
+sense. In primitive humanity its influence must have been enormous: the
+use of fire, the manufacture of weapons, of utensils, the casting of
+metals: all that came about through accidents as simple as, for example,
+a tree falling across a stream suggesting the first idea of a bridge.
+
+In historic times--and to keep merely to the modern period--the
+collection of authentic facts would fill a large volume. Who does not
+know of Newton's apple, Galileo's lamp, Galvani's frog? Huygens declared
+that, were it not for an unforeseen combination of circumstances, the
+invention of the telescope would require "a superhuman genius;" it is
+known that we owe it to children who were playing with pieces of glass
+in an optician's shop. Schönbein discovered ozone, thanks to the
+phosphorous odor of air traversed by electric sparks. The discoveries of
+Grimaldi and of Fresnel in regard to interferences, those of Faraday, of
+Arago, of Foucault, of Fraunhofer, of Kirchoff, and of hundreds of
+others owed something to "fortune." It is said that the sight of a crab
+suggested to Watt the idea of an ingenious machine. To chance, also,
+many poets, novelists, dramatists, and artists have owed the best part
+of their inspirations: literature and the arts abound in fictitious
+characters whose real originals are known.
+
+So much for the external, fortuitous factor; its rôle is clear. That of
+the internal factor is less so. It is not at all apparent to the
+ordinary mind, escaping the unreflecting. Yet it is extremely important.
+The same fortuitous event passes by millions of men without exciting
+anything. How many of Pisa's inhabitants had seen the lamp of their
+cathedral before Galileo! He does not necessarily find who wants to
+find. The happy chance comes only to those worthy of it. In order to
+profit thereby, one must first possess the spirit of observation,
+wide-awake attention, that isolates and fixates the accident; then, if
+it is a matter of scientific or practical inventions, the penetration
+that seizes upon relations and finds unforeseen resemblances; if it
+concerns esthetic productions, the imagination that constructs,
+organizes, gives life.
+
+Without repeating an evident truism, although it is often misunderstood,
+we ought to end by remarking that _chance is an occasion for, not an
+agent of, creation_.
+
+FOOTNOTES:
+
+[65] See above, Chapter II.
+
+[66] Some of these and the following figures are borrowed from
+Oelzelt-Newin, _op. cit._, pp. 70 ff.
+
+[67] Compare the well-known theory of Dr. Hughlings-Jackson. (Tr.)
+
+[68] For an elaborate and interesting discussion of this subject,
+see Tolstoi's _Physiology of War_. As showing the later trend of
+thought on this general theme, see the excellent summary by
+Professor Seligman, _The Economic Interpretation of History_. (Tr.)
+
+[69] William James, _The Will to Believe and other Essays_, pp. 218
+ff.; Jastrow, _Psych. Rev._, May, 1898, p. 307; J. Royce, _ibid._,
+March, 1898; Baldwin, _Social and Ethical Interpretations_, etc.
+
+[70] Joly, _Psychologie des grands hommes_.
+
+[71] Osborn, _From the Greeks to Darwin_.
+
+[72] Such, according to Binet and Passy, seem to be the cases of the
+Goncourts, Pailleron, etc. See "Psychologie des auteurs
+dramatiques," in _L'année psychologique_, I, 96.
+
+[73] Compare the striking instance of this moment as given by
+Froebel, in his _Autobiography_, in connection with his idea of the
+Kindergarten. (Tr.)
+
+[74] Quoted by Arréat, _Mémoire et Imagination_, p. 118. (Paris, F.
+Alcan.)
+
+[75] Paulhan ("De l'invention," _Rev. Philos._, December, 1898, pp.
+590 ff.) distinguishes three kinds of development in invention: (1)
+Spontaneous or reasoned--the directing idea persists to the end; (2)
+transformation, which comprises several contradictory evolutions
+succeeding and replacing one another in consequence of impressions
+and feelings; (3) deviation, which is a composite of the two
+preceding forms.
+
+[76] Cf. the well-known doctrine of Empedocles. (Tr.)
+
+[77] P. Souriau, _Théorie de l'invention_, pp. 6-7.
+
+
+
+
+CHAPTER V
+
+LAW OF THE DEVELOPMENT OF THE IMAGINATION
+
+
+Is imagination, so often called "a capricious faculty," subject to some
+law? The question thus asked is too simple, and we must make it more
+precise.
+
+As the direct cause of invention, great or small, the imagination acts
+without assignable determination; in this sense it is what is known as
+"spontaneity"--a vague term, which we have attempted to make clear. Its
+appearance is irreducible to any law; it results from the often
+fortuitous convergence of various factors previously studied.
+
+Leaving aside the moment of origin, does the inventive power, considered
+in its individual and specific development, seem to follow any law, or,
+if this term appear too ambitious, does it present, in the course of its
+evolution, any perceptible regularity? Observation separates out an
+empirical law; that is, extracts directly an abridged formula that is
+only a condensation of facts. We may enunciate it thus: The creative
+imagination in its complete development passes through two periods
+separated by a critical phase: a period of autonomy or efflorescence, a
+critical moment, a period of definitive constitution presenting several
+aspects.
+
+This formula, being only a summary of experience, should be justified
+and explained by the latter. For this purpose we can borrow facts from
+two distinct sources: (a) individual development, which is the safest,
+clearest, and easiest to observe; (b) the development of the species, or
+historical development, according to the accepted principle that
+phylogenesis and ontogenesis follow the same general line.
+
+
+I
+
+_First Period._ We are already acquainted with it: it is the imaginative
+age. In normal man, it begins at about the age of three, and embraces
+infancy, adolescence, youth: sometimes a longer, sometimes a shorter
+period. Play, romantic invention, mythic and fantastic conceptions of
+the world sum it up first; after that, in most, imagination is dependent
+on the influence of the passions, and especially sexual love. For a long
+time it remains without any rational element.
+
+Nevertheless, little by little, the latter wins a place.
+Reflection--including under the term the working of the
+intelligence--begins very late, grows slowly, and the proportion as it
+asserts itself, gains an influence over the imaginative activity and
+tends to reduce it. This growing antagonism is represented in the
+following figure.
+
+The curve IM is that of the imagination during this first period. It
+rises at first very slowly, then attains a rapid ascent and keeps at a
+height that marks its greatest attainment in this earliest form. The
+dotted line RX represents the rational development that begins later,
+advances much more slowly, but progressively, and reaches at X the level
+of the imaginative curve. The two intellectual forms are present like
+two rivals. The position MX on the ordinate marks the beginning of the
+second period.
+
+[Illustration]
+
+_Second Period._ This is a critical period of indeterminate length, in
+any case, always much briefer than the other two. This critical moment
+can be characterized only by its causes and results. Its causes are, in
+the physiological sphere, the formation of an organism and a fully
+developed brain; in the psychologic order, the antagonism between the
+pure subjectivity of the imagination and the objectivity of
+ratiocinative processes; in other words, between mental instability and
+stability. As for the results, they appear only in the third period, the
+resultant of this obscure, metamorphic stage.
+
+_Third Period._ It is definite: in some way or another and in some
+degree the imagination has become rationalized, but this change is not
+reducible to a single formula.
+
+(1) The creative imagination falls, as is indicated in the figure, where
+the imagination curve MN´ descends rapidly toward the line of abcissas
+without ever reaching it. This is the most general case; only truly
+imaginative minds are exceptions. One falls little by little into the
+prose of practical life--such is the downfall of love which is treated
+as a phantom, the burial of the dreams of youth, etc. This is a
+regression, not an end; for the creative imagination disappears
+completely in no man; it only becomes accessory.
+
+(2) It keeps up but becomes transformed; it adapts itself to the
+conditions of rational thought; it is no longer pure imagination, but
+becomes a mixed form--the fact is indicated in the diagram by the union
+of the two lines, MN, the imagination, and XO, the rational. This is the
+case with truly imaginative beings, in whom inventive power long remains
+young and fresh.
+
+This period of preservation, of definitive constitution with rational
+transformation, presents several varieties. First, and simplest,
+_transformation into logical form_. The creative power manifested in the
+first stage remains true to itself, and always follows the same trend.
+Such are the precocious inventors, those whose vocation appeared early
+and never changed direction. Invention loses its childish or juvenile
+character in becoming virile; there are no other changes. Compare
+Schiller's _Robbers_, written in his teens, with his _Wallenstein_,
+dating from his fortieth year; or the vague sketches of the adolescent
+James Watt with his inventions as a man.
+
+Another case is the _metamorphosis_ or _deviation_ of creative power. We
+know what numbers of men who have left a great name in science,
+politics, mechanical or industrial invention started out with mediocre
+efforts in music, painting, and especially poetry, the drama, and
+fiction. The imaginative impulse did not discover its true direction at
+the outset; it imitated while trying to invent. What has been said above
+concerning the chronological development of the imagination would be
+tiresome repetition. The need of creating followed from the first the
+line of least resistance, where it found certain materials ready to
+hand. But in order to arrive to full consciousness of itself it needed
+more time, more knowledge, more accumulated experience.
+
+We might here ask whether the contrary case is also met with; i.e.,
+where the imagination, in this third period, would return to the
+inclinations of the first period. This regressive metamorphosis--for I
+cannot style it otherwise--is rare but not without examples. Ordinarily
+the creative imagination, when it has passed its adult stage, becomes
+attenuated by slow atrophy without undergoing serious change of form.
+Nevertheless, I am able to cite the case of a well-known scholar who
+began with a taste for art, especially plastic art, went over rapidly
+to literature, devoted his life to biologic studies, in which he gained
+a very deserved reputation; then, in turn, became totally disgusted with
+scientific research, came back to literature and finally to the arts,
+which have entirely monopolized him.
+
+Finally--for there are very many forms--in some the imagination, though
+strong, scarcely passes beyond the first stage, always retains its
+youthful, almost childish form, hardly modified by a minimum of
+rationality. Let us note that it is not a question here of the
+characteristic ingenuousness of some inventors, which has caused them to
+be called "grown-up children," but of the candor and inherent simplicity
+of the imagination itself. This exceptional form is hardly reconcilable
+except with esthetic creation. Let us add the mystic imagination. It
+could furnish examples, less in its religious conceptions, which are
+without control, than in its reveries of a scientific turn. Contemporary
+mystics have invented adaptations of the world that take us back to the
+mythology of early times. This prolonged childhood of the imagination,
+which is, in a word, an anomaly, produces curiosities rather than
+lasting works.
+
+At this third period in the development of the imagination appears a
+second, subsidiary law, that of _increasing complexity_; it follows a
+progressive line from the simple to the complex. Indeed, it is not,
+strictly speaking, a law of the imagination but of the rational
+development exerting an influence on it by a counter-action. It is a
+law of the mind that _knows_, not of one that _imagines_.
+
+It is needless to show that theoretical and practical intelligence
+develops as an increasing complex. But from the time that the mind
+distinguishes clearly between the possible and the impossible, between
+the fancied and the real--which is a capacity wanting in primitive
+man--as soon as man has formed rational habits and has undergone
+experience the impress of which is ineffaceable, the creative
+imagination is subject, _nolens volens_, to new conditions; it is no
+longer absolute mistress of itself, it has lost the assurance of its
+infancy, and is under the rules of logical thought, which draws it along
+in its train. Aside from the exceptions given above--and even they are
+partial exceptions only--creative power depends on the ability to
+understand, which imposes upon it its form and developmental law. In
+literature and in the arts comparison between the simplicity of
+primitive creations and the complexity of advanced civilizations has
+become commonplace. In the practical, technical, scientific and social
+worlds the higher up we go the more we have to know in order to create,
+and in default of this condition we merely repeat when we think we are
+inventing.
+
+
+II
+
+Historically considered, in the species, the development of the
+imagination follows the same line of progress as in the individual. We
+will not repeat it; it would be mere reiteration in a vaguer form of
+what we have just said. A few brief notes will suffice.
+
+Vico--whose name deserves to be mentioned here because he was the first
+to see the good that we can get from myths for the study of the
+imagination--divided the course of humanity into three successive ages:
+divine or theocratic, heroic or fabulous, human or historic, after which
+the cycle begins over again. Although this too hypothetic conception is
+now forgotten, it is sufficient for our purposes. What, indeed, are
+those first two stages that have everywhere and always been the
+harbingers and preparers of civilization, if not the triumphant period
+of the imagination? It has produced myths, religions, legends, epics and
+martial narratives, and imposing monuments erected in honor of gods and
+heroes. Many nations whose evolution has been incomplete have not gone
+beyond this stage.
+
+Let us now consider this question under a more definite, more limited,
+better known form--the history of intellectual development in Europe
+since the fall of the Roman Empire. It shows very distinctly our three
+periods.
+
+No one will question the preponderance of the imagination during the
+middle Ages: intensity of religious feeling, ceaselessly repeated
+epidemics of superstition; the institution of chivalry, with all its
+accessories; heroic poetry, chivalric romances; courts of love,
+efflorescence of Gothic art, the beginning of modern music, etc. On the
+other hand, the _quantity_ of imagination applied during this epoch to
+practical, industrial, commercial invention is very small. Their
+scientific culture, buried in Latin jargon, is made up partly of antique
+traditions, partly of fancies; what the ten centuries added to positive
+science is almost _nil_. Our figure, with its two curves, one
+imaginative, the other rational, thus applies just as well to historical
+development as to individual development during this first period.
+
+No more will anyone question that the Renaissance is a critical moment,
+a transition period, and a transformation analogous to that which we
+have noted in the individual, when there rises, opposed to imagination,
+a rival power.
+
+Finally, it will be admitted without dissent that during the modern
+period social imagination has become partly decayed, partly
+rationalized, under the influence of two principal factors--one
+scientific, the other economic. On the one hand the development of
+science, on the other hand the great maritime discoveries, by
+stimulating industrial and commercial inventions, have given the
+imagination a new field of activity. There have arisen points of
+attraction that have drawn it into other paths, have imposed upon it
+other forms of creation that have often been neglected or misunderstood
+and that we shall study in the Third Part.
+
+
+
+
+THIRD PART
+
+THE PRINCIPAL TYPES OF IMAGINATION
+
+
+
+
+PRELIMINARY
+
+
+After having studied the creative imagination in its constitutive
+elements and in its development we purpose, in this last part,
+describing its principal forms. This will be neither analytic nor
+genetic but concrete. The reader need not fear wearisome repetition; our
+subject is sufficiently complex to permit a third treatment without
+reiteration.
+
+The expression "creative imagination," like all general terms, is an
+abbreviation and an abstraction. There is no "imagination in general,"
+but only _men who imagine_, and who do so in different ways; the reality
+is in them. The diversities in creation, however numerous, should be
+reducible to types that are _varieties_ of imagination, and the
+determination of these varieties is analogous to that of character as
+related to will. Indeed, when we have settled upon the physiological and
+psychological conditions of voluntary activity we have only done a work
+in _general_ psychology. Men being variously constituted, their modes of
+action bear the stamp of their individuality; in each one there is a
+personal factor that, whatever its ultimate nature, puts its mark on the
+will and makes it energetic or weak, rapid or slow, stable or unstable,
+continuous or intermittent. The same is true of the creative
+imagination. We cannot know it completely without a study of its
+varieties, without a special psychology, toward which the following
+chapters are an attempt.
+
+How are we to determine these varieties? Many will be inclined to think
+that the method is indicated in advance. Have not psychologists
+distinguished, according as one or another of image-groups
+preponderates, visual, auditory, motor and mixed types? Is not the way
+clear and is it not well enough to go in this direction? However natural
+this solution may appear, it is illusory and can lead to naught. It
+rests on the equivocal use of the word "imagination," which at one time
+means mere reproduction of images, and at another time creative
+activity, and which, consequently, keeps up the erroneous notion that in
+the creative imagination images, the raw materials, are the essential
+part. The materials, no doubt, are not a negligible element, but by
+themselves they cannot reveal to us the species and varieties that have
+their origin in an anterior and superior tendency of mind. We shall see
+in the sequel that the very nature of constructive imagination may
+express itself indifferently in sounds, words, colors, lines, and even
+numbers. The method that should allege to settle the various
+orientations of creative activity according to the nature of images
+would no more go to the bottom of the matter than would a classification
+of architecture according to the materials employed (as rock, brick,
+iron, wood, etc.) with no regard for differences of style.
+
+This method aside, since the determination must be made according to the
+individuality of the architect, what method shall we follow? The matter
+is even more perplexing than the study of character. Although various
+authors have treated the latter subject (we have attempted it
+elsewhere), no one of the proposed classifications has been universally
+accepted. Nevertheless, despite their differences, they coincide in
+several points, because these have the advantage of resting on a common
+basis--the large manifestations of human nature, feeling, doing,
+thinking. In our subject I find nothing like this and I seek in vain for
+a point of support. Classifications are made according to the essential
+dominating attributes; but, as regards the varieties of the creative
+imagination, what are they?
+
+We may, indeed, as was said above, distinguish two great classes--the
+intuitive and the combining. From another point of view we may
+distinguish invention of free range (esthetic, religious, mystic) from
+invention more or less restricted (mechanical, scientific, commercial,
+military, political, social). But these two divisions are too general,
+leading to nothing. A true classification should be in touch with facts,
+and this one soars too high.
+
+Leaving, then, to others, more skilled or more fortunate, the task of a
+rational and systematic determination, if it be possible, we shall try
+merely to distinguish and describe the principal forms, such as
+experience gives them to us, emphasizing those that have been neglected
+or misinterpreted. What follows is thus neither a classification nor
+even a complete enumeration.
+
+We shall study at first two general forms of the creative
+imagination--the plastic and the diffluent--and later, special forms,
+determined by their content and subject.
+
+       *       *       *       *       *
+
+Wundt, in a little-noticed passage of his _Physiological Psychology_,
+has undertaken to determine the composition of the "principal forms of
+talent," which he reduces to four:
+
+The first element is imagination. It may be intuitive, "that is,
+conferring on representations a clearness of sense-perception," or
+combining; "then it operates on multiple combinations of images." A very
+marked development in both directions at the same time is uncommon; the
+author assigns reasons for this.
+
+The second element is understanding (_Verstand_). It may be
+inductive--i.e., inclining toward the collection of facts in order to
+draw generalizations from them--or deductive, taking general concepts
+and laws to trace their consequences.
+
+If the intuitive imagination is joined to the inductive spirit we have
+the talent for observation of the naturalist, the psychologist, the
+pedagogue, the man of affairs.
+
+If the intuitive imagination is combined with the deductive spirit we
+have the analytical talent of the systematic naturalist, of the
+geometrician. In Linnaeus and Cuvier the intuitive element predominates;
+in Gauss, the analytical element.
+
+The combining imagination joined to the inductive spirit constitutes
+"the talent for invention strictly so-called," in industry, in the
+technique of science; it gives the artist and the poet the power of
+composing their works.
+
+The combining imagination plus the deductive spirit gives the
+speculative talent of the mathematician and philosopher; deduction
+predominates in the former, imagination in the latter.[78]
+
+FOOTNOTES:
+
+[78] Wundt, _Physiologische Psychologie_, 4th German edition, Vol.
+II, pp. 490-95.
+
+
+
+
+CHAPTER I
+
+THE PLASTIC IMAGINATION
+
+I
+
+
+By "plastic imagination" I understand that which has for its special
+characters clearness and precision of form; more explicitly those forms
+whose materials are clear images (whatever be their nature), approaching
+perception, giving the impression of reality; in which, too, there
+predominate _associations with objective relations_, determinable with
+precision. The plastic mark, therefore, is in the images, and in the
+modes of association of images. In somewhat rough terms, requiring
+modifications which the reader himself can make, it is the imagination
+that materializes.
+
+Between perception--a very complex synthesis of qualities, attributes
+and relations--and conception--which is only the consciousness of a
+quality, quantity, or relation, often of only a single word accompanied
+by vague outlines and a latent, potential knowledge; between concrete
+and abstract, the image occupies an intermediate position and can run
+from one pole to another, now full of reality, now almost as poor and
+pale as a concept. The representation here styled plastic descends
+towards its point of origin; it is an external imagination, arising from
+sensation rather than from feeling and needing to become objective.
+
+Thus its general characters are easy of determination. First and
+foremost, it makes use of visual images; then of motor images; lastly,
+in practical invention, of tactile images. In a word, the three groups
+of images present to a great extent the character of externality and
+objectivity. The clearness of form of these three groups proceeds from
+their origin, because they arise from sensation well determined in
+space--sight, movement, touch. Plastic imagination depends most on
+spatial conditions. We shall see that its opposite, diffluent
+imagination, is that which depends least upon that factor, or is most
+free from it. Among these naturally objective elements the plastic
+imagination chooses the most objective, which fact gives its creations
+an air of reality and life.
+
+The second characteristic is inferiority of the affective element; it
+appears only intermittently and is entirely blotted out before sensory
+impression. This form of the creative imagination, coming especially
+from sensation, aims especially at sensation. Thus it is rather
+superficial, greatly devoid of that internal mark that comes from
+feeling.
+
+But if it chance that both sensory and affective elements are equal in
+power; if there is at the same time intense vision adequate to reality,
+and profound emotion, violent shock, then there arise extraordinary
+imaginative personages, like Shakespeare, Carlyle, Michelet. It is
+needless to describe this form of imagination, excellent pen-pictures of
+which have been given by the critics;[79] let us merely note that its
+psychology reduces itself to an alternately ascending and descending
+movement between the two limiting points of perception and idea. The
+ascending process assigns to inanimate objects life, desires and
+feelings. Thus Michelet: "The great streams of the Netherlands, _tired_
+with their very long course, _perish_ as though from _weariness_ in the
+_unfeeling_ ocean."[80] Elsewhere, the great folio begets the octavo,
+"which becomes the parent of the small volume, of booklets, of ephemeral
+pamphlets, invisible spirits flying in the night, creating under the
+very eyes of tyrants the circulation of liberty." The descending process
+materializes abstractions, gives them body, makes them flesh and bone;
+the Middle Ages become "a poor child, torn from the bowels of
+Christianity, born amidst tears, grown up in prayer and revery, in
+anguish of heart, dying without achieving anything." In this dazzle of
+images there is a momentary return to primitive animism.
+
+
+II
+
+In order to more fully understand the plastic imagination, let us take
+up its principal manifestations.
+
+1. First, the arts dealing with form, where its necessity is evident.
+The sculptor, painter, architect, must have visual and tactile-motor
+images; it is the material in which their creations are wrapped up. Even
+leaving out the striking acts requiring such a sure and tenacious
+external vision (portraits executed from memory, exact remembrance of
+faces at the end of twenty years, as in the case of Gavarni, etc.[81]),
+and limiting ourselves merely to the usual, the plastic arts demand an
+observant imagination. For the majority of men the concrete image of a
+face, a form, a color, usually remains vague and fleeting; "red, blue,
+black, white, tree, animal, head, mouth, arm, etc., are scarcely more
+than words, symbols expressing a rough synthesis. For the painter, on
+the other hand, images have a very high precision of details, and what
+he sees beneath the words or in real objects are analyzed facts,
+positive elements of perception and movement."[82]
+
+The rôle of tactile-motor images is not insignificant. There has often
+been cited the instance of sculptors who, becoming blind, have
+nevertheless been able to fashion busts of close resemblance to the
+original. This is memory of touch and of the muscular sense, entirely
+equivalent to the visual memory of the portrait painters mentioned
+above. Practical knowledge of design and modeling--i.e., of contour and
+relief--though resulting from natural or acquired disposition, depends
+on cerebral conditions, the development of definite sensory-motor
+regions and their connections; and on psychological conditions--the
+acquisition and organization of appropriate images. "We learn to paint
+and carve," wrote a contemporary painter, "as we do sewing, embroidery,
+sawing, filing and turning." In short, like all manual labor requiring
+associated and combined acts.
+
+2. Another form of plastic imagination uses words as means for evoking
+vivid and clear impressions of sight, touch, movement; it is the poetic
+or literary form. Of it we find in Victor Hugo a finished type. As all
+know, we need only open his works at hazard to find a stream of
+glittering images. But what is their nature? His recent biographers,
+guided by contemporary psychology, have well shown that they always
+paint scenes or movements. It is unnecessary to give proofs. Some facts
+have a broader range and throw light upon his psychology. Thus we are
+told that "he never dictates or rhymes from memory and composes only in
+writing, for he believes that writing has its own features, and he
+wants to _see the words_. Théophile Gautier, who knows and understands
+him so well, says: 'I also believe that in the sentence we need most of
+all an _ocular_ rhythm. A book is made to be read, not to be spoken
+aloud.'" It is added that "Victor Hugo never spoke his verses but wrote
+them out and would often illustrate them on the margin, as if he needed
+to fixate the image in order to find the appropriate word."[83]
+
+After visual representations come those of movement: the steeple
+_pierces_ the horizon, the mountain _rends_ the cloud, the mountain
+_raises himself_ and looks about, "the cold caverns open their mouths
+_drowsily_," the wind lashes the rock into tears with the waterfall, the
+thorn is an enraged plant, and so on indefinitely.
+
+A more curious fact is the transposition of sonorous sensations or
+images of sound, and like them without form or figure, into visual and
+motor images: "The _ruffles_ of sound that the fifer cuts out; the flute
+_goes up_ to alto like a frail capital on a column." This thoroughly
+plastic imagination remains identical with itself while reducing
+everything spontaneously, unconsciously, to spatial terms.
+
+In literature this altogether foreign mode of creative activity has
+found its most complete expression among the _Parnassiens_ and their
+congeners, whose creed is summed up in the formula, faultless form and
+impassiveness. Théophile Gautier claims that "a poet, no matter what may
+be said of him, is a _workman_; it is not necessary that he have more
+intelligence than a laborer and have knowledge of a state other than his
+own, without which he does badly. I regard as perfectly absurd the mania
+that people have of hoisting them (the poets) up onto an ideal pedestal;
+_nothing is less ideal than a poet_. For him words have in themselves
+and outside the meaning they express, their own beauty and value, just
+like precious stones not yet cut and mounted in bracelets, necklaces and
+rings; they charm the understanding that looks at them and takes them
+from the finger to the little pile where they are put aside for future
+use." If this statement, whether sincere or not, is taken literally, I
+see no longer any difference, save as regards the materials employed,
+between the imagination of poets and the imagination active in the
+mechanical arts. For the usefulness of the one and the "uselessness" of
+the other is a characteristic foreign to invention itself.
+
+3. In the teeming mass of myths and religious conceptions that the
+nineteenth century has gathered with so much care we could establish
+various classifications--according to race, content, intellectual level;
+and, in a more artificial manner but one suitable for our subject,
+according to the degree of precision or fluidity.
+
+Neglecting intermediate forms, we may, indeed, divide them into two
+groups; some are clear in outline, are consistent, relatively logical,
+resembling a definite historical relation; others are vague, multiform,
+incoherent, contradictory; their characters change into one another, the
+tales are mixed and are imperceptible in the whole.
+
+The former types are the work of the plastic imagination. Such are, if
+we eliminate oriental influences, most of the myths belonging to Greece
+when, on emerging from the earliest period, they attained their definite
+constitution. It has been held that the plastic character of these
+religious conceptions is an effect of esthetic development: statues,
+bas-reliefs, poetry, and even painting, have made definite the
+attributes of the gods and their history. Without denying this influence
+we must nevertheless understand that it is only auxiliary. To those who
+would challenge this opinion let us recall that the Hindoos have had
+gigantic poems, have covered their temples with numberless sculptures,
+and yet their fluid mythology is the opposite of the Greek. Among the
+peoples who have incarnated their divinities in no statue, in no human
+or animal form, we find the Germans and the Celts. But the mythology of
+the former is clear, well kept within large lines; that of the latter is
+fleeting and inconsistent--the despair of scholars.[84]
+
+It is, then, certain that myths of the plastic kind are the fruits of an
+innate quality of mind, of a mode of feeling and of translating, at a
+given moment in its history, the preponderating characters of a race; in
+short, of a form of imagination and ultimately of a special cerebral
+structure.
+
+4. The most complete manifestation of the plastic imagination is met
+with in mechanical invention and what is allied thereto, in consequence
+of the need of very exact representations of qualities and relations.
+But this is a specialized form, and, as its importance has been too
+often misunderstood, it deserves a separate study. (See Chapter V,
+_infra_.)
+
+
+III
+
+Such are the principal traits of this type of imagination: clearness of
+outline, both of the whole and of the details. It is not identical with
+the form called realistic--it is more comprehensive; it is a genus of
+which "realism" is a species. Moreover, the latter expression being
+reserved by custom for esthetic creation, I purposely digress in order
+to dwell on this point: that the esthetic imagination has no essential
+character belonging exclusively to it, and that it differs from other
+forms (scientific, mechanical, etc.) only in its materials and in its
+end, not in its primary nature.
+
+On the whole, the plastic imagination could be summed up in the
+expression, _clearness in complexity_. It always preserves the mark of
+its original source--i.e., in the creator and those disposed to enjoy
+and understand him it tends to approach the clearness of perception.
+
+Would it be improper to consider as a variety of the genus a mode of
+representation that could be expressed as _clearness in simplicity_? It
+is the dry and rational imagination. Without depreciating it we may say
+that it is rather a condition of imaginative poverty. We hold with
+Fouillée that the average Frenchman furnishes a good example of it. "The
+Frenchman," says he, "does not usually have a very strong imagination.
+His internal vision has neither the hallucinative intensity nor the
+exuberant fancy of the German and Anglo-Saxon mind; it is an
+intellectual and distant view rather than a sensitive resurrection or an
+immediate contact with, and possession of, the things themselves.
+Inclined to deduce and construct, our intellect excels less in
+representing to itself real things than in discovering relations between
+possible or necessary things. In other words, it is a logical and
+combining imagination that takes pleasure in what has been termed the
+abstract view of life. The Chateaubriands, Hugos, Flauberts, Zolas, are
+exceptional with us. We reason more than we imagine."[85]
+
+Its psychological constitution is reducible to two elements: slightly
+concrete images, _schemas_ approaching general ideas; for their
+association, relations predominantly rational, more the products of the
+logic of the intellect than of the logic of the feelings. It lacks the
+sudden, violent shock of emotion that gives brilliancy to images, making
+them arise and grouping them in unforeseen combinations. It is a form of
+invention and construction that is more the work of reason than of
+imagination proper.
+
+Consequently, is it not paradoxical to relate it to plastic imagination,
+as species to genus? It would be idle to enter upon a discussion of the
+subject here without attempting a classification; let us merely note the
+likenesses and differences. Both are above all objective--the first,
+because it is sensory; the other, because it is rational. Both make use
+of analogous modes of association, dependent more on the nature of
+things than on the personal impression of the subject. Opposition exists
+only on one point: the former is made up of vivid images that approach
+perception; the latter is made up of internal images bordering upon
+concepts. Rational imagination is plastic imagination desiccated and
+simplified.
+
+FOOTNOTES:
+
+[79] Thus Taine says of Carlyle: "He cannot stick to simple
+expression; at every step he drops into figures, gives body to every
+idea, must touch forms. We see that he is possessed and haunted by
+glittering or saddening visions; in him every thought is an
+explosion; a flood of seething passion reaches the boiling-point in
+his brain, which overflows, and the torrent of images runs over the
+banks and rushes with all its mud and all its splendor. He cannot
+reason, he must paint." Despite the vigor of this sketch, the
+perusal of ten pages of _Sartor Resartus_ or of the _French
+Revolution_ teaches more in regard to the nature of this imagination
+than all the commentaries.
+
+[80] For a point of view in criticism that has seemed correct to
+many on this matter, compare the well-known chapter on the "Pathetic
+Fallacy" by Ruskin, in his _Modern Painters_. (Tr.)
+
+[81] Arréat (_Psychologie du peintre_, pp. 62 ff.) gives a large
+number of examples of this.
+
+[82] _Ibid._, p. 115.
+
+[83] For further details on this point, consult Mabilleau, _Victor
+Hugo_, 2nd part, chaps. II, III, IV.--Renouvier, in the book devoted
+to the poet, asserts that "on account of his aptitude for
+representing to himself the details of a figure, order and position
+in space, beyond any present sensation," Victor Hugo could have
+become a mathematician of the highest order.
+
+[84] As bearing out the position of the author, we may also call
+attention to the fact that while the Hebrew race has had very slight
+development in the plastic arts, yet its mythology has always taken
+a very definite form, even when dealing with the vaguest and most
+abstract subjects. (Tr.)
+
+[85] Fouillée, _Psychologie du peuple français_, p. 185.
+
+
+
+
+CHAPTER II
+
+THE DIFFLUENT IMAGINATION
+
+I
+
+
+The diffluent imagination is another general form, but one that is
+completely opposed to the foregoing. It consists of vaguely-outlined,
+indistinct images that are evoked and joined according to the least
+rigorous modes of association. It presents, then, two things for our
+consideration--the nature of the images and of their associations.
+
+(1) It employs neither the clear-cut, concrete, reality-penetrated
+images of the plastic imagination, nor the semi-schematic
+representations of the rational imagination, but those midway in that
+ascending and descending scale extending from perception to conception.
+This determination, however, is insufficient, and we can make it more
+precise. Analysis, indeed, discovers a certain class of ill-understood
+images, which I call emotional abstractions, and which are the proper
+material for the diffluent imagination. These images are reduced to
+certain qualities or attributes of things, taking the place of the
+whole, and chosen from among the others for various reasons, the origin
+of which is affective. We shall comprehend their nature better through
+the following comparison:
+
+Intellectual or rational abstraction results from the choice of a
+fundamental, or at least principal, character, which becomes the
+substitute for all the rest that is omitted. Thus, extension,
+resistance, or impenetrability, come to represent, through
+simplification and abbreviation, what we call "matter."
+
+Emotional abstraction, on the other hand, results from the permanent or
+temporary predominance of an emotional state. Some aspect of a thing,
+essential or not, comes into relief, solely because it is in direct
+relation to the disposition of our sensibility, with no other
+preoccupation; a quality, an attribute is spontaneously, arbitrarily
+selected because it impresses us at the given instant--in the final
+analysis, because it somehow pleases or displeases us. The images of
+this class have an "impressionist" mark. They are abstractions in the
+strict sense--i.e., extracts from and simplifications of the sensory
+data. They act less through a direct influence than by evoking,
+suggesting, whispering; they permit a glance, a passing glimpse: we may
+justly call them crepuscular or twilight ideas.
+
+(2) As for the forms of association, the relations linking these images,
+they do not depend so much on the order and connections of things as on
+the changing dispositions of the mind. They have a very marked subjective
+character. Some depend on the intellectual factor; the most usual are
+based on chance, on distant and vacillating analogies--further down, even
+on assonance and alliteration. Others depend on the affective factor and
+are ruled by the disposition of the moment: association by contrast,
+especially those alike in emotional basis, which have been previously
+studied. (First Part, Chapter II.)
+
+Thus the diffluent imagination is, trait for trait, the opposite of the
+plastic imagination. It has a general character of inwardness because it
+arises less from sensation than from feeling, often from a simple and
+fugitive impression. Its creations have not the organic character of the
+other, lacking a stable center of attraction; but they act by diffusion
+and inclusion.
+
+
+II
+
+By its very nature it is _de jure_, if not _de facto_, excluded from
+certain territories--if it ventures therein it produces only abortions.
+This is true of the practical sphere, which permits neither vague images
+nor approximate constructions; and of the scientific world, where the
+imagination may be used only to create a theory or invent processes of
+discovery (experiments, schemes of reasoning). Even with these
+exceptions there is still left for it a very wide range.
+
+Let us rapidly pass over some very frequent, very well-known
+manifestations of the diffluent imagination--those obliterated forms in
+which it does not reach complete development and cannot give the full
+measure of its power.
+
+(1) Revery and related states. This is perhaps the purest specimen of
+the kind, but it remains embryonic.
+
+(2) The romantic turn of mind. This is seen in those who, confronted by
+any event whatever or an unknown person, make up, spontaneously,
+involuntarily, in spite of themselves, a story out of whole cloth. I
+shall later give examples of it according to the written testimony of
+several people.[86] In whatever concerns themselves or others they
+create an imagined world, which they substitute for the real.
+
+(3) The fantastic mind. Here we come away from the vague forms; the
+diffluent imagination becomes substantial and asserts itself through its
+permanence. At bottom this fantastic form is the romantic spirit tending
+toward objectification. The invention, which was at first only a
+thoroughly internal construction and recognized as such, aspires to
+become external, to become realized, and when it ventures into a world
+other than its own, one requiring the rigorous conditions of the
+practical imagination, it is wrecked, or succeeds only through chance,
+and that very rarely. To this class belong those inventors, known to
+everyone, who are fertile in methods of enriching themselves or their
+country by means of agricultural, mining, industrial or commercial
+enterprises; the makers of the utopias of finance, politics, society,
+etc. It is a form of imagination unnaturally oriented toward the
+practical.[87]
+
+(4) The list increases with myths and religious conceptions; the
+imagination in its diffuse form here finds itself on its own ground.
+
+Depending on linguistics, it has recently been maintained that, among
+the Aryans at least, the imagination created at first only momentary
+gods (_Augenblicksgötter_).[88] Every time that primitive man, in the
+presence of a phenomenon, experienced a perceptible emotion, he
+translated it by a name, the manifestation of what was imagined the
+divine part in the emotion felt. "Every religious emotion gives rise to
+a new name--i.e., a new divinity. But the religious imagination is
+never identical with itself; though produced by the same phenomenon, it
+translates itself, at two different moments, by two different words." As
+a consequence, "during the early periods of the human race, religious
+names must have been applied not to _classes_ of beings or events but to
+_individual_ beings or events. Before worshipping the comet or the
+fig-tree, men must have worshiped each one of the comets they beheld
+crossing the sky, every one of the fig-trees that their eyes saw."
+Later, with advancing capacity for generalization, these "instantaneous"
+divinities would be condensed into more consistent gods. If this
+hypothesis, which has aroused many criticisms, be sound--if this state
+were met with--it would be the ideal type of imaginative instability in
+the religious order.
+
+Nearer to us, authentic evidence shows that certain peoples, at given
+stages of their history, have created such vague, fluid myths, that we
+cannot succeed in delimiting them. Every god can change himself into
+another, different, or even opposite, one. The Semitic religions might
+furnish examples of this. There has been established the identity of
+Istar, Astarte, Tanit, Baalath, Derketo, Mylitta, Aschera, and still
+others. But it is in the early religion of the Hindoos that we perceive
+best this kaleidoscopic process applied to divine beings. In the vedic
+hymns not only are the clouds now serpents, now cows and later
+fortresses (the retreats of dark Asuras), but we see Agni (fire)
+becoming Kama (desire or love), and Indra becoming Varuna, and so on.
+"We cannot imagine," says Taine, "such a great clearness. The myth here
+is not a disguise, but an expression; no language is more true and more
+supple. It permits a glimpse of, or rather, it causes us to discern the
+forms of clouds, movements of the air, changes of seasons, all the
+happenings of sky, fire, storm: external nature has never met a mind so
+impressionable and pliant in which to mirror itself in all the
+inexhaustible variety of its appearances. However changeable nature may
+be, this imagination corresponds to it. It has no fixed gods; they are
+changeable like the things themselves; they blend one into another.
+Everyone of them is in turn the supreme deity; no one of them is a
+distinct personality; everyone is only a moment of nature, able,
+according to the apperception of the moment, to include its neighbor or
+be included by it. In this fashion they swarm and teem. Every moment of
+nature and every apperceptive moment may furnish one of them."[89] Let
+us, indeed, note that, for the worshiper, the god to whom he addresses
+himself and while he is praying, is always the greatest and most
+powerful. The assignment of attributes passes suddenly from one to the
+other, regardless of contradiction. In this versatility some writers
+believe they have discovered a vague pantheistic conception. Nothing is
+more questionable, fundamentally, than this interpretation. It is more
+in harmony with the psychology of these naïve minds to assume simply an
+extreme state of "impressionism," explicable by the logic of feeling.
+
+Thus, there is a complete antithesis between the imagination that has
+created the clear-cut and definite polytheism of the Greeks and that
+whence have issued those fluctuating divinities that allow the
+presentation of the future doctrine of _Mâya_, of universal
+illusion--another more refined form of the diffluent imagination.
+Finally, let us note that the Hellenic imagination realized its gods
+through anthropomorphism--they are the ideal forms of human
+attributes[90]--majesty, beauty, power, wisdom, etc. The Hindoo
+imagination proceeds through symbolism: its divinities have several
+heads, several arms, several legs, to symbolize limitless intelligence,
+power, etc.; or better still, animal forms, as e.g., Ganesa, the god of
+wisdom, with the head of the elephant, reputed the wisest of animals.
+
+(5) It would be easy to show by the history of literature and the fine
+arts that the vague forms have been preferred according to peoples,
+times, and places. Let us limit ourselves to a single contemporary
+example that is complete and systematically created--the art of the
+"symbolists." It is not here a question of criticism, of praise, or even
+of appreciation, but merely of a consideration of it as a psychological
+fact likely to instruct us in regard to the nature of the diffluent
+imagination.
+
+This form of art despises the clear and exact representation of the
+outer world: it replaces it by a sort of music that aspires to express
+the changing and fleeting inwardness of the human soul. It is the school
+of the subject "who wants to know only mental states." To that end, it
+makes use of a natural or artificial lack of precision: everything
+floats in a dream, men as well as things, often without mark in time and
+space. Something happens, one knows not where or when; it belongs to no
+country, is of no period in time: it is _the_ forest, _the_ traveler,
+_the_ city, _the_ knight, _the_ wood; less frequently, even _He_, _She_,
+_It_. In short, all the vague and unstable characters of the pure,
+content-less affective state. This process of "suggestion" sometimes
+succeeds, sometimes fails.
+
+The word is the sign _par excellence_. As, according to the symbolists,
+it should give us emotions rather than representations, it is necessary
+that it lose, partially, its intellectual function and undergo a new
+adaptation.
+
+A principal process consists of employing usual words and changing their
+ordinary acceptation, or rather, associating them in such a way that
+they lose their precise meaning, and appear vague and mysterious: these
+are the words "written in the depths." The writers do not name--they
+leave it for us to infer. "They banish commonplaces through lack of
+precision, and leave to things only the power of moving." A rose is not
+described by the particular sensations that it causes, but by the
+general condition that it excites.
+
+Another method is the employment of new words or words that have fallen
+into disuse. Ordinary words retain, in spite of everything, somewhat of
+their customary meaning, associations and thoughts condensed in them
+through long habit; words forgotten during four or five centuries
+escape this condition--they are coins without fixed value.
+
+Lastly, a still more radical method is the attempt to give to words an
+exclusively emotional valuation. Unconsciously or as the result of
+reflection some symbolists have come to this extreme trial, which the
+logic of events imposed upon them. Ordinarily, thought expresses itself
+in words; feeling, in gestures, cries, interjections, change of tone: it
+finds its complete and classic expression in music. The symbolists want
+to transfer the rôle of sound to words, to make of them the instrument
+for translating and suggesting emotion through sound alone: words have
+to act not as signs but as sounds: they are "musical notes in the
+service of an impassioned psychology."
+
+All this, indeed, concerns only imagination expressing itself in words;
+but we know that the symbolic school has applied itself to the plastic
+arts, to treat them in its own way. The difference, however, is in the
+vesture that the esthetic ideal assumes. The pre-Raphaelites have
+attempted, by effacing forms, outlines, semblances, colors, "to cause
+things to appear as mere sources of emotion," in a word, to _paint_
+emotions.
+
+To sum up--In this form of the diffluent imagination the emotional
+factor exercises supreme authority.
+
+May the type of imagination, the chief manifestations of which we have
+just enumerated, be considered as identical with the idealistic
+imagination? This question is similar to that asked in the preceding
+chapter, and permits the same answer. In idealistic art, doubtless, the
+material element furnished in perception (form, color, touch, effort) is
+minimized, subtilized, sublimated, refined, so as to approach as nearly
+as possible to a purely internal state. By the nature of its favorite
+images, by its preference for vague associations and uncertain
+relations, it presents all the characteristics of diffluent imagination;
+but the latter covers a much broader field: it is the genus of which the
+other is a species. Thus, it would be erroneous to regard the fantastic
+imagination as idealistic; it has no claim to the term: on the contrary,
+it believes itself adapted for practical work and acts in that
+direction.
+
+In addition, it must be recognized that were we to make a complete
+review of all the forms of esthetic creation, we should frequently be
+embarrassed to classify them, because there are among them, as in the
+case of characters, mixed or composite forms. Here, for example, are two
+kinds seemingly belonging to the diffluent imagination which, however,
+do not permit it to completely include them.
+
+(a) The "wonder" class (fairy-tales, the Thousand and One Nights,
+romances of chivalry, Ariosto's poem, etc.) is a survival of the mythic
+epoch, when the imagination is given free play without control or check;
+whereas, in the course of centuries, art--and especially literary
+creation--becomes, as we have already said, a decadent and rationalized
+mythology. This form of invention consists neither of idealizing the
+external world, nor reproducing it with the minuteness of realism, but
+_remaking_ the universe to suit oneself, without taking into account
+natural laws, and despising the impossible: it is a liberated realism.
+Often, in an environment of pure fancy, where only caprice reigns, the
+characters appear clear, well-fashioned, living. The "wonder" class
+belongs, then, to the vague as well as to the plastic imagination; more
+or less to one or to the other, according to the temperament of the
+creator.
+
+(b) The fantastic class develops under the same conditions. Its chiefs
+(Hoffmann, Poe, _et al._) are classed by critics as realists. They are
+such by virtue of their vision, intensified to hallucination, the
+precision in details, the rigorous logic of characters and events: they
+rationalize the improbable.[91] On the other hand, the environment is
+strange, shrouded in mystery: men and things move in an unreal
+atmosphere, where one feels rather than perceives. It is thus proper to
+remark that this class easily glides into the deeply sad, the horrible,
+terrifying, nightmare-producing, "satanic literature;" Goya's paintings
+of robbers and thieves being garroted; Wiertz, a genius bizarre to the
+point of extravagance, who paints only suicides or the heads of
+guillotined criminals.
+
+Religious conceptions could also furnish a fine lot of examples: Dante's
+_Inferno_, the twenty-eight hells of Buddhism, which are perhaps the
+masterpieces of this class, etc. But all this belongs to another
+division of our subject, one that I have expressly eliminated from this
+essay--the pathology of the creative imagination.
+
+
+III
+
+There yet remains for us to study two important varieties that I connect
+with the diffluent imagination.
+
+NUMERICAL IMAGINATION
+
+Under this head I designate the imagination that takes pleasure in the
+unlimited--in infinity of time and space--under the form of number. It
+seems at first that these two terms--imagination and number--must be
+mutually exclusive. Every number is precise, rigorously determined,
+since we can always reduce it to a relation with unity; it owes nothing
+to fancy. But the _series_ of numbers is unlimited in two directions:
+starting from any term in the series, we may go on ever increasingly or
+ever decreasingly. The working of the mind gives rise to a possible
+infinity that is limitless: it thus traces a route for the movement of
+the imagination. The number, or rather the series of numbers, is less an
+object than a vehicle.
+
+This form of imagination is produced in two principal ways--in religious
+conceptions and cosmogonies, and in science.
+
+(1) Numerical imagination has nowhere been more exuberant than among the
+peoples of the Orient. They have played with number with magnificent
+audacity and prodigality. Chaldean cosmogony relates that _Oannes_, the
+Fish-god, devoted 259,200 years to the education of mankind, then came a
+period of 432,000 years taken up with the reigns of mythical personages,
+and at the end of these 691,000 years, the deluge renewed the face of the
+earth. The Egyptians, also, were liberal with millions of years, and in
+the face of the brief and limited chronology of the Greeks (another kind
+of imagination) were wont to exclaim, "You, O Greeks, you are only
+children!" But the Hindoos have done better than all that. They have
+invented enormous units to serve as basis and content for their numerical
+fancies: the _Koti_, equivalent to ten millions; the _Kalpa_ (or the age
+of the world between two destructions), 4,328,000,000 years. Each _Kalpa_
+is merely one of 365 days of divine life: I leave to the reader, if he is
+so inclined, the work of calculating this appalling number. The Djanas
+divide time into two periods, one ascending, the other descending: each is
+of fabulous duration, 2,000,000,000,000,000 oceans of years; each ocean
+being itself equivalent to 1,000,000,000,000,000 years. "If there were a
+lofty rock, sixteen miles in each dimension, and one touched it once in a
+hundred years with a bit of the finest Benares linen, it would be reduced
+to the size of a wango-stone before a fourth of one of these _Kalpas_ had
+rolled by." In the sacred books of Buddhism, poor, dry, colorless, as they
+ordinarily are, imagination in its numerical forms is triumphant. The
+_Lalitavistara_ is full of nomenclatures and enumerations of fatiguing
+monotony: Buddha is seated on a rock shaded by 100,000 parasols,
+surrounded by minor gods forming an assemblage of 68,000 _Kotis_ (i.e.,
+680,000,000 persons), and--this surpasses all the rest--"he had
+experienced many vicissitudes during 10,100,000,000 _Kalpas_." This makes
+one dizzy.
+
+(2) Numerical imagination in the sciences does not take on these
+delirious forms; it has the advantage of resting on an objective basis:
+it is the substitute of an unrepresentable reality. Scientific culture,
+which people often accuse of stifling imagination, on the contrary opens
+to it a field much vaster than esthetics. Astronomy delights in
+infinitudes of time and space: it sees worlds arise, burn at first with
+the feeble light of a nebular mass, glow like suns, become chilled,
+covered with spots, and then become condensed. Geology follows the
+development of our earth through upheavals and cataclysms: it foresees a
+distant future when our globe, deprived of the atmospheric vapors that
+protect it, will perish of cold. The hypotheses of physics and chemistry
+in regard to atoms and molecules are not less reckless than the
+speculations of the Hindoo imagination. "Physicists have determined the
+volume of a molecule, and referring to the numbers that they give, we
+find that a cube, a millimeter each way (scarcely the volume of a
+silkworm's egg), would contain a number of molecules at least equal to
+the cube of 10,000,000--i.e., unity followed by twenty-one zeros. One
+scientist has calculated that if one had to count them and could
+separate in thought a million per second, it would take more than
+250,000,000 years: the being who commenced the task at the time that our
+solar system could have been no more than a formless nebula, would not
+yet have reached the end."[92] Biology, with its protoplasmic elements,
+its plastids, gemmules, hypotheses on hereditary transmission by means
+of infinitesimal subdivisions; the theory of evolution, which speaks
+off-hand of periods of a hundred thousand years; and many other
+scientific theses that I omit, offer fine material for the numerical
+imagination.
+
+More than one scientist has even made use of this form of imagination
+for the pleasure of developing a purely fanciful notion. Thus Von Baer,
+supposing that we might perceive the portions of duration in another
+way, imagines the changes that would result therefrom in our outlook on
+nature: "Suppose we were able, within the length of a second, to note
+10,000 events distinctly, instead of barely 10, as now; if our life were
+then destined to hold the same number of impressions, it might be 1,000
+times as short. We should live less than a month, and personally know
+nothing of the change of seasons. If born in winter, we should believe
+in summer as we now believe in the heats of the Carboniferous era. The
+motions of organic beings would be so slow to our senses as to be
+inferred, not seen. The sun would stand still in the sky, the moon be
+almost free from change, and so on. But now reverse the hypothesis and
+suppose a being to get only one 1,000th part of the sensations that we
+get in a given time, and consequently to live 1,000 times as long.
+Winters and summers will be to him like quarters of an hour. Mushrooms
+and the swifter-growing plants will shoot into being so rapidly as to
+appear instantaneous creations; annual shrubs will rise and fall from
+the earth like restlessly boiling water springs; the motions of animals
+will be as invisible as are to us the movements of bullets and
+cannonballs; the sun will scour through the sky like a meteor, leaving a
+fiery trail behind him, etc."[93]
+
+The psychologic conditions of this variety of the creative imagination
+are, then, these: Absence of limitation in time and space, whence the
+possibility of an endless movement in all directions, and the
+possibility of filling either with a myriad of dimly-perceived events.
+These events not being susceptible of clear representation as to their
+nature and quantity, escaping even a schematic representation, the
+imagination makes its constructions with substitutes that are, in this
+case, numbers.
+
+
+IV
+
+MUSICAL IMAGINATION
+
+Musical imagination deserves a separate monograph. As the task requires,
+in addition to psychological capacity, a profound knowledge of musical
+history and technique, it cannot be undertaken here. I purpose only one
+thing, namely, to show that it has its own individual mark--that it is
+the type of affective imagination.
+
+I have elsewhere[94] attempted to prove that, contrary to the general
+opinion of psychologists, there exists, in many men at least, an
+affective memory; that is, a memory of emotions strictly so called, and
+not merely of the intellectual conditions that caused and accompanied
+them. I hold that there exists also a form of the creative imagination
+that is purely emotional--the contents of which are wholly made up of
+states of mind, dispositions, wants, aspirations, feelings, and emotions
+of all kinds, and that it is the characteristic of the composer of
+genius, of the born musician.
+
+The musician sees in the world what concerns him. "He carries in his
+head a coherent system of tone-images, in which every element has its
+place and value; he perceives delicate differences of sound, of
+_timbre_; he succeeds, through exercise, in penetrating into their most
+varied combinations, and the knowledge of harmonious relations is for
+him what design and the knowledge of color are for the painter:
+intervals and harmony, rhythm and tone-qualities are, as it were,
+standards to which he relates his present perceptions and which he
+causes to enter into the marvelous constructions of his fancy."[95]
+
+These sound-elements and their combinations are the words of a special
+language that is very clear for some, impenetrable for others. People
+have spoken to a tiresome extent of the vagueness of musical expression;
+some have been pleased to hold that every one may interpret it in his
+own way. We must surely recognize that emotional language does not
+possess the precision of intellectual language; but in music it is the
+same as in any other idiom: there are those who do not understand at
+all; those who half understand and consequently always give wrong
+renderings; and those who understand well--and in this last category
+there are grades as varying as the aptitude for perceiving the delicate
+and subtle shades of speech.[96]
+
+The materials necessary for this form of imaginative construction are
+gathered slowly. Many centuries passed between the early ages when man's
+voice and the simple instruments imitating it translated simple
+emotions, to the period when the efforts of antiquity and of the middle
+ages finally furnished the musical imagination with the means of
+expressing itself completely, and allowed complex and difficult
+constructions in sound. The development of music--slow and belated as
+compared to the other arts--has perhaps been due, in part at least, to
+the fact that the affective imagination, its chief province (imitative,
+descriptive, picturesque music being only an episode and accessory),
+being made up, contrary to sensorial imagination, of tenuous, subtle,
+fugitive states, has been long in seeking its methods of analysis and of
+expression. However it be, Bach and the contrapuntists, by their
+treatment in an independent manner of the different voices constituting
+harmony, have opened a new path. Henceforth melody will be able to
+develop and give rise to the richest combinations. We shall be able to
+associate various melodies, sing them at the same time, or in
+alternation, assign them to various instruments, vary indefinitely the
+pitch of singing and concerted voices. The boundless realm of musical
+combinations is open; it has been worth while to take the trouble to
+invent. Modern polyphony with its power of expressing at the same time
+different, even opposing, feelings is a marvelous instrument for a form
+of imagination which, alien to the forms clear-cut in space, moves only
+in time.
+
+What furnishes us the best entrance into the psychology of this form of
+imagination is the natural transposition operative in musicians. It
+consists in this: An external or internal impression, any occurrence
+whatever, even a metaphysical idea, undergoes change of a certain kind,
+which the following examples will make better understood than any amount
+of commentary.
+
+Beethoven said of Klopstock's _Messiah_, "always _maestoso_, written in
+_D flat major_." In his fourth symphony he expressed musically the
+destiny of Napoleon; in the ninth symphony he tries to give a proof of
+the existence of God. By the side of a dead friend, in a room draped in
+black, he improvises the _adagio_ of the sonata in _C sharp minor_. The
+biographers of Mendelssohn relate analogous instances of transposition
+under musical form. During a storm that almost engulfed George Sand,
+Chopin, alone in the house, under the influence of his agony, and half
+unconsciously, composed one of his _Préludes_. The case of Schumann is
+perhaps the most curious of all: "From the age of eight, he would amuse
+himself with sketching what might be called musical portraits, drawing
+by means of various turns of song and varied rhythms the shades of
+character, and even the physical peculiarities, of his young comrades.
+He sometimes succeeded in making such striking resemblances that all
+would recognize, with no further designation, the figure indicated by
+the skillful fingers that genius was already guiding." He said later: "I
+feel myself affected by all that goes on in the world--men, politics,
+literature; I reflect on all that in my own way and it issues outwards
+in the form of music. That is why many of my compositions are so hard to
+understand: they relate to events of distant interest, though important;
+but everything remarkable that is furnished me by the period I must
+express musically." Let us recall again that Weber interpreted in one of
+the finest scenes of his _Freyschütz_ (the bullet-casting scene) "a
+landscape that he had seen near the falls of Geroldsau, at the hour when
+the moon's rays cause the basin in which the water rushes and boils to
+glisten like silver."[97] In short, the events go into the composer's
+brain, mix there, and come out changed into a musical structure.
+
+The plastic imagination furnishes us a counter-proof: it transposes
+inversely. The musical impression traverses the brain, sets it in
+turmoil, but comes out transformed into visual images. We have already
+cited examples from Victor Hugo (ch. I); Goethe, we know, had poor
+musical gifts. After having the young Mendelssohn render an overture
+from Bach, he exclaimed, "How pompous and grand that is! It seems to me
+like a procession of grand personages, in gala attire, descending the
+steps of a gigantic staircase."
+
+We might generalize the question and ask whether or no there exists a
+natural antagonism between true musical imagination and plastic
+imagination. An answer in the affirmative seems scarcely liable to be
+challenged. I had undertaken an investigation which, at the outset, made
+for a different goal. It happens that it answered clearly enough the
+question propounded above: the conclusion has arisen of itself,
+unsought; which fact saves me from any charge of a preconceived opinion.
+
+The question asked orally of a large number of people was this: "Does
+hearing or even remembering a bit of _symphonic_ music excite visual
+images in you and of what kind are they?" For self evident reasons
+dramatic music was expressly excluded: the appearance of the theater,
+stage, and scenery impose on the observer visual perceptions that have a
+tendency to be repeated later in the form of memories.
+
+The result of observation and of the collected answers are summed up as
+follows:
+
+Those who possess great musical culture and--this is by far more
+important--taste or passion for music, generally have no visual images.
+If these arise, it is only momentarily, and by chance. I give a few of
+the answers: "I see absolutely nothing; I am occupied altogether with
+the pleasure of the music: I live entirely in a world of sound. In
+accordance with my knowledge of harmony, I analyze the harmonies but
+not for long. I follow the development of the phrasing." "I see nothing:
+I am given up wholly to my impressions. I believe that the chief effect
+of music is to heighten in everyone the predominating feelings."
+
+Those who possess little musical culture, and especially those having
+little taste for music, have very clear visual representations. It must
+nevertheless be admitted that it is very hard to investigate these
+people. Because of their anti-musical natures, they avoid concerts, or
+at the most, resign themselves to sit through an opera. However, since
+the nature and quality of the music does not matter here, we may quote:
+"Hearing a Barbary organ in the street, I picture the instrument to
+myself. I see the man turning the crank. If military music sounds from
+afar, I _see_ a regiment marching." An excellent pianist plays for a
+friend Beethoven's sonata in C sharp minor, putting into its execution
+all the pathos of which he is capable. The other sees in it "the tumult
+and excitement of a fair." Here the musical rendering is misinterpreted
+through misapprehension. I have several times noted this--in people
+familiar with design or painting, music calls up pictures and various
+scenes; one of these persons says that he is "besieged by visual
+images." Here the hearing of music evidently acts as excitant.[98]
+
+In a word, insofar as it is permissible in psychology to make use of
+general formulas--and with the proviso that they apply to most, not to
+all cases--we may say that during the working of the musical imagination
+the appearance of visual images is the exception; that when this form of
+imagination is weak, the appearance of images is the rule.
+
+Furthermore, this result of observation is altogether in accord with
+logic. There is an irreducible antithesis between affective imagination,
+the characteristic of which is interiority, and visual imagination,
+basically objective. Intellectual language--speech--is an arrangement
+of words that stand for objects, qualities, relations, extracts of
+things: in order to be understood they must call up in consciousness the
+corresponding images. Emotional language--music--is an appropriate
+ordering of successive or simultaneous sounds, of melodies and harmonies
+that are signs of affective states: in order to be understood, they must
+call up in consciousness the corresponding affective modifications. But,
+in the non-musically inclined, the evocative power is small--sonorous
+combinations excite only superficial and unstable internal states. The
+exterior excitation, that of the sounds, follows the line of least
+resistance, and acting according to the psychic nature of the
+individual, tends to arouse objective images, pictures, visual
+representations, well or ill adapted.
+
+To sum up: In contrast to sensorial imagination, which has its origin
+without, affective imagination begins within. The _stuff_ of its
+creation is found in the mental states enumerated above, and in their
+innumerable combinations, which it expresses and fixes in language
+peculiar to itself, of which it has been able to make wonderful use.
+Taking it altogether, the only great division possible between the
+different types of imagination is perhaps reducible to this: To speak
+more exactly, there are exterior and interior imaginations. These two
+chapters have given a sketch of them. There now remains for us to study
+the less general forms of the creative power.
+
+FOOTNOTES:
+
+[86] See Appendix E.
+
+[87] Let us cite merely the case of Balzac who, says one of his
+biographers, "was always odd." He buys a property, in order to start
+a dairy there with "the best cows in the world," from which he
+expects to receive a net income of 3,000 francs. In addition,
+high-grade vegetable gardens, same income; vineyard, with Malaga
+plants, which should bring about 2,000 fr. He has the commune of
+Sèvres deed over to him a walnut tree, worth annually 2,000 francs
+to him, because all the townspeople dump their rubbish there. And so
+on, until at the end of four years he sees himself obliged to sell
+his domain for 3,000 francs, after spending on it thrice that sum.
+
+[88] Usener, _Götternamen_, 1896.
+
+[89] _Nouveaux Essais de critique_, p. 320.
+
+[90] Or, as it has been expressed, "human qualities raised to their
+highest power." (Tr.)
+
+[91] The same statement holds good as regards the "Temptations of
+Saint Anthony" and other analogous subjects that have often
+attracted painters.
+
+[92] R. Dubois, _Leçons de physiologie générale et comparée_, p.
+286.
+
+[93] Von Baer, in James, _Psychology_, I, 639.
+
+[94] _Psychology of the Emotions_, Part I, Chapter IX.
+
+[95] Arréat, _Mémoire et Imagination_, p. 118.
+
+[96] Mendelssohn wrote to an author who composed verses for his
+_Lieder_: "Music is more definite than speech, and to want to
+explain it by means of words is to make the meaning obscure. I do
+not think that words suffice for that end, and were I persuaded to
+the contrary, I would not compose music. There are people who accuse
+music of being ambiguous, who allege that words are always
+understood: for me it is just the other way; words seem to me vague,
+ambiguous, unintelligible, if we compare them to the true music that
+fills the soul with a thousand things better than words. What the
+music that I like expresses to me seems to me too _definite_, rather
+than too indefinite, for anyone to be able to match words to it."
+
+[97] Oelzelt-Newin, _op. cit._, pp. 22-23. For analogous facts from
+contemporary musicians, see Paulhan, _Rev. Phil._, 1898, pp. 234-35.
+
+[98] For the sake of brevity and clearness I do not give here the
+observations and evidence. They will be found at the end of this
+work, as Appendix D.
+
+Under the title "An experimental test of musical expressiveness,"
+Gilman, in _American Journal of Psychology_, vol. IV, No. 4, and vol.
+V, No. 1 (1892-3), has studied from another point of view the effect
+of music on various listeners. Eleven selections were given; I note
+that three or four at the most excited visual images--ten (perhaps
+eleven), emotional states. More recently, the _Psychological Review_
+(September, 1898, pp. 463 ff.) has published a personal observation of
+Macdougal in which sight-images accompany the hearing of music only
+exceptionally and under special conditions. The author characterizes
+himself as a "poor visualizer;" he declares that music arouses in him
+only very rarely visual representations; "even then they are
+fragmentary, consisting of simple forms without bond between them,
+appearing on a dark background, remaining visible for a moment or two,
+and soon disappearing." But, having gone to the concert fatigued and
+jaded, he sees nothing during the first number: the visions begin
+during the _andante_ of the second, and accompany "in profusion" the
+rendering of the third. (See Appendix D.) May we not assume that the
+state of fatigue, by lowering the vital tone, which is the basis of
+the emotional life, likewise diminishes the tendency of affective
+dispositions to arise again under the form of memory? On the other
+hand, sensory images remain without opposition and come to the front;
+at least, unless they are reënforced by a state of semi-morbid
+excitation.
+
+
+
+
+CHAPTER III.
+
+THE MYSTIC IMAGINATION
+
+
+Mystic imagination deserves a place of honor, as it is the most complete
+and most daring of purely theoretic invention. Related to diffluent
+imagination, especially in the latter's affective form, it has its own
+special characters, which we shall try to separate out.
+
+Mysticism rests essentially on two modes of mental life--feeling, which
+we need not study; and imagination, which, in the present instance,
+represents the intellectual factor. Whether the part of consciousness
+that this state of mind requires and permits be imaginative in nature
+and nothing else it is easy to find out. Indeed, the mystic considers
+the data of sense as vain appearances, or at the most as signs revealing
+and frequently laying bare the world of reality. He therefore finds no
+solid support in perception. On the other hand, he scorns reasoned
+thought, looking upon it as a cripple, halting half-way. He makes
+neither deductions nor inductions, and does not draw conclusions after
+the method of scientific hypotheses. The conclusion, then, is that he
+imagines, i.e., that he realizes a construction in images that is for
+him knowledge of the world; and he never proceeds, and does not proceed
+here, save _ex analogia hominis_.
+
+
+I
+
+The root of the mystic imagination consists of a tendency to incarnate
+the ideal in the sensible, to discover a hidden "idea" in every material
+phenomenon or occurrence, to suppose in things a supranatural principle
+that reveals itself to whoever may penetrate to it. Its fundamental
+character, from which the others are derived, is thus a way of thinking
+_symbolically_; but the algebraist also thinks by means of symbols, yet
+is not on that account a mystic. The nature of this symbolism must,
+then, be determined.
+
+In doing so, let us note first of all that our images--understanding the
+word "image" in its broadest sense--may be divided into two distinct
+groups:
+
+(1) _Concrete_ images, earliest to be received, being representations of
+greatest power, residues of our perceptions, with which they have a
+direct and immediate relation.
+
+(2) _Symbolic_ images, or signs, of secondary acquirement, being
+representations of lesser power, having only indirect and mediate
+relations with things.
+
+Let us make the differences between the two clear by a few simple
+examples.
+
+Concrete images are: In the visual sphere, the recollection of faces,
+monuments, landscapes, etc.; in the auditory sphere, the remembrance of
+the sounds of the sea, wind, the human voice, a melody, etc.; in the
+motor sphere, the tossings one feels when resting after having been at
+sea, the illusions of those who have had limbs amputated, etc.
+
+Symbolic images are: In the visual order, written words, ideographic
+signs, etc.; in the auditory order, spoken words or verbal images; in
+the motor order, significant gestures, and even better, the
+finger-language of deaf-mutes.
+
+Psychologically, these two groups are not identical in nature. Concrete
+images result from a persistence of perceptions and draw from the latter
+all their validity; symbolic images result from a mental synthesis, from
+an association of perception and image, or of image and image. If they
+have not the same origin, no more do they disappear in the same way, as
+is proven by very numerous examples of aphasia.
+
+The originality of mystic imagination is found in this fact: It
+transforms concrete images into symbolic images, and uses them as such.
+It extends this process even to perceptions, so that all manifestations
+of nature or of human art take on a value as signs or symbols. We shall
+later find numerous examples of this. Its mode of expression is
+necessarily synthetic. In itself, and because of the materials that it
+makes use of, it differs from the affective imagination previously
+described; it also differs from sensuous imagination, which makes use
+of forms, movements, colors, as having a value of their own; and from
+the imagination developing in the functions of words, through an
+analytic process. It has thus a rather special mark.
+
+Other characters are related to this one of symbolism, or else are
+derived from it, viz.:
+
+(1) An external character: the manner of writing and of speaking, the
+mode of expression, whatever it is. "The dominant style among mystics,"
+says von Hartmann, "is metaphorical in the extreme--now flat and
+ordinary, more often turgid and emphatic. Excess of imagination betrays
+itself there, ordinarily, in the thought and in the form in which that
+is rendered.... A sign of mysticism which it has been believed may often
+be taken as an essential sign, is obscurity and unintelligibility of
+language. We find it in almost all those who have written."[99] We might
+add that even in the plastic arts, symbolists and "_décadents_" have
+attempted, as far as possible, methods that merely indicate and suggest
+or hint instead of giving real, definite objects: which fact makes them
+inaccessible to the greater number of people.
+
+This characteristic of obscurity is due to two causes. First, mystical
+imagination is guided by the logic of feeling, which is purely
+subjective, full of leaps, jerks, and gaps. Again, it makes use of the
+language of images, especially visual images--a language whose ideal is
+vagueness, just as the ideal of verbal language is precision. All this
+can be summed up in a phrase--the subjective character inherent in the
+symbol. While seeming to speak like everyone else, the mystic uses a
+personal idiom: things becoming symbols at the pleasure of his fancy, he
+does not use signs that have a fixed and universally admitted value. It
+is not surprising if we do not understand him.
+
+(2) An extraordinary abuse of analogy and comparison in their various
+forms (allegory, parable, etc.)--a natural consequence of a mode of
+thinking that proceeds by means of symbols, not concepts. It has been
+said, and rightly, that "the only force that makes the vast field of
+mysticism fruitful is analogy."[100] Bossuet, a great opponent of
+mystics, had already remarked: "One of the characteristics of these
+authors is the pushing of allegories to the extreme limit." With warm
+imagination, having at their disposal overexcited senses, they are
+lavish of changes of expressions and figures, hoping thereby to explain
+the world's mysteries. We know to what inventive labors the Vedas, the
+Bible, the Koran, and other sacred books have given rise. The
+distinction between literal and figurative sense, which is boundlessly
+arbitrary, has given commentators a freedom to imagine equal to that of
+the myth-creators.
+
+All this is yet very reasonable; but the imagination left to itself
+stops at no extravagance. After having strained the meaning of
+expressions, the imaginative mind exercises itself on words and letters.
+Thus, the cabalists would take the first or the last letters of the
+words composing a verse, and would form with them a new word which was
+to reveal the hidden meaning. Again, they would substitute for the
+letters composing words the numbers that these letters represent in the
+Hebrew numerical system and form the strangest combinations with them.
+In the _Zohar_, all the letters of the alphabet come before God, each
+one begging to be chosen as the creative element of the universe.
+
+Let us also bring to mind numerical mysticism, different from numerical
+imagination heretofore studied. Here, number is no longer the means that
+mind employs in order to soar in time and space; it becomes a symbol and
+material for fanciful construction. Hence arise those "sacred numbers"
+teeming in the old oriental religions:--3, symbol of the trinity; 4,
+symbol of the cosmic elements; 7, representing the moon and the planets,
+etc.[101] Besides these fantastic meanings, there are more complicated
+inventions--calculating, from the letters of one's name, the years of
+life of a sick person, the auspices of a marriage, etc. The Pythagorean
+philosophy, as Zeller has shown, is the systematic form of this
+mathematical mysticism, for which numbers are not symbols of
+quantitative relations, but the very essence of things.
+
+This exaggerated symbolism, which makes the works of mystics so fragile,
+and which permits the mind to feed only on glimpses, has nevertheless an
+undeniable source of energy in its enchanting capacity to suggest.
+Without doubt suggestion exists also in art, but much more weakly, for
+reasons that we shall indicate.
+
+(3) Another characteristic of mystic imagination is the nature and the
+great degree of belief accompanying it. We already know[102] that when
+an image enters consciousness, even in the form of a recollection, of a
+purely passive reproduction, it appears at first, and for a moment, just
+as real as a percept. Much more so, in the case of imaginative
+constructions. But this illusion has degrees, and with mystics it
+attains its maximum.
+
+In the scientific and practical world, the work of the imagination is
+accompanied by only a conditional and provisional belief. The
+construction in images must justify its existence, in the case of the
+scientist, by explaining; and in the case of the man of affairs, by
+being embodied in an invention that is useful and answers its purpose.
+
+In the esthetic field, creation is accompanied by a momentary belief.
+Fancy, remarks Groos, is necessarily joined to appearance. Its special
+character does not consist merely in freedom in images; what
+distinguishes it from association and from memory is this--that what is
+merely representative is taken for the reality. The creative artist has
+a conscious illusion (_bewusste Selbsttäuschung_): _the esthetic
+pleasure is an oscillation between the appearance and the reality_.[103]
+
+Mystic imagination presupposes an unconditioned and permanent belief.
+Mystics are believers in the true sense--they have faith. This character
+is peculiar to them, and has its origin in the intensity of the
+affective state that excites and supports this form of invention.
+Intuition becomes an object of knowledge only when clothed in images.
+There has been much dispute as to the objective value of those symbolic
+forms that are the working material of the mystic imagination. This
+contest does not concern us here; but we may make the positive statement
+that the constructive imagination has never obtained such a frequently
+hallucinatory form as in the mystics. Visions, touch-illusions, external
+voices, inner and "wordless" voices, which we now regard as psycho-motor
+hallucinations--all that we meet every moment in their works, until they
+become commonplace. But as to the nature of these psychic states there
+are only two solutions possible--one, naturalistic, that we shall
+indicate; the other, supernatural, which most theologians hold, and
+which regards these phenomena as valid and true revelation. In either
+case, the mystic imagination seems to us naturally tending toward
+objectification. It tends outwardly, by a spontaneous movement that
+places it on the same level as reality. Whichever conclusion we adopt,
+no imaginative type has the same great gift of energy and permanence in
+belief.
+
+
+II
+
+Mystic imagination, working along the lines peculiar to it, produces
+cosmological, religious, and metaphysical constructions, a summary
+exposition of which will help us understand its true nature.
+
+(1) The all-embracing cosmological form is the conception of the world
+by a purely imaginative being. It is rare, abnormal, and is nowadays met
+with only in a few artists, dreamers, or morbidly esthetic persons, as a
+kind of survival and temporary form. Thus, Victor Hugo sees in each
+letter of the alphabet the pictured imitation of one of the objects
+essential to human knowledge: "_A_ is the head, the gable, the
+cross-beam, the arch, _arx_; _D_ is the back, _dos_; _E_ is the
+basement, the console, etc., so that man's house and its architecture,
+man's body and its structure, and then justice, music, the church, war,
+harvesting, geometry, mountains, etc.--all that is comprised in the
+alphabet through the mystic virtue of form."[104] Even more radical is
+Gérard de Nerval (who, moreover, was frequently subject to
+hallucinations): "At certain times everything takes on for me a new
+aspect--secret voices come out of plant, tree, animals, from the
+humblest insects, to caution and encourage me. Formless and lifeless
+objects have mysterious turns the meaning of which I understand." To
+others, contemporaries, "the real world is a fairy land."
+
+The middle ages--a period of lively imagination and slight rational
+culture--overflowed in this direction. "Many thought that on this earth
+everything is a sign, a figure, and that the visible is worth nothing
+except insofar as it covers up the invisible." Plants, animals--there is
+nothing that does not become subject for interpretation; all the members
+of the body are emblems; the head is Christ, the hairs are the saints,
+the legs are the apostles, the eye is contemplation, etc. There are
+extant special books in which all that is seriously explained. Who does
+not know the symbolism of the cathedrals, and the vagaries to which it
+has given rise? The towers are prayer, the columns the apostles, the
+stones and the mortar the assembly of the faithful; the windows are the
+organs of sense, the buttresses and abutments are the divine assistance;
+and so on to the minutest detail.
+
+In our day of intense intellectual development, it is not given to many
+to return sincerely to a mental condition that recalls that of the
+earliest times. Even if we come near it, we still find a difference.
+Primitive man puts life, consciousness, activity, into everything;
+symbolism does likewise, but it does not believe in an autonomous,
+distinct, particular soul inherent in each thing. The absence of
+abstraction and generalization, characteristic of humanity in its early
+beginnings, when it peoples the world with myriads of animate beings,
+has disappeared. Every source of activity revealed by symbols appears
+as a fragmentary manifestation; it descends from a single primary,
+personal or impersonal, spring. At the root of this imaginative
+construction there is always either theism or pantheism.
+
+(2) Mystical imagination has often and erroneously been identified with
+religious imagination. Although it may be held that every religion, no
+matter how dull and poor, presupposes a latent mysticism, because it
+supposes an Unknown beyond the reach of sense, there are religions very
+slightly mystical in fact--those of savages, strictly utilitarian; among
+barbarians, the martial cults of the Germans and the Aztecs; among
+civilized races, Rome and Greece.[105] However, even though the mystic
+imagination is not confined to the bounds of religious thought, history
+shows us that there it attains its completest expansion.
+
+To be brief, and to keep strictly within our subject, let us note that
+in the completely developed great religions there has arisen opposition
+between the rationalists and the imaginative expounders, between the
+dogmatists and the mystics. The former, rational architects, build by
+means of abstract ideas, logical relations and methods, by deduction and
+induction; the others, imaginative builders, care little for this
+learned magnificence--they excel in vivid creations because the moving
+energy with them is in their feelings, "in their hearts;" because they
+speak a language made up of concrete images, and consequently their
+wholly symbolic speech is at the same time an original construction. The
+mystic imagination is a transformation of the mythic imagination, the
+myth changing into symbols. It cannot escape the necessity of this. On
+the other hand, the affective states cannot longer remain vague,
+diffuse, purely internal; they must become fixed in time and space, and
+condensed into images forming a personality, legend, event, or rite.
+Thus, Buddha represents the tendencies towards pity and resignation,
+summing up the aspirations for final rest. On the other hand, abstract
+ideas, pure concepts, being repugnant to the mystic's nature, it is also
+necessary that they take on images through which they may be seen--e.g.,
+the relations between God and man, in the various forms of
+communion; the idea of divine protection in incarnations, mediators,
+etc. But the images made use of are not dry and colorless like words
+that by long use have lost all direct representative value and are
+merely marks or tags. Being symbolic, i.e., concrete, they are, as we
+have seen, direct substitutes for reality, and they differ as much from
+words as sketching and drawing differ from our alphabetical signs, which
+are, however, their derivatives or abbreviations.
+
+It must, however, be noted that if "the mystic fact is a naïve effort to
+apprehend the absolute, a mode of symbolic, not dialectic, thinking,
+that lives on symbols and finds in them the only fitting
+expression,"[106] it seems that this imaginative phase has been to some
+minds only an internal form, for they have attempted to go beyond it
+through ecstacy, aspiring to grasp the ultimate principle as a pure
+unity, without image and without form,[107] which metaphysical realism
+hopes to attain by other methods and by a different route. However
+interesting they may be for psychology, these attempts, luring one on
+further and further, by their seeming or real elimination of every
+symbolic element, become foreign to our subject, and we cannot consider
+them at greater length here.
+
+(3) "History shows that philosophy has done nothing but transform ideas
+of mystic production, substituting for the form of images and
+undemonstrated statements the form of assertions of a rational
+system."[108] This declaration of a metaphysician saves us from dwelling
+on the subject long.
+
+When we seek the difference between religious and metaphysical or
+philosophical symbolism, we find it in the nature of the constitutive
+elements. Turned in the direction of religion, mystic symbolism
+presupposes two principal elements--imagination and feeling; turned in
+a metaphysical direction, it presupposes imagination and a very small
+rational element. This substitution involves appreciable deviation
+from the primitive type. The construction is of greater logical
+regularity. Besides, and this is the important characteristic, the
+subject-matter--though still resembling symbolic images--tends to
+become concepts: such are vivified abstractions, allegorical beings,
+hereditary entities of spirits and of gods. In short, metaphysical
+mysticism is a transition-form towards metaphysical rationalism,
+although these two tendencies have always been inimical in the history
+of philosophy, just as in the history of religion.
+
+In this imaginative plan of the world we may recognize stages according
+to the increasing weakness of the systems, depending on the number and
+quality of the hypotheses. For example, the progression is apparent
+between Plotinus and the frenzied creations of the Gnostics and the
+Cabalists. With the latter, we come into a world of unbridled fancy
+which, in place of human romances, invents cosmic romances. Here appear
+the allegorical beings mentioned above, half concept, half symbol; the
+ten Sephiros of the Cabala, immutable forms of being; the _syzygies_ or
+couples of Gnosticism--soul and reflection, depth and silence, reason
+and life, inspiration and truth, etc.; the absolute manifesting itself
+by the unfolding of fifty-two attributes, each unfolding comprising
+seven _eons_, corresponding to the 364 days of the year, etc. It would
+be wearisome to follow these extravagant thoughts, which, though the
+learned may treat them with some respect, have for the psychologist only
+the interest of pathologic evidence. Moreover, this form of mystic
+imagination presents too little that is new for us to speak of it
+without repeating ourselves.
+
+To conclude: The mystic imagination, in its alluring freedom, its
+variety, and its richness, is second to no form, not even to esthetic
+invention, which, according to common prejudice, is the type _par
+excellence_. Following the most venturesome methods of analogy, it has
+constructed conceptions of the world made up almost wholly of feelings
+and images--symbolic architectures.
+
+FOOTNOTES:
+
+[99] _Philosophy of the Unconscious_, I, part 2, ch. IX.
+
+[100] J. Darmesteter, in Récéjac, _Essai sur les fondements de la
+connaissance mystique_, p. 124.
+
+[101] In such notions may perhaps be best found the genesis of the
+present superstitions in regard to "lucky" and "unlucky" numbers,
+like the number 13, which have such persistence. (Tr.)
+
+[102] See Part Two, chapter II.
+
+[103] Groos, _Die Spiele der Thiere_, pp. 308-312.
+
+[104] Mabilleau, _op. cit._, p. 132.
+
+[105] If we leave out oriental influences and the Mysteries, which,
+according to Aristotle, were not dogmatic teaching, but a show, an
+assemblage of symbols, acting by evocation, or suggestion, following
+the special mode of mystic imagination that we already know.
+
+[106] Récéjac, _op. cit._, pp. 139 ff.
+
+[107] One at once calls to mind Plotinus, whose highest philosophy
+is a kind of indescribable ecstacy. (Tr.)
+
+[108] Hartmann, _op. cit._, vol. I, part 2, chapter IX.
+
+
+
+
+CHAPTER IV
+
+THE SCIENTIFIC IMAGINATION
+
+
+It is quite generally recognized that imagination is indispensable in
+all sciences; that without it we could only copy, repeat, imitate; that
+it is a stimulus driving us onward and launching us into the unknown. If
+there does exist a very widespread prejudice to the contrary--if many
+hold that scientific culture throttles imagination--we must look for the
+explanation of this view first, in the equivocation, pointed out several
+times, that makes the essence of the creative imagination consist of
+images, which are here most often replaced by abstractions or extracts
+of things--whence it results that the created work does not have the
+living forms of religion, of art, or even of mechanical invention; and
+then, in the rational requirements regulating the development of the
+creative faculty--it may not wander at will. In either case its end is
+determined, and in order to exist, i.e., in order to be accepted, the
+invention must become subject to preëstablished rules.
+
+This variety of imagination being, after the esthetic form, the one
+that psychologists have best described, we may therefore be brief. A
+complete study of the subject, however, remains yet to be made. Indeed,
+we may remark that there is no "scientific imagination" in general, that
+its form must vary according to the nature of the science, and that,
+consequently, it really resolves itself into a certain number of genera
+and even of species. Whence arises the need of monographs, each one of
+which should be the work of a competent man.
+
+No one will question that mathematicians have a way of thinking all
+their own; but even this is too general. The arithmetician, the
+algebraist, and more generally the analyst, in whom invention obtains in
+the most abstract form of discontinuous functions--symbols and their
+relations--cannot imagine like the geometrician. One may well speak of
+the ideal figures of geometry--the empirical origin of which is no
+longer anywhere contested--but we cannot escape from representing them
+as somehow in space. Does anyone think that Monge, the creator of
+descriptive geometry, who by his work has aided builders, architects,
+mechanics, stone cutters in their labors, could have the same type of
+imagination as the mathematician who has been given up all his life to
+the theory of number? Here, then, are at least two well-marked
+varieties, to say nothing of mixed forms. The physicist's imagination is
+necessarily more concrete; since he is incessantly obliged to refer to
+the data of sense or to that totality of visual, tactile, motor,
+acoustic, thermic, etc., representations that we term the "properties
+of matter." Our eye, says Tyndall, cannot see sound waves contract and
+dilate, but we construct them in thought--i.e., by means of visual
+images. The same remarks are true of chemists. The founders of the
+atomic theory certainly _saw_ atoms, and pictured them in the mind's
+eye, and their arrangement in compound bodies. The complexity of the
+imagination increases still more in the geologist, the botanist, the
+zoologist; it approaches more and more, with its increasing details, to
+the level of perception. The physician, in whom science becomes also an
+art, has need of visual representations of the exterior and interior,
+microscopic and macroscopic, of the various forms of diseased
+conditions; auditory representations (auscultation); tactile
+representations (touch, reverberation, etc.); and let us also add that
+we are not speaking merely of diagnosis of diseases, which is a matter
+of reproductive imagination, but of the discovery of a new pathologic
+"entity," proven and made certain from the symptoms. Lastly, if we do
+not hesitate to give a very broad extension to the term "scientific,"
+and apply it also to invention in social matters, we shall see that the
+latter is still more exacting, for one must represent to oneself not
+only the elements of the past and of the present, but in addition
+construct a picture of the future according to probable inductions and
+deductions.
+
+It might be objected that the foregoing enumeration proves a great
+variety in the _content_ of creative imagination but not in the
+imagination itself, and that nothing has proven that, under all these
+various aspects, there does not exist a so-called scientific
+imagination, that always remains identical. This position is untenable.
+For we have seen above[109] that there exists no creative instinct in
+general, no one mere indeterminate "creative power," but only wants
+that, in certain cases, excite novel combinations of images. The nature
+of the separable materials, then, is a factor of the first importance;
+it is determining, and indicates to the mind the direction in which it
+is turned, and all treason in this regard is paid for by aborted
+construction, by painful labor for some petty result. Invention,
+separated from what gives it body and soul, is nothing but a pure
+abstraction.
+
+The monographs called for above would, then, be a not unneeded work. It
+is only from them collectively that the rôle of the imagination in the
+sciences could be completely shown, and we might by abstraction separate
+out the characters common to all varieties--the essential marks of this
+imaginative type.
+
+Mathematics aside, all the sciences dealing with facts--from astronomy
+to sociology--suppose three moments, namely, observation, conjecture,
+verification. The first depends on external and internal sense, the
+second on the creative imagination, the third on rational operations,
+although the imagination is not entirely barred from it. In order to
+study its influence on scientific development, we shall study it (a) in
+the sciences in process of formation; (b) in the established sciences;
+(c) in the processes of verification.
+
+
+II
+
+It has often been said that the perfection of a science is measured by
+the amount of mathematics it requires; we might say, conversely, that
+its lack of completeness is measured by the amount of imagination that
+it includes. It is a psychological necessity. Where the human mind
+cannot explain or prove, there it invents; preferring a semblance of
+knowledge to its total absence.[110] Imagination fulfills the function
+of a substitute; it furnishes a subjective, conjectural solution in
+place of an objective, rational explanation. This substitution has
+degrees:
+
+(1) The sway of the imagination is almost complete in the
+pseudo-sciences (alchemy, astrology, magic, occultism, etc.), which it
+would be more proper to call embryonic sciences, for they were the
+beginnings of more exact disciplines and their fancies have not been
+without use. In the history of science, this is the golden age of the
+creative imagination, corresponding to the myth-making period already
+studied.
+
+(2) The semi-sciences, incompletely proved (certain portions of
+biology, psychology, sociology, etc.), although they show a regression
+of imaginative explanation repulsed by the hitherto absent or
+insufficient experimentation, nevertheless abound in hypotheses, that
+succeed, contradict, destroy one another. It is a commonplace truism
+that does not need to be dwelt on--they furnish _ad libitum_ examples of
+what has been rightly termed scientific mythology.
+
+Aside from the quantity of imagination expended, often without great
+profit, there is another character to be noted--the nature of the belief
+that accompanies imaginative creation. We have already seen repeatedly
+that the intensity of the imaginary conception is in direct ratio to the
+accompanying belief, or rather, that the two phenomena are really
+one--merely the two aspects of one and the same state of consciousness.
+But faith--i.e., the adherence of the mind to an undemonstrated
+assertion--is here at its maximum.
+
+There are in the sciences hypotheses that are not believed in, that are
+preserved for their didactic usefulness, because they furnish a simple
+and convenient method of explanation. Thus the "properties of matter"
+(heat, electricity, magnetism, etc.), regarded by physicists as distinct
+qualities even in the first half of the last century; the "two electric
+fluids;" cohesion, affinity, etc., in chemistry--these are some of the
+convenient and admitted expressions to which, however, we attach no
+explanatory value.
+
+There is also to be mentioned the hypothesis held as an approximation
+of reality--this is the truly scientific position. It is accompanied by
+a provisional and ever-revocable belief. This is admitted, in principle
+at least, by all scientists, and has been put into practice by many of
+them.
+
+Lastly, there is the hypothesis regarded as the truth itself--one that
+is accompanied by a complete, absolute, belief. But daily observation
+and history show us that in the realm of embryonic and ill-proven
+sciences this disposition is more flourishing than anywhere else. _The
+less proof there is, the more we believe._ This attitude, however wrong
+from the standpoint of the logician, seems to the psychologist natural.
+The mind clings tenaciously to the hypothesis because the latter is its
+own creation, or, because in adopting it, it seems to the mind that it
+should have itself discovered the hypothesis, so much does the latter
+harmonize with its inner states. Let us take the hypothesis of
+evolution, for example: we need not mention its high philosophical
+bearing, and the immense influence that it exerts on almost all forms of
+human thought. Nevertheless, it still remains an hypothesis; but for
+many it is an indisputable and inviolable dogma, raised far above all
+controversy. They accept it with the uncompromising fervor of believers:
+a new proof of the underlying connection between imagination and
+belief--they increase and decrease _pari passu_.
+
+
+III
+
+Should we assign as belonging solely to the imagination every invention
+or discovery--in a word, whatever is new--in the well-organized sciences
+that form a body of solid, constantly-broadening doctrine? It is a hard
+question. That which raises scientific knowledge above popular knowledge
+is the use of an experimental method and rigorous reasoning processes;
+but, is not induction and deduction going from the known to the unknown?
+Without desiring to depreciate the method and its value, it must
+nevertheless be admitted that it is preventive, not inventive. It
+resembles, says Condillac, the parapets of a bridge, which do not help
+the traveler to walk, but keep him from falling over. It is of value
+especially as a habit of mind. People have wisely discoursed on the
+"methods" of invention. There are none; but for which fact we could
+manufacture inventors just as we make mechanics and watchmakers. It is
+the imagination that invents, that provides the rational faculties with
+their materials, with the position, and even the solution of their
+problems. Reasoning is only a means for control and proof; it transforms
+the work of the imagination into acceptable, logical results. If one has
+not imagined beforehand, the logical method is aimless and useless, for
+we cannot reason concerning the completely unknown. Even when a problem
+seems to advance towards solution wholly through the reason, the
+imagination ceaselessly intervenes in the form of a succession of
+groupings, trials, guesses, and possibilities that it proposes. The
+function of method is to determine its value, to accept or reject
+it.[111]
+
+Let us show by a few examples that conjecture, the work of the combining
+imagination, is at the root of the most diverse scientific
+inventions.[112]
+
+Every mathematical invention is at first only an hypothesis that must be
+demonstrated, i.e., must be brought under previously established
+general principles: prior to the decisive moment of rational
+verification it is only a thing imagined. "In a conversation concerning
+the place of imagination in scientific work," says Liebig, "a great
+French mathematician expressed the opinion to me that the greater part
+of mathematical truth is acquired not through deduction, but through the
+imagination. He might have said 'all the mathematical truths,' without
+being wrong." We know that Pascal discovered the thirty-second
+proposition of Euclid all by himself. It is true that it has been
+concluded, wrongly perhaps, that he had also discovered all the earlier
+ones, the order followed by the Greek geometrician not being necessary,
+and not excluding other arrangements. However it be, reasoning alone was
+not enough for that discovery. "Many people," says Naville, "of whom I
+am one, might have thought hard all their lives without finding out the
+thirty-two propositions of Euclid." This fact alone shows clearly the
+difference between invention and demonstration, imagination and reason.
+
+In the sciences dealing with facts, all the best-established
+experimental truths have passed through a conjectural stage. History
+permits no doubt on this point. What makes it appear otherwise is the
+fact that for centuries there has gradually come to be formed a body of
+solid belief, making a whole, stored away in classic treatises from
+which we learn from childhood, and in which they seem to be arranged of
+themselves. We are not told of the series of checks and failures through
+which[113] they have passed. Innumerable are the inventions that
+remained for a long time in a state of conjecture, matters of pure
+imagination, because various circumstances did not permit them to take
+shape, to be demonstrated and verified. Thus, in the thirteenth century,
+Roger Bacon had a very clear idea of a construction on rails similar to
+our railroads; of optical instruments that would permit, as does the
+telescope, to see very far, and to discover the invisible. It is even
+claimed that he must have foreseen the phenomena of interferences, the
+demonstration of which had to be awaited ten centuries.
+
+On the other hand, there are guesses that have met success without much
+delay, but in which the imaginative phase--that of the invention
+preceding all demonstration--is easy to locate. We know that
+Tycho-Brahé, lacking inventive genius but rich in capacity for exact
+observation, met Kepler, an adventurous spirit: together, the two made a
+complete scientist. We have seen how Kepler, guided by a preconceived
+notion of the "harmony of the spheres," after many trials and
+corrections, ended by discovering his laws. Copernicus recognized
+expressly that his theory was suggested to him by an hypothesis of
+Pythagoras--that of a revolution of the earth about a central fire,
+assumed to be in a fixed position. Newton imagined his hypothesis of
+gravitation from the year 1666 on, then abandoned it, the result of his
+calculations disagreeing with observation; finally he took it up again
+after a lapse of a few years, having obtained from Paris the new measure
+of the terrestrial meridian that permitted him to prove his guess. In
+relating his discoveries, Lavoisier is lavish in expressions that leave
+no doubt as to their originally conjectural character. "He _suspects_
+that the air of the atmosphere is not a simple thing, but is composed of
+two very different substances." "He _presumes_ that the permanent
+alkalies (potash, soda) and the earths (lime, magnesia) should not be
+considered simple substances." And he adds: "What I present here is at
+the most no more than a mere _conjecture_." We have mentioned above the
+case of Darwin. Besides, the history of scientific discoveries is full
+of facts of this sort.
+
+The passage from the imaginative to the rational phase may be slow or
+sudden. "For eight months," says Kepler, "I have seen a first glimmer;
+for three months, daylight; for the last week I see the sunlight of the
+most wonderful contemplation." On the other hand, Haüy drops a bit of
+crystallized calcium spar, and, looking at one of the broken prisms,
+cries out, "All is found!" and immediately verifies his quick intuition
+in regard to the true nature of crystallization. We have already
+indicated[114] the psychological reasons for these differences.
+
+Underneath all the reasoning, inductions, deductions, calculations,
+demonstrations, methods, and logical apparatus of every sort, there is
+something animating them that is not understood, that is the work of
+that complex operation--the constructive imagination.
+
+To conclude: The hypothesis is a creation of the mind, invested with a
+provisional reality that may, after verification, become permanent.
+False hypotheses are characterized as imaginary, by which designation is
+meant that they have not become freed from the first state. But for
+psychology they are different neither in their origin nor in their
+nature from those scientific hypotheses that, subjected to the power of
+reason or of experiment, have come out victorious. Besides, in addition
+to abortive hypotheses, there are dethroned ones. What theory was more
+clinging, more fascinating in its applications, than that of phlogiston?
+Kant[115] praised it as one of the greatest discoveries of the
+eighteenth century. The development of the sciences is replete with
+these downfalls. They are psychological regressions: the invention,
+considered for a time as adequate to reality, decays, returns to the
+imaginative phase whence it seems to have emerged, and remains pure
+imagination.
+
+
+IV
+
+Imagination is not absent from the third stage of scientific research,
+in demonstration and experimentation, but here we must be brief, (1)
+because it passes to a minor place, yielding its rank to other modes of
+investigation, and (2) because this study would have to become doubly
+employed with the practical and mechanical imagination, which will
+occupy our attention later. The imagination is here only an auxiliary, a
+useful instrument, serving:
+
+(1) In the sciences of reasoning, to discover ingenious methods of
+demonstration, stratagems for avoiding or overcoming difficulties.
+
+(2) In the experimental sciences for inventing methods of research or of
+control--whence its analogy, above mentioned, to the practical
+imagination. Furthermore, the reciprocal influence of these two forms of
+imagination is a matter of common observation: a scientific discovery
+permits the invention of new instruments; the invention of new
+instruments makes possible experiments that are increasingly more
+complicated and delicate.
+
+One remark further: This constructive imagination at the third stage is
+the only one met with in many scientists. They lack genius for
+invention, but discover details, additions, corrections, improvements. A
+recent author distinguishes (a) those who have created the hypothesis,
+prepared the experiments, and imagined the appropriate apparatus; (b)
+those who have imagined the hypothesis and the experiment, but use means
+already invented; and (c) those who, having found the hypothesis made
+and demonstrated, have thought out a new method of verification.[116]
+The scientific imagination becomes poorer as we follow it down this
+scale, which, however, bears no relation to exactness of reasoning and
+firmness of method.
+
+Neglecting species and varieties, we may reduce the fundamental
+characters of the scientific imagination to the following:
+
+For its material, it has concepts, the degree of abstraction of which
+varies with the nature of the science.
+
+It employs only those associational forms that have an objective basis,
+although its mission is to form new combinations, "the discoveries
+consisting of the relation of ideas, capable of being united, which
+hitherto have been isolated."[117] (Laplace.) All association with an
+affective basis is strictly excluded.
+
+It aims toward objectivity: in its conjectural construction it attempts
+to reproduce the order and connection of things. Whence its natural
+affinity for realistic art, which is midway between fiction and reality.
+
+It is unifying, and so just the opposite of the esthetic imagination,
+which is rather developmental. It puts forward the master idea (Claude
+Bernard's _idée directrice_), a center of attraction and impulse that
+enlivens the entire work. The principle of unity, without which no
+creation succeeds, is nowhere more visible than in the scientific
+imagination. Even when illusory, it is useful. Pasteur, scrupulous
+scientist that he was, did not hesitate to say: "The experimenter's
+illusions are a part of his power: they are the preconceived ideas
+serving as guides for him."
+
+
+V
+
+It does not seem to me wrong to regard the imagination of the
+metaphysician as a variety of the scientific imagination. Both arise
+from one and the same requirement. Several times before this we have
+emphasized this point--that the various forms of imagination are not the
+work of an alleged "creative instinct," but that each particular one has
+arisen from a special need. The scientific imagination has for its prime
+motive the need of _partial_ knowledge or explanation; the metaphysical
+imagination has for its prime motive the need of a _total_ or complete
+explanation. The latter is no longer an endeavor on a restricted group
+of phenomena, but a conjecture as to the totality of things, as
+aspiration toward completely unified knowledge, a need of final
+explanation that, for certain minds, is just as imperious as any other
+need.
+
+This necessity is expressed by the creation of a cosmic or human
+hypothesis constructed after the type and methods of scientific
+hypotheses, but radically subjective in its origin--only apparently
+objective. _It is a rationalized myth._
+
+The three moments requisite for the constitution of a science are found
+here, but in a modified form: reflection replaces observation, the
+choice of the hypothesis becomes all-important, and its application to
+everything corresponds to scientific proof.
+
+(1) The first moment or preparatory stage, does not belong to our
+subject. It requires, however, a word in passing. In all science,
+whether well or ill established, firm or weak, we start from facts
+derived from observation or experiment. Here, facts are replaced by
+general ideas. The terminus of every science is, then, the
+starting-point of philosophical speculation:--metaphysics begins where
+each separate science ends; and the limits of the latter are theories,
+hypotheses. These hypotheses become working material for metaphysics
+which, consequently, is an hypothesis built on hypotheses, a conjecture
+grafted on conjecture, a work of imagination superimposed on works of
+imagination. Its principal source, then, is imagination, to which
+reflection applies itself.
+
+Metaphysicians, indeed, hold that the object of their researches, far
+from being symbolic and abstract, as in science, or fictitious and
+imaginary, as in art, is the very essence of things,--absolute reality.
+Unfortunately, they have never proven that it suffices to seek in order
+to find, and to wish in order to get.
+
+(2) The second stage is critical. It is concerned with finding the
+principle that rules and explains everything. In the invention of his
+theory the metaphysician gives his measure, and permits us to value his
+imaginative power. But the hypothesis, which in science is always
+provisional and revocable, is here the supreme reality, the fixed
+position, the _inconcussum quid_.
+
+The choice of the principle depends on several causes: The chief of
+these is the creator's individuality. Every metaphysician has a point of
+view, a personal way of contemplating and interpreting the totality of
+things, a belief that tends to recruit adherents.
+
+Secondary causes are: the influence of earlier systems, the sum of
+acquired knowledge, the social _milieu_, the variable predominance of
+religions, sciences, morality, esthetic culture.
+
+Without troubling ourselves with classifications, otherwise very
+numerous, into which we may group systems (idealism, materialism,
+monism, etc.) we shall, for our purpose, divide metaphysicians into the
+imaginative and rational, according as the imagination is superior to
+the reason or the reason rules the imagination. The differences between
+these two types of mind, already clearly shown in the choice of the
+hypothesis, are proven in its development.
+
+(3) The fundamental principle, indeed, must come out of its state of
+involution and justify its universal validity by explaining everything.
+This is the third moment, when the scientific process of verification is
+replaced by a process of construction.
+
+All imaginative metaphysics have a dynamic basis, e.g., the Platonic
+_Ideas_, Leibniz' _Monadology_, the _Nature-philosophy_ of Schelling,
+Schopenhauer's _Will_, and Hartmann's _Unconscious_, the mystics, the
+systems that assume a world-soul, etc. Semi-abstract, semi-poetic
+constructions, they are permeated with imagination not only in the
+general conception, but also in the numberless details of its
+application. Such are the "fulgurations" of Leibniz, those very rich
+digressions of Schopenhauer, etc. They have the fascination of a work of
+art as much as that of science, and this is no longer questioned by
+metaphysicians themselves;[118] they are living things.
+
+Rational metaphysics, on the other hand, have a chilly aspect, which
+brings them nearer the abstract sciences. Such are most of the
+mechanical conceptions, the Hegelian _Dialectic_, Spinoza's construction
+_more geometrico_, the _Summa_ of the Middle Ages. These are buildings
+of concepts solidly cemented together with logical relations. But art is
+not wholly absent; it is seen in the systematic concatenation, in the
+beautiful ordering, in the symmetry of division, in the skill with which
+the generative principle is constantly brought in, in showing it
+ever-present, explaining everything. It has been possible to compare
+these systems with the architecture of the Gothic cathedrals, in which
+the dominant idea is incessantly repeated in the numberless details of
+the construction, and in the branching multiplicity of ornamentation.
+
+Further, whatever view we adopt as to its ultimate value, it must be
+recognized that the imagination of the great metaphysicians, by the
+originality and fearlessness of its conceptions, by its skill in
+perfecting all parts of its work, is inferior to no other form. It is
+equal to the highest, if it does not indeed surpass them.
+
+FOOTNOTES:
+
+[109] See Part I, chapter II.
+
+[110] Cf. the Preface to Kant's _Critique of Pure Reason_. "Our
+reason ... is always troubled with questions which cannot be
+ignored, because they spring from the very nature of reason, and
+which cannot be answered, because they transcend the powers of human
+reason." (Tr.)
+
+[111] In the rare _Notes_ that he has left, James Watt writes that
+one afternoon he had gone out for a stroll on the Green at Glasgow,
+and his thoughts were absorbed with the experiments in which he was
+busied, trying to prevent the cooling of the cylinder. The thought
+then came to him that steam, being an elastic fluid, should expand
+and be precipitated in a space formerly void; and having made a
+vacuum in a separate vessel and opened communication between the
+steam of the cylinder and the vacant space, we see what should
+follow. Thus, having imagined the masterpiece of his discovery, he
+enumerates the processes that, employed in turn, allowed him to
+perfect it.
+
+[112] For further information we refer to the _Logique de
+l'hypothèse_, by E. Naville, from which are borrowed most of the
+facts here given.
+
+[113] This much-criticised defect has been only partially overcome
+in our methods of education through "object" lessons, and, if we may
+call them so, evolutionary methods, showing to the child "wie es
+eigentlich gewesen." Cf. J. Dewey, "_The School and Society_." (Tr.)
+
+[114] See above, Part Two, chapter IV.
+
+[115] Preface to the _Critique of Pure Reason_.
+
+[116] Colozza, _L'immaginazione nella Scienza_ (Paravia, 1900), pp.
+89 ff. In this author will be found abundant details respecting
+famous discoveries or experiments--those of Galileo, Franklin,
+Grimaldi, etc.
+
+[117] Here is an example in confirmation, taken from Duclaux's book
+on Pasteur: Herschel established a relation between the crystalline
+structure of quartz and the rotatory power of the substance; later
+on, Biot established it for sugar, tartaric acid, etc.--i.e., for
+substances in solution, whence he concluded that the rotatory power
+is due to the form of the molecule itself, not to the arrangement of
+the molecules in relation to one another. Pasteur discovered a
+relation between molecular dyssymmetry and hemiedry, and the study
+of hemiedry in crystals led him logically to that of fermentation
+and spontaneous generation.
+
+[118] On this point cf. Fouillée, _L'Avenir de la Metaphysique_, pp.
+79 ff.
+
+
+
+
+CHAPTER V
+
+THE PRACTICAL AND MECHANICAL IMAGINATION
+
+
+The study of the practical imagination is not without difficulties.
+First of all, it has not hitherto attracted psychologists, so that we
+enter the field at random, and wander unguided in an unexplored region.
+But the principal obstacle is in the lack of determination of this form
+of imagination, and in the absence of boundary lines. Where does it
+begin, and where does it end? Penetrating all our life even in its least
+details, it is likely to lead us astray through the diversity, often
+insignificant, of its manifestations. To convince ourselves of this
+fact, let us take a man regarded as least imaginative:--subtract the
+moments when his consciousness is busied with perceptions, memories,
+emotions, logical thought and action--all the rest of his mental life
+must be put down to the credit of the imagination. Even thus limited,
+this function is not a negligible quantity:--it includes the plans and
+constructions for the future, and all the dreams of escaping from the
+present; and there is no man but makes such. This had to be mentioned
+on account of its very triteness, because it is often forgotten, and
+consequently the field of the creative imagination is unduly restricted,
+being limited little by little to exceptional cases.
+
+It must, however, be recognized that these small facts teach us little.
+Consequently, following our adopted procedure, dwelling longest on the
+clearer and more evident cases in which the work of creating appears
+distinctly, we shall rapidly pass over the lower forms of the practical
+imagination, in order to dwell on the higher form--technical or
+mechanical imagination.
+
+
+I
+
+If we take an ordinary imaginative person,--understanding by this
+expression, one whom his nature singles out for no special invention--we
+see that he excels in the small inventions, adapted for a moment, for a
+detail, for the petty needs constantly arising in human life. It is a
+fruitful, ingenious, industrious mind, one that knows how to "take hold
+of things." The active, enterprising American, capable of passing from
+one occupation to another according to circumstances, opportunity, or
+imagined profits, furnishes a good example.
+
+If we descend from this form of sane imagination toward the morbid
+forms, we meet first the unstable--knights of industry, hunters of
+adventure, inventors frequently of questionable means, people hungry for
+change, always imagining what they haven't, trying in turn all
+professions, becoming workmen, soldiers, sailors, merchants, etc., not
+from expediency, but from natural instability.
+
+Further down are found the acknowledged "freaks" at the brink of
+insanity, who are but the extreme form of the unstable, and who, after
+having wasted haphazard much useless imagination, end in an insane
+asylum or worse still.
+
+Let us consider these three groups together. Let us eliminate the
+intellectual and moral qualities characteristic of each group, which
+establish notable differences between them, and let us consider only
+their inventive capacity as applied to practical life. One character
+common to all is mobility--the tendency to change. It is a matter of
+current observation that men of lively imagination are changeable.
+Common opinion, which is also the opinion of moralists and of most
+psychologists, attributes this mobility, this instability, to the
+imagination. This, in my opinion, is just upside down. _It is not
+because they have an active imagination that they are changeable, but it
+is because they are changeable that their imagination is active._ We
+thus return to the _motor_ basis of all creative work. Each new or
+merely modified disposition becomes a center of attraction and pull.
+Doubtless the inner push is a necessary condition, but it is not
+sufficient. If there were not within them a sufficient number of
+concrete, abstract, or semi-abstract representations, susceptible of
+various combinations, nothing would happen; but the origin of invention
+and of its frequent or constant changes of direction lies in the
+emotional and motor constitution, not in the quantity or quality of
+representations. I shall not dwell longer on a subject already
+treated,[119] but it was proper to show, in passing, that common opinion
+starts from an erroneous conception of the primary conditions of
+invention--whether great or small, speculative or practical.
+
+In the immense empire of the practical imagination, superstitious
+beliefs form a goodly province.
+
+What is superstition? By what positive signs do we recognize it? An
+exact definition and a sure criterion are impossible. It is a flitting
+notion that depends on the times, places, and nature of minds. Has it
+not often been said that the religion of one is superstition to another,
+and _vice versâ_? This, too, is only a single instance from among many
+others; for the common opinion that restricts superstition within the
+bounds of religious faith is an incomplete view. There are peculiar
+beliefs, foreign to every dogma and every religious feeling, from which
+the most radical freethinker is not exempt; for example, the
+superstitions of gamblers. Indeed, at the bottom of all such beliefs, we
+always find the vague, semi-conscious notion of a mysterious
+power--destiny, fate, chance.
+
+Without taking the trouble to set arbitrary limits, let us take the
+facts as they are, without possible question, i.e., imaginary
+creations, subjective fancies, having reality only for those admitting
+them. Even a summary collection of past and present superstitions would
+fill a library. Aside from those having a frankly religious mark, others
+almost as numerous surround civil life, birth, marriage, death,
+appearance and healing of diseases, _dies fasti atque nefasti_,
+propitious or fateful words, auguries drawn from the meeting or acts of
+certain animals. The list would be endless.[120]
+
+All that can be attempted here is a determination of the principal
+condition of that state of mind, the psychology of which is in the last
+analysis very simple. We shall thus answer in an indirect and incomplete
+manner the question of criterion.
+
+First, since we hold that the origin of all imaginative creation is a
+need, a desire, a tendency, where then is the origin of that
+inexhaustible fount of fancies? _In the instinct for individual
+preservation_, orientated in the direction of the future. Man seeks to
+divine future events, and by various means to act on the order of things
+to modify it for his own advantage or to appease his evil fate.
+
+As for the mental mechanism that, set in motion by this desire, produces
+the vain images of the superstitious, it implies:
+
+(1) A deep idea of causality, reduced to a _post hoc, ergo propter hoc_.
+Herodotus says of the Egyptian priests: "They have discovered more
+prodigies and presages than any other people, because, when some
+extraordinary thing appears, they note it as well as all the events
+following it, so that if a similar prodigy appears anew, they expect to
+see the same events reproduced." It is the hypothesis of an indissoluble
+association between two or more events, assumed without verification,
+without criticism. This manner of thinking depends on the weakness of
+the logical faculties or on the excessive influence of the feelings.
+
+(2) The abuse of reasoning by analogy. This great artisan of the
+imagination is satisfied with likenesses so vague and agreements so
+strange, that it dares everything. Resemblance is no longer a quality of
+things imposed on the mind, but an hypothesis of the mind imposed on
+things. Astrology groups into "constellations" stars that are billions
+of miles apart, believes that it discovers there an animal shape, human
+or any other, and deduces therefrom alleged "influences." This star is
+reddish (Mars), sign of blood; this other is of a pure, brilliant
+silvery light (Venus) or livid (Saturn), and acts in a different way. We
+know what clever structures of conjectures and prognoses have been built
+on these foundations. Need we mention the Middle Age practice of charms,
+which even in our day still has adherents among cultured people? The
+physicians of the time of Charles II, says Lang, gave their patients
+"mummy powder" (pulverized mummies) because the mummies, having lasted a
+long time, must prolong life.[121] Gold in solution has been esteemed
+as a medicine--gold, being a perfect substance, should produce perfect
+health. In order to get rid of a disease nothing is more frequent among
+primitive men than to picture the sick person on wood or on the ground,
+and to strike the injured part with an arrow or knife, in order to
+annihilate the sickening principle.
+
+(3) Finally, there is the magic influence ascribed to certain words. It
+is the triumph of the theory of _nomina numina_; we need not return to
+it. But the working of the mind on words, erecting them into entities,
+conferring life and power on them--in a word, the activity that creates
+myths and is the final basis of all constructive imagination--appears
+also here.[122]
+
+
+II
+
+Up to this point we have considered the practical imagination only in
+its somewhat petty aspect in small inventions or as semi-morbid in
+superstitious fancies. We now come to its higher form, mechanical
+invention.
+
+This subject has not been studied by psychologists. Not that they have
+misunderstood its rôle, which is, after all, very evident; but they
+limit themselves to speak of it cursorily, without emphasizing it.
+
+In order to appreciate its importance, I see no other way than to put
+ourselves face to face with the works that it has produced, to question
+the history of discovery and useful arts, to profit by the disclosures
+of inventors and their biographers.
+
+Of a work of this kind, which would be very long because the materials
+are scattered, we can give here only a rough sketch, merely to take
+therefrom what is of interest for psychology and what teaches us in
+regard to the characters peculiar to this type of imagination.
+
+The erroneous view that opposes imagination to the useful, and claims
+that they are mutually exclusive, is so widespread and so persistent,
+that we shall seem to many to be expressing a paradox when we say that
+if we could strike the balance of the imagination that man has spent and
+made permanent in esthetic life on the one hand, and in technical and
+mechanical invention on the other, the balance would be in favor of the
+latter. This assertion, however, will not seem paradoxical to those who
+have considered the question. Why, then, the view above mentioned? Why
+are people inclined to believe that our present subject, if not entirely
+foreign to the imagination, is only an impoverished form of it? I
+account for it by the following reasons:
+
+Esthetic imagination, when fully complete, is simply _fixed_, i.e.,
+remains a fictitious matter recognized as such. It has a frankly
+subjective, personal character, arbitrary in its choice of means. A work
+of art--a poem, a novel, a drama, an opera, a picture, a statue--might
+have been otherwise than it is. It is possible to modify the general
+plan, to add or reduce an episode, to change an ending. The novelist who
+in the course of his work changes his characters; the dramatic author
+who, in deference to public sentiment, substitutes a happy _denoûement_
+in place of a catastrophe, furnish naïve testimony of this freedom of
+imagination. Moreover, artistic creation, expressing itself in words,
+sounds, lines, forms, colors, is cast in a mould that allows it only a
+feeble "material" reality.
+
+The mechanical imagination is objective--it must be embodied, take on a
+form that gives it a place side by side with products of nature. It is
+arbitrary neither in its choice nor in its means; it is not a free
+creature having its end in itself. In order to succeed, it is subjected
+to rigorous physical conditions, to a determinism. It is at this cost
+that it becomes a reality, and as we instinctively establish an
+antithesis between the imaginary and the real, it seems that mechanical
+invention is outside the realm of the imagination. Moreover, it requires
+the constant intervention of calculation, of reasoning, and lastly, of a
+manual operation of supreme importance. We may say without exaggerating
+that the success of many mechanical creations depends on the skillful
+manipulation of materials. But this last moment, because it is decisive,
+should not make us forget its antecedents, especially the initial
+moment, which is, for psychology, similar to all other instances of
+invention, when the idea arises, tending to become objective.
+
+Otherwise, the differences here pointed out between the two forms of
+imagination--esthetic and mechanical--are but relative. The former is
+not independent of technical apprenticeship, often of long duration (e.g.,
+in music, sculpture, painting). As for the latter, we should not
+exaggerate its determinism. Often the same end can be reached by
+different inventions--by means differently imagined, through different
+mental constructions; and it follows that, after all allowances are
+made, these differently realized imaginations are equally useful.
+
+The difference between the two types is found in the nature of the need
+or desire stimulating the invention, and secondly in the nature of the
+materials employed. Others have confounded two distinct things--liberty
+of imagination, which belongs rather to esthetic creation, and quality
+and power of imagination, which may be identical in both cases.
+
+I have questioned certain inventors very skillful in mechanics,
+addressing myself to those, preferably, whom I knew to be strangers to
+any preconceived psychological theory. Their replies agree, and prove
+that the birth and development of mechanical invention are very
+strictly like those found in other forms of constructive imagination. As
+an example, I cite the following statement of an engineer, which I
+render literally:
+
+"The so-called creative imagination surely proceeds in very different
+ways, according to temperament, aptitudes, and, in the same individual,
+following the mental disposition, the _milieu_.
+
+"We may, however, as far as regards mechanical inventions, distinguish
+four sufficiently clear phases--the germ, incubation, flowering, and
+completion.
+
+"By germ I mean the first idea coming to the mind to furnish a solution
+for a problem that the whole of one's observations, studies, and
+researches has put before one, or that, put by another, has struck one.
+
+"Then comes incubation, often very long and painful, or, again, even
+unconscious. Instinctively as well as voluntarily one brings to the
+solution of the problem all the materials that the eyes and ears can
+gather.
+
+"When this latent work is sufficiently complete, the idea suddenly
+bursts forth, it may be at the end of a voluntary tension of mind, or on
+the occasion of a chance remark, tearing the veil that hides the
+surmised image.
+
+"But this image always appears simple and clear. In order to get the
+ideal solution into practice, there is required a struggle against
+matter, and the bringing to an issue is the most thankless part of the
+inventor's work.
+
+"In order to give consistence and body to the idea caught sight of
+enthusiastically in an aureole, one must have patience, a perseverance
+through all trials. One must view on all sides the mechanical agencies
+that should serve to set the image together, until the latter has
+attained the simplicity that alone makes invention viable. In this work
+of bringing to a head, the same spirit of invention and imagination must
+be constantly drawn upon for the solution of all the details, and it is
+against this arduous requirement that the great majority of inventors
+rebel again and again.
+
+"This is then, I believe, how one may in a general way understand the
+genesis of an invention. It follows from this that here, as almost
+everywhere, the imagination acts through association of ideas.
+
+"Thanks to a profound acquaintance with known mechanical methods, the
+inventor succeeds, through association of ideas, in getting novel
+combinations producing new effects, towards the realization of which his
+mind has in advance been bent."
+
+But for a slightly explored subject, the foregoing remarks are not
+enough. It is necessary to determine more precisely the general and
+special characters of this form of imagination.
+
+
+_1. General Characters_
+
+I term general characters those that the mechanical imagination
+possesses in common with the best known, least questioned forms of the
+constructive imagination. In order to be convinced that, so far as
+concerns these characters it does not differ from the rest, let us take,
+for the sake of comparison, esthetic imagination, since it is agreed,
+rightly or wrongly, that this is the model _par excellence_. We shall
+see that the essential psychological conditions coincide in the two
+instances.
+
+The mechanical imagination thus has like the other its ideal, i.e., a
+perfection conceived and put forward as capable, little by little, of
+being realized. The idea is at first hidden; it is, to use our
+correspondent's phrase, "the germ," the principle of unity, center of
+attraction, that suggests, excites, and groups appropriate associations
+of images, in which it is enwrapped and organized into a structure, an
+_ensemble_ of means converging toward a common end. It thus presupposes
+a dissociation of experience. The inventor undoes, decomposes, breaks up
+in thought, or makes of experience a tool, an instrument, a machine, an
+agency for building anew with the débris.
+
+The practical imagination is no more foreign to inspiration than the
+esthetic imagination. The history of useful inventions is full of men
+who suffered privations, persecution, ruin; who fought to the bitter end
+against relatives and friends--drawn by the need of creating, fascinated
+not by the hope of future gain but by the idea of an imposed mission, of
+a destiny they had to fulfill. What more have poets and artists done?
+The fixed and irresistible idea has led more than one to a foreseen
+death, as in the discovery of explosives, the first attempts at
+lightning conductors, aeronautics, and many others. Thus, from a true
+intuition, primitive civilizations have put on a level great poets and
+great inventors, erected into divinities or demi-gods historical or
+legendary personages in whom the genius of discovery is
+personified:--among the Hindoos, Vicavakarma; among the Greeks,
+Hephaestos, Prometheus, Triptolemus, Daedalus and Icarus. The Chinese,
+despite their dry imagination, have done the same; and we find the same
+condition in Egypt, Assyria, and everywhere. Moreover, the practical and
+mechanical arts have passed through a first period of no-change, during
+which the artisan, subjected to fixed rules and an undisputed tradition,
+considers himself an instrument of divine revelation.[123] Little by
+little he has emerged from that theological age, to enter the humanistic
+age, when, being fully conscious of being the author of his work, he
+labors freely, changes and modifies according to his own inspiration.
+
+Mechanical and industrial imagination, like esthetic imagination, has
+its preparatory period, its zenith and decline: the periods of the
+precursors, of the great inventors, and of mere perfectors. At first a
+venture is made, effort is wasted with small result,--the man has come
+too early or lacks clear vision; then a great imaginative mind arises,
+blossoms; after him the work passes into the hands of _dii minores_,
+pupils or imitators, who add, abridge, modify: such is the order. The
+many-times written history of the application of steam, from the time of
+the eolipile of Hero of Alexandria to the heroic period of Newcomen and
+Watt, and the improvements made since their time, is one proof of the
+statement. Another example:--the machine for measuring duration is at
+first a simple clepsydra; then there are added marks indicating the
+subdivisions of time, then a water gauge causes a hand to move around a
+dial, then two hands for the hours and minutes; then comes a great
+moment--by the use of weights the clepsydra becomes a clock, at first
+massive and cumbersome, later lightened, becoming capable, with
+Tycho-Brahé, of marking seconds; and then another moment--Huyghens
+invents the spiral spring to replace the weights, and the clock,
+simplified and lightened, becomes the watch.
+
+
+_2. Special Characters_
+
+The special characteristics of the mechanical imagination being the
+marks belonging to this type, we shall study them at greater length.
+
+(I) There is first of all, at least in great inventors, an inborn
+quality,--that is, a natural disposition,--that does not originate in
+experience and owes the latter only its development. This quality is a
+bent in a practical, useful direction; a tendency to act, not in the
+realm of dreams or human feeling, not on individuals or social groups,
+not toward the attainment of theoretical knowledge of nature, but to
+become master over natural forces, to transform them and adapt them
+toward an end.
+
+Every mechanical invention arises from a need: from the strict necessity
+for individual preservation in the case of primitive man who wages war
+against the powers of nature; from the desire for well-being and the
+necessity for luxury in growing civilization; from the need of creating
+little engines, imitating instruments and machines, in the child. In a
+word, _every particular invention, great or small, arises from a
+particular need_; for, we repeat again, there is no creative instinct in
+general. A man distinguished for various inventions along practical
+lines, writes: "As far as my memory allows, I can state that in my case
+conception always results from a material or mental need.[124] It
+springs up suddenly. Thus, in 1887, a speech of Bismarck made me so
+angry that I immediately thought of arming my country with a repeating
+rifle. I had already made various applications to the ministry of war,
+when I learned that the Lebel system had just been adopted. My
+patriotism was fully satisfied, but I still have the design of the gun
+that I invented." This communication mentions two or three other
+inventions that arose under analogous circumstances, but have had a
+chance of being adopted.
+
+Among the requisite qualities I mention the natural and necessary
+preëminence of certain groups of sensations or images (visual, tactile,
+motor) that may be decisive in determining the direction of the
+inventor.
+
+(II) Mechanical invention grows by successive stratifications and
+additions, as in the sciences, but more completely. It is a fine
+verification of the "subsidiary law of growing complexity" previously
+discussed.[125] If we measure the distance traversed since the distant
+ages when man was naked and unarmed before nature to the present time of
+the reign of machinery, we are astonished at the amount of imagination
+produced and expended, often uselessly lavished, and we ask ourselves
+how such a work could have been misunderstood or so lightly appreciated.
+It does not pertain to our subject to make even a summary table of this
+long development. The reader can consult the special works which,
+unfortunately, are most often fragmentary and lack a general view. So we
+should feel grateful to a historian of the useful arts, L. Bourdeau,
+for having attempted to separate out the philosophy of the subject, and
+for having fastened it down in the following formulas:[126]
+
+(a) The exploitation of the powers of nature is made according to their
+degree of power.
+
+(b) The extension of working instruments has followed a logical
+evolution in the direction of growing complexity and perfection.
+
+Man, according to the observations of M. Bourdeau, has applied his
+creative activity to natural forces and has set them to work according
+to a regular order, viz.:
+
+(1) Human forces, the only ones available during the "state of nature"
+and the savage state. Before all else, man created weapons: the most
+circumscribed primitive races have invented engines for attack and
+defense--of wood, bone, stone, as they were able. Then the weapon became
+a tool by special adaptation:--the battle-club serves as a lever, the
+tomahawk as a hammer, the flint ax as a hatchet, etc. In this manner
+there is gradually formed an arsenal of instruments. "Inferior to most
+animals as regards certain work that would have to be done with the aid
+of our organic resources alone, we are superior to all as soon as we set
+our tools at work. If the rodents with their sharp teeth cut wood better
+than we can, we do it still better with the ax, the chisel, the saw.
+Some birds, with the help of a strong beak, by repeated blows,
+penetrate the trunk of a tree: but the auger, the gimlet, the wimble do
+the same work better and more quickly. The knife is superior to the
+carnivore's teeth for tearing meat; the hoe better than the mole's paw
+for digging earth, the trowel than the beaver's tail for beating and
+spreading mortar. The oar permits us to rival the fish's fin; the sail,
+the wing of the bird. The distaff and spindle allow our imitating the
+industry of insect spinners; etc. Man thus reproduces and sums up in his
+technical contrivances the scattered perfections of the animal world. He
+even succeeds in surpassing them, because, in the form of tools, he uses
+substances and combinations of effects that cannot figure as part of an
+organism."[127] It is scarcely likely that most of these inventions
+arose from a voluntary imitation of animals: but even supposing such an
+origin, there would still remain a fine place for personal creative
+work. Man has produced by conscious effort what life realizes by methods
+that escape us; so that the creative imagination in man is a
+_succedaneum_ of the generative powers of nature.
+
+(2) During the pastoral stage man brought animals under subjection and
+discipline. An animal is a machine, ready-made, that needs only to be
+trained to obedience; but this training has required and stimulated all
+sorts of inventions, from the harness with which to equip it, to the
+chariots, wagons, and roads with which and on which it moves.
+
+(3) Later, the natural motors--air and water--have furnished new
+material for human ingenuity, e.g., in navigation; wind- and
+water-mills, used at first to grind grain, then for a multitude of
+uses--sawing, milling, lifting hammers; etc.
+
+(4) Lastly, much later, come products of an already mature civilization,
+artificial motors, explosives,--powder and all its derivatives and
+substitutes--steam, which has made such great progress.
+
+If the reader please to represent to himself well the immense number of
+facts that we have just indicated in a few lines; if he please to note
+that every invention, great or small, before becoming a fixed and
+realized thing, was at first an imagination, a mere contrivance of the
+brain, an assembly of new combinations or new relations, he will be
+forced to admit that nowhere--not excepting even esthetic
+production--has man imagined to such a great extent.
+
+One of the reasons--though not the only one--that supports the contrary
+opinion is, that by the very law of their growing complexity, inventions
+are grafted one on another. In all the useful arts improvements have
+been so slow, and so gradually wrought, that each one of them passed
+unperceived, without leaving its author the credit for its discovery.
+The immense majority of inventions are anonymous--some great names alone
+survive. But, whether individual or collective, imagination remains
+imagination. In order that the plow, at first a simple piece of wood
+hardened by the fire and pushed along with the human hand, should become
+what it is to-day, through a long series of modifications described in
+the special works, who knows how many imaginations have labored! In the
+same way, the uncertain flame of a resinous branch guiding vaguely in
+the night leads us, through a long series of inventions, to gas and
+electric lighting. All objects, even the most ordinary and most common
+that now serve us in our everyday-life, are _condensed imagination_.
+
+(III) More than any other form, mechanical imagination depends strictly
+on physical conditions. It cannot rest content with combining images, it
+postulates material factors that impose themselves unyieldingly.
+Compared to it, the scientific imagination has much more freedom in the
+building of its hypotheses. In general, every great invention has been
+preceded by a period of abortive attempts. History shows that the
+so-called "initial moment" of a mechanical discovery, followed by its
+improvements, is the moment ending a series of unsuccessful trials: we
+thus skip a phase of pure imagination, of imaginative construction that
+has not been able to enter into the mold of an appropriate determinism.
+There must have existed innumerable inventions that we might term
+mechanical romances, which, however, we cannot refer to because they
+have left us no trace, not being born viable. Others are known as
+curiosities because they have blazed the path. We know that Otto de
+Guericke made four fruitless attempts before discovering his air-pump.
+The brothers Montgolfier were possessed with the desire to make
+"imitation clouds," like those they saw moving over the Alps. "In order
+to imitate nature," they at first enclosed water-vapor in a light, stout
+case, which fell on cooling. Then they tried hydrogen; then the
+production of a gas with electrical properties; and so on. Thus, after a
+succession of hypotheses and failures, they finally succeeded. From the
+end of the sixteenth century there was offered the possibility of
+communicating at a distance by means of electricity. "In a work
+published in 1624 the Jesuit, Father Leurechon, described an imaginary
+apparatus (by means of which, he said, people could converse at a
+distance) for the aid of lovers who, by the connection of their
+movements, would cause a needle to move about a dial on which would be
+written the letters of the alphabet; and the drawing accompanying the
+text is almost a picture of Breguet's telegraph." But the author
+considered it impossible "in the absence of lovers having such
+ability."[128]
+
+Mechanical inventions that fail correspond to erroneous or unverified
+scientific hypotheses. They do not emerge from the stage of pure
+imagination, but they are instructive to the psychologist because they
+give in bare form the initial work of the constructive imagination in
+the technical field.
+
+There still remain the requirements of reasoning, of calculation, of
+adaptation to the properties of matter. But, we repeat, this determinism
+has several possible forms--one can reach the same goal through
+different means. Besides, these determining conditions are not lacking
+in any type of imagination; there is only a difference as between lesser
+and greater. Every imaginative construction from the moment that it is
+little more than a group of fancies, a spectral image haunting a
+dreamer's brain, must take on a body, submit to external conditions on
+which it depends, and which materialize it somewhat. In this respect,
+architecture is an excellent example. It is classed among the fine arts;
+but it is subject to so many limitations that its process of invention
+strongly resembles technical and mechanical creations. Thus it has been
+possible to say that "Architecture is the least personal of all the
+arts." "Before being an art it is an industry in the sense that it has
+nearly always a useful end that is imposed on it and rules its
+manifestations. Whatever it builds--a temple, a theater, a palace--it
+must before all else subordinate its work to the end assigned to it in
+advance. This is not all:--it must take account of materials, climate,
+soil, location, habits--of all things that may require much skill, tact,
+calculation, which, however, do not interest art as such, and do not
+permit architecture to manifest its purely esthetic qualities."[129]
+
+Thus, at bottom, there is an identity of nature between the constructive
+imagination of the mechanic and that of the artist: the difference is
+only in the end, the means, and the conditions. The formula, _Ars homo
+additus naturae_, has been too often restricted to esthetics--it should
+comprehend everything artificial. Esthetes, doubtless, hold that their
+imagination has for them a loftier quality--a disputed question that
+psychology need not discuss; for it, the essential mechanism is the same
+in the two cases: a great mechanic is a poet in his own way, because he
+makes instruments imitating life. "Those constructions that at other
+times are the marvel of the ignorant crowd deserve the admiration of the
+reflecting:--Something of the power that has organized matter seems to
+have passed into combinations in which nature is imitated or surpassed.
+Our machines, so varied in form and in function, are the representatives
+of a new kingdom intermediate between senseless and animate forms,
+having the passivity of the former and the activity of the latter, and
+exploiting everything for our sake. They are counterfeits of animate
+beings, capable of giving inert substances a regular functioning. Their
+skeleton of iron, organs of steel, muscles of leather, soul of fire,
+panting or smoking breath, rhythm of movement--sometimes even the shrill
+or plaintive cries expressing effort or simulating pain:--all that
+contributes to give them a fantastic likeness to life--a specter and
+dream of inorganic life."[130]
+
+FOOTNOTES:
+
+[119] See above, Part One, chapter II.
+
+[120] For a complete and recent study of the question, see A.
+Lehmann, _Aberglaube und Zauberei von den ältesten Zeiten bis in die
+Gegenwart_, 1898.
+
+[121] Lang, _op. cit._, I, 96. There will be found many other facts
+of this kind.
+
+[122] If this book were not merely an essay, we should have had to
+study language as an instrument of the practical life in its
+relations to the creative imagination, especially the function of
+analogy, in the extension and transformation of the meanings of
+words. Works on linguistics are full of evidence on this point. One
+could do better still by attending exclusively to the vernacular, to
+slang, which shows us creative force in action. "Slang," says one
+philologist, "has the property of figuring, expressing, and
+picturing language.... With it, however low its origin, one could
+reconstruct a people or a society." Its principal, not only, means,
+are metaphor and allegory. It lends itself equally to methods that
+degrade or ennoble existing words, but with a very marked preference
+for the worse or degrading meanings.
+
+[123] Ample information on this point will be found in the work of
+Espinas, _Les Origines de la Technologie_.
+
+[124] The same correspondent, without my having asked him in regard
+to this, gives me the following details: "When about seven years old
+I saw a locomotive, its fire and smoke. My father's stove also made
+fire and smoke, but lacked wheels. If, then, I told my father, we
+put wheels under the stove, it would move like a locomotive. Later,
+when about thirteen, the sight of a steam threshing-machine
+suggested to me the idea of making a horseless wagon. I began a
+childish construction of one, which my father made me give up," etc.
+The tendency toward mechanical invention shows itself very early in
+some children--we gave examples of it before. Our inventor adds: "My
+imagination was strongest at about the age of 25 to 35 (I am now 45
+years old). After that time it seems to me that the remainder of
+life is good only for producing less important conceptions, forming
+a natural consequence of the principal conceptions born of the
+period of youth."
+
+[125] See above, Part Two, chapter V.
+
+[126] L. Bourdeau, _Les Forces de l'Industrie_, Paris, 1884. This
+very substantial work, abounding in facts, conceived after a
+systematic plan, has aided us much in this study.
+
+[127] _Op. cit._, pp. 45-46.
+
+[128] Quoted by L. Bourdeau (_op. cit._, p. 354), who also mentions
+many other attempts: an anonymous Scot in 1753, Lesage of Geneva,
+1780, Lhomond (France, 1787), Battencourt (Spain, 1787), Reiser, a
+German (1794), Salva (Madrid, 1796). The insufficient study of
+dynamic electricity did not permit them to succeed.
+
+[129] E. Veron, _L'Esthétique_, p. 315.
+
+[130] L. Bourdeau, _op. cit._, p. 233.
+
+
+
+
+CHAPTER VI
+
+THE COMMERCIAL IMAGINATION
+
+
+Taking the word "commercial" in its broadest signification, I understand
+by this expression all those forms of the constructive imagination that
+have for their chief aim the production and distribution of wealth, all
+inventions making for individual or collective enrichment. Even less
+studied than the form preceding, this imaginative manifestation reveals
+as much ingenuity as any other. The human mind is largely busied in that
+way. There are inventors of all kinds--the great among these equal those
+whom general opinion ranks as highest. Here, as elsewhere, the great
+body invent nothing, live according to tradition, in routine and
+imitation.
+
+Invention in the commercial or financial field is subject to various
+conditions with which we are not concerned:
+
+(1) External conditions:--Geographical, political, economic, social,
+etc., varying according to time, place, and people. Such is its external
+determinism--human and social here in place of cosmic, physical, as in
+mechanical invention.
+
+(2) Internal, psychological conditions, most of which are foreign to the
+primary and essential inventive act:--on one hand, foresight,
+calculation, strength of reasoning;--in a word, capacity for reflection;
+on the other hand, assurance, recklessness, soaring into the unknown--in
+a word, strong capacity for action. Whence arise, if we leave out the
+mixed forms, two principal types--the calculating, the venturesome. In
+the former the rational element is first. They are cautious,
+calculating, selfish exploiters, with no great moral or social
+preoccupations. In the latter, the active and emotional element
+predominates. They have a broader sweep. Of this sort were the
+merchant-sailors of Tyre, Carthage, and Greece; the merchant-travelers
+of the Middle Ages, the mercantile and gain-hungry explorers of the
+fifteenth, sixteenth, and seventeenth centuries; later, in a changed
+form, the organizers of great companies, the inventors of monopolies,
+American "trusts," etc. These are the great imaginative minds.
+
+Eliminating, then, from our subject, what is not the purely imaginative
+element in order to study it alone, I see only two points for us to
+treat, if we would avoid repetition--at the initial moment of invention,
+the intuitive act that is its germ; during the period of development and
+organization, the necessary and exclusive rôle of schematic images.
+
+
+I
+
+By "intuition" we generally understand a practical, immediate judgment
+that goes straight to the goal. Tact, wisdom, scent, divination, are
+synonymous or equivalent expressions. First let us note that intuition
+does not belong exclusively to this part of our subject, for it is found
+_in parvo_ throughout; but in commercial invention it is preponderating
+on account of the necessity of perceiving quickly and surely, and of
+grasping chances. "Genius for business," someone has said, "consists in
+making exact hypotheses regarding the fluctuations of values." To
+characterize the mental state is easy, if it is a matter merely of
+giving examples; very difficult, if one attempts to discover its
+mechanism.
+
+The physician who in a trice diagnoses a disease, who, on a higher
+level, groups symptoms in order to deduce a new disease from them, like
+Duchenne de Boulogne; the politician who knows human nature, the
+merchant who scents a good venture, etc., furnish examples of intuition.
+It does not depend on the degree of culture;--not to mention women,
+whose insight into practical matters is well known, there are ignorant
+people--peasants, even savages--who, in their limited sphere, are the
+equals of fine diplomats.
+
+But all these facts teach us nothing concerning its psychological
+nature. Intuition presupposes acquired experience of a special nature
+that gives the judgment its validity and turns it in a particular
+direction. Nevertheless, this accumulated knowledge of itself gives no
+evidence as to the future. Now, every intuition is an anticipation of
+the future, resulting from only two processes:--inductive or deductive
+reasoning, e.g., the chemist foreseeing a reaction; imagination, i.e.,
+a representative construction. Which is the chief process here?
+Evidently the former, because it is not a matter of fancied hypothesis,
+but of adaptation of former experience to a new case. Intuition
+resembles logical operations much more than it does imaginative
+combinations. We may liken it to unconscious reasoning, if we are not
+afraid of the seeming contradiction of this expression which supposes a
+logical operation without consciousness of the middle term. Although
+questionable, it is perhaps to be preferred to other proposed
+explanations--such as automatism, habit, "instinct," "nervous
+connections." Carpenter, who as promoter of "unconscious cerebration,"
+deserves to be consulted, likens this state to reflection. In ending, he
+reprints a letter that John Stuart Mill wrote to him on the subject, in
+which he says in substance that this capacity is found in persons who
+have experience and lean toward practical things, but attach little
+importance to theory.[131]
+
+Every intuition, then, becomes concrete as a judgment, equivalent to a
+conclusion. But what seems obscure and even mysterious in it is the fact
+that, from among many possible solutions, it finds at the first shot the
+proper one. In my opinion this difficulty arises largely from a partial
+comprehension of the problem. By "intuition" people mean only cases in
+which the divination is correct; they forget the other, far more
+numerous, cases that are failures. The act by which one reaches a
+conclusion is a special case of it. What constitutes the originality of
+the operation is not its accuracy, but its _rapidity_--the latter is the
+essential character, the former accessory.
+
+Further, it must be acknowledged that the gift of seeing correctly is an
+inborn quality, vouchsafed to one, denied to another:--people are born
+with it, just as they are born right-or left-handed: experience does not
+give it--only permits it to be put to use. As for knowing why the
+intuitive act now succeeds and at another time fails, that is a question
+that comes down to the natural distinction between accurate and
+erroneous minds, which we do not need to examine here.
+
+Without dwelling longer on this initial stage, let us return to the
+commercial imagination, and follow it in its development.
+
+
+II
+
+The human race passed through a pre-commercial age. The Australians,
+Fuegians, and their class seem to have had no idea whatever of exchange.
+This primitive period, which was long, corresponds to the age of the
+horde or large clan. Commercial invention, arising like the other forms
+from needs,--simple and indispensable at first, artificial and
+superfluous later,--could not arise in that dim period when the groups
+had almost their sole relations with one another as war. Nothing called
+it to arise. But at a higher stage the rudimentary form of commerce,
+exchange in kind or truck, appeared early and almost everywhere. Then
+this long, cumbersome, inconvenient method gave place to a more
+ingenious invention--the employment of "standard values," beings or
+material objects serving as a common measure for all the rest:--their
+choice varied with the time, place, and people--e.g., certain shells,
+salt, cocoa-seeds, cloth, straw-matting, cattle, slaves, etc.; but this
+innovation held all the remainder in the germ, for it was the first
+attempt at substitution. But during the earliest period of commercial
+evolution the chief effort at invention consisted of finding
+increasingly more simple methods in the mechanism of exchange. Thus,
+there succeeded to these disparate values, the precious metals, in the
+form of powder and ingots, subject to theft and the inconveniences of
+weighing. Then, money of fixed denomination, struck under the authority
+of a chief or of a social group. Finally, gold and silver are replaced
+by the letter of credit, the bank check, and the numerous forms of
+fiduciary money.[132]
+
+Every one of these forward steps is due to inventors. I say inventors,
+in the plural, because it is proven that every change in the means of
+exchange has been imagined several times, in several ages--though in the
+same way--on the surface of our earth.
+
+Summing up--the inventive labor of this period is reduced to creating
+increasingly more simple and more rapid methods of _substitution_ in the
+commercial mechanism.
+
+The appearance of commerce on a large scale has depended on the state of
+agriculture, industry, ways of communication, social and economic
+conditions and political extension. It came into being toward the end of
+the Roman Republic. After the interruption of the Middle Ages the
+activity is taken up again by the Italian cities, the Hanseatic League,
+etc.; in the fifteenth century with the great maritime discoveries; in
+the sixteenth century by the _Conquistadores_, hungering for adventure
+and wealth; later on, by the mixed expeditions, whose expenses are
+defrayed by merchants in common, and which are often accompanied by
+armed bands that fight for them; lastly comes the incorporation of great
+companies that have been wittily dubbed "_Conquistadores_ of the
+counting-house."
+
+We now come to the moment when commercial invention attains its complex
+form and must move great masses. Taken as a whole, its psychological
+mechanism is the same as that of any other creative work. In the first
+instance, the idea arises, from inspiration, from reflection, or by
+chance. Then comes a period of fermenting during which the inventor
+sketches his construction in images, represents to himself the material
+to be worked upon, the grouping of stockholders, the making up of a
+capital, the mechanism of buying and selling, etc. All this differs from
+the genesis of an esthetic or mechanical work only in the end, or in the
+nature of the images. In the second phase it is necessary to proceed to
+execution--a castle in the air must be made a solid structure. Then
+appear a thousand obstructions in the details that must be overcome. As
+everywhere else, minor inventions become grafted on the principal
+invention; the author lets us see the poverty or richness in resource of
+his mind. Finally, the work is triumphant, fails, or is only
+half-successful.
+
+Did it keep only to these general traits, commercial imagination would
+be merely the reiteration, with slight changes, of forms already
+studied; but it has characteristics all its own that must be
+distinguished.
+
+(1) It is a combining or tactical imagination. Heretofore, we have met
+nothing like it. This special mark is derived from the very nature of
+its determinism, which is very different from that limiting the
+scientific or mechanical imagination. Every commercial project, in order
+to emerge from the internal, purely imaginative phase, and become a
+reality, requires "coming to a head," very exact calculation of
+frequently numerous, divergent, even contrary elements. The American
+dealer speculating in grain is under the absolute necessity of being
+quickly and surely informed regarding the agricultural situation in all
+countries of the world that are rich in grain, that export or import; in
+regard to the probable chances of rain or drouth; the tariff duties of
+the various countries, etc. Lacking that, he buys and sells haphazard.
+Moreover, as he deals in enormous quantities, the least error means
+great losses, the smallest profit on a unit is of account, and is
+multiplied and increased into a noticeable gain.
+
+Besides that initial intuition that shows opportune business and
+moments, commercial imagination presupposes a well-studied, detailed
+campaign for attack and defense, a rapid and reliable glance at every
+moment of execution in order to incessantly modify this plan--it is a
+kind of war. All this totality of special conditions results from a
+general condition,--namely, competition, strife. We shall come back to
+this point at the end of the chapter.
+
+Let us follow to the end the working of this creative imagination. Like
+the other forms, this kind of invention arises from a need, a
+desire--that of the spreading of "self-feeling," of the expansion of the
+individual under the form of enrichment. But this tendency, and with it
+the resulting imaginative creation, can undergo changes.
+
+It is a well-known law of the emotional life that what is at first
+sought as a means may become an end and be desired for itself. A very
+sensual passion may at length undergo a sort of idealization; people
+study a science at first because it is useful, and later because of its
+fascination; and we may desire money in order to spend it, and later in
+order to hoard it. Here it is the same: the financial inventor is often
+possessed with a kind of intoxication--he no longer labors for lucre,
+but for art; he becomes, in his own way, an author of romance. His
+imagination, set at the beginning toward gain, now seeks only its
+complete expansion, the assertion and eruption of its creative power,
+the pleasure of inventing for invention's sake,[133] daring the
+extraordinary, the unheard-of--it is the victory of pure construction.
+The natural equilibrium between the three necessary elements of
+creation--mobility, combination of images, calculation--is destroyed.
+The rational element gives way, is obliterated, and the speculator is
+launched into adventure with the possibility of a dazzling success or
+astounding catastrophe. But let us note well that the primary and sole
+cause of this change is in the affective and motor element, in an
+hypertrophy of the lust for power, in an unmeasured and morbid want of
+expansion of self. Here, as everywhere, the source of invention is the
+emotional nature of the inventor.
+
+(2) A second special character of commercial imagination is the
+exclusive employment of schematic representations. Although this process
+is also met with in the sciences and especially in social inventions,
+the imaginative type that we are now considering has the privilege of
+using them without exception. This, then, is the proper moment for a
+description.
+
+By "schematic images" I mean those that are, by their very nature,
+intermediate between the concrete image and the pure concept, but
+approach more nearly the concept. We have already pointed out very
+different kinds of representations--concrete images, material pertaining
+to plastic and mechanical imagination; the emotional abstractions of the
+diffluent imagination; affective images, the type of which is found in
+musicians; symbolic images, familiar in mystics. It may seem improper to
+add another class to this list, but it is not a meaningless subtlety.
+Indeed, there are no images in general that, according to the ordinary
+conception, would be copies of reality. Even their separation into
+visual, auditory, motor, etc., is not sufficient, because it
+distinguishes them only with regard to their _origin_. There are other
+differences. We have seen that the image, like everything living,
+undergoes corrosions, damages, twisting, and transformation: whence it
+comes about that this remainder of former impressions varies according
+to its composition, i.e., in simplicity, complexity, grouping of its
+constitutive elements, etc., and takes on many aspects. On the other
+hand, as the difference between the chief types of creative imagination
+depends in part on the materials employed--on the nature of the images
+that serve in mental building--a precise determination of the nature of
+the images belonging to each type is not an idle operation.
+
+In order to clearly explain what we mean by schematic images, let us
+represent by a line, _PC_, the scale of images according to the degree
+of complexity, from the percept, _P_, to the concept, _C_.
+
+  P------------X----G----S----C
+
+As far as I am aware, this determination of all the degrees has never
+been made. The work would be delicate; I do not regard it as impossible.
+I have no intention to undertake it, even as I do not pretend that I
+have given above the complete list of the various forms of images.
+
+If, then, we consider the foregoing figure merely as a means of
+representing the gradation to the eye, the image in moving, by
+hypothesis, from the moment of perception, _P_, is less and less in
+contact with reality, becomes simplified, impoverished, and loses some
+of its constitutive elements. At _X_ it crosses the middle threshold to
+approach nearer and nearer to the concept. At _G_ let us locate generic
+images, primitive forms of generalization, whose nature and process of
+becoming are well-known;[134] we should place farther along, at _S_,
+schematic images, which require a higher function of mind. Indeed, the
+generic image results from a spontaneous fusion of like or very
+analogous images--such as the vague representation of the oak, the
+horse, the negro, etc.; it belongs to only one class of objects. The
+schematic image results from a voluntary act; it is not limited to exact
+resemblances--it rises into abstraction; so it is scarcely accompanied
+by a fleeting representation of concrete objects--it is almost reduced
+to the word. At a higher level, it is freed from all sensuous elements
+or pictures, and is reduced, in the present instance, to the mere notion
+of value--it is not different from a pure concept. While the artist and
+the mechanic build with concrete images, the commercial imagination can
+act directly neither on things nor on their immediate representations,
+because from the time that it goes beyond the primitive age it requires
+a substitution of increasing generality; materials become values that
+are in turn reducible to symbols. Consequently, it proceeds as in the
+stating and solving of abstract problems in which, after having
+substituted for things and their relations figures and letters,
+calculation works with signs, and indirectly with things.
+
+Aside from the first moment of invention, the finding of the idea--an
+invariable psychological state--it must be recognized that in its
+development and detailed construction the commercial imagination is made
+up chiefly of calculations and combinations that hardly permit concrete
+images. If we admit, then,--and this is unquestionable--that these are
+the materials _par excellence_ of the creative imagination, we shall be
+disposed to hold that the imaginative type we are now studying is a kind
+of involution, a case of impoverishment--an unacceptable thesis as
+regards the invention itself, but strictly acceptable as regards the
+conditions that necessity imposes upon it.
+
+In closing, let us note that financial imagination does not always have
+as its goal the enriching of an individual or of a closely limited group
+of associates: it can aim higher, act on greater masses, address itself
+strenuously to a problem as complex as the reformation of the finances
+of a powerful state. All the civilized nations count in their history
+men who imagined a financial system and succeeded, with various
+fortunes, in making it prevail. The word "system," consecrated by usage,
+makes unnecessary any comment, and relates this form of imagination to
+that of scientists and philosophers. Every system rests on a
+master-conception, on an ideal, a center about which there is assembled
+the mental construction made up of imagination and calculation which, if
+circumstances permit, must take shape, must show that it can live.
+
+Let us call to mind the author of the first, or at least, of the most
+notorious of these "systems." Law claimed that he was applying "the
+methods of philosophy, the principles of Descartes, to social economy,
+abandoned hitherto to chance and empiricism." His ideal was the
+institution of _credit_ by the state. Commerce, said he, was during its
+first stage the exchange of merchandise in kind; in a second stage,
+exchange by means of another, more manageable, commodity or universal
+value, security equivalent to the object it represented; it must enter
+a third stage when exchange will be made by a purely conventional sign
+having no value of its own. Paper represents money, just as the latter
+represents goods, "with the difference that the paper is not security,
+but a simple promise, constituting credit." The state must do
+systematically what individuals have done instinctively; but it must
+also do what individuals cannot do--create currency by printing on the
+paper of exchange the seal of public authority. We know the history of
+the downfall of this system, the eulogies and criticisms it has
+received:--but because of the originality and boldness of his views, the
+inexhaustible fecundity of his lesser inventions, Law holds an
+undisputed place among the great imaginative minds.
+
+
+III
+
+We said above that commerce, in its higher manifestations, is a kind of
+war.[135] Here, then, would be the place to study the military
+imagination. The subject cannot be treated save by a man of the
+profession, so I shall limit myself to a few brief remarks based on
+personal information, or gleaned from authorities.
+
+Between the various types of imagination hitherto studied we have shown
+great differences as regards their external conditions. While the
+so-called forms of pure imagination, whence esthetic, mythic, religious,
+mystic creations arise, can realize themselves by submitting to material
+conditions that are simple and not very exacting, the others can become
+embodied only when they satisfy an _ensemble_ of numerous, inevitable,
+rigorously determined conditions; the goal is fixed, the materials are
+rigid, there is little choice of the appropriate means. If there be
+added to the inflexible laws of nature unforeseen human passions and
+determinations, as in political or social invention, or the offensive
+combination of opponents, as in commerce and war; then the imaginative
+construction is confronted with problems of constantly growing
+complexity. The most ingenious inventor cannot invent an object as a
+whole, letting his work develop through an immanent logic:--the early
+plan must be continually modified and readapted; and the difficulty
+arises not merely from the multiple elements of the problem to be
+solved, but from ceaseless changes in their positions. So one can
+advance only step by step, and go forward by calculations and strict
+examination of possibilities. Hence it results that underneath this
+thick covering of material and intellectual conditions (calculation,
+reasoning), spontaneity (the aptness for finding new combinations, "that
+art of inventing without which we hardly advance"[136]) reveals itself
+to few clear-sighted persons; but, in spite of everything, this creative
+power is everywhere, flowing like subterranean streams, a vivifying
+agency.
+
+These general remarks, although not applicable exclusively to the
+military imagination, find their justification in it, because of its
+extreme complexity. Let us rapidly enumerate, proceeding from without
+inwards, the enormous mass of representations that it has to move and
+combine in order to make its construction adequate to reality, able at a
+precise moment to cease being a dream:--(1) Arms, engines, instruments
+of destruction and supply, varying according to time, place, richness of
+the country, etc. (2) The equally variable human element--mercenaries, a
+national army; strong, tried troops or weak and new. (3) The general
+principles of war, acquired by the study of the masters. (4) More
+personal is the power of reflection, the habitual solving of tactical
+and strategic problems. "Battles," said Napoleon, "are thought out at
+length, and in order to be successful it is necessary that we think
+several times in regard to what may happen." All the foregoing should be
+headed "science." Advancing more and more within the secret psychology
+of the individual, we come to art, the characteristic work of pure
+imagination. (5) Let us note the exact, rapid intuition at the
+commencement of the opportune moments. (6) Lastly, the creative element,
+the conception, a natural gift bearing the hall-mark of each inventor.
+Thus "the Napoleonic esthetics was always derived from a single concept,
+based on a principle that may be summed up thus:--Strict economy
+wherever it can be done; expenditure without limit on the decisive
+point. This principle inspires the strategy of the master; it directs
+everything, especially his battle-tactics, in which it is synthetized
+and summed up."[137]
+
+Such, in analytical terms, appears the hidden spring that makes
+everything move, and it is to be attributed neither to experience nor to
+reasoning, nor to wise combinations, for it arises from the innermost
+depths of the inventor. "The principle exists in him in a latent state,
+i.e., in the depths of the unconscious, and unconsciously it is that he
+applies it, when the shock of the circumstances, of goal and means,
+causes to flash from his brain the spark stimulating the artistic
+solution _par excellence_, one that reaches the limits of human
+perfection."[138]
+
+FOOTNOTES:
+
+[131] Carpenter, _Mental Physiology_, chapter XI (end).
+
+[132] Historically, the evolution has not always proceeded strictly
+in this order, which, however, seems the most logical one.
+Negotiable drafts were known to the Assyrians and Carthaginians. For
+thousands of years Egypt used ingots, not real money, but it was
+acquainted with fiduciary money. In the new world, the Peruvians
+made use of the scale, the Aztecs were ignorant of its use, etc. For
+details, see Letourneau, _L'Évolution du commerce dans les diverses
+races humaines_, Paris, 1897, especially pp. 264, 330, 354, 384,
+etc.
+
+[133] This condition has been well-described by various novelists,
+among them Zola, in _Money_.
+
+[134] For further details on this point, we refer the reader to our
+_Evolution of General Ideas_ (chapter I).
+
+[135] A general, a former professor in the War College, told me that
+when he heard a great merchant tell of the quick and sure service of
+his commercial information, the conception of the whole, and the
+care in all the details of his operations, he could not keep from
+exclaiming, "Why, that is war!"
+
+[136] Leibniz.
+
+[137] General Bonnal, _Les Maîtres de la Guerre_, 1899, p. 137. "In
+him (Napoleon)," says the writer, "there was something of the poet,
+and one could explain all his acts by means of this singular
+complex, a medley of imagination, passion, and calculation. The
+dreams of an Ossian with the positive cast of mind of a
+mathematician and the passions of a Corsican--such were the
+heterogeneous elements that clashed in that powerful organization"
+(p. 151).
+
+[138] _Op. cit._, p. 6.
+
+
+
+
+CHAPTER VII
+
+THE UTOPIAN IMAGINATION[139]
+
+
+When the human mind creates, it can use only two classes of ideas as
+materials to embody its idea, viz.:
+
+(1) Natural phenomena, the forces of the organic and inorganic worlds.
+In its scientific form, seeking to explain, to know, it ends in the
+hypothesis, a disinterested creation. In its industrial aspect, aiming
+towards application and utilization, it ends in practical, interested
+inventions.
+
+(2) Human, i.e., psychic elements--instincts, passions, feelings,
+ideas, and actions. Esthetic creation is the disinterested form, social
+invention is the utilitarian form.
+
+Consequently, we may say that invention in science resembles invention
+in the fine arts, both being speculative; and that mechanical and
+industrial invention approaches social invention through a common
+tendency toward the practical. I shall not insist on this distinction,
+which, to be definite, rests only on partial characters; I merely wish
+to mention that invention, whose rôle in social, political and moral
+evolution is large, must, in order to be a success, adopt certain
+processes while neglecting others. This the Utopians do not do.
+
+The development of human societies depends on a multitude of factors,
+such as race, geographic and economic conditions, war, etc., which we
+need neither enumerate nor study. One only belongs to our topic--the
+successive appearance of idealistic conceptions that, like all other
+creations of mind, tend to realize themselves, the moral ideal
+consisting of new combinations arising from the predominance of one
+feeling, or from an unconscious elaboration (inspiration), or from
+analogy.
+
+At the beginning of civilizations we meet semi-historic, semi-legendary
+persons--Manu, Zoroaster, Moses, Confucius, etc., who were inventors or
+reformers in the social and moral spheres. That a part of the inventions
+attributed to them must be credited to predecessors or successors is
+probable; but the invention, no matter who is its author, remains none
+the less invention. We have said elsewhere, and may repeat, that the
+expression _inventor_ in morals may seem strange to some, because we are
+imbued with the notion of a knowledge of good and evil that is innate,
+universal, bestowed on all men and in all times. If we admit, on the
+other hand, as observation compels us to do, not a ready-made morality,
+but a morality in the making, it must be, indeed, the _creation_ of an
+individual or of a group. Everybody recognizes inventors in geometry,
+in music, in the plastic and mechanic arts; but there have also been men
+who, in their moral dispositions, were very superior to their
+contemporaries, and were promoters, initiators.[140] For reasons of
+which we are ignorant, analogous to those that produce a great poet or a
+great painter, there arise moral geniuses who feel strongly what others
+do not feel at all, just as does a great poet, in comparison with the
+crowd. But it is not enough that they feel: they must create, they must
+realize their ideal in a belief and in rules of conduct accepted by
+other men. All the founders of great religions were inventors of this
+kind. Whether the invention comes from themselves alone, or from a
+collectivity of which they are the sum and incarnation, matters little.
+In them moral invention has found its complete form; like all invention,
+it is organic. The legend relates that Buddha, possessed with the desire
+of finding the perfect road of salvation for himself and all other men,
+gives himself up, at first, to an extravagant asceticism. He perceives
+the uselessness of this and renounces it. For seven years he meditates,
+then he beholds the light. He comes into possession of knowledge of the
+means that give freedom from _Karma_ (the chain of causes and effects),
+and from the necessity of being born again. Soon he renounces the life
+of contemplation, and during fifty years of ceaseless wanderings
+preaches, makes converts, organizes his followers. Whether true or
+false historically, this tale is psychologically exact. A fixed and
+besetting idea, trial followed by failure, the decisive moment of
+_Eureka!_ then the inner revelation manifests itself outwardly, and
+through the labors of the master and his disciples becomes complete,
+imposes itself on millions of men. In what respect does this mode of
+creation differ from others, at least in the practical order?
+
+Thus, from the viewpoint of our present study, we may divide ethics into
+living and dead. Living ethics arise from needs and desires, stimulate
+an imaginative construction that becomes fixed in actions, habits and
+laws; they offer to men a concrete, positive ideal which, under various
+and often contrary aspects, is always happiness. The lifeless ethics,
+from which invention has withdrawn, arise from reflection upon, and the
+rational codification of, living ethics. Stored away in the writings of
+philosophers, they remain theoretical, speculative, without appreciable
+influence on the masses, mere material for dissertation and commentary.
+
+In proportion as we recede from distant origins the light grows, and
+invention in the social and moral order becomes manifest as the work of
+two principal categories of minds--the fantastic, the positive. The
+former, purely imaginative beings, visionaries, utopians, are closely
+related to poets and artists. The latter, practical creators or
+reformers, capable of organizing, belong to the family of inventors in
+the industrial-commercial-mechanical order.
+
+
+I
+
+The chimerical form of imagination, applied to the social sciences, is
+the one that, taking account neither of the external determinism nor of
+practical requirements, spreads out freely. Such are the creators of
+ideal republics, seeking for a lost or to-be-discovered-in-the-future
+golden age, constructing, as their fancy pleases, human societies in
+their large outlines and in their details. They are social novelists,
+who bear the same relation to sociologists that poets do to critics.
+Their dreams, subjected merely to the conditions of an inner logic, have
+lived only within themselves, an ideal life, without ever passing
+through the test of application. It is the creative imagination in its
+unconscious form, restrained to its first phase.
+
+Nothing is better known than their names and their works: The _Republic_
+of Plato, Thomas More's _Utopia_, Campanella's _City of the Sun_,
+Harrington's _Oceana_, Fenelon's _Salente_, etc.[141] However idealistic
+they may be, one could easily show that all the materials of their ideal
+are taken from the surrounding reality, they bear the stamp of the
+_milieu_, be it Greek, English, Christian, etc., in which they lived,
+and it should not be forgotten that in the Utopians everything is not
+chimerical--some have been revealers, others have acted as stimuli or
+ferments. True to its mission, which is to make innovations, the
+constructive imagination is a spur that arouses; it hinders social
+routine and prevents stagnation.
+
+Among the creators of ideal societies there is one, almost contemporary,
+who would deserve a study of individual psychology--Ch. Fourier. If it
+is a question merely of fertility in pure construction, I doubt whether
+we could find one superior to him--he is equal to the highest, with the
+special characteristic of being at the same time exuberant to delirium
+and exact in details to the least minutiæ. He is such a fine type of the
+imaginative intellect that he deserves that we stop a moment.
+
+His cosmogony seems the work of an omnipotent demiurge fashioning the
+universe at will. His conception of the future world with its
+"counter-cast" creations, where the present ugliness and troubles of
+animal reign become changed into their opposites, where there will be
+"anti-lions," "anti-crocodiles," "anti-whales," etc., is one example of
+hundreds showing his inexhaustible richness in fantastic visions: the
+work of an imagination that is hot and overflowing, with no rational
+preoccupation.
+
+On the other hand, his psychogony, based on the idea of metempsychosis
+borrowed from the Orient, gives itself up to numerical vagaries.
+Assuming for every soul a periodical rebirth, he assigns it first a
+period of "ascending subversion," the first phase of which lasts five
+thousand years, the second thirty-six thousand; then comes a period of
+completion, 9,000 years; and then a period of "descending subversion,"
+whose first stage is 27,000 years, and the second 4,000 years--a total
+of 81,000 years. This form of imagination is already known to us.[142]
+
+The principal part of his psychology, the theory of the emotions,
+questionable in many respects, is relatively rational. But in the
+construction of human society, the duality of his imagination--powerful
+and minute--reappears. We know his methodical organization: the _group_,
+composed of seven to nine persons; the _series_, comprising twenty-four
+to thirty-two groups; a _phalanx_ that includes eighteen groups,
+constituting the phalanstery; the small city, a general center of
+phalanges; the provincial city, the imperial capital, the universal
+metropolis. He has a passion for classification and ordering; "his
+phalanstery works like a clock."
+
+This rare imaginative type well deserved a few remarks, because of its
+mixture of apparent exactness and a natural, unconscious utopianism and
+extravagance. For, beneath all these pulsating inventions of precise,
+petty details, the foundation is none the less a purely speculative
+construction of the mind. Let us add an incredible abuse of analogy,
+that chief intellectual instrument of invention, of which only the
+reading of his books can give an idea.[143] Heinrich Heine said of
+Michelet, "He has a Hindoo imagination." The term would apply still
+better to Fourier, in whom coexist unchecked profusion of images and the
+taste for numerical accumulations. People have tried to explain this
+abundance of figures and calculation as a professional habit--he was for
+a long time a bookkeeper or cashier, always an excellent accountant. But
+this is taking the effect for cause. This dualism existed in the very
+nature of his mind, and he took advantage of it in his calling. The
+study of the numerical imagination[144] has shown how it is frequently
+met with among orientals, whose imaginative development is unquestioned,
+and we have seen why the idealistic imagination agrees so well with the
+indefinite series of numbers and makes use of it as a vehicle.
+
+
+II
+
+With practical inventors and reformers the ideal falls--not that they
+sacrifice it for their personal interests, but because they have a
+comprehension of possibilities. The imaginative construction must be
+corrected, narrowed, mutilated, if it is to enter into the narrow frame
+of the conditions of existence, until it becomes adapted and determined.
+This process has been described several times, and it is needless to
+repeat it here in other terms. Nevertheless, the ideal--understanding by
+this term the unifying principle that excites creative work and supports
+it in its development--undergoes metamorphosis and must be not only
+individual but collective; the creation does not realize itself save
+through a "communion of minds," by a co-operation of feelings and of
+wills; the work of one conscious individual must become the work of a
+social consciousness.
+
+That form of imagination, creating and organizing social groups,
+manifests itself in various degrees according to the tendency and power
+of creators.
+
+There are the founders of small societies, religious in form--the
+Essenes, the earliest Christian communities, the monastic orders of the
+Orient and Occident, the great Catholic or Mohammedan congregations, the
+semi-lay, semi-religious sects like the Moravian Brotherhood, the
+Shakers, Mormons, etc. Less complete because it does not cover the
+individual altogether in all the acts of life is the creation of secret
+associations, professional unions, learned societies, etc. The founder
+conceives an ideal of complete living or one limited to a given end, and
+puts it into practice, having for material men grouped of their free
+choice, or by coöptation.
+
+There is invention operating on great masses--social or political
+invention strictly so called--ordinarily not proposed but imposed,
+which, however, despite its coercive power, is subject to requirements
+even more numerous than mechanical, industrial, or commercial invention.
+It has to struggle against natural forces, but most of all against human
+forces--inherited habits, customs, traditions. It must make terms with
+dominant passions and ideas, finding its justification, like all other
+creation, only in success.
+
+Without entering into the details of this inevitable determination,
+which would require useless repetition, we may sum up the rôle of the
+constructive imagination in social matters by saying that it has
+undergone a regression--i.e., that its area of development has been
+little by little narrowed; not that inventive genius, reduced to pure
+construction in images, has suffered an eclipse, but on its part it has
+had to make increasingly greater room for experiment, rational elements,
+calculation, inductions and deductions that permit foresight--for
+practical necessities.
+
+If we omit the spontaneous, instinctive, semi-conscious invention of the
+earliest ages, that was sufficient for primitive societies, and keep to
+creations that were the result of reflection and of great pretension, we
+can roughly distinguish three successive periods:
+
+(1) A very long idealistic phase (Antiquity, Renaissance) when triumphed
+the pure imagination, and the play of the free fancy that spends itself
+in social novels. Between the creation of the mind and the life of
+contemporary society there was no relation; they were worlds apart,
+strangers to one another. The true Utopians scarcely troubled themselves
+to make applications. Plato and More--would they have wished to realize
+their dreams?
+
+(2) An intermediate phase, when an attempt is made to pass from the
+ideal to the practical, from pure speculation to social facts. Already,
+in the eighteenth century, some philosophers (Locke, Rousseau) drew up
+constitutions, at the request of interested persons. During this period,
+when the work of the imagination, instead of merely becoming fixed in
+books, tends to become objectified in acts, we find many failures and
+some successes. Let us recall the fruitless attempts of the
+"phalansteries" in France, in Algeria, Brazil, and in the United States.
+Robert Owen was more fortunate;[145] in four years he reformed New
+Larnak, after his ideal, and with varying fortune founded short-lived
+colonies. Saint-Simonism has not entirely died out; the primitive
+civilization after his ideal rapidly disappeared, but some of his
+theories have filtered into or have become incorporated with other
+doctrines.
+
+(3) A phase in which imaginative creation becomes subordinated to
+practical life: The conception of society ceases to be purely idealistic
+or constructed _a priori_ by deduction from a single principle; it
+recognizes the conditions of its environment, adapts itself to the
+necessities of its development. It is the passage from the absolutely
+autonomous state of the imagination to a period when it submits to the
+laws of a rational imperative. In other words, the transition from the
+esthetic to the scientific, and especially the practical, form.
+Socialism is a well-known and excellent example of this. Compare its
+former utopias, down to about the middle of the last century, with its
+contemporary forms, and without difficulty we can appreciate the amount
+of imaginative elements lost in favor of an at least equivalent quantity
+of rational elements and positive calculations.
+
+FOOTNOTES:
+
+[139] This title, as will be seen later, corresponds only in part to
+the contents of this chapter.
+
+[140] For facts in support, see the _Psychology of the Emotions_,
+Second Part, chapter VIII.
+
+[141] Our author does not mention Bacon's _New Atlantis_, one of the
+best specimens of its kind. "Wisest Verulam," active and
+distinguished in so many fields, is not amenable to rules, and is
+here found among "idealists," as elsewhere among the foremost
+empiricists and iconoclasts. (Tr.)
+
+[142] See above, Part III, chapter III.
+
+[143] We recommend to the reader the "Epilogue sur l'Analogie," in
+_Le Monde Industriel_, pp. 244 ff., where he will learn that the
+"goldfinch depicts the child born of poor parents; the pheasant
+represents the jealous husband; the cock is the symbol of the man of
+the world; the cabbage is the emblem of mysterious love," etc. There
+are several pages in this tone, with alleged reasons in support of
+the statements.
+
+[144] See above, chapter II.
+
+[145] For an excellent account of the principles of these movements,
+see Rae, _Contemporary Socialism_; for Owen's ideals, his
+_Autobiography_; and for an account of some of the trials, Bushee's
+"Communistic Societies in the United States," _Political Science
+Quarterly_, vol. XX, pp. 625 ff. (Tr.)
+
+
+
+
+CONCLUSION.
+
+
+
+
+CONCLUSION
+
+I
+
+THE FOUNDATIONS OF THE CREATIVE IMAGINATION
+
+
+Why is the human mind able to create? In a certain sense this question
+may seem idle, childish, and even worse. We might just as well ask why
+does man have eyes and not an electric apparatus like the torpedo? Why
+does he perceive directly sounds but not the ultra-red and ultra-violet
+rays? Why does he perceive changes of odors but not magnetic changes?
+And so on _ad infinitum_. We will put the question in a very different
+manner: Being given the physical and mental constitution of man such as
+it is at present, how is the creative imagination a natural product of
+this constitution?
+
+Man is able to create for two principal reasons. The first, motor in
+nature, is found in the action of his needs, appetites, tendencies,
+desires. The second is the possibility of a spontaneous revival of
+images that become grouped in new combination.
+
+1. We have already shown in detail[146] that the hypothesis of a
+"creative instinct," if the expression is used not as an abbreviated or
+metaphorical formula but in the strict sense, is a pure chimera, an
+empty entity. In studying the various types of imagination we have
+always been careful to note that every mode of creation may be reduced,
+as regards its beginnings, to a tendency, a want, a special, determinate
+desire. Let us recall for the last time these initial conditions of all
+invention--these desires, conscious or not, that excite it.
+
+The wants, tendencies, desires--it matters not which term we adopt--the
+whole of which constitutes the instinct of individual preservation, have
+been the generators of all inventions dealing with food-getting,
+housing, making of weapons, instruments, and machines.
+
+The need for individual and social expansion or extension has given rise
+to military, commercial, and industrial invention, and in its
+disinterested form, esthetic creation.
+
+As for the sexual instinct, its psychic fertility is in no way less than
+the physical--it is an inexhaustible source of imagination in everyday
+life as well as in art.
+
+The wants of man in contact with his fellows have engendered, through
+instinctive or reflective action, the numerous social and practical
+creations regulating human groups, and they are rough or complex, stable
+or unstable, just or unjust, kindly or harsh.
+
+The need of knowing and of explaining, well or ill, has created myths,
+religions, philosophical systems, scientific hypotheses.
+
+Every want, tendency or desire may, then, become creative, by itself or
+associated with others, and into these final elements it is that
+analysis must resolve "creative spontaneity." This vague expression
+corresponds to a _sum_, not to a special property.[147] Every invention,
+then, has a _motor_ origin; _the ultimate basis of the constructive
+imagination is motor_.
+
+2. But needs and desires by themselves cannot create--they are only a
+stimulus and a spring. Whence arises the need of a second condition--the
+spontaneous revival of images.
+
+In many animals that are endowed only with memory the return of images
+is always provoked. Sensation from without or from within bring them
+into consciousness under the form, pure and simple, of former
+experience; whence we have reproduction, repetition without new
+associations. People of slight imagination and used to routine approach
+this mental condition. But, as a matter of fact, man from his second
+year on, and some higher animals, go beyond this stage--they are capable
+of spontaneous revival. By this term I mean that revival that comes
+about abruptly, without _apparent_ antecedents. We know that these act
+in a latent form, and consist of thinking by analogy, affective
+dispositions, unconscious elaboration. This sudden appearance excites
+other states which, grouped into new associations, contain the first
+elements of the creative act.
+
+Taken altogether, and however numerous its manifestations, the
+constructive imagination seems to me reducible to three forms, which I
+shall call _sketched_, _fixed_, _objectified_, according as it remains
+an internal fancy, or takes on a material but contingent and unstable
+form, or is subjected to the conditions of a rigorous internal or
+external determinism.
+
+(a) The _sketched_ form is primordial, original, the simplest of all; it
+is a nascent moment or first attempt. It appears first of all in
+dreaming--an embryonic, unstable and uncoördinated manifestation of the
+creative imagination--a transition-stage between passive reproduction
+and organized construction. A step higher is revery, whose flitting
+images, associated by chance, without personal intervention, are
+nevertheless vivid enough to exclude from consciousness every impression
+of the external world--so much so that the day-dreamer re-enters it only
+with a shock of surprise. More coherent are the imaginary constructions
+known as "castles in Spain"--the works of a wish considered
+unrealizable, fancies of love, ambition, power and wealth, the goal of
+which seems to be forever beyond our reach. Lastly, still higher, come
+all the plans for the future conceived vaguely and as barely
+possible--foreseeing the end of a sickness, of a business enterprise, of
+a political event, etc.
+
+This vague and "outline" imagination, penetrating our entire life, has
+its peculiar characters--the unifying principle is _nil_ or ephemeral,
+which fact always reduces it to the dream as a type; it does not
+externalize itself, does not change into acts, a consequence of its
+basically chimerical nature or of weakness of will, which reduces it to
+a strictly internal and individual existence. It is needless to say that
+this kind of imagination is a permanent and definite form with the
+dreamers living in a world of ceaselessly reappearing images, having no
+power to organize them, to change them into a work of art, a theory, or
+a useful invention.
+
+The "sketched" form is or remains an elementary, primitive, automatic
+form. Conformably to the general law ruling the development of
+mind--passage from indefinite to definite, from the incoherent to the
+coherent, from spontaneity to reflection, from the reflex to the
+voluntary period--the imagination comes out of its swaddling-clothes,
+is changed--through the intervention of a teleological act that assigns
+it an end; through the union of rational elements that subdue it for an
+adaptation. Then appear the other two forms.
+
+(b) The _fixed_ form comprises mythic and esthetic creations,
+philosophical and scientific hypotheses. While the "outline" imagination
+remains an internal phenomenon, existing only in and for a single
+individual, the fixed form is projected outwards, made something else.
+The former has no reality other than the momentary belief accompanying
+it; the latter exists by itself, for its creator and for others; the
+work is accepted, rejected, examined, criticised. Fiction rests on the
+same level as reality. Do not people discuss seriously the objective
+value of certain myths, and of metaphysical theories? the action of a
+novel or drama as though it were a matter of real events? the character
+of the _dramatis personae_ as though they were living flesh and blood?
+
+The fixed imagination moves in an elastic frame. The material elements
+circumscribing it and composing it have a certain fluidity; they are
+language, writing, musical sounds, colors, forms, lines. Furthermore, we
+know that its creations, in spite of the spontaneous adherence of the
+mind accepting them, are the work of a free will; they could have been
+otherwise--they preserve an indelible imprint of contingency and
+subjectivity.
+
+(c) This last mark is rubbed out without disappearing (for a thing
+imagined is always a personal thing) in the objectified form that
+comprises successful practical inventions--whether mechanical,
+industrial, commercial, military, social, or political. These have no
+longer an arbitrary, borrowed reality; they have their place in the
+totality of physical and social phenomena. They resemble creations of
+nature, subject like them to fixed conditions of existence and to a
+limited determinism. We shall not dwell longer on this last character,
+so often pointed out.
+
+In order the better to comprehend the distinction between the three
+forms of imagination let us borrow for a moment the terminology of
+spiritualism or of the common dualism--merely as a means of explaining
+the matter clearly. The "outline" imagination is a soul without a body,
+a pure spirit, without determination in space. The "fixed" imagination
+is a soul or spirit surrounded by an almost immaterial sheath, like
+angels or demons, genii, shadows, the "double" of savages, the
+_peresprit_ of spiritualists, etc. The _objectified_ imagination is soul
+and body, a complete organization after the pattern of living people;
+the ideal is incarnated, but it must undergo transformation, reductions
+and adaptations, in order that it may become practical--just as the
+soul, according to spiritualism, must bend to the necessities of the
+body, to be at the same time the servant of, and served by, the bodily
+organs.
+
+According to general opinion the great imaginers are found only in the
+first two classes, which is, in the strict sense of the word, true; in
+the full sense of the word false. As long as it remains "outline," or
+even "fixed," the constructive imagination can reign as supreme
+mistress. Objectified, it still rules, but shares its power with
+competitors; it avails nought without them, they can do nothing without
+it. What deceives us is the fact that we see it no longer in the open.
+Here the imaginative stroke resembles those powerful streams of water
+that must be imprisoned in a complicated network of canals and
+ramifications varying in shape and in diameter before bursting forth in
+multiple jets and in liquid architecture.[148]
+
+
+II
+
+THE IMAGINATIVE TYPE.
+
+Let us try now, by way of conclusion, to present to the reader a picture
+of the whole of the imaginative life in all its degrees.
+
+If we consider the human mind principally under its intellectual
+aspect--i.e., insofar as it knows and thinks, deducting its emotions
+and voluntary activity--the observation of individuals distinguishes
+some very clear varieties of mentality.
+
+First, those of a "positive" or realistic turn of mind, living chiefly
+on the external world, on what is perceived and what is immediately
+deducible therefrom--alien or inimical to vain fancy; some of them flat,
+limited, of the earth earthy; others, men of action, energetic but
+limited by real things.
+
+Second, abstract minds, "quintessence abstractors," with whom the
+internal life is dominant in the form of combinations of concepts. They
+have a schematic representation of the world, reduced to a hierarchy of
+general ideas, noted by symbols. Such are the pure mathematicians, the
+pure metaphysicians. If these two tendencies exist together, or, as
+happens, are grafted one on the other, without anything to
+counterbalance them, the abstract spirit attains its perfect form.
+
+Midway between these two groups are the imaginers in whom the internal
+life predominates in the form of combinations of images, which fact
+distinguishes them clearly from the abstractors. The former alone
+interest us, and we shall try to trace this imaginative type in its
+development from the normal or average stage to the moment when
+ever-growing exuberance leads us into pathology.
+
+The explanation of the various phases of this development is reducible
+to a well-known psychologic law--the natural antagonism between
+sensation and image, between phenomena of peripheral origin and
+phenomena of central origin; or, in a more general form, between the
+outer and inner life. I shall not dwell long on this point, which Taine
+has so admirably treated.[149] He has shown in detail how the image is
+a spontaneously arising sensation, one that is, however, aborted by the
+opposing shock of real sensation, which is its reducer, producing on it
+an arresting action and maintaining it in the condition of an internal,
+subjective fact. Thus, during the waking hours, the frequency and
+intensity of impressions from without press the images back to the
+second level; but during sleep, when the external world is as it were
+suppressed, their hallucinatory tendency is no longer kept in check, and
+the world of dreams is momentarily the reality.
+
+The psychology of the imaginer reduces itself to a progressively
+increasing interchange of rôles. Images become stronger and stronger
+states; perceptions, more and more feeble. In this movement opposite to
+nature I note four steps, each of which corresponds to particular
+conditions: (1) The quantity of images; (2) quantity and intensity; (3)
+quantity, intensity and duration; (4) complete systematization.
+
+(1) In the first place the predominance of imagination is marked only by
+the quantity of representations invading consciousness; they teem, break
+apart, become associated, combine easily and in various ways. All the
+imaginative persons who have given us their experiences either orally or
+in writing agree in regard to the extreme ease of the formation of
+associations, not in repeating past expedience, but in sketching little
+romances.[150] From among many examples I choose one. One of my
+correspondents writes that if at church, theatre, on a street, or in a
+railway station, his attention is attracted to a person--man or
+woman--he immediately makes up, from the appearance, carriage and
+attractiveness his or her present or past, manner of life,
+occupation--representing to himself the part of the city he or she must
+dwell in, the apartments, furniture, etc.--a construction most often
+erroneous; I have many proofs of it. Surely this disposition is normal;
+it departs from the average only by an excess of imagination that is
+replaced in others by an excessive tendency to observe, to analyze, or
+to criticise, reason, find fault. In order to take the decisive step and
+become abnormal one condition more is necessary--intensity of the
+representations.
+
+2. Next, the interchange of place, indicated above, occurs. Weak states
+(images) become strong; strong states (perceptions) become weak. The
+impressions from without are powerless to fulfill their regular function
+of inhibition. We find the simplest example of this state in the
+exceptional persistence of certain dreams. Ordinarily, our nocturnal
+imaginings vanish as empty phantasmagorias at the inrush of the
+perceptions and habits of daily life--they seem like faraway phantoms,
+without objective value. But, in the struggle occurring, on waking,
+between images and perceptions, the latter are not always victorious.
+There are dreams--i.e., imaginary creations--that remain firm in face
+of reality, and for some time go along parallel with it. Taine was
+perhaps the first to see the importance of this fact. He reports that
+his relative, Dr. Baillarger, having dreamt that one of his friends had
+been appointed editor of a journal, announced the news seriously to
+several persons, and doubt arose in his mind only toward the end of the
+afternoon. Since then contemporary psychologists have gathered various
+observations of this kind.[151] The emotional persistence of certain
+dreams is known. So-and-so, one of our neighbors, plays in a dream an
+odious rôle; we may have a feeling of repulsion or spite toward him
+persisting throughout the day. But this triumph of the image, accidental
+and ephemeral in normal man, is frequent and stable in the imaginers of
+the second class. Many among them have asserted that this internal world
+is the only reality. Gérard de Nerval "had very early the conviction
+that the majority is mistaken, that the material universe in which it
+believes, because its eyes see it and its hands touch it, is nothing but
+phantoms and appearances. For him the invisible world, on the contrary,
+was the only one not chimerical." Likewise, Edgar Allan Poe: "The real
+things of the world would affect me like visions, and only so; while the
+wild ideas of the land of dreams became in turn not only the feeding
+ground of my daily existence but positively the sole and entire
+existence itself." Others describe their life as "a permanent dream."
+We could multiply examples. Aside from the poets and artists, the
+mystics would furnish copious examples. Let us take an exaggerated
+instance: This permanent dream is, indeed, only a part of their
+existence; it is above all active through its intensity; but, while it
+lasts, it absorbs them so completely that they enter the external world
+only with a sudden, violent and painful shock.
+
+(3) If the changing of images into strong states preponderating in
+consciousness is no longer an episode but a lasting disposition, then
+the imaginative life undergoes a partial systematization that approaches
+insanity. Everyone may be "absorbed" for a moment; the above-mentioned
+authors are so frequently. On a higher level this invading supremacy of
+the internal life becomes a habit. This third degree is but the second
+carried to excess.
+
+Some cases of double personality (those of Azam, Reynolds) are known in
+which the second state is at first embryonic and of short duration; then
+its appearances are repeated, its sphere becomes extended. Little by
+little it engrosses the greater part of life; it may even entirely
+supplant the earlier self. The growing working of the imagination is
+similar to this. Thanks to two causes acting in unison, temperament and
+habit, the imaginative and internal life tends to become systematized
+and to encroach more and more on the real, external life. In an account
+by Féré[152] one may follow step by step this work of systematization
+which we abridge here to its chief characteristics.
+
+The subject, M......, a man thirty-seven years old, had from childhood a
+decided taste for solitude. Seated in an out-of-the-way corner of the
+house or out of doors, "he commenced from that time on to build castles
+in Spain that little by little took on a considerable importance in his
+life. His constructions were at first ephemeral, replaced every day by
+new ones. They became progressively more consistent.... When he had well
+entered into his imaginary rôle, he often succeeded in continuing his
+musing in the presence of other people. At college, whole hours would be
+spent in this way; often he would see and hear nothing." Married, the
+head of a prosperous business house, he had some respite; then he
+returned to his former constructions. "They commenced by being, as
+before, not very durable or absorbing; but gradually they acquired more
+intensity and duration, and lastly became fixed in a definite form."
+
+"To sum up, here is what this ideal life, lasting almost from his fourth
+year, meant: M...... had built at Chaville, on the outskirts of the
+forest, an imaginary summer residence surrounded by a garden. By
+successive additions the pavilion became a château; the garden, a park;
+servants, horses, water-fixtures came to ornament the domain. The
+furnishings of the inside had been modified at the same time. A wife had
+come to give life to the picture; two children had been born. Nothing
+was wanting to this household, only the being true.... One day he was
+in his imaginary salon at Chaville, occupied in watching an upholsterer
+who was changing the arrangement of the tapestry. He was so absorbed in
+the matter that he did not notice a man coming toward him, and at the
+question, 'M......, if you please--?' he answered, without thinking, 'He
+is at Chaville.' This reply, given in public, aroused in him a real
+terror. 'I believe that I was foolish,' he said. Coming to himself, he
+declared that he was ready to do anything to get rid of his ideas."
+
+Here the imaginative type is at its maximum, at the brink of insanity
+without being over it. Associations and combinations of images form the
+entire content of consciousness, which remains impervious to impressions
+from without. Its world becomes _the_ world. The parasitic life
+undermines and corrodes the other in order to become established in its
+place--it grows, its parts adhere more closely, it forms a compact
+mass--the imaginary systematization is complete.
+
+(4) The fourth stage is an exaggeration of the foregoing. The
+_completely_ systematized and permanent imaginative life excludes the
+other. This is the extreme form, the beginning of insanity, which is
+outside our subject, from which pathology has been excluded.
+
+Imagination in the insane would deserve a special study, that would be
+lengthy, because there is no form of imagination that insanity has not
+adopted. In no period have insane creations been lacking in the
+practical, religious, or mystic life, in poetry, the fine arts, and in
+the sciences; in industrial, commercial, mechanical, military projects,
+and in plans for social and political reform. We should, then, be
+abundantly supplied with facts.[153]
+
+It would be difficult, for, if in ordinary life we are often perplexed
+to decide whether a man is sane or not, how much more then, when it is a
+question of an inventor, of an act of the creative faculty, i.e., of a
+venture into the unknown! How many innovators have been regarded as
+insane, or as at least unbalanced, visionary! We cannot even invoke
+success as a criterion. Many non-viable or abortive inventions have been
+fathered by very sane minds, and people regarded as insane have
+vindicated their imaginative constructions through success.
+
+Let us leave these difficulties of a subject that is not our own, in
+order to determine merely the psychological criterion belonging to the
+fourth stage.
+
+How may we rightly assert that a form of imaginative life is clearly
+pathologic? In my opinion, the answer must be sought in the nature and
+degree of belief accompanying the labor of creating. It is an axiom
+unchallenged by anyone--whether idealist or realist of any shade of
+belief--that nothing has existence for us save through the consciousness
+we have of it; but for realism--and experimental psychology is of
+necessity realistic--there are two distinct forms of existence.
+
+One, subjective, having no reality except in consciousness, for the one
+experiencing it, its reality being due only to belief, to that first
+affirmation of the mind so often described.
+
+The other, objective, existing in consciousness and outside of it, being
+real not only for me but for all those whose constitution is similar or
+analogous to mine.
+
+This much borne in mind, let us compare the last two degrees of the
+development of the imaginative life.
+
+For the imaginer of the third stage, the two forms of existence are not
+confounded. He distinguishes _two_ worlds, preferring one and making
+the best of the other, but believing in both. He is conscious of passing
+from one to the other. There is an alternation. The observation of Féré,
+although extreme, is a proof of this.
+
+At the fourth stage, in the insane, imaginative labor--the only kind
+with which we are concerned--is so systematized that the distinction
+between the two kinds of existence has disappeared. All the phantoms of
+his brain are invested with objective reality. Occurrences without, even
+the most extraordinary, do not reach one in this stage, or else are
+interpreted in accordance with the diseased fancy. There is no longer
+any alternation.[154]
+
+By way of summary we may say: The creative imagination consists of the
+property that images have of gathering in new combinations, through the
+effect of a spontaneity whose nature we have attempted to describe. It
+always tends to realize itself in degrees that vary from mere momentary
+belief to complete objectivity. Throughout its multiple manifestations,
+it remains identical with itself in its basic nature, in its
+constitutive elements. The diversity of its deeds depends on the end
+desired, the conditions required for its attainment, materials employed
+which, as we have seen, under the collective name "representations" are
+very unlike one another, not only as regards their sensuous origin
+(visual, auditory, tactile, etc.) but also as regards their psychologic
+nature (concrete, symbolic, affective, emotional-abstract images;
+generic and schematic images, concepts--each group itself having shades
+or degrees).
+
+This constructive activity, applying itself to everything and radiating
+in all directions, is in its early, typical form a mythic creation. It
+is an invincible need of man to reflect and reproduce his own nature in
+the world surrounding him. The first application of his mind is thinking
+by analogy, which vivifies everything after the human model and attempts
+to know everything according to arbitrary resemblances. Myth-making
+activity, which we have studied in the child and in primitive man, is
+the embryonic form whence arise by a slow evolution religious
+creations--gross or refined; esthetic development, which is a fallen,
+impoverished mythology; the fantastic conceptions of the world that may
+little by little become scientific conceptions, with, however, an
+irreducible residuum of hypotheses. Alongside of these creations, all
+bordering upon what we have called the fixed form, there are practical,
+objective creations. As for the latter, we could not trace them to the
+same mythic source except by dialectic subtleties which we renounce. The
+former arise from an internal efflorescence; the latter from urgent
+life-needs; they appear later and are a bifurcation of the early trunk:
+but the same sap flows in both branches.
+
+The constructive imagination penetrates every part of our life, whether
+individual or collective, speculative and practical, in all its
+forms--IT IS EVERYWHERE.
+
+FOOTNOTES:
+
+[146] See above, Part I, chapter II.
+
+[147] It is a postulate of contemporary physiology that all the
+neurones taken together cannot spontaneously, that is, of
+themselves, give rise to any movement--they receive from without,
+and expend their energy outwards. Nevertheless, between the two
+moments that, in reflex and instinctive actions, seem continuous, a
+third interposes, which, for the higher psychic acts, may be of long
+duration. Thus, reasonings in logical form and reflection regarding
+a decision to be made have a feeble tendency to become changed into
+acts; their motor effects are indirect, and at a long range. But
+this intermediate moment is _par excellence_ the moment for
+psychology. It is also the moment of the personal equation: every
+man receives, transforms, and restores outwards according to his own
+organization, temperament, idiosyncrasies, character--in a word,
+according to his personality, of which needs, tendencies, desires,
+are the direct and immediate expression. So we come back, by another
+route, to the same definition of spontaneity.
+
+[148] Besides these three principal forms, there are intermediate
+forms, transitions from one category to another, that are hard to
+classify: certain mythic creations are half-sketched, half-fixed;
+and we find religious and social and political conceptions, partly
+theoretic or fixed, partly practical or objective.
+
+[149] Taine, _On Intelligence_, Part I, Book II, ch. I.
+
+[150] See Appendix E.
+
+[151] Sante de Santis, _I Sogni_, chapter X; Dr. Tissié, _Les
+Rêves_, esp. p. 165, the case of a merchant who dreams of having
+paid a certain debt, and several weeks afterward meets his creditor,
+and maintains that they are even, giving way only to proof.
+
+[152] For the complete account, see his _Pathologie des émotions_,
+pp. 345-49. (Paris, F. Alcan.)
+
+[153] Dr. Max Simon, in an article on "Imagination in Insanity"
+(_Annales médico-psychologiques_, December, 1876), holds that every
+kind of mental disease has its own form of imagination that
+expresses itself in stories, compositions, sketches, decorations,
+dress, and symbolic attributes. The maniac invents complicated and
+improbable designs; the persecuted, symbolic designs, strange
+writings, bordering on the horrible; megalomaniacs look for the
+effect of everything they say and do; the general paralytic lives in
+grandeur and attributes capital importance to everything; lunatics
+love the naïve and childishly wonderful.
+
+There are also great imaginers who, having passed through a period
+of insanity, have strongly regretted it "as a state in which the
+soul, more exalted and more refined, perceives invisible relations
+and enjoys spectacles that escape the material eyes." Such was
+Gérard de Nerval. As for Charles Lamb, he would assert that he
+should be envied the days spent in an insane asylum. "Sometimes," he
+said in a letter to Coleridge, "I cast a longing glance backwards to
+the condition in which I found myself; for while it lasted I had
+many hours of pure happiness. Do not believe, Coleridge, that you
+have tasted the grandeur and all the transport of fancy if you have
+not been insane. Everything seems to me now insipid in comparison."
+Quoted by A. Barine, _Névrosés_, p. 326.
+
+[154] There has often been cited the instance of certain maniacs at
+Charenton, who, during the Franco-Prussian War, despite the stories
+that were told them, the papers that they read, and the shells
+bursting under the walls of the asylum, maintained that the war was
+only imagined, and that all was only a contrivance of their
+persecutors.
+
+
+
+
+APPENDICES
+
+
+
+
+APPENDIX A
+
+THE VARIOUS FORMS OF INSPIRATION[155]
+
+
+Among the descriptions of the inspired state found in various authors, I
+select only three, which are brief and have each a special character.
+
+I. Mystic inspiration, in a passive form, in Jacob Boehme (_Aurora_): "I
+declare before God that I do not myself know how the thing arises within
+me, without the participation of my will. I do not even know that which
+I must write. If I write, it is because the Spirit moves me and
+communicates to me a great, wonderful knowledge. Often I do not even
+know whether I dwell in spirit in this present world and whether it is I
+myself that have the fortune to possess a certain and solid knowledge."
+
+II. Feverish and painful inspiration in Alfred de Musset: "Invention
+annoys me and makes me tremble. Execution, always too slow for my wish,
+makes my heart beat awfully, and weeping, and keeping myself from crying
+aloud, I am delivered of an idea that is intoxicating me, but of which
+I am mortally ashamed and disgusted next morning. If I change it, it is
+worse, it deserts me--it is much better to forget it and wait for
+another; but this other comes to me so confused and misshapen that my
+poor being cannot contain it. It presses and tortures me, until it has
+taken realizable proportions, when comes the other pain, of bringing
+forth, a truly physical suffering that I cannot define. And that is how
+my life is spent when I let myself be dominated by this artistic monster
+in me. It is much better, then, that I should live as I have imagined
+living, that I go to all kinds of excess, and that I kill this
+never-dying worm that people like me modestly term their inspiration,
+but which I call, plainly, my weakness."[156]
+
+III. The poet Grillparzer[157] analyzes the condition, thus:
+
+"Inspiration, properly so called, is the concentration of all the
+faculties and aptitudes on a single point which, for the moment, should
+include the rest of the world less than represent it. The strengthening
+of the state of the soul comes from the fact that its various faculties,
+instead of being disseminated over the whole world, find themselves
+contained within the limits of a single object, touch one another,
+reciprocally upholding, reënforcing, completing themselves. Thanks to
+this isolation, the object emerges out of the average level of its
+_milieu_, is illumined all around and put in relief--it takes body,
+moves, lives. But to attain this is necessary the concentration of all
+the faculties. It is only when the art-work has been a world for the
+artist that it is also a world for others."
+
+FOOTNOTES:
+
+[155] See Part One, chapter III.
+
+[156] George Sand, _Elle et Lui_, I.
+
+[157] In Oelzelt-Newin, _op. cit._, p. 49.
+
+
+
+
+APPENDIX B
+
+ON THE NATURE OF THE UNCONSCIOUS FACTOR
+
+
+We have seen that in the question of the unconscious there
+must be recognized a positive part--facts, and an hypothetical
+part--theories.[158]
+
+Insofar as the facts are concerned, it would be well, I think, to
+establish two categories--(1) static unconscious, comprising habits,
+memory, and, in general, all that is organized knowledge. It is a state
+of preservation, of rest; very relatively, since representations suffer
+incessant corrosion and change. (2) Dynamic unconscious, which is a
+state of latent activity, of elaboration and incubation. We might give a
+multitude of proofs of this unconscious rumination. The well-known fact
+that an intellectual work gains by being interrupted; that in resuming
+it one often finds it cleared up, changed, even accomplished, was
+explained by some psychologists prior to Carpenter by "the resting of
+the mind." It would be just as valid to say that a traveler covers
+leagues by lying abed. The author just mentioned[159] has brought
+together many observations in which the solution of a mathematical,
+mechanical, commercial problem appeared suddenly after hours and days of
+vague, undefinable uneasiness, the cause of which is unknown, which,
+however, is only the result of an underlying cerebral working; for the
+trouble, sometimes rising to anguish, ceases as soon as the unawaited
+conclusion has entered consciousness. The men who think the most are not
+those who have the clearest and "most conscious" ideas, but those having
+at their disposal a rich fund of unconscious elaboration. On the other
+hand, shallow minds have a naturally poor unconscious fund, capable of
+but slight development; they give out immediately and rapidly all that
+they are able to give; they have no reserve. It is useless to allow them
+time for reflection or invention. They will not do better; they may do
+worse.
+
+As to the nature of the unconscious working, we find disagreement and
+darkness. One may doubtless maintain, theoretically, that in the
+inventor everything goes on in subconsciousness and in unconsciousness,
+just as in consciousness itself, with the exception that a message does
+not arrive as far as the self; that the labor that may be followed, in
+clear consciousness, in its progress and retreats, remains the same when
+it continues unknown to us. This is possible. Yet it must at least be
+recognized that consciousness is rigorously subject to the condition of
+time, the unconscious is not. This difference, not to mention others, is
+not negligible, and could well arouse other problems.
+
+The contemporary theories regarding the nature of the unconscious seem
+to me reducible to two principal positions--one psychological, the other
+physiological.
+
+1. The physiological theory is simple and scarcely permits any
+variations. According to it, unconscious activity is simply cerebral; it
+is an "unconscious cerebration." The psychic factor, which ordinarily
+accompanies the activity of the nervous centers, is absent. Although I
+incline toward this hypothesis, I confess that it is full of
+difficulties.
+
+It has been proven through numerous experiments (Féré, Binet, Mosso,
+Janet, Newbold, etc.) that "unconscious sensations"[160] act, since they
+produce the same reactions as conscious sensations, and Mosso has been
+able to maintain that "the testimony of consciousness is less certain
+than that of the sphygmograph." But the particular instance of invention
+is very different; for it does not merely suppose the adaptation to an
+end which the physiological factor would suffice to explain; it implies
+a series of adaptations, corrections, rational operations, of which
+nervous activity alone furnishes us no example.[161]
+
+2. The psychological theory is based on an equivocal use of the word
+consciousness. Consciousness has one definite mark--it is an internal
+event existing, not by itself, but for me and insofar as it is known by
+me. But the psychological theory of the unconscious assumes that if we
+descend from clear consciousness progressively to obscure consciousness,
+to the subconscious, to the unconscious that manifests itself only
+through its motor reactions, the first state thus successively
+impoverished, still remains, down to its final term, identical in its
+basis with consciousness. It is an hypothesis that nothing justifies.
+
+No difficulty arises when we bear in mind the legitimate distinction
+between consciousness of self and consciousness in general, the former
+entirely subjective, the latter in a way objective (the consciousness of
+a man captivated by an attractive scene; better yet, the fluid form of
+revery or of the awaking from syncope). We may admit that this
+evanescent consciousness, affective in nature, felt rather than
+perceived, is due to a lack of synthesis, of relations among the
+internal states, which remain isolated, unable to unite into a whole.
+
+The difficulty commences when we descend into the region of the
+subconscious, which allows stages whose obscurity increases in
+proportion as we move away from clear consciousness, "like a lake in
+which the action of light is always nearing extinction" (in double
+coexisting personalities, automatic writing, mediums, etc.). Here some
+postulate two currents of consciousness existing at the same time in one
+person without reciprocal connection. Others suppose a "field of
+consciousness" with a brilliant center and extending indefinitely toward
+the dim distance. Still others liken the phenomenon to the movement of
+waves, whose summit alone is lighted up. Indeed, the authors declare
+that with these comparisons and metaphors they make no pretense of
+explaining; but certainly they all reduce unconsciousness to
+consciousness, as a special to a general case, and what is that if not
+explaining?
+
+I do not intend to enumerate all the varieties of the psychological
+theory. The most systematic, that of Myers, accepted by Delboef and
+others, is full of a biological mysticism all its own. Here it is in
+substance: In every one of us there is a conscious self adapted to the
+needs of life, and potential selves constituting the subliminal
+consciousness. The latter, much broader in scope than personal
+consciousness, has dependent on it the entire vegetative
+life--circulation, trophic actions, etc. Ordinarily the conscious self
+is on the highest level, the subliminal consciousness on the second; but
+in certain extraordinary states (hypnosis, hysteria, divided
+consciousness, etc.) it is just the reverse. Here is the bold part of
+the hypothesis: Its authors suppose that the supremacy of the subliminal
+consciousness is a reversion, a return to the ancestral. In the higher
+animals and in primitive man, according to them, all trophic actions
+entered consciousness and were regulated by it. In the course of
+evolution this became organized; the higher consciousness has delegated
+to the subliminal consciousness the care of silently governing the
+vegetative life. But in case of mental disintegration there occurs a
+return to the primitive state. In this manner they explain burns through
+suggestion, stigmata, trophic changes of a miraculous appearance, etc.
+It is needless to dwell on this conception of the unconscious. It has
+been vehemently criticised, notably by Bramwell, who remarks that if
+certain faculties could little by little fall into the domain of
+subliminal consciousness because they were no longer necessary for the
+struggle for life, there are nevertheless faculties so essential to the
+well-being of the individual that we ask ourselves how they have been
+able to escape from the control of the will. If, for example, some lower
+type had the power of arresting pain, how could it lose it?
+
+At the foundation of the psychological theory in all its forms is the
+unexpressed hypothesis that consciousness may be likened to a quantity
+that forever decreases without reaching zero. This is a postulate that
+nothing justifies. The experiments of psychophysicists, without solving
+the question, would support rather the opposite view. We know that the
+"threshold of consciousness" or minimum perceptible quantity, appears
+and disappears suddenly; the excitation is not felt under a determinate
+limit. Likewise in regard to the "summit of perception" or maximum
+perceptible, any increase of excitation is no longer felt if above a
+determinate limit. Moreover, in order that an increase or diminution be
+felt between these two extreme limits, it is necessary that both have a
+constant relation--differential threshold--as is expressed in Weber's
+law. All these facts, and others that I omit, are not favorable to the
+thesis of growing or diminishing continuity of consciousness. It has
+even been maintained that consciousness "has an aversion for
+continuity."
+
+To sum up: The two rival theories are equally unable to penetrate into
+the inner nature of the unconscious factor. We have thus had to limit
+ourselves to taking it as a fact of experience and to assign it its
+place in the complex function that produces invention.
+
+The observations of Flournoy (in his book, mentioned above, Part I,
+chapter III) have a particular interest in relation to our subject. His
+medium, Helène S......--very unlike others, who are satisfied with
+forecasts of the future, disclosures of unknown past events, counsel,
+prognosis, evocation, etc., without creating anything, in the proper
+sense--is the author of three or four novels, one of which, at least, is
+invented out of whole cloth--revelations in regard to the planet Mars,
+its countries, inhabitants, dwellings, etc. Although the descriptions
+and pictures of Helène S. are found on comparison to be borrowed from
+our terrestrial globe, and transposed and changed, as Flournoy has well
+shown, it is certain that in this "Martian novel," to say nothing of the
+others, there is a richness of invention that is rare among mediums: the
+creative imagination in its subliminal (unconscious) form encloses the
+other in its éclat. We know how much the cases of mediums teach us in
+regard to the unconscious life of the mind. Here we are permitted, as an
+exceptional case, to penetrate into the dark laboratory of romantic
+invention, and we can appreciate the importance of the labor that is
+going on there.
+
+FOOTNOTES:
+
+[158] See Part I, Chapter III.
+
+[159] _Mental Physiology_, Book II, chapter 13.
+
+[160] This expression is put in quotation marks because in American
+and English usage "sensation" is defined in terms of consciousness,
+and such an expression as "unconscious sensation" is paradoxical,
+and would lead to futile discussion. (Tr.)
+
+[161] For the detailed criticism of unconscious cerebration, see
+Boris Sidis, _The Psychology of Suggestion: A research into the
+subconscious nature of Man and Society_, New York, Appletons, 1898,
+pp. 121-127. The author, who assumes the coëxistence of two
+selves--one waking, the other subwaking, and who attributes to the
+latter all weakness and vice (according to him the unconscious is
+incapable of rising above mere association by contiguity; it is
+"stupid," "uncritical," "credulous," "brutal," etc.) would be
+greatly puzzled to explain its rôle in creative activity.
+
+
+
+
+APPENDIX C
+
+COSMIC AND HUMAN IMAGINATION[162]
+
+
+For Froschammer, _Fancy_ is the original principle of things. In his
+philosophical theory it plays the same part as Hegel's _Idea_,
+Schopenhauer's _Will_, Hartmann's _Unconscious_, etc. It is, at first,
+objective--in the beginning the universal creative power is immanent in
+things, just as there is contained in the kernel the principle that
+shall give the plant its form and construct its organism; it spreads out
+into the myriads of vegetable and animal existences that have been
+succeeded or that still live on the surface of the Cosmos. The first
+organized beings must have been very simple; but little by little the
+objective imagination increases its energy by exercising it; it invents
+and realizes increasingly more complex images that attest the progress
+of its artistic genius. So Darwin was right in asserting that a slow
+evolution raises up organized beings towards fulness of life and beauty
+of form.
+
+Step by step, it succeeds in becoming conscious of itself in the mind of
+man--it becomes subjective. Generative power, at first diffused
+throughout the organism, becomes localized in the generative organs, and
+becomes established in sex. "The brain, in living beings, may form a
+pole opposed to the reproductive organs, especially when these beings
+are very high in the organic scale." Thus changed, the generative power
+has become capable of perceiving new relations, of bringing forth
+internal worlds. In nature and in man it is the same principle that
+causes living forms to appear--objective images in a way, and subjective
+images, a kind of living forms that arise and die in the mind.[163]
+
+This metaphysical theory, one of the many varieties of _mens agitat
+molem_, being, like every other, a personal conception, it is
+superfluous to discuss or criticise its evident anthropomorphism. But,
+since we are dealing with hypotheses, I venture to risk a comparison
+between embryological development in physiology, instinct in
+psychophysiology, and the creative imagination in psychology. These
+three phenomena are creations, i.e., a disposition of certain materials
+following a determinate type.
+
+In the first case, the ovum after fertilization is subject to a
+rigorously determined evolution whence arises such and such an
+individual with its specific and personal characters, its hereditary
+influences, etc. Every disturbing factor in this evolution produces
+deviations, monstrosities, and the creation does not attain the normal.
+Embryology can follow these changes step by step. There remains one
+obscure point in any event, and that is, the nature of what the ancients
+called the _nisus formativus_.
+
+In the case of instinct, the initial moment is an external or internal
+sensation, or rather, a representation--the image of a nest to be built,
+in the case of the bird; of a tunnel to be dug, for the ant; of a comb
+to be made, for the bee and the wasp; of a web to be spun, for the
+spider, etc. This initial state puts into action a mechanism determined
+by the nature of each species, and ends in creations of special kinds.
+However, variations of instinct, its adaptation to various conditions,
+show that the conditions of the determinism are less simple, that the
+creative activity is endowed with a certain plasticity.
+
+In the third case, creative imagination, the ideal, a sketched
+construction, is the equivalent of the ovum; but it is evident that the
+plasticity of the creative imagination is much greater than that of
+instinct. The imagination may radiate in several very different ways,
+and the plan of the invention, as we have seen,[164] may arise as a
+whole and develop regularly in an embryological manner, or else present
+itself in a fragmentary, partial form that becomes complete after a
+series of attractions.
+
+Perhaps an identical process, forming three stages--a lower, middle,
+and higher--is at the root of all three cases. But this is only a
+speculative hypothesis, foreign to psychology proper.
+
+FOOTNOTES:
+
+[162] See above, Part One, Chapter IV.
+
+[163] Those who, not having the courage to read the 575 pages of
+Froschammer's book, want more details, may profitably consult the
+excellent analysis that Séailles has given (_Rev. Philos._, March,
+1878, pp. 198-220). See also Ambrosi, _Psicologia dell'
+immaginazione nella storia della filosofia_, pp. 472-498.
+
+[164] See above, Part II, chapter IV.
+
+
+
+
+APPENDIX D
+
+EVIDENCE IN REGARD TO MUSICAL IMAGINATION[165]
+
+
+The question asked above,[166] Does the experiencing of purely musical
+sounds evoke images, universally, and of what nature and under what
+conditions? seemed to me to enter a more general field--the affective
+imagination--which I intend to study elsewhere in a special work. For
+the time being I limit myself to observations and information that I
+have gathered, picking from them several that I give here for the sake
+of shedding light on the question. I give first the replies of
+musicians; then, those of non-musicians.
+
+1. M. Lionel Dauriac writes me: "The question that you ask me is
+complex. I am not a 'visualizer;' I have infrequent hypnagogic
+hallucinations, and they are all of the auditory type.
+
+"... Symphonic music aroused in me no image of the visual type while I
+remained the amateur that you knew from 1876 to 1898. When that amateur
+began to reflect methodically on the art of his taste, he recognized in
+music a power of suggesting:
+
+"1. Sonorous, non-musical images--thunder, clock. Example, the overture
+of _William Tell_.
+
+"2. Psychic images--suggestion of a mental state--anger, love, religious
+feeling.
+
+"3. Visual images, whether following upon the psychic image or through
+the intermediation of a programme.
+
+"Under what condition, in a symphonic work, is the visual image,
+introduced by the psychic image, produced? In the event of a break in
+the melodic web (see my _Psychologie dans l'Opéra_, pp. 119-120). Here
+are given, without orderly arrangement, some of the ideas that have come
+to me:
+
+"Beethoven's _symphony in C major_ appears to me purely musical--it is
+of a sonorous design. The _symphony in D major_ (the second) suggests to
+me visual-motor images--I set a ballet to the first part and keep track
+altogether of the ballet that I picture. The _Heroic Symphony_ (aside
+from the funeral march, the meaning of which is indicated in the title)
+suggests to me images of a military character, ever since the time that
+I noticed that the fundamental theme of the first portion is based on
+notes of perfect harmony--trumpet-notes and, by association, military.
+The _finale_ of this symphony, which I consider superior to other parts,
+does not cause me to see anything. _Symphony in B flat major_--I see
+nothing there--this may be said without qualification. _Symphony in C
+minor_--it is dramatic, although the melodic web is never broken. The
+first part suggests the image, not of Fate knocking at the gate, as
+Beethoven said, but of a soul overcome with the crises of revolt,
+accompanied by a hope of victory. Visual images do not come except as
+brought by psychic images."
+
+F. G., a musician, always sees--that is the rule, notably in the
+_Pastoral_, and in the _Heroic Symphony_. In Bach's _Passion_ he beholds
+the scene of the mystic lamb.
+
+A composer writes me: "When I compose or play music of my own
+composition I behold dancing figures; I see an orchestra, an audience,
+etc. When I listen to or play music by another composer I do not see
+anything." This communication also mentions three other musicians who
+see nothing.
+
+2. D......, so little of a musician that I had some trouble to make him
+understand the term "symphonic music," never goes to concerts. However,
+he went once, fifteen years ago, and there remains in his memory very
+clearly the principal phrase of a minuet (he hums it)--he cannot recall
+it without seeing people dancing a minuet.
+
+M. O. L...... has been kind enough to question in my behalf sixteen
+non-musical persons. Here are the results of his inquiry:
+
+Eight see curved lines.
+
+Three see images, figures springing in the air, fantastic designs.
+
+Two see the waves of the ocean.
+
+Three do not see anything.
+
+FOOTNOTES:
+
+[165] See Part Three, Chapter II.
+
+[166] _Ibid._, IV.
+
+
+
+
+APPENDIX E
+
+THE IMAGINATIVE TYPE AND ASSOCIATION OF IDEAS[167]
+
+
+I have questioned a very great number of imaginative persons, well known
+to me as such, and have chosen preferably those who, not making a
+profession of creating, let their fancy wander as it wills, without
+professional care. In all the mechanism is the same, differing scarcely
+more than temperament and degree of culture. Here are two examples.
+
+B......, forty-six years of age, is acquainted with a large part of
+Europe, North America, Oceania, Hindoostan, Indo-China, and North
+Africa, and has not passed through these countries on the run, but,
+because of his duties, resided there some time. It is worthy of remark,
+as will be seen from the following observation, that the remembrance of
+such various countries does not have first place in this brilliant,
+fanciful personage--which fact is an argument in favor of the very
+personal character of the creative imagination.
+
+"In a general way, imagination, very lively in me, functions by
+association of ideas. Memory or the outer world furnishes me some data.
+On this data there is not always, though there should be, imaginative
+work proper, and then things remain as they are, without end.
+
+"But when I meet a construction--it matters little whether ancient or in
+the course of erection--the formula, 'That ought to be fixed,' is one
+that rises mechanically to my mind in such a case; often it happens that
+I think aloud and say it, although alone. When going away from the
+architectural subject[168] under consideration, I make up infinite
+variations upon it, one after another. Sometimes the things start from a
+reflex...."
+
+After having noted his preference for the architecture of the Middle
+Ages, B...... adds (here he touches on the unconscious factor):
+
+"Were I to explain or attempt to explain how the Middle Ages have such
+an attraction for my mind, I should see therein an atavistic
+accumulation of religious feeling fixed in my family, on the female side
+no doubt, and of religiousness in ecclesiastical architecture--these
+touch.
+
+"Another example illustrating the rôle of association of ideas in the
+same matter. One Sunday night I left Noumea in the carriage of Dr.
+F...... who was going to visit a nunnery five leagues from there. At the
+moment of our arrival the doctor asked what time it was. 'Half-past
+two,' I said, looking at my watch. As we stopped in the convent court
+in front of the chapel I _heard_ the lusty conclusion of a psalm. 'They
+are singing vespers,' I remarked to the doctor. He commenced to laugh.
+'What time are vespers sung in your town?' 'At half-past two,' I
+answered. I opened the chapel door in order to show the doctor that
+vespers had just been held: the chapel was vacant. As I stood there,
+somewhat non-plussed, the doctor remarked, 'Cerebral automatism.'
+
+"I may add here, _by association_ of ideas. The doctor had seen through
+me, and had with fine insight perceived _why_ I had _heard_ the end of
+the psalm. The incident made a great impression on me, all the more as
+ever since the age of eight my memory testifies to a like hallucination,
+but of sight in place of hearing. It was at L...... that on Good Friday
+they rang at the cathedral with all their might. It was the very moment
+before the bells remain silent for three days, and it is known that this
+silence, ordained in the liturgy, is explained to children by telling
+them that during these two days the bells have flown to Rome. Naturally
+I was treated to this little tale, and as they finished telling it, I
+_saw_ a bell flying at an angle that I could still describe.
+
+"But this transforming power of my imagination is not present in me to
+the same extent as regards all things. It is much more operative in
+relation to Romano-Gothic architecture, mystic literature, and
+sociological knowledge than in relation, for instance, to my memories of
+travels. When I see again, in the mind's eye, the Isle of Bourbon,
+Niagara, Tahiti, Calcutta, Melbourne, the Pyramids and the Sphinx, the
+graphic representation is intellectually perfect. The objects live again
+in all their external surroundings. I feel the _Khamsinn_, the desert
+wind that scorched me at the foot of Pompey's Column; I hear the sea
+breaking into foam on the barrier reef of Tahiti. But the image does not
+lead to evocation of related or parallel ideas.
+
+"When, on the other hand, I take a walk over the Comburg moor, the
+castle weighs upon me in all its massiveness; the recollections of the
+_Mémoires d'Outre-tombe_ besiege me like living pictures. I see, like
+Chateaubriand himself, the family of great famished lords in their
+feudal castle. With Chateaubriand I return in the twinkling of an eye to
+the Niagara that we have both seen. In the fall of the waters I find the
+deep and melancholy note that he himself found; and after that I think
+of that dark cathedral of Dol that evidently suggested to the author his
+_Génie du Christianisme_.
+
+"In literature, things are very unequally suggestive to me. Classic
+literature has only few paths outwards for me--Tacitus, Lucretius,
+Juvenal, Homer, and Saint-Simon excepted. I read the other authors of
+this class partly for themselves, without making a comparison. On the
+other hand, the reading of Dante, Shakespeare, St. Jerome's compact
+verses on the Hebrew, and Middle Age prose excites within me a whole
+world of ideas, like Wagner's music, _canto-fermo_, and Beethoven.
+Certain things form a link for me from one order of ideas to another.
+For example, Michaelangelo and the Bible, Rembrandt and Balzac, Puvis de
+Chavannes and the Merovingian narratives.
+
+"To sum up: There are in me certain _milieux_ especially favorable to
+imagination. When any circumstance brings me into one of them, it is
+rare that an imaginative network does not occur; and, if one is
+produced, association of ideas will perform the work. When I give myself
+up to serious work, I have to mistrust myself: and in this connection I
+shall surprise people when I say that in the class of ideas above
+indicated the subject exciting the most ideas in me is sociology."
+
+M......, sixty years of age, artistic temperament. Because of the
+necessities of life, he has followed a profession entirely opposite to
+his bent. He has given me his "confession" in the form of fragmentary
+notes made day by day. Many are _moral_ remarks on the subject of his
+imagination--I leave them out. I note especially the unconquerable
+tendency to make up little romances and some details in regard to visual
+representation, and a dislike for numbers.
+
+"It happens that I experience sharp regret when I see the photograph of
+a monument, e.g., the Pantheon, the proportions of which I have
+constructed according to the descriptions of the monument and the idea
+that I had of the life of the Greeks. The photograph mars my dream.
+
+"From the seen to the unknown. In the S. G. library. A slender young
+woman, smartly dressed--spotless black gloves--between her fingers a
+small pencil and a tiny note-book. What business has this affectation
+this morning in a classic and dull building, in a common environment of
+poor workmen? She is not a servant-maid, and not a teacher. Now for the
+solution of the unknown. I follow the woman to her family, into her
+home, and it is quite a task.
+
+"In the same library. I want to get an address from the _Almanach
+Bottin_. A young man, perhaps a student, has borrowed the ridiculous
+volume. Bent over it, his hands in his hair, he turns the leaves with
+the sage leisure of a scholar looking for a commentary. From the empty
+dictionary he often draws out a letter. He must have received this
+letter this morning from the country. His family advises him to apply to
+so-and-so. It is a question of money and employment. He must locate the
+people who, provincial ignorance said, are near him. And so goes the
+wandering imagination.
+
+"When I feel myself drawn to anyone, I prefer seeing images or portraits
+rather than the reality. That is how I avoid making unforeseen
+discoveries that would spoil my model.
+
+"If I make numerical calculations, in the absence of concrete factors,
+the imagination goes afield, and the figures group themselves
+mechanically, harkening to an inner voice that arranges them in order to
+get the sense.
+
+"There may be an imagination devoted to arithmetical
+calculations--forms, beings intrude, even the outline of the figure 3,
+for example; and then the addition or any other calculation is ruined.
+
+"I revert to the impossibility of making an addition without a swerve of
+imagination, because plastic figures are always ready before the
+calculator. The man of imagination is always constructing by means of
+plastic images.[169] Life possesses him, intoxicates him, so he never
+gets tired."
+
+THE END
+
+FOOTNOTES:
+
+[167] See Conclusion, II, above.
+
+[168] B...... is not an architect.
+
+[169] We see that the speaker is a visualizer.
+
+
+
+
+INDEX.
+
+
+Absent images, Association of, 94.
+
+Abstraction, 15;
+  Late appearance of, 146.
+
+Abulics, 11.
+
+Activity, normal end of imagination, 11.
+
+Adaptation of means to end, 264.
+
+Advance plans in commerce, 288.
+
+Adventure, Eras of, 287.
+
+Affective states, Rôle of, 8.
+
+Alcoholic liquors, 74.
+
+Alembert, d', 87.
+
+Alexander, 138, 142, 143.
+
+Alfieri, 56.
+
+Allen, 150.
+
+Americans, change occupations, 257.
+
+Analogy, 299;
+  Abuse of, 305;
+  based on qualitative resemblance, 26;
+  essential to creative imagination, 25;
+  not trustworthy in science, 27;
+  Rôle of, in primitive life, 125;
+  Thinking by, 117.
+
+Anatomical conditions, 65.
+
+Anger, 34.
+
+Animal fancy, 97.
+
+Animals, Association fibers or centers, lacking in, 100;
+  Discoveries of, 98;
+  Imagination in, 93, 94;
+  Usefulness of, to man, 274.
+
+Animism, 107, 189;
+  of primitives, 123.
+
+Anticipations of later inventions, 277.
+
+Apollo, 50.
+
+Apperception, Importance of, 16.
+
+_Apprehensio simplex_, a logical figment, 110.
+
+Arago, 145.
+
+Aristotle, vi, 134, 141.
+
+Art, Indefiniteness of modern, 203;
+  Realistic, 250;
+  Various theories of, 46.
+
+Artificial motors, Use of, a late development, 275.
+
+Aryan race, 129.
+
+Association, 22, 23;
+  Forms of, 196;
+  Laws of, 23;
+  of ideas, 59, 353;
+  of ideas, Criticism of the term, 23;
+  of ideas, Discovery depends on, 250;
+  suggests cause, 261.
+
+Associational systems, 67.
+
+Astral influences, 261.
+
+Asyllogistic deduction, 283.
+
+Attention, 86.
+
+Australians, 285.
+
+Automatisms, 71.
+
+Azam, 325.
+
+
+Bach, 69, 214, 216.
+
+Bacon, Roger, 245, 303 n.
+
+Baillarger, Dr., 324.
+
+Baldwin, 104.
+
+Barter, 286.
+
+Baudelaire, 39, 55.
+
+Beethoven, 52, 71, 148, 218.
+
+Bernard, Claude, 52;
+  _idée directrice_ of, 250.
+
+Binet, 340.
+
+Bipartite division of the brain, 67.
+
+Bismarck, 271.
+
+Blood circulation, Importance of, 70.
+
+Boehme, Jacob, 335.
+
+Bonnal, 298 n.
+
+Borgia, Lucretia, 139.
+
+Bossuet, 225.
+
+Boulogne, De, 283.
+
+Bourdeau, L., 272.
+
+Brain- development and abstraction, 100;
+  regions, Development of, 67;
+  weights, 66.
+
+Bramwell, 343.
+
+Breguet, 277.
+
+Brown-Séquard, 77.
+
+Buddha, Life of, 301.
+
+Buffon, 52, 73.
+
+Byron, 145.
+
+
+Cabalists, 234.
+
+Cabalistic mysticism, 226.
+
+Cabanis, 78.
+
+Campanella, 303.
+
+Carlyle, 150, 186.
+
+Carpenter, 284, 339.
+
+Carthage, 282.
+
+Categories of images, 16.
+
+Causality, Search for, 260.
+
+Charcot, 6.
+
+Charlemagne, 138.
+
+Chateaubriand, 76.
+
+Chatterton, 145.
+
+Cherubini, 145.
+
+Child, Adult misinterpretation of, 104;
+  Creative imagination in the, 103 ff.;
+  Exaggeration of his intelligence, 115;
+  Oscillation of belief and doubt in the, 113;
+  Stages of development, 105.
+
+Child-study, Difficulties of, 104.
+
+Chopin, 52, 215.
+
+Chorea, 101.
+
+Cid, The, 140.
+
+Classes of discoverers, 249.
+
+Classification, 181.
+
+Coleridge, 37.
+
+Colored hearing, 38.
+
+Columbus, Christopher, 89.
+
+Commerce, Combative element in, 295.
+
+Commercial imagination, Conditions of, 281;
+  development due to increasing substitution, 287;
+  development, Stages of, 285.
+
+Common factor in comparison, 40.
+
+Complementary scientists, 246.
+
+Complete images impossible, 16.
+
+Comte, 146.
+
+Condillac, 243.
+
+Confucius, 300.
+
+Confusion of impressions, 18.
+
+Conjecture, beginning of science, 245.
+
+Conscious imagination, a special case, 58.
+
+Constellation, 59, 126.
+
+Constitutions by philosophers, 309.
+
+Contiguity and resemblance, 24.
+
+Contrapuntists, 214.
+
+Contrast, Association by, 40.
+
+Cooperation, 309;
+  of intellect and feeling, 43.
+
+Copernicus, 246.
+
+Counter-world, 304.
+
+Creation hindered by complete redintegration, 22;
+  in physiological inhibition, 6;
+  Motor basis of, 258;
+  Physiological and imaginative, 76;
+  versus repetition, 5.
+
+Creative imagination, a growth, 9;
+  Composite character of, 12;
+  conditioned by knowledge, 173;
+  either esthetic or practical, 44;
+  implies feeling, 32;
+  Neglect of, by writers on psychology, vii;
+  Reasons for, 313.
+
+Creative instinct, non-existent, 42.
+
+Crisis, not essential, 58.
+
+Critical stage of investigation, 252.
+
+Cromwell, 144.
+
+Cumulative inventions, 272.
+
+Curiosity, 99;
+  of primitive man, 45, 131.
+
+Cuvier, 183.
+
+
+Daedalus, 269.
+
+Dante, 205.
+
+Darwin, 117, 346.
+
+Dauriac, 350.
+
+Deduction, Process of, 283.
+
+Deffant, Madame du, 48.
+
+Deities, Coalescence of, 200;
+  Momentary, 199;
+  Multiplicity of Roman, 125.
+
+Delboef, 342.
+
+DeQuincy, 55.
+
+Descartes, 73, 294.
+
+Determinism, Neglect of, by idealists, 303;
+  of art, 278;
+  of invention, 264.
+
+Dewey, John, 132 n.
+
+_Dialectic_, Hegelian, 254.
+
+Diffluent imagination, 196 ff.
+
+_Dii minores_, 269.
+
+Disinterestedness of the artist, 35.
+
+Dissociation, 15, 268;
+  by concomitant variations, 21;
+  of series, 19.
+
+Double personality, 325.
+
+Dreams, 38;
+  Emotional persistence of, 324.
+
+Drugs, Effect of, 55;
+  Use of, as excitants, 70.
+
+Dualism of Fourier, 306.
+
+Dürer, 145.
+
+
+Egypt, 135.
+
+Egyptian conception of causality, 260.
+
+Emotion, and sensation, 38;
+  material for imagination, 33;
+  presupposes unsatisfied needs, 32;
+  Realization of, 80.
+
+Emotional abstraction, 196;
+  factor, 31 ff.
+
+Empedocles, 136.
+
+Epic, Rise of the, 138.
+
+Essenes, 307.
+
+Esthetic imagination,
+  contrasted to mechanical, 264;
+  Fixity of, 264.
+
+Ethics, Living and dead, 302.
+
+Euclid, 244, 245.
+
+Eureka, Moment of, 247, 302.
+
+Evolution of commerce, Law's statement of, 294.
+
+Exact knowledge requisite in commerce, 289.
+
+Expansion of self, 314.
+
+Experience requisite for literary invention, 146.
+
+External factors, 21.
+
+
+Facts and general ideas, 252.
+
+Faith, 112;
+  -cure, 6;
+  highest in semi-science, 241;
+  Rôle of, 7.
+
+Fancy, 346;
+  in animals, 97;
+  Source of, 260.
+
+Fear, 34.
+
+Fenelon, 303.
+
+Féré, 325, 340.
+
+Fiduciary money, 286.
+
+Fixed ideas, 88, 89.
+
+Flechsig, 67, 68, 100, 103.
+
+Flournoy, 38, 344.
+
+Forel, 96.
+
+Fouillée, 193.
+
+Fourier, 304.
+
+French, not strong in imagination, 193;
+  Revolution, 151.
+
+Fresnel, 145.
+
+Fromentin, 17.
+
+Froschammer, 75, 346.
+
+Fuegians, 285.
+
+
+Gauss, 69, 183.
+
+Gautier, Théophile, 55, 189, 190.
+
+Gavarni, 187.
+
+Generic image, 18.
+
+Genius, and brain structure, 68;
+  depends on subliminal imagination, 57;
+  exceptional, 149;
+  No common measure of, 143.
+
+Geniuses, of judgment, 142;
+  of mastery over men, and matter, 142.
+
+Gilman, 219 n.
+
+Gnostics, 234.
+
+Goethe, 29, 149, 150, 216.
+
+Gold, Curative powers of, 261.
+
+Goncourt, 74.
+
+Goya, 39, 206.
+
+Greece, 282.
+
+Greek republics, 151.
+
+Grétry, 73.
+
+Grillparzer, 85, 336.
+
+Groos, 35, 47, 99, 227.
+
+Guericke, Otto de, 276.
+
+
+Habits, 22.
+
+Hamilton, 19, 58, 60.
+
+Handel, 145.
+
+Hanseatic League, 287.
+
+Harrington, 303.
+
+Hartmann, 254, 346.
+
+Haüy, 247.
+
+Haydn, 145.
+
+Hegel, 254, 346.
+
+Heine, 306.
+
+Hellenic imagination, anthropomorphic, 202.
+
+Helmholtz, 20, 87, 142.
+
+Henry IV, 139.
+
+Hephæstos, 269.
+
+Hercules, 137.
+
+Hero, 270.
+
+Herodotus, 260.
+
+Hesiod, 130.
+
+Hindoo imagination, symbolic, 202.
+
+Hindoos, 128.
+
+Hodgson, 35.
+
+Höffding, 41.
+
+Hoffman, 39, 206.
+
+_Homo duplex_, 43.
+
+Homonomy, 120.
+
+Howe, 60 n.
+
+Huber, 96.
+
+Hugo, Victor, 188, 189, 216, 229;
+  Animism in, 189.
+
+Human force, beginning of invention, 273.
+
+Hume, 111.
+
+Huyghens, 270.
+
+Hyperæmia, 70.
+
+Hyperesthesia, Temporary, 74.
+
+Hypermnesia, 54.
+
+Hypothesis, 251;
+  Progressive, 244.
+
+
+Icarus, 269.
+
+Idea and emotion, Equivalence of, 80.
+
+Ideal modified in practice, 306.
+
+Idealistic conceptions, 300.
+
+Idealization, Process of, 38.
+
+Illusion, 107;
+  and legend, 137;
+  Conscious, of mystic, 228.
+
+Illusions, valuable to scientist, 251.
+
+Image, Modification of, 18, 291.
+
+Images, 80;
+  abbreviations of reality, 232;
+  Categories of, 16;
+  Concrete, 222;
+  provoked, 188;
+  sketched type, 81;
+  Symbolic, 222;
+  Visual, provoked by music, 217.
+
+Imagination, and abulia, 11;
+  and foresight, 284;
+  anthropocentric, 10;
+  basis of the cosmic process, 75;
+  Commercial, 281;
+  complete in animals, 95;
+  condensed in common objects, 276;
+  Conditions of, 44;
+  Development of, 167 ff.;
+  Diffluent, 196 ff.;
+  Esthetic, 264;
+  fixed form, 318;
+  in animals, 93;
+  in experimentation, 248;
+  in primitive man, 118;
+  Mechanical and technical, 257;
+  Motives of different sorts of, 251;
+  Musical, 212 ff., 350;
+  Mystic, 221 ff.;
+  Mystical, different from religious, 231;
+  not opposed to the useful, 263;
+  Numerical, 207 ff.;
+  Periods of development of, 144;
+  Plastic, 184 ff.;
+  Poetical, 267;
+  Practical, 256 ff.;
+  present in all activities, viii;
+  Quality of, same in many lives, 265;
+  Scientific, 236 ff.;
+  sketched form, 316;
+  substitute for reason, 29;
+  Varieties of, 180.
+
+Imaginative type, 320.
+
+Imitation, through pleasure, 98.
+
+Imitative music, 214.
+
+Impersonality, 52, 86.
+
+Incomplete images, 18.
+
+Incubation, Periods of, 278.
+
+Individual variations, 179.
+
+Individuality of genius, 149.
+
+Inductive reasoning, 132.
+
+Infantile insanity, 101.
+
+Inhibition by representation, 6.
+
+Initial moment of discovery, 276.
+
+Inspiration, 50, 85;
+  and intoxication, 55;
+  Characteristic of, 57;
+  characterized by suddenness and impersonality, 51;
+  resembles somnambulism, 56;
+  Subjective feeling of, untrustworthy, 59.
+
+Instinct, 75;
+  answer to specific needs, 42;
+  Creative, 313;
+  Resemblance of invention to, 48.
+
+Intellectual factor, 15.
+
+Intuition, 282, 285.
+
+Introspectors, 321.
+
+Intentional combination of images, 95.
+
+Interest, a factor in creation, 82.
+
+Interesting, defined, 36.
+
+Invention arises to satisfy a need, 271;
+  Higher forms of, 140 ff.;
+  in morals, 300;
+  in successive parts, 296;
+  of monopolies, 282;
+  Pain of, 51;
+  Spontaneity of, 51;
+  subjected to tradition, 269.
+
+Inventions, Amplifiers of, 270;
+  largely anonymous, 275;
+  Mechanical, neglected by psychologists, 263;
+  Stratification of, 272.
+
+Inventors deified, 269;
+  Oddities of, 72.
+
+
+James, William, 21, 25, 37, 83, 112.
+
+Janet, 340.
+
+Jealousy, stimulates imagination, 34.
+
+Jordæns, 145.
+
+Joy, 34.
+
+
+Kant, 248.
+
+Kepler, 246, 247.
+
+Klopstock, 215.
+
+Kühn, 129.
+
+
+Lagrange, 71.
+
+Lamennais, 73.
+
+Lang, 128, 261.
+
+Language, Origin of, 120.
+
+Laplace, 250.
+
+Larvated epilepsy, 141.
+
+Lavoisier, 246.
+
+Law, 294.
+
+Lazarus, 47.
+
+Leibniz, 73, 74, 146, 253, 296 n.
+
+Lélut, 141.
+
+Leurechon, 277.
+
+Liebig, 244.
+
+Linnæus, 183.
+
+Literal mysticism, 226.
+
+Localization, 65.
+
+Loch Lomond, 58.
+
+Locke, 309.
+
+Lombroso, 141, 142.
+
+Louis XIV, 150.
+
+Love, 34;
+  and hate, 134.
+
+Love-plays, 99.
+
+
+Machiavelli, 73.
+
+Machines, counterfeits of human beings, 279.
+
+Man and animals, Specific quality of, 273.
+
+Manu, 300.
+
+Mastery, Spirit of, 114.
+
+Materials of imagination, 299.
+
+Maury, A., 6 n.
+
+Mechanic and poet, 279.
+
+Mechanical aptitude, 145.
+
+Mechanical imagination, Ideal of, 268.
+
+Mediate association, 59.
+
+Memory, Predominant tendencies in, 61;
+  untrustworthy, 17.
+
+Men, Great, as makers of history, 150.
+
+Mendelssohn, 145, 213 n., 215, 216.
+
+Mental chemistry, 82.
+
+Merchant sailors, 282.
+
+Metamorphosis, 28;
+  of deities, 129;
+  Regressive, 171.
+
+Metaphysical speculation, 251;
+  thought, Stages of, 252.
+
+Metaphysics, 252 ff.
+
+Methods of invention, 243.
+
+Meynert, 100.
+
+Michaelangelo, 145, 148, 149.
+
+Michelet, 186, 306.
+
+Middle Ages, predominantly imaginative, 174.
+
+Military invention, 295;
+  Conditions of, 297.
+
+Mill, John Stuart, 82, 284.
+
+Milton, 73.
+
+Mimicry, 98.
+
+Mind, Varieties of, 320.
+
+Mission, Consciousness of, 148.
+
+Misunderstanding of the new, 151.
+
+Mobility of inventors, 258.
+
+Monadology, 253.
+
+Money, Invention of, 286;
+  sought as an end, 289.
+
+Monge, 237.
+
+Moses, 300.
+
+More, 303, 309.
+
+Morgan, Lloyd, 99.
+
+Mormons, 307.
+
+Monoideism, 87.
+
+Montgolfier, 277.
+
+Moral geniuses, 301.
+
+Moravian brotherhood, 307.
+
+Mosso, 71, 340.
+
+Motor elements in all representation, 4;
+  elements, Rôle of, 7;
+  manifestation basis of creation, 9.
+
+Movements, Importance of, in imagination, 3.
+
+Mozart, 73, 145.
+
+Müller, Max, 120, 129, 130.
+
+Mummy powder, 261.
+
+Münsterberg, 60.
+
+Muses, 50.
+
+Music an emotional language, 220;
+  Precocity in, 144.
+
+Musical imagination, 212, 350.
+
+Musset, Alfred de, 335.
+
+Myers, 342.
+
+Mystic imagination, 221 ff., 335.
+
+Mystics, Abuse of allegory, by, 225;
+  Belief of, 227;
+  Metaphorical style of, 224.
+
+Mysticism by suggestion, 229.
+
+Myth, defined, 123;
+  Depersonification of, 133;
+  in Plato, 134;
+  in science, 134;
+  Subjective and objective factors in, 122.
+
+Myths, Significance of, 119;
+  Variations in, 127.
+
+Myth-making activity, viii, 331.
+
+
+Napoleon, 10, 66, 71, 142;
+  his war practice, 298.
+
+Natural, and human phenomena, 299;
+  law, Uniformity of, opposed to dissociation, 21;
+  motors, Use of, 275.
+
+Naville, 245.
+
+Need of knowing, 314.
+
+Neglect of details in sensation, 20.
+
+Nerval, Gérard de, 229, 324.
+
+Nervous overflow, 71.
+
+New Larnak, 309.
+
+Newbold, 340.
+
+Newcomen, 270.
+
+Newton, 58, 87, 146.
+
+Nietzsche, 150.
+
+_Nomina Numina_, 120, 262.
+
+Nordau, 142.
+
+Numerical imagination, 207 ff.;
+  mysticism, 226;
+  series unlimited, 207.
+
+
+Objective study of inventors, 71.
+
+Oddities of inventors, 72.
+
+Oelzelt-Newin, 33, 95.
+
+Old age, Effect of, on imagination, 77.
+
+Organic conditions, 65.
+
+Orientation conditioned by individual organization, 48;
+  Personal, 270.
+
+Owen, Robert, 309.
+
+
+Paradox of belief, 242.
+
+Paralysis by ideas, 6.
+
+Pascal, 146, 244.
+
+Pasteur, 142, 143, 251.
+
+Pathological view of genius, 141.
+
+Pathology and physiology, 74.
+
+Perception, 15;
+  and conception, 184;
+  and imagination, 106.
+
+Perez, B., 115.
+
+Persistence of ideas due to feeling, 79.
+
+Personification, 186;
+  characteristic of aborigines and children, 27;
+  source of myth, 28.
+
+Phalanges, Organization of society into, 305.
+
+Philippe, J., 17 n.
+
+Philosophy, a transformation of mystic ideas, 233.
+
+Phlogiston, 248.
+
+Physiological states, 70.
+
+Physiology and pathology, 74.
+
+Plastic art and mythology, 191;
+  imagination, 184 f.
+
+Plato, 134, 303, 309.
+
+Platonic ideas, 81, 253.
+
+Play, 47, 97;
+  Uses of, for man, 114.
+
+Plotinus, 234.
+
+Poe, 39, 206, 324.
+
+Poet, a workman, 190.
+
+Poetical imagination, general characters, 267;
+  Inspiration in, 268;
+  special characters, 270.
+
+Poetical invention, Stages of, 266.
+
+Polyideism, 87.
+
+Polynomy, 120.
+
+Poncelet, 143.
+
+Positive minds, 318.
+
+Powers of nature, Exploitation of 271.
+
+Practical imagination, Ubiquity of, 254.
+
+Practice, essential in motor creation, 186.
+
+Precocity, 144;
+  in poetry, 145;
+  of mathematicians, 147.
+
+Pre-Raphaelites, 204.
+
+Preyer, 117.
+
+Primitive man, 45;
+  and myth, 118 ff.
+
+Principle of unity, 250.
+
+Progressive stages of imagination, 84.
+
+Prometheus, 269.
+
+Provoked revival, 94.
+
+Pseudo-science, 240.
+
+Psychic atoms, 19;
+  paralysis, 6.
+
+Psychological regressions, 248.
+
+Puberty, Influence of, on imagination, 76.
+
+Pythagoras, 226, 246.
+
+Pythagoreans, 134.
+
+
+Qualities, Attribution of, to objects, 124.
+
+
+Raphael, 145.
+
+Rational Metaphysics, 234.
+
+Reason, Objectivity of, 10.
+
+Reciprocal working of scientific and practical discoveries, 249.
+
+Recuperative theory of play, 97.
+
+Redintegration, Law of, 19;
+  Total, 36.
+
+Regis, 54.
+
+Religion, Universality of, 128.
+
+Renaissance, 151, 175.
+
+Reni, Guido, 73.
+
+Repetition versus creation, 5, 23.
+
+Representation and belief inseparable, 110.
+
+Representations, Interchange of, 323;
+  Number of, 322.
+
+Revery, 38, 198, 316.
+
+Reymond, Du Bois, 52.
+
+Reynolds, 6, 325.
+
+Roland, 138.
+
+Roman Republic, 151.
+
+Romans, 125.
+
+Romanes, 94, 95, 96.
+
+Romantic invention, 115.
+
+Röntgen, 142.
+
+Rossini, 73.
+
+Rousseau, 309.
+
+Rubens, 145.
+
+Rüdinger, 69.
+
+
+Saint-Simonism, 309.
+
+Sand, George, 52, 215.
+
+Satanic literature, 206.
+
+Schelling, 253.
+
+Schematic images, 18, 291.
+
+Schiller, 47, 72, 73, 145.
+
+Schopenhauer, 37, 149, 150, 253, 346.
+
+Schubert, 145.
+
+Schumann, 215.
+
+Science, 45;
+  Conjecture beginning of, 245;
+  prescribes conditions and limits to imagination, 236;
+  Three movements in growth of, 239.
+
+Scientific imagination, 236 ff.
+
+Scripture, 60.
+
+Self-feeling, 35.
+
+Semi-science, 240.
+
+Seneca, 141.
+
+Sensation changed in memory, 17.
+
+Sensorial insanity, 101.
+
+Sexual instinct, 314.
+
+Shakers, 307.
+
+Shakespeare, 143, 186.
+
+Shelly, 56.
+
+Social aims in finance, 294;
+  invention, limited by the past, 308;
+  wants, 314.
+
+Socialism, Utopian and scientific, 310.
+
+Societies for special ends, 307.
+
+Sorrow, 34.
+
+Special modes of scientific imagining, 237.
+
+Specific, not general imagination, 179.
+
+Spencer, 47, 131, 150.
+
+Spinoza, 110, 143, 254.
+
+Spirits, Belief in, 51.
+
+Spontaneity, 296.
+
+Spontaneous revival, 94, 315.
+
+Spontaneous variations, 140.
+
+Stages of passage from percept to concept, 292.
+
+Stallo, 134.
+
+State credit, Law's system of, 294.
+
+Stewart, Dugald, 111.
+
+Stigmata, etc., unprecedented in individual's experience, 7.
+
+Stigmatized individuals, 6.
+
+Subjective factors, 20.
+
+Subliminal imagination, 57.
+
+Sully, 21.
+
+_Summa_, 254.
+
+Summary, 330.
+
+Superstition and religion, 259.
+
+Symbolism of Hindoos, 202.
+
+
+Taine, 18, 111, 117, 129, 150, 200.
+
+Teleological character of will and imagination, 10.
+
+Thales, 134.
+
+Titchener, 83.
+
+Tolstoi, 151.
+
+Tools, 274.
+
+Tours, Moreau de, 55, 78, 141.
+
+Triptolemus, 269.
+
+Tropisms, 75.
+
+Tycho-Brahé, 73, 246, 270.
+
+Tylor, 99, 123, 125, 131, 139.
+
+Tyndall, 238.
+
+Tyre, 282.
+
+
+Unconscious, Nature of the, 339;
+  physiological theory, 340, 341.
+
+Unconscious cerebration, 53;
+  factor, 50 ff.;
+  factor, not a distinct element in invention, 64.
+
+Units of exchange, 286.
+
+Unity, Principle of, 79.
+
+_Universale post rem_, 84.
+
+Utopias, based on author's _milieu_, 303.
+
+Utopian imagination, 299.
+
+Utopians, indifferent to realization, 309.
+
+
+Van Dyck, 145.
+
+Vaucanson, 48.
+
+Vedic epoch, 129.
+
+Vesication, 5, 7.
+
+Vicavakarma, 269.
+
+Vico, 174.
+
+Vignoli, 128.
+
+Vinci, Leonardo da, 58, 149.
+
+_Vis a fronte_ and _a tergo_, 11.
+
+Vocation, Change of, 172;
+  Choice of, 144.
+
+Voltaire, 150.
+
+Voluntary activity analogous to creative imagination, 9.
+
+Von Baer, 210.
+
+Von Hartmann, 224.
+
+
+Wagner, 145.
+
+Wahle, 62.
+
+Wallace, 96, 99.
+
+Wallaschek, 99.
+
+Watch, Evolution of the, 270.
+
+Watt, James, 66, 244, 270.
+
+Wealth, desired from artistic motives, 290.
+
+Weber, E. F., 5, 145, 216.
+
+Weismann, 148.
+
+Wernicke, 100.
+
+Wiertz, 39, 206.
+
+Will, The broad meaning of, 112;
+  a coordinating function, 9;
+  Effect of, on physiological functioning, 5.
+
+Words, Rôle of, 96.
+
+Wundt, 24, 40, 182.
+
+
+Zeller, 226.
+
+Ziehen, 61, 62.
+
+Zoroaster, 300.
+
+  +--------------------------------------------------------------+
+  | Transcriber's Notes:                                         |
+  |                                                              |
+  | Page 23: Fn. 8: Phychology amended to Psychology             |
+  | Page 25: Missing footnote marker in original. Added          |
+  | footnote marker after James quote.                           |
+  | Page 35: casual amended to causal                            |
+  | Page 38: haphazard amended to haphazardly; grouping amended  |
+  | to groupings                                                 |
+  | Page 39: subejct amended to subject                          |
+  | Page 54: vender _sic_                                        |
+  | Page 56: "Under the influence of alcoholic drinks and of     |
+  | poisonous intoxicants attention and will always fall into    |
+  | exhaustion." _sic_ Possibly the word "does" or similar       |
+  | is missing before "and," or "and" is superfluous.            |
+  | Page 55: subtances amended to substances                     |
+  | Page 75: images amended to image                             |
+  | Page 84: unisersale amended to universale                    |
+  | Page 85: The following lines transposed: "which, for the     |
+  | time being, should represent the" and "all the forces and    |
+  | capacities upon a single point"                              |
+  | Page 123: fill amended to fills                              |
+  | Page 151: duplicate "the" removed ("the the deep working of  |
+  | the masses")                                                 |
+  | Page 155: Section II amended to IV                           |
+  | Page 163: Section III amended to V                           |
+  | Page 193: Saxin amended to Saxon                             |
+  | Page 200: everyone amended to every one                      |
+  | Page 208: apalling amended to appalling                      |
+  | Page 213: Missing footnote marker in original. Added         |
+  | footnotemarker after last paragraph on page.                 |
+  | Page 226: caballists amended to cabalists                    |
+  | Page 229: plant and tree amended to plants and trees         |
+  | Page 236: In Chapter IV, "The Scientific Imagination," there |
+  | are sections II, III, IV and V, but no section I.            |
+  | Page 250: dyssymetry amended to dyssymmetry                  |
+  | Page 280: Missing footnote marker in original. Added         |
+  | footnote marker after "... inorganic life."                  |
+  | Page 286: Fn. 132: Evolution amended to Évolution            |
+  | Page 292: acording amended to according                      |
+  | Page 294: managable amended to manageable                    |
+  | Page 297: opoprtune amended to opportune                     |
+  | Page 319: or amended to of ("the double of savages")         |
+  | Page 321: quintescence amended to quintessence               |
+  | Page 338: Footnote marker and number added to note on page.  |
+  | Footnote marker added at end of first paragraph.             |
+  | Page 348: quivalent amended to equivalent                    |
+  | Page 351: l'Opera amended to l'Opéra                         |
+  | Page 365: Lammennais amended to Lamennais                    |
+  | Page 365: Michelangelo amended to Michaelangelo              |
+  |                                                              |
+  | Part II, Chapter II: The chapter heading in the table of     |
+  | contents differs from that shown on page 102. Left as is.    |
+  |                                                              |
+  | Accented letters, italicisation and the punctuation of       |
+  | abbreviations have been standardised.                        |
+  |                                                              |
+  | Where a word is spelt differently and there is an equal      |
+  | number of instances, the variant spellings have been left as |
+  | is: Hephaestos/Hephæstos; Jordaens/Jordæns;                  |
+  | Linnaeus/Linnæus.                                            |
+  +--------------------------------------------------------------+
+
+
+
+
+
+End of Project Gutenberg's Essay on the Creative Imagination, by Th. Ribot
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+almost no restrictions whatsoever.  You may copy it, give it away or
+re-use it under the terms of the Project Gutenberg License included
+with this eBook or online at www.gutenberg.org
+
+
+Title: Essay on the Creative Imagination
+
+Author: Th. Ribot
+
+Translator: Albert H. N. Baron
+
+Release Date: August 25, 2008 [EBook #26430]
+
+Language: English
+
+Character set encoding: ISO-8859-1
+
+*** START OF THIS PROJECT GUTENBERG EBOOK ESSAY ON THE CREATIVE IMAGINATION ***
+
+
+
+
+Produced by Clare Boothby and the Online Distributed
+Proofreading Team at http://www.pgdp.net
+
+
+
+
+
+
+</pre>
+
+
+
+
+
+
+<div class="transnote">
+<h3>Transcriber's Note:</h3>
+
+<p>Obvious typographical errors have been corrected in this text. For a
+complete list, please see <a href="#transnote">the bottom of this document</a>.</p>
+
+<p>The children's letters on page <a href="#Page_108">108</a> have been reproduced in this text as illustrations.</p>
+</div>
+
+
+
+
+
+<h1>ESSAY</h1>
+<h3>ON THE</h3>
+<h1>CREATIVE IMAGINATION</h1>
+
+<h3>BY</h3>
+
+<h2>TH. RIBOT</h2>
+
+<h3>TRANSLATED FROM THE FRENCH</h3>
+<h3>BY</h3>
+<h2>ALBERT H. N. BARON</h2>
+<h4>FELLOW IN CLARK UNIVERSITY</h4>
+
+<p class='center'>LONDON<br />
+KEGAN PAUL, TRENCH, TR&Uuml;BNER &amp; CO., <span class="smcap">Ltd</span>.<br />
+1906</p>
+
+<p class='frontend'>COPYRIGHT BY<br />
+<span class="smcap">The Open Court Publishing Co</span>.<br />
+CHICAGO, U. S. A.<br />
+1906<br />
+<i>All rights reserved.</i></p>
+
+<hr style="width: 45%;" />
+
+<p class='center'><span class="smcap">To the Memory of My Teacher<br />
+and Friend</span>,</p>
+
+<p class='center'><span class='allin'>Arthur Allin, Ph. D.,</span><br />
+<span class='allin2'>professor of psychology and education,<br />
+university of colorado,</span></p>
+
+<p class='center'><span class='smcap'>who first interested me in the problems of psychology,<br />
+this book is dedicated, with reverence<br />
+and gratitude, by</span></p>
+
+<p class='rightindent'><span class="smcap">The Translator</span>.</p>
+
+
+
+<hr style="width: 65%;" /><p><span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_v" id="Page_v">[v]</a></span></p>
+<h2>TRANSLATOR'S PREFACE.</h2>
+
+
+<p>The name of Th. Ribot has been for many years
+well known in America, and his works have gained
+wide popularity. The present translation of one
+of his more recent works is an attempt to render
+available in English what has been received as a
+classic exposition of a subject that is often discussed,
+but rarely with any attempt to understand
+its true nature.</p>
+
+<p>It is quite generally recognized that psychology
+has remained in the semi-mythological, semi-scholastic
+period longer than most attempts at scientific
+formulization. For a long time it has been
+the "spook science" <i>per se</i>, and the imagination, now
+analyzed by M. Ribot in such a masterly manner,
+has been one of the most persistent, apparently real,
+though very indefinite, of psychological spooks.
+Whereas people have been accustomed to speak of
+the imagination as an entity <i>sui generis</i>, as a lofty
+something found only in long-haired, wild-eyed
+"geniuses," constituting indeed the center of a cult,
+our author, Prometheus-like, has brought it down
+from the heavens, and has clearly shown that
+<i>imagination is a function of mind common to all</i><span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_vi" id="Page_vi">[vi]</a></span>
+<i>men in some degree</i>, and that it is shown in as
+highly developed form in commercial leaders and
+practical inventors as in the most bizarre of romantic
+idealists. The only difference is that the manifestation
+is not the same.</p>
+
+<p>That this view is not entirely original with M.
+Ribot is not to his discredit&mdash;indeed, he does not
+claim any originality. We find the view clearly
+expressed elsewhere, certainly as early as Aristotle,
+that the greatest artist is he who actually embodies
+his vision and will in permanent form, preferably
+in social institutions. This idea is so clearly enunciated
+in the present monograph, which the author
+modestly styles an essay, that when the end of the
+book is reached but little remains of the great
+imagination-ghost, save the one great mystery underlying
+all facts of mind.</p>
+
+<p>That the present rendering falls far below the
+lucid French of the original, the translator is well
+aware; he trusts, however, that the indulgent reader
+will take into account the good intent as offsetting
+in part, at least, the numerous shortcomings of this
+version.</p>
+
+<p>I wish here to express my obligation to those
+friends who encouraged me in the congenial task
+of translation.</p>
+
+<p class='right'>A. H. N. B.</p>
+
+
+
+<hr style="width: 65%;" /><p><span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_vii" id="Page_vii">[vii]</a></span></p>
+<h2>AUTHOR'S PREFACE</h2>
+
+
+<p>Contemporary psychology has studied the purely
+reproductive imagination with great eagerness and
+success. The works on the different image-groups&mdash;visual,
+auditory, tactile, motor&mdash;are known to
+everyone, and form a collection of inquiries solidly
+based on subjective and objective observation, on
+pathological facts and laboratory experiments. The
+study of the creative or constructive imagination,
+on the other hand, has been almost entirely neglected.
+It would be easy to show that the best,
+most complete, and most recent treatises on psychology
+devote to it scarcely a page or two; often,
+indeed, do not even mention it. A few articles, a
+few brief, scarce monographs, make up the sum of
+the past twenty-five years' work on the subject.
+The subject does not, however, at all deserve this
+indifferent or contemptuous attitude. Its importance
+is unquestionable, and even though the study
+of the creative imagination has hitherto remained almost
+inaccessible to experimentation strictly so-called,
+there are yet other objective processes that
+permit of our approaching it with some likelihood
+of success, and of continuing the work of former<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_viii" id="Page_viii">[viii]</a></span>
+psychologists, but with methods better adapted to
+the requirements of contemporary thought.</p>
+
+<p>The present work is offered to the reader as an
+essay or first attempt only. It is not our intention
+here to undertake a complete monograph that would
+require a thick volume, but only to seek the underlying
+conditions of the creative imagination, showing
+that it has its beginning and principal source in
+the natural tendency of images to become objectified
+(or, more simply, in the motor elements inherent
+in the image), and then following it in its
+development under its manifold forms, whatever
+they may be. For I cannot but maintain that, at
+present, the psychology of the imagination is concerned
+almost wholly with its part in esthetic creation
+and in the sciences. We scarcely get beyond
+that; its other manifestations have been occasionally
+mentioned&mdash;never investigated. Yet invention in
+the fine arts and in the sciences is only a special
+case, and possibly not the principal one. We hope
+to show that in practical life, in mechanical, military,
+industrial, and commercial inventions, in religious,
+social, and political institutions, the human
+mind has expended and made permanent as much
+imagination as in all other fields.</p>
+
+<p>The constructive imagination is a faculty that in
+the course of ages has undergone a reduction&mdash;or
+at least, some profound changes. So, for reasons
+indicated later on, the mythic activity has been
+taken in this work as the central point of our topic,
+as the primitive and typical form out of which the<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_ix" id="Page_ix">[ix]</a></span>
+greater number of the others have arisen. The creative
+power is there shown entirely unconfined,
+freed from all hindrance, careless of the possible
+and the impossible; in a pure state, unadulterated
+by the opposing influence of imitation, of ratiocination,
+of the knowledge of natural laws and their
+uniformity.</p>
+
+<p>In the first or analytical part, we shall try to resolve
+the constructive imagination into its constitutive
+factors, and study each of them singly.</p>
+
+<p>The second or genetic part will follow the imagination
+in its development as a whole from the dimmest
+to the most complex forms.</p>
+
+<p>Finally, the third or concrete part, will be no
+longer devoted to the imagination, but to imaginative
+beings, to the principal types of imagination
+that observation shows us.</p>
+
+<p>May, 1900.<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_x" id="Page_x">[x]</a></span></p>
+
+
+
+<hr style="width: 65%;" /><p><span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_xi" id="Page_xi">[xi]</a></span></p>
+<h2>ANALYTICAL TABLE OF CONTENTS.</h2>
+
+<div class='center'>
+<table border="0" cellpadding="4" cellspacing="0" summary="toc">
+<tr><td align='left'></td><td class='nums'><span class='smcap'>page</span></td></tr>
+<tr><td class='hang'>Translator's Preface</td><td class='nums'><a href="#Page_v">v</a></td></tr>
+<tr><td class='hang'>Author's Preface</td><td class='nums'><a href="#Page_vii">vii</a></td></tr>
+<tr><td colspan='2'>INTRODUCTION.<br />
+<span class='smcap'>the motor nature of the constructive imagination.</span></td></tr>
+<tr><td class='hang'>Transition from the reproductive to the creative imagination.&mdash;Do
+all representations contain motor elements?&mdash;Unusual effects produced by images: vesication,
+stigmata; their conditions; their meaning for our subject.&mdash;The
+imagination is, on the intellectual side,
+equivalent to will. Proof: Identity of development;
+subjective, personal character of both; teleologic character;
+analogy between the abortive forms of the
+imagination and abulias.</td><td class='nums'><a href="#Page_3">3</a></td></tr>
+<tr><td colspan='2'>FIRST PART.<br />
+<span class='smcap'>analysis of the imagination.</span></td></tr>
+<tr><td colspan='2'>CHAPTER I.<br />
+<span class='smcap'>the intellectual factor.</span></td></tr>
+<tr><td class='hang'>Dissociation, preparatory work.&mdash;Dissociation in complete,
+incomplete and schematic images.&mdash;Dissociation in
+series. Its principal causes: internal or subjective,
+external or objective.&mdash;Association: its r&ocirc;le reduced
+to a single question, the formation of new combinations.&mdash;The
+principal intellectual factor is thinking by<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_xii" id="Page_xii">[xii]</a></span>
+analogy. Why it is an almost inexhaustible source of
+creation. Its mechanism. Its processes reducible to
+two, viz.: personification, transformation.</td><td class='nums'><a href="#Page_15">15</a></td></tr>
+<tr><td colspan='2'>CHAPTER II.<br />
+<span class='smcap'>the emotional factor.</span></td></tr>
+<tr><td class='hang'>The great importance of this element.&mdash;All forms of the
+creative imagination imply affective elements. Proofs:
+All affective conditions may influence the imagination.
+Proofs: Association of ideas on an emotional basis;
+new combinations under ordinary and extraordinary
+forms.&mdash;Association by contrast.&mdash;The motor element
+in tendencies.&mdash;There is no creative instinct; invention
+has not <i>a</i> source, but <i>sources</i>, and always arises
+from a need.&mdash;The work of the imagination reduced
+to two great classes, themselves reducible to special
+needs.&mdash;Reasons for the prejudice in favor of a creative
+instinct.</td><td class='nums'><a href="#Page_31">31</a></td></tr>
+<tr><td colspan='2'>CHAPTER III.<br />
+<span class='smcap'>the unconscious factor.</span></td></tr>
+<tr><td class='hang'>Various views of the "inspired state." Its essential characteristics;
+suddenness, impersonality.&mdash;Its relations
+to unconscious activity.&mdash;Resemblances to hypermnesia,
+the initial state of alcoholic intoxication and
+somnambulism on waking.&mdash;Disagreements concerning
+the ultimate nature of unconsciousness: two hypotheses.&mdash;The
+"inspired state" is not a cause, but an
+index.&mdash;Associations in unconscious form.&mdash;Mediate or
+latent association: recent experiments and discussions
+on this subject.&mdash;"Constellation" the result of a
+summation of predominant tendencies. Its mechanism.</td><td class='nums'><a href="#Page_50">50</a></td></tr>
+<tr><td colspan='2'>CHAPTER IV.<br />
+<span class='smcap'>the organic conditions of the imagination.</span></td></tr>
+<tr><td class='hang'>Anatomical conditions: various hypotheses. Obscurity of
+the question. Flechsig's theory.&mdash;Physiological conditions:<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_xiii" id="Page_xiii">[xiii]</a></span>
+are they cause, effect, or accompaniment?
+Chief factor: change in cerebral and local circulation.&mdash;Attempts
+at experimentation.&mdash;The oddities of inventors
+brought under two heads: the explicable and
+inexplicable. They are helpers of inspiration.&mdash;Is
+there any analogy between physical and psychic creation?
+A philosophical hypothesis on the subject.&mdash;Limitation
+of the question. Impossibility of an exact
+answer.</td><td class='nums'><a href="#Page_65">65</a></td></tr>
+<tr><td colspan='2'>CHAPTER V.<br />
+<span class='smcap'>the principle of unity.</span></td></tr>
+<tr><td class='hang'>Importance of the unifying principle. It is a fixed idea
+or a fixed emotion.&mdash;Their equivalence.&mdash;Distinction
+between the synthetic principle and the ideal, which
+is the principle of unity in motion: the ideal is a construction
+in images, merely outlined.&mdash;The principal
+forms of the unifying principles: unstable, organic or
+middle, extreme or semi-morbid.&mdash;Obsession of the inventor
+and the sick: insufficiency of a purely psychological
+criterion.</td><td class='nums'><a href="#Page_79">79</a></td></tr>
+<tr><td colspan='2'>SECOND PART.<br />
+<span class='smcap'>the development of the imagination.</span></td></tr>
+<tr><td colspan='2'>CHAPTER I.<br />
+<span class='smcap'>imagination in animals.</span></td></tr>
+<tr><td class='hang'>Difficulties of the subject.&mdash;The degree of imagination in
+animals.&mdash;Does creative synthesis exist in them?
+Affirmation and denials.&mdash;The special form of animal
+imagination is motor, and shows itself through play:
+its numerous varieties.&mdash;Why the animal imagination
+must be above all motor: lack of intellectual development.&mdash;Comparison
+with young children, in whom the
+motor system predominates: the r&ocirc;les of movements in
+infantile insanity.</td><td class='nums'><a href="#Page_93">93</a></td></tr>
+<tr><td colspan='2'>CHAPTER II.<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_xiv" id="Page_xiv">[xiv]</a></span><br />
+<span class='smcap'>imagination in the child.</span></td></tr>
+<tr><td class='hang'>Division of its development into four principal periods.&mdash;Transition
+from passive to creative imagination: perception
+and illusion.&mdash;Animating everything: analysis
+of the elements constituting this moment: the r&ocirc;le of
+belief.&mdash;Creation in play: period of imitation, attempts
+at invention.&mdash;Fanciful invention.</td><td class='nums'><a href="#Page_103">103</a></td></tr>
+<tr><td colspan='2'>CHAPTER III.<br />
+<span class='smcap'>primitive man and the creation of myths.</span></td></tr>
+<tr><td class='hang'>The golden age of the creative imagination.&mdash;Myths:
+hypotheses as to the origin: the myth is the psycho-physical
+objectification of man in the phenomena that
+he perceives. The r&ocirc;le of imagination.&mdash;How myths
+are formed. The moment of creation: two operations&mdash;animating
+everything, qualifying everything. Romantic
+invention lacking in peoples without imagination.
+The r&ocirc;le of analogy and of association through
+"constellation."&mdash;The evolution of myths: ascension,
+acme, decline.&mdash;The explanatory myths undergo a radical
+transformation: the work of depersonification of
+the myth. Survivals.&mdash;The non-explanatory myths
+suffer a partial transformation: Literature is a fallen
+and rationalized mythology.&mdash;Popular imagination
+and legends: the legend is to the myth what illusion
+is to hallucination.&mdash;Unconscious processes that the
+imagination employs in order to create legends:
+fusion, idealization.</td><td class='nums'><a href="#Page_118">118</a></td></tr>
+<tr><td colspan='2'>CHAPTER IV.<br />
+<span class='smcap'>the higher forms of invention.</span></td></tr>
+<tr><td class='hang'>Is a psychology of great inventors possible? Pathological
+and physiological theories of genius.&mdash;General characters
+of great inventors. Precocity: chronological order
+of the development of the creative power. Psychological<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_xv" id="Page_xv">[xv]</a></span>
+reasons for this order. Why the creator commences
+by imitating.&mdash;Necessity or fatalism of vocation.&mdash;The
+representative character of great creators.
+Discussion as to the origin of this character&mdash;is it in
+the individual or in the environment?&mdash;Mechanism of
+creation. Two principal processes&mdash;complete, abridged.
+Their three phases; their resemblances and differences.&mdash;The
+r&ocirc;le of chance in invention: it supposes the
+meeting of two factors&mdash;one internal, the other external.&mdash;Chance
+is an occasion for, not an agent of,
+creation.</td><td class='nums'><a href="#Page_140">140</a></td></tr>
+<tr><td colspan='2'>CHAPTER V.<br />
+<span class='smcap'>law of the development of the imagination.</span></td></tr>
+<tr><td class='hang'>Is the creative imagination, in its evolution, subject to
+any law?&mdash;It passes through two stages separated by
+a critical phase.&mdash;Period of autonomy; critical period;
+period of definite constitution. Two cases: decay or
+transformation through logical form, through deviation.&mdash;Subsidiary
+law of increasing complexity.&mdash;Historical
+verification.</td><td class='nums'><a href="#Page_167">167</a></td></tr>
+<tr><td colspan='2'>THIRD PART.<br />
+<span class='smcap'>the principal types of imagination.</span><br />
+<span class='smcap'>preliminary.</span></td></tr>
+<tr><td class='hang'>The need of a concrete study.&mdash;The varieties of the creative
+imagination, analogous to the varieties of character.</td><td class='nums'><a href="#Page_179">179</a></td></tr>
+<tr><td colspan='2'>CHAPTER I.<br />
+<span class='smcap'>the plastic imagination.</span></td></tr>
+<tr><td class='hang'>It makes use of clear images, well determined in space,
+and of associations of objective relations.&mdash;Its external
+character.&mdash;Inferiority of the affective element.&mdash;Its
+principal manifestations: in the arts dealing<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_xvi" id="Page_xvi">[xvi]</a></span>
+with form; in poetry (transformation of sonorous into
+visual images); in myths with clear outline; in mechanical
+invention.&mdash;The dry and rational imagination
+its elements.</td><td class='nums'><a href="#Page_184">184</a></td></tr>
+<tr><td colspan='2'>CHAPTER II.<br />
+<span class='smcap'>the diffluent imagination.</span></td></tr>
+<tr><td class='hang'>It makes use of vague images linked according to the
+least rigorous modes of association. Emotional abstractions;
+their nature.&mdash;Its characteristic of inwardness.&mdash;Its
+principal manifestations: revery, the romantic
+spirit, the chimerical spirit; myths and religious
+conceptions, literature and the fine arts (the
+symbolists), the class of the marvelous and fantastic.&mdash;Varieties
+of the diffluent imagination: first, numerical
+imagination; its nature; two principal forms,
+cosmogonic and scientific conceptions; second, musical
+imagination, the type of the affective imagination.
+Its characteristics; it does not develop save after an
+interval of time.&mdash;Natural transposition of events in
+musicians.&mdash;Antagonism between true musical imagination
+and plastic imagination. Inquiry and facts
+on the subject.&mdash;Two great types of imagination.</td><td class='nums'><a href="#Page_195">195</a></td></tr>
+<tr><td colspan='2'>CHAPTER III.<br />
+<span class='smcap'>mystic imagination.</span></td></tr>
+<tr><td class='hang'>Its elements; its special characteristics.&mdash;Thinking symbolically.&mdash;Nature
+of this symbolism.&mdash;The mystic
+changes concrete images into symbolic images.&mdash;Their
+obscurity; whence it arises.&mdash;Extraordinary abuse of
+analogy.&mdash;Mystic labor on letters, numbers, etc.&mdash;Nature
+and extent of the belief accompanying this
+form of imagination: it is unconditional and permanent.&mdash;The
+mystic conception of the world a general
+symbolism.&mdash;Mystic imagination in religion and in
+metaphysics.</td><td class='nums'><a href="#Page_221">221</a></td></tr>
+<tr><td colspan='2'>CHAPTER IV.<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_xvii" id="Page_xvii">[xvii]</a></span><br />
+<span class='smcap'>the scientific imagination.</span></td></tr>
+<tr><td class='hang'>It is distinguishable into genera and species.&mdash;The need
+for monographs that have not yet appeared.&mdash;The
+imagination in growing sciences&mdash;belief is at its
+maximum; in the organized sciences&mdash;the negative
+r&ocirc;le of method.&mdash;The conjectural phase; proof of its
+importance.&mdash;Abortive and dethroned hypotheses.&mdash;The
+imagination in the processes of verification.&mdash;The
+metaphysician's imagination arises from the same
+need as the scientist's.&mdash;Metaphysics is a rationalized
+myth.&mdash;Three moments.&mdash;Imaginative and rationalist.</td><td class='nums'><a href="#Page_236">236</a></td></tr>
+<tr><td colspan='2'>CHAPTER V.<br />
+<span class='smcap'>the practical and mechanical imagination.</span></td></tr>
+<tr><td class='hang'>Indetermination of this imaginative form.&mdash;Inferior
+forms: the industrious, the unstable, the eccentric.
+Why people of lively imagination are changeable.&mdash;Superstitious
+beliefs. Origin of this form of imagination&mdash;its
+mental mechanism and its elements.&mdash;The
+higher form&mdash;mechanical imagination.&mdash;Man has expended
+at least as much imagination there as in
+esthetic creation.&mdash;Why the contrary view prevails.&mdash;Resemblances
+between these two forms of imagination.&mdash;Identity
+of development. Detail observation&mdash;four
+phases.&mdash;General characters. This form, at its
+best, supposes inspiration; periods of preparation,
+of maturity, and of decline.&mdash;Special characters:
+invention occurs in layers. Principal steps of its
+development.&mdash;It depends strictly on physical conditions.&mdash;A
+phase of pure imagination&mdash;mechanical
+romances. Examples.&mdash;Identical nature of the imagination
+of the mechanic and that of the artist.</td><td class='nums'><a href="#Page_256">256</a></td></tr>
+<tr><td colspan='2'>CHAPTER VI.<br />
+<span class='smcap'>the commercial imagination.</span></td></tr>
+<tr><td class='hang'>Its internal and external conditions.&mdash;Two classes of
+creators&mdash;the cautious, the daring.&mdash;The initial moment<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_xviii" id="Page_xviii">[xviii]</a></span>
+of invention.&mdash;The importance of the intuitive
+mind.&mdash;Hypotheses in regard to its psychologic
+nature.&mdash;Its development: the creation of increasingly
+more simple processes of substitution.&mdash;Characters in
+common with the forms of creation already studied.&mdash;Characters
+peculiar to it&mdash;the combining imagination
+of the tactician; it is a form of war.&mdash;Creative
+intoxication.&mdash;Exclusive use of schematic representations.&mdash;Remarks
+on the various types of images.&mdash;The
+creators of great financial systems.&mdash;Brief remarks
+on the military imagination.</td><td class='nums'><a href="#Page_281">281</a></td></tr>
+<tr><td colspan='2'>CHAPTER VII.<br />
+<span class='smcap'>the utopian imagination.</span></td></tr>
+<tr><td class='hang'>Successive appearances of ideal conceptions.&mdash;Creators in
+ethics and in the social realm.&mdash;Chimerical forms.
+Social novelists.&mdash;Ch. Fourrier, type of the great
+imaginer.&mdash;Practical invention&mdash;the collective ideal.&mdash;Imaginative
+regression.</td><td class='nums'><a href="#Page_299">299</a></td></tr>
+<tr><td colspan='2'>CONCLUSION.</td></tr>
+<tr><td colspan='2'>I. <i>The foundations of the creative imagination.</i></td></tr>
+<tr><td class='hang'>Why man is able to create: two principal conditions.&mdash;"Creative
+spontaneity," which resolves itself into
+needs, tendencies, desires.&mdash;Every imaginative creation
+has a motor origin.&mdash;The spontaneous revival of
+images.&mdash;The creative imagination reduced to three
+forms: outlined, fixed, objectified. Their peculiar
+characteristics.</td><td class='nums'><a href="#Page_313">313</a></td></tr>
+<tr><td colspan='2'>II. <i>The imaginative type.</i></td></tr>
+<tr><td class='hang'>A view of the imaginative life in all its stages.&mdash;Reduction
+to a psychologic law.&mdash;Four stages characterized:
+1, by the <i>quantity</i> of images; 2, by their <i>quantity
+and intensity</i>; 3, by quantity, intensity and duration;
+4, by the complete and permanent systematization
+of the imaginary life.&mdash;Summary.</td><td class='nums'><a href="#Page_320">320</a></td></tr>
+<tr><td colspan='2'>APPENDICES.<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_xix" id="Page_xix">[xix]</a></span><br />
+<span class='smcap'>observations and documents.</span></td></tr>
+<tr><td class='hang'>A. The various forms of inspiration.</td><td class='nums'><a href="#Page_335">335</a></td></tr>
+<tr><td class='hang'>B. On the nature of the unconscious factor. Two categories&mdash;static
+unconscious, dynamic unconscious.&mdash;Theories
+as to the nature of the unconscious.&mdash;Objections,
+criticisms.</td><td class='nums'><a href="#Page_338">338</a></td></tr>
+<tr><td class='hang'>C. Cosmic and human imagination.</td><td class='nums'><a href="#Page_346">346</a></td></tr>
+<tr><td class='hang'>D. Evidence in regard to musical imagination.</td><td class='nums'><a href="#Page_350">350</a></td></tr>
+<tr><td class='hang'>E. The imaginative type and association of ideas.</td><td class='nums'><a href="#Page_353">353</a></td></tr>
+</table></div>
+
+
+
+
+<hr style="width: 65%;" /><p><span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_3" id="Page_3">[3]</a></span></p>
+<h2>INTRODUCTION</h2>
+
+
+
+<hr style="width: 65%;" />
+<h2>INTRODUCTION</h2>
+
+<h3><span class="smcap">The Motor Nature of the Constructive Imagination</span></h3>
+
+
+<h3>I</h3>
+
+<p>It has been often repeated that one of the principal
+conquests of contemporary psychology is the
+fact that it has firmly established the place and
+importance of movements; that it has especially
+through observation and experiment shown the representation
+of a movement to be a movement begun,
+a movement in the nascent state. Yet those
+who have most strenuously insisted on this proposition
+have hardly gone beyond the realm of the
+passive imagination; they have clung to facts of
+pure reproduction. My aim is to extend their
+formula, and to show that it explains, in large
+measure at least, the origin of the creative imagination.</p>
+
+<p>Let us follow step by step the passage from reproduction
+pure and simple to the creative stage, showing
+therein the persistence and preponderance of the
+motor element in proportion as we rise from mere
+repetition to invention.</p>
+
+<p>First of all, do all representations include motor<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_4" id="Page_4">[4]</a></span>
+elements? Yes, I say, because every perception
+presupposes movements to some extent, and representations
+are the remnants of past perceptions.
+Certain it is that, without our examining the question
+in detail, this statement holds good for the
+great majority of cases. So far as visual and tactile
+images are concerned there is no possible doubt as
+to the importance of the motor elements that enter
+into their composition. The eye is very poorly endowed
+with movements for its office as a higher
+sense-organ; but if we take into account its intimate
+connection with the vocal organs, so rich in capacity
+for motor combinations, we note a kind of compensation.
+Smell and taste, secondary in human
+psychology, rise to a very high rank indeed among
+many animals, and the olfactory apparatus thus obtains
+with them a complexity of movements proportionate
+to its importance, and one that at times
+approaches that of sight. There yet remains the
+group of internal sensations that might cause discussion.
+Setting aside the fact that the vague impressions
+bound up with chemical changes within
+the tissues are scarcely factors in representation, we
+find that the sensations resulting from changes in
+respiration, circulation, and digestion are not lacking
+in motor elements. The mere fact that, in
+some persons, vomiting, hiccoughs, micturition, etc.,
+can be caused by perceptions of sight or of hearing
+proves that representations of this character have
+a tendency to become translated into acts.</p>
+
+<p>Without emphasizing the matter we may, then,<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_5" id="Page_5">[5]</a></span>
+say that this thesis rests on a weighty mass of facts;
+that the motor element of the image tends to cause
+it to lose its purely "inner" character, to objectify
+it, to externalize it, to project it outside of ourselves.</p>
+
+<p>It should, however, be noted that what has just
+been said does not take us beyond the reproductive
+imagination&mdash;beyond memory. All these revived
+images are <i>repetitions</i>; but the creative imagination
+requires something <i>new</i>&mdash;this is its peculiar and essential
+mark. In order to grasp the transition from
+reproduction to production, from repetition to creation,
+it is necessary to consider other, more rare,
+and more extraordinary facts, found only among
+some favored beings. These facts, known for a
+long time, surrounded with some mystery, and attributed
+in a vague manner "to the power of the
+imagination," have been studied in our own day
+with much more system and exactness. For our
+purpose we need to recall only a few of them.</p>
+
+<p>Many instances have been reported of tingling
+or of pains that may appear in different parts of the
+body solely through the effect of the imagination.
+Certain people can increase or inhibit the beating of
+their hearts at will, i.e., by means of an intense
+and persistent representation. The renowned physiologist,
+E. F. Weber, possessed this power, and has
+described the mechanism of the phenomenon. Still
+more remarkable are the cases of vesication produced
+in hypnotized subjects by means of suggestion.
+Finally, let us recall the persistent story of<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_6" id="Page_6">[6]</a></span>
+the stigmatized individuals, who, from the thirteenth
+century down to our own day, have been quite
+numerous and present some interesting varieties&mdash;some
+having only the mark of the crucifix, others
+of the scourging, or of the crown of thorns.<a name="FNanchor_1_1" id="FNanchor_1_1"></a><a href="#Footnote_1_1" class="fnanchor">[1]</a> Let
+us add the profound changes of the organism, results
+of the suggestive therapeutics of contemporaries;
+the wonderful effects of the "faith cure," i.e.,
+the miracles of all religions in all times and in all
+places; and this brief list will suffice to recall certain
+creative activities of the human imagination that we
+have a tendency to forget.</p>
+
+<p>It is proper to add that the image acts not altogether
+in a positive manner. Sometimes it has an
+inhibitory power. A vivid representation of a
+movement arrested is the beginning of the stoppage
+of that movement; it may even end in complete
+arrest of the movement. Such are the cases of
+"paralysis by ideas" first described by Reynolds,
+and later by Charcot and his school under the name
+of "psychic paralysis." The patient's inward conviction
+that he cannot move a limb renders him
+powerless for any movement, and he recovers his
+motor power only when the morbid representation
+has disappeared.</p>
+
+<p>These and similar facts suggest a few remarks.</p>
+
+<p>First, that we have here creation in the strict
+sense of the word, though it be limited to the organism.
+What appears is <i>new</i>. Though one may<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_7" id="Page_7">[7]</a></span>
+strictly maintain that from our own experience we
+have a knowledge of formication, rapid and slow
+beating of the heart, even though we may not be
+able ordinarily to produce them at will, this position
+is absolutely untenable when we consider cases of
+vesication, stigmata, and other alleged miraculous
+phenomena: <i>these are without precedent in the life
+of the individual</i>.</p>
+
+<p>Second, in order that these unusual states may
+occur, there are required additional elements in the
+producing mechanism. At bottom this mechanism
+is very obscure. To invoke "the power of the
+imagination" is merely to substitute a word where
+an explanation is needed. Fortunately, we do not
+need to penetrate into the inmost part of this mystery.
+It is enough for us to make sure of the
+facts, to prove that they have a representation as
+the starting point, and to show that the representation
+by itself is not enough. What more then is
+needed? Let us note first of all that these occurrences
+are rare. It is not within the power of everybody
+to acquire stigmata or to become cured of a
+paralysis pronounced incurable. This happens only
+to those having an ardent faith, a strong desire
+<i>that it shall come to pass</i>. This is an indispensable
+psychic condition. What is concerned in such a
+case is not a single state, but a double one: an
+image followed by a particular emotional state (desire,
+aversion, etc.). In other words, there are two
+conditions: In the first are concerned the motor
+elements included in the image, the remains of previous
+<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_8" id="Page_8">[8]</a></span>perceptions; in the second, there are concerned
+the foregoing, <i>plus</i> affective states, tendencies that
+sum up the individual's energy. It is the latter fact
+that explains their power.</p>
+
+<p>To conclude: This group of facts shows us the
+existence, beyond images, of another factor, instinctive
+or emotional in form, which we shall have
+to study later and which will lead us to the ultimate
+source of the creative imagination.</p>
+
+<p>I fear that the distance between the facts here
+given and the creative imagination proper will seem
+to the reader very great indeed. And why so?
+First, because the creative activity here has as its
+only material the organism, and is not separated
+from the creator. Then, too, because these facts
+are extremely simple, and the creative imagination,
+in the ordinary sense, is extremely complex; here
+there is one operating cause, a single representation
+more or less complex, while in imaginative creation
+we have several co-operating images with combinations,
+co&ouml;rdination, arrangement, grouping.
+But it must not be forgotten that our present aim
+is simply to find <i>a transition stage</i><a name="FNanchor_2_2" id="FNanchor_2_2"></a><a href="#Footnote_2_2" class="fnanchor">[2]</a> between reproduction
+and production; to show the common origin
+of the two forms of imagination&mdash;the purely representative
+faculty and the faculty of creating by
+means of the intermediation of images;&mdash;and to
+show at the same time the work of separation, of
+severance between the two.</p>
+<p><span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_9" id="Page_9">[9]</a></span></p>
+
+<h3>II</h3>
+
+<p>Since the chief aim of this study is to prove that
+the basis of invention must be sought in motor manifestations,
+I shall not hesitate to dwell on it, and
+I take the subject up again under another, clearer,
+more precise, and more psychological form, in putting
+the following question: Which one among the
+various modes of mind-activity offers the closest
+analogy to the creative imagination? I unhesitatingly
+answer, <i>voluntary activity</i>: Imagination, in
+the intellectual order, is the equivalent of will in the
+realm of movements. Let us justify this comparison
+by some proof.</p>
+
+<p>1. Likeness of development in the two instances.
+Growth of voluntary control is progressive, slow,
+crossed and checked. The individual has to become
+master of his muscles and by their agency extend
+his sway over other things. Reflexes, instinctive
+movements, and movements expressive of emotion
+constitute the primary material of voluntary movements.
+The will has no movements of its own as
+an inheritance: it must co&ouml;rdinate and associate,
+since it separates in order to form new associations.
+It reigns by right of conquest, not by right of birth.
+In like manner, the creative imagination does not
+rise completely armed. Its raw materials are
+images, which here correspond to muscular movements.
+It goes through a period of trial. It always
+is, at the start (for reasons indicated later on),
+an imitation; it attains its complex forms only
+through a process of growth.<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_10" id="Page_10">[10]</a></span></p>
+
+<p>2. But this first comparison does not go to the
+bottom of the matter; there are yet deeper analogies.
+First, the completely subjective character of both
+instances. The imagination is subjective, personal,
+anthropocentric; its movement is from within outwards
+toward an objectification. The understanding,
+i.e., the intellect in the restricted sense, has
+opposite characteristics&mdash;it is objective, impersonal,
+receives from outside. For the creative imagination
+the inner world is the regulator; there is a preponderance
+of the inner over the outer. For the
+understanding, the outside world is the regulator;
+there is a preponderance of the outer over the inner.
+The world of my imagination is <i>my</i> world as opposed
+to the world of my understanding, which is
+the world of all my fellow creatures. On the other
+hand, as regards the will, we might repeat exactly,
+word for word, what we have just said of the
+imagination. This is unnecessary. Back of both,
+then, we have our true cause, whatever may be our
+opinion concerning the ultimate nature of causation
+and of will.</p>
+
+<p>3. Both imagination and will have a teleological
+character, and act only with a view toward an end,
+being thus the opposite of the understanding, which,
+as such, limits itself to proof. We are always
+wanting something, be it worthless or important.
+We are always inventing for an end&mdash;whether in
+the case of a Napoleon imagining a plan of campaign,
+or a cook making up a new dish. In both
+instances there is now a simple end attained by immediate
+<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_11" id="Page_11">[11]</a></span>means, now a complex and distant goal presupposing
+subordinate ends which are means in relation
+to the final end. In both cases there is a <i>vis a
+tergo</i> designated by the vague term "spontaneity,"
+which we shall attempt to make clear later, and a
+<i>vis a fronte</i>, an attracting movement.</p>
+
+<p>4. Added to this analogy as regards their nature,
+there are other, secondary likenesses between the
+abortive forms of the creative imagination and the
+impotent forms of the will. In its normal and
+complete form will culminates in an act; but with
+wavering characters and sufferers from abulia deliberation
+never ends, or the resolution remains inert,
+incapable of realization, of asserting itself in
+practice. The creative imagination also, in its complete
+form, has a tendency to become objectified, to
+assert itself in a work that shall exist not only for
+the creator but for everybody. On the contrary,
+with dreamers pure and simple, the imagination remains
+a vaguely sketched inner affair; it is not embodied
+in any esthetic or practical invention. Revery
+is the equivalent of weak desires; dreamers are
+the abulics of the creative imagination.</p>
+
+<p>It is unnecessary to add that the similarity established
+here between the will and the imagination is
+only partial and has as its aim only to bring to light
+the r&ocirc;le of the motor elements. Surely no one will
+confuse two aspects of our psychic life that are so
+distinct, and it would be foolish to delay in order
+to enumerate the differences. The characteristic of
+novelty should by itself suffice, since it is the special<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_12" id="Page_12">[12]</a></span>
+and indispensable mark of invention, and for volition
+is only accessory: The extraction of a tooth
+requires of the patient as much effort the second
+time as the first, although it is no longer a novelty.</p>
+
+<p>After these preliminary remarks we must go on
+to the analysis of the creative imagination, in order
+to understand its nature in so far as that is accessible
+with our existing means. It is, indeed, a tertiary
+formation in mental life, if we assume a primary
+layer (sensations and simple emotions), and
+a secondary (images and their associations, certain
+elementary logical operations, etc.). Being composite,
+it may be decomposed into its constituent elements,
+which we shall study under these three headings,
+viz., the intellectual factor, the affective or
+emotional factor, and the unconscious factor. But
+that is not enough; the analysis should be completed
+by a synthesis. All imaginative creation, great or
+small, is organic, requires a unifying principle: there
+is then also a synthetic factor, which it will be necessary
+to determine.</p>
+
+<div class="footnotes"><h3>FOOTNOTES:</h3>
+
+<div class="footnote"><p><a name="Footnote_1_1" id="Footnote_1_1"></a><a href="#FNanchor_1_1"><span class="label">[1]</span></a> A. Maury, in his book <i>L'Astronomie et la Magie</i>, enumerates
+fifty cases.</p></div>
+
+<div class="footnote"><p><a name="Footnote_2_2" id="Footnote_2_2"></a><a href="#FNanchor_2_2"><span class="label">[2]</span></a> There are still others, as we shall see later on.</p></div>
+</div>
+
+
+<hr style="width: 65%;" /><p><span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_13" id="Page_13">[13]</a></span></p>
+<h2>PART ONE</h2>
+
+<h3>ANALYSIS OF THE IMAGINATION</h3><p><span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_14" id="Page_14">[14]</a></span></p>
+
+
+
+<hr style="width: 65%;" /><p><span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_15" id="Page_15">[15]</a></span></p>
+<h2>CHAPTER I</h2>
+
+<h3>THE INTELLECTUAL FACTOR.</h3>
+
+
+<h3>I</h3>
+
+<p>Considered under its intellectual aspect, that is,
+in so far as it borrows its elements from the understanding,
+the imagination presupposes two fundamental
+operations&mdash;the one, negative and preparatory,
+dissociation; the other, positive and constitutive,
+association.</p>
+
+<p>Dissociation is the "abstraction" of the older psychologists,
+who well understood its importance for
+the subject with which we are now concerned.
+Nevertheless, the term "dissociation" seems to me
+preferable, because it is more comprehensive. It
+designates a genus of which the other is a species.
+It is a spontaneous operation and of a more radical
+nature than the other. Abstraction, strictly so-called,
+acts only on isolated states of consciousness;
+dissociation acts, further, on series of states of consciousness,
+which it sorts out, breaks up, dissolves,
+and through this preparatory work makes suitable
+for entering into new combinations.</p>
+
+<p>Perception is a synthetic process, but dissociation
+(or abstraction) is already present in embryo in<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_16" id="Page_16">[16]</a></span>
+perception, just because the latter is a complex state.
+Everyone perceives after an individual fashion, according
+to his constitution and the impression of the
+moment. A painter, a sportsman, a dealer, and an
+uninterested spectator do not see a given horse in
+the same manner: the qualities that interest one are
+unnoticed by another.<a name="FNanchor_3_3" id="FNanchor_3_3"></a><a href="#Footnote_3_3" class="fnanchor">[3]</a></p>
+
+<p>The image being a simplification of sensory data,
+and its nature dependent on that of previous perceptions,
+it is inevitable that the work of dissociation
+should go on in it. But this is far too mild
+a statement. Observation and experiment show us
+that in the majority of cases the process grows wonderfully.
+In order to follow the progressive development
+of this dissolution, we may roughly differentiate
+images into three categories&mdash;complete,
+incomplete, and schematic&mdash;and study them in
+order.</p>
+
+<p>The group of images here termed <i>complete</i> comprises
+first, objects repeatedly presented in daily
+experience&mdash;my wife's face, my inkstand, the sound
+of a church bell or of a neighboring clock, etc. In
+this class are also included the images of things that
+we have perceived but a few times, but which, for
+additional reasons, have remained clean-cut in our
+memory. Are these images complete, in the strict
+sense of the word? They cannot be; and the contrary
+belief is a delusion of consciousness that, however,
+disappears when one confronts it with the<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_17" id="Page_17">[17]</a></span>
+reality. The mental image can contain all the qualities
+of an object in even less degree than the perception;
+the image is the result of selection, varying
+with every case. The painter Fromentin, who
+was proud that he found after two or three years
+"an exact recollection" of things he had barely
+noticed on a journey, makes elsewhere, however,
+the following confession: "My memory of things,
+although very faithful, has never the certainty admissible
+as documentary evidence. The weaker it
+grows, the more is it changed in becoming the property
+of my memory and the more valuable is it for
+the work that I intend for it. In proportion as the
+exact form becomes altered, another form, partly
+real, partly imaginary, which I believe preferable,
+takes its place." Note that the person speaking thus
+is a painter endowed with an unusual visual memory;
+but recent investigations have shown that
+among men generally the so-called complete and
+exact images undergo change and warping. One
+sees the truth of this statement when, after a lapse
+of some time, one is placed in the presence of the
+original object, so that comparison between the real
+object and its image becomes possible.<a name="FNanchor_4_4" id="FNanchor_4_4"></a><a href="#Footnote_4_4" class="fnanchor">[4]</a> Let us
+note that in this group <i>the image always corresponds</i><span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_18" id="Page_18">[18]</a></span>
+<i>to certain individual objects</i>; it is not the same with
+the other two groups.</p>
+
+<p>The group of <i>incomplete</i> images, according to
+the testimony of consciousness itself, comes from
+two distinct sources&mdash;first, from perceptions insufficiently
+or ill-fixed; and again, from impressions of
+like objects which, when too often repeated, end
+by becoming confused. The latter case has been
+well described by Taine. A man, says he, who,
+having gone through an avenue of poplars wants
+to picture a poplar; or, having looked into a poultry-yard,
+wishes to call up a picture of a hen, experiences
+a difficulty&mdash;his different memories rise up.
+The experiment becomes a cause of effacement; the
+images canceling one another decline to a state of
+imperceptible tendencies which their likeness and
+unlikeness prevent from predominating. Images
+become blunted by their collision just as do bodies
+by friction.<a name="FNanchor_5_5" id="FNanchor_5_5"></a><a href="#Footnote_5_5" class="fnanchor">[5]</a></p>
+
+<p>This group leads us to that of <i>schematic</i> images,
+or those entirely without mark&mdash;the indefinite image
+of a rosebush, of a pin, of a cigarette, etc. This is
+the greatest degree of impoverishment; the image,
+deprived little by little of its own characteristics,
+is nothing more than a shadow. It has become that
+transitional form between image and pure concept
+that we now term "generic image," or one that at
+least resembles the latter.</p>
+
+<p>The image, then, is subject to an unending process
+of change, of suppression and addition, of dissociation
+<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_19" id="Page_19">[19]</a></span>and corrosion. This means that it is not a
+dead thing; it is not at all like a photographic plate
+with which one may reproduce copies indefinitely.
+Being dependent on the state of the brain, the image
+undergoes change like all living substance,&mdash;it is
+subject to gains and losses, especially losses. But
+each of the foregoing three classes has its use for
+the inventor. They serve as material for different
+kinds of imagination&mdash;in their concrete form, for
+the mechanic and the artist; in their schematic form,
+for the scientist and for others.</p>
+
+<p>Thus far we have seen only a part of the work of
+dissociation and, taking it all in all, the smallest
+part. We have, seemingly, considered images as
+isolated facts, as psychic atoms; but that is a
+purely theoretic position. Images are not solitary
+in actual life; they form part of a chain, or rather
+of a woof or net, since, by reason of their manifold
+relations they may radiate in all directions, through
+all the senses. Dissociation, then, works also upon
+<i>series</i>, cuts them up, mangles them, breaks them,
+and reduces them to ruins.</p>
+
+<p>The ideal law of the recurrence of images is that
+known since Hamilton's time under the name of
+"law of redintegration,"<a name="FNanchor_6_6" id="FNanchor_6_6"></a><a href="#Footnote_6_6" class="fnanchor">[6]</a> which consists in the passing
+<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_20" id="Page_20">[20]</a></span>from a part to the whole, each element tending
+to reproduce the complete state, each member of a
+series the whole of that series. If this law existed
+alone, invention would be forever forbidden to us;
+we could not emerge from repetition; we should be
+condemned to monotony. But there is an opposite
+power that frees us&mdash;it is dissociation.</p>
+
+<p>It is very strange that, while psychologists have
+for so long a time studied the laws of association,
+no one has investigated whether the inverse process,
+dissociation, also has not laws of its own. We
+can not here attempt such a task, which would be
+outside of our province; it will suffice to indicate in
+passing two general conditions determining the association
+of series.</p>
+
+<p>First, there are the internal or subjective causes.
+The revived image of a face, a monument, a landscape,
+an occurrence, is, most often, only partial.
+It depends on various conditions that revive the
+essential part and drop the minor details, and this
+"essential" which survives dissociation depends on
+subjective causes, the principal ones of which are
+at first practical, utilitarian reasons. It is the tendency
+already mentioned to ignore what is of no
+value, to exclude that from consciousness. Helmholtz
+has shown that in the act of seeing, various
+details remain unnoticed because they are immaterial
+in the concerns of life; and there are many
+other like instances. Then, too, emotional reasons
+governing the attention orientate it exclusively in
+one direction&mdash;these will be studied in the course<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_21" id="Page_21">[21]</a></span>
+of this work. Lastly, there are logical or intellectual
+reasons, if we understand by this term the law
+of mental inertia or the law of least resistance by
+means of which the mind tends toward the simplification
+and lightening of its labor.</p>
+
+<p>Secondly, there are external or objective causes
+which are variations in experience. When two or
+more qualities or events are given as constantly associated
+in experience we do not dissociate them.
+The uniformity of nature's laws is the great opponent
+of dissociation. Many truths (for example,
+the existence of the antipodes) are established with
+difficulty, because it is necessary to break up closely
+knit associations. The oriental king whom Sully
+mentions, who had never seen ice, refused to credit
+the existence of solid water. A total impression,
+the elements of which had never been given us separately
+in experience, would be unanalyzable. If
+all cold objects were moist, and all moist objects
+cold; if all liquids were transparent and all non-liquids
+opaque, we should find it difficult to distinguish
+cold from moisture and liquidity from
+transparency. On his part, James adds further
+that what has been associated sometimes with
+one thing and sometimes with another tends to
+become dissociated from both. This might be
+called a law of association by concomitant variations.<a name="FNanchor_7_7" id="FNanchor_7_7"></a><a href="#Footnote_7_7" class="fnanchor">[7]</a></p>
+
+<p>In order to thoroughly comprehend the absolute
+necessity for dissociation, let us note that total<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_22" id="Page_22">[22]</a></span>
+redintegration is <i>per se</i> a hindrance to creation. Examples
+are given of people who can easily remember
+twenty or thirty pages of a book, but if they want
+a particular passage they are unable to pick it out&mdash;they
+must begin at the beginning and continue down
+to the required place. Excessive ease of retention
+thus becomes a serious inconvenience. Besides these
+rare cases, we know that ignorant people, those intellectually
+limited, give the same invariable story of
+every occurrence, in which all the parts&mdash;the important
+and the accessory, the useful and the useless&mdash;are
+on a dead level. They omit no detail, they cannot
+select. Minds of this kind are inapt at invention. In
+short, we may say that there are two kinds of memory:
+one is completely systematized, e.g., habits,
+routine, poetry or prose learned by heart, faultless
+musical rendering, etc. The acquisition forms a compact
+whole and cannot enter into new combinations.
+The other is not systematized; it is composed of
+small, more or less coherent groups. This kind of
+memory is plastic and capable of becoming combined
+in new ways.</p>
+
+<p>We have enumerated the spontaneous, natural
+causes of association, omitting the voluntary and
+artificial causes, which are but their imitations. As
+a result of these various causes, images are taken
+to pieces, shattered, broken up, but made all the
+readier as materials for the inventor. This is a
+process analogous to that which, in geologic time,
+produces new strata through the wearing away of
+old rocks.<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_23" id="Page_23">[23]</a></span></p>
+
+
+<h3>II</h3>
+
+<p>Association is one of the big questions of psychology;
+but as it does not especially concern our
+subject, it will be discussed in strict proportion to
+its use here. Nothing is easier than limiting ourselves.
+Our task is reducible to a very clear and
+very brief question: What are the forms of association
+that give rise to new combinations and
+under what influences do they arise? All other
+forms of association, those that are only repetitions,
+should be eliminated. Consequently, this subject
+can not be treated in one single effort; it must be
+studied, in turn, in its relations to our three factors&mdash;intellectual,
+emotional, unconscious.</p>
+
+<p>It is generally admitted that the expression "association
+of ideas" is faulty.<a name="FNanchor_8_8" id="FNanchor_8_8"></a><a href="#Footnote_8_8" class="fnanchor">[8]</a> It is not comprehensive
+enough, association being active also in
+psychic states other than ideas. It seems indicative
+rather of mere juxtaposition, whereas associated
+states modify one another by the very fact of their
+being connected. But, as it has been confirmed by
+long usage, it would be difficult to eliminate the
+phrase.</p>
+
+<p>On the other hand, psychologists are not at all
+agreed as regards the determination of the principal
+laws or forms of association. Without taking sides
+in the debate, I adopt the most generally accepted
+classification, the one most suitable for our subject&mdash;the
+one that reduces everything to the two fundamental
+<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_24" id="Page_24">[24]</a></span>laws of contiguity and resemblance. In
+recent years various attempts have been made to
+reduce these two laws to one, some reducing resemblance
+to contiguity; others, contiguity to resemblance.
+Putting aside the ground of this discussion,
+which seems to me very useless, and which
+perhaps is due to excessive zeal for unity, we must
+nevertheless recognize that this discussion is not
+without interest for the study of the creative imagination,
+because it has well shown that each of the
+two fundamental laws has a characteristic mechanism.</p>
+
+<p>Association by contiguity (or continuity), which
+Wundt calls external, is simple and homogeneous.
+It reproduces the order and connection of things;
+it reduces itself to habits contracted by our nervous
+system.</p>
+
+<p>Is association by resemblance, which Wundt calls
+internal, strictly speaking, an elementary law?
+Many doubt it. Without entering into the long
+and frequently confused discussions to which this
+subject has given rise, we may sum up their results
+as follows: In so-called association by resemblance
+it is necessary to distinguish three moments&mdash;(a)
+That of the presentation; a state <i>A</i> is
+given in perception or association-by-contiguity, and
+forms the starting point. (b) That of the work of
+assimilation; <i>A</i> is recognized as more or less like a
+state <i>a</i> previously experienced. (c) As a consequence
+of the co&euml;xistence of <i>A</i> and <i>a</i> in consciousness,
+they can later be recalled reciprocally, although<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_25" id="Page_25">[25]</a></span>
+the two original occurrences <i>A</i> and <i>a</i> have previously
+never existed together, and sometimes, indeed,
+may not possibly have existed together. It
+is evident that the crucial moment is the second, and
+that it consists of an act of active assimilation.
+Thus James maintains that "it is a relation that the
+mind perceives after the fact, just as it may perceive
+the relations of superiority, of distance, of
+causality, of container and content, of substance and
+accident, or of contrast between an object, and
+some second object which the associative machinery
+calls up."<a name="FNanchor_9_9" id="FNanchor_9_9"></a><a href="#Footnote_9_9" class="fnanchor">[9]</a></p>
+
+<p>Association by resemblance presupposes a joint
+labor of association and dissociation&mdash;it is an active
+form. Consequently it is the principal source of
+the material of the creative imagination, as the
+sequel of this work will sufficiently show.</p>
+
+<p>After this rather long but necessary preface, we
+come to the intellectual factor rightly so termed,
+which we have been little by little approaching.
+The essential, fundamental element of the creative
+imagination in the intellectual sphere is the capacity
+of thinking by analogy; that is, by partial and often
+accidental resemblance. By analogy we mean an
+imperfect kind of resemblance: like is a genus of
+which analogue is a species.</p>
+
+<p>Let us examine in some detail the mechanism of<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_26" id="Page_26">[26]</a></span>
+this mode of thought in order that we may understand
+how analogy is, by its very nature, an almost
+inexhaustible instrument of creation.</p>
+
+<p>1. Analogy may be based solely on the <i>number of
+attributes compared</i>. Let <i>a b c d e f</i> and <i>r s t u d v</i>
+be two beings or objects, each letter representing
+symbolically one of the constitutive attributes. It
+is evident that the analogy between the two is very
+weak, since there is only one common element, <i>d</i>.
+If the number of the elements common to both increases,
+the analogy will grow in the same proportion.
+But the agreement represented above is not
+infrequent among minds unused to a somewhat severe
+discipline. A child sees in the moon and stars
+a mother surrounded by her daughters. The aborigines
+of Australia called a book "mussel," merely
+because it opens and shuts like the valves of a shellfish.<a name="FNanchor_10_10" id="FNanchor_10_10"></a><a href="#Footnote_10_10" class="fnanchor">[10]</a></p>
+
+<p>2. Analogy may have for its basis the <i>quality</i> or
+<i>value</i> of the compound attributes. It rests on a
+variable element, which oscillates from the essential
+to the accidental, from the reality to the appearance.
+To the layman, the likeness between cetacians and
+fishes are great; to the scientist, slight. Here,
+again, numerous agreements are possible, provided
+one take no account either of their solidity or their
+frailty.</p>
+
+<p>3. Lastly, in minds without power, there occurs<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_27" id="Page_27">[27]</a></span>
+a semi-unconscious operation that we may call a
+transfer through the omission of the middle term.
+There is analogy between <i>a b c d e</i> and <i>g h a i f</i>
+through the common letter <i>a</i>; between <i>g h a i f</i> and
+<i>x y f z q</i> through the common letter <i>f</i>; and finally an
+analogy becomes established between <i>a b c d e</i> and
+<i>x y f z q</i> for no other reason than that of their common
+analogy with <i>g h a i f</i>. In the realm of the
+affective states, transfers of this sort are not at all
+rare.</p>
+
+<p>Analogy, an unstable process, undulating and
+multiform, gives rise to the most unforeseen and
+novel groupings. Through its pliability, which is
+almost unlimited, it produces in equal measure absurd
+comparisons and very original inventions.</p>
+
+<p>After these remarks on the mechanism of thinking
+by analogy, let us glance at the processes it employs
+in its creative work. The problem is, apparently,
+inextricable. Analogies are so numerous, so
+various, so arbitrary, that we may despair of finding
+any regularity whatever in creative work. Despite
+this it seems, however, reducible to two principal
+types or processes, which are personification, and
+transformation or metamorphosis.</p>
+
+<p>Personification is the earlier process. It is radical,
+always identical with itself, but transitory.
+It goes out from ourselves toward other things.
+It consists in attributing life to everything, in supposing
+in everything that shows signs of life&mdash;and
+even in inanimate objects&mdash;desires, passions, and
+acts of will analogous to ours, acting like ourselves<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_28" id="Page_28">[28]</a></span>
+in view of definite ends. This state of mind is
+incomprehensible to an adult civilized man; but it
+must be admitted, since there are facts without number
+that show its existence. We do not need to
+cite them&mdash;they are too well known. They fill the
+works of ethnologists, of travelers in savage lands,
+of books of mythology. Besides, all of us, at the
+commencement of our lives, during our earliest
+childhood, have passed through this inevitable stage
+of universal animism. Works on child-psychology
+abound in observations that leave no possible room
+for doubt on this point. The child endows everything
+with life, and he does so the more in proportion
+as he is more imaginative. But this stage,
+which among civilized people lasts only a brief
+period, remains in the primitive man a permanent
+disposition and one that is always active. This
+process of personification is the perennial fount
+whence have gushed the greater number of myths,
+an enormous mass of superstitions, and a large
+number of esthetic productions. To sum up in a
+word, all things that have been invented <i>ex analogia
+hominis</i>.</p>
+
+<p>Transformation or metamorphosis is a general,
+permanent process under many forms, proceeding
+not from the thinking subject towards objects, but
+from one object to another, from one thing to another.
+It consists of a transfer through partial
+resemblance. This operation rests on two fundamental
+bases&mdash;depending at one time on vague resemblances
+(a cloud becomes a mountain, or a<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_29" id="Page_29">[29]</a></span>
+mountain a fantastic animal; the sound of the wind
+a plaintive cry, etc.), or again, on a resemblance
+with a predominating emotional element: A perception
+provokes a feeling, and becomes the mark,
+sign, or plastic form thereof (the lion represents
+courage; the cat, artifice; the cypress, sorrow; and
+so on). All this, doubtless, is erroneous or arbitrary;
+but the function of the imagination is to invent,
+not to perceive. All know that this process
+creates metaphors, allegories, symbols; it should
+not, however, be believed on that account that it
+remains restricted to the realm of art or of the development
+of language. We meet it every moment
+in practical life, in mechanical, industrial, commercial,
+and scientific invention, and we shall, later,
+give a large number of examples in support of this
+statement.</p>
+
+<p>Let us note, briefly, that analogy, as an imperfect
+form of resemblance&mdash;as was said above, if we assume
+among the objects compared a totality of likenesses
+and differences in varying proportions&mdash;necessarily
+allows all degrees. At one end of the
+scale, the comparison is made between valueless or
+exaggerated likenesses. At the other end, analogy
+is restricted to exact resemblance; it approaches
+cognition, strictly so called; for example, in mechanical
+and scientific invention. Hence it is not at all
+surprising that the imagination is often a substitute
+for, and as Goethe expressed it, "a forerunner of,"
+reason. Between the creative imagination and rational
+investigation there is a community of nature<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_30" id="Page_30">[30]</a></span>&mdash;both
+presuppose the ability of seizing upon likenesses.
+On the other hand, the predominance of the
+exact process establishes from the outset a difference
+between "thinkers" and imaginative dreamers ("visionaries").<a name="FNanchor_11_11" id="FNanchor_11_11"></a><a href="#Footnote_11_11" class="fnanchor">[11]</a></p>
+
+<div class="footnotes"><h3>FOOTNOTES:</h3>
+
+<div class="footnote"><p><a name="Footnote_3_3" id="Footnote_3_3"></a><a href="#FNanchor_3_3"><span class="label">[3]</span></a> Cf. the well-known aphorism, "<i>Apperception ist alles</i>."
+(Tr.)</p></div>
+
+<div class="footnote"><p><a name="Footnote_4_4" id="Footnote_4_4"></a><a href="#FNanchor_4_4"><span class="label">[4]</span></a> See especially J. Philippe, "La d&eacute;formation et les transformations
+des images" in <i>Revue Philosophique</i>, May and November,
+1897. Although these investigations had in view only
+visual representations, it is not at all doubtful that the results
+hold good for others, especially those of hearing (voice, song,
+harmony).</p></div>
+
+<div class="footnote"><p><a name="Footnote_5_5" id="Footnote_5_5"></a><a href="#FNanchor_5_5"><span class="label">[5]</span></a> <i>On Intelligence</i>, Vol. I, Bk. ii, Chap. 2.</p></div>
+
+<div class="footnote"><p><a name="Footnote_6_6" id="Footnote_6_6"></a><a href="#FNanchor_6_6"><span class="label">[6]</span></a> In his recent history of the theories of the imagination,
+<i>La psicologia dell' immaginazione, nella storia filosofia</i> (Rome,
+1898) Ambrosi shows that this law is found already formulated
+in the <i>Psychologia Empirica</i> of Christian Wolff [d. 1754]:
+"<i>Perceptio pr&aelig;terita integra recurrit cujus pr&aelig;sens continet
+partem.</i>"</p></div>
+
+<div class="footnote"><p><a name="Footnote_7_7" id="Footnote_7_7"></a><a href="#FNanchor_7_7"><span class="label">[7]</span></a> Sully, <i>Human Mind</i>, I, p. 365; James, <i>Psychology</i>, I, p. 502.</p></div>
+
+<div class="footnote"><p><a name="Footnote_8_8" id="Footnote_8_8"></a><a href="#FNanchor_8_8"><span class="label">[8]</span></a> For a good criticism of the term, consult Titchener, <i>Outlines
+of Psychology</i> (New York, 1896), p. 190.</p></div>
+
+<div class="footnote"><p><a name="Footnote_9_9" id="Footnote_9_9"></a><a href="#FNanchor_9_9"><span class="label">[9]</span></a> For the discussions on the reduction to a unity, a detailed
+bibliography will be found in Jodl, <i>Lehrbuch der Psychologie</i>
+(Stuttgart, 1896), p. 490. On the comparison of the two laws,
+James, <i>op. cit.</i>, I, 590; Sully, <i>op. cit.</i>, I, 331 ff; H&ouml;ffding, <i>Psychologie</i>,
+213 ff. (Eng. ed. <i>Outlines of Psychology</i>, pp. 152 ff.).</p></div>
+
+<div class="footnote"><p><a name="Footnote_10_10" id="Footnote_10_10"></a><a href="#FNanchor_10_10"><span class="label">[10]</span></a> Note here a characteristically na&iuml;ve working of the primitive
+intellect in explaining the unknown in terms of the known.
+Cf. Part II, <a href="#Page_118">Chap. iii</a>, below. (Tr.)</p></div>
+
+<div class="footnote"><p><a name="Footnote_11_11" id="Footnote_11_11"></a><a href="#FNanchor_11_11"><span class="label">[11]</span></a> It is yet, and will probably long remain, an open question
+whether we can draw any clear distinction between the two
+kinds of mind here discussed. The author is careful to base
+his distinction on the "predominance" of the "rational" or
+of the "imaginative" process. So-called "thinkers," who <i>do</i>
+nothing, can not, certainly, be ranked with the persons of great
+intellectual attainment through whose efforts the progress of the
+world is made; on the other hand, the author seeks to make
+<i>results</i> or accomplishments the crucial test of true imagination
+(see Introduction).
+</p><p>
+As regards the relative value or rank of the two bents of
+mind there has ever been, and probably forever will be, great
+difference of opinion. Even in this intensely "practical" age
+there is an undercurrent of feeling that the narrowly "practical"
+individual is not the final ideal, and the innermost conviction
+of many is the same as that of the poet who declares
+that "a dreamer lives forever, but a thinker dies in a day."
+(Tr.)</p></div>
+</div>
+
+
+<hr style="width: 65%;" /><p><span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_31" id="Page_31">[31]</a></span></p>
+<h2>CHAPTER II</h2>
+
+<h3>THE EMOTIONAL FACTOR.</h3>
+
+
+<p>The influence of emotional states on the working
+of the imagination is a matter of current observation.
+But it has been studied chiefly by moralists,
+who most often have criticised or condemned it as
+an endless cause of mistakes. The point of view of
+the psychologist is altogether different. He does
+not need at all to investigate whether emotions and
+passions give rise to mental phantoms&mdash;which is an
+indisputable fact&mdash;but <i>why</i> and <i>how</i> they arise.
+For, the emotional factor yields in importance to
+no other; it is the ferment without which no creation
+is possible. Let us study it in its principal
+forms, although we may not be able at this moment
+to exhaust the topic.</p>
+
+
+<h3>I</h3>
+
+<p>It is necessary to show at the outset that the influence
+of the emotional life is unlimited, that it
+penetrates the entire field of invention with no restriction
+whatever; that this is not a gratuitous assertion,
+but is, on the contrary, strictly justified<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_32" id="Page_32">[32]</a></span>
+by facts, and that we are right in maintaining the
+following two propositions:</p>
+
+<p>1. <i>All forms of the creative imagination imply
+elements of feeling.</i></p>
+
+<p>This statement has been challenged by authoritative
+psychologists, who hold that "emotion is
+added to imagination in its esthetic aspect, not in
+its mechanical and intellectual form." This is an
+error of fact resulting from the confusion, or from
+the imperfect analysis, of two distinct cases. In
+the case of non-esthetic creation, the r&ocirc;le of the emotional
+life is simple; in esthetic creation, the r&ocirc;le of
+emotional element is double.</p>
+
+<p>Let us consider invention, first, in its most general
+form. The emotional element is the primal, original
+factor; for all invention presupposes a want,
+a craving, a tendency, an unsatisfied impulse, often
+even a state of gestation full of discomfort. Moreover,
+it is concomitant, that is, under its form of
+pleasure or of pain, of hope, of spite, of anger, etc.,
+it accompanies all the phases or turns of creation.
+The creator may, haphazard, go through the most
+diverse forms of exaltation and depression; may
+feel in turn the dejection of repulse and the joy of
+success; finally the satisfaction of being freed from
+a heavy burden. I challenge anyone to produce
+a solitary example of invention wrought out <i>in
+abstracto</i>, and free from any factors of feeling.
+Human nature does not allow such a miracle.</p>
+
+<p>Now, let us take up the special case of esthetic
+creation, and of forms approaching thereto. Here<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_33" id="Page_33">[33]</a></span>
+again we find the original emotional element as at
+first motor, then attached to various aspects of
+creation, as an accompaniment. But, <i>in addition,
+affective states become material for the creative activity</i>.
+It is a well-known fact, almost a rule, that
+the poet, the novelist, the dramatist, and the musician&mdash;often,
+indeed, even the sculptor and the
+painter&mdash;experience the thoughts and feeling of their
+characters, become identified with them. There are,
+then, in this second instance, two currents of feeling&mdash;the
+one, constituting emotion as material for art,
+the other, drawing out creative activity and developing
+along with it.</p>
+
+<p>The difference between the two cases that we
+have distinguished consists in this and nothing more
+than this. The existence of an emotion-content
+belonging to esthetic production changes in no way
+the psychologic mechanism of invention generally.
+Its absence in other forms of imagination does not
+at all prevent the necessary existence of affective
+elements everywhere and always.</p>
+
+<p>2. <i>All emotional dispositions whatever may influence
+the creative imagination.</i></p>
+
+<p>Here, again, I find opponents, notably Oelzelt-Newin,
+in his short and substantial monograph on
+the imagination.<a name="FNanchor_12_12" id="FNanchor_12_12"></a><a href="#Footnote_12_12" class="fnanchor">[12]</a> Adopting the twofold division of
+emotions as sthenic and asthenic, or exciting and
+depressing, he attributes to the first the exclusive
+privilege of influencing creative activity; but though
+the author limits his study exclusively to the esthetic<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_34" id="Page_34">[34]</a></span>
+imagination, his thesis, even understood thus, is
+untenable. The facts contradict it completely, and
+it is easy to demonstrate that all forms of emotion,
+without exception, act as leaven for imagination.</p>
+
+<p>No one will deny that fear is the type of asthenic
+manifestations. Yet is it not the mother of phantoms,
+of numberless superstitions, of altogether irrational
+and chimerical religious practices?</p>
+
+<p>Anger, in its exalted, violent form, is rather an
+agent of destruction, which seems to contradict my
+thesis; but let us pass over the storm, which is
+always of short duration, and we find in its place
+milder intellectualized forms, which are various
+modifications of primitive fury, passing from the
+acute to the chronic state: envy, jealousy, enmity,
+premeditated vengeance, and so forth. Are not
+these dispositions of the mind fertile in artifices,
+stratagems, inventions of all kinds? To keep even
+to esthetic creation, is it necessary to recall the saying
+<i>facit indignatio versum</i>?</p>
+
+<p>It is not necessary to demonstrate the fecundity
+of joy. As for love, everyone knows that its work
+consists of creating an imaginary being, which is
+substituted for the beloved object; then, when the
+passion has vanished, the disenchanted lover finds
+himself face to face with the bare reality.</p>
+
+<p>Sorrow rightly belongs in the category of depressing
+emotions, and yet, it has as great influence on
+invention as any other emotion. Do we not know
+that melancholy and even profound sorrow has furnished
+poets, musicians, painters, and sculptors with<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_35" id="Page_35">[35]</a></span>
+their most beautiful inspirations? Is there not an
+art frankly and deliberately pessimistic? And this
+influence is not at all limited to esthetic creation.
+Dare we hold that hypochondria and insanity following
+upon the delirium of persecution are devoid
+of imagination? Their morbid character is, on the
+contrary, the well whence strange inventions incessantly
+bubble.</p>
+
+<p>Lastly, that complex emotion termed "self-feeling,"
+which reduces itself finally to the pleasure of
+asserting our power and of feeling its expansion, or
+to the pitiable feeling of our shackled, enfeebled
+power, leads us directly to the motor elements that
+are the fundamental conditions of invention. Above
+all, in this personal feeling, there is the satisfaction
+of being a causal factor, i.e., a creator, and every
+creator has a consciousness of his superiority over
+non-creators. However petty his invention, it confers
+upon him a superiority over those who have
+invented nothing. Although we have been surfeited
+with the repeated statement that the characteristic
+mark of esthetic creation is "being disinterested," it
+must be recognized, as Groos has so truly remarked,<a name="FNanchor_13_13" id="FNanchor_13_13"></a><a href="#Footnote_13_13" class="fnanchor">[13]</a>
+that the artist does not create out of the simple
+pleasure of creating, but in order that he may behold
+a mastery over other minds.<a name="FNanchor_14_14" id="FNanchor_14_14"></a><a href="#Footnote_14_14" class="fnanchor">[14]</a> Production is the<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_36" id="Page_36">[36]</a></span>
+natural extension of "self-feeling," and the accompanying
+pleasure is the pleasure of conquest.</p>
+
+<p>Thus, on condition that we extend "imagination"
+to its full sense, without limiting it unduly to
+esthetics, there is, among the many forms of the
+emotional life, not one that may not stimulate invention.
+It remains to see this emotional factor
+at work,&mdash;to note how it can give rise to new combinations;
+and this brings us to the association of
+ideas.</p>
+
+
+<h3>II</h3>
+
+<p>We have said above that the ideal and theoretic
+law of the recurrence of images is that of "total
+redintegration," as e.g., recalling all the incidents
+of a long voyage in chronological order, with
+neither additions nor omissions. But this formula
+expresses what ought to be, not what actually occurs.
+It supposes man reduced to a state of pure
+intelligence, and sheltered from all disturbing influences.
+It suits the completely systematized forms
+of memory, hardened into routine and habit; but,
+outside of these cases, it remains an abstract concept.</p>
+
+<p>To this law of ideal value, there is opposed the
+real and practical law that actually obtains in the
+revival of images. It is rightly styled the "law of
+interest" or the affective law, and may be stated thus:
+In every past event the interesting parts alone revive,
+or with more intensity than the others. "Interesting"
+here means <i>what affects us in some way under</i><span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_37" id="Page_37">[37]</a></span>
+<i>a pleasing or painful form</i>. Let us note that the
+importance of this fact has been pointed out not by
+the associationists (a fact especially worth remembering)
+but by less systematic writers, strangers to
+that school,&mdash;Coleridge, Shadworth Hodgson, and
+before them, Schopenhauer. William James calls
+it the "ordinary or mixed association."<a name="FNanchor_15_15" id="FNanchor_15_15"></a><a href="#Footnote_15_15" class="fnanchor">[15]</a> The "law
+of interest" doubtless is less exact than the intellectual
+laws of contiguity and resemblance. Nevertheless,
+it seems to penetrate all the more in later
+reasoning. If, indeed, in the problem of association
+we distinguish these three things&mdash;facts, laws,
+causes&mdash;the practical law brings us near to causes.</p>
+
+<p>Whatever the truth may be in this matter, the
+emotional factor brings about new combinations by
+several processes.</p>
+
+<p>There are the ordinary, simple cases, with a natural,
+emotional foundation, depending on momentary
+dispositions. They exist because of the fact
+that representations that have been accompanied
+by the same emotional state tend later to become
+associated: the emotional resemblance reunites and
+links disparate images. This differs from association
+by contiguity, which is a repetition of experience,
+and from association by resemblance in the
+intellectual sense. The states of consciousness become
+combined, not because they have been previously
+given together, not because we perceive the
+agreement of resemblance between them, but because
+they have a common <i>emotional</i> note. Joy,<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_38" id="Page_38">[38]</a></span>
+sorrow, love, hatred, admiration, ennui, pride,
+fatigue, etc., may become a center of attraction that
+groups images or events having otherwise no rational
+relations between them, but having the same
+emotional stamp,&mdash;joyous, melancholy, erotic, etc.
+This form of association is very frequent in dreams
+and reveries, i.e., in a state of mind in which the
+imagination enjoys complete freedom and works
+haphazard. We easily see that this influence, active
+or latent, of the emotional factor, must cause entirely
+unexpected grouping to arise, and offers an almost
+unlimited field for novel combinations, the number
+of images having a common emotional factor being
+very great.</p>
+
+<p>There are unusual and remarkable cases with an
+exceptional emotional base. Of such is "colored
+hearing." We know that several hypotheses have
+been offered in regard to the origin of this phenomenon.
+Embryologically, it would seem to be
+the result of an incomplete separation between the
+sense of sight and that of hearing, and the survival,
+it is said, from a distant period of humanity, when
+this state must have been the rule; anatomically,
+the result of supposed anastamoses between the
+cerebral centers for visual and auditory sensations;
+physiologically, the result of nervous irradiation;
+psychologically, the result of association. This latter
+hypothesis seems to account for the greater
+number of instances, if not for all; but, as Flournoy
+has observed, it is a matter of "affective" imagination.
+Two sensations absolutely unlike (for instance,
+<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_39" id="Page_39">[39]</a></span>the color blue and the sound <i>i</i>) may resemble
+one another through the equal retentive quality that
+they possess in the organism of some favored individuals,
+and this emotional factor becomes a bond
+of association. Observe that this hypothesis explains
+also the much more unusual cases of "colored"
+smell, taste, and pain; that is, an abnormal
+association between given colors and tastes, smells,
+or pains.</p>
+
+<p>Although we meet them only as exceptional
+cases, these modes of association are susceptible to
+analysis, and seem clear, almost self-evident, if we
+compare them with other, subtle, refined, barely perceptible
+cases, the origin of which is a subject for
+supposition, for guessing rather than for clear comprehension.
+It is, moreover, a sort of imagination
+belonging to very few people: certain artists and
+some eccentric or unbalanced minds, scarcely ever
+found outside the esthetic or practical life. I wish
+to speak of the forms of invention that permit only
+fantastic conceptions, of a strangeness pushed to the
+extreme (Hoffman, Poe, Baudelaire, Goya, Wiertz,
+etc.), or surprising, extraordinary thoughts, known
+of no other men (the symbolists and decadents that
+flourish at the present time in various countries of
+Europe and America, who believe, rightly or
+wrongly, that they are preparing the esthetics of the
+future). It must be here admitted that there exists
+an altogether special manner of <i>feeling</i>, dependent
+on temperament at first, which many cultivate and
+refine as though it were a precious rarity. There<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_40" id="Page_40">[40]</a></span>
+lies the true source of their invention. Doubtless,
+to assert this pertinently, it would be necessary to
+establish the direct relations between their physical
+and psychical constitution and that of their work;
+to note even the particular states at the moment of
+the creative act. To me at least, it seems evident
+that the novelty, the strangeness of combinations,
+through its deep subjective character, indicates an
+emotional rather than an intellectual origin. Let
+us merely add that these abnormal manifestations
+of the creative imagination belong to the province
+of pathology rather than to that of psychology.</p>
+
+<p>Association by contrast is, from its very nature,
+vague, arbitrary, indeterminate. It rests, in truth,
+on an essentially subjective and fleeting conception,
+that of contrariety, which it is almost impossible to
+delimit scientifically; for, most often, contraries exist
+only by and for us. We know that this form of
+association is not primary and irreducible. It is
+brought down by some to contiguity, by most others
+to resemblance. These two views do not seem to
+me irreconcilable. In association by contrast we
+may distinguish two layers,&mdash;the one, superficial,
+consists of contiguity: all of us have in memory associated
+couples, such as large-small, rich-poor, high-low,
+right-left, etc., which result from repetition and
+habit; the other, deep, is resemblance; <i>contrast exists
+only where a common measure between two
+terms is possible</i>. As Wundt remarks, a wedding
+may be compared to a burial (the union and separation
+of a couple), but not to a toothache. There is<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_41" id="Page_41">[41]</a></span>
+contrast between two colors, contrast between
+sounds, but not between a sound and a color, at
+least in that there may not be a common basis to
+which we may relate them, as in the previously
+given instances of "colored" sound. In association
+by contrast, there are conscious elements opposed
+to one another, and below, an unconscious
+element, resemblance,&mdash;not clearly and logically
+perceived, but felt&mdash;that evokes and relates the conscious
+elements.</p>
+
+<p>Whether this explanation be right or not, let us
+remark that association by contrast could not be
+left out, because its mechanism, full of unforeseen
+possibilities, lends itself easily to novel relations.
+Otherwise, I do not at all claim that it is entirely
+dependent upon the emotional factor. But, as
+H&ouml;ffding observes,<a name="FNanchor_16_16" id="FNanchor_16_16"></a><a href="#Footnote_16_16" class="fnanchor">[16]</a> the special property of the emotional
+life is moving among contraries; it is altogether
+determined by the great opposition between
+pleasure and pain. Thus, the effects of contrasts
+are much stronger than in the realm of sensation.
+This form of association predominates in esthetic
+and mythic creation, that is to say, in creation of the
+free fancy; it becomes dimmed in the precise forms
+of practical, mechanical, and scientific invention.</p>
+
+
+<h3>III</h3>
+
+<p>Hitherto we have considered the emotional factor
+under a single aspect only&mdash;the purely emotional&mdash;that
+which is manifested in consciousness under an<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_42" id="Page_42">[42]</a></span>
+agreeable or disagreeable or mixed form. But
+thoughts, feelings, and emotions include elements
+that are deeper&mdash;motor, i.e., impulsive or inhibitory&mdash;which
+we may neglect the less since it is in movements
+that we seek the origin of the creative imagination.
+This motor element is what current speech
+and often even psychological treatises designate
+under the terms "creative instinct," "inventive instinct;"
+what we express in another form when we
+say that creators are guided by instinct and "are
+pushed like animals toward the accomplishment of
+certain acts."</p>
+
+<p>If I mistake not, this indicates that the "creative
+instinct" exists in all men to some extent&mdash;feeble in
+some, perceptible in others, brilliant in the great
+inventors.</p>
+
+<p>For I do not hesitate to maintain that the creative
+instinct, taken in this strict meaning, compared to
+animal instinct, is a mere figure of speech, an "entity"
+regarded as a reality, an abstraction. There
+are needs, appetites, tendencies, desires, common to
+all men, which, in a given individual at a given
+moment can result in a creative act; but there is no
+special psychic manifestation that may be the "creative
+instinct." What, indeed, could it be? Every
+instinct has its own particular end:&mdash;hunger, thirst,
+sex, the specific instincts of the bee, ant, beaver,
+consist of a group of movements adapted for a determinate
+end that is always the same. Now, what
+would be a creative instinct <i>in general</i> which, by
+hypothesis, could produce in turn an opera, a machine,
+<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_43" id="Page_43">[43]</a></span>a metaphysical theory, a system of finance,
+a plan of military campaign, and so forth? It is a
+pure fancy. Inventive genius has not <i>a</i> source, but
+<i>sources</i>.</p>
+
+<p>Let us consider from our present viewpoint the
+human duality, the <i>homo duplex</i>:</p>
+
+<p>Suppose man reduced to a state of pure intelligence,
+that is, capable of perceiving, remembering,
+associating, dissociating, reasoning, and nothing
+else. All creative activity is then impossible, because
+there is nothing to solicit it.</p>
+
+<p>Suppose, again, man reduced to organic manifestations;
+he is then no more than a bundle of
+wants, appetites, instincts,&mdash;that is, of motor activities,
+blind forces that, lacking a sufficient cerebral
+organ, will produce nothing.</p>
+
+<p>The co&ouml;peration of both these factors is indispensable:
+without the first, nothing begins; without
+the second, nothing results. I hold that it is in needs
+that we must seek for the primary cause of all inventions;
+it is evident that the motor element alone
+is insufficient. If the needs are strong, energetic,
+they may determine a production, or, if the intellectual
+factor is insufficient, may spoil it. Many
+want to make discoveries but discover nothing. A
+want so common as hunger or thirst suggests to
+one some ingenious method of satisfying it; another
+remains entirely destitute.</p>
+
+<p>In short, in order that a creative act occur, there
+is required, first, a need; then, that it arouse a combination
+<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_44" id="Page_44">[44]</a></span>of images; and lastly, that it objectify and
+<i>realize</i> itself in an appropriate form.</p>
+
+<p>We shall try later (in the Conclusion) to answer
+the question, <i>Why</i> is one imaginative? In passing,
+let us put the opposite question, Why is one <i>not</i>
+imaginative? One may possess in the mind an inexhaustible
+treasure of facts and images and yet
+produce nothing: great travelers, for example, who
+have seen and heard much, and who draw from their
+experiences only a few colorless anecdotes; men
+who were partakers in great political events or military
+movements, who leave behind only a few dry
+and chilly memoirs; prodigies of reading, living
+encyclopedias, who remain crushed under the load
+of their erudition. On the other hand, there are
+people who easily move and act, but are limited,
+lacking images and ideas. Their intellectual poverty
+condemns them to unproductiveness; nevertheless,
+being nearer than the others to the imaginative
+type, they bring forth childish or chimerical
+productions. So that we may answer the question
+asked above: The non-imaginative person is such
+from lack of materials or through the absence of resourcefulness.</p>
+
+<p>Without contenting ourselves with these theoretical
+remarks, let us rapidly show that it is thus
+that these things actually happen. All the work of
+the creative imagination may be classed under two
+great heads&mdash;esthetic inventions and practical inventions;
+on the one hand, what man has brought
+to pass in the domain of art, and on the other hand,<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_45" id="Page_45">[45]</a></span>
+all else. Though this division may appear strange,
+and unjustifiable, it has reason for its being, as we
+shall see hereafter.</p>
+
+<p>Let us consider first the class of non-esthetic creations.
+Very different in nature, all the products
+of this group coincide at one point:&mdash;they are of
+practical utility, they are born of a vital need, of one
+of the conditions of man's existence. There are
+first the inventions "practical" in the narrow sense&mdash;all
+that pertains to food, clothing, defense, housing,
+etc. Every one of these special needs has stimulated
+inventions adapted to a special end. Inventions
+in the social and political order answer to the
+conditions of collective existence; they arise from
+the necessity of maintaining the coherence of the
+social aggregate and of defending it against inimical
+groups. The work of the imagination whence have
+arisen the myths, religious conceptions, and the first
+attempts at a scientific explanation may seem at first
+disinterested and foreign to practical life. This is
+an erroneous supposition. Man, face to face with
+the higher powers of nature, the mystery of which
+he does not penetrate, has a <i>need</i> of acting upon it;
+he tries to conciliate them, even to turn them to his
+service by magic rites and operations. <i>His</i> curiosity
+is not at all theoretic; he does not aim to know for
+the sake of knowing, but in order to act upon the
+outside world and to draw profit therefrom. To the
+numerous questions that necessity puts to him his
+imagination alone responds, because his reason is<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_46" id="Page_46">[46]</a></span>
+shifting and his scientific knowledge <i>nil</i>. Here,
+then, invention again results from urgent needs.</p>
+
+<p>Indeed, in the course of the nineteenth century
+and on account of growing civilization all these
+creations reach a second moment when their origin
+is hidden. Most of our mechanical, industrial and
+commercial inventions are not stimulated by the
+immediate necessity of living, by an urgent need; it
+is not a question of existence but of better existence.
+The same holds true of social and political
+inventions which arise from the increasing complexity
+and the new requirements of the aggregates
+forming great states. Lastly, it is certain that primitive
+curiosity has partially lost its utilitarian character
+in order to become, in some men at least, the
+taste for pure research&mdash;theoretical, speculative, disinterested.
+But all this in no way affects our thesis,
+for it is a well-known elementary psychological law
+that upon primitive wants are grafted acquired
+wants fully as imperative. The primitive need is
+modified, metamorphosed, adapted; there remains of
+it, nonetheless, the fundamental activity toward
+creation.</p>
+
+<p>Let us now consider the class of esthetic creations.
+According to the generally accepted theory which is
+too well known for me to stop to explain it, art has
+its beginning in a superfluous, bounding activity,
+useless as regards the preservation of the individual,
+which is shown first in the form of play. Then,
+through transformation and complication, play becomes
+primitive art, dancing, music, and poetry at<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_47" id="Page_47">[47]</a></span>
+the same time, closely united in an apparently indissoluble
+unity. Although the theory of the absolute
+inutility of art has met some strong criticism, let us
+accept it for the present. Aside from the true or
+false character of inutility, the psychological
+mechanism remains the same here as in the preceding
+cases; we shall only say that in place of a vital
+need it is a need of <i>luxury</i> acting, but it acts only
+because it is in man.</p>
+
+<p>Nevertheless, the inutility of play is far from
+proven biologically. Groos, in his two excellent
+works on the subject,<a name="FNanchor_17_17" id="FNanchor_17_17"></a><a href="#Footnote_17_17" class="fnanchor">[17]</a> has maintained with much
+power the opposite view. According to him the
+theory of Schiller and Spencer, based on the expenditure
+of superfluous activity and the opposite
+theory of Lazarus, who reduces play to a relaxation&mdash;that
+is, a recuperation of strength&mdash;are but
+partial explanations. Play has a positive use. In
+man there exist a great number of instincts that
+are not yet developed at birth. An incomplete being,
+he must have education of his capacities, and
+this is obtained through play, <i>which is the exercise
+of the natural tendencies of human activities</i>. In
+man and in the higher animals plays are a preparation,
+a prelude to the active functions of life.
+<i>There is no instinct of play in general, but there
+are special instincts that are manifested under the
+forms of play.</i> If we admit this explanation, which
+does not lack potency, the work of the esthetic<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_48" id="Page_48">[48]</a></span>
+imagination itself would be reduced to a biological
+necessity, and there would be no reason for making
+a separate category of it. Whichever view we may
+adopt, it still remains established that any invention
+is reducible, directly or indirectly, to a particular,
+determinate need, and that to allow man a special
+instinct, the definite specific character of which
+should be stimulation to creative activity, is a fantastic
+notion.</p>
+
+<p>Whence, then, comes this persistent and in some
+respects seductive idea that creation is an instinctive
+result? Because a happy invention has characteristics
+that evidently relate it to instinctive activity
+in the strict sense of the word. First, precocity,
+of which we shall later give numerous examples,
+and which resembles the innateness of instinct.
+Again, orientation in a single direction: the
+inventor is, so to speak, polarized; he is the slave of
+music, of mechanics, of mathematics; often inapt at
+everything outside his own particular sphere. We
+know the witticism of Madame du Deffant on
+Vaucanson, who was so awkward, so insignificant
+when he ventured outside of mechanics. "One
+should say that this man had manufactured himself."
+Finally, the ease with which invention often
+(not always) manifests itself makes it resemble
+the work of a pre-established mechanism.</p>
+
+<p>But these and similar characteristics may be lacking.
+They are necessary for instinct, not for invention.
+There are great creators who have been
+neither precocious nor confined in a narrow field,<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_49" id="Page_49">[49]</a></span>
+and who have given birth to their inventions painfully,
+laboriously. Between the mechanism of instinct
+and that of imaginative creation there are
+frequently great analogies but not identity of nature.
+Every tendency of our organization, useful
+or hurtful, may become the beginning of a
+creative act. Every invention arises from a particular
+need of human nature, acting within its
+own sphere and for its own special end.</p>
+
+<p>If now it should be asked why the creative
+imagination directs itself preferably in one line
+rather than in another&mdash;toward poetry or physics,
+trade or mechanics, geometry or painting, strategy
+or music, etc.&mdash;we have nothing in answer. It is a
+result of the individual organization, the secret of
+which we do not possess. In ordinary life we
+meet people visibly borne along toward love or good
+cheer, toward ambition, riches or good works;
+we say that they are "so built," that such is their
+character. At bottom the two questions are identical,
+and current psychology is not in a position to
+solve them.</p>
+
+<div class="footnotes"><h3>FOOTNOTES:</h3>
+
+<div class="footnote"><p><a name="Footnote_12_12" id="Footnote_12_12"></a><a href="#FNanchor_12_12"><span class="label">[12]</span></a> <i>Ueber Phantasievorstellungen</i>, Graz, 1889, p. 48.</p></div>
+
+<div class="footnote"><p><a name="Footnote_13_13" id="Footnote_13_13"></a><a href="#FNanchor_13_13"><span class="label">[13]</span></a> <i>Die Spiele der Thiere</i>, Jena, 1896. The subject has been
+very well treated by this author, pp. 294-301.</p></div>
+
+<div class="footnote"><p><a name="Footnote_14_14" id="Footnote_14_14"></a><a href="#FNanchor_14_14"><span class="label">[14]</span></a> The "disinterested" view is found widely advocated or
+hinted at in literature. Cf. Goethe's "Der S&auml;nger" (Tr.).</p></div>
+
+<div class="footnote"><p><a name="Footnote_15_15" id="Footnote_15_15"></a><a href="#FNanchor_15_15"><span class="label">[15]</span></a> <i>Psychology</i>, I, 571 ff.</p></div>
+
+<div class="footnote"><p><a name="Footnote_16_16" id="Footnote_16_16"></a><a href="#FNanchor_16_16"><span class="label">[16]</span></a> H&ouml;ffding, <i>Psychologie</i>, p. 219; <i>Eng. trans.</i>, p. 161.</p></div>
+
+<div class="footnote"><p><a name="Footnote_17_17" id="Footnote_17_17"></a><a href="#FNanchor_17_17"><span class="label">[17]</span></a> Groos, <i>Die Spiele der Thiere</i>, 1896, and <i>Die Spiele der Menschen</i>,
+1899 (Eng. trans., Appletons, New York, 1898, 1901).</p></div>
+</div>
+
+
+<hr style="width: 65%;" /><p><span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_50" id="Page_50">[50]</a></span></p>
+<h2>CHAPTER III</h2>
+
+<h3>THE UNCONSCIOUS FACTOR</h3>
+
+
+<h3>I</h3>
+
+<p>By this term I designate principally, not exclusively,
+what ordinary speech calls "inspiration." In
+spite of its mysterious and semi-mythological appearance,
+the term indicates a positive fact, one
+that is ill-understood in a deep sense, like all that is
+near the roots of creation. This concept has its
+history, and if it is permissible to apply a very
+general formula to a particular case we may say
+that it has developed according to the law of the
+three states assumed by the positivists.</p>
+
+<p>In the beginning, inspiration is literally ascribed
+to the gods&mdash;among the Greeks to Apollo and the
+Muses, and in like manner under various polytheistic
+religions. Later, the gods become supernatural
+spirits, angels, saints, etc. In one way or another
+it is always regarded as external and superior
+to man. In the beginnings of all inventions&mdash;agriculture,
+navigation, medicine, commerce, legislation,
+fine arts&mdash;there is a belief in revelation; the
+human mind considers itself incapable of having
+discovered all that. Creation has arisen, we do<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_51" id="Page_51">[51]</a></span>
+not know how, in a total ignorance of the processes.</p>
+
+<p>Later on these higher beings become empty formulas,
+mere survivals; there remain only the poets
+to invoke their aid, through the force of tradition,
+without believing in them. But side by side with
+these formal survivals there remains a mysterious
+ground which is translated by vague expressions
+and metaphors, such as "enthusiasm," "poetic
+frenzy," "possession by a spirit," "being overcome,"
+"having the devil inside one," "the spirit whispers
+as it lists," etc. Here we have come out of the supernatural
+without, however, attempting a positive
+(i.e., a scientific) explanation.</p>
+
+<p>Lastly, in the third stage, we try to sound this
+unknown. Psychology sees in it a special manifestation
+of the mind, a particular, semi-conscious,
+semi-unconscious state which we must now study.</p>
+
+<p>At first sight, and considered in its negative aspect,
+inspiration presents a very definite character.
+It does not depend on the individual will. As in the
+case of sleep or digestion, we may try to call it
+forth, encourage it, maintain it; but not always with
+success. Inventors, great and small, never cease to
+complain over the periods of unproductiveness which
+they undergo in spite of themselves. The wiser
+among them watch for the moment; the others
+attempt to fight against their evil fate and to create
+despite nature.</p>
+
+<p>Considered in its positive aspect, inspiration has
+two essential marks&mdash;suddenness and impersonality.<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_52" id="Page_52">[52]</a></span></p>
+
+<p>(a) It makes a sudden eruption into consciousness,
+but one presupposing a latent, frequently long,
+labor. It has its analogues among other well-known
+psychic states; for example, a passion that is forgotten,
+which, after a long period of incubation,
+reveals itself through an act; or, better, a sudden
+resolve after endless deliberation which did not
+seem able to come to a head. Again, there may be
+absence of effort and of appearance of preparation.
+Beethoven would strike haphazard the keys of a
+piano or would listen to the songs of birds. "With
+Chopin," says George Sand, "creation was spontaneous,
+miraculous; he wrought without foreseeing.
+It would come complete, sudden, sublime."
+One might pile up like facts in abundance. Sometimes,
+indeed, inspiration bursts forth in deep sleep
+and awakens the sleeper, and lest we may suppose
+this suddenness to be especially characteristic of
+artists we see it in all forms of invention. "You
+feel a little electric shock striking you in the head,
+seizing your heart at the same time&mdash;that is the moment
+of genius" (Buffon). "In the course of my
+life I have had some happy thoughts," says Du Bois
+Reymond, "and I have often noted that they would
+come to me involuntarily, and when I was not
+thinking of the subject." Claude Bernard has
+voiced the same thought more than once.</p>
+
+<p>(b) Impersonality is a deeper character than the
+preceding. It reveals a power superior to the conscious
+individual, strange to him although acting
+through him: a state which many inventors have<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_53" id="Page_53">[53]</a></span>
+expressed in the words, "I counted for nothing in
+that." The best means of recognizing it would be
+to write down some observations taken from the
+inspired individuals themselves. We do not lack
+them, and some have the virtue of good observation.<a name="FNanchor_18_18" id="FNanchor_18_18"></a><a href="#Footnote_18_18" class="fnanchor">[18]</a>
+But that would lead us too far afield. Let
+us only remark that this unconscious impulse acts
+variously according to the individual. Some submit
+to it painfully, striving against it just like the
+ancient pythoness at the time of giving her oracle.
+Others, especially in religious inspiration, submit
+themselves entirely with pleasure or else sustain it
+passively. Still others of a more analytic turn have
+noted the concentration of all their faculties and
+capacities on a single point. But whatever characteristics
+it takes on, remaining impersonal at bottom
+and unable to appear in a fully conscious individual,
+we must admit, unless we wish to give it a
+supernatural origin, that inspiration is derived from
+the unconscious activity of the mind. In order to
+make sure of its nature it would then be necessary
+to make sure first of the nature of the unconscious,
+which is one of the enigmas of psychology.</p>
+
+<p>I put aside all the discussions on the subject as
+tiresome and useless for our present aim. Indeed,
+they reduce themselves to these two principal propositions:
+for some the unconscious is a purely
+physiological activity, a "cerebration"; for others
+it is a gradual diminution of consciousness which<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_54" id="Page_54">[54]</a></span>
+exists without being bound to me&mdash;i.e., to the principal
+consciousness. Both these are full of difficulties
+and present almost insurmountable objections.<a name="FNanchor_19_19" id="FNanchor_19_19"></a><a href="#Footnote_19_19" class="fnanchor">[19]</a></p>
+
+<p>Let us take the "unconscious" as a fact and let us
+limit ourselves to clearing it up, relating inspiration
+to mental states that have been judged worthy of
+explaining it.</p>
+
+<p>1. Hypermnesia, or exaltation of memory, in
+spite of what has been said about it, teaches us
+nothing in regard to the nature of inspiration or of
+invention in general. It is produced in hypnotism,
+mania, the excited period of "circular insanity,"
+at the beginning of general paralysis, and especially
+under the form known as "the gift of tongues" in
+religious epidemics. We find, it is true, some observations
+(among others one by Regis of an illiterate
+newspaper vender composing pieces of poetry of his
+own), indicating that a heightened memory sometimes
+accompanies a certain tendency toward invention.
+But hypermnesia, pure and simple, consists
+of an extraordinary flood of memories totally
+lacking that essential mark of creation&mdash;new combinations.
+It even appears that in the two instances
+there is rather an antagonism since heightened memory
+comes near to the ideal law of total redintegration,
+which is, as we know, a hindrance to invention.
+They are alike only with respect to the great mass
+of separable materials, but where the principle of
+unity is wanting there can be no creation.<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_55" id="Page_55">[55]</a></span></p>
+
+<p>2. Inspiration has often been likened to the state
+of excitement preceding intoxication. It is a well-known
+fact that many inventors have sought it in
+wine, alcoholic liquors, toxic substances like hashish,
+opium, ether, etc. It is unnecessary to mention
+names. The abundance of ideas, the rapidity of
+their flow, the eccentric spurts and caprices, novel
+ideas, strengthening of the vital and emotional tone,
+that brief state of bounding fancy of which novelists
+have given such good descriptions, make evident
+to the least observing that under the influence of
+intoxication the imagination works to a much
+greater extent than ordinarily. Yet how pale that
+is compared to the action of the intellectual poisons
+above mentioned, especially hashish. The "artificial
+paradise" of DeQuincy, Moreau de Tours, Th&eacute;ophile
+Gautier, Baudelaire and others have made
+known to all an enormous expansion of the imagination
+launched into a giddy course without limits
+of time and space.</p>
+
+<p>Strictly, these are facts representing only a stimulated,
+artificial, temporary inspiration. They do
+not take us into its true nature; at the most they
+may teach us concerning some of their physiological
+conditions. It is not even an inspiration in the
+strict sense, but rather a beginning, an embryo, an
+outline, analogous to the creations produced in
+dreams which are found very incoherent when we
+awake. One of the essential conditions of creation,
+a principal element&mdash;the directing principle that organizes
+and unifies&mdash;is lacking. Under the influence<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_56" id="Page_56">[56]</a></span>
+of alcoholic drinks and of poisonous intoxicants attention
+and will always fall into exhaustion.</p>
+
+<p>3. With greater reason it has been sought to explain
+inspiration by comparison with certain forms
+of somnambulism, and it has been said that "it is
+only the lowest degree of the latter state, somnambulism
+in a waking state. In inspiration it is as
+though a strange personality were speaking to the
+author; in somnambulism it is the stranger himself
+who talks or holds the pen, who speaks or writes&mdash;in
+a word, does the work."<a name="FNanchor_20_20" id="FNanchor_20_20"></a><a href="#Footnote_20_20" class="fnanchor">[20]</a> It would thus be the
+modified form of a state that is the culmination of
+subconscious activity and a state of double personality.
+As this last explanatory expression is wonderfully
+abused, and is called upon to serve in all
+conditions, preciseness is indispensable.</p>
+
+<p>The inspired individual is like an awakened
+dreamer&mdash;he lives in his dream. (Of this we might
+cite seemingly authentic examples: Shelly, Alfieri,
+etc.) Psychologically, this means that there is in
+him a double inversion of the normal state.</p>
+
+<p>To begin with, consciousness monopolized by the
+number and intensity of its images is closed to the
+influences of the outside world, or else receives them
+only to make them enter the web of its dream. The
+internal life annihilates the external, which is just
+the opposite of ordinary life.</p>
+
+<p>Further, the unconscious or subconscious activity<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_57" id="Page_57">[57]</a></span>
+passes to the first plane, plays the first part, while
+preserving its impersonal character.</p>
+
+<p>This much allowed, if we would go further, we
+are thrown into increasing difficulties. The existence
+of an unconscious working is beyond doubt;
+facts in profusion could be given in support of this
+obscure elaboration which enters consciousness only
+when all is done. But what is the nature of this
+work? Is it purely physiological? Is it psychological?
+We come to two opposing theses. Theoretically,
+we may say that everything goes on in the
+realm of the unconscious just as in consciousness,
+<i>only without a message to me</i>; that in clear consciousness
+the work may be followed up step by
+step, while in unconsciousness it proceeds likewise,
+but unknown to us. It is evident that all this is
+purely hypothetical.</p>
+
+<p>Inspiration resembles a cipher dispatch which the
+unconscious activity transmits to the conscious
+process, which translates it. Must we admit that
+in the deep levels of the unconscious there are
+formed only fragmentary combinations and that they
+reach complete systematization only in clear consciousness,
+or, rather, is the creative labor identical
+in both cases? It is difficult to decide. It seems to
+be accepted that genius, or at least richness, in invention
+depends on the subliminal imagination,<a name="FNanchor_21_21" id="FNanchor_21_21"></a><a href="#Footnote_21_21" class="fnanchor">[21]</a> not on<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_58" id="Page_58">[58]</a></span>
+the other, which is superficial in nature and soon
+exhausted. The one is spontaneous, true; the other,
+artificial, feigned. "Inspiration" signifies unconscious
+imagination, and is only a special case of it.
+Conscious imagination is a kind of perfected state.</p>
+
+<p>To sum up, inspiration is the result of an underhand
+process existing in men, in some to a very great
+degree. The nature of this work being unknown,
+we can conclude nothing as to the ultimate nature
+of inspiration. On the other hand, we may in a
+positive manner fix the value of the phenomenon in
+invention, all the more as we are inclined to over-value
+it. We should, indeed, note that inspiration
+is not a cause but an effect&mdash;more exactly, a moment,
+a crisis, a critical stage; it is an <i>index</i>. It
+marks either the end of an unconscious elaboration
+which may have been very short or very long, or
+else the beginning of a conscious elaboration which
+will be very short or very long (this is seen especially
+in cases of creation suggested by chance).
+On the one hand, it never has an absolute beginning;
+on the other hand, it never delivers a finished
+work; the history of inventions sufficiently proves
+this. Furthermore, one may pass beyond it; many
+creations long in preparation seem without a crisis,
+strictly so called; such as Newton's law of attraction,
+Leonardo da Vinci's "Last Supper," and the
+"Mona Lisa." Finally, many have felt themselves<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_59" id="Page_59">[59]</a></span>
+really inspired without producing anything of
+value.<a name="FNanchor_22_22" id="FNanchor_22_22"></a><a href="#Footnote_22_22" class="fnanchor">[22]</a></p>
+
+
+<h3>II</h3>
+
+<p>What has been said up to this point does not exhaust
+the study of the unconscious factor as a source
+of new combinations. Its r&ocirc;le can be studied under
+a simpler and more limited form. For this purpose
+we need to return for the last time to association
+of ideas. The final reason for association (outside
+of contiguity, in part at least) must be sought in the
+temperament, character, individuality of the subject,
+often even in the <i>moment</i>; that is, in a passing
+influence, hardly perceptible because it is unconscious
+or subconscious. These momentary dispositions
+in latent form can excite novel relations in two
+ways&mdash;through mediate association and through a
+special mode of grouping which has recently received
+the name "constellation."</p>
+
+<p>1. Mediate association has been well known since
+the time of Hamilton, who was the first to determine
+its nature and to give a personal example that has
+become classic. Loch Lomond recalled to him the
+Prussian system of education because, when visiting
+the lake, he had met a Prussian officer who conversed
+with him on the subject. His general formula
+is this: <i>A</i> recalls <i>C</i>, although there is between them
+neither contiguity nor resemblance, but because a
+middle term, <i>B</i>, which does not enter consciousness,
+serves as a transition between <i>A</i> and <i>C</i>. This mode
+of association seemed universally accepted when, latterly,
+<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_60" id="Page_60">[60]</a></span>it has been attacked by M&uuml;nsterberg and
+others. People have had recourse to experimentation,
+which has given results only in slight agreement.<a name="FNanchor_23_23" id="FNanchor_23_23"></a><a href="#Footnote_23_23" class="fnanchor">[23]</a>
+For my own part, I count myself among
+those contemporaries who admit mediate association,
+and they are the greater number. Scripture, who
+has made a special study of the subject, and who
+has been able to note all the intermediate conditions
+between almost clear consciousness and the unconscious,
+considers the existence of mediate association
+as proven. In order to pronounce as an illusion
+a fact that is met with so often in daily experience,
+and one that has been studied by so many
+excellent observers, there is required more than experimental
+investigations (the conditions of which
+are often artificial and unnatural), some of which,
+moreover, conclude for the affirmative.</p>
+
+<p>This form of association is produced, like the
+others, now by contiguity, now by resemblance. The
+example given by Hamilton belongs to the first type.
+In the experiments by Scripture are found some of<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_61" id="Page_61">[61]</a></span>
+the second type&mdash;e.g., a red light recalled, through
+the vague memory of a flash of strontium light, a
+scene of an opera.</p>
+
+<p>It is clear that by its very nature mediate association
+can give rise to novel combinations. Contiguity
+itself, which is usually only repetition, becomes
+the source of unforeseen relations, thanks to
+the elimination of the middle term. Nothing, moreover,
+proves that there may not sometimes be several
+latent intermediate terms. It is possible that <i>A</i>
+should call up <i>D</i> through the medium of <i>b</i> and <i>c</i>,
+which remain below the threshold of consciousness.
+It seems even impossible not to admit this in the
+hypothesis of the subconscious, where we see only
+the two end links of the chain, without being able to
+allow a break of continuity between them.</p>
+
+<p>2. In his determination of the regulating causes
+of association of ideas, Ziehen designates one of
+these under the name of "constellation," which has
+been adopted by some writers. This may be enunciated
+thus: The recall of an image, or of a group of
+images, is in some cases the result of a sum of
+predominant tendencies.</p>
+
+<p>An idea may become the starting point of a host
+of associations. The word "Rome" can call up a
+hundred. Why is one called up rather than another,
+and at such a moment rather than at another?
+There are some associations based on contiguity
+and on resemblance which one may foresee,
+but how about the rest? Here is an idea <i>A</i>; it is
+the center of a network; it can radiate in all directions<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_62" id="Page_62">[62]</a></span>&mdash;<i>B,
+C, D, E, F, etc.</i> Why does it call up now
+<i>B</i>, later <i>F</i>?</p>
+
+<p>It is because every image is comparable to a force,
+which may pass from the latent to the active condition,
+and in this process may be reinforced or
+checked by other images. There are simultaneous
+and inhibitory tendencies. <i>B</i> is in a state of tension
+and <i>C</i> is not; or it may be that <i>D</i> exerts an arresting
+influence on <i>C</i>. Consequently <i>C</i> cannot prevail.
+But an hour later conditions have changed and victory
+rests with <i>C</i>. This phenomenon rests on a
+physiological basis: the existence of several currents
+diffusing themselves through the brain and the possibility
+of receiving simultaneous excitations.<a name="FNanchor_24_24" id="FNanchor_24_24"></a><a href="#Footnote_24_24" class="fnanchor">[24]</a></p>
+
+<p>A few examples will make plainer this phenomenon
+of reinforcement, in consequence of which an
+association prevails. Wahle reports that the Gothic
+<i>H&ocirc;tel de Ville</i>, near his house, had never suggested
+to him the idea of the Doges' Palace at Venice, in
+spite of certain architectural likenesses, until a certain
+day when this idea broke upon him with much
+clearness. He then recalled that two hours before
+he had observed a lady wearing a beautiful brooch
+in the form of a gondola. Sully rightly remarks
+that it is much easier to recall the words of a foreign
+language when we return from the country
+where it is spoken than when we have lived a long
+time in our own, because the tendency toward recollection
+is reinforced by the recent experience of the<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_63" id="Page_63">[63]</a></span>
+words heard, spoken, read, and a whole array of
+latent dispositions that work in the same direction.</p>
+
+<p>In my opinion we would find the finest examples
+of "constellation," regarded as a creative element,
+in studying the formation and development of
+myths. Everywhere and always man has had for
+material scarcely anything save natural phenomena&mdash;the
+sky, land, water, stars, storms, wind, seasons,
+life, death, etc. On each of these themes he builds
+thousands of explanatory stories, which vary from
+the grandly imposing to the laughably childish.
+Every myth is the work of a human group which
+has worked according to the tendencies of its special
+genius under the influence of various stages of intellectual
+culture. No process is richer in resources,
+of freer turn, or more apt to give what every inventor
+promises&mdash;the novel and unexpected.</p>
+
+<p>To sum up: The initial element, external or internal,
+excites associations that one cannot always
+foresee, because of the numerous orientations possible;
+an analogous case to that which occurs in the
+realm of the will when there are present reasons
+for and against, acting and not acting, one direction
+or another, now or later&mdash;when the final resolution
+cannot be predicted, and often depends on
+imperceptible causes.</p>
+
+<p>In conclusion, I anticipate a possible question:
+"Does the unconscious factor differ in nature from
+the two others (intellectual and emotional)?" The
+answer depends on the hypothesis that one holds
+as to the nature of the unconscious itself. According
+<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_64" id="Page_64">[64]</a></span>to one view it would be especially physiological,
+consequently different; according to another, the difference
+can exist only <i>in the processes</i>: unconscious
+elaboration is reducible to intellectual or emotional
+processes the preparatory work of which is slighted,
+and which enters consciousness ready made. Consequently,
+the unconscious factor would be a special
+form of the other two rather than a distinct element
+in invention.</p>
+
+<div class="footnotes"><h3>FOOTNOTES:</h3>
+
+<div class="footnote"><p><a name="Footnote_18_18" id="Footnote_18_18"></a><a href="#FNanchor_18_18"><span class="label">[18]</span></a> Several of them will be found in <a href="#Page_335">Appendix A</a> at the end of
+this work.</p></div>
+
+<div class="footnote"><p><a name="Footnote_19_19" id="Footnote_19_19"></a><a href="#FNanchor_19_19"><span class="label">[19]</span></a> On this subject see <a href="#Page_338">Appendix B</a>.</p></div>
+
+<div class="footnote"><p><a name="Footnote_20_20" id="Footnote_20_20"></a><a href="#FNanchor_20_20"><span class="label">[20]</span></a> Dr. Chabaneix, <i>Le subconscient sur les artistes, les savants,
+et les &eacute;crivains</i>, Paris, 1897, p. 87.</p></div>
+
+<div class="footnote"><p><a name="Footnote_21_21" id="Footnote_21_21"></a><a href="#FNanchor_21_21"><span class="label">[21]</span></a> The recent case, studied with so much ability by M. Flournoy
+in his book, "<i>Des Indes &agrave; la plan&egrave;te Mars</i>" (1900), is an
+example of the subliminal creative imagination, and of the work
+it is capable of doing by itself.</p></div>
+
+<div class="footnote"><p><a name="Footnote_22_22" id="Footnote_22_22"></a><a href="#FNanchor_22_22"><span class="label">[22]</span></a> We shall return to this point in another part of this work.
+See Part II, <a href="#Page_140">chapter iv</a>.</p></div>
+
+<div class="footnote"><p><a name="Footnote_23_23" id="Footnote_23_23"></a><a href="#FNanchor_23_23"><span class="label">[23]</span></a> Thus Howe (<i>American Journal of Psychology</i>, vi, 239 ff.),
+has published some investigations in the negative. One series
+of 557 experiments gave him eight apparently mediate associations;
+after examination, he reduced them to a single one,
+which seemed to him doubtful. Another series of 961 experiments
+gives 72 cases, for which he offers an explanation other
+than mediate association. On the other hand, Aschaffenburg
+admits them to the extent of four per cent.; the association-time
+is longer than for average associations (<i>Psychologische
+Arbeiten</i>, I and II). Consult especially Scripture, <i>The New
+Psychology</i>, chapter xiii, with experiments in support of his
+conclusion.</p></div>
+
+<div class="footnote"><p><a name="Footnote_24_24" id="Footnote_24_24"></a><a href="#FNanchor_24_24"><span class="label">[24]</span></a> Ziehen, <i>Leitfaden der physiologischen Psychologie</i>, 4th edition,
+1898, pp. 164, 174. Also, Sully, <i>Human Mind</i>, I, 343.</p></div>
+</div>
+
+
+<hr style="width: 65%;" /><p><span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_65" id="Page_65">[65]</a></span></p>
+<h2>CHAPTER IV</h2>
+
+<h3>THE ORGANIC CONDITIONS OF THE IMAGINATION</h3>
+
+
+<p>Whatever opinion we may hold concerning the
+nature of the unconscious, since that form of activity
+is related more than any other to the physiological
+conditions of the mental life, the present time is
+suitable for an exposition of the hypotheses that it
+is permissible to express concerning the organic
+bases of the imagination. What we may regard as
+positive, or even as probable, is very little.</p>
+
+
+<h3>I</h3>
+
+<p>First, the anatomical conditions. Is there a "seat"
+of the imagination? Such is the form of the question
+asked for the last twenty years. In that period
+of extreme and closely bounded localization men
+strained themselves to bind down every psychic
+manifestation to a strictly determined point of the
+brain. Today the problem presents itself no longer
+in this simple way. As at present we incline
+toward scattered localization, functional rather than
+properly anatomical, and as we often understand
+by "center" the synergic action of several centers<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_66" id="Page_66">[66]</a></span>
+differently grouped according to the individual case,
+our question becomes equivalent to: "Are there certain
+portions of the brain having an exclusive or preponderating
+part in the working of the creative
+imagination?" Even in this form the question is
+hardly acceptable. Indeed, the imagination is not
+a primary and relatively simple function like that
+of visual, auditory and other sensations. We have
+seen that it is a state of tertiary formation and very
+complex. There is required, then, (1) that the elements
+constituting imagination be determined in a
+rigorous manner, but the foregoing analysis makes
+no pretense of being definitive; (2) that each of
+these constitutive elements may be strictly related
+to its anatomic conditions. It is evident that we
+are far from possessing the secret of such a mechanism.</p>
+
+<p>An attempt has been made to put the question
+in a more precise and limited form by studying the
+brains of men distinguished in different lines. But
+this method, in avoiding the difficulty, answers our
+question indirectly only. Most often great inventors
+possess qualities besides imagination indispensable
+for success (Napoleon, James Watt, etc.). How
+draw a dividing line so as to assign to the imagination
+only its rightful share? In addition, the anatomical
+determination is beset with difficulties.</p>
+
+<p>A method flourishing very greatly about the middle
+of the nineteenth century consisted of weighing
+carefully a large number of brains and drawing various
+conclusions as to intellectual superiority or inferiority
+<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_67" id="Page_67">[67]</a></span>from a comparison of the weights. We
+find on this point numerous documents in the special
+works published during the period mentioned. But
+this method of weights has given rise to so many
+surprises and difficulties in the way of explanation
+that it has been quite necessary to give it up, since
+we see in it only another element of the problem.</p>
+
+<p>Nowadays we attribute the greatest importance to
+the morphology of the brain, to its histological structure,
+the marked development of certain regions, the
+determination not only of centers but of connections
+and associations between centers. On this last
+point contemporary anatomists have given themselves
+up to eager researches, and, although the
+cerebral architecture is not conceived by all in the
+same way, it is proper for psychology to note that
+all with their "centers" or "associational system"
+try to translate into their own language the complex
+conditions of mental life. Since we must choose
+from among these various anatomical views let us
+accept that of Flechsig, one of the most renowned
+and one having also the advantage of putting directly
+the problem of the organic conditions of the
+imagination.</p>
+
+<p>We know that Flechsig relies on the embryological
+method&mdash;that is, on the development&mdash;in the
+order of time, of nerves and centers. For him
+there exist on the one hand sensitive regions (sensory-motor),
+occupying about a third of the cortical
+surface; on the other hand, association-centers, occupying
+the remaining part.<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_68" id="Page_68">[68]</a></span></p>
+
+<p>So far as the sensory centers are concerned, development
+occurs in the following order: Organic
+sensations (middle of cerebral cortex), smell (base
+of the brain and part of the frontal lobes), sight
+(occipital lobe), hearing (first temporal). Whence
+it results that in a definite part of the brain the body
+comes to proper consciousness of its impulses, wants,
+appetites, pains, movements, etc., and that this part
+develops first&mdash;"knowledge of the body precedes
+that of the outside world."</p>
+
+<p>In what concerns the associational centers, Flechsig
+supposes three regions: The great posterior center
+(parieto-occipito-temporal); another, much
+smaller, anterior or frontal; and a middle center, the
+smallest of all (the Island of Reil). Comparative
+anatomy proves that the associational centers are
+more important than those of sensation. Among
+the lower mammals they develop as we go up the
+scale: "That which makes the psychic man may
+be said to be the centers of association that he possesses."
+In the new-born child the sensitive centers
+are isolated, and, in the absence of connections between
+them, the unity of the self cannot be manifested;
+there is a plurality of consciousness.</p>
+
+<p>This much admitted, let us return to our special
+question, which Flechsig asks in these words: "On
+what does genius rest? Is it based on a special
+structure in the brain, or rather on special irritability?
+that is, according to our present notions, on
+chemical factors? We may hold the first opinion
+with all possible force. Genius is always united to<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_69" id="Page_69">[69]</a></span>
+a special structure, to a particular organization of
+the brain." All parts of this organ do not have the
+same value. It has been long admitted that the
+frontal part may serve as a measure of intellectual
+capacity; but we must allow, contrariwise, that there
+are other regions, "principally a center located under
+the protuberance at the top of the head, which is
+very much developed in all men of genius whose
+brains have been studied down to our day. In
+Beethoven, and probably also in Bach, the enormous
+development of this part of the brain is striking. In
+great scientists like Gauss the centers of the posterior
+region of the brain and those of the frontal region
+are strongly developed. The scientific genius thus
+shows proportions of brain-structure other than the
+artistic genius."<a name="FNanchor_25_25" id="FNanchor_25_25"></a><a href="#Footnote_25_25" class="fnanchor">[25]</a> There would then be, according
+to our author, a preponderance of the frontal and
+parietal regions&mdash;the former obtain especially among
+artists; the latter among scientists. Already, twenty
+years before Flechsig, R&uuml;dinger had noted the extraordinary
+development of the parietal convolutions
+in eminent men after a study of eighteen brains. All
+the convolutions and fissures were so developed,
+said he, that the parieto-occipital region had an altogether
+peculiar character.</p>
+
+<p>By way of summary we must bear in mind that,
+as regards anatomical conditions, even when depending
+on the best of sources, we can at present give
+only fragmentary, incomplete, hypothetical views.</p>
+
+<p>Let us now go on to the physiology.</p>
+
+<p><span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_70" id="Page_70">[70]</a></span></p>
+<h3>II</h3>
+
+<p>We might have rightly asked whether the physiological
+states existing along with the working of
+the creative imagination are the cause, effect, or
+merely the accompaniment of this activity. Probably
+all the three conditions are met with. First,
+concomitance is an accomplished fact, and we may
+consider it as an organic manifestation parallel to
+that of the mind. Again, the employment of artificial
+means to excite and maintain the effervescence
+of the imagination assigns a causal or antecedent
+position to the physiologic conditions. Lastly, the
+psychic activity may be initial and productive of
+changes in the organism, or, if these already exist,
+may augment and prolong them.</p>
+
+<p>The most instructive instances are those indicated
+by very clear manifestations and profound modifications
+of the bodily condition. Such are the moments
+of inspiration or simply those of warmth from work
+which arise in the form of sudden impulses.</p>
+
+<p>The general fact of most importance consists of
+changes in the blood circulation. Increase of intellectual
+activity means an increase of work in the
+cortical cells, dependent on a congested, sometimes
+a temporarily an&aelig;mic state. Hyper&aelig;mia seems
+rather the rule, but we also know that slight an&aelig;mia
+increases cortical excitability. "Weak, contracted
+pulse; pale, chilly skin; overheated head; brilliant,
+sunken, roving eyes," such is the classic, frequently
+quoted description of the physiological state during<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_71" id="Page_71">[71]</a></span>
+creative labor. There are numerous inventors who,
+of their own accord, have noted these changes&mdash;irregular
+pulse, in the case of Lagrange; congestion
+of the head, in Beethoven, who made use of cold
+douches to relieve it, etc. This elevation of the vital
+tone, this nervous tension, translates itself also into
+motor form through movements analogous to reflexes,
+without special end, mechanically repeated
+and always the same in the same man&mdash;e.g., movement
+of the feet, hands, fingers; whittling the table
+or the arms of a chair (as in the case of Napoleon
+when he was elaborating a plan of campaign), etc.
+It is a safety-valve for the excessive flow of nervous
+impulse, and it is admitted that this method of expenditure
+is not useless for preserving the understanding
+in all its clearness. In a word, increase of
+the cerebral circulation is the formula covering the
+majority of observations on this subject.</p>
+
+<p>Does experimentation, strictly so called, teach us
+anything on this point? Numerous and well-known
+physiological researches, especially those of Mosso,
+show that all intellectual, and, most of all, emotional,
+work, produces cerebral congestion; that the brain-volume
+increases, and the volume of the peripheral
+organs diminishes. But that tells us nothing particularly
+about the imagination, which is but a
+special case under the rule. Latterly, indeed, it has
+been proposed to study inventors by an objective
+method through the examination of their several
+circulatory, respiratory, digestive apparatus; their<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_72" id="Page_72">[72]</a></span>
+general and special sensibility; the modes of their
+memory and forms of association, their intellectual
+processes, etc. But up to this time no conclusion has
+been drawn from these individual descriptions that
+would allow any generalization. Besides, has an
+experiment, in the strict sense of the word, ever
+been made at the "psychological moment"? I know
+of none. Would it be possible? Let us admit that
+by some happy chance the experimenter, using all
+his means of investigation, can have the subject
+under his hand at the exact moment of inspiration&mdash;of
+the sudden, fertile, brief creative impulse&mdash;would
+not the experiment itself be a disturbing
+cause, so that the result would be <i>ipso facto</i> vitiated,
+or at least unconvincing?</p>
+
+<p>There still remains a mass of facts deserving
+summary notice&mdash;the oddities of inventors. Were
+we to collect only those that may be regarded as
+authentic we could make a thick volume. Despite
+their anecdotal character these evidences do not
+seem to be unworthy of some regard.</p>
+
+<p>It is impossible to enter here upon an enumeration
+that would be endless. After having collected for
+my own information a large number of these strange
+peculiarities, it seems to me that they are reducible
+to two categories:</p>
+
+<p>(1) Those inexplicable freaks dependent on the
+individual constitution, and more often probably
+also on experiences in life the memory of which
+has been lost. Schiller, for example, kept rotten
+apples in his work desk.<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_73" id="Page_73">[73]</a></span></p>
+
+<p>(2) The others, more numerous, are easy to explain.
+They are physiological means consciously or
+unconsciously chosen to aid creative work; they are
+auxiliary helpers of the imagination.</p>
+
+<p>The most frequent method consists of artificially
+increasing the flow of blood to the brain. Rousseau
+would think bare-headed in full sunshine; Bossuet
+would work in a cold room with his head wrapped
+in furs; others would immerse their feet in ice-cold
+water (Gr&eacute;try, Schiller). Very numerous are those
+who think "horizontally"&mdash;that is, lying stretched
+out and often flattened under their blankets (Milton,
+Descartes, Leibniz, Rossini, etc.)</p>
+
+<p>Some require motor excitation; they work only
+when walking,<a name="FNanchor_26_26" id="FNanchor_26_26"></a><a href="#Footnote_26_26" class="fnanchor">[26]</a> or else prepare for work by physical
+exercise (Mozart). For variety's sake, let us note
+those who must have the noise of the streets, crowds,
+talk, festivities, in order to invent. For others
+there must be external pomp and a personal part
+in the scene (Machiavelli, Buffon). Guido Reni
+would paint only when dressed in magnificent style,
+his pupils crowded about him and attending to his
+wants in respectful silence.</p>
+
+<p>On the opposite side are those requiring retirement,
+silence, contemplation, even shadowy darkness,
+like Lamennais. In this class we find especially
+scientists and thinkers&mdash;Tycho-Brah&eacute;, who for
+twenty-one years scarcely left his observatory; Leibniz,
+<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_74" id="Page_74">[74]</a></span>who could remain for three days almost motionless
+in an armchair.</p>
+
+<p>But most methods are too artificial or too strong
+not to become quickly noxious. Every one knows
+what they are&mdash;abuse of wine, alcoholic liquors, narcotics,
+tobacco, coffee, etc., prolonged periods of
+wakefulness, less for increasing the time for work
+than to cause a state of hyperesthesia and a morbid
+sensibility (Goncourt).</p>
+
+<p>Summing up: The organic bases of the creative
+imagination, if there are any specially its own, remain
+to be determined. For in all that has been said
+we have been concerned only with some conditions
+of the general working of the mind&mdash;assimilation
+as well as invention. The eccentricities of inventors
+studied carefully and in a detailed manner would
+finally, perhaps, be most instructive material, because
+it would allow us to penetrate into their inmost
+individuality. Thus, the physiology of the
+imagination quickly becomes pathology. I shall not
+dwell on this, having purposely eliminated the morbid
+side of our subject. It will, however, be necessary
+to return thereto, touching upon it in another
+part of this essay.</p>
+
+
+<h3>III</h3>
+
+<p>There remains a problem, so obscure and enigmatic
+that I scarcely venture to approach it, in the
+analogy that most languages&mdash;the spontaneous expression
+of a common thought&mdash;establish between
+physiologic and psychic creation. Is it only a superficial
+<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_75" id="Page_75">[75]</a></span>likeness, a hasty judgment, a metaphor, or does
+it rest on some positive basis? Generally, the various
+manifestations of mental activity have as their
+precursor an unconscious form from which they
+arise. The sensitiveness belonging to living substance,
+known by the names heliotropism, chemotropism,
+etc., is like a sketch of sensation and of the
+reactions following it; organic memory is the basis
+and the obliterated form of conscious memory. Reflexes
+introduce voluntary activity; appetitions and
+hidden tendencies are the forerunners of effective
+psychology. Instinct, on several sides, is like an
+unconscious and specific trial of reason. Has the
+creative power of the human mind also analogous
+antecedents, a physiological equivalent?</p>
+
+<p>One metaphysician, Froschammer, who has elevated
+the creative imagination to the rank of primary
+world-principle, asserts this positively. For him
+there is an objective or cosmic imagination working
+in nature, producing the innumerable varieties of
+vegetable and animal forms; transformed into subjective
+imagination it becomes in the human brain
+the source of a new form of creation. "The very
+same principle causes the living forms to appear&mdash;a
+sort of objective image&mdash;and the subjective images,
+a kind of living form."<a name="FNanchor_27_27" id="FNanchor_27_27"></a><a href="#Footnote_27_27" class="fnanchor">[27]</a> However ingenious and
+attractive this philosophical theory may be, it is
+evidently of no positive value for psychology.</p>
+
+<p>Let us stick to experience. Physiology teaches<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_76" id="Page_76">[76]</a></span>
+that generation is a "prolonged nutrition," a surplus,
+as we see so plainly in the lower forms of
+agamous generation (budding, division). The
+creative imagination likewise presupposes a superabundance
+of psychic life that might otherwise spend
+itself in another way. Generation in the physical
+order is a spontaneous, natural tendency, although
+it may be stimulated, successfully or otherwise, by
+artificial means. We can say as much of the other.
+This list of resemblances it would be easy to prolong.
+But all this is insufficient for the establishment
+of a thorough identity between the two cases
+and the solution of the question.</p>
+
+<p>It is possible to limit it, to put it into more precise
+language. Is there a connection between the development
+of the generative function and that of the
+imagination? Even in this form the question scarcely
+permits any but vague answers. In favor of a
+connection we may allege:</p>
+
+<p>(1) The well-known influence of puberty on the
+imagination of both sexes, expressing itself in day-dreams,
+in aspirations toward an unattainable ideal,<a name="FNanchor_28_28" id="FNanchor_28_28"></a><a href="#Footnote_28_28" class="fnanchor">[28]</a><span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_77" id="Page_77">[77]</a></span>
+in the genius for invention that love bestows upon
+the least favored. Let us recall also the mental
+troubles, the psychoses designated by the name
+hebephrenia. With adolescence coincides the first
+flowering of the fancy which, having emerged from
+its swaddling-clothes of childhood, is not yet sophisticated
+and rationalized.</p>
+
+<p>It is not a matter of indifference for the general
+thesis of the present work to note that this development
+of the imagination depends wholly on the
+first effervescence of the emotional life. That "influence
+of the feelings on the imagination" and of
+"the imagination on the feelings" of which the
+moralists and the older psychologists speak so often
+is a vague formula for expressing this fact&mdash;that
+the motor element included in the images is reinforced.</p>
+
+<p>(2) <i>Per contra</i>, the weakening of the generative
+power and of the constructive imagination coincide
+in old age, which is, in a word, a decay of nutrition,
+a progressive atrophy. It is proper not to omit the
+influence of castration. According to the theory of
+Brown-S&eacute;quard, it produces an abatement of the
+nutritive functions through the suppression of an
+internal stimulus; and, although its relations to the
+imagination have not been especially studied, it is
+not rash to admit that it is an arresting cause.</p>
+
+<p>However, the foregoing merely establishes, between
+the functions compared, a concomitance in
+the general course of their evolution and in their
+critical periods; it is insufficient for a conclusion.<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_78" id="Page_78">[78]</a></span>
+There would be needed clear, authentic and sufficiently
+numerous observations proving that individuals
+bereft of imagination of the creative type
+have acquired it suddenly through the sole fact of
+their sexual influences, and, inversely, that brilliant
+imaginations have faded under the contrary conditions.
+We find some of these evidences in Cabanis,<a name="FNanchor_29_29" id="FNanchor_29_29"></a><a href="#Footnote_29_29" class="fnanchor">[29]</a>
+Moreau de Tours and various alienists; they would
+seem to be in favor of the affirmative, but some seem
+to me not sure enough, others not explicit enough.
+Despite my investigations on this point, and inquiry
+of competent persons, I do not venture to draw a
+definite conclusion. I leave the question open; it
+will perhaps tempt another more fortunate investigator.</p>
+
+<div class="footnotes"><h3>FOOTNOTES:</h3>
+
+<div class="footnote"><p><a name="Footnote_25_25" id="Footnote_25_25"></a><a href="#FNanchor_25_25"><span class="label">[25]</span></a> Flechsig, <i>Gehirn und Seele</i>, 1896.</p></div>
+
+<div class="footnote"><p><a name="Footnote_26_26" id="Footnote_26_26"></a><a href="#FNanchor_26_26"><span class="label">[26]</span></a> Is it possible that this would explain the fact of Aristotle
+lecturing to his pupils while walking about, thus giving the
+name "peripatetic" to his school and system? (Tr.)</p></div>
+
+<div class="footnote"><p><a name="Footnote_27_27" id="Footnote_27_27"></a><a href="#FNanchor_27_27"><span class="label">[27]</span></a> <i>Die Phantasie als Grundprincip der Weltprocesses</i>, M&uuml;nchen,
+1877. For other details on the subject, see Appendix C.</p></div>
+
+<div class="footnote"><p><a name="Footnote_28_28" id="Footnote_28_28"></a><a href="#FNanchor_28_28"><span class="label">[28]</span></a> A passage from Chateaubriand (cited by Paulhan, <i>Rev.
+Philos.</i>, March, 1898, p. 237) is a typical description of the
+situation: "The warmth of my (adolescent) imagination, my
+shyness, and solitude, caused me, instead of casting myself on
+something without, to fall back upon myself. Wanting a real
+object, I evoked through the power of my desires, a phantom,
+which thenceforth never left me; I made a woman, composed
+of all the women that I had already seen. That charming
+idea followed me everywhere, though invisible; I conversed
+with her as with a real being; she would change according to
+my frenzy. Pygmalion was less enamored of his statue."</p></div>
+
+<div class="footnote"><p><a name="Footnote_29_29" id="Footnote_29_29"></a><a href="#FNanchor_29_29"><span class="label">[29]</span></a> Cabanis, <i>Rapports du Physique et du Moral</i>, &eacute;dition Peisse,
+pp. 248-249, an anecdote that he relates after Buffon. Analogous,
+but less clear, facts may also be found in Moreau de
+Tours' <i>Psychologie morbide</i>.</p></div>
+</div>
+
+
+<hr style="width: 65%;" /><p><span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_79" id="Page_79">[79]</a></span></p>
+<h2>CHAPTER V</h2>
+
+<h3>THE PRINCIPLE OF UNITY</h3>
+
+
+<p>The psychological nature of the imagination
+would be very imperfectly known were we limited
+to the foregoing analytical study. Indeed, all creation
+whatever, great or small, shows an organic
+character; it implies a unifying, synthetic principle.
+Every one of the three factors&mdash;intellectual, emotional,
+unconscious&mdash;works not as an isolated fact
+on its own account; they have no worth save
+through their union, and no signification save
+through their common bearing. This principle of
+unity, which all invention demands and requires, is
+at one time intellectual in nature, i.e., as a fixed
+idea; at another time emotional, i.e., as a fixed emotion
+or passion. These terms&mdash;fixed idea, fixed
+emotion&mdash;are somewhat absolute and require restrictions
+and reservations, which will be made in
+what follows.</p>
+
+<p>The distinction between the two is not at all
+absolute. Every fixed idea is supported and maintained
+by a need, a tendency, a desire; i.e., by an
+affective element. For it is idle fancy to believe in
+the <i>persistence</i> of an idea which, by hypothesis,<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_80" id="Page_80">[80]</a></span>
+would be a purely intellectual state, cold and dry.
+The principle of unity in this form naturally predominates
+in certain kinds of creation: in the practical
+imagination wherein the end is clear, where
+images are direct substitutes for things, where invention
+is subjected to strict conditions under penalty
+of visible and palpable check; in the scientific
+and metaphysical imagination, which works with
+concepts and is subject to the laws of rational logic.</p>
+
+<p>Every fixed emotion should realize itself in an
+idea or image that gives it body and systematizes it,
+without which it remains diffuse; and all affective
+states can take on this permanent form which makes
+a unified principle of them. The simple emotions
+(fear, love, joy, sorrow, etc.), the complex or derived
+emotions (religious, esthetic, intellectual
+ideas) may equally monopolize consciousness in their
+own interests.</p>
+
+<p>We thus see that these two terms&mdash;fixed idea,
+fixed emotion&mdash;are almost equivalent, for they both
+imply inseparable elements, and serve only to indicate
+the preponderance of one or the other element.</p>
+
+<p>This principle of unity, center of attraction and
+support of all the working of the creative imagination&mdash;that
+is, a subjective principle tending to become
+objectified&mdash;is the ideal. In the complete
+sense of the word&mdash;not restrained merely to esthetic
+creation or made synonymous with perfection as in
+ethics&mdash;the ideal is a construction in images that
+should become a reality. If we liken imaginative
+creation to physiological generation, the ideal is the<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_81" id="Page_81">[81]</a></span>
+ovum awaiting fertilization in order to begin its development.</p>
+
+<p>We could, to be more exact, make a distinction
+between the synthetic principle and the ideal conception
+which is a higher form of it. The fixation of
+an end and the discovery of appropriate means are
+the necessary and sufficient conditions for all invention.
+A creation, whatever it be, that looks only
+to present success, can satisfy itself with a unifying
+principle that renders it viable and organized,
+but we can look higher than the merely necessary
+and sufficient.</p>
+
+<p>The ideal is the principle of unity in motion in
+its historic evolution; like all development, it advances
+or recedes according to the times. Nothing
+is less justified than the conception of a fixed archetype
+(an undisguised survival of the Platonic
+Ideas), illuminating the inventor, who reproduces
+it as best he can. The ideal is a nonentity; it arises
+in the inventor and through him; its life is a
+<i>becoming</i>.</p>
+
+<p>Psychologically, it is a construction in images belonging
+to the merely sketched or outlined type.<a name="FNanchor_30_30" id="FNanchor_30_30"></a><a href="#Footnote_30_30" class="fnanchor">[30]</a>
+It results from a double activity, negative and positive,
+or dissociation and association, the first cause
+and origin of which is found in a <i>will that it shall
+be so</i>; it is the motor tendency of images in the<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_82" id="Page_82">[82]</a></span>
+nascent state engendering the ideal. The inventor
+cuts out, suppresses, sifts, according to his temperament,
+character, taste, prejudices, sympathies and
+antipathies&mdash;in short, his <i>interest</i>. In this separation,
+already studied, let us note one important particular.
+"We know nothing of the complex psychic
+production that may simply be the sum of component
+elements and in which they would remain with their
+own characters, with no modification. The nature
+of the components disappears in order to give birth
+to a novel phenomenon that has its own and particular
+features. The construction of the ideal is
+not a mere grouping of past experiences; in its totality
+it has its own individual characteristics, among
+which we no more see the composing lines than we
+see the components, oxygen and hydrogen, in water.
+In no scientific or artistic production, says Wundt,
+does the whole appear as made up of its parts, like
+a mosaic."<a name="FNanchor_31_31" id="FNanchor_31_31"></a><a href="#Footnote_31_31" class="fnanchor">[31]</a> In other words, it is a case of mental
+chemistry. The exactness of this expression, which
+is due, I believe, to J. Stuart Mill, has been questioned.
+Still it answers to positive facts; for example,
+in perception, to the phenomena of contrast
+and their analogues; juxtaposition or rapid succession
+of two different colors, two different sounds,
+of tactile, olfactory, gustatory impressions different
+in quality, produces a particular state of consciousness,
+similar to a combination. Harmony or
+discord does not, indeed, exist in each separate<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_83" id="Page_83">[83]</a></span>
+sound, but only in the relations and sequence of
+sounds&mdash;it is a <i>tertium quid</i>. We have heretofore,
+in the discussion of association of ideas, very frequently
+represented the states of consciousness as
+fixed elements that approach one another, cohere,
+separate, come together anew, but always unalterable,
+like atoms. It is not so at all. Consciousness,
+says Titchener, resembles a fresco in which the transition
+between colors is made through all kinds of
+intermediate stages of light and shade.... The
+idea of a pen or of an inkwell is not a stable thing
+clearly pictured like the pen or inkwell itself. More
+than any one else, William James has insisted on
+this point in his theory of "fringes" of states of
+consciousness. Outside of the given instances we
+could find many others among the various manifestations
+of the mental life. It is not, then, at all
+chimerical to assume in psychology an equivalent of
+chemical combination. In a complex state there is,
+in addition to the component elements, the result
+of their reciprocal influences, of their varying relations.
+Too often we forget this resultant.</p>
+
+<p>At bottom the ideal is an individual concept. If
+objection is offered that an ideal common to a large
+mass of men is a fact of common experience (e.g.,
+idealists and realists in the fine arts, and even more
+so religious, moral, social and political concepts,
+etc.), the answer is easy: There are families of
+minds. They have a common ideal because, in certain
+matters, they have the same way of feeling and
+thinking. It is not a transcendental idea that unites<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_84" id="Page_84">[84]</a></span>
+them; but this result occurs because from their
+common aspirations the collective ideal becomes disengaged;
+it is, in scholastic terminology, a <i>universale
+post rem</i>.</p>
+
+<p>The ideal conception is the first moment of the
+creative act, which is not yet battling with the conditions
+of the actual. It is only the internal vision
+of an individual mind that has not yet been projected
+externally with a form and body. We know how
+the passage from the internal to the external life
+has given rise among inventors to deceptions and
+complaints. Such was the imaginative construction
+that could not, unchanged, enter into its mould and
+become a reality.</p>
+
+<p>Let us now examine the various forms of this
+coagulating<a name="FNanchor_32_32" id="FNanchor_32_32"></a><a href="#Footnote_32_32" class="fnanchor">[32]</a> principle in advancing from the lowest
+to the highest, from the unity vaguely anticipated to
+the absolute and tyrannical masterful unity. Following
+a method that seems to me best adapted for
+these ill-explained questions I shall single out only
+the principal forms, which I have reduced to three&mdash;the
+unstable, the organic or middle, and the extreme
+or semi-morbid unity.</p>
+
+<p>(1) The unstable form has its starting point directly
+and immediately in the reproductive imagination
+<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_85" id="Page_85">[85]</a></span>without creation. It assembles its elements
+somewhat by chance and stitches together the bits
+of our life; it ends only in beginnings, in attempts.
+The unity-principle is a momentary disposition, vacillating
+and changing without cessation according
+to the external impressions or modifications of our
+vital conditions and of our humor. By way of example
+let us recall the state of the day-dreamer
+building castles in the air; the delirious constructions
+of the insane, the inventions of the child following
+all the fluctuations of chance, of its caprice;
+the half-coherent dreams that seem to the dreamer
+to contain a creative germ. In consequence of the
+extreme frailty of the synthetic principle the creative
+imagination does not succeed in accomplishing its
+task and remains in a condition intermediate between
+simple association of ideas and creation proper.</p>
+
+<p>(2) The organic or middle form may be given as
+the type of the unifying power. Ultimately it reduces
+itself to attention and presupposes nothing
+more, because, thanks to the process of "localization,"
+which is the essential mark of attention, it
+makes itself a center of attraction, grouping about
+the leading idea the images, associations, judgments,
+tendencies and voluntary efforts. "Inspiration," the
+poet Grillparzer used to say, "is a concentration of
+all the forces and capacities upon a single point
+which, for the time being, should represent the
+world rather than enclose it. The reinforcement of
+the state of the mind comes from the fact that its
+several powers, instead of spreading themselves<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_86" id="Page_86">[86]</a></span>
+over the whole world, are contained within the
+bounds of a single object, touch one another, reciprocally
+help and reinforce each other."<a name="FNanchor_33_33" id="FNanchor_33_33"></a><a href="#Footnote_33_33" class="fnanchor">[33]</a> What the
+poet here maintains as regards esthetics only is applicable
+to all the <i>organic</i> forms of creation&mdash;that
+is to those ruled by an immanent logic, and, like
+them, resembling works of Nature.</p>
+
+<p>In order to leave no doubt as to the identity of
+attention and imaginative synthesis, and in order
+to show that it is normally the true unifying principle,
+we offer the following remarks:</p>
+
+<p>Attention is at times spontaneous, natural, without
+effort, simply dependent on the interest that a
+thing excites in us&mdash;lasting as long as it holds us
+in subjection, then ceasing entirely. Again, it is
+voluntary, artificial, an imitation of the other, precarious
+and intermittent, maintained with effort&mdash;in
+a word, laborious. The same is true of the
+imagination. The moment of inspiration is ruled
+by a perfect and spontaneous unity; its impersonality
+approaches that of the forces of Nature. Then
+appears the personal moment, the detailed working
+and long, painful, intermittent resumptions, the miserable
+turns of which so many inventors have described.
+The analogy between the two cases seems
+to me incontestable.</p>
+
+<p>Next let us note that psychologists always adduce
+the same examples when they wish to illustrate on
+the one hand, the processes of the persistent, tenacious
+attention, and, on the other hand, the developmental
+<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_87" id="Page_87">[87]</a></span>labor without which creative work does not
+come to pass: "Genius is only long patience," the
+saying of Newton; "always thinking of it," and like
+expressions of d'Alembert, Helmholtz and others,
+because in the one case as in the other the fundamental
+condition is the existence of a fixed, ever-active
+idea, notwithstanding its relaxations and its
+incessant disappearances into the unconscious with
+return to consciousness.</p>
+
+<p>(3) The extreme form, which from its nature
+is semi-morbid, becomes in its highest degree plainly
+pathological; the unifying principle changes to a
+condition of obsession.</p>
+
+<p>The normal state of our mind is a plurality of
+states of consciousness (polyideism). Through association
+there is a radiation in every direction. In
+this totality of coexisting images no one long occupies
+first place; it is driven away by others, which
+are displaced in turn by still others emerging from
+the penumbra. On the contrary, in attention (relative
+monoideism) a single image retains first place
+for a long time and tends to have the same importance
+again. Finally, in a condition of obsession
+(absolute monoideism) the fixed idea defies all rivalry
+and rules despotically. Many inventors have
+suffered painfully this tyranny and have vainly
+struggled to break it. The fixed idea, once settled,
+does not permit anything to dislodge it save for the
+moment and with much pain. Even then it is displaced
+only apparently, for it persists in the unconscious
+life where it has thrust its deep roots.<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_88" id="Page_88">[88]</a></span></p>
+
+<p>At this stage the unifying principle, although it
+can act as a stimulus for creation, is no longer normal.
+Consequently, a natural question arises:
+Wherein is there a difference between the obsession
+of the inventor and the obsession of the insane, who
+most generally destroys in place of creating?</p>
+
+<p>The nature of fixed ideas has greatly occupied
+contemporary alienists. For other reasons and in
+their own way they, too, have been led to divide
+obsession into two classes, the intellectual and
+emotional, according as the idea or the affective
+state predominates. Then they have been led to
+ask: Which of these two elements is the primitive
+one? For some it is the idea. For others, and it
+seems that these are the more numerous, the affective
+state is in general the primary fact; the obsession
+always rests on a basis of morbid emotion and
+in a retention of impressions.<a name="FNanchor_34_34" id="FNanchor_34_34"></a><a href="#Footnote_34_34" class="fnanchor">[34]</a></p>
+
+<p>But whatever opinion we may hold on this point,
+the difficulty of establishing a dividing line between
+the two forms of obsession above mentioned remains
+the same. Are there characters peculiar to
+each one?</p>
+
+<p>It has been said: "The physiologically fixed idea
+is normally longed for, often sought, in all cases
+accepted, and it does not break the unity of the
+self." It does not impose itself fatally on consciousness;
+the individual knows the value thereof, knows<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_89" id="Page_89">[89]</a></span>
+where it leads him, and adapts his conduct to its
+requirements. For example, Christopher Columbus.</p>
+
+<p>The pathological fixed idea is "parasitic," automatic,
+discordant, irresistible. Obsession is only a
+special case of psychic disintegration, a kind of
+doubling of consciousness. The individual becomes
+a person "possessed," whose self has been confiscated
+for the sake of the fixed idea, and whose submission
+to his situation is wrought with pain.</p>
+
+<p>In spite of this parallel the distinguishing criterion
+between the two is very vague, because from the
+sane to the delirious idea the transitions are very
+numerous. We are obliged to recognize "that with
+certain workers&mdash;who are rather taken up with the
+elaboration of their work, and not masters directing
+it, quitting it, and resuming it at their pleasure&mdash;an
+artistic, scientific, or mechanical conception
+succeeds in haunting the mind, imposing itself upon
+it even to the extent of causing suffering." In reality,
+pure psychology is unable to discover a positive
+difference between obsession leading to creative
+work and the other forms, because in both cases
+the mental mechanism is, at bottom, the same. The
+criterion must be sought elsewhere. For that we
+must go out of the internal world and proceed
+objectively. We must judge the fixed idea not in
+itself but by its effects. What does it produce in
+the practical, esthetic, scientific, moral, social, religious
+field? It is of value according to its fruits.
+If objection be made to this change of front we
+may, in order to stick to a strictly psychological<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_90" id="Page_90">[90]</a></span>
+point of view, state that it is certain that as soon
+as it passes beyond a middle point, which it is
+difficult to determine, the fixed idea profoundly
+troubles the mechanism of the mind. In imaginative
+persons this is not rare, which partly explains
+why the pathological theory of genius (of which we
+shall speak later) has been able to rally so many to
+its support and to allege so many facts in its favor.</p>
+
+<div class="footnotes"><h3>FOOTNOTES:</h3>
+
+<div class="footnote"><p><a name="Footnote_30_30" id="Footnote_30_30"></a><a href="#FNanchor_30_30"><span class="label">[30]</span></a> For the distinction between this form of imagination and
+the two others (fixed, objectified), I refer the reader to the
+<a href="#Page_311">Conclusion</a> of this work, where the subject will be treated in
+detail.</p></div>
+
+<div class="footnote"><p><a name="Footnote_31_31" id="Footnote_31_31"></a><a href="#FNanchor_31_31"><span class="label">[31]</span></a> Colozza, <i>L'immaginazione nella Scienza</i>, Rome, 1900, pp.
+111 ff.</p></div>
+
+<div class="footnote"><p><a name="Footnote_32_32" id="Footnote_32_32"></a><a href="#FNanchor_32_32"><span class="label">[32]</span></a> This unifying, organizing, creative principle is so active in
+certain minds that, placed face to face with any work whatever&mdash;novel,
+picture, monument, scientific or philosophic theory,
+financial or political institution&mdash;while believing that they are
+merely considering it, they spontaneously remake it. This
+characteristic of their psychology distinguishes them from mere
+critics.</p></div>
+
+<div class="footnote"><p><a name="Footnote_33_33" id="Footnote_33_33"></a><a href="#FNanchor_33_33"><span class="label">[33]</span></a> Oelzelt-Newin, <i>op. cit.</i>, p. 49.</p></div>
+
+<div class="footnote"><p><a name="Footnote_34_34" id="Footnote_34_34"></a><a href="#FNanchor_34_34"><span class="label">[34]</span></a> Pitres et R&eacute;gis, <i>S&eacute;m&eacute;iologie des obsessions et des id&eacute;es fixes</i>,
+1878. S&eacute;glas, <i>Le&ccedil;ons cliniques sur les maladies mentales</i>, 1895.
+Raymond et Janet, <i>N&eacute;vroses et id&eacute;es fixes</i>, 1898.</p></div>
+</div>
+
+
+<hr style="width: 65%;" /><p><span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_91" id="Page_91">[91]</a></span></p>
+<h2>SECOND PART</h2>
+
+<h3>THE DEVELOPMENT OF THE IMAGINATION.</h3>
+<p><span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_92" id="Page_92">[92]</a></span></p>
+
+
+<hr style="width: 65%;" /><p><span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_93" id="Page_93">[93]</a></span></p>
+<h2>CHAPTER I</h2>
+
+<h3>IMAGINATION IN ANIMALS</h3>
+
+
+<p>Up to this point the imagination has been treated
+analytically only. This process alone would give
+us but a very imperfect idea of its essentially concrete
+and lively nature were we to stop here. So
+this part continues the subject in another shape. I
+shall attempt to follow the imagination in its ascending
+development from the lowest to the most complex
+forms, from the animal to the human infant,
+to primitive man, thence to the highest modes of
+invention. It will thus be exhibited in the inexhaustible
+variety of its manifestations which the
+abstract and simplifying process of analysis does
+not permit us to suspect.</p>
+
+
+<h3>I</h3>
+
+<p>I shall not dwell at length on the imagination of
+animals, not only because the question is much involved
+but also because it is hardly liable to a positive
+solution. Even eliminating mere anecdotes and
+doubtful observations, there is no lack of verified
+and authentic material, but it still remains to interpret
+them. As soon as we begin to conjecture we<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_94" id="Page_94">[94]</a></span>
+know how difficult it is to divest ourselves of all
+anthropomorphism.</p>
+
+<p>The question has been formulated, even if not
+treated, with much system by Romanes in his
+<i>Mental Evolution in Animals</i>.<a name="FNanchor_35_35" id="FNanchor_35_35"></a><a href="#Footnote_35_35" class="fnanchor">[35]</a> Taking "imagination"
+in its broadest sense, he recognizes four stages:</p>
+
+<p>1. Provoked revival of images. For example,
+the sight of an orange reminds one of its taste.
+This is a low form of memory, resting on association
+by contiguity. It is met with very far down
+in the animal scale, and the author furnishes abundant
+proof of it.</p>
+
+<p>2. Spontaneous revival. An object present calls
+up an absent object. This is a higher form of
+memory, frequent in ants, bees, wasps, etc., which
+fact explains the mistrustful sagacity of wild animals.
+At night, the distant baying of a hound stops
+the fox in his course, because all the dangers he
+has undergone are represented in his mind.</p>
+
+<p>These two stages do not go beyond memory pure
+and simple, i.e., reproductive imagination. The
+other two constitute the higher imagination.</p>
+
+<p>3. The capacity of associating absent images,
+without suggestion derived from without, through
+an internal working of the mind. It is the lower
+and primitive form of the creative imagination,
+which may be called a passive synthesis. In order
+to establish its existence, Romanes reminds us that
+dreams have been proven in dogs, horses, and a<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_95" id="Page_95">[95]</a></span>
+large number of birds; that certain animals, especially
+in anger, seem to be subject to delusions and
+pursued by phantoms; and lastly, that in some
+there is produced a condition resembling nostalgia,
+expressing itself in a violent desire to return to
+former haunts, or in a wasting away resulting from
+the absence of accustomed persons and things. All
+these facts, especially the latter, can hardly be
+explained without a vivid recollection of the images
+of previous life.</p>
+
+<p>4. The highest stage consists of intentionally
+reuniting images in order to make novel combinations
+from them. This may be called an active
+synthesis, and is the true creative imagination. Is
+this sometimes found in the animal kingdom?
+Romanes very clearly replies, no; and not without
+offering a plausible reason. For creation, says he,
+there must first be capacity for abstraction, and,
+without speech, abstraction is very weak. One of
+the conditions for creative imagination is thus
+wanting in the higher animals.</p>
+
+<p>We here come to one of those critical moments,
+so frequent in animal psychology, when one asks,
+Is this character exclusively human, or is it found
+in embryo in lower forms? Thus it has been possible
+to support a theory opposing that of Romanes.
+Certain animals, says Oelzelt-Newin, fulfill all the
+conditions necessary for creative imagination&mdash;subtle
+senses, good memory, and appropriate emotional
+states.<a name="FNanchor_36_36" id="FNanchor_36_36"></a><a href="#Footnote_36_36" class="fnanchor">[36]</a> This assertion is perhaps true, but<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_96" id="Page_96">[96]</a></span>
+it is purely dialectic. It is equivalent to saying that
+the thing is possible; it does not establish it as a
+fact. Besides, is it very certain that all the conditions
+for creative imagination are present here,
+since we have just shown that there is lack of
+abstraction? The author, who voluntarily limits
+his study to birds and the construction of their
+nests, maintains, against Wallace and others, that
+nest-building requires "the mysterious synthesis of
+representations." We might with equal reason
+bring the instances of other building animals (bees,
+wasps, white ants, the common ants, beavers, etc.).
+It is not unreasonable to attribute to them an
+anticipated representation of their architecture.
+Shall we say that it is "instinctive," consequently
+unconscious? At least, may we not group under
+this head, changes and adaptations to new conditions
+which these animals succeed in applying to
+the typical plans of their construction? Observations
+and even systematic experiments (like those
+of Huber, Forel, <i>et al.</i>) show that, reduced to the
+alternative of the impossibility of building or the
+modification of their habits, certain animals modify
+them. Judging from this, how refuse them invention
+altogether? This contradicts in no way the
+very just reservation of Romanes. It is sufficient
+to remark that abstraction or dissociation has stages,
+that the simplest are accessible to the animal intelligence.
+If, in the absence of words, the logic of
+concepts is forbidden it, there yet remains the logic<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_97" id="Page_97">[97]</a></span>
+of images,<a name="FNanchor_37_37" id="FNanchor_37_37"></a><a href="#Footnote_37_37" class="fnanchor">[37]</a> which is sufficient for slight innovations.
+In a word, animals can invent according to
+the extent that they can dissociate.</p>
+
+<p>In our opinion, if we may with any truthfulness
+attribute a creative power to animals, we must seek
+it elsewhere. Generally speaking, we attribute only
+a mediocre importance to a manifestation that
+might very well be the proper form of animal fancy.
+It is purely motor, and expresses itself through the
+various kinds of play.</p>
+
+<p>Although play may be as old as mankind, its
+psychology dates only from the nineteenth century.
+We have already seen that there are three theories
+concerning its nature&mdash;it is "expenditure of superfluous
+activity," "a mending, restoring of strength,
+a recuperation," "an apprenticeship, a preliminary
+exercise for the active functions of life and for the
+development of our natural gifts."<a name="FNanchor_38_38" id="FNanchor_38_38"></a><a href="#Footnote_38_38" class="fnanchor">[38]</a> The last position,
+due to Groos, does not rule out the other two;
+it holds the first valid for the young, the second for
+adults; but it comprehends both in a more general
+explanation.</p>
+
+<p><span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_98" id="Page_98">[98]</a></span></p><p>Let us leave this doctrinal question in order to
+call attention to the variety and richness of form
+of play in the animal world. In this respect the
+aforementioned book of Groos is a rich mine of
+evidence to which I would refer the reader. I limit
+myself to summing up his classification. He distinguishes
+nine classes of play, viz.: (1) Those
+that are at bottom experimental, consisting of trials
+at hazard without immediate end, often giving the
+animal a certain knowledge of the properties of the
+external world. This is the introduction to an
+experimental physics, optics, and mechanics for the
+brood of animals. (2) Movements or changes of
+place executed of their own accord&mdash;a very general
+fact as is proven by the incessant movements of
+butterflies, flies, birds, and even fishes, which often
+appear to play in the water rather than to seek prey;
+the mad running of horses, dogs, etc., in free space.
+(3) Mimicry of hunting, i.e., playing with a living
+or dead prey: the dog and cat following moving
+objects, a ball, feather, etc. (4) Mimic battles,
+teasing and fighting without anger. (5) Architectural
+art, revealing itself especially in the building
+of nests: certain birds ornament them with
+shining objects (stones, bits of glass), by a kind
+of anticipation of the esthetic feeling. (6) Doll-play
+is universal in mankind, whether civilized or
+savage. Groos believes he has found its equivalent
+in certain animals. (7) Imitation through pleasure,
+so familiar in monkeys (grimaces); singing-birds
+which counterfeit the voices of a large number of<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_99" id="Page_99">[99]</a></span>
+beasts. (8) Curiosity, which is the only mental
+play one meets in animals&mdash;the dog watching, from
+a wall or window, what is going on in the street.
+(9) Love-plays, "which differ from the others in
+that they are not mere exercises, but have in view
+a real object." They have been well-known since
+Darwin's time, he attributing to them an esthetic
+value which has been denied by Wallace, Tylor,
+Lloyd Morgan, Wallaschek, and Groos.</p>
+
+<p>Let us recapitulate in thought the immense
+quantity of motor expressions included in these nine
+categories and let us note that they have the following
+characters in common: They are grouped
+in combinations that are often new and unforeseen;
+they are not a repetition of daily life, acts necessary
+for self-preservation. At one time the movements
+are combined simultaneously (exhibition of beautiful
+colors), again (and most often) successively
+(amorous parades, fights, flight, dancing, emission
+of noises, sounds or songs); but, under one form or
+another, there is <i>creation</i>, <i>invention</i>. Here, the
+imagination acts in its purely motor character; it
+consists of a small number of images that become
+translated into actions, and serve as a center for
+their grouping; perhaps even the image itself is
+hardly conscious, so that all is limited to a spontaneous
+production and a collection of motor phenomena.</p>
+
+<p>It will doubtless be said that this form of imagination
+belongs to a very shallow, poor psychology.
+It cannot be otherwise. It is necessary that imaginative
+<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_100" id="Page_100">[100]</a></span>production be found reduced to its simplest
+expression in animals, and the motor form must be
+its special characteristic mark. It cannot have any
+others for the following reasons: incapacity for
+the work that necessarily precedes abstraction or
+dissociation, breaking into bits the data of experience,
+making them raw material for the future
+construction; lack of images, and especially fewness
+of possible combinations of images. This last point
+is proven alike from the data of animal psychology
+and of comparative anatomy. We know that the
+nervous elements in the brain serving as connections
+between sensory regions&mdash;whether one conceive of
+them as centers (Flechsig), or as bundles of commisural
+fibers (Meynert, Wernicke)&mdash;are hardly
+outlined in the lower mammalia and attain only a
+mediocre development in the higher forms.</p>
+
+<p>By way of corroboration of the foregoing, let us
+compare the higher animals with young children:
+this comparison is not based on a few far-fetched
+analogies, but in a thorough resemblance in nature.
+Man, during the first years of his life, has a brain
+but slightly differentiated, especially as regards
+connections, a very poor supply of images, a very
+weak capacity for abstraction. His intellectual
+development is much inferior to that of reflex,
+instinctive, impulsive, and imitative movements. In
+consequence of this predominance of the motor
+system, the simple and imperfect images, in children
+as in animals, tend to be immediately changed
+into movements. Even most of their inventions in<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_101" id="Page_101">[101]</a></span>
+play are greatly inferior to those enumerated above
+under nine distinct heads.</p>
+
+<p>A serious argument in favor of the prevalence
+of imagination of the motor type in the child is
+furnished by the principal part taken by movements
+in infantile insanity: a remark made by many
+alienists. The first stage of this madness, they say,
+is found in the convulsions that are not merely a
+physical ailment, but "a muscular delirium." The
+disturbance of the automatic and instinctive functions
+of the child is so often associated with muscular
+disturbances that at this age the mental disorders
+correspond to the motor ganglionic centers
+situated below those parts that later assume the
+labor of analysis and of imagination. The disturbances
+are in the primary centers of organization and
+according to the symptoms lack those analytic or
+constructive qualities, those ideal forms, that we
+find in adult insanity. If we descend to the lowest
+stage of human life&mdash;to the baby&mdash;we see that
+insanity consists almost entirely of the activity of
+a muscular group acting on external objects. The
+insane baby bites, kicks, and these symptoms are
+the external measure of the degree of its madness.<a name="FNanchor_39_39" id="FNanchor_39_39"></a><a href="#Footnote_39_39" class="fnanchor">[39]</a>
+Has not chorea itself been called a muscular insanity?</p>
+
+<p>Doubtless, there likewise exists in the child a
+sensorial madness (illusions, hallucinations); but
+by reason of its feeble intellectual development the<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_102" id="Page_102">[102]</a></span>
+delirium causes a disorder of movements rather
+than of images; its insane imagination is above all
+a motor insanity.</p>
+
+<p>To hold that the creative imagination belonging
+to animals consists of new combinations of movements
+is certainly an hypothesis. Nevertheless, I
+do not believe that it is merely a mental form without
+foundation, if we take into account the foregoing
+facts. I consider it rather as a point in favor
+of the motor theory of invention. It is a singular
+instance in which the original form of creation is
+shown bare. If we wanted to discover it, it would
+be necessary to seek it where it is reduced to the
+greatest simplicity&mdash;in the animal world.</p>
+
+<div class="footnotes"><h3>FOOTNOTES:</h3>
+
+<div class="footnote"><p><a name="Footnote_35_35" id="Footnote_35_35"></a><a href="#FNanchor_35_35"><span class="label">[35]</span></a> Chapter X.</p></div>
+
+<div class="footnote"><p><a name="Footnote_36_36" id="Footnote_36_36"></a><a href="#FNanchor_36_36"><span class="label">[36]</span></a> <i>Op. cit.</i>, Appendix.</p></div>
+
+<div class="footnote"><p><a name="Footnote_37_37" id="Footnote_37_37"></a><a href="#FNanchor_37_37"><span class="label">[37]</span></a> For a more detailed study of this subject, the reader is
+referred to the author's <i>Evolution of General Ideas</i> (English
+trans., Open Court Publishing Co., Chicago), chapter I, section
+I.</p></div>
+
+<div class="footnote"><p><a name="Footnote_38_38" id="Footnote_38_38"></a><a href="#FNanchor_38_38"><span class="label">[38]</span></a> A rather extended study of the subject by H. A. Carr will
+be found in the <i>Investigations of the Department of Psychology
+and Education of the University of Colorado</i>, vol. I, Number 2,
+1902. The late Professor Arthur Allin devoted much time to
+the investigation of play. See his brief article entitled
+"Play" in the <i>University of Colorado Studies</i>, vol. I, 1902,
+pp. 58-73. (Tr.)</p></div>
+
+<div class="footnote"><p><a name="Footnote_39_39" id="Footnote_39_39"></a><a href="#FNanchor_39_39"><span class="label">[39]</span></a> Hack Tuke, "Insanity of Children," in <i>Dictionary of Psychological
+Medicine</i>.</p></div>
+</div>
+
+
+<hr style="width: 65%;" /><p><span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_103" id="Page_103">[103]</a></span></p>
+<h2>CHAPTER II</h2>
+
+<h3>THE CREATIVE IMAGINATION IN THE CHILD</h3>
+
+
+<p>At what age, in what form, under what conditions
+does the creative imagination make its appearance?
+It is impossible to answer this question,
+which, moreover, has no justification. For the
+creative imagination develops little by little out of
+pure reproduction by an evolutionary process, not
+by sudden eruption. Nevertheless, its evolution is
+very slow on account of causes both organic and
+psychological.</p>
+
+<p>We could not dwell long on the organic causes
+without falling into tiresome repetitions. The new-born
+infant is a spinal being, with an unformed
+diffluent brain, composed largely of water. Reflex
+life itself is not complete in him, and the cortico-motor
+system only hinted at; the sensory centers
+are undifferentiated, the associational systems remain
+isolated for a long time after birth. We have
+given above Flechsig's observation on this point.</p>
+
+<p>The psychological causes reduce themselves to
+the necessity for a consolidation of the primary and<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_104" id="Page_104">[104]</a></span>
+secondary operations of the mind, without which
+the creative imagination cannot take form. To be
+precise, we might distinguish, as does Baldwin, four
+epochs in the mental development of the child: (1)
+affective (rudimentary sensory processes, pleasures
+and pains, simple motor adaptations); (2) and (3)
+objective, in which the author establishes two
+grades, (a) appearance of special senses, of memory,
+instincts primarily defensive, and imitation;
+(b) complex memory, complicated movements,
+offensive activities, rudimentary will; (4) subjective
+or final (conscious thought, constitutive will,
+ideal emotions). If we accept this scheme as
+approximately correct, the <i>moment</i> of imagination
+must be assigned to the third period (the second
+stage of the objective epoch) which fulfills all the
+sufficient and necessary conditions for its origination
+and for its rise above pure reproduction.</p>
+
+<p>Whatever the propitious age may be, the study
+of the child-imagination is not without difficulties.
+In order to enter into the child-mind, we must
+become like a child; as it is, we are limited to an
+interpretation of it in terms of the adult, with much
+false interpretation possible, agreeing too much or
+too little with the facts. Furthermore, the children
+studied live and grow up in a civilized environment.
+The result is that the development of their imagination
+is rarely unhampered and complete; for as soon
+as their fancy passes the middle level, the rationalizing
+education of parents and teachers is eager to
+master and control it. In truth it gives its full<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_105" id="Page_105">[105]</a></span>
+measure and reveals itself in the fulness of growth
+only among primitive peoples. With us it is
+checked in its flight by an antagonistic power,
+which treats it as a harbinger of insanity. Finally,
+children are not equally well-suited for this study;
+we must make a distinction between the imaginative
+and non-imaginative, and the latter should be eliminated.</p>
+
+<p>When we have thus chosen suitable subjects,
+observation shows from the start sufficiently distinct
+varieties, different orientations of the imagination
+depending on intellectual causes, such as the
+predominance of visual or acoustic or tactile-motor
+images making for mechanical invention; or dependent
+on emotional causes, that is, of character,
+according as the latter is timid, joyous, exuberant,
+retired, healthy, sickly, etc.</p>
+
+<p>If we now attempt to follow the development of
+the child-imagination, we may distinguish four
+principal stages, without assigning them, otherwise,
+a rigorous chronological order.</p>
+
+<p>1. The first stage consists of the passage from
+passive to creative imagination. Its history would
+be long were we to include all the hybrid forms that
+are made up partly of memories, partly of new
+groupings, being at the same time repetition and
+construction. Even in the adult, they are very frequent.
+I know a person who is always afraid of
+being smothered, and for this reason urgently asks
+that in his coffin his shirt be not tight at the neck:
+this odd prepossession of the mind belongs neither<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_106" id="Page_106">[106]</a></span>
+to memory nor to imagination. This particular
+case illustrates in a very clear form the nature of
+the first flights of the mind attempting to exercise
+its imaginative powers. Without enumerating other
+facts of this kind, it is more desirable to follow the
+imagination's development, limiting ourselves to
+two forms of the psychic life&mdash;perception and illusion.
+The necessary presence of the image in these
+two forms has been so often proven by contemporary
+psychology that a few words to recall this
+to mind will be sufficient.</p>
+
+<p>There seems to be a radical difference between
+perception, which seizes reality, and imagination.
+Nevertheless, it is generally admitted that in order
+to rise above sensation to perception, there must be
+a synthesis of images. To put it more simply, two
+elements are required&mdash;one, coming from without,
+the physiological stimulus acting on the nerves and
+the sensory centers, which becomes translated in
+consciousness through the vague state that goes by
+the name "sensation"; the other, coming from within,
+adds to the sensations present appropriate images,
+remnants of former experiences. So that perception
+requires an apprenticeship; we must feel, then imperfectly
+perceive, in order to finally perceive well.
+The sensory datum is only a fraction of the total
+fact; and in the operation we call "perceiving," that
+is, apprehending an object directly, a part only of
+the object is represented.</p>
+
+<p>This, however, does not go beyond reproductive
+imagination. The decisive step is taken in illusion.<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_107" id="Page_107">[107]</a></span>
+We know that illusion has as a basis and support a
+modification of the external senses which are metamorphosed,
+amplified by an immediate construction
+of the mind: a branch of a tree becomes a serpent,
+a distant noise seems the music of an orchestra.
+Illusion has as broad a field as perception, since
+there is no perception but may undergo this erroneous
+transformation, and it is produced by the same
+mechanism, but with interchange of the two terms.
+In perception, the chief element is the sensory, and
+the representative element is secondary; in illusion,
+we have just the opposite condition: what one takes
+as perceived is merely imagined&mdash;the imagination
+assumes the principal r&ocirc;le. Illusion is the type of
+the transitional forms, of the mixed cases, that consist
+of constructions made up of memories, without
+being, in the strict sense, creations.</p>
+
+<p>2. The creative imagination asserts itself with
+its peculiar characteristics only in the second stage,
+in the form of animism or the attributing of life
+to everything. This turn of the mind is already
+known to us, though mentioned only incidentally.
+As the state of the child's mind at that period
+resembles that which in primitive man creates
+myths, we shall return to it in the next chapter.
+Works on psychology abound in facts demonstrating
+that this primitive tendency to attribute life and
+even personality to everything is a necessary phase
+that the mind must undergo&mdash;long or short in duration,
+rich or poor in inventions, according to the
+level of the child's imagination. His attitude towards
+<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_108" id="Page_108">[108]</a></span>his dolls is the common example of this state,
+and also the best example, because it is universal,
+being found in all countries without exception,
+among all races of men. It is needless to pile up
+facts on an uncontroverted point.<a name="FNanchor_40_40" id="FNanchor_40_40"></a><a href="#Footnote_40_40" class="fnanchor">[40]</a> Two will suffice;
+I choose them on account of their extravagance,
+which shows that at this particular moment
+animism, in certain minds, can dare anything. "One
+little fellow, aged one year eight months, conceived
+a special fondness for the letter W, addressing it
+thus: 'Dear old boy W.' Another little boy well
+on in his fourth year, when tracing a letter L, happened
+to slip, so that the horizontal limb formed
+an angle, thus:</p>
+
+<div class="figcenter" style="width: 84px;">
+<img src="images/fig001.jpg" width="84" height="87" alt="" title="" />
+</div>
+
+<p>He instantly saw the resemblance
+to the sedentary human form, and said:
+'Oh, he's sitting down.' Similarly, when he made
+an F turn the wrong way and then put the correct
+form to the left, thus,</p>
+
+<div class="figcenter" style="width: 96px;">
+<img src="images/fig002.jpg" width="96" height="81" alt="" title="" />
+</div>
+
+<p>he exclaimed, 'They're
+talking together!'" One of Sully's correspondents
+says: "I had the habit of attributing intelligence
+not only to all living creatures ... but even
+to stones and manufactured articles. I used to feel
+how dull it must be for the pebbles in the causeway
+to lie still and only see what was round about.
+When I walked out with a basket for putting
+flowers in, I used sometimes to pick up a pebble or
+two and carry them out to have a change."<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_109" id="Page_109">[109]</a></span></p>
+
+<p>Let us stop a moment in order to try to determine
+the nature of this strange mental state, all the more
+as we shall meet it again in primitive man, and since
+it presents the creative imagination at its beginning.</p>
+
+<p>a. The first element is a fixed idea, or rather, an
+image, or group of images, that takes possession of
+consciousness to the exclusion of everything else:&mdash;it
+is the analogue of the state of suggestion in the
+hypnotized subject, with this sole difference&mdash;that
+the suggestion does not come from without, from
+another, but from the child itself&mdash;it is auto-suggestion.
+The stick that the child holds between his
+legs becomes for him an imaginary steed. The
+poverty of his mental development makes all the
+easier this contraction of the field of his consciousness,
+which assures the supremacy of the image.</p>
+
+<p>b. This has as its basis a reality that it includes.
+This is an important detail to note, because this
+reality, however tiny, gives objectivity to the imaginary
+creation and incorporates it with the external
+world. The mechanism is like that which produces
+illusion, but with a stable character excluding correction.
+The child transforms a bit of wood or
+paper into another self, because he perceives only
+the phantom he has created; that is, the images, not
+the material exciting them, haunt his brain.</p>
+
+<p>c. Lastly, this creative power investing the image
+with all its attributes of real existence is derived
+from a fundamental fact&mdash;the state of belief, i.e.,
+adherence of the mind founded on purely subjective
+conditions. It does not come within my province to<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_110" id="Page_110">[110]</a></span>
+treat incidentally such a large question. Neglected
+by the older physiology, whose faculty-method inclined
+it toward this omission, belief or faith has
+recently become the object of numerous studies.<a name="FNanchor_41_41" id="FNanchor_41_41"></a><a href="#Footnote_41_41" class="fnanchor">[41]</a>
+I necessarily limit myself to remarking that but for
+this psychic state, the nature of the imagination is
+totally incomprehensible. The peculiarity of the
+imagination is the production of a reality of human
+origin, and it succeeds therein only because of the
+faith accompanying the image.</p>
+
+<p>Representation and belief are not completely
+separated; it is the nature of the image to appear
+at first as a real object. This psychological truth,
+though proven through observation, has made itself
+acceptable only with great difficulty. It has had to
+struggle on the one hand against the prejudices of
+common-sense for which imagination is synonymous
+with sham and vain appearance and opposed to the
+real as non-being to being; on the other hand,
+against a doctrine of the logicians who maintain
+that the idea is at first merely conceived with no
+affirmation of existence or non-existence (<i>apprehensio
+simplex</i>). This position, legitimate in logic,
+which is an abstract science, is altogether unacceptable
+in psychology, a concrete science. The psychological
+viewpoint giving the true nature of the
+image has prevailed little by little. Spinoza already
+asserts "that representations considered by themselves
+<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_111" id="Page_111">[111]</a></span>contain no errors," and he "denies that it is
+possible to perceive [represent] without affirming."
+More explicitly, Hume assigns belief to our subjective
+dispositions: Belief does not depend on the
+nature of the idea, but on the manner in which we
+conceive it. Existence is not a quality added to it
+by us; it is founded on habit and is irresistible.
+The difference between fiction and belief consists of
+a feeling added to the latter but not to the former.
+Dugald Stewart treats the question purely as a
+psychologist following the experimental method.
+He enumerates very many facts whence he concludes
+that imagination is always accompanied by
+an act of belief, but for which fact the more vivid
+the image, the less one would believe it; but just
+the contrary happens&mdash;the strong representation
+commands persuasion like sensation itself. Finally,
+Taine treats the subject methodically, by studying
+the nature of the image and its primitive character
+of hallucination.<a name="FNanchor_42_42" id="FNanchor_42_42"></a><a href="#Footnote_42_42" class="fnanchor">[42]</a> At present, I think, there is no
+psychologist who does not regard as proven that
+the image, when it enters consciousness, has two
+moments. During the first, it is objective, appearing
+as a full and complete reality; during the
+second, which is definitive, it is deprived of its
+objectivity, reduced to a completely internal event,
+through the effect of other states of consciousness<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_112" id="Page_112">[112]</a></span>
+which oppose and finally annihilate its objective
+character. There is an affirmation, then negation;
+impulse, then inhibition.</p>
+
+<p>Faith, being only a mode of existence, an attitude
+of the mind, owes its creative and vivifying power
+to general dispositions of our constitution. Besides
+the intellectual element which is its content, its
+material&mdash;the thing affirmed or denied&mdash;there are
+tendencies and other affective factors (desire, fear,
+love, etc.) giving the image its intensity, and assuring
+it success in the struggle against other states
+of consciousness. There are active faculties that
+we sometimes designate by the name "will," understanding
+by the term, as James says, not only deliberate
+volition, but all the factors of belief (hope,
+fear, passions, prejudices, sectarian feeling, and so
+forth),<a name="FNanchor_43_43" id="FNanchor_43_43"></a><a href="#Footnote_43_43" class="fnanchor">[43]</a> and this has justly given rise to the truthful
+saying that the test of belief is action.<a name="FNanchor_44_44" id="FNanchor_44_44"></a><a href="#Footnote_44_44" class="fnanchor">[44]</a> This
+explains how in love, religion, in the moral life, in
+politics, and elsewhere, belief can withstand the
+logical assaults of the rationalizing intelligence&mdash;its
+power is found everywhere. It lasts as long as
+the mind waits and consents; but, as soon as these
+affective and active dispositions disappear in life's
+experience, faith falls with them, leaving in its place
+a formless content, an empty and dead representation.</p>
+
+<p>After this, is it necessary to remark that belief<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_113" id="Page_113">[113]</a></span>
+depends peculiarly on the motor elements of our
+organization and not on the intellectual? As there
+is no imagination without belief, nor belief without
+imagination, we return by another route to the
+thesis supported in the first part of this essay, that
+creative activity depends on the motor nature of
+images.</p>
+
+<p>Insofar as concerns the special case of the child,
+the first of the two moments (the affirming) that
+the image undergoes in consciousness is all in all
+for him, the second (the rectifying) is nothing:
+there is hypertrophy of one, atrophy of the other.
+For the adult the contrary is true&mdash;in many cases,
+indeed, in consequence of experience and habit,
+the first moment, wherein the image should be
+affirmed as a reality, is only virtual, is literally
+atrophied. We must, however, remark that this
+applies only partially to the ignorant and even less
+to the savage.</p>
+
+<p>We might, nevertheless, ask ourselves if the
+child's belief in his phantoms is complete, entire,
+absolute, unreserved. Is the stick that he bestrides
+perfectly identified with a horse? Was Sully's child,
+that showed its doll a series of engravings to choose
+from, completely deceived? It seems that we must
+rather admit an intermittence, an alteration between
+affirmation and negation. On the one hand,
+the skeptical attitude of those who laugh at it displeases
+the child, who is like a devout believer
+whose faith is being broken down. On the other
+hand, doubt must indeed arise in him from time to<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_114" id="Page_114">[114]</a></span>
+time, for without this, rectification could never
+occur&mdash;one belief opposes the other or drives it
+away. This second work proceeds little by little,
+but then, under this form, imagination retreats.</p>
+
+<p>3. The third stage is that of play, which, in
+chronological order, coincides with the one just
+preceding. As a form of creation it is already
+known to us, but in passing from animals to children,
+it grows in complexity and becomes intellectualized.
+It is no longer a simple combination of images.</p>
+
+<p>Play serves two ends&mdash;for experimenting: as
+such it is an introduction to knowledge, gives certain
+vague notions concerning the nature of things;
+for creating: this is its principal function.</p>
+
+<p>The human child, like the animal, expends itself
+in movements, forms associations new to it, simulates
+defence, flight, attack; but the child soon
+passes beyond this lower stage, in order to construct
+by means of images (ideally). He begins by imitating:
+this is a physiological necessity, reasons for
+which we shall give later (see chapter iv. <i>infra</i>).
+He constructs houses, boats, gives himself up to
+large plans; but he imitates most in his own person
+and acts, making himself in turn soldier, sailor,
+robber, merchant, coachman, etc.</p>
+
+<p>To the period of imitation succeed more serious
+attempts&mdash;he acts with a "spirit of mastery," he is
+possessed by his idea which he tends to realize.
+The personal character of creation is shown in that
+he is really interested only in a work that emanates<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_115" id="Page_115">[115]</a></span>
+from himself and of which he feels himself the
+cause. B. Perez relates that he wanted to give a
+lesson to his nephew, aged three and a half years,
+whose inventions seemed to him very poor. Perez
+scratched in the sand a trench resembling a river,
+planted little branches on both banks, and had water
+flow through it; put a bridge across, and launched
+boats. At each new act the child would remain
+cool, his admiration would always have to be waited
+for. Out of patience, he remarked shortly that
+"this isn't at all entertaining." The author adds:
+"I believed it useless to persist, and I trampled
+under foot, laughing at myself, my awkward attempt
+at a childish construction."<a name="FNanchor_45_45" id="FNanchor_45_45"></a><a href="#Footnote_45_45" class="fnanchor">[45]</a> "I had already
+read it in many a book, but this time I had learned
+from experience that the free initiative of children
+is always superior to the imitations we pretend to
+make for them. In addition, this experience and
+others like it have taught me that their creative
+force is much weaker than has been said."</p>
+
+<p>4. At the fourth stage appears romantic invention,
+which requires a more refined culture, being
+a purely internal, wholly imaginative (i.e., cast in
+images) creation. It begins at about three or
+four years of age. We know the taste of imaginative
+children for stories and legends, which they
+have repeated to them until surfeited: in this
+respect they resemble semi-civilized people, who
+listen greedily to rhapsodies for hours at a time,
+experiencing all the emotions appropriate to the<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_116" id="Page_116">[116]</a></span>
+incidents of the tale. This is the prelude to creation,
+a semi-passive, semi-active state, an apprentice
+period, which will permit them to create in their
+own turn. Thus the first attempts are made with
+reminiscences, and imitated rather than created.</p>
+
+<p>Of this we find numerous examples in the special
+works. A child of three and a half saw a lame man
+going along a road, and exclaimed: "Look at that
+poor ole man, mamma, he has dot [got] a bad leg."
+Then the romance begins: He was on a high horse;
+he fell on a rock, struck his poor leg; he will have
+to get some powder to heal it, etc. Sometimes the
+invention is less realistic. A child of three often
+longed to live like a fish in the water, or like a star
+in the sky. Another, aged five years nine months,
+having found a hollow rock, invented a fairy story:
+the hole was a beautiful hall inhabited by brilliant
+mysterious personages, etc.<a name="FNanchor_46_46" id="FNanchor_46_46"></a><a href="#Footnote_46_46" class="fnanchor">[46]</a></p>
+
+<p>This form of imagination is not as common as
+the others. It belongs to those whom nature has
+well endowed. It forecasts a development of mind
+above the average. It may even be the sign of an
+inborn vocation and indicate in what direction the
+creative activity will be orientated.<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_117" id="Page_117">[117]</a></span></p>
+
+<p>Let us briefly recall the creative r&ocirc;le of the
+imagination in language, through the intervening
+of a factor already studied&mdash;thinking by analogy,
+an abundant source of often picturesque metaphors.
+A child called the cork of a bottle "door;" a small
+coin was called by a little American a "baby dollar;"
+another, seeing the dew on the grass, said, "The
+grass is crying."</p>
+
+<p>The extension of the meaning of words has been
+studied by Taine, Darwin, Preyer, and others. They
+have shown that its psychological mechanism depends
+sometimes on the perception of resemblance,
+again on association by contiguity, processes that
+appear and intermingle in an unforeseen manner.
+Thus, a child applies the word "mambro" at first
+to his nurse, then to a sewing machine that she uses,
+then by analogy to an organ that he sees on the
+street adorned with a monkey, then to his toys
+representing animals.<a name="FNanchor_47_47" id="FNanchor_47_47"></a><a href="#Footnote_47_47" class="fnanchor">[47]</a> We have elsewhere given
+more similar cases, where we perceive the fundamental
+difference between thought by imagery and
+rational thought.</p>
+
+<p>To conclude: At this period the imagination is
+the master-faculty and the highest form of intellectual
+development. It works in two directions,
+one principal&mdash;it creates plays, invents romances,
+and extends language; the other secondary&mdash;it
+contains a germ of thought and ventures a fanciful
+explanation of the world which can not yet be conceived
+according to abstract notions and laws.</p>
+
+<div class="footnotes"><h3>FOOTNOTES:</h3>
+
+<div class="footnote"><p><a name="Footnote_40_40" id="Footnote_40_40"></a><a href="#FNanchor_40_40"><span class="label">[40]</span></a> One will find a large number of examples in Sully's work,
+<i>Studies of Childhood</i>, Chapter ii, entitled "The Age of Imagination."
+Most of the observations given in the present chapter
+have been borrowed from this author.</p></div>
+
+<div class="footnote"><p><a name="Footnote_41_41" id="Footnote_41_41"></a><a href="#FNanchor_41_41"><span class="label">[41]</span></a> Apropos of this subject compare especially the recent
+studies by William James, <i>Varieties of Religious Experience</i>.
+(Tr.)</p></div>
+
+<div class="footnote"><p><a name="Footnote_42_42" id="Footnote_42_42"></a><a href="#FNanchor_42_42"><span class="label">[42]</span></a> Spinoza, <i>Ethics</i>, II, 49, <i>Scholium</i>; Hume, <i>Human Understanding</i>,
+Part III, Section VII ff.; Dugald Stewart, <i>Elements
+of the Philosophy of the Human Mind</i>, Vol. I, Ch. III; Taine,
+<i>On Intelligence</i>, Part II.</p></div>
+
+<div class="footnote"><p><a name="Footnote_43_43" id="Footnote_43_43"></a><a href="#FNanchor_43_43"><span class="label">[43]</span></a> James, <i>The Will to Believe and Other Essays</i>, p. 10.</p></div>
+
+<div class="footnote"><p><a name="Footnote_44_44" id="Footnote_44_44"></a><a href="#FNanchor_44_44"><span class="label">[44]</span></a> Payot, <i>De la croyance</i>, 139 ff.</p></div>
+
+<div class="footnote"><p><a name="Footnote_45_45" id="Footnote_45_45"></a><a href="#FNanchor_45_45"><span class="label">[45]</span></a> B. Perez, <i>Les trois premi&egrave;res ann&eacute;es de l'enfant</i>, p. 323.</p></div>
+
+<div class="footnote"><p><a name="Footnote_46_46" id="Footnote_46_46"></a><a href="#FNanchor_46_46"><span class="label">[46]</span></a> Sully, <i>op. cit.</i>, pp. 59-61. Compayr&eacute;, <i>L'&eacute;volution intellectuelle
+et morale de l'enfant</i>, p. 145.
+</p><p>
+(Some time ago the writer was riding on a train, when the
+engine, for some reason or other, began to slow up, jerking,
+puffing, almost groaning, until it finally came to a full stop.
+The groaning continued. A little girl of about three called to
+her mother, "Too-too sick, too-too sick," and when finally the
+train started on again, the child was overjoyed that "too-too"
+was well again. (Tr.))</p></div>
+
+<div class="footnote"><p><a name="Footnote_47_47" id="Footnote_47_47"></a><a href="#FNanchor_47_47"><span class="label">[47]</span></a> Sully, <i>op. cit.</i>, p. 164.</p></div>
+</div>
+
+
+<hr style="width: 65%;" /><p><span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_118" id="Page_118">[118]</a></span></p>
+<h2>CHAPTER III</h2>
+
+<h3>PRIMITIVE MAN AND THE CREATION OF MYTHS</h3>
+
+
+<p>We come now to a unique period in the history
+of the development of the imagination&mdash;its golden
+age. In primitive man, still confined in savagery
+or just starting toward civilization, it reaches its
+full bloom in the creation of myths; and we are
+rightly astonished that psychologists, obstinately
+attached to esthetics, have neglected such an important
+form of activity, one so rich in information
+concerning the creative imagination. Where, indeed,
+find more favorable conditions for knowing it?</p>
+
+<p>Man, prior to civilization, is a purely imaginative
+being; that is, the imagination marks the summit of
+his intellectual development. He does not go
+beyond this stage, but it is no longer an enigma as
+in animals, nor a transitory phase as in the civilized
+child who rapidly advances to the age of reason;
+it is a fixed state, permanent and lasting throughout
+life.<a name="FNanchor_48_48" id="FNanchor_48_48"></a><a href="#Footnote_48_48" class="fnanchor">[48]</a> It is there revealed to us in its entire spontaneity:
+<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_119" id="Page_119">[119]</a></span>it has free rein; it can create without
+imitation or tradition; it is not imprisoned in any
+conventional form; it is sovereign. As primitive
+man has knowledge neither of nature nor of its
+laws, he does not hesitate to embody the most senseless
+imaginings flitting through his brain. The
+world is not, for him, a totality of phenomena
+subject to laws, and nothing limits or hinders him.</p>
+
+<p>This working of the pure imagination, left to
+itself and unadulterated by the intrusion and
+tyranny of rational elements, becomes translated
+into one form&mdash;the creation of myths; an anonymous,
+unconscious work, which, as long as its rule
+lasts, is sufficient in every way, comprehends everything&mdash;religion,
+poetry, history, science, philosophy,
+law.</p>
+
+<p>Myths have the advantage of being the incarnation
+of pure imagination, and, moreover, they permit
+psychologists to study them objectively. Thanks
+to the labors of the nineteenth century, they offer
+an almost inexhaustible content. While past ages
+forgot, misunderstood, disfigured, and often despised
+myths as aberrations of the human mind, as
+unworthy of an hour's attention, it is no longer
+necessary in our time to show their interest and
+importance, even for psychology, which, however,
+has not as yet drawn all the benefit possible from
+them.<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_120" id="Page_120">[120]</a></span></p>
+
+<p>But before commencing the psychological study
+of the genesis and formation of myths considered
+as an objective emanation of the creative imagination,
+we must briefly summarize the hypotheses at
+present offered for their origin. We find two principal
+ones&mdash;the one, etymological, genealogical, or
+linguistic; the other, ethno-psychological, or anthropological.<a name="FNanchor_49_49" id="FNanchor_49_49"></a><a href="#Footnote_49_49" class="fnanchor">[49]</a></p>
+
+<p>The first, whose principal though not sole champion
+is Max M&uuml;ller, holds that myths are the result
+of a disease of language&mdash;words become things,
+"nomina numina." This transformation is the
+effect of two principal linguistic causes&mdash;(a) Polynomy;
+several words for one thing. Thus the sun
+is designated by more than twenty names in the
+Vedas; Apollo, Phaethon, Hercules are three personifications
+of the sun; <i>Varouna</i> (night) and
+<i>Yama</i> (death) express at first the same conception,
+and have become two distinct deities. In short,
+every word tends to become an entity having its
+attributes and its legends. (b) Homonomy, a
+single word for several things. The same adjective,
+"shining," refers to the sun, a fountain, spring, etc.
+This is another source of confusion. Let us also
+add metaphors taken literally, plays upon words,
+wrong construction, etc.</p>
+
+<p>The opponents of this doctrine maintain that in<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_121" id="Page_121">[121]</a></span>
+the formation of myths, words represent scarcely
+five per cent. Whatever may be the worth of this
+assertion, the purely philological explanation remains
+without value for psychology: it is neither
+true nor false&mdash;it does not solve the question; it
+merely avoids it. The word is only an occasion, a
+vehicle; without the working of the mind exciting
+it, nothing would change. Moreover, Max M&uuml;ller
+himself has recently recognized this.<a name="FNanchor_50_50" id="FNanchor_50_50"></a><a href="#Footnote_50_50" class="fnanchor">[50]</a></p>
+
+<p>The anthropological theory, much more general
+than the foregoing, penetrates further to psychological
+origins&mdash;it leads us to the first advances of
+the human mind. It regards the myth not as an
+accident of primitive life, but as a natural function,
+a mode of activity proper to man during a certain
+period of his development. Later, the mythic creations
+seem absurd, often immoral, because they are
+survivals of a distant epoch, cherished and consecrated
+through tradition, habits, and respect for
+antiquity. According to the definition that seems
+to me best adapted for psychology, the myth is
+"the psychological objectification of man in all the
+phenomena that he can perceive."<a name="FNanchor_51_51" id="FNanchor_51_51"></a><a href="#Footnote_51_51" class="fnanchor">[51]</a> It is a humanization
+of nature according to processes peculiar to
+the imagination.</p>
+<p><span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_122" id="Page_122">[122]</a></span></p>
+<p>Are these two views irreconcilable? It does not
+seem so to me, provided we accept the first as only
+a partial explanation. In any event, both schools
+agree on one point important for us&mdash;that the
+material for myths is furnished by the observation
+of natural phenomena, including the great events
+of human life: birth, sickness, death, etc. This is
+the objective factor. The creation of myths has its
+explanation in the nature of human imagination&mdash;this
+is the subjective factor. We can not deny that
+most works on mythology have a very decided
+tendency to give the greater importance to the first
+factor; in which respect they need a little psychology.
+The periodic returns of the dawn, the sun,
+the moon and stars, winds and storms, have their
+effect also, we may suppose, on monkeys, elephants,
+and other animals supposedly the most intelligent.
+Have they inspired myths? Just the opposite: "the
+surprising monotony of the ideas that the various
+races have made final causes of phenomena, of the
+origin and destiny of man, whence it results that
+the numberless myths are reduced to a very small
+number of types,"<a name="FNanchor_52_52" id="FNanchor_52_52"></a><a href="#Footnote_52_52" class="fnanchor">[52]</a> shows that it is the human
+imagination that takes the principal part and that
+it is on the whole perhaps not so rich as we are
+pleased to say&mdash;that it is even very poor, compared
+to the fecundity of nature.</p>
+
+<p>Let us now study the psychology of this creative
+activity, reducing it to these two questions: How<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_123" id="Page_123">[123]</a></span>
+are myths formed? What line does their evolution
+follow?</p>
+
+
+<h3>I</h3>
+
+<p>The psychology of the origin of the myth, of the
+work that causes its rise, may theoretically, and for
+the sake of facilitating analysis, be regarded as two
+principal moments&mdash;that of creation proper, and
+that of romantic invention.</p>
+
+<p>a. The moment of creation presupposes two
+inseparable operations which, however, we have to
+describe separately. The first consists of attributing
+life to all things, the second of assigning qualities
+to all things.</p>
+
+<p>Animating everything, that is attributing life
+and action to everything, representing everything to
+one's self as living and acting&mdash;even mountains,
+rocks, and other objects (seemingly) incapable of
+movement. Of this inborn and irresistible tendency
+there are so many facts in proof that an enumeration
+is needless: it is the rule. The evidence gathered
+by ethnologists, mythologists, and travelers fills
+large volumes. This state of mind does not particularly
+belong to long-past ages. It is still in
+existence, it is contemporary, and if we would see
+it with our own eyes it is not at all necessary to
+plunge into virgin countries, for there are frequent
+reversions even in civilized lands. On the whole,
+says Tylor, it must be regarded as conceded that to
+the lower races of humanity the sun and stars, the
+trees and rivers, the winds and clouds, become<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_124" id="Page_124">[124]</a></span>
+animated creatures living like men and beasts, fulfilling
+their special function in creation&mdash;or rather
+that what the human eye can reach is only the
+instrument or the matter of which some gigantic
+being, like a man, hidden behind the visible things,
+makes use. The grounds on which such ideas are
+based cannot be regarded as less than a poetic fancy
+or an ill-understood metaphor; they depend on a
+vast philosophy of nature, certainly rude and primitive,
+but coherent and serious.</p>
+
+<p>The second operation of the mind, inseparable,
+as we have said, from the first, attributes to these
+imaginary beings various qualities, but all important
+to man. They are good or bad, useful or
+hurtful, weak or powerful, kind or cruel. One
+remains stupefied before the swarming of these
+numberless genii whom no natural phenomenon, no
+act of life, no form of sickness escapes, and these
+beliefs remain unbroken even among the tribes that
+are in contact with old civilizations.<a name="FNanchor_53_53" id="FNanchor_53_53"></a><a href="#Footnote_53_53" class="fnanchor">[53]</a> Primitive
+man lives and moves among the ceaseless phantoms
+of his own imagination.<a name="FNanchor_54_54" id="FNanchor_54_54"></a><a href="#Footnote_54_54" class="fnanchor">[54]</a></p>
+
+<p><span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_125" id="Page_125">[125]</a></span></p><p>Lastly, the psychological mechanism of the creative
+moment is very simple. It depends on a single
+factor previously studied&mdash;thinking by analogy. It
+is a matter first of all&mdash;and this is important&mdash;of
+conceiving beings analogous to ourselves, cast in
+our mould, cut after our pattern; that is, feeling
+and acting; then qualifying them and determining
+them according to the attributes of our own nature.
+But the logic of images, very different from that of
+reason, concludes an objective resemblance; it regards
+as alike, what seem alike; it attributes to an
+internal linking of images, the validity of an objective
+connection between things. Whence arises the
+discord between the imagined world and the world
+of reality. "Analogies that for us are only fancies
+were for the man of past ages real" (Tylor).</p>
+
+<p>b. In the genesis of myths, the second moment
+is that of fanciful invention. Entities take form;
+they have a history and adventures: they become
+the stuff for a romance. People of poor and dry
+imagination do not reach the second period. Thus,
+the religion of the Romans peopled the universe
+with an innumerable quantity of genii. No object,
+no act, no detail, but had its own presiding genius.
+There was one for germinating grain, for sprouting
+grain, for grain in flower, for blighted grain; for<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_126" id="Page_126">[126]</a></span>
+the door, its hinges, its lock, etc. There was a
+myriad of misty, formless entities. This is animism
+arrested at its first stage; abstraction has killed
+imagination.</p>
+
+<p>Who created those legends and tales of adventure
+constituting the subject-matter of mythology?
+Probably inspired individuals, priests or prophets.
+They came perhaps from dreams, hallucinations,
+insane attacks&mdash;they are derived from several
+sources. Whatever their origin, they are the work
+of imaginative minds <i>par excellence</i> (we shall study
+them later) who, confronted with any event whatever,
+must, because of their nature, construct a
+romance.</p>
+
+<p>Besides analogy, this imaginative creation has as
+its principal source the associational form already
+described under the name "constellation." We
+know that it is based on the fact that, in certain
+cases, the arousing of an image-group is the result
+of a tendency prevailing at a given instant over
+several that are possible. This operation has already
+been expounded theoretically with individual
+examples in support.<a name="FNanchor_55_55" id="FNanchor_55_55"></a><a href="#Footnote_55_55" class="fnanchor">[55]</a> But in order to gauge its
+importance, we must see it act in large masses.
+Myths allow us to do this. Ordinarily they have
+been studied in their historical development according
+to their geographical distribution or ethnic character.
+If we proceed otherwise, if we consider only
+their content&mdash;i.e., the very few themes upon which
+the human imagination has labored, such as celestial<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_127" id="Page_127">[127]</a></span>
+phenomena, terrestrial disturbances, floods, the
+origin of the universe, of man, etc.&mdash;we are surprised
+at the wonderful richness of variety. What
+diversity in the solar myths, or those of creation,
+of fire, of water! These variations are due to
+multiple causes, which have orientated the imagination
+now in one direction, now in another. Let
+us mention the principal ones: Racial characteristics&mdash;whether
+the imagination is clear or mobile,
+poor or exuberant; the manner of living&mdash;totally
+savage, or on a level of civilization; the physical
+environment&mdash;external nature cannot be reflected
+in the brain of a Hindoo in the same way as in
+that of a Scandinavian; and lastly, that assemblage
+of considerable and unexpected causes grouped
+under the term "chance."</p>
+
+<p>The variable combinations of these different
+factors, with the predominance of one or the other,
+explain the multiplicity of the imaginative conceptions
+of the world, in contrast to the unity and
+simplicity of scientific conceptions.</p>
+
+
+<h3>II</h3>
+
+<p>The form of imagination now occupying our
+attention by reason of its non-individual, anonymous,
+collective character, attains a long development
+that we may follow in its successive phases
+of ascent, climax, and decline. To begin with, is it
+necessarily inherent in the human mind? Are there
+races or groups of men totally devoid of myths?
+which is a slightly different question from that<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_128" id="Page_128">[128]</a></span>
+usually asked, "Are there tribes totally devoid of
+religious thoughts?" Although it is very doubtful
+that there are such now, it is probable that there
+were in the beginning, when man had scarcely left
+the brute level&mdash;at least if we agree with Vignoli<a name="FNanchor_56_56" id="FNanchor_56_56"></a><a href="#Footnote_56_56" class="fnanchor">[56]</a>
+that we already find in the higher animals embryonic
+forms of animism.</p>
+
+<p>In any event, mythic creation appears early. We
+can infer this from the signs of puerility of certain
+legends. Savages who could not know themselves&mdash;the
+Iroquois, the Australian aborigines, the natives
+of the Andaman Islands&mdash;believed that the
+earth was at first sterile and dry, all the water
+having been swallowed by a gigantic frog or toad
+which was compelled, by queer stratagems, to
+regurgitate it. These are little children's imaginings.
+Among the Hindoos the same myth takes
+the form of an alluring epic&mdash;the dragon watching
+over the celestial waters, of which he has taken
+possession, is wounded by Indra after a heroic
+battle, and restores them to the earth.</p>
+
+<p>Cosmogonies, Lang remarks, furnish a good
+example of the development of myths; it is possible
+to mark out stages and rounds according to the
+degree of culture and intelligence. The natives of
+Oceania believe that the world was created and
+organized by spiders, grasshoppers, and various
+birds. More advanced peoples regard powerful
+animals as gods in disguise (such are certain Mexican
+divinities). Later, all trace of animal worship<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_129" id="Page_129">[129]</a></span>
+disappears, and the character of the myth is purely
+anthropomorphic.<a name="FNanchor_57_57" id="FNanchor_57_57"></a><a href="#Footnote_57_57" class="fnanchor">[57]</a> K&uuml;hn, in a special work, has
+shown how the successive stages of social evolution
+express themselves in the successive stages of mythology&mdash;myths
+of cannibals, of hunters, of herders,
+land-tillers, sailors. Speaking of pure savagery,
+Max M&uuml;ller<a name="FNanchor_58_58" id="FNanchor_58_58"></a><a href="#Footnote_58_58" class="fnanchor">[58]</a> admits at least two periods&mdash;pan-Aryan
+and Indo-Iranian&mdash;prior to the Vedic period.
+In the course of this slow evolution the work of the
+imagination passes little by little from infancy,
+becomes more and more complex, subtle and refined.</p>
+
+<p>In the Aryan race, the Vedic epoch, despite its
+sacerdotal ritualism, is considered as the period <i>par
+excellence</i> of mythic efflorescence. "The myth,"
+says Taine, "is not here (in the Vedas) a disguise,
+but an expression; no language is more true and
+more supple: it permits a glimpse of, or rather
+causes us to discern, the forms of mist, the movements
+of the air, change of seasons, all the accidents
+of sky, fire, storm: external nature has never found
+a mode of thought so graceful and flexible for
+reflecting itself thereby in all the inexhaustible
+variety of her appearances. However changeable
+nature may be, the imagination is equally so."<a name="FNanchor_59_59" id="FNanchor_59_59"></a><a href="#Footnote_59_59" class="fnanchor">[59]</a> It
+animates everything&mdash;not only fire in general, <i>Agni</i>,
+but also the seven forms of flame, the wood that
+lights it, the ten fingers of the sacrificing priest, the<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_130" id="Page_130">[130]</a></span>
+prayer itself, and even the railing surrounding the
+altar. This is one example among many others.
+The partisans of the linguistic theory have been able
+to maintain that at this moment every word is a
+myth, because every word is a name designating a
+quality or an act, transformed by the imagination
+into substance. Max M&uuml;ller has translated a page
+of Hesiod, substituting the analytic, abstract, rational
+language of our time for the image-making
+names. Immediately, all the mythical material
+vanishes. Thus, "Selene kisses the sleeping
+Endymion" becomes the dry formula, "It is night."
+The most skilled linguists often declare themselves
+unable to change the pliant tongue of the imaginative
+age into our algebraic idioms.<a name="FNanchor_60_60" id="FNanchor_60_60"></a><a href="#Footnote_60_60" class="fnanchor">[60]</a> Thought by
+imagery cannot remain itself and at the same time
+take on a rational dress.</p>
+
+<p>The mental state that marks the zenith of the
+free development of the imagination, is at present
+met with only in mystics and in some poets. Language
+has, however, preserved numerous vestiges
+of it in current expressions, the mythic signification
+of which has been lost&mdash;the sun rises, the sea is
+treacherous, the wind is mad, the earth is thirsty,
+etc.</p>
+
+<p>To this triumphant period there succeeds among
+the races that have made progress in evolution, i.e.,
+that have been able to rise above the age of (pure)<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_131" id="Page_131">[131]</a></span>
+imagination, the period of waning, of regression, of
+decline. In order to understand it and perceive the
+how and why of it, let us first note that myths are
+reducible to two great categories:</p>
+
+<p>a. The explicative myths, arising from utility,
+from the necessity of knowing. <i>These undergo a
+radical transformation.</i></p>
+
+<p>b. The non-explicative myths, resulting from a
+need of luxury, from a pure desire to create: these
+undergo only a <i>partial</i> transformation.</p>
+
+<p>Let us follow them in the accomplishment of their
+destinies.</p>
+
+<p>a. The myths of the first class, answering the
+various needs of knowing in order afterwards to
+act, are much the more numerous.... Is
+primitive man by nature curious? The question
+has been variously answered; thus, Tylor says yes;
+Spencer, no.<a name="FNanchor_61_61" id="FNanchor_61_61"></a><a href="#Footnote_61_61" class="fnanchor">[61]</a> The affirmative and negative answers
+are not, perhaps, irreconcilable, if we take account
+of the differences in races. Taking it generally,
+it is hard to believe that he is not curious&mdash;he holds
+his life at that price. He is in the presence of the
+universe just as we are when confronted with an
+unknown animal or fruit. Is it useful or hurtful?
+He has all the more need for a conception of the
+world since he feels himself dependent on everything.
+While our subordination as regards nature
+is limited by the knowledge of her laws, he is on<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_132" id="Page_132">[132]</a></span>
+account of his animism in a position similar to ours
+before an assembly of persons whom we have to
+approach or avoid, conciliate or yield to. It is
+necessary that he be <i>practically</i> curious&mdash;that is
+indispensable for his preservation. There has been
+alleged the indifference of primitive man to the
+complicated engines of civilization (a steamboat, a
+watch, etc.). This shows, not lack of curiosity, but
+absence of intelligence or interest for what he does
+not consider immediately useful for his needs.</p>
+
+<p>His conception of the world is a product of the
+imagination, because no other is possible for him.
+The problem is imperatively set, he solves it as best
+he can; the myth is a response to a host of theoretical
+and practical needs. For him, the imaginative
+explanation takes the place of the rational
+explanation which is yet unborn, and which for
+great reasons can not arise&mdash;first, because the
+poverty of his experience, limited to a small circle,
+engenders a multitude of erroneous associations,
+which remain unbroken in the absence of other experiences
+to contradict and shatter them; secondly,
+because of the extreme weakness of his logic and
+especially of his conception of causality, which most
+often reduces itself to a <i>post hoc, ergo propter hoc</i>.
+Whence we have the thorough subjectivity of his
+interpretation of the world.<a name="FNanchor_62_62" id="FNanchor_62_62"></a><a href="#Footnote_62_62" class="fnanchor">[62]</a> In short, primitive<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_133" id="Page_133">[133]</a></span>
+man makes without exception or reserve, and in
+terms of images, what science makes provisionally,
+with reserves, and by means of concepts&mdash;namely,
+hypotheses.</p>
+
+<p>Thus, the explicative myths are as we see, an
+epitome of a practical philosophy, proportioned to
+the requirements of the man of the earliest, or
+slightly-cultured ages. Then comes the period of
+critical transformation: a slow, progressive substitution
+of a rational conception of the world for the
+imaginative conception. It results from a work of
+<i>depersonification</i> of the myth, which little by little
+loses its subjective, anthropomorphic character in
+order to become all the more objective, without ever
+succeeding therein completely.</p>
+
+<p>This transformation occurs thanks to two principal
+supports: methodical and prolonged observation
+of phenomena, which suggests the objective
+notion of stability and law, opposed to the caprices
+of animism (example: the work of the ancient
+astronomers of the Orient); the growing power of
+reflection and of logical rigor, at least in well-endowed
+races.</p>
+
+<p>It does not concern the subject in hand to trace
+here the fortunes of the old battle whereby the
+imagination, assailed by a rival power, loses little
+by little its position and preponderance in the interpretation
+of the world. A few remarks will suffice.<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_134" id="Page_134">[134]</a></span></p>
+
+<p>To begin with, the myth is transformed into
+philosophic speculation, but without total disappearance,
+as is seen in the mystic speculations of the
+Pythagoreans, in the cosmology of Empedocles,
+ruled by two human-like antitheses, Love and Hate.
+Even to Thales, an observing, positive spirit that
+calculates eclipses, the world is full of <i>daemons</i>,
+remains of primitive animism.<a name="FNanchor_63_63" id="FNanchor_63_63"></a><a href="#Footnote_63_63" class="fnanchor">[63]</a> In Plato, even
+leaving out his theory of Ideas, the employment of
+myth is not merely a playful mannerism, but a real
+survival.</p>
+
+<p>This work of elimination, begun by the philosophers,
+is more firmly established in the first attempts
+of pure science (the Alexandrian mathematicians;
+naturalists like Aristotle; certain Greek physicians).
+Nevertheless, we know how imaginary concepts
+remained alive in physics, chemistry, biology, down
+to the sixteenth century; we know the bitter
+struggle that the two following centuries witnessed
+against occult qualities and loose methods. Even
+in our day, Stallo has been able to propose to write
+a treatise "On Myth in Science." Without speaking
+at this time of the hypotheses admitted as such and
+on account of their usefulness, there yet remain in
+the sciences many latent signs of primitive anthropomorphism.
+At the beginning of the nineteenth<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_135" id="Page_135">[135]</a></span>
+century people believed in several "properties of
+matter" that we now regard as merely modes of
+energy. But this latter notion, an expression of
+permanence underneath the various manifestations
+of nature, is for science only an abstract, symbolical
+formula: if we attempt to embody it, to make
+it concrete and representable, then, whether we will
+or no, it resolves itself into the feeling of muscular
+effort, that is, takes on a human character. To
+produce no other examples, we see that so far as
+concerns the last term of this slow regression, the
+imagination is not yet completely annulled, although
+it may have had to recede incessantly before a more
+solid and better armed rival.</p>
+
+<p>b. In addition to the explanatory myths, there
+are those having no claim to be in this class,
+although they have perhaps been originally suggested
+by some phenomenon of animate or inanimate
+nature. They are much less numerous than
+the others, since they do not answer multiple necessities
+of life. Such are the epic or heroic stories,
+popular tales, romances (which are found as early
+as ancient Egypt): it is the first appearance of that
+form of esthetic activity destined later to become
+literature. Here, the mythic activity suffers only a
+superficial metamorphosis&mdash;the essence is not
+changed. Literature is mythology transformed and
+adapted to the variable conditions of civilization.
+If this statement appear doubtful or disrespectful,
+we should note the following.</p>
+
+<p>Historically, from myths wherein there figure at<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_136" id="Page_136">[136]</a></span>
+first only divine personages, there arise the epics of
+the Hindoos, Greeks, Scandinavians, etc., in which
+the gods and heroes are confounded, live in the
+same world, on a level. Little by little the divine
+character is rubbed out; the myth approaches the
+ordinary conditions of human life, until it becomes
+the romantic novel, and finally the realistic story.</p>
+
+<p>Psychologically, the imaginative work that has
+at first created the gods and superior beings before
+whom man bows because he has unconsciously produced
+them, becomes more and more humanized as
+it becomes conscious; but it cannot cease being a
+projection of the feelings, ideas, and nature of man
+into the fictitious beings upon whom the belief of
+their creator and of his hearers confers an illusory
+and fleeting existence. The gods have become puppets
+whose master man feels himself, and whom he
+treats as he likes. Throughout the manifold techniques,
+esthetics, documentary collections, reproductions
+of the social life, the creative activity of the
+earliest time remains at bottom unchanged. Literature
+is a decadent and rationalized mythology.</p>
+
+
+<h3>III</h3>
+
+<p>Does the mythic activity of ancient times still
+exist among civilized peoples, unmodified as in
+literary creation, but in its pure form, as a non-individual,
+collective, anonymous, unconscious,
+work? Yes; as the popular imagination, when
+creating legends. In passing from natural phenomena
+to historic events and persons, the constructive
+<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_137" id="Page_137">[137]</a></span>imagination takes a slightly different position
+which we may characterize thus: legend is to myth
+what illusion is to hallucination.</p>
+
+<p>The psychological mechanism is the same in both
+cases. Illusion and legend are partial imaginations,
+hallucination and myth are total imaginations. Illusion
+may vary in all shades between exact perception
+and hallucination; legend can run all the way
+from exact history to pure myth. The difference
+between illusion and hallucination is sometimes
+imperceptible; the same is sometimes true of legend
+and myth. Sensory illusion is produced by an
+addition of images changing perception; legend is
+also produced by an addition of images changing
+the historic personage or event. The only difference,
+then, is in the material used; in one case, a
+datum of sense, a natural phenomenon; in the other,
+a fact of history, a human event.</p>
+
+<p>The psychological genesis of legends being thus
+established in general, what, according to the facts,
+are the unconscious processes that the imagination
+employs for creating them? We may distinguish
+two principal ones.</p>
+
+<p>The first process is a fusion or combination. The
+myth precedes the fact; the historical personage or
+event enters into the mould of a pre-existing myth.
+"It is necessary that the mythic form be fashioned
+before one may pour into it, in a more or less fluid
+state, the historic metal." Imagination had created
+a solar mythology long before it could be incarnated
+by the Greeks in Hercules and his exploits. "There<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_138" id="Page_138">[138]</a></span>
+was historically a Roland, perhaps even an Arthur,
+but the greater part of the great deeds that the
+poetry of the Middle Ages attributes to them had
+been accomplished long before by mythological
+heroes whose very names had been forgotten."<a name="FNanchor_64_64" id="FNanchor_64_64"></a><a href="#Footnote_64_64" class="fnanchor">[64]</a> At
+one time the man is completely hidden by the myth
+and becomes absolutely legendary; again, he
+assumes only an aureole that transfigures him.
+This is exactly what occurs in the simpler phenomenon
+of sensory illusion: now the real (the
+perception) is swamped by the images, is transformed,
+and the objective element reduced to almost
+nothing; at another time, the objective element
+remains master, but with numerous deformations.</p>
+
+<p>The second process is idealization, which can act
+conjointly with the other. Popular imagination
+incarnates in a real man its ideal of heroism, of
+loyalty, of love, of piety, or of cowardice, cruelty,
+wickedness, and other abnormalities. The process
+is more complex. It presupposes in addition to
+mythic creation a labor of abstraction, through
+which a dominating characteristic of the historic
+personage is chosen and everything else is suppressed,
+cast into oblivion: the ideal becomes a
+center of attraction about which is formed the
+legend, the romantic tale. Compare the Alexander,
+the Charlemagne, the Cid of the Middle Age traditions
+to the character of history.</p>
+
+<p>Even much nearer to us, this process of extreme
+simplification&mdash;which the law of mental inertia or<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_139" id="Page_139">[139]</a></span>
+of least effort is sufficient to explain&mdash;always persists:
+Lucretia Borgia remains the type of debauchery,
+Henry IV of good fellowship, etc. The protests
+of historians and the documentary evidence
+that they produce avail nothing: the work of the
+imagination resists everything.</p>
+
+<p>To conclude: We have just passed over a period
+of mental evolution wherein the creative imagination
+reigns exclusively, explains everything, is sufficient
+for everything. It has been said that the
+imagination is "a temporary derangement." It
+seems so to us, although it is often an effort toward
+wisdom, i.e., toward the comprehension of things.
+It would be more correct to say, with Tylor, that it
+represents a state intermediate between that of a
+man of our time, prosaic and well-to-do, and that
+of a furious madman, or of a man in the delirium
+of fever.</p>
+
+<div class="footnotes"><h3>FOOTNOTES:</h3>
+
+<div class="footnote"><p><a name="Footnote_48_48" id="Footnote_48_48"></a><a href="#FNanchor_48_48"><span class="label">[48]</span></a> Primitive man has been defined as "he for whom sensuous
+data and images surpass in importance rational concepts."
+From this standpoint, many contemporary poets, novelists, and
+artists would be primitive. The mental state of the human
+individual is not enough for such a determination; we must
+also take account of the (comparative) simplicity of the social
+environment.</p></div>
+
+<div class="footnote"><p><a name="Footnote_49_49" id="Footnote_49_49"></a><a href="#FNanchor_49_49"><span class="label">[49]</span></a> Let us mention the euhemeristic theory of Herbert Spencer,
+taken up recently by Grant Allen (<i>The Evolution of the
+Idea of God</i>, 1897), who brings down all religious and mythic
+concepts from a single origin&mdash;the worship of the dead.</p></div>
+
+<div class="footnote"><p><a name="Footnote_50_50" id="Footnote_50_50"></a><a href="#FNanchor_50_50"><span class="label">[50]</span></a> "When I tried to briefly characterize mythology in its
+inner nature, I called it a disease of language rather than a disease
+of thought. The expression was strange but intentionally
+so, meant to arouse attention and to provoke opposition. For
+me, language and thought are inseparable." <i>Nouvelles &eacute;tudes
+de Mythologie</i>, p. 51.</p></div>
+
+<div class="footnote"><p><a name="Footnote_51_51" id="Footnote_51_51"></a><a href="#FNanchor_51_51"><span class="label">[51]</span></a> Vignoli, <i>Mito e Scienza</i>, p. 27.</p></div>
+
+<div class="footnote"><p><a name="Footnote_52_52" id="Footnote_52_52"></a><a href="#FNanchor_52_52"><span class="label">[52]</span></a> Marillier, Preface to the French translation of Andrew
+Lang's <i>Myth, Ritual, and Religion</i>.</p></div>
+
+<div class="footnote"><p><a name="Footnote_53_53" id="Footnote_53_53"></a><a href="#FNanchor_53_53"><span class="label">[53]</span></a> On this point consult a work very rich in information,
+W. Crooke's book, <i>Popular Religion and Folk-lore of Northern
+India</i>, 1897.</p></div>
+
+<div class="footnote"><p><a name="Footnote_54_54" id="Footnote_54_54"></a><a href="#FNanchor_54_54"><span class="label">[54]</span></a> "The Indian traversing the Monta&ntilde;a never feels himself
+alone. Legions of beings accompany him. All of the nature
+to whom he owes his soul speaks to him through the noise of
+the wind, in the roaring of the waterfall. The insect like the
+bird&mdash;everything, even to the bending twig wet with dew&mdash;for
+him has language, distinct personality. The forest is alive in
+its depths, has caprices, periods of anger; it avoids the thicket
+under the tread of the huntsman, or again presses him more
+closely, drags him into infected swamps, into closed bogs, where
+miserable goblins exhaust all their witchcraft upon him, drink
+his blood by attaching their lips to the wounds made by briers.
+The Indian knows all that; he knows those dread genii by
+name." Monnier, <i>Des Andes au Para</i>, p. 300.</p></div>
+
+<div class="footnote"><p><a name="Footnote_55_55" id="Footnote_55_55"></a><a href="#FNanchor_55_55"><span class="label">[55]</span></a> See Part I, <a href="#Page_65">Chapter IV</a>.</p></div>
+
+<div class="footnote"><p><a name="Footnote_56_56" id="Footnote_56_56"></a><a href="#FNanchor_56_56"><span class="label">[56]</span></a> <i>Op. cit.</i>, pp. 23-24.</p></div>
+
+<div class="footnote"><p><a name="Footnote_57_57" id="Footnote_57_57"></a><a href="#FNanchor_57_57"><span class="label">[57]</span></a> Lang, <i>op. cit.</i>, I, 162, and <i>passim</i>.</p></div>
+
+<div class="footnote"><p><a name="Footnote_58_58" id="Footnote_58_58"></a><a href="#FNanchor_58_58"><span class="label">[58]</span></a> Max M&uuml;ller, <i>op cit.</i>, p. 12.</p></div>
+
+<div class="footnote"><p><a name="Footnote_59_59" id="Footnote_59_59"></a><a href="#FNanchor_59_59"><span class="label">[59]</span></a> <i>Nouveaux Essais</i>, p. 320.</p></div>
+
+<div class="footnote"><p><a name="Footnote_60_60" id="Footnote_60_60"></a><a href="#FNanchor_60_60"><span class="label">[60]</span></a> See Lang, <i>Myth, Ritual and Religion</i>, I, p. 234, a passage
+from the <i>Rig-Veda</i>, with four very different translations by
+Max M&uuml;ller, Wilson, Benfrey, and Langlois.</p></div>
+
+<div class="footnote"><p><a name="Footnote_61_61" id="Footnote_61_61"></a><a href="#FNanchor_61_61"><span class="label">[61]</span></a> On curiosity as the beginning of knowledge, compare the
+position held by Plato. (Tr.)</p></div>
+
+<div class="footnote"><p><a name="Footnote_62_62" id="Footnote_62_62"></a><a href="#FNanchor_62_62"><span class="label">[62]</span></a> On this general subject consult the interesting though somewhat
+general article by Professor John Dewey, "The Interpretation
+of the Savage Mind," in the <i>Psychological Review</i>, May,
+1903. The author justly criticises the current description of
+savages in negative terms, and contends that there is general
+misunderstanding of the true nature of the savage and of his
+activities. (Tr.)</p></div>
+
+<div class="footnote"><p><a name="Footnote_63_63" id="Footnote_63_63"></a><a href="#FNanchor_63_63"><span class="label">[63]</span></a> It is now well accepted that Thales cannot be regarded as
+propounding a materialistic theory when he declares that everything
+is derived from water; for with him, "water" stands
+not merely for the substance that we call chemically "H<sub>2</sub>O,"
+but for the "spirit that is in water" as well&mdash;the water-spirit
+is the <i>Grundprincip</i>. (Tr.)</p></div>
+
+<div class="footnote"><p><a name="Footnote_64_64" id="Footnote_64_64"></a><a href="#FNanchor_64_64"><span class="label">[64]</span></a> Max M&uuml;ller, <i>op. cit.</i>, 39, 47-48, 59-60.</p></div>
+</div>
+
+
+<hr style="width: 65%;" /><p><span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_140" id="Page_140">[140]</a></span></p>
+<h2>CHAPTER IV</h2>
+
+<h3>THE HIGHER FORMS OF INVENTION</h3>
+
+
+<p>We now pass from primitive to civilized man,
+from collective to individual creation, the characters
+of which it remains for us to study as we find
+them in great inventors who exhibit them on a
+large scale. Fortunately, we may dismiss the treatment
+of the oft-discussed, never-solved problem of
+the psychological nature of genius. As we have
+already noted, there enter into its composition factors
+other than the creative imagination, although
+the latter is not the least among them. Besides,
+great men being exceptions, anomalies, or as the
+current expression has it, "spontaneous variations,"
+we may ask <i>in limine</i> whether their psychology is
+explicable by means of simple formul&aelig;, as with the
+average man, or whether even monographs teach us
+no more concerning their nature than general
+theories that are never applicable to all cases.
+Taking genius, then, as synonymous with great inventor,
+accepting it <i>de facto</i> historically and psychologically,
+our task is limited to the attempt to separate
+characters that seem, from observation and
+experiment, to belong to it as peculiarly its own.<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_141" id="Page_141">[141]</a></span></p>
+
+<p>Putting aside vague dissertations and dithyrambics
+in favor of theories with a scientific tendency
+as to the nature of genius, we meet first the one
+attributing to it a pathological origin. Hinted at
+in antiquity (Aristotle, Seneca, etc.), suggested in
+the oft-expressed comparison between inspiration
+and insanity, it has reached, as we know&mdash;through
+timid, reserved, and partial statements (L&eacute;lut)&mdash;its
+complete expression in the famous formula of
+Moreau de Tours, "Genius is a neurosis."</p>
+
+<p>Neuropathy was for him the exaggeration of vital
+properties and consequently the most favorable condition
+for the hatching of works of genius. Later,
+Lombroso, in a book teeming with doubtful or
+manifestly false evidence, finding his predecessor's
+theory too vague, attempts to give it more precision
+by substituting for neurosis in general a specific
+neurosis&mdash;larvated epilepsy. Alienists, far from
+eagerly accepting this view, have set themselves to
+combat it and to maintain that Lombroso has compromised
+everything in wanting to make the term
+too precise. There are several possible hypotheses,
+they say: either the neuropathic state is the direct,
+immediate cause of which the higher faculties of
+genius are effects; or, the intellectual superiority,
+through the excessive labor and excitation it involves,
+causes neuropathic disturbances; or, there
+is no relation of cause and effect between genius and
+neurosis, but mere co&euml;xistence, since there are found
+very mediocre neuropaths, and men above the average
+without a neurotic blemish; or, the two states<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_142" id="Page_142">[142]</a></span>&mdash;the
+one psychic, the other physiological&mdash;are both
+effects, resulting from organic conditions that produce
+according to circumstances genius, insanity,
+and divers nervous troubles. Every one of these
+hypotheses can allege facts in its favor. We must,
+however, recognize that in most men of genius are
+found so many peculiarities, physical eccentricities
+and disorders of all kinds that the pathologic theory
+retains much probability.</p>
+
+<p>There remain for consideration the sane geniuses
+who, despite many efforts and subtleties, have not
+yet been successfully brought under the foregoing
+formula, and who have made possible the enunciation
+of another theory. Recently, Nordau, rejecting
+the theory of his master Lombroso, has maintained
+that it is just as reasonable to say that
+"genius is a neurosis" as that "athleticism is a
+cardiopathy" because many athletes are affected
+with heart disease. For him, "the essential elements
+of genius are judgment and will." Following
+this definition, he establishes the following
+hierarchy of men of genius: At the highest rung
+of the ladder are those in whom judgment and will
+are equally powerful; men of action who make
+world-history (Alexander, Cromwell, Napoleon)&mdash;these
+are masters of men. On the second level are
+found the geniuses of judgment, with no hyper-development
+of will&mdash;these are masters of matter
+(Pasteur, Helmholtz, R&ouml;ntgen). On the third step
+are geniuses of judgment without energetic will<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_143" id="Page_143">[143]</a></span>&mdash;thinkers
+and philosophers. What then shall we do
+with the emotional geniuses&mdash;the poets and artists?
+Theirs is not genius in the strict sense, "because it
+creates nothing new and exercises no influence on
+phenomena." Without discussing the value of this
+classification, without examining whether it is even
+possible,&mdash;since there is no common measure between
+Alexander, Pasteur, Shakespeare, and Spinoza,&mdash;and
+whether, on the other hand, common
+opinion is not right in putting on the same level
+the great creators, whoever they be, solely because
+they are far above the average, this remark is absolutely
+necessary: In the definition above cited the
+creative faculty <i>par excellence</i>&mdash;imagination&mdash;necessary
+to all inventors, is entirely left out.</p>
+
+<p>We can, however, derive some benefit from this
+arbitrary division. Although it is impossible to
+admit that "emotional geniuses" create nothing new
+and have no influence on society, they do form a
+special group. Creative work requires of them a
+nervous excitability and a predominance of affective
+states that rapidly become morbid. In this way
+they have provided the pathological theory with
+most of its facts. It would perhaps be necessary to
+recognize distinctions between the various forms of
+invention. They require very different organic and
+psychic conditions in order that some may profit
+by morbid dispositions that are far from useful to
+others. This point should deserve a special study
+never made hitherto.</p>
+
+<p><span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_144" id="Page_144">[144]</a></span></p>
+<h3>I</h3>
+
+<p>We shall reduce to three the characters ordinarily
+met in most great inventors. No one of them is
+without exception.</p>
+
+<p>1. <i>Precocity</i>, which is reducible to innateness.
+The natural bent becomes manifest as soon as circumstances
+allow&mdash;it is the sign of the true vocation.
+The story is the same in all cases: at one
+moment the flash occurs; but this is not as frequent
+as is supposed. False vocations abound. If we
+deduct those attracted through imitation, environmental
+influence, exhortations and advice, chance,
+the attraction of immediate gain, aversion to a
+career imposed from without which they shun and
+adoption of an opposite one, will there remain many
+natural and irresistible vocations?</p>
+
+<p>We have seen above that<a name="FNanchor_65_65" id="FNanchor_65_65"></a><a href="#Footnote_65_65" class="fnanchor">[65]</a> the passage from reproductive
+to constructive imagination takes place
+toward the end of the third year. According to
+some authors, this initial period should be followed
+by a depression about the fifth year; thenceforward
+the upward progress is continuous. But the
+creative faculty, from its nature and content, develops
+in a very clear, chronological order. Music,
+plastic arts, poetry, mechanical invention, scientific
+imagination&mdash;such is the usual order of appearance.</p>
+
+<p>In music, with the exception of a few child-prodigies,
+we hardly find personal creation before the
+age of twelve or thirteen. As examples of precocity<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_145" id="Page_145">[145]</a></span>
+may be cited: Mozart, at the age of three; Mendelssohn,
+five; Haydn, four; Handel, twelve; Weber,
+twelve; Schubert, eleven; Cherubini, thirteen;
+and many others. Those late in developing&mdash;Beethoven,
+Wagner, etc.&mdash;are fewer by far.<a name="FNanchor_66_66" id="FNanchor_66_66"></a><a href="#Footnote_66_66" class="fnanchor">[66]</a></p>
+
+<p>In the plastic arts, vocation and creative aptitude
+are shown perceptibly later, on the average about
+the fourteenth year: Giotto, at ten; Van Dyck,
+ten; Raphael, eight; Guerchin, eight; Greuze, eight;
+Michaelangelo, thirteen; Albrecht D&uuml;rer, fifteen;
+Bernini, twelve; Rubens and Jordaens being also
+precocious.</p>
+
+<p>In poetry we find no work having any individual
+character before sixteen. Chatterton died at that
+age, perhaps the only example of so young a poet
+leaving any reputation. Schiller and Byron also
+began at sixteen. Besides this, we know that the
+talent for versification, at least as imitation, is very
+early in developing.</p>
+
+<p>In mechanical arts children have early a remarkable
+capacity for understanding and imitating. At
+nine, Poncelet bought a watch that was out of
+order in order to study it, then took it apart and
+put it together correctly. Arago tells that at the
+same age Fresnel was called by his comrades a
+"man of genius," because he had determined by
+correct experiments "the length and caliber of children's
+elder-wood toy cannon giving the longest
+range; also, which green or dry woods used in the<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_146" id="Page_146">[146]</a></span>
+manufacture of bows have most strength and lasting
+power." In general, the average of mechanical
+invention is later, and scarcely comes earlier than
+that of scientific discovery.</p>
+
+<p>The form of abstract imagination requisite for
+invention in the sciences has no great personal
+value before the twentieth year: there are a goodly
+number, however, who have given proof of it before
+that age&mdash;Pascal, Newton, Leibniz, Gauss, Auguste
+Comte, etc. Almost all are mathematicians.</p>
+
+<p>These chronological variations result not from
+chance, but from psychological conditions necessary
+for the development of each form of imagination.
+We know that the acquisition of musical sounds is
+prior to speech: many children can repeat a scale
+correctly before they are able to talk. On the other
+hand, as dissolution follows evolution in inverse
+order,<a name="FNanchor_67_67" id="FNanchor_67_67"></a><a href="#Footnote_67_67" class="fnanchor">[67]</a> aphasic patients lacking the most common
+words, can nevertheless sing. Sound-images are
+thus organized before all others, and the creative
+power when acting in this direction finds very early
+material for its use. For the plastic arts a longer
+apprenticeship is necessary for the education of the
+senses and movements. To acquire manual dexterity
+one must become skilled in observing form,
+combinations of lines and colors, and apt at reproducing
+them. Poetry and first attempts at novel-writing
+presuppose some experience of the passions
+of human life and a certain reflection of which the<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_147" id="Page_147">[147]</a></span>
+child is incapable. Invention in the mechanic arts,
+as in the plastic arts, requires the education of the
+senses and movements; and, further, calculation, rational
+combination of means, rigorous adaptation to
+practical necessities. Lastly, scientific imagination
+is nothing without a high development of the
+capacity for abstraction, which is a matter of slow
+growth. Mathematicians are the most precocious
+because their material is the most simple; they have
+no need, as in the case of the experimental sciences,
+of an extended knowledge of facts, which is
+acquired only with time.</p>
+
+<p>At this period of its development the imagination
+is in large part imitation. We must explain this
+paradox. The creator begins by imitating: this is
+such a well-known fact that it is needless to give
+proof of it, and it is subject to few exceptions.
+The most original mind is, at first, consciously or
+unconsciously somebody's disciple. It is necessarily
+so. Nature gives only one thing, "the creative instinct;"
+that is, the need of producing in a determined
+line. This internal factor alone is insufficient.
+Aside from the fact that the imagination at
+first has at its disposal only a very limited material,
+it lacks technique, the processes indispensable for
+realizing itself. As long as the creator has not
+found the suitable form into which to cast his
+creation he must indeed borrow it from another;
+his ideas must suffer the necessity of a provisional
+shelter. This explains how it is that later the
+inventor, reaching full consciousness of himself,<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_148" id="Page_148">[148]</a></span>
+in order to complete mastery of his methods, often
+breaks with his models, and burns what he at first
+adorned.</p>
+
+
+<h3>II</h3>
+
+<p>A second character consists of the necessity, the
+fatality of creation. Great inventors feel that they
+have a task to accomplish; they feel that they are
+charged with a mission. On this point we have a
+large number of testimonials and avowals. In the
+darkest days of his life Beethoven, haunted by the
+thought of suicide, wrote, "Art alone has kept me
+back. It seemed to me that I could not leave the
+world before producing all that I felt within me."
+Ordinarily, inventors are apt in only one line; even
+when they have a certain versatility, they remain
+bound to their own peculiar manner&mdash;they have
+their mark&mdash;like Michaelangelo; or, if they attempt
+to change it, if they try to be unfaithful as respects
+their vocation, they fall much below themselves.</p>
+
+<p>This characteristic of irresistible impulsion which
+makes the genius create not because he wants to, but
+because he must do it, has often been likened to
+instinct. This very widespread view has been examined
+before (Part I, <a href="#Page_31">Chapter ii</a>).</p>
+
+<p>We have seen that there is no creative instinct
+in general, but <i>particular</i> tendencies, orientated in a
+definite direction, which in most respects resemble
+instinct. It is contrary to experience and logic to
+admit that the creative genius follows any path
+whatever at his choice&mdash;a proposition that Weismann,
+<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_149" id="Page_149">[149]</a></span>in his horror of inheritance of acquired characters
+(which are a kind of innateness) is not afraid
+to support. That is true only of the man of talent,
+a matter of education and circumstances. The distinction
+between these two orders of creators&mdash;the
+great and the ordinary&mdash;has been made too often
+to need repetition, although it is proper to recognize
+that it is not always easy in practice, that there are
+names that cause us to hesitate, which we class
+somewhat at hazard. Yet genius remains, as Schopenhauer
+used to say, <i>monstrum per excessum</i>; excessive
+development in one direction. Hypertrophy
+of a special aptitude often makes genius fall, as far
+as the others are concerned, below the average level.
+Even those exceptional men who have given proof
+of multiple aptitudes, such as Vinci, Michaelangelo,
+Goethe, etc., always have a predominating tendency
+which, in common opinion, sums them up.</p>
+
+
+<h3>III</h3>
+
+<p>A third characteristic is the clearly defined <i>individuality</i>
+of the great creator. He is the man of
+his work; he has done this or that: that is his
+mark. He is "representative." There is no other
+opinion as to this; what is a subject of discussion
+is the <i>origin</i>, not the nature of this individuality.
+The Darwinian theory as to the all-powerful action
+of environment has led to the question whether the
+representative character of great inventors comes
+from themselves, and from them alone, or must<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_150" id="Page_150">[150]</a></span>
+not rather be sought in the unconscious influence of
+the race and epoch of which they are at a given
+instant only brighter sparks. This debate goes beyond
+the bounds of our subject. To decide whether
+social changes are due mostly to the accumulated
+influences of some individuals and their initiative,
+or to the environment, to circumstances, to hereditary
+transmission, is not a problem for psychology
+to solve. We can not, however, totally avoid this
+discussion, for it touches the very springs of creation.</p>
+
+<p>Is the inventive genius the highest degree of personality
+or a synthesis of masses?&mdash;the result of
+himself or of others?&mdash;the expression of an individual
+activity or of a collective activity? In short,
+should we look for his representative character
+within him or without? Both these alternatives
+have authoritative supporters.</p>
+
+<p>For Schopenhauer, Carlyle (<i>Hero-worship</i>),
+Nietzsche, <i>et al.</i>, the great man is an autonomous
+product, a being without a peer, a demigod, "<i>Uebermensch</i>."
+He can be explained neither by heredity,
+nor by environment.</p>
+
+<p>For others (Taine, Spencer, Grant, Allen, <i>et al.</i>),
+the important factor is seen in the race and external
+conditions. Goethe held that a whole family line is
+summarized some day in a single one of its members,
+and a whole people in one or several men.
+For him, Louis XIV and Voltaire are respectively
+the French king and writer <i>par excellence</i>. "The<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_151" id="Page_151">[151]</a></span>
+alleged great men," says Tolstoi, "are only the labels
+of history, they give their names to events."<a name="FNanchor_68_68" id="FNanchor_68_68"></a><a href="#Footnote_68_68" class="fnanchor">[68]</a></p>
+
+<p>Each party explains the same facts according to
+its own principle and in its own peculiar way. The
+great historic epochs are rich in great men (the
+Greek republics of the fourth century B. C., the
+Roman Republic, the Renaissance, French Revolution,
+etc.). Why? Because, say some, periods put
+into ferment by the deep working of the masses
+make this blossoming possible. Because, say the
+others, this flowering modifies profoundly the social
+and intellectual condition of the masses and raises
+their level. For the former the ferment is deep
+down; for the latter it is on top.</p>
+
+<p>Without presuming to solve this vexed question,
+I lean toward the view of individualism pure and
+simple. It seems to me very difficult to admit that
+the great creator is only the result of his environment.
+Since this influence acts on many others,
+it is very necessary that, in great men, there should
+be in addition a personal factor. Besides, in opposition
+to the exclusively environmental theory we
+may bring the well-known fact that most innovators
+and inventors at first arouse opposition. We
+know the invariable sentence on everything novel&mdash;it
+is "false" or "bad;" then it is adopted with the
+statement that it had been known for a long time.<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_152" id="Page_152">[152]</a></span>
+In the hypothesis of collective invention, it seems
+that the mass of people should applaud inventors,
+recognizing itself in them, seeing its confused
+thought take form and body: but most often the
+contrary happens. The misoneism of crowds seems
+to me one of the strongest arguments in favor of
+the individual character of invention.</p>
+
+<p>We can doubtless distinguish two cases&mdash;in the
+first, the creator sums up and clearly translates the
+aspirations of his <i>milieu</i>; in the second, he is in
+opposition to it because he goes beyond it. How
+many innovators have been disappointed because
+they came before their time! But this distinction
+does not reach to the bottom of the question, and is
+not at all sufficient as an answer.</p>
+
+<p>Let us leave this problem, which, on account of
+its complexity, we can hardly solve through peremptory
+reasoning, and let us try to examine <i>objectively</i>
+the relation between creation and environment in
+order that we may see to what extent the creative
+imagination, without losing its individual character&mdash;which
+is impossible&mdash;depends on the intellectual
+and social surrounding.</p>
+
+<p>If, with the American psychologists,<a name="FNanchor_69_69" id="FNanchor_69_69"></a><a href="#Footnote_69_69" class="fnanchor">[69]</a> we term
+the disposition for innovating a "spontaneous variation"&mdash;a
+Darwinian term explaining nothing, but
+convenient&mdash;we may enunciate the following law:</p>
+<p><span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_153" id="Page_153">[153]</a></span></p>
+<p><i>The tendency toward spontaneous variation (invention)
+is always in inverse ratio to the simplicity
+of the environment.</i></p>
+
+<p>The savage environment is in its nature very
+simple, consequently homogeneous. The lower races
+show a much smaller degree of differentiation than
+the higher; in them, as Jastrow says, physical and
+psychic maturity is more precocious, and as the
+period just before the adult age is the plastic period
+<i>per se</i>, this diminishes the chances of a departure
+from the common type. Thus comparison between
+whites and blacks, between primitive and civilized
+peoples, shows that, for equal populations, there is
+an enormous disproportion as to the number of
+innovators.</p>
+
+<p>The barbarian environment is much more complex
+and heterogeneous: it contains all the rudiments
+of civilized life. Consequently, it favors
+more individual variations and is richer in superior
+men. But these variations are rarely produced outside
+of a very restricted field&mdash;political, military,
+religious. So it seems impossible to agree with
+Joly<a name="FNanchor_70_70" id="FNanchor_70_70"></a><a href="#Footnote_70_70" class="fnanchor">[70]</a> that neither primitive nor barbarian peoples
+produce superior minds, "unless," as he says, "by
+this name we mean those that simply surpass
+their congeners." But is there a criterion other
+than that? I see none. Greatness is altogether a
+relative idea; and would not our great creators
+seem, to beings better endowed than we, very small?</p>
+
+<p>The civilized environment, requiring division of<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_154" id="Page_154">[154]</a></span>
+labor and consequently a constantly growing complexity
+of heterogeneous elements, is an open door
+for all vocations. Doubtless, the social spirit always
+retains something of that tendency toward stagnation
+that is the rule in lower social orders; it is
+more favorable to tradition than to innovation. But
+the inevitable necessity of a warm competition between
+individuals and peoples is a natural antidote
+for that natural inertia; it favors useful variations.
+Moreover, civilization means evolution; consequently
+the conditions under which the imagination
+is active change with the times. Let us suppose,
+Weismann justly says, that in the Samoan
+Islands there were born a child having the singular
+and extraordinary genius of Mozart. What could
+he accomplish? At the most, extend the gamut of
+three or four tones to seven, and create a few more
+complex melodies; but he would be as unable to
+compose symphonies as Archimedes would have
+been to invent an electric dynamo. How many
+creators have been wrecked because the conditions
+necessary for their inventions were lacking? Roger
+Bacon foresaw several of our great discoveries;
+Cardan, the differential calculus; Van Helmont,
+chemistry; and it has been possible to write a book
+on the forerunners of Darwin.<a name="FNanchor_71_71" id="FNanchor_71_71"></a><a href="#Footnote_71_71" class="fnanchor">[71]</a> We talk so much
+of the free flight of imagination, of the all-comprehensive
+power of the creator, that we forget the
+sociological conditions&mdash;not to mention others&mdash;on
+which they are every moment dependent. In<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_155" id="Page_155">[155]</a></span>
+this respect, no invention is personal in the strict
+sense; there always remains in it a little of that
+anonymous collaboration the highest expression of
+which, as we have seen, is the mythic activity.</p>
+
+<p>By way of summary, and whatever be the causes,
+we may say that there is a universal tendency in
+all living matter toward variation, whether we consider
+vegetables, animals, or the physical and mental
+man. The need of innovating is only a special
+case, rare in the lower races, frequent in the higher.
+This tendency toward variation is fundamental or
+superficial: As fundamental, it corresponds to
+genius, and survives through processes analogous
+to natural selection, i.e., by its own power. As
+superficial, it corresponds to talent, survives and
+prospers chiefly through the help of circumstances
+and environment. Here, the orientation comes
+from without, not from within. According as the
+spirit of the time inclines rather to poetry or painting,
+or music, or scientific research, or industry, or
+military art, minds of the second order are dragged
+into the current&mdash;showing that a goodly part of
+their power is in the aptness, not for invention, but
+for <i>imitation</i>.</p>
+
+
+<h3>IV</h3>
+
+<p>The determination of the characters belonging to
+the inventive genius has necessitated some seemingly
+irrelevant remarks on the action of the environment.
+Let us return to invention, strictly
+so-called.<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_156" id="Page_156">[156]</a></span></p>
+
+<p>For inventing there is always required a natural
+aptitude, sometimes, a happy chance.</p>
+
+<p>The natural disposition should be accepted as a
+fact. Why does a man create? Because he is
+capable of forming new combinations of ideas.
+However na&iuml;ve this answer may be, there is no
+other. The only thing possible, is the determination
+of the conditions necessary and sufficient for producing
+novel combinations: this has been done in
+the first part of this book, and there is no occasion
+for going over it again. But there is another
+aspect in creative work to be considered&mdash;its psychological
+<i>mechanism</i>, and the form of its development.</p>
+
+<p>Every normal person creates little or much.
+He may, in his ignorance, invent what has been
+already done a thousand times. Even if this is not
+a creation as regards the species, it is none the less
+such for the individual. It is wrong to say, as has
+been said, that an invention "is a new and important
+idea." <i>Novelty</i> only is essential&mdash;that is the
+psychological mark: importance and utility are accessory,
+merely social marks. Invention is thus
+unduly limited when we attribute it to great inventors
+only. At this moment, however, we are concerned
+only with these, and in them the mechanism
+of invention is easier to study.</p>
+
+<p>We have already seen how false is the theory
+that holds that there is always a sudden stroke of
+inspiration, followed by a period of rapid or slow
+execution. On the contrary, observation reveals<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_157" id="Page_157">[157]</a></span>
+many processes that apparently differ less in the
+<i>content</i> of invention than according to individual
+temperament. I distinguish two general processes
+of which the rest are variations. In all creation,
+great or small, there is a directing idea, an "ideal"&mdash;understanding
+the word not in its transcendental
+sense, but merely as synonymous with end or goal&mdash;or
+more simply, a problem to solve. The <i>locus</i> of
+the idea, of the given problem, is not the same in
+the two processes. In the one I term "complete"
+the ideal is at the beginning: in the "abridged" it is
+in the middle. There are also other differences
+which the following tables will make more clear:</p>
+
+
+
+<div class='center'>
+<table border="0" cellpadding="0" cellspacing="8" summary="first process">
+<tr><td colspan='3'><i>First Process</i> (<i>complete</i>).</td></tr>
+<tr><td align='center'>1st phase</td><td align='center'>2nd phase</td><td align='center'>3d phase</td></tr>
+<tr><td class='firstp'>IDEA (commencement)<br />
+Special incubation<br />
+&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp;of more or less<br />
+&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp;duration</td>
+<td class='firstp'>INVENTION,<br />
+&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp;or<br />
+DISCOVERY<br />
+&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp;(end)</td>
+<td class='firstp'>VERIFICATION,<br />
+&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp;or<br />
+APPLICATION</td></tr>
+</table></div>
+
+<p>The idea excites attention and takes a fixed character.
+The period of brooding begins. For Newton
+it lasted seventeen years, and at the time of definitely
+establishing his discovery by calculation he
+was so overcome with emotion that he had to assign
+to another the task of completing it. The mathematician
+Hamilton tells us that his method of quaternians
+burst upon him one day, completely finished,
+while he was near a bridge in Dublin. "In
+that moment I had the result of fifteen years' labor."
+Darwin gathers material during his voyages, spends<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_158" id="Page_158">[158]</a></span>
+a long time observing plants and animals, then
+through the chance reading of Malthus' book, hits
+upon and formulates his theory. In literary and
+artistic creation similar examples are frequent.<a name="FNanchor_72_72" id="FNanchor_72_72"></a><a href="#Footnote_72_72" class="fnanchor">[72]</a></p>
+
+<p>The second phase is only an instant, but essential&mdash;the
+moment of discovery, when the creator
+exclaims his "Eureka!"<a name="FNanchor_73_73" id="FNanchor_73_73"></a><a href="#Footnote_73_73" class="fnanchor">[73]</a> With it, the work is virtually
+or really ended.</p>
+
+
+<div class='center'>
+<table border="0" cellpadding="0" cellspacing="8" summary="secondprocess">
+<tr><td colspan='3'><i>Second Process</i> (<i>abridged</i>).</td></tr>
+<tr><td align='center'>1st phase</td><td align='center'>2nd phase</td><td align='center'>3rd phase</td></tr>
+<tr><td class='firstp'>General preparation<br />
+&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp;(unconscious)</td>
+<td class='firstp'>IDEA (commencement)<br />
+INSPIRATION<br />
+ERUPTION</td>
+<td class='firstp'>CONSTRUCTIVE<br />
+&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp;and<br />
+DEVELOPING<br />
+&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp;period.</td></tr>
+</table></div>
+
+<p>This is the process in intuitive minds. Such
+seems to have been the case of Mozart, Poe, etc.
+Without attempting what would be a tedious
+enumeration of examples, we may say that this
+form of creation comprises two classes&mdash;those
+coming to maturity through an internal impulse,
+a sudden stroke of inspiration, and those who are
+suddenly illumined by chance. The two processes
+differ superficially rather than essentially. Let us
+briefly compare them.</p>
+
+<p>With some, the first phase is long and fully conscious;
+<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_159" id="Page_159">[159]</a></span>in others it seems negligible, equal to zero&mdash;there
+is nothing of it because there exists a natural
+or acquired tendency toward equilibrium. "For a
+long time," says Schumann, "I had the habit of
+racking my brain, and now I scarcely need to scratch
+my forehead. Everything runs naturally."<a name="FNanchor_74_74" id="FNanchor_74_74"></a><a href="#Footnote_74_74" class="fnanchor">[74]</a></p>
+
+<p>The second phase is almost the same in both
+cases: it is only an instant, but it is essential&mdash;it
+is the moment of imaginative synthesis.</p>
+
+<p>Lastly, the third phase is very short for some,
+because the main labor is already done, and there
+remains only the finishing touch or the verification.
+It is long for others, because they must pass from
+the perceived idea to complete realization, and because
+the preparatory work is faulty; so that for
+these the second creative process is shortened in
+appearance only.</p>
+
+<p>Such seem to me the two principal forms of the
+mechanism of creation. These are genera; they
+include species and varieties that a patient and
+minute study of the processes peculiar to various
+inventors would reveal to us. We must bear in
+mind that this work makes no claim of being a
+monograph on invention, but merely a sketch.<a name="FNanchor_75_75" id="FNanchor_75_75"></a><a href="#Footnote_75_75" class="fnanchor">[75]</a></p>
+
+<p>The two processes above described seem to correspond
+<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_160" id="Page_160">[160]</a></span>on the whole to the oft-made distinction between
+the intuitive or spontaneous, and the combining
+or reflective imagination.</p>
+
+<p>The intuitive, essentially synthetic form, is found
+principally in the purely imaginative types, children
+and savages. The mind proceeds from the whole
+to details. The generative idea resembles those concepts
+which, in the sciences, are of wide range
+because they condense a generalization rich in consequences.
+The subject is at first comprehended as
+a whole; development is organic, and we may compare
+it to the embryological process that causes a
+living being to arise from the fertilized ovum,
+analogous to an immanent logic. As a type of this
+creative form there has often been given a letter
+wherein Mozart explains his mode of conception.
+Recently (and that is why I do not reprint it here)
+it has been suspected of being apocryphal. I regret
+this&mdash;it was worthy of being authentic. According
+to Goethe, Shakespeare's <i>Hamlet</i> could have been
+created only through an intuitive process, etc.</p>
+
+<p>The combining, discursive imagination proceeds
+from details to the vaguely-perceived unity. It
+starts from a fragment that serves as a matrix, and
+becomes completed little by little. An adventure, an
+anecdote, a scene, a rapid glance, a detail, suggests
+a literary or artistic creation; but the organic form
+does not appear in a trice. In science, Kepler furnishes
+a good example of this combining imagination.
+<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_161" id="Page_161">[161]</a></span>It is known that he devoted a part of his
+life trying strange hypotheses, until the day when,
+having discovered the elliptical orbit of Mars, all
+his former work took shape and became an organized
+system. Did we want to make use once more
+of an embryological comparison, it would be necessary
+to look for it in the strange conceptions of
+ancient cosmogonies: they believed that from an
+earthly slime arose parts of bodies and separate
+organs which through a mysterious attraction and
+happy chance ended by sticking together, and forming
+living bodies.<a name="FNanchor_76_76" id="FNanchor_76_76"></a><a href="#Footnote_76_76" class="fnanchor">[76]</a></p>
+
+<p>It is an accepted view that of these two modes,
+one, the abridged or intuitive process, is superior to
+the other. I confess to having held this prejudice.
+On examination, I find it doubtful, even false.
+There is a <i>difference</i>, not any "higher" and "lower."</p>
+
+<p>First of all, both these forms of creation are
+necessary. The intuitive process can suffice for an
+invention of short duration: a rhyme, a story, a
+profile, a <i>motif</i>, an ornamental stroke, a little
+mechanical contrivance, etc. But as soon as the
+work requires time and development the discursive
+process becomes absolutely necessary: with many
+inventors one easily perceives the change from one
+form to the other. We have seen that in the case
+of Chopin, "creation was spontaneous, miraculous,"
+coming complete and sudden. But George Sand
+adds: "The crisis over, then commenced the most
+heartrending labor at which I have ever been present,"
+<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_162" id="Page_162">[162]</a></span>and she pictures him to us agonized, for days
+and weeks, running after the bits of lost inspiration.
+Goethe, likewise, in a letter to Humboldt regarding
+his Faust, which occupied him for sixty years, full
+of interruptions and gaps: "The difficulty has been
+to get through strength of will what is really to be
+gotten only by a spontaneous act of nature." Zola,
+according to his biographer, Toulouse, "imagines a
+novel, always starting out with a general idea that
+dominates the work; then, from induction to induction,
+he draws out of it the characters and all the
+story."</p>
+
+<p>To sum up: Pure intuition and pure combination
+are exceptional; ordinarily, it is a mixed process in
+which one of the two elements prevails and permits
+its qualification. If we note, in addition, that it
+would be easy to group under these two headings
+names of the first rank, we shall conclude that the
+difference is altogether in the <i>mechanism</i>, not in the
+<i>nature</i> of creation, and is consequently accessory;
+and that this difference is reducible to natural dispositions,
+which we may contrast as follows:</p>
+
+
+<div class='center'>
+<table border="0" cellpadding="8" cellspacing="8" summary="ready">
+<tr><td class='ready'>Ready-witted minds,<br />
+excelling in conception,<br />
+making the whole almost<br />
+out of one piece.</td>
+<td class='ready'>Logically-developing<br />
+minds, excelling in<br />
+elaboration.</td></tr>
+<tr><td class='ready'>Work primarily unconscious.</td>
+<td class='ready'>Patience the preponderating<br />
+r&ocirc;le.</td></tr>
+<tr><td align='left'></td><td class='ready'>Work primarily conscious.</td></tr>
+<tr><td class='ready'>Actions quick.</td>
+<td class='ready'>Actions slow.</td></tr>
+</table></div>
+
+<p><span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_163" id="Page_163">[163]</a></span></p>
+
+<h3>V</h3>
+
+<p>"Were we to raise monuments to inventors in
+the arts and sciences, there would be fewer statues
+to men than to children, animals, and especially
+<i>fortune</i>." In this wise expressed himself one of
+the sage thinkers of the eighteenth century, Turgot.
+The importance of the last factor has been much
+exaggerated. Chance may be taken in two senses&mdash;one
+general, the other narrow.</p>
+
+<p>(1) In its broad meaning, chance depends on
+entirely internal, purely psychic circumstances. We
+know that one of the best conditions for inventing
+is abundance of material, accumulated experience,
+knowledge&mdash;which augment the chances of original
+association of ideas. It has even been possible to
+maintain that the nature of memory implies the
+capacity of creating in a special direction. The revelations
+of inventors or of their biographers leave no
+doubt as to the necessity of a large number of
+sketches, trials, preliminary drawings, no matter
+whether it is a matter of industry, commerce, a machine,
+a poem, an opera, a picture, a building, a
+plan of campaign, etc. "Genius for discovery,"
+says Jevons, depends on the number of notions and
+chance thoughts coming to the inventor's mind. To
+be fertile in hypotheses&mdash;that is the first requirement
+for finding something new. The inventor's brain
+must be full of forms, of melodies, of mechanical
+agents, of commercial combinations, of figures, etc.,
+according to the nature of his work. "But it is<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_164" id="Page_164">[164]</a></span>
+very rare that the ideas we find are exactly those
+we were seeking. In order to find, <i>we must think
+along other lines</i>."<a name="FNanchor_77_77" id="FNanchor_77_77"></a><a href="#Footnote_77_77" class="fnanchor">[77]</a> Nothing is more true.</p>
+
+<p>So much for chance within: it is indisputable,
+whatever may have been said of it, but it depends
+finally on individuality&mdash;from it arises the non-anticipated
+synthesis of ideas. The abundance of
+memory-ideas, we know, is not a sufficient condition
+for creation; it is not even a necessary condition.
+It has been remarked that a relative ignorance
+is sometimes useful for invention: it favors assurance.
+There are inventions, especially scientific and
+industrial, that could not have been made had the
+inventors been arrested by the ruling and presumably
+invincible dogmas. The inventor was all the
+more free the more he was unaware of them. Then,
+as it was quite necessary to bow before the accomplished
+fact, theory was broadened to include the
+new discovery and explain it.</p>
+
+<p>(2) Chance, in the narrow sense, is a fortunate
+occurrence stimulating invention: but to attribute to
+it the greater part, is a partial, erroneous view.
+Here, what we call chance, is the meeting and convergence
+of <i>two</i> factors&mdash;one internal (individual
+genius), the other, external (the fortuitous occurrence).</p>
+
+<p>It is impossible to determine all that invention
+owes to chance in this sense. In primitive humanity
+its influence must have been enormous: the use of
+fire, the manufacture of weapons, of utensils, the<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_165" id="Page_165">[165]</a></span>
+casting of metals: all that came about through accidents
+as simple as, for example, a tree falling across
+a stream suggesting the first idea of a bridge.</p>
+
+<p>In historic times&mdash;and to keep merely to the
+modern period&mdash;the collection of authentic facts
+would fill a large volume. Who does not know of
+Newton's apple, Galileo's lamp, Galvani's frog?
+Huygens declared that, were it not for an unforeseen
+combination of circumstances, the invention of
+the telescope would require "a superhuman genius;"
+it is known that we owe it to children who were
+playing with pieces of glass in an optician's shop.
+Sch&ouml;nbein discovered ozone, thanks to the phosphorous
+odor of air traversed by electric sparks.
+The discoveries of Grimaldi and of Fresnel in regard
+to interferences, those of Faraday, of Arago,
+of Foucault, of Fraunhofer, of Kirchoff, and of
+hundreds of others owed something to "fortune."
+It is said that the sight of a crab suggested to Watt
+the idea of an ingenious machine. To chance, also,
+many poets, novelists, dramatists, and artists have
+owed the best part of their inspirations: literature
+and the arts abound in fictitious characters whose
+real originals are known.</p>
+
+<p>So much for the external, fortuitous factor; its
+r&ocirc;le is clear. That of the internal factor is less so.
+It is not at all apparent to the ordinary mind, escaping
+the unreflecting. Yet it is extremely important.
+The same fortuitous event passes by millions of
+men without exciting anything. How many of
+Pisa's inhabitants had seen the lamp of their cathedral
+<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_166" id="Page_166">[166]</a></span>before Galileo! He does not necessarily find
+who wants to find. The happy chance comes only
+to those worthy of it. In order to profit thereby,
+one must first possess the spirit of observation, wide-awake
+attention, that isolates and fixates the accident;
+then, if it is a matter of scientific or practical
+inventions, the penetration that seizes upon relations
+and finds unforeseen resemblances; if it concerns
+esthetic productions, the imagination that constructs,
+organizes, gives life.</p>
+
+<p>Without repeating an evident truism, although it
+is often misunderstood, we ought to end by remarking
+that <i>chance is an occasion for, not an agent of,
+creation</i>.</p>
+
+<div class="footnotes"><h3>FOOTNOTES:</h3>
+
+<div class="footnote"><p><a name="Footnote_65_65" id="Footnote_65_65"></a><a href="#FNanchor_65_65"><span class="label">[65]</span></a> See above, <a href="#Page_103">Chapter II</a>.</p></div>
+
+<div class="footnote"><p><a name="Footnote_66_66" id="Footnote_66_66"></a><a href="#FNanchor_66_66"><span class="label">[66]</span></a> Some of these and the following figures are borrowed from
+Oelzelt-Newin, <i>op. cit.</i>, pp. 70 ff.</p></div>
+
+<div class="footnote"><p><a name="Footnote_67_67" id="Footnote_67_67"></a><a href="#FNanchor_67_67"><span class="label">[67]</span></a> Compare the well-known theory of Dr. Hughlings-Jackson.
+(Tr.)</p></div>
+
+<div class="footnote"><p><a name="Footnote_68_68" id="Footnote_68_68"></a><a href="#FNanchor_68_68"><span class="label">[68]</span></a> For an elaborate and interesting discussion of this subject,
+see Tolstoi's <i>Physiology of War</i>. As showing the later trend
+of thought on this general theme, see the excellent summary by
+Professor Seligman, <i>The Economic Interpretation of History</i>.
+(Tr.)</p></div>
+
+<div class="footnote"><p><a name="Footnote_69_69" id="Footnote_69_69"></a><a href="#FNanchor_69_69"><span class="label">[69]</span></a> William James, <i>The Will to Believe and other Essays</i>, pp.
+218 ff.; Jastrow, <i>Psych. Rev.</i>, May, 1898, p. 307; J. Royce,
+<i>ibid.</i>, March, 1898; Baldwin, <i>Social and Ethical Interpretations</i>,
+etc.</p></div>
+
+<div class="footnote"><p><a name="Footnote_70_70" id="Footnote_70_70"></a><a href="#FNanchor_70_70"><span class="label">[70]</span></a> Joly, <i>Psychologie des grands hommes</i>.</p></div>
+
+<div class="footnote"><p><a name="Footnote_71_71" id="Footnote_71_71"></a><a href="#FNanchor_71_71"><span class="label">[71]</span></a> Osborn, <i>From the Greeks to Darwin</i>.</p></div>
+
+<div class="footnote"><p><a name="Footnote_72_72" id="Footnote_72_72"></a><a href="#FNanchor_72_72"><span class="label">[72]</span></a> Such, according to Binet and Passy, seem to be the cases of
+the Goncourts, Pailleron, etc. See "Psychologie des auteurs
+dramatiques," in <i>L'ann&eacute;e psychologique</i>, I, 96.</p></div>
+
+<div class="footnote"><p><a name="Footnote_73_73" id="Footnote_73_73"></a><a href="#FNanchor_73_73"><span class="label">[73]</span></a> Compare the striking instance of this moment as given by
+Froebel, in his <i>Autobiography</i>, in connection with his idea of
+the Kindergarten. (Tr.)</p></div>
+
+<div class="footnote"><p><a name="Footnote_74_74" id="Footnote_74_74"></a><a href="#FNanchor_74_74"><span class="label">[74]</span></a> Quoted by Arr&eacute;at, <i>M&eacute;moire et Imagination</i>, p. 118. (Paris,
+F. Alcan.)</p></div>
+
+<div class="footnote"><p><a name="Footnote_75_75" id="Footnote_75_75"></a><a href="#FNanchor_75_75"><span class="label">[75]</span></a> Paulhan ("De l'invention," <i>Rev. Philos.</i>, December, 1898,
+pp. 590 ff.) distinguishes three kinds of development in invention:
+(1) Spontaneous or reasoned&mdash;the directing idea persists
+to the end; (2) transformation, which comprises several
+contradictory evolutions succeeding and replacing one another
+in consequence of impressions and feelings; (3) deviation,
+which is a composite of the two preceding forms.</p></div>
+
+<div class="footnote"><p><a name="Footnote_76_76" id="Footnote_76_76"></a><a href="#FNanchor_76_76"><span class="label">[76]</span></a> Cf. the well-known doctrine of Empedocles. (Tr.)</p></div>
+
+<div class="footnote"><p><a name="Footnote_77_77" id="Footnote_77_77"></a><a href="#FNanchor_77_77"><span class="label">[77]</span></a> P. Souriau, <i>Th&eacute;orie de l'invention</i>, pp. 6-7.</p></div>
+</div>
+
+
+<hr style="width: 65%;" /><p><span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_167" id="Page_167">[167]</a></span></p>
+<h2>CHAPTER V</h2>
+
+<h3>LAW OF THE DEVELOPMENT OF THE IMAGINATION</h3>
+
+
+<p>Is imagination, so often called "a capricious
+faculty," subject to some law? The question thus
+asked is too simple, and we must make it more
+precise.</p>
+
+<p>As the direct cause of invention, great or small,
+the imagination acts without assignable determination;
+in this sense it is what is known as "spontaneity"&mdash;a
+vague term, which we have attempted
+to make clear. Its appearance is irreducible to any
+law; it results from the often fortuitous convergence
+of various factors previously studied.</p>
+
+<p>Leaving aside the moment of origin, does the
+inventive power, considered in its individual and
+specific development, seem to follow any law, or, if
+this term appear too ambitious, does it present, in
+the course of its evolution, any perceptible regularity?
+Observation separates out an empirical law;
+that is, extracts directly an abridged formula that
+is only a condensation of facts. We may enunciate
+it thus: The creative imagination in its complete
+development passes through two periods separated<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_168" id="Page_168">[168]</a></span>
+by a critical phase: a period of autonomy or efflorescence,
+a critical moment, a period of definitive constitution
+presenting several aspects.</p>
+
+<p>This formula, being only a summary of experience,
+should be justified and explained by the latter.
+For this purpose we can borrow facts from two distinct
+sources: (a) individual development, which is
+the safest, clearest, and easiest to observe; (b) the
+development of the species, or historical development,
+according to the accepted principle that phylogenesis
+and ontogenesis follow the same general
+line.</p>
+
+
+<h3>I</h3>
+
+<p><i>First Period.</i> We are already acquainted with
+it: it is the imaginative age. In normal man, it
+begins at about the age of three, and embraces infancy,
+adolescence, youth: sometimes a longer,
+sometimes a shorter period. Play, romantic invention,
+mythic and fantastic conceptions of the world
+sum it up first; after that, in most, imagination is
+dependent on the influence of the passions, and
+especially sexual love. For a long time it remains
+without any rational element.</p>
+
+<p>Nevertheless, little by little, the latter wins a
+place. Reflection&mdash;including under the term the
+working of the intelligence&mdash;begins very late, grows
+slowly, and the proportion as it asserts itself, gains
+an influence over the imaginative activity and tends
+to reduce it. This growing antagonism is represented
+in the following figure.<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_169" id="Page_169">[169]</a></span></p>
+
+<p>The curve IM is that of the imagination during
+this first period. It rises at first very slowly, then
+attains a rapid ascent and keeps at a height that
+marks its greatest attainment in this earliest form.
+The dotted line RX represents the rational development
+that begins later, advances much more slowly,
+but progressively, and reaches at X the level of the
+imaginative curve. The two intellectual forms are
+present like two rivals. The position MX on the
+ordinate marks the beginning of the second period.</p>
+
+<div class="figcenter" style="width: 400px;">
+<img src="images/fig003.jpg" width="400" height="181" alt="" title="" />
+</div>
+
+<p><i>Second Period.</i> This is a critical period of indeterminate
+length, in any case, always much briefer
+than the other two. This critical moment can be
+characterized only by its causes and results. Its
+causes are, in the physiological sphere, the formation
+of an organism and a fully developed brain; in
+the psychologic order, the antagonism between the
+pure subjectivity of the imagination and the objectivity
+of ratiocinative processes; in other words,
+between mental instability and stability. As for
+the results, they appear only in the third period, the
+resultant of this obscure, metamorphic stage.<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_170" id="Page_170">[170]</a></span></p>
+
+<p><i>Third Period.</i> It is definite: in some way or
+another and in some degree the imagination has become
+rationalized, but this change is not reducible
+to a single formula.</p>
+
+<p>(1) The creative imagination falls, as is indicated
+in the figure, where the imagination curve
+MN&acute; descends rapidly toward the line of abcissas
+without ever reaching it. This is the most general
+case; only truly imaginative minds are exceptions.
+One falls little by little into the prose of practical
+life&mdash;such is the downfall of love which is treated
+as a phantom, the burial of the dreams of youth,
+etc. This is a regression, not an end; for the creative
+imagination disappears completely in no man;
+it only becomes accessory.</p>
+
+<p>(2) It keeps up but becomes transformed; it
+adapts itself to the conditions of rational thought;
+it is no longer pure imagination, but becomes a
+mixed form&mdash;the fact is indicated in the diagram
+by the union of the two lines, MN, the imagination,
+and XO, the rational. This is the case with truly
+imaginative beings, in whom inventive power long
+remains young and fresh.</p>
+
+<p>This period of preservation, of definitive constitution
+with rational transformation, presents several
+varieties. First, and simplest, <i>transformation into
+logical form</i>. The creative power manifested in
+the first stage remains true to itself, and always follows
+the same trend. Such are the precocious inventors,
+those whose vocation appeared early and
+never changed direction. Invention loses its childish<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_171" id="Page_171">[171]</a></span>
+or juvenile character in becoming virile; there are
+no other changes. Compare Schiller's <i>Robbers</i>,
+written in his teens, with his <i>Wallenstein</i>, dating
+from his fortieth year; or the vague sketches of
+the adolescent James Watt with his inventions as a
+man.</p>
+
+<p>Another case is the <i>metamorphosis</i> or <i>deviation</i>
+of creative power. We know what numbers of men
+who have left a great name in science, politics, mechanical
+or industrial invention started out with
+mediocre efforts in music, painting, and especially
+poetry, the drama, and fiction. The imaginative
+impulse did not discover its true direction at the outset;
+it imitated while trying to invent. What has
+been said above concerning the chronological development
+of the imagination would be tiresome repetition.
+The need of creating followed from the first
+the line of least resistance, where it found certain
+materials ready to hand. But in order to arrive
+to full consciousness of itself it needed more time,
+more knowledge, more accumulated experience.</p>
+
+<p>We might here ask whether the contrary case is
+also met with; i.e., where the imagination, in this
+third period, would return to the inclinations of the
+first period. This regressive metamorphosis&mdash;for I
+cannot style it otherwise&mdash;is rare but not without
+examples. Ordinarily the creative imagination,
+when it has passed its adult stage, becomes attenuated
+by slow atrophy without undergoing serious
+change of form. Nevertheless, I am able to cite the
+case of a well-known scholar who began with a<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_172" id="Page_172">[172]</a></span>
+taste for art, especially plastic art, went over rapidly
+to literature, devoted his life to biologic studies,
+in which he gained a very deserved reputation; then,
+in turn, became totally disgusted with scientific research,
+came back to literature and finally to the
+arts, which have entirely monopolized him.</p>
+
+<p>Finally&mdash;for there are very many forms&mdash;in some
+the imagination, though strong, scarcely passes beyond
+the first stage, always retains its youthful, almost
+childish form, hardly modified by a minimum
+of rationality. Let us note that it is not a question
+here of the characteristic ingenuousness of some inventors,
+which has caused them to be called "grown-up
+children," but of the candor and inherent simplicity
+of the imagination itself. This exceptional
+form is hardly reconcilable except with esthetic creation.
+Let us add the mystic imagination. It could
+furnish examples, less in its religious conceptions,
+which are without control, than in its reveries of a
+scientific turn. Contemporary mystics have invented
+adaptations of the world that take us back to the
+mythology of early times. This prolonged childhood
+of the imagination, which is, in a word, an
+anomaly, produces curiosities rather than lasting
+works.</p>
+
+<p>At this third period in the development of the
+imagination appears a second, subsidiary law, that of
+<i>increasing complexity</i>; it follows a progressive line
+from the simple to the complex. Indeed, it is not,
+strictly speaking, a law of the imagination but of
+the rational development exerting an influence on<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_173" id="Page_173">[173]</a></span>
+it by a counter-action. It is a law of the mind that
+<i>knows</i>, not of one that <i>imagines</i>.</p>
+
+<p>It is needless to show that theoretical and practical
+intelligence develops as an increasing complex. But
+from the time that the mind distinguishes clearly
+between the possible and the impossible, between the
+fancied and the real&mdash;which is a capacity wanting
+in primitive man&mdash;as soon as man has formed rational
+habits and has undergone experience the impress
+of which is ineffaceable, the creative imagination
+is subject, <i>nolens volens</i>, to new conditions;
+it is no longer absolute mistress of itself, it has lost
+the assurance of its infancy, and is under the rules
+of logical thought, which draws it along in its train.
+Aside from the exceptions given above&mdash;and even
+they are partial exceptions only&mdash;creative power depends
+on the ability to understand, which imposes
+upon it its form and developmental law. In literature
+and in the arts comparison between the simplicity
+of primitive creations and the complexity of
+advanced civilizations has become commonplace. In
+the practical, technical, scientific and social worlds
+the higher up we go the more we have to know in
+order to create, and in default of this condition we
+merely repeat when we think we are inventing.</p>
+
+
+<h3>II</h3>
+
+<p>Historically considered, in the species, the development
+of the imagination follows the same line of
+progress as in the individual. We will not repeat
+it; it would be mere reiteration in a vaguer form<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_174" id="Page_174">[174]</a></span>
+of what we have just said. A few brief notes will
+suffice.</p>
+
+<p>Vico&mdash;whose name deserves to be mentioned here
+because he was the first to see the good that we can
+get from myths for the study of the imagination&mdash;divided
+the course of humanity into three successive
+ages: divine or theocratic, heroic or fabulous, human
+or historic, after which the cycle begins over
+again. Although this too hypothetic conception is
+now forgotten, it is sufficient for our purposes.
+What, indeed, are those first two stages that have
+everywhere and always been the harbingers and preparers
+of civilization, if not the triumphant period
+of the imagination? It has produced myths, religions,
+legends, epics and martial narratives, and
+imposing monuments erected in honor of gods and
+heroes. Many nations whose evolution has been incomplete
+have not gone beyond this stage.</p>
+
+<p>Let us now consider this question under a more
+definite, more limited, better known form&mdash;the history
+of intellectual development in Europe since the
+fall of the Roman Empire. It shows very distinctly
+our three periods.</p>
+
+<p>No one will question the preponderance of the
+imagination during the middle Ages: intensity of
+religious feeling, ceaselessly repeated epidemics of
+superstition; the institution of chivalry, with all its
+accessories; heroic poetry, chivalric romances; courts
+of love, efflorescence of Gothic art, the beginning
+of modern music, etc. On the other hand, the <i>quantity</i>
+of imagination applied during this epoch to<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_175" id="Page_175">[175]</a></span>
+practical, industrial, commercial invention is very
+small. Their scientific culture, buried in Latin
+jargon, is made up partly of antique traditions, partly
+of fancies; what the ten centuries added to positive
+science is almost <i>nil</i>. Our figure, with its two
+curves, one imaginative, the other rational, thus applies
+just as well to historical development as to individual
+development during this first period.</p>
+
+<p>No more will anyone question that the Renaissance
+is a critical moment, a transition period, and a
+transformation analogous to that which we have
+noted in the individual, when there rises, opposed
+to imagination, a rival power.</p>
+
+<p>Finally, it will be admitted without dissent that
+during the modern period social imagination has become
+partly decayed, partly rationalized, under the
+influence of two principal factors&mdash;one scientific, the
+other economic. On the one hand the development
+of science, on the other hand the great maritime discoveries,
+by stimulating industrial and commercial
+inventions, have given the imagination a new field
+of activity. There have arisen points of attraction
+that have drawn it into other paths, have imposed
+upon it other forms of creation that have often
+been neglected or misunderstood and that we shall
+study in the Third Part.</p>
+
+
+
+<hr style="width: 65%;" /><p><span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_176" id="Page_176">[176]</a></span></p>
+<h2>THIRD PART</h2>
+
+<h3>THE PRINCIPAL TYPES OF IMAGINATION</h3>
+<p><span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_178" id="Page_178">[178]</a></span></p>
+
+
+
+<hr style="width: 65%;" /><p><span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_179" id="Page_179">[179]</a></span></p>
+<h2>PRELIMINARY</h2>
+
+
+<p>After having studied the creative imagination in
+its constitutive elements and in its development we
+purpose, in this last part, describing its principal
+forms. This will be neither analytic nor genetic but
+concrete. The reader need not fear wearisome repetition;
+our subject is sufficiently complex to permit
+a third treatment without reiteration.</p>
+
+<p>The expression "creative imagination," like all
+general terms, is an abbreviation and an abstraction.
+There is no "imagination in general," but only <i>men
+who imagine</i>, and who do so in different ways; the
+reality is in them. The diversities in creation, however
+numerous, should be reducible to types that are
+<i>varieties</i> of imagination, and the determination of
+these varieties is analogous to that of character as related
+to will. Indeed, when we have settled upon the
+physiological and psychological conditions of voluntary
+activity we have only done a work in <i>general</i>
+psychology. Men being variously constituted, their
+modes of action bear the stamp of their individuality;
+in each one there is a personal factor that, whatever
+its ultimate nature, puts its mark on the will
+and makes it energetic or weak, rapid or slow, stable<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_180" id="Page_180">[180]</a></span>
+or unstable, continuous or intermittent. The same
+is true of the creative imagination. We cannot
+know it completely without a study of its varieties,
+without a special psychology, toward which the following
+chapters are an attempt.</p>
+
+<p>How are we to determine these varieties? Many
+will be inclined to think that the method is indicated
+in advance. Have not psychologists distinguished,
+according as one or another of image-groups preponderates,
+visual, auditory, motor and mixed
+types? Is not the way clear and is it not well
+enough to go in this direction? However natural
+this solution may appear, it is illusory and can lead
+to naught. It rests on the equivocal use of the
+word "imagination," which at one time means mere
+reproduction of images, and at another time creative
+activity, and which, consequently, keeps up the erroneous
+notion that in the creative imagination
+images, the raw materials, are the essential part. The
+materials, no doubt, are not a negligible element,
+but by themselves they cannot reveal to us the
+species and varieties that have their origin in an
+anterior and superior tendency of mind. We shall
+see in the sequel that the very nature of constructive
+imagination may express itself indifferently in
+sounds, words, colors, lines, and even numbers. The
+method that should allege to settle the various
+orientations of creative activity according to the
+nature of images would no more go to the bottom
+of the matter than would a classification of architecture
+according to the materials employed (as<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_181" id="Page_181">[181]</a></span>
+rock, brick, iron, wood, etc.) with no regard for
+differences of style.</p>
+
+<p>This method aside, since the determination must
+be made according to the individuality of the architect,
+what method shall we follow? The matter is
+even more perplexing than the study of character.
+Although various authors have treated the latter
+subject (we have attempted it elsewhere), no one
+of the proposed classifications has been universally
+accepted. Nevertheless, despite their differences,
+they coincide in several points, because these have
+the advantage of resting on a common basis&mdash;the
+large manifestations of human nature, feeling, doing,
+thinking. In our subject I find nothing like
+this and I seek in vain for a point of support. Classifications
+are made according to the essential dominating
+attributes; but, as regards the varieties of the
+creative imagination, what are they?</p>
+
+<p>We may, indeed, as was said above, distinguish
+two great classes&mdash;the intuitive and the combining.
+From another point of view we may distinguish
+invention of free range (esthetic, religious, mystic)
+from invention more or less restricted (mechanical,
+scientific, commercial, military, political, social).
+But these two divisions are too general, leading to
+nothing. A true classification should be in touch
+with facts, and this one soars too high.</p>
+
+<p>Leaving, then, to others, more skilled or more
+fortunate, the task of a rational and systematic determination,
+if it be possible, we shall try merely to
+distinguish and describe the principal forms, such as<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_182" id="Page_182">[182]</a></span>
+experience gives them to us, emphasizing those that
+have been neglected or misinterpreted. What follows
+is thus neither a classification nor even a complete
+enumeration.</p>
+
+<p>We shall study at first two general forms of the
+creative imagination&mdash;the plastic and the diffluent&mdash;and
+later, special forms, determined by their content
+and subject.</p>
+
+<hr style='width: 45%;' />
+
+<p>Wundt, in a little-noticed passage of his <i>Physiological
+Psychology</i>, has undertaken to determine the
+composition of the "principal forms of talent,"
+which he reduces to four:</p>
+
+<p>The first element is imagination. It may be intuitive,
+"that is, conferring on representations a
+clearness of sense-perception," or combining; "then
+it operates on multiple combinations of images." A
+very marked development in both directions at the
+same time is uncommon; the author assigns reasons
+for this.</p>
+
+<p>The second element is understanding (<i>Verstand</i>).
+It may be inductive&mdash;i.e., inclining toward the collection
+of facts in order to draw generalizations
+from them&mdash;or deductive, taking general concepts
+and laws to trace their consequences.</p>
+
+<p>If the intuitive imagination is joined to the inductive
+spirit we have the talent for observation of
+the naturalist, the psychologist, the pedagogue, the
+man of affairs.</p>
+
+<p>If the intuitive imagination is combined with the
+deductive spirit we have the analytical talent of the<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_183" id="Page_183">[183]</a></span>
+systematic naturalist, of the geometrician. In Linnaeus
+and Cuvier the intuitive element predominates;
+in Gauss, the analytical element.</p>
+
+<p>The combining imagination joined to the inductive
+spirit constitutes "the talent for invention strictly
+so-called," in industry, in the technique of science;
+it gives the artist and the poet the power of composing
+their works.</p>
+
+<p>The combining imagination plus the deductive
+spirit gives the speculative talent of the mathematician
+and philosopher; deduction predominates in
+the former, imagination in the latter.<a name="FNanchor_78_78" id="FNanchor_78_78"></a><a href="#Footnote_78_78" class="fnanchor">[78]</a></p>
+
+<div class="footnotes"><h3>FOOTNOTES:</h3>
+
+<div class="footnote"><p><a name="Footnote_78_78" id="Footnote_78_78"></a><a href="#FNanchor_78_78"><span class="label">[78]</span></a> Wundt, <i>Physiologische Psychologie</i>, 4th German edition,
+Vol. II, pp. 490-95.</p></div>
+</div>
+
+
+<hr style="width: 65%;" /><p><span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_184" id="Page_184">[184]</a></span></p>
+<h2>CHAPTER I</h2>
+
+<h3>THE PLASTIC IMAGINATION</h3>
+
+
+<h3>I</h3>
+
+<p>By "plastic imagination" I understand that which
+has for its special characters clearness and precision
+of form; more explicitly those forms whose materials
+are clear images (whatever be their nature),
+approaching perception, giving the impression of
+reality; in which, too, there predominate <i>associations
+with objective relations</i>, determinable with precision.
+The plastic mark, therefore, is in the images, and in
+the modes of association of images. In somewhat
+rough terms, requiring modifications which the
+reader himself can make, it is the imagination that
+materializes.</p>
+
+<p>Between perception&mdash;a very complex synthesis of
+qualities, attributes and relations&mdash;and conception&mdash;which
+is only the consciousness of a quality, quantity,
+or relation, often of only a single word accompanied
+by vague outlines and a latent, potential
+knowledge; between concrete and abstract, the
+image occupies an intermediate position and can run
+from one pole to another, now full of reality, now<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_185" id="Page_185">[185]</a></span>
+almost as poor and pale as a concept. The representation
+here styled plastic descends towards its
+point of origin; it is an external imagination, arising
+from sensation rather than from feeling and needing
+to become objective.</p>
+
+<p>Thus its general characters are easy of determination.
+First and foremost, it makes use of visual
+images; then of motor images; lastly, in practical
+invention, of tactile images. In a word, the three
+groups of images present to a great extent the
+character of externality and objectivity. The clearness
+of form of these three groups proceeds from
+their origin, because they arise from sensation well
+determined in space&mdash;sight, movement, touch. Plastic
+imagination depends most on spatial conditions.
+We shall see that its opposite, diffluent imagination,
+is that which depends least upon that factor, or is
+most free from it. Among these naturally objective
+elements the plastic imagination chooses the most
+objective, which fact gives its creations an air of
+reality and life.</p>
+
+<p>The second characteristic is inferiority of the affective
+element; it appears only intermittently and is
+entirely blotted out before sensory impression. This
+form of the creative imagination, coming especially
+from sensation, aims especially at sensation. Thus
+it is rather superficial, greatly devoid of that internal
+mark that comes from feeling.</p>
+
+<p>But if it chance that both sensory and affective
+elements are equal in power; if there is at the same
+time intense vision adequate to reality, and profound<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_186" id="Page_186">[186]</a></span>
+emotion, violent shock, then there arise extraordinary
+imaginative personages, like Shakespeare, Carlyle,
+Michelet. It is needless to describe this form
+of imagination, excellent pen-pictures of which have
+been given by the critics;<a name="FNanchor_79_79" id="FNanchor_79_79"></a><a href="#Footnote_79_79" class="fnanchor">[79]</a> let us merely note that its
+psychology reduces itself to an alternately ascending
+and descending movement between the two limiting
+points of perception and idea. The ascending process
+assigns to inanimate objects life, desires and feelings.
+Thus Michelet: "The great streams of the
+Netherlands, <i>tired</i> with their very long course, <i>perish</i>
+as though from <i>weariness</i> in the <i>unfeeling</i>
+ocean."<a name="FNanchor_80_80" id="FNanchor_80_80"></a><a href="#Footnote_80_80" class="fnanchor">[80]</a> Elsewhere, the great folio begets the octavo,
+"which becomes the parent of the small volume,
+of booklets, of ephemeral pamphlets, invisible
+spirits flying in the night, creating under the very
+eyes of tyrants the circulation of liberty." The descending
+process materializes abstractions, gives
+them body, makes them flesh and bone; the Middle<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_187" id="Page_187">[187]</a></span>
+Ages become "a poor child, torn from the bowels
+of Christianity, born amidst tears, grown up in
+prayer and revery, in anguish of heart, dying without
+achieving anything." In this dazzle of images
+there is a momentary return to primitive animism.</p>
+
+
+<h3>II</h3>
+
+<p>In order to more fully understand the plastic imagination,
+let us take up its principal manifestations.</p>
+
+<p>1. First, the arts dealing with form, where its
+necessity is evident. The sculptor, painter, architect,
+must have visual and tactile-motor images; it
+is the material in which their creations are wrapped
+up. Even leaving out the striking acts requiring
+such a sure and tenacious external vision (portraits
+executed from memory, exact remembrance of faces
+at the end of twenty years, as in the case of Gavarni,
+etc.<a name="FNanchor_81_81" id="FNanchor_81_81"></a><a href="#Footnote_81_81" class="fnanchor">[81]</a>), and limiting ourselves merely to the
+usual, the plastic arts demand an observant imagination.
+For the majority of men the concrete image
+of a face, a form, a color, usually remains vague and
+fleeting; "red, blue, black, white, tree, animal, head,
+mouth, arm, etc., are scarcely more than words, symbols
+expressing a rough synthesis. For the painter,
+on the other hand, images have a very high precision
+of details, and what he sees beneath the words or
+in real objects are analyzed facts, positive elements
+of perception and movement."<a name="FNanchor_82_82" id="FNanchor_82_82"></a><a href="#Footnote_82_82" class="fnanchor">[82]</a></p>
+
+<p><span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_188" id="Page_188">[188]</a></span></p><p>The r&ocirc;le of tactile-motor images is not insignificant.
+There has often been cited the instance of
+sculptors who, becoming blind, have nevertheless
+been able to fashion busts of close resemblance to
+the original. This is memory of touch and of the
+muscular sense, entirely equivalent to the visual
+memory of the portrait painters mentioned above.
+Practical knowledge of design and modeling&mdash;i.e.,
+of contour and relief&mdash;though resulting from natural
+or acquired disposition, depends on cerebral
+conditions, the development of definite sensory-motor
+regions and their connections; and on psychological
+conditions&mdash;the acquisition and organization
+of appropriate images. "We learn to paint and
+carve," wrote a contemporary painter, "as we do
+sewing, embroidery, sawing, filing and turning."
+In short, like all manual labor requiring associated
+and combined acts.</p>
+
+<p>2. Another form of plastic imagination uses
+words as means for evoking vivid and clear impressions
+of sight, touch, movement; it is the poetic or
+literary form. Of it we find in Victor Hugo a finished
+type. As all know, we need only open his
+works at hazard to find a stream of glittering images.
+But what is their nature? His recent biographers,
+guided by contemporary psychology, have well
+shown that they always paint scenes or movements.
+It is unnecessary to give proofs. Some facts have
+a broader range and throw light upon his psychology.
+Thus we are told that "he never dictates or
+rhymes from memory and composes only in writing,
+<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_189" id="Page_189">[189]</a></span>for he believes that writing has its own features,
+and he wants to <i>see the words</i>. Th&eacute;ophile Gautier,
+who knows and understands him so well, says: 'I
+also believe that in the sentence we need most of all
+an <i>ocular</i> rhythm. A book is made to be read, not
+to be spoken aloud.'" It is added that "Victor Hugo
+never spoke his verses but wrote them out and
+would often illustrate them on the margin, as if he
+needed to fixate the image in order to find the appropriate
+word."<a name="FNanchor_83_83" id="FNanchor_83_83"></a><a href="#Footnote_83_83" class="fnanchor">[83]</a></p>
+
+<p>After visual representations come those of movement:
+the steeple <i>pierces</i> the horizon, the mountain
+<i>rends</i> the cloud, the mountain <i>raises himself</i> and
+looks about, "the cold caverns open their mouths
+<i>drowsily</i>," the wind lashes the rock into tears with
+the waterfall, the thorn is an enraged plant, and so
+on indefinitely.</p>
+
+<p>A more curious fact is the transposition of sonorous
+sensations or images of sound, and like them
+without form or figure, into visual and motor
+images: "The <i>ruffles</i> of sound that the fifer cuts out;
+the flute <i>goes up</i> to alto like a frail capital on a column."
+This thoroughly plastic imagination remains
+identical with itself while reducing everything
+spontaneously, unconsciously, to spatial terms.</p>
+
+<p>In literature this altogether foreign mode of creative
+<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_190" id="Page_190">[190]</a></span>activity has found its most complete expression
+among the <i>Parnassiens</i> and their congeners, whose
+creed is summed up in the formula, faultless form
+and impassiveness. Th&eacute;ophile Gautier claims that "a
+poet, no matter what may be said of him, is a <i>workman</i>;
+it is not necessary that he have more intelligence
+than a laborer and have knowledge of a state
+other than his own, without which he does badly.
+I regard as perfectly absurd the mania that people
+have of hoisting them (the poets) up onto an ideal
+pedestal; <i>nothing is less ideal than a poet</i>. For
+him words have in themselves and outside the
+meaning they express, their own beauty and value,
+just like precious stones not yet cut and mounted in
+bracelets, necklaces and rings; they charm the understanding
+that looks at them and takes them from
+the finger to the little pile where they are put aside
+for future use." If this statement, whether sincere
+or not, is taken literally, I see no longer any difference,
+save as regards the materials employed, between
+the imagination of poets and the imagination
+active in the mechanical arts. For the usefulness
+of the one and the "uselessness" of the other is a
+characteristic foreign to invention itself.</p>
+
+<p>3. In the teeming mass of myths and religious
+conceptions that the nineteenth century has gathered
+with so much care we could establish various classifications&mdash;according
+to race, content, intellectual
+level; and, in a more artificial manner but one suitable
+for our subject, according to the degree of
+precision or fluidity.<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_191" id="Page_191">[191]</a></span></p>
+
+<p>Neglecting intermediate forms, we may, indeed,
+divide them into two groups; some are clear in outline,
+are consistent, relatively logical, resembling
+a definite historical relation; others are vague, multiform,
+incoherent, contradictory; their characters
+change into one another, the tales are mixed and are
+imperceptible in the whole.</p>
+
+<p>The former types are the work of the plastic
+imagination. Such are, if we eliminate oriental influences,
+most of the myths belonging to Greece
+when, on emerging from the earliest period, they
+attained their definite constitution. It has been held
+that the plastic character of these religious conceptions
+is an effect of esthetic development: statues,
+bas-reliefs, poetry, and even painting, have made
+definite the attributes of the gods and their history.
+Without denying this influence we must nevertheless
+understand that it is only auxiliary. To those who
+would challenge this opinion let us recall that the
+Hindoos have had gigantic poems, have covered
+their temples with numberless sculptures, and yet
+their fluid mythology is the opposite of the Greek.
+Among the peoples who have incarnated their divinities
+in no statue, in no human or animal form, we
+find the Germans and the Celts. But the mythology
+of the former is clear, well kept within large lines;
+that of the latter is fleeting and inconsistent&mdash;the
+despair of scholars.<a name="FNanchor_84_84" id="FNanchor_84_84"></a><a href="#Footnote_84_84" class="fnanchor">[84]</a></p>
+<p><span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_192" id="Page_192">[192]</a></span></p>
+<p>It is, then, certain that myths of the plastic kind
+are the fruits of an innate quality of mind, of a
+mode of feeling and of translating, at a given moment
+in its history, the preponderating characters
+of a race; in short, of a form of imagination and
+ultimately of a special cerebral structure.</p>
+
+<p>4. The most complete manifestation of the plastic
+imagination is met with in mechanical invention
+and what is allied thereto, in consequence of the need
+of very exact representations of qualities and relations.
+But this is a specialized form, and, as its importance
+has been too often misunderstood, it deserves
+a separate study. (See Chapter V, <i>infra</i>.)</p>
+
+
+<h3>III</h3>
+
+<p>Such are the principal traits of this type of imagination:
+clearness of outline, both of the whole and
+of the details. It is not identical with the form
+called realistic&mdash;it is more comprehensive; it is a
+genus of which "realism" is a species. Moreover,
+the latter expression being reserved by custom for
+esthetic creation, I purposely digress in order to
+dwell on this point: that the esthetic imagination
+has no essential character belonging exclusively to
+it, and that it differs from other forms (scientific,
+mechanical, etc.) only in its materials and in its
+end, not in its primary nature.</p>
+
+<p>On the whole, the plastic imagination could be
+summed up in the expression, <i>clearness in complexity</i>.<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_193" id="Page_193">[193]</a></span>
+It always preserves the mark of its original
+source&mdash;i.e., in the creator and those disposed to
+enjoy and understand him it tends to approach the
+clearness of perception.</p>
+
+<p>Would it be improper to consider as a variety of
+the genus a mode of representation that could be
+expressed as <i>clearness in simplicity</i>? It is the dry
+and rational imagination. Without depreciating it
+we may say that it is rather a condition of imaginative
+poverty. We hold with Fouill&eacute;e that the
+average Frenchman furnishes a good example of it.
+"The Frenchman," says he, "does not usually have
+a very strong imagination. His internal vision has
+neither the hallucinative intensity nor the exuberant
+fancy of the German and Anglo-Saxon mind; it is an
+intellectual and distant view rather than a sensitive
+resurrection or an immediate contact with, and possession
+of, the things themselves. Inclined to deduce
+and construct, our intellect excels less in representing
+to itself real things than in discovering
+relations between possible or necessary things. In
+other words, it is a logical and combining imagination
+that takes pleasure in what has been termed
+the abstract view of life. The Chateaubriands,
+Hugos, Flauberts, Zolas, are exceptional with us.
+We reason more than we imagine."<a name="FNanchor_85_85" id="FNanchor_85_85"></a><a href="#Footnote_85_85" class="fnanchor">[85]</a></p>
+
+<p>Its psychological constitution is reducible to two
+elements: slightly concrete images, <i>schemas</i> approaching
+general ideas; for their association, relations
+predominantly rational, more the products of<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_194" id="Page_194">[194]</a></span> the logic of the intellect than of the logic of the
+feelings. It lacks the sudden, violent shock of emotion
+that gives brilliancy to images, making them
+arise and grouping them in unforeseen combinations.
+It is a form of invention and construction that is
+more the work of reason than of imagination
+proper.</p>
+
+<p>Consequently, is it not paradoxical to relate it to
+plastic imagination, as species to genus? It would
+be idle to enter upon a discussion of the subject
+here without attempting a classification; let us
+merely note the likenesses and differences. Both are
+above all objective&mdash;the first, because it is sensory;
+the other, because it is rational. Both make use of
+analogous modes of association, dependent more on
+the nature of things than on the personal impression
+of the subject. Opposition exists only on one point:
+the former is made up of vivid images that approach
+perception; the latter is made up of internal images
+bordering upon concepts. Rational imagination is
+plastic imagination desiccated and simplified.</p>
+
+<div class="footnotes"><h3>FOOTNOTES:</h3>
+
+<div class="footnote"><p><a name="Footnote_79_79" id="Footnote_79_79"></a><a href="#FNanchor_79_79"><span class="label">[79]</span></a> Thus Taine says of Carlyle: "He cannot stick to simple
+expression; at every step he drops into figures, gives body to
+every idea, must touch forms. We see that he is possessed and
+haunted by glittering or saddening visions; in him every
+thought is an explosion; a flood of seething passion reaches
+the boiling-point in his brain, which overflows, and the torrent
+of images runs over the banks and rushes with all its mud and
+all its splendor. He cannot reason, he must paint." Despite
+the vigor of this sketch, the perusal of ten pages of <i>Sartor
+Resartus</i> or of the <i>French Revolution</i> teaches more in regard
+to the nature of this imagination than all the commentaries.</p></div>
+
+<div class="footnote"><p><a name="Footnote_80_80" id="Footnote_80_80"></a><a href="#FNanchor_80_80"><span class="label">[80]</span></a> For a point of view in criticism that has seemed correct to
+many on this matter, compare the well-known chapter on the
+"Pathetic Fallacy" by Ruskin, in his <i>Modern Painters</i>. (Tr.)</p></div>
+
+<div class="footnote"><p><a name="Footnote_81_81" id="Footnote_81_81"></a><a href="#FNanchor_81_81"><span class="label">[81]</span></a> Arr&eacute;at (<i>Psychologie du peintre</i>, pp. 62 ff.) gives a large
+number of examples of this.</p></div>
+
+<div class="footnote"><p><a name="Footnote_82_82" id="Footnote_82_82"></a><a href="#FNanchor_82_82"><span class="label">[82]</span></a> <i>Ibid.</i>, p. 115.</p></div>
+
+<div class="footnote"><p><a name="Footnote_83_83" id="Footnote_83_83"></a><a href="#FNanchor_83_83"><span class="label">[83]</span></a> For further details on this point, consult Mabilleau, <i>Victor
+Hugo</i>, 2nd part, chaps. II, III, IV.&mdash;Renouvier, in the book
+devoted to the poet, asserts that "on account of his aptitude
+for representing to himself the details of a figure, order and
+position in space, beyond any present sensation," Victor Hugo
+could have become a mathematician of the highest order.</p></div>
+
+<div class="footnote"><p><a name="Footnote_84_84" id="Footnote_84_84"></a><a href="#FNanchor_84_84"><span class="label">[84]</span></a> As bearing out the position of the author, we may also call
+attention to the fact that while the Hebrew race has had very
+slight development in the plastic arts, yet its mythology has
+always taken a very definite form, even when dealing with the
+vaguest and most abstract subjects. (Tr.)</p></div>
+
+<div class="footnote"><p><a name="Footnote_85_85" id="Footnote_85_85"></a><a href="#FNanchor_85_85"><span class="label">[85]</span></a> Fouill&eacute;e, <i>Psychologie du peuple fran&ccedil;ais</i>, p. 185.</p></div>
+</div>
+
+
+<hr style="width: 65%;" /><p><span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_195" id="Page_195">[195]</a></span></p>
+<h2>CHAPTER II</h2>
+
+<h3>THE DIFFLUENT IMAGINATION</h3>
+
+
+<h3>I</h3>
+
+<p>The diffluent imagination is another general form,
+but one that is completely opposed to the foregoing.
+It consists of vaguely-outlined, indistinct images
+that are evoked and joined according to the least
+rigorous modes of association. It presents, then,
+two things for our consideration&mdash;the nature of the
+images and of their associations.</p>
+
+<p>(1) It employs neither the clear-cut, concrete,
+reality-penetrated images of the plastic imagination,
+nor the semi-schematic representations of the rational
+imagination, but those midway in that ascending
+and descending scale extending from perception
+to conception. This determination, however,
+is insufficient, and we can make it more precise.
+Analysis, indeed, discovers a certain class of
+ill-understood images, which I call emotional abstractions,
+and which are the proper material for
+the diffluent imagination. These images are reduced
+to certain qualities or attributes of things,
+taking the place of the whole, and chosen from<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_196" id="Page_196">[196]</a></span>
+among the others for various reasons, the origin of
+which is affective. We shall comprehend their nature
+better through the following comparison:</p>
+
+<p>Intellectual or rational abstraction results from
+the choice of a fundamental, or at least principal,
+character, which becomes the substitute for all the
+rest that is omitted. Thus, extension, resistance,
+or impenetrability, come to represent, through simplification
+and abbreviation, what we call "matter."</p>
+
+<p>Emotional abstraction, on the other hand, results
+from the permanent or temporary predominance of
+an emotional state. Some aspect of a thing, essential
+or not, comes into relief, solely because it is in
+direct relation to the disposition of our sensibility,
+with no other preoccupation; a quality, an attribute
+is spontaneously, arbitrarily selected because it impresses
+us at the given instant&mdash;in the final analysis,
+because it somehow pleases or displeases us. The
+images of this class have an "impressionist" mark.
+They are abstractions in the strict sense&mdash;i.e., extracts
+from and simplifications of the sensory data.
+They act less through a direct influence than by
+evoking, suggesting, whispering; they permit a
+glance, a passing glimpse: we may justly call them
+crepuscular or twilight ideas.</p>
+
+<p>(2) As for the forms of association, the relations
+linking these images, they do not depend so much
+on the order and connections of things as on the
+changing dispositions of the mind. They have a
+very marked subjective character. Some depend on
+the intellectual factor; the most usual are based on<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_197" id="Page_197">[197]</a></span>
+chance, on distant and vacillating analogies&mdash;further
+down, even on assonance and alliteration.
+Others depend on the affective factor and are ruled
+by the disposition of the moment: association by
+contrast, especially those alike in emotional basis,
+which have been previously studied. (First Part,
+<a href="#Page_31">Chapter II</a>.)</p>
+
+<p>Thus the diffluent imagination is, trait for trait,
+the opposite of the plastic imagination. It has a
+general character of inwardness because it arises
+less from sensation than from feeling, often from a
+simple and fugitive impression. Its creations have
+not the organic character of the other, lacking a
+stable center of attraction; but they act by diffusion
+and inclusion.</p>
+
+
+<h3>II</h3>
+
+<p>By its very nature it is <i>de jure</i>, if not <i>de facto</i>,
+excluded from certain territories&mdash;if it ventures
+therein it produces only abortions. This is true of
+the practical sphere, which permits neither vague
+images nor approximate constructions; and of the
+scientific world, where the imagination may be used
+only to create a theory or invent processes of discovery
+(experiments, schemes of reasoning). Even
+with these exceptions there is still left for it a very
+wide range.</p>
+
+<p>Let us rapidly pass over some very frequent, very
+well-known manifestations of the diffluent imagination&mdash;those
+obliterated forms in which it does not<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_198" id="Page_198">[198]</a></span>
+reach complete development and cannot give the
+full measure of its power.</p>
+
+<p>(1) Revery and related states. This is perhaps
+the purest specimen of the kind, but it remains
+embryonic.</p>
+
+<p>(2) The romantic turn of mind. This is seen in
+those who, confronted by any event whatever or an
+unknown person, make up, spontaneously, involuntarily,
+in spite of themselves, a story out of whole
+cloth. I shall later give examples of it according
+to the written testimony of several people.<a name="FNanchor_86_86" id="FNanchor_86_86"></a><a href="#Footnote_86_86" class="fnanchor">[86]</a> In
+whatever concerns themselves or others they create
+an imagined world, which they substitute for the
+real.</p>
+
+<p>(3) The fantastic mind. Here we come away
+from the vague forms; the diffluent imagination becomes
+substantial and asserts itself through its permanence.
+At bottom this fantastic form is the romantic
+spirit tending toward objectification. The
+invention, which was at first only a thoroughly internal
+construction and recognized as such, aspires
+to become external, to become realized, and when
+it ventures into a world other than its own, one requiring
+the rigorous conditions of the practical
+imagination, it is wrecked, or succeeds only through
+chance, and that very rarely. To this class belong
+those inventors, known to everyone, who are fertile
+in methods of enriching themselves or their country
+by means of agricultural, mining, industrial or commercial
+enterprises; the makers of the utopias of<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_199" id="Page_199">[199]</a></span>
+finance, politics, society, etc. It is a form of imagination
+unnaturally oriented toward the practical.<a name="FNanchor_87_87" id="FNanchor_87_87"></a><a href="#Footnote_87_87" class="fnanchor">[87]</a></p>
+
+<p>(4) The list increases with myths and religious
+conceptions; the imagination in its diffuse form here
+finds itself on its own ground.</p>
+
+<p>Depending on linguistics, it has recently been
+maintained that, among the Aryans at least, the
+imagination created at first only momentary gods
+(<i>Augenblicksg&ouml;tter</i>).<a name="FNanchor_88_88" id="FNanchor_88_88"></a><a href="#Footnote_88_88" class="fnanchor">[88]</a> Every time that primitive
+man, in the presence of a phenomenon, experienced
+a perceptible emotion, he translated it by a name,
+the manifestation of what was imagined the divine
+part in the emotion felt. "Every religious emotion
+gives rise to a new name&mdash;i.e., a new divinity. But
+the religious imagination is never identical with itself;
+though produced by the same phenomenon, it
+translates itself, at two different moments, by two
+different words." As a consequence, "during the
+early periods of the human race, religious names
+must have been applied not to <i>classes</i> of beings or
+events but to <i>individual</i> beings or events. Before<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_200" id="Page_200">[200]</a></span>
+worshipping the comet or the fig-tree, men must
+have worshiped each one of the comets they beheld
+crossing the sky, every one of the fig-trees that their
+eyes saw." Later, with advancing capacity for generalization,
+these "instantaneous" divinities would
+be condensed into more consistent gods. If this
+hypothesis, which has aroused many criticisms,
+be sound&mdash;if this state were met with&mdash;it would be
+the ideal type of imaginative instability in the religious
+order.</p>
+
+<p>Nearer to us, authentic evidence shows that certain
+peoples, at given stages of their history, have
+created such vague, fluid myths, that we cannot
+succeed in delimiting them. Every god can change
+himself into another, different, or even opposite,
+one. The Semitic religions might furnish examples
+of this. There has been established the identity of
+Istar, Astarte, Tanit, Baalath, Derketo, Mylitta,
+Aschera, and still others. But it is in the early
+religion of the Hindoos that we perceive best this
+kaleidoscopic process applied to divine beings. In
+the vedic hymns not only are the clouds now serpents,
+now cows and later fortresses (the retreats of
+dark Asuras), but we see Agni (fire) becoming
+Kama (desire or love), and Indra becoming
+Varuna, and so on. "We cannot imagine," says
+Taine, "such a great clearness. The myth here is
+not a disguise, but an expression; no language is
+more true and more supple. It permits a glimpse
+of, or rather, it causes us to discern the forms of
+clouds, movements of the air, changes of seasons,<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_201" id="Page_201">[201]</a></span>
+all the happenings of sky, fire, storm: external
+nature has never met a mind so impressionable and
+pliant in which to mirror itself in all the inexhaustible
+variety of its appearances. However changeable
+nature may be, this imagination corresponds to
+it. It has no fixed gods; they are changeable like
+the things themselves; they blend one into another.
+Everyone of them is in turn the supreme deity; no
+one of them is a distinct personality; everyone is
+only a moment of nature, able, according to the
+apperception of the moment, to include its neighbor
+or be included by it. In this fashion they swarm
+and teem. Every moment of nature and every
+apperceptive moment may furnish one of them."<a name="FNanchor_89_89" id="FNanchor_89_89"></a><a href="#Footnote_89_89" class="fnanchor">[89]</a>
+Let us, indeed, note that, for the worshiper, the
+god to whom he addresses himself and while he is
+praying, is always the greatest and most powerful.
+The assignment of attributes passes suddenly from
+one to the other, regardless of contradiction. In
+this versatility some writers believe they have discovered
+a vague pantheistic conception. Nothing is
+more questionable, fundamentally, than this interpretation.
+It is more in harmony with the psychology
+of these na&iuml;ve minds to assume simply an
+extreme state of "impressionism," explicable by the
+logic of feeling.</p>
+
+<p>Thus, there is a complete antithesis between the
+imagination that has created the clear-cut and
+definite polytheism of the Greeks and that whence
+have issued those fluctuating divinities that allow<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_202" id="Page_202">[202]</a></span>
+the presentation of the future doctrine of <i>M&acirc;ya</i>, of
+universal illusion&mdash;another more refined form of
+the diffluent imagination. Finally, let us note that
+the Hellenic imagination realized its gods through
+anthropomorphism&mdash;they are the ideal forms of
+human attributes<a name="FNanchor_90_90" id="FNanchor_90_90"></a><a href="#Footnote_90_90" class="fnanchor">[90]</a>&mdash;majesty, beauty, power, wisdom,
+etc. The Hindoo imagination proceeds
+through symbolism: its divinities have several
+heads, several arms, several legs, to symbolize
+limitless intelligence, power, etc.; or better still,
+animal forms, as e.g., Ganesa, the god of wisdom,
+with the head of the elephant, reputed the wisest
+of animals.</p>
+
+<p>(5) It would be easy to show by the history of
+literature and the fine arts that the vague forms
+have been preferred according to peoples, times, and
+places. Let us limit ourselves to a single contemporary
+example that is complete and systematically
+created&mdash;the art of the "symbolists." It is not here
+a question of criticism, of praise, or even of appreciation,
+but merely of a consideration of it as a
+psychological fact likely to instruct us in regard to
+the nature of the diffluent imagination.</p>
+
+<p>This form of art despises the clear and exact
+representation of the outer world: it replaces it by
+a sort of music that aspires to express the changing
+and fleeting inwardness of the human soul. It is
+the school of the subject "who wants to know only
+mental states." To that end, it makes use of a<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_203" id="Page_203">[203]</a></span>
+natural or artificial lack of precision: everything
+floats in a dream, men as well as things, often without
+mark in time and space. Something happens,
+one knows not where or when; it belongs to no
+country, is of no period in time: it is <i>the</i> forest,
+<i>the</i> traveler, <i>the</i> city, <i>the</i> knight, <i>the</i> wood; less
+frequently, even <i>He</i>, <i>She</i>, <i>It</i>. In short, all the
+vague and unstable characters of the pure, content-less
+affective state. This process of "suggestion"
+sometimes succeeds, sometimes fails.</p>
+
+<p>The word is the sign <i>par excellence</i>. As, according
+to the symbolists, it should give us emotions
+rather than representations, it is necessary that it
+lose, partially, its intellectual function and undergo
+a new adaptation.</p>
+
+<p>A principal process consists of employing usual
+words and changing their ordinary acceptation, or
+rather, associating them in such a way that they
+lose their precise meaning, and appear vague and
+mysterious: these are the words "written in the
+depths." The writers do not name&mdash;they leave it
+for us to infer. "They banish commonplaces
+through lack of precision, and leave to things only
+the power of moving." A rose is not described by
+the particular sensations that it causes, but by the
+general condition that it excites.</p>
+
+<p>Another method is the employment of new words
+or words that have fallen into disuse. Ordinary
+words retain, in spite of everything, somewhat of
+their customary meaning, associations and thoughts
+condensed in them through long habit; words forgotten
+<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_204" id="Page_204">[204]</a></span>during four or five centuries escape this condition&mdash;they
+are coins without fixed value.</p>
+
+<p>Lastly, a still more radical method is the attempt
+to give to words an exclusively emotional valuation.
+Unconsciously or as the result of reflection some
+symbolists have come to this extreme trial, which
+the logic of events imposed upon them. Ordinarily,
+thought expresses itself in words; feeling, in gestures,
+cries, interjections, change of tone: it finds
+its complete and classic expression in music. The
+symbolists want to transfer the r&ocirc;le of sound to
+words, to make of them the instrument for translating
+and suggesting emotion through sound alone:
+words have to act not as signs but as sounds: they
+are "musical notes in the service of an impassioned
+psychology."</p>
+
+<p>All this, indeed, concerns only imagination expressing
+itself in words; but we know that the
+symbolic school has applied itself to the plastic arts,
+to treat them in its own way. The difference, however,
+is in the vesture that the esthetic ideal assumes.
+The pre-Raphaelites have attempted, by effacing
+forms, outlines, semblances, colors, "to cause things
+to appear as mere sources of emotion," in a word, to
+<i>paint</i> emotions.</p>
+
+<p>To sum up&mdash;In this form of the diffluent imagination
+the emotional factor exercises supreme
+authority.</p>
+
+<p>May the type of imagination, the chief manifestations
+of which we have just enumerated, be considered
+as identical with the idealistic imagination?<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_205" id="Page_205">[205]</a></span>
+This question is similar to that asked in the preceding
+chapter, and permits the same answer. In
+idealistic art, doubtless, the material element furnished
+in perception (form, color, touch, effort) is
+minimized, subtilized, sublimated, refined, so as to
+approach as nearly as possible to a purely internal
+state. By the nature of its favorite images, by its
+preference for vague associations and uncertain
+relations, it presents all the characteristics of diffluent
+imagination; but the latter covers a much
+broader field: it is the genus of which the other is
+a species. Thus, it would be erroneous to regard
+the fantastic imagination as idealistic; it has no
+claim to the term: on the contrary, it believes itself
+adapted for practical work and acts in that direction.</p>
+
+<p>In addition, it must be recognized that were we
+to make a complete review of all the forms of
+esthetic creation, we should frequently be embarrassed
+to classify them, because there are among
+them, as in the case of characters, mixed or composite
+forms. Here, for example, are two kinds
+seemingly belonging to the diffluent imagination
+which, however, do not permit it to completely
+include them.</p>
+
+<p>(a) The "wonder" class (fairy-tales, the Thousand
+and One Nights, romances of chivalry,
+Ariosto's poem, etc.) is a survival of the mythic
+epoch, when the imagination is given free play
+without control or check; whereas, in the course of
+centuries, art&mdash;and especially literary creation<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_206" id="Page_206">[206]</a></span>&mdash;becomes,
+as we have already said, a decadent and
+rationalized mythology. This form of invention
+consists neither of idealizing the external world,
+nor reproducing it with the minuteness of realism,
+but <i>remaking</i> the universe to suit oneself, without
+taking into account natural laws, and despising the
+impossible: it is a liberated realism. Often, in an
+environment of pure fancy, where only caprice
+reigns, the characters appear clear, well-fashioned,
+living. The "wonder" class belongs, then, to the
+vague as well as to the plastic imagination; more
+or less to one or to the other, according to the
+temperament of the creator.</p>
+
+<p>(b) The fantastic class develops under the same
+conditions. Its chiefs (Hoffmann, Poe, <i>et al.</i>) are
+classed by critics as realists. They are such by
+virtue of their vision, intensified to hallucination,
+the precision in details, the rigorous logic of characters
+and events: they rationalize the improbable.<a name="FNanchor_91_91" id="FNanchor_91_91"></a><a href="#Footnote_91_91" class="fnanchor">[91]</a>
+On the other hand, the environment is strange,
+shrouded in mystery: men and things move in an
+unreal atmosphere, where one feels rather than perceives.
+It is thus proper to remark that this class
+easily glides into the deeply sad, the horrible, terrifying,
+nightmare-producing, "satanic literature;"
+Goya's paintings of robbers and thieves being garroted;
+Wiertz, a genius bizarre to the point of<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_207" id="Page_207">[207]</a></span>
+extravagance, who paints only suicides or the heads
+of guillotined criminals.</p>
+
+<p>Religious conceptions could also furnish a fine lot
+of examples: Dante's <i>Inferno</i>, the twenty-eight
+hells of Buddhism, which are perhaps the masterpieces
+of this class, etc. But all this belongs to
+another division of our subject, one that I have
+expressly eliminated from this essay&mdash;the pathology
+of the creative imagination.</p>
+
+
+<h3>III</h3>
+
+<p>There yet remains for us to study two important
+varieties that I connect with the diffluent imagination.</p>
+
+<p class='center'><span class="smcap">Numerical Imagination</span></p>
+
+<p>Under this head I designate the imagination that
+takes pleasure in the unlimited&mdash;in infinity of time
+and space&mdash;under the form of number. It seems
+at first that these two terms&mdash;imagination and
+number&mdash;must be mutually exclusive. Every number
+is precise, rigorously determined, since we can
+always reduce it to a relation with unity; it owes
+nothing to fancy. But the <i>series</i> of numbers is
+unlimited in two directions: starting from any term
+in the series, we may go on ever increasingly or
+ever decreasingly. The working of the mind gives
+rise to a possible infinity that is limitless: it thus
+traces a route for the movement of the imagination.
+The number, or rather the series of numbers, is less
+an object than a vehicle.<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_208" id="Page_208">[208]</a></span></p>
+
+<p>This form of imagination is produced in two
+principal ways&mdash;in religious conceptions and cosmogonies,
+and in science.</p>
+
+<p>(1) Numerical imagination has nowhere been
+more exuberant than among the peoples of the
+Orient. They have played with number with magnificent
+audacity and prodigality. Chaldean cosmogony
+relates that <i>Oannes</i>, the Fish-god, devoted
+259,200 years to the education of mankind, then
+came a period of 432,000 years taken up with the
+reigns of mythical personages, and at the end of
+these 691,000 years, the deluge renewed the face
+of the earth. The Egyptians, also, were liberal with
+millions of years, and in the face of the brief and
+limited chronology of the Greeks (another kind of
+imagination) were wont to exclaim, "You, O
+Greeks, you are only children!" But the Hindoos
+have done better than all that. They have invented
+enormous units to serve as basis and content for
+their numerical fancies: the <i>Koti</i>, equivalent to ten
+millions; the <i>Kalpa</i> (or the age of the world between
+two destructions), 4,328,000,000 years.
+Each <i>Kalpa</i> is merely one of 365 days of divine
+life: I leave to the reader, if he is so inclined, the
+work of calculating this appalling number. The
+Djanas divide time into two periods, one ascending,
+the other descending: each is of fabulous duration,
+2,000,000,000,000,000 oceans of years; each ocean
+being itself equivalent to 1,000,000,000,000,000
+years. "If there were a lofty rock, sixteen miles in
+each dimension, and one touched it once in a hundred
+<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_209" id="Page_209">[209]</a></span>years with a bit of the finest Benares linen, it
+would be reduced to the size of a wango-stone
+before a fourth of one of these <i>Kalpas</i> had rolled
+by." In the sacred books of Buddhism, poor, dry,
+colorless, as they ordinarily are, imagination in its
+numerical forms is triumphant. The <i>Lalitavistara</i>
+is full of nomenclatures and enumerations of fatiguing
+monotony: Buddha is seated on a rock shaded
+by 100,000 parasols, surrounded by minor gods
+forming an assemblage of 68,000 <i>Kotis</i> (i.e., 680,000,000
+persons), and&mdash;this surpasses all the rest&mdash;"he
+had experienced many vicissitudes during
+10,100,000,000 <i>Kalpas</i>." This makes one dizzy.</p>
+
+<p>(2) Numerical imagination in the sciences does
+not take on these delirious forms; it has the advantage
+of resting on an objective basis: it is the
+substitute of an unrepresentable reality. Scientific
+culture, which people often accuse of stifling imagination,
+on the contrary opens to it a field much
+vaster than esthetics. Astronomy delights in infinitudes
+of time and space: it sees worlds arise, burn
+at first with the feeble light of a nebular mass, glow
+like suns, become chilled, covered with spots, and
+then become condensed. Geology follows the development
+of our earth through upheavals and cataclysms:
+it foresees a distant future when our globe,
+deprived of the atmospheric vapors that protect it,
+will perish of cold. The hypotheses of physics and
+chemistry in regard to atoms and molecules are not
+less reckless than the speculations of the Hindoo
+imagination. "Physicists have determined the volume
+<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_210" id="Page_210">[210]</a></span>of a molecule, and referring to the numbers
+that they give, we find that a cube, a millimeter
+each way (scarcely the volume of a silkworm's
+egg), would contain a number of molecules at least
+equal to the cube of 10,000,000&mdash;i.e., unity followed
+by twenty-one zeros. One scientist has calculated
+that if one had to count them and could
+separate in thought a million per second, it would
+take more than 250,000,000 years: the being who
+commenced the task at the time that our solar
+system could have been no more than a formless
+nebula, would not yet have reached the end."<a name="FNanchor_92_92" id="FNanchor_92_92"></a><a href="#Footnote_92_92" class="fnanchor">[92]</a>
+Biology, with its protoplasmic elements, its plastids,
+gemmules, hypotheses on hereditary transmission
+by means of infinitesimal subdivisions; the theory
+of evolution, which speaks off-hand of periods of a
+hundred thousand years; and many other scientific
+theses that I omit, offer fine material for the numerical
+imagination.</p>
+
+<p>More than one scientist has even made use of this
+form of imagination for the pleasure of developing
+a purely fanciful notion. Thus Von Baer, supposing
+that we might perceive the portions of duration
+in another way, imagines the changes that would
+result therefrom in our outlook on nature: "Suppose
+we were able, within the length of a second, to
+note 10,000 events distinctly, instead of barely 10,
+as now; if our life were then destined to hold the
+same number of impressions, it might be 1,000 times<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_211" id="Page_211">[211]</a></span>
+as short. We should live less than a month, and
+personally know nothing of the change of seasons.
+If born in winter, we should believe in summer as
+we now believe in the heats of the Carboniferous
+era. The motions of organic beings would be so
+slow to our senses as to be inferred, not seen. The
+sun would stand still in the sky, the moon be almost
+free from change, and so on. But now reverse the
+hypothesis and suppose a being to get only one
+1,000th part of the sensations that we get in a given
+time, and consequently to live 1,000 times as long.
+Winters and summers will be to him like quarters
+of an hour. Mushrooms and the swifter-growing
+plants will shoot into being so rapidly as to appear
+instantaneous creations; annual shrubs will rise and
+fall from the earth like restlessly boiling water
+springs; the motions of animals will be as invisible
+as are to us the movements of bullets and cannonballs;
+the sun will scour through the sky like a
+meteor, leaving a fiery trail behind him, etc."<a name="FNanchor_93_93" id="FNanchor_93_93"></a><a href="#Footnote_93_93" class="fnanchor">[93]</a></p>
+
+<p>The psychologic conditions of this variety of the
+creative imagination are, then, these: Absence of
+limitation in time and space, whence the possibility
+of an endless movement in all directions, and the
+possibility of filling either with a myriad of dimly-perceived
+events. These events not being susceptible
+of clear representation as to their nature and
+quantity, escaping even a schematic representation,
+the imagination makes its constructions with substitutes
+that are, in this case, numbers.</p>
+
+
+<h3>IV</h3><p><span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_212" id="Page_212">[212]</a></span></p>
+
+<p class='center'><span class="smcap">Musical Imagination</span></p>
+
+<p>Musical imagination deserves a separate monograph.
+As the task requires, in addition to psychological
+capacity, a profound knowledge of musical
+history and technique, it cannot be undertaken here.
+I purpose only one thing, namely, to show that it
+has its own individual mark&mdash;that it is the type of
+affective imagination.</p>
+
+<p>I have elsewhere<a name="FNanchor_94_94" id="FNanchor_94_94"></a><a href="#Footnote_94_94" class="fnanchor">[94]</a> attempted to prove that, contrary
+to the general opinion of psychologists, there
+exists, in many men at least, an affective memory;
+that is, a memory of emotions strictly so called, and
+not merely of the intellectual conditions that caused
+and accompanied them. I hold that there exists
+also a form of the creative imagination that is
+purely emotional&mdash;the contents of which are wholly
+made up of states of mind, dispositions, wants, aspirations,
+feelings, and emotions of all kinds, and that
+it is the characteristic of the composer of genius, of
+the born musician.</p>
+
+<p>The musician sees in the world what concerns
+him. "He carries in his head a coherent system of
+tone-images, in which every element has its place
+and value; he perceives delicate differences of sound,
+of <i>timbre</i>; he succeeds, through exercise, in penetrating
+into their most varied combinations, and the
+knowledge of harmonious relations is for him what
+design and the knowledge of color are for the<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_213" id="Page_213">[213]</a></span>
+painter: intervals and harmony, rhythm and tone-qualities
+are, as it were, standards to which he
+relates his present perceptions and which he causes
+to enter into the marvelous constructions of his
+fancy."<a name="FNanchor_95_95" id="FNanchor_95_95"></a><a href="#Footnote_95_95" class="fnanchor">[95]</a></p>
+
+<p>These sound-elements and their combinations are
+the words of a special language that is very clear
+for some, impenetrable for others. People have
+spoken to a tiresome extent of the vagueness of
+musical expression; some have been pleased to hold
+that every one may interpret it in his own way. We
+must surely recognize that emotional language does
+not possess the precision of intellectual language;
+but in music it is the same as in any other idiom:
+there are those who do not understand at all; those
+who half understand and consequently always give
+wrong renderings; and those who understand well&mdash;and
+in this last category there are grades as varying
+as the aptitude for perceiving the delicate and subtle
+shades of speech.<a name="FNanchor_96_96" id="FNanchor_96_96"></a><a href="#Footnote_96_96" class="fnanchor">[96]</a></p>
+<p><span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_214" id="Page_214">[214]</a></span></p>
+<p>The materials necessary for this form of imaginative
+construction are gathered slowly. Many
+centuries passed between the early ages when man's
+voice and the simple instruments imitating it translated
+simple emotions, to the period when the efforts
+of antiquity and of the middle ages finally furnished
+the musical imagination with the means of expressing
+itself completely, and allowed complex and difficult
+constructions in sound. The development of
+music&mdash;slow and belated as compared to the other
+arts&mdash;has perhaps been due, in part at least, to the
+fact that the affective imagination, its chief province
+(imitative, descriptive, picturesque music being only
+an episode and accessory), being made up, contrary
+to sensorial imagination, of tenuous, subtle, fugitive
+states, has been long in seeking its methods of
+analysis and of expression. However it be, Bach
+and the contrapuntists, by their treatment in an
+independent manner of the different voices constituting
+harmony, have opened a new path. Henceforth
+melody will be able to develop and give rise
+to the richest combinations. We shall be able to
+associate various melodies, sing them at the same
+time, or in alternation, assign them to various instruments,
+vary indefinitely the pitch of singing and
+concerted voices. The boundless realm of musical
+combinations is open; it has been worth while to
+take the trouble to invent. Modern polyphony with
+its power of expressing at the same time different,
+even opposing, feelings is a marvelous instrument<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_215" id="Page_215">[215]</a></span>
+for a form of imagination which, alien to the forms
+clear-cut in space, moves only in time.</p>
+
+<p>What furnishes us the best entrance into the
+psychology of this form of imagination is the natural
+transposition operative in musicians. It consists
+in this: An external or internal impression,
+any occurrence whatever, even a metaphysical idea,
+undergoes change of a certain kind, which the following
+examples will make better understood than
+any amount of commentary.</p>
+
+<p>Beethoven said of Klopstock's <i>Messiah</i>, "always
+<i>maestoso</i>, written in <i>D flat major</i>." In his fourth
+symphony he expressed musically the destiny of
+Napoleon; in the ninth symphony he tries to give
+a proof of the existence of God. By the side of a
+dead friend, in a room draped in black, he improvises
+the <i>adagio</i> of the sonata in <i>C sharp minor</i>.
+The biographers of Mendelssohn relate analogous
+instances of transposition under musical form.
+During a storm that almost engulfed George Sand,
+Chopin, alone in the house, under the influence of
+his agony, and half unconsciously, composed one of
+his <i>Pr&eacute;ludes</i>. The case of Schumann is perhaps
+the most curious of all: "From the age of eight,
+he would amuse himself with sketching what might
+be called musical portraits, drawing by means of
+various turns of song and varied rhythms the shades
+of character, and even the physical peculiarities, of
+his young comrades. He sometimes succeeded in
+making such striking resemblances that all would<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_216" id="Page_216">[216]</a></span>
+recognize, with no further designation, the figure
+indicated by the skillful fingers that genius was
+already guiding." He said later: "I feel myself
+affected by all that goes on in the world&mdash;men,
+politics, literature; I reflect on all that in my own
+way and it issues outwards in the form of music.
+That is why many of my compositions are so hard
+to understand: they relate to events of distant
+interest, though important; but everything remarkable
+that is furnished me by the period I must
+express musically." Let us recall again that Weber
+interpreted in one of the finest scenes of his <i>Freysch&uuml;tz</i>
+(the bullet-casting scene) "a landscape that
+he had seen near the falls of Geroldsau, at the hour
+when the moon's rays cause the basin in which the
+water rushes and boils to glisten like silver."<a name="FNanchor_97_97" id="FNanchor_97_97"></a><a href="#Footnote_97_97" class="fnanchor">[97]</a> In
+short, the events go into the composer's brain, mix
+there, and come out changed into a musical structure.</p>
+
+<p>The plastic imagination furnishes us a counter-proof:
+it transposes inversely. The musical impression
+traverses the brain, sets it in turmoil, but
+comes out transformed into visual images. We
+have already cited examples from Victor Hugo (<a href="#Page_184">ch.
+I</a>); Goethe, we know, had poor musical gifts. After
+having the young Mendelssohn render an overture
+from Bach, he exclaimed, "How pompous and grand
+that is! It seems to me like a procession of grand<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_217" id="Page_217">[217]</a></span>
+personages, in gala attire, descending the steps of
+a gigantic staircase."</p>
+
+<p>We might generalize the question and ask
+whether or no there exists a natural antagonism
+between true musical imagination and plastic imagination.
+An answer in the affirmative seems scarcely
+liable to be challenged. I had undertaken an investigation
+which, at the outset, made for a different
+goal. It happens that it answered clearly enough
+the question propounded above: the conclusion has
+arisen of itself, unsought; which fact saves me from
+any charge of a preconceived opinion.</p>
+
+<p>The question asked orally of a large number of
+people was this: "Does hearing or even remembering
+a bit of <i>symphonic</i> music excite visual images
+in you and of what kind are they?" For self evident
+reasons dramatic music was expressly excluded:
+the appearance of the theater, stage, and
+scenery impose on the observer visual perceptions
+that have a tendency to be repeated later in the
+form of memories.</p>
+
+<p>The result of observation and of the collected
+answers are summed up as follows:</p>
+
+<p>Those who possess great musical culture and&mdash;this
+is by far more important&mdash;taste or passion for
+music, generally have no visual images. If these
+arise, it is only momentarily, and by chance. I give
+a few of the answers: "I see absolutely nothing; I
+am occupied altogether with the pleasure of the
+music: I live entirely in a world of sound. In
+accordance with my knowledge of harmony, I<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_218" id="Page_218">[218]</a></span>
+analyze the harmonies but not for long. I follow
+the development of the phrasing." "I see nothing:
+I am given up wholly to my impressions. I believe
+that the chief effect of music is to heighten in everyone
+the predominating feelings."</p>
+
+<p>Those who possess little musical culture, and
+especially those having little taste for music, have
+very clear visual representations. It must nevertheless
+be admitted that it is very hard to investigate
+these people. Because of their anti-musical natures,
+they avoid concerts, or at the most, resign themselves
+to sit through an opera. However, since the
+nature and quality of the music does not matter
+here, we may quote: "Hearing a Barbary organ in
+the street, I picture the instrument to myself. I see
+the man turning the crank. If military music sounds
+from afar, I <i>see</i> a regiment marching." An excellent
+pianist plays for a friend Beethoven's sonata in
+C sharp minor, putting into its execution all the
+pathos of which he is capable. The other sees in it
+"the tumult and excitement of a fair." Here the
+musical rendering is misinterpreted through misapprehension.
+I have several times noted this&mdash;in
+people familiar with design or painting, music calls
+up pictures and various scenes; one of these persons
+says that he is "besieged by visual images." Here
+the hearing of music evidently acts as excitant.<a name="FNanchor_98_98" id="FNanchor_98_98"></a><a href="#Footnote_98_98" class="fnanchor">[98]</a></p>
+<p><span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_219" id="Page_219">[219]</a></span></p>
+<p>In a word, insofar as it is permissible in psychology
+to make use of general formulas&mdash;and with the
+proviso that they apply to most, not to all cases&mdash;we
+may say that during the working of the musical
+imagination the appearance of visual images is the
+exception; that when this form of imagination is
+weak, the appearance of images is the rule.</p>
+
+<p>Furthermore, this result of observation is altogether
+in accord with logic. There is an irreducible
+antithesis between affective imagination, the characteristic
+of which is interiority, and visual imagination,
+basically objective. Intellectual language<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_220" id="Page_220">[220]</a></span>&mdash;speech&mdash;is
+an arrangement of words that stand for
+objects, qualities, relations, extracts of things: in
+order to be understood they must call up in consciousness
+the corresponding images. Emotional
+language&mdash;music&mdash;is an appropriate ordering of
+successive or simultaneous sounds, of melodies and
+harmonies that are signs of affective states: in order
+to be understood, they must call up in consciousness
+the corresponding affective modifications. But, in
+the non-musically inclined, the evocative power is
+small&mdash;sonorous combinations excite only superficial
+and unstable internal states. The exterior excitation,
+that of the sounds, follows the line of least
+resistance, and acting according to the psychic nature
+of the individual, tends to arouse objective
+images, pictures, visual representations, well or ill
+adapted.</p>
+
+<p>To sum up: In contrast to sensorial imagination,
+which has its origin without, affective imagination
+begins within. The <i>stuff</i> of its creation is found in
+the mental states enumerated above, and in their
+innumerable combinations, which it expresses and
+fixes in language peculiar to itself, of which it has
+been able to make wonderful use. Taking it altogether,
+the only great division possible between the
+different types of imagination is perhaps reducible
+to this: To speak more exactly, there are exterior
+and interior imaginations. These two chapters have
+given a sketch of them. There now remains for us
+to study the less general forms of the creative
+power.</p>
+
+<div class="footnotes"><h3>FOOTNOTES:</h3>
+
+<div class="footnote"><p><a name="Footnote_86_86" id="Footnote_86_86"></a><a href="#FNanchor_86_86"><span class="label">[86]</span></a> See <a href="#Page_353">Appendix E</a>.</p></div>
+
+<div class="footnote"><p><a name="Footnote_87_87" id="Footnote_87_87"></a><a href="#FNanchor_87_87"><span class="label">[87]</span></a> Let us cite merely the case of Balzac who, says one of his
+biographers, "was always odd." He buys a property, in
+order to start a dairy there with "the best cows in the world,"
+from which he expects to receive a net income of 3,000 francs.
+In addition, high-grade vegetable gardens, same income; vineyard,
+with Malaga plants, which should bring about 2,000 fr.
+He has the commune of S&egrave;vres deed over to him a walnut tree,
+worth annually 2,000 francs to him, because all the townspeople
+dump their rubbish there. And so on, until at the end of four
+years he sees himself obliged to sell his domain for 3,000
+francs, after spending on it thrice that sum.</p></div>
+
+<div class="footnote"><p><a name="Footnote_88_88" id="Footnote_88_88"></a><a href="#FNanchor_88_88"><span class="label">[88]</span></a> Usener, <i>G&ouml;tternamen</i>, 1896.</p></div>
+
+<div class="footnote"><p><a name="Footnote_89_89" id="Footnote_89_89"></a><a href="#FNanchor_89_89"><span class="label">[89]</span></a> <i>Nouveaux Essais de critique</i>, p. 320.</p></div>
+
+<div class="footnote"><p><a name="Footnote_90_90" id="Footnote_90_90"></a><a href="#FNanchor_90_90"><span class="label">[90]</span></a> Or, as it has been expressed, "human qualities raised to
+their highest power." (Tr.)</p></div>
+
+<div class="footnote"><p><a name="Footnote_91_91" id="Footnote_91_91"></a><a href="#FNanchor_91_91"><span class="label">[91]</span></a> The same statement holds good as regards the "Temptations
+of Saint Anthony" and other analogous subjects that have
+often attracted painters.</p></div>
+
+<div class="footnote"><p><a name="Footnote_92_92" id="Footnote_92_92"></a><a href="#FNanchor_92_92"><span class="label">[92]</span></a> R. Dubois, <i>Le&ccedil;ons de physiologie g&eacute;n&eacute;rale et compar&eacute;e</i>, p.
+286.</p></div>
+
+<div class="footnote"><p><a name="Footnote_93_93" id="Footnote_93_93"></a><a href="#FNanchor_93_93"><span class="label">[93]</span></a> Von Baer, in James, <i>Psychology</i>, I, 639.</p></div>
+
+<div class="footnote"><p><a name="Footnote_94_94" id="Footnote_94_94"></a><a href="#FNanchor_94_94"><span class="label">[94]</span></a> <i>Psychology of the Emotions</i>, Part I, Chapter IX.</p></div>
+
+<div class="footnote"><p><a name="Footnote_95_95" id="Footnote_95_95"></a><a href="#FNanchor_95_95"><span class="label">[95]</span></a> Arr&eacute;at, <i>M&eacute;moire et Imagination</i>, p. 118.</p></div>
+
+<div class="footnote"><p><a name="Footnote_96_96" id="Footnote_96_96"></a><a href="#FNanchor_96_96"><span class="label">[96]</span></a> Mendelssohn wrote to an author who composed verses for
+his <i>Lieder</i>: "Music is more definite than speech, and to want
+to explain it by means of words is to make the meaning
+obscure. I do not think that words suffice for that end, and
+were I persuaded to the contrary, I would not compose music.
+There are people who accuse music of being ambiguous, who
+allege that words are always understood: for me it is just the
+other way; words seem to me vague, ambiguous, unintelligible,
+if we compare them to the true music that fills the soul with
+a thousand things better than words. What the music that
+I like expresses to me seems to me too <i>definite</i>, rather than too
+indefinite, for anyone to be able to match words to it."</p></div>
+
+<div class="footnote"><p><a name="Footnote_97_97" id="Footnote_97_97"></a><a href="#FNanchor_97_97"><span class="label">[97]</span></a> Oelzelt-Newin, <i>op. cit.</i>, pp. 22-23. For analogous facts
+from contemporary musicians, see Paulhan, <i>Rev. Phil.</i>, 1898,
+pp. 234-35.</p></div>
+
+<div class="footnote"><p><a name="Footnote_98_98" id="Footnote_98_98"></a><a href="#FNanchor_98_98"><span class="label">[98]</span></a> For the sake of brevity and clearness I do not give here the
+observations and evidence. They will be found at the end of
+this work, as <a href="#Page_350">Appendix D</a>.
+</p><p>
+Under the title "An experimental test of musical expressiveness,"
+Gilman, in <i>American Journal of Psychology</i>, vol. IV,
+No. 4, and vol. V, No. 1 (1892-3), has studied from another
+point of view the effect of music on various listeners. Eleven
+selections were given; I note that three or four at the most
+excited visual images&mdash;ten (perhaps eleven), emotional states.
+More recently, the <i>Psychological Review</i> (September, 1898, pp.
+463 ff.) has published a personal observation of Macdougal in
+which sight-images accompany the hearing of music only exceptionally
+and under special conditions. The author characterizes
+himself as a "poor visualizer;" he declares that music arouses
+in him only very rarely visual representations; "even then
+they are fragmentary, consisting of simple forms without bond
+between them, appearing on a dark background, remaining
+visible for a moment or two, and soon disappearing." But,
+having gone to the concert fatigued and jaded, he sees nothing
+during the first number: the visions begin during the <i>andante</i>
+of the second, and accompany "in profusion" the rendering
+of the third. (See Appendix D.) May we not assume that the
+state of fatigue, by lowering the vital tone, which is the basis
+of the emotional life, likewise diminishes the tendency of affective
+dispositions to arise again under the form of memory?
+On the other hand, sensory images remain without opposition
+and come to the front; at least, unless they are re&euml;nforced by
+a state of semi-morbid excitation.</p></div>
+</div>
+
+
+<hr style="width: 65%;" /><p><span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_221" id="Page_221">[221]</a></span></p>
+<h2>CHAPTER III.</h2>
+
+<h3>THE MYSTIC IMAGINATION</h3>
+
+
+<p>Mystic imagination deserves a place of honor, as
+it is the most complete and most daring of purely
+theoretic invention. Related to diffluent imagination,
+especially in the latter's affective form, it has
+its own special characters, which we shall try to
+separate out.</p>
+
+<p>Mysticism rests essentially on two modes of
+mental life&mdash;feeling, which we need not study; and
+imagination, which, in the present instance, represents
+the intellectual factor. Whether the part of
+consciousness that this state of mind requires and
+permits be imaginative in nature and nothing else
+it is easy to find out. Indeed, the mystic considers
+the data of sense as vain appearances, or at the most
+as signs revealing and frequently laying bare the
+world of reality. He therefore finds no solid support
+in perception. On the other hand, he scorns
+reasoned thought, looking upon it as a cripple, halting
+half-way. He makes neither deductions nor
+inductions, and does not draw conclusions after the
+method of scientific hypotheses. The conclusion,<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_222" id="Page_222">[222]</a></span>
+then, is that he imagines, i.e., that he realizes a
+construction in images that is for him knowledge
+of the world; and he never proceeds, and does not
+proceed here, save <i>ex analogia hominis</i>.</p>
+
+
+<h3>I</h3>
+
+<p>The root of the mystic imagination consists of a
+tendency to incarnate the ideal in the sensible, to
+discover a hidden "idea" in every material phenomenon
+or occurrence, to suppose in things a supranatural
+principle that reveals itself to whoever may
+penetrate to it. Its fundamental character, from
+which the others are derived, is thus a way of thinking
+<i>symbolically</i>; but the algebraist also thinks by
+means of symbols, yet is not on that account a
+mystic. The nature of this symbolism must, then,
+be determined.</p>
+
+<p>In doing so, let us note first of all that our images&mdash;understanding
+the word "image" in its broadest
+sense&mdash;may be divided into two distinct groups:</p>
+
+<p>(1) <i>Concrete</i> images, earliest to be received, being
+representations of greatest power, residues of our
+perceptions, with which they have a direct and immediate
+relation.</p>
+
+<p>(2) <i>Symbolic</i> images, or signs, of secondary acquirement,
+being representations of lesser power,
+having only indirect and mediate relations with
+things.</p>
+
+<p>Let us make the differences between the two clear
+by a few simple examples.</p>
+
+<p>Concrete images are: In the visual sphere, the<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_223" id="Page_223">[223]</a></span>
+recollection of faces, monuments, landscapes, etc.;
+in the auditory sphere, the remembrance of the
+sounds of the sea, wind, the human voice, a melody,
+etc.; in the motor sphere, the tossings one feels when
+resting after having been at sea, the illusions of
+those who have had limbs amputated, etc.</p>
+
+<p>Symbolic images are: In the visual order, written
+words, ideographic signs, etc.; in the auditory
+order, spoken words or verbal images; in the motor
+order, significant gestures, and even better, the
+finger-language of deaf-mutes.</p>
+
+<p>Psychologically, these two groups are not identical
+in nature. Concrete images result from a persistence
+of perceptions and draw from the latter all
+their validity; symbolic images result from a mental
+synthesis, from an association of perception and
+image, or of image and image. If they have not
+the same origin, no more do they disappear in the
+same way, as is proven by very numerous examples
+of aphasia.</p>
+
+<p>The originality of mystic imagination is found in
+this fact: It transforms concrete images into symbolic
+images, and uses them as such. It extends
+this process even to perceptions, so that all manifestations
+of nature or of human art take on a value
+as signs or symbols. We shall later find numerous
+examples of this. Its mode of expression is necessarily
+synthetic. In itself, and because of the materials
+that it makes use of, it differs from the affective
+imagination previously described; it also differs<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_224" id="Page_224">[224]</a></span>
+from sensuous imagination, which makes use of
+forms, movements, colors, as having a value of their
+own; and from the imagination developing in the
+functions of words, through an analytic process. It
+has thus a rather special mark.</p>
+
+<p>Other characters are related to this one of symbolism,
+or else are derived from it, viz.:</p>
+
+<p>(1) An external character: the manner of writing
+and of speaking, the mode of expression, whatever
+it is. "The dominant style among mystics," says
+von Hartmann, "is metaphorical in the extreme&mdash;now
+flat and ordinary, more often turgid and emphatic.
+Excess of imagination betrays itself there,
+ordinarily, in the thought and in the form in which
+that is rendered.... A sign of mysticism
+which it has been believed may often be taken as an
+essential sign, is obscurity and unintelligibility of
+language. We find it in almost all those who have
+written."<a name="FNanchor_99_99" id="FNanchor_99_99"></a><a href="#Footnote_99_99" class="fnanchor">[99]</a> We might add that even in the plastic
+arts, symbolists and "<i>d&eacute;cadents</i>" have attempted, as
+far as possible, methods that merely indicate and
+suggest or hint instead of giving real, definite objects:
+which fact makes them inaccessible to the
+greater number of people.</p>
+
+<p>This characteristic of obscurity is due to two
+causes. First, mystical imagination is guided by
+the logic of feeling, which is purely subjective, full
+of leaps, jerks, and gaps. Again, it makes use of
+the language of images, especially visual images&mdash;a
+language whose ideal is vagueness, just as the<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_225" id="Page_225">[225]</a></span>
+ideal of verbal language is precision. All this can
+be summed up in a phrase&mdash;the subjective character
+inherent in the symbol. While seeming to speak
+like everyone else, the mystic uses a personal idiom:
+things becoming symbols at the pleasure of his
+fancy, he does not use signs that have a fixed and
+universally admitted value. It is not surprising if
+we do not understand him.</p>
+
+<p>(2) An extraordinary abuse of analogy and comparison
+in their various forms (allegory, parable,
+etc.)&mdash;a natural consequence of a mode of thinking
+that proceeds by means of symbols, not concepts.
+It has been said, and rightly, that "the only force
+that makes the vast field of mysticism fruitful is
+analogy."<a name="FNanchor_100_100" id="FNanchor_100_100"></a><a href="#Footnote_100_100" class="fnanchor">[100]</a> Bossuet, a great opponent of mystics,
+had already remarked: "One of the characteristics
+of these authors is the pushing of allegories to the
+extreme limit." With warm imagination, having at
+their disposal overexcited senses, they are lavish of
+changes of expressions and figures, hoping thereby
+to explain the world's mysteries. We know to what
+inventive labors the Vedas, the Bible, the Koran,
+and other sacred books have given rise. The distinction
+between literal and figurative sense, which
+is boundlessly arbitrary, has given commentators a
+freedom to imagine equal to that of the myth-creators.</p>
+
+<p>All this is yet very reasonable; but the imagination
+left to itself stops at no extravagance. After<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_226" id="Page_226">[226]</a></span>
+having strained the meaning of expressions, the
+imaginative mind exercises itself on words and
+letters. Thus, the cabalists would take the first or
+the last letters of the words composing a verse, and
+would form with them a new word which was to
+reveal the hidden meaning. Again, they would
+substitute for the letters composing words the numbers
+that these letters represent in the Hebrew
+numerical system and form the strangest combinations
+with them. In the <i>Zohar</i>, all the letters of the
+alphabet come before God, each one begging to be
+chosen as the creative element of the universe.</p>
+
+<p>Let us also bring to mind numerical mysticism,
+different from numerical imagination heretofore
+studied. Here, number is no longer the means that
+mind employs in order to soar in time and space; it
+becomes a symbol and material for fanciful construction.
+Hence arise those "sacred numbers"
+teeming in the old oriental religions:&mdash;3, symbol of
+the trinity; 4, symbol of the cosmic elements; 7,
+representing the moon and the planets, etc.<a name="FNanchor_101_101" id="FNanchor_101_101"></a><a href="#Footnote_101_101" class="fnanchor">[101]</a> Besides
+these fantastic meanings, there are more complicated
+inventions&mdash;calculating, from the letters of
+one's name, the years of life of a sick person, the
+auspices of a marriage, etc. The Pythagorean
+philosophy, as Zeller has shown, is the systematic
+form of this mathematical mysticism, for which<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_227" id="Page_227">[227]</a></span>
+numbers are not symbols of quantitative relations,
+but the very essence of things.</p>
+
+<p>This exaggerated symbolism, which makes the
+works of mystics so fragile, and which permits the
+mind to feed only on glimpses, has nevertheless an
+undeniable source of energy in its enchanting capacity
+to suggest. Without doubt suggestion exists
+also in art, but much more weakly, for reasons that
+we shall indicate.</p>
+
+<p>(3) Another characteristic of mystic imagination
+is the nature and the great degree of belief accompanying
+it. We already know<a name="FNanchor_102_102" id="FNanchor_102_102"></a><a href="#Footnote_102_102" class="fnanchor">[102]</a> that when an image
+enters consciousness, even in the form of a recollection,
+of a purely passive reproduction, it appears
+at first, and for a moment, just as real as a percept.
+Much more so, in the case of imaginative constructions.
+But this illusion has degrees, and with
+mystics it attains its maximum.</p>
+
+<p>In the scientific and practical world, the work of
+the imagination is accompanied by only a conditional
+and provisional belief. The construction in
+images must justify its existence, in the case of the
+scientist, by explaining; and in the case of the man
+of affairs, by being embodied in an invention that is
+useful and answers its purpose.</p>
+
+<p>In the esthetic field, creation is accompanied by
+a momentary belief. Fancy, remarks Groos, is
+necessarily joined to appearance. Its special character
+does not consist merely in freedom in images;
+what distinguishes it from association and from<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_228" id="Page_228">[228]</a></span>
+memory is this&mdash;that what is merely representative
+is taken for the reality. The creative artist has a
+conscious illusion (<i>bewusste Selbstt&auml;uschung</i>): <i>the
+esthetic pleasure is an oscillation between the appearance
+and the reality</i>.<a name="FNanchor_103_103" id="FNanchor_103_103"></a><a href="#Footnote_103_103" class="fnanchor">[103]</a></p>
+
+<p>Mystic imagination presupposes an unconditioned
+and permanent belief. Mystics are believers in the
+true sense&mdash;they have faith. This character is
+peculiar to them, and has its origin in the intensity
+of the affective state that excites and supports this
+form of invention. Intuition becomes an object of
+knowledge only when clothed in images. There has
+been much dispute as to the objective value of those
+symbolic forms that are the working material of the
+mystic imagination. This contest does not concern
+us here; but we may make the positive statement
+that the constructive imagination has never obtained
+such a frequently hallucinatory form as in the
+mystics. Visions, touch-illusions, external voices,
+inner and "wordless" voices, which we now regard
+as psycho-motor hallucinations&mdash;all that we meet
+every moment in their works, until they become
+commonplace. But as to the nature of these psychic
+states there are only two solutions possible&mdash;one,
+naturalistic, that we shall indicate; the other, supernatural,
+which most theologians hold, and which
+regards these phenomena as valid and true revelation.
+In either case, the mystic imagination seems
+to us naturally tending toward objectification. It
+tends outwardly, by a spontaneous movement that<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_229" id="Page_229">[229]</a></span>
+places it on the same level as reality. Whichever
+conclusion we adopt, no imaginative type has the
+same great gift of energy and permanence in belief.</p>
+
+
+<h3>II</h3>
+
+<p>Mystic imagination, working along the lines peculiar
+to it, produces cosmological, religious, and
+metaphysical constructions, a summary exposition
+of which will help us understand its true nature.</p>
+
+<p>(1) The all-embracing cosmological form is the
+conception of the world by a purely imaginative
+being. It is rare, abnormal, and is nowadays met
+with only in a few artists, dreamers, or morbidly
+esthetic persons, as a kind of survival and temporary
+form. Thus, Victor Hugo sees in each letter
+of the alphabet the pictured imitation of one of the
+objects essential to human knowledge: "<i>A</i> is the
+head, the gable, the cross-beam, the arch, <i>arx</i>; <i>D</i>
+is the back, <i>dos</i>; <i>E</i> is the basement, the console, etc.,
+so that man's house and its architecture, man's body
+and its structure, and then justice, music, the
+church, war, harvesting, geometry, mountains, etc.&mdash;all
+that is comprised in the alphabet through the
+mystic virtue of form."<a name="FNanchor_104_104" id="FNanchor_104_104"></a><a href="#Footnote_104_104" class="fnanchor">[104]</a> Even more radical is
+G&eacute;rard de Nerval (who, moreover, was frequently
+subject to hallucinations): "At certain times everything
+takes on for me a new aspect&mdash;secret voices
+come out of plant, tree, animals, from the humblest
+insects, to caution and encourage me. Formless and
+lifeless objects have mysterious turns the meaning<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_230" id="Page_230">[230]</a></span>
+of which I understand." To others, contemporaries,
+"the real world is a fairy land."</p>
+
+<p>The middle ages&mdash;a period of lively imagination
+and slight rational culture&mdash;overflowed in this direction.
+"Many thought that on this earth everything
+is a sign, a figure, and that the visible is worth
+nothing except insofar as it covers up the invisible."
+Plants, animals&mdash;there is nothing that does not
+become subject for interpretation; all the members
+of the body are emblems; the head is Christ, the
+hairs are the saints, the legs are the apostles, the
+eye is contemplation, etc. There are extant special
+books in which all that is seriously explained. Who
+does not know the symbolism of the cathedrals, and
+the vagaries to which it has given rise? The towers
+are prayer, the columns the apostles, the stones and
+the mortar the assembly of the faithful; the windows
+are the organs of sense, the buttresses and abutments
+are the divine assistance; and so on to the
+minutest detail.</p>
+
+<p>In our day of intense intellectual development, it
+is not given to many to return sincerely to a mental
+condition that recalls that of the earliest times. Even
+if we come near it, we still find a difference. Primitive
+man puts life, consciousness, activity, into
+everything; symbolism does likewise, but it does not
+believe in an autonomous, distinct, particular soul
+inherent in each thing. The absence of abstraction
+and generalization, characteristic of humanity in its
+early beginnings, when it peoples the world with
+myriads of animate beings, has disappeared. Every<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_231" id="Page_231">[231]</a></span>
+source of activity revealed by symbols appears as a
+fragmentary manifestation; it descends from a
+single primary, personal or impersonal, spring. At
+the root of this imaginative construction there is
+always either theism or pantheism.</p>
+
+<p>(2) Mystical imagination has often and erroneously
+been identified with religious imagination.
+Although it may be held that every religion, no
+matter how dull and poor, presupposes a latent
+mysticism, because it supposes an Unknown beyond
+the reach of sense, there are religions very slightly
+mystical in fact&mdash;those of savages, strictly utilitarian;
+among barbarians, the martial cults of the
+Germans and the Aztecs; among civilized races,
+Rome and Greece.<a name="FNanchor_105_105" id="FNanchor_105_105"></a><a href="#Footnote_105_105" class="fnanchor">[105]</a> However, even though the
+mystic imagination is not confined to the bounds of
+religious thought, history shows us that there it
+attains its completest expansion.</p>
+
+<p>To be brief, and to keep strictly within our subject,
+let us note that in the completely developed
+great religions there has arisen opposition between
+the rationalists and the imaginative expounders,
+between the dogmatists and the mystics. The former,
+rational architects, build by means of abstract
+ideas, logical relations and methods, by deduction
+and induction; the others, imaginative builders, care<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_232" id="Page_232">[232]</a></span>
+little for this learned magnificence&mdash;they excel in
+vivid creations because the moving energy with
+them is in their feelings, "in their hearts;" because
+they speak a language made up of concrete images,
+and consequently their wholly symbolic speech is at
+the same time an original construction. The mystic
+imagination is a transformation of the mythic
+imagination, the myth changing into symbols. It
+cannot escape the necessity of this. On the other
+hand, the affective states cannot longer remain
+vague, diffuse, purely internal; they must become
+fixed in time and space, and condensed into images
+forming a personality, legend, event, or rite. Thus,
+Buddha represents the tendencies towards pity and
+resignation, summing up the aspirations for final
+rest. On the other hand, abstract ideas, pure concepts,
+being repugnant to the mystic's nature, it is
+also necessary that they take on images through
+which they may be seen&mdash;e.g., the relations between
+God and man, in the various forms of communion;
+the idea of divine protection in incarnations, mediators,
+etc. But the images made use of are not dry
+and colorless like words that by long use have lost
+all direct representative value and are merely marks
+or tags. Being symbolic, i.e., concrete, they are, as
+we have seen, direct substitutes for reality, and they
+differ as much from words as sketching and drawing
+differ from our alphabetical signs, which are, however,
+their derivatives or abbreviations.</p>
+
+<p>It must, however, be noted that if "the mystic
+fact is a na&iuml;ve effort to apprehend the absolute, a<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_233" id="Page_233">[233]</a></span>
+mode of symbolic, not dialectic, thinking, that lives
+on symbols and finds in them the only fitting expression,"<a name="FNanchor_106_106" id="FNanchor_106_106"></a><a href="#Footnote_106_106" class="fnanchor">[106]</a>
+it seems that this imaginative phase has been
+to some minds only an internal form, for they have
+attempted to go beyond it through ecstacy, aspiring
+to grasp the ultimate principle as a pure unity, without
+image and without form,<a name="FNanchor_107_107" id="FNanchor_107_107"></a><a href="#Footnote_107_107" class="fnanchor">[107]</a> which metaphysical
+realism hopes to attain by other methods and by a
+different route. However interesting they may be
+for psychology, these attempts, luring one on further
+and further, by their seeming or real elimination of
+every symbolic element, become foreign to our subject,
+and we cannot consider them at greater length
+here.</p>
+
+<p>(3) "History shows that philosophy has done
+nothing but transform ideas of mystic production,
+substituting for the form of images and undemonstrated
+statements the form of assertions of a
+rational system."<a name="FNanchor_108_108" id="FNanchor_108_108"></a><a href="#Footnote_108_108" class="fnanchor">[108]</a> This declaration of a metaphysician
+saves us from dwelling on the subject long.</p>
+
+<p>When we seek the difference between religious
+and metaphysical or philosophical symbolism, we
+find it in the nature of the constitutive elements.
+Turned in the direction of religion, mystic symbolism
+presupposes two principal elements&mdash;imagination
+and feeling; turned in a metaphysical direction, it<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_234" id="Page_234">[234]</a></span>
+presupposes imagination and a very small rational
+element. This substitution involves appreciable deviation
+from the primitive type. The construction is
+of greater logical regularity. Besides, and this is
+the important characteristic, the subject-matter&mdash;though
+still resembling symbolic images&mdash;tends to
+become concepts: such are vivified abstractions,
+allegorical beings, hereditary entities of spirits and
+of gods. In short, metaphysical mysticism is a
+transition-form towards metaphysical rationalism,
+although these two tendencies have always been
+inimical in the history of philosophy, just as in the
+history of religion.</p>
+
+<p>In this imaginative plan of the world we may
+recognize stages according to the increasing weakness
+of the systems, depending on the number and
+quality of the hypotheses. For example, the progression
+is apparent between Plotinus and the frenzied
+creations of the Gnostics and the Cabalists.
+With the latter, we come into a world of unbridled
+fancy which, in place of human romances, invents
+cosmic romances. Here appear the allegorical
+beings mentioned above, half concept, half symbol;
+the ten Sephiros of the Cabala, immutable forms of
+being; the <i>syzygies</i> or couples of Gnosticism&mdash;soul
+and reflection, depth and silence, reason and life,
+inspiration and truth, etc.; the absolute manifesting
+itself by the unfolding of fifty-two attributes, each
+unfolding comprising seven <i>eons</i>, corresponding to
+the 364 days of the year, etc. It would be wearisome
+to follow these extravagant thoughts, which,<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_235" id="Page_235">[235]</a></span>
+though the learned may treat them with some
+respect, have for the psychologist only the interest
+of pathologic evidence. Moreover, this form of
+mystic imagination presents too little that is new
+for us to speak of it without repeating ourselves.</p>
+
+<p>To conclude: The mystic imagination, in its
+alluring freedom, its variety, and its richness, is
+second to no form, not even to esthetic invention,
+which, according to common prejudice, is the type
+<i>par excellence</i>. Following the most venturesome
+methods of analogy, it has constructed conceptions
+of the world made up almost wholly of feelings and
+images&mdash;symbolic architectures.</p>
+
+<div class="footnotes"><h3>FOOTNOTES:</h3>
+
+<div class="footnote"><p><a name="Footnote_99_99" id="Footnote_99_99"></a><a href="#FNanchor_99_99"><span class="label">[99]</span></a> <i>Philosophy of the Unconscious</i>, I, part 2, ch. IX.</p></div>
+
+<div class="footnote"><p><a name="Footnote_100_100" id="Footnote_100_100"></a><a href="#FNanchor_100_100"><span class="label">[100]</span></a> J. Darmesteter, in R&eacute;c&eacute;jac, <i>Essai sur les fondements de la
+connaissance mystique</i>, p. 124.</p></div>
+
+<div class="footnote"><p><a name="Footnote_101_101" id="Footnote_101_101"></a><a href="#FNanchor_101_101"><span class="label">[101]</span></a> In such notions may perhaps be best found the genesis of
+the present superstitions in regard to "lucky" and "unlucky"
+numbers, like the number 13, which have such persistence.
+(Tr.)</p></div>
+
+<div class="footnote"><p><a name="Footnote_102_102" id="Footnote_102_102"></a><a href="#FNanchor_102_102"><span class="label">[102]</span></a> See Part Two, <a href="#Page_103">chapter II</a>.</p></div>
+
+<div class="footnote"><p><a name="Footnote_103_103" id="Footnote_103_103"></a><a href="#FNanchor_103_103"><span class="label">[103]</span></a> Groos, <i>Die Spiele der Thiere</i>, pp. 308-312.</p></div>
+
+<div class="footnote"><p><a name="Footnote_104_104" id="Footnote_104_104"></a><a href="#FNanchor_104_104"><span class="label">[104]</span></a> Mabilleau, <i>op. cit.</i>, p. 132.</p></div>
+
+<div class="footnote"><p><a name="Footnote_105_105" id="Footnote_105_105"></a><a href="#FNanchor_105_105"><span class="label">[105]</span></a> If we leave out oriental influences and the Mysteries, which,
+according to Aristotle, were not dogmatic teaching, but a
+show, an assemblage of symbols, acting by evocation, or suggestion,
+following the special mode of mystic imagination that
+we already know.</p></div>
+
+<div class="footnote"><p><a name="Footnote_106_106" id="Footnote_106_106"></a><a href="#FNanchor_106_106"><span class="label">[106]</span></a> R&eacute;c&eacute;jac, <i>op. cit.</i>, pp. 139 ff.</p></div>
+
+<div class="footnote"><p><a name="Footnote_107_107" id="Footnote_107_107"></a><a href="#FNanchor_107_107"><span class="label">[107]</span></a> One at once calls to mind Plotinus, whose highest philosophy
+is a kind of indescribable ecstacy. (Tr.)</p></div>
+
+<div class="footnote"><p><a name="Footnote_108_108" id="Footnote_108_108"></a><a href="#FNanchor_108_108"><span class="label">[108]</span></a> Hartmann, <i>op. cit.</i>, vol. I, part 2, chapter IX.</p></div>
+</div>
+
+
+<hr style="width: 65%;" /><p><span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_236" id="Page_236">[236]</a></span></p>
+<h2>CHAPTER IV</h2>
+
+<h3>THE SCIENTIFIC IMAGINATION</h3>
+
+
+<p>It is quite generally recognized that imagination
+is indispensable in all sciences; that without it we
+could only copy, repeat, imitate; that it is a stimulus
+driving us onward and launching us into the unknown.
+If there does exist a very widespread prejudice
+to the contrary&mdash;if many hold that scientific
+culture throttles imagination&mdash;we must look for the
+explanation of this view first, in the equivocation,
+pointed out several times, that makes the essence of
+the creative imagination consist of images, which
+are here most often replaced by abstractions or
+extracts of things&mdash;whence it results that the created
+work does not have the living forms of religion, of
+art, or even of mechanical invention; and then, in
+the rational requirements regulating the development
+of the creative faculty&mdash;it may not wander at
+will. In either case its end is determined, and in
+order to exist, i.e., in order to be accepted, the
+invention must become subject to pre&euml;stablished
+rules.</p>
+
+<p>This variety of imagination being, after the<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_237" id="Page_237">[237]</a></span>
+esthetic form, the one that psychologists have best
+described, we may therefore be brief. A complete
+study of the subject, however, remains yet to be
+made. Indeed, we may remark that there is no
+"scientific imagination" in general, that its form
+must vary according to the nature of the science,
+and that, consequently, it really resolves itself into
+a certain number of genera and even of species.
+Whence arises the need of monographs, each one of
+which should be the work of a competent man.</p>
+
+<p>No one will question that mathematicians have a
+way of thinking all their own; but even this is too
+general. The arithmetician, the algebraist, and
+more generally the analyst, in whom invention obtains
+in the most abstract form of discontinuous
+functions&mdash;symbols and their relations&mdash;cannot
+imagine like the geometrician. One may well speak
+of the ideal figures of geometry&mdash;the empirical
+origin of which is no longer anywhere contested&mdash;but
+we cannot escape from representing them as
+somehow in space. Does anyone think that Monge,
+the creator of descriptive geometry, who by his
+work has aided builders, architects, mechanics, stone
+cutters in their labors, could have the same type of
+imagination as the mathematician who has been
+given up all his life to the theory of number? Here,
+then, are at least two well-marked varieties, to say
+nothing of mixed forms. The physicist's imagination
+is necessarily more concrete; since he is incessantly
+obliged to refer to the data of sense or to
+that totality of visual, tactile, motor, acoustic,<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_238" id="Page_238">[238]</a></span>
+thermic, etc., representations that we term the
+"properties of matter." Our eye, says Tyndall,
+cannot see sound waves contract and dilate, but we
+construct them in thought&mdash;i.e., by means of
+visual images. The same remarks are true of chemists.
+The founders of the atomic theory certainly
+<i>saw</i> atoms, and pictured them in the mind's eye, and
+their arrangement in compound bodies. The complexity
+of the imagination increases still more in the
+geologist, the botanist, the zoologist; it approaches
+more and more, with its increasing details, to the
+level of perception. The physician, in whom science
+becomes also an art, has need of visual representations
+of the exterior and interior, microscopic and
+macroscopic, of the various forms of diseased conditions;
+auditory representations (auscultation); tactile
+representations (touch, reverberation, etc.); and
+let us also add that we are not speaking merely of
+diagnosis of diseases, which is a matter of reproductive
+imagination, but of the discovery of a new
+pathologic "entity," proven and made certain from
+the symptoms. Lastly, if we do not hesitate to give
+a very broad extension to the term "scientific," and
+apply it also to invention in social matters, we shall
+see that the latter is still more exacting, for one must
+represent to oneself not only the elements of the
+past and of the present, but in addition construct a
+picture of the future according to probable inductions
+and deductions.</p>
+
+<p>It might be objected that the foregoing enumeration
+proves a great variety in the <i>content</i> of creative<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_239" id="Page_239">[239]</a></span>
+imagination but not in the imagination itself, and
+that nothing has proven that, under all these various
+aspects, there does not exist a so-called scientific
+imagination, that always remains identical. This
+position is untenable. For we have seen above<a name="FNanchor_109_109" id="FNanchor_109_109"></a><a href="#Footnote_109_109" class="fnanchor">[109]</a> that
+there exists no creative instinct in general, no one
+mere indeterminate "creative power," but only wants
+that, in certain cases, excite novel combinations of
+images. The nature of the separable materials, then,
+is a factor of the first importance; it is determining,
+and indicates to the mind the direction in which it
+is turned, and all treason in this regard is paid for
+by aborted construction, by painful labor for some
+petty result. Invention, separated from what gives
+it body and soul, is nothing but a pure abstraction.</p>
+
+<p>The monographs called for above would, then, be
+a not unneeded work. It is only from them collectively
+that the r&ocirc;le of the imagination in the
+sciences could be completely shown, and we might
+by abstraction separate out the characters common
+to all varieties&mdash;the essential marks of this imaginative
+type.</p>
+
+<p>Mathematics aside, all the sciences dealing with
+facts&mdash;from astronomy to sociology&mdash;suppose three
+moments, namely, observation, conjecture, verification.
+The first depends on external and internal
+sense, the second on the creative imagination, the
+third on rational operations, although the imagination
+is not entirely barred from it. In order to
+study its influence on scientific development, we<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_240" id="Page_240">[240]</a></span>
+shall study it (a) in the sciences in process of
+formation; (b) in the established sciences; (c) in
+the processes of verification.</p>
+
+
+<h3>II</h3>
+
+<p>It has often been said that the perfection of a
+science is measured by the amount of mathematics
+it requires; we might say, conversely, that its lack
+of completeness is measured by the amount of
+imagination that it includes. It is a psychological
+necessity. Where the human mind cannot explain
+or prove, there it invents; preferring a semblance
+of knowledge to its total absence.<a name="FNanchor_110_110" id="FNanchor_110_110"></a><a href="#Footnote_110_110" class="fnanchor">[110]</a> Imagination
+fulfills the function of a substitute; it furnishes a
+subjective, conjectural solution in place of an objective,
+rational explanation. This substitution has
+degrees:</p>
+
+<p>(1) The sway of the imagination is almost complete
+in the pseudo-sciences (alchemy, astrology,
+magic, occultism, etc.), which it would be more
+proper to call embryonic sciences, for they were the
+beginnings of more exact disciplines and their fancies
+have not been without use. In the history of
+science, this is the golden age of the creative imagination,
+corresponding to the myth-making period
+already studied.</p>
+
+<p>(2) The semi-sciences, incompletely proved (certain
+<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_241" id="Page_241">[241]</a></span>portions of biology, psychology, sociology,
+etc.), although they show a regression of imaginative
+explanation repulsed by the hitherto absent or
+insufficient experimentation, nevertheless abound in
+hypotheses, that succeed, contradict, destroy one
+another. It is a commonplace truism that does not
+need to be dwelt on&mdash;they furnish <i>ad libitum</i>
+examples of what has been rightly termed scientific
+mythology.</p>
+
+<p>Aside from the quantity of imagination expended,
+often without great profit, there is another character
+to be noted&mdash;the nature of the belief that accompanies
+imaginative creation. We have already seen
+repeatedly that the intensity of the imaginary conception
+is in direct ratio to the accompanying belief,
+or rather, that the two phenomena are really one&mdash;merely
+the two aspects of one and the same state of
+consciousness. But faith&mdash;i.e., the adherence of
+the mind to an undemonstrated assertion&mdash;is here at
+its maximum.</p>
+
+<p>There are in the sciences hypotheses that are not
+believed in, that are preserved for their didactic
+usefulness, because they furnish a simple and convenient
+method of explanation. Thus the "properties
+of matter" (heat, electricity, magnetism, etc.),
+regarded by physicists as distinct qualities even in
+the first half of the last century; the "two electric
+fluids;" cohesion, affinity, etc., in chemistry&mdash;these
+are some of the convenient and admitted expressions
+to which, however, we attach no explanatory value.</p>
+
+<p>There is also to be mentioned the hypothesis held<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_242" id="Page_242">[242]</a></span>
+as an approximation of reality&mdash;this is the truly
+scientific position. It is accompanied by a provisional
+and ever-revocable belief. This is admitted,
+in principle at least, by all scientists, and has been
+put into practice by many of them.</p>
+
+<p>Lastly, there is the hypothesis regarded as the
+truth itself&mdash;one that is accompanied by a complete,
+absolute, belief. But daily observation and history
+show us that in the realm of embryonic and ill-proven
+sciences this disposition is more flourishing
+than anywhere else. <i>The less proof there is, the
+more we believe.</i> This attitude, however wrong
+from the standpoint of the logician, seems to the
+psychologist natural. The mind clings tenaciously
+to the hypothesis because the latter is its own creation,
+or, because in adopting it, it seems to the mind
+that it should have itself discovered the hypothesis,
+so much does the latter harmonize with its inner
+states. Let us take the hypothesis of evolution, for
+example: we need not mention its high philosophical
+bearing, and the immense influence that it exerts on
+almost all forms of human thought. Nevertheless,
+it still remains an hypothesis; but for many it is an
+indisputable and inviolable dogma, raised far above
+all controversy. They accept it with the uncompromising
+fervor of believers: a new proof of the
+underlying connection between imagination and
+belief&mdash;they increase and decrease <i>pari passu</i>.</p>
+
+
+<h3>III</h3>
+
+<p>Should we assign as belonging solely to the<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_243" id="Page_243">[243]</a></span>
+imagination every invention or discovery&mdash;in a
+word, whatever is new&mdash;in the well-organized
+sciences that form a body of solid, constantly-broadening
+doctrine? It is a hard question. That
+which raises scientific knowledge above popular
+knowledge is the use of an experimental method and
+rigorous reasoning processes; but, is not induction
+and deduction going from the known to the unknown?
+Without desiring to depreciate the method
+and its value, it must nevertheless be admitted that
+it is preventive, not inventive. It resembles, says
+Condillac, the parapets of a bridge, which do not
+help the traveler to walk, but keep him from falling
+over. It is of value especially as a habit of mind.
+People have wisely discoursed on the "methods" of
+invention. There are none; but for which fact we
+could manufacture inventors just as we make
+mechanics and watchmakers. It is the imagination
+that invents, that provides the rational faculties with
+their materials, with the position, and even the solution
+of their problems. Reasoning is only a means
+for control and proof; it transforms the work of the
+imagination into acceptable, logical results. If one
+has not imagined beforehand, the logical method is
+aimless and useless, for we cannot reason concerning
+the completely unknown. Even when a problem
+seems to advance towards solution wholly through
+the reason, the imagination ceaselessly intervenes in
+the form of a succession of groupings, trials,
+guesses, and possibilities that it proposes. The<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_244" id="Page_244">[244]</a></span>
+function of method is to determine its value, to
+accept or reject it.<a name="FNanchor_111_111" id="FNanchor_111_111"></a><a href="#Footnote_111_111" class="fnanchor">[111]</a></p>
+
+<p>Let us show by a few examples that conjecture,
+the work of the combining imagination, is at the
+root of the most diverse scientific inventions.<a name="FNanchor_112_112" id="FNanchor_112_112"></a><a href="#Footnote_112_112" class="fnanchor">[112]</a></p>
+
+<p>Every mathematical invention is at first only an
+hypothesis that must be demonstrated, i.e., must
+be brought under previously established general
+principles: prior to the decisive moment of rational
+verification it is only a thing imagined. "In a
+conversation concerning the place of imagination in
+scientific work," says Liebig, "a great French
+mathematician expressed the opinion to me that the
+greater part of mathematical truth is acquired not
+through deduction, but through the imagination.
+He might have said 'all the mathematical truths,'
+without being wrong." We know that Pascal discovered
+the thirty-second proposition of Euclid all
+by himself. It is true that it has been concluded,<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_245" id="Page_245">[245]</a></span>
+wrongly perhaps, that he had also discovered all
+the earlier ones, the order followed by the Greek
+geometrician not being necessary, and not excluding
+other arrangements. However it be, reasoning alone
+was not enough for that discovery. "Many people,"
+says Naville, "of whom I am one, might have
+thought hard all their lives without finding out the
+thirty-two propositions of Euclid." This fact alone
+shows clearly the difference between invention and
+demonstration, imagination and reason.</p>
+
+<p>In the sciences dealing with facts, all the best-established
+experimental truths have passed through
+a conjectural stage. History permits no doubt on
+this point. What makes it appear otherwise is the
+fact that for centuries there has gradually come to
+be formed a body of solid belief, making a whole,
+stored away in classic treatises from which we learn
+from childhood, and in which they seem to be arranged
+of themselves. We are not told of the series
+of checks and failures through which<a name="FNanchor_113_113" id="FNanchor_113_113"></a><a href="#Footnote_113_113" class="fnanchor">[113]</a> they have
+passed. Innumerable are the inventions that remained
+for a long time in a state of conjecture,
+matters of pure imagination, because various circumstances
+did not permit them to take shape, to
+be demonstrated and verified. Thus, in the thirteenth
+century, Roger Bacon had a very clear idea<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_246" id="Page_246">[246]</a></span>
+of a construction on rails similar to our railroads;
+of optical instruments that would permit, as does
+the telescope, to see very far, and to discover the
+invisible. It is even claimed that he must have
+foreseen the phenomena of interferences, the demonstration
+of which had to be awaited ten centuries.</p>
+
+<p>On the other hand, there are guesses that have
+met success without much delay, but in which the
+imaginative phase&mdash;that of the invention preceding
+all demonstration&mdash;is easy to locate. We know that
+Tycho-Brah&eacute;, lacking inventive genius but rich in
+capacity for exact observation, met Kepler, an
+adventurous spirit: together, the two made a complete
+scientist. We have seen how Kepler, guided
+by a preconceived notion of the "harmony of the
+spheres," after many trials and corrections, ended
+by discovering his laws. Copernicus recognized
+expressly that his theory was suggested to him by
+an hypothesis of Pythagoras&mdash;that of a revolution
+of the earth about a central fire, assumed to be in
+a fixed position. Newton imagined his hypothesis
+of gravitation from the year 1666 on, then abandoned
+it, the result of his calculations disagreeing
+with observation; finally he took it up again after a
+lapse of a few years, having obtained from Paris
+the new measure of the terrestrial meridian that
+permitted him to prove his guess. In relating his
+discoveries, Lavoisier is lavish in expressions that
+leave no doubt as to their originally conjectural
+character. "He <i>suspects</i> that the air of the atmosphere
+is not a simple thing, but is composed of two<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_247" id="Page_247">[247]</a></span>
+very different substances." "He <i>presumes</i> that the
+permanent alkalies (potash, soda) and the earths
+(lime, magnesia) should not be considered simple
+substances." And he adds: "What I present here
+is at the most no more than a mere <i>conjecture</i>."
+We have mentioned above the case of Darwin. Besides,
+the history of scientific discoveries is full of
+facts of this sort.</p>
+
+<p>The passage from the imaginative to the rational
+phase may be slow or sudden. "For eight months,"
+says Kepler, "I have seen a first glimmer; for three
+months, daylight; for the last week I see the sunlight
+of the most wonderful contemplation." On
+the other hand, Ha&uuml;y drops a bit of crystallized calcium
+spar, and, looking at one of the broken prisms,
+cries out, "All is found!" and immediately verifies
+his quick intuition in regard to the true nature of
+crystallization. We have already indicated<a name="FNanchor_114_114" id="FNanchor_114_114"></a><a href="#Footnote_114_114" class="fnanchor">[114]</a> the psychological
+reasons for these differences.</p>
+
+<p>Underneath all the reasoning, inductions, deductions,
+calculations, demonstrations, methods, and
+logical apparatus of every sort, there is something
+animating them that is not understood, that is the
+work of that complex operation&mdash;the constructive
+imagination.</p>
+
+<p>To conclude: The hypothesis is a creation of the
+mind, invested with a provisional reality that may,
+after verification, become permanent. False hypotheses
+are characterized as imaginary, by which
+designation is meant that they have not become freed<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_248" id="Page_248">[248]</a></span>
+from the first state. But for psychology they are
+different neither in their origin nor in their nature
+from those scientific hypotheses that, subjected to
+the power of reason or of experiment, have come out
+victorious. Besides, in addition to abortive
+hypotheses, there are dethroned ones. What theory
+was more clinging, more fascinating in its applications,
+than that of phlogiston? Kant<a name="FNanchor_115_115" id="FNanchor_115_115"></a><a href="#Footnote_115_115" class="fnanchor">[115]</a> praised it as
+one of the greatest discoveries of the eighteenth century.
+The development of the sciences is replete
+with these downfalls. They are psychological regressions:
+the invention, considered for a time as
+adequate to reality, decays, returns to the imaginative
+phase whence it seems to have emerged, and
+remains pure imagination.</p>
+
+
+<h3>IV</h3>
+
+<p>Imagination is not absent from the third stage of
+scientific research, in demonstration and experimentation,
+but here we must be brief, (1) because it
+passes to a minor place, yielding its rank to other
+modes of investigation, and (2) because this study
+would have to become doubly employed with the
+practical and mechanical imagination, which will
+occupy our attention later. The imagination is here
+only an auxiliary, a useful instrument, serving:</p>
+
+<p>(1) In the sciences of reasoning, to discover ingenious
+methods of demonstration, stratagems for
+avoiding or overcoming difficulties.<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_249" id="Page_249">[249]</a></span></p>
+
+<p>(2) In the experimental sciences for inventing
+methods of research or of control&mdash;whence its analogy,
+above mentioned, to the practical imagination.
+Furthermore, the reciprocal influence of these two
+forms of imagination is a matter of common observation:
+a scientific discovery permits the invention
+of new instruments; the invention of new instruments
+makes possible experiments that are increasingly
+more complicated and delicate.</p>
+
+<p>One remark further: This constructive imagination
+at the third stage is the only one met with in
+many scientists. They lack genius for invention,
+but discover details, additions, corrections, improvements.
+A recent author distinguishes (a) those
+who have created the hypothesis, prepared the experiments,
+and imagined the appropriate apparatus;
+(b) those who have imagined the hypothesis and the
+experiment, but use means already invented; and
+(c) those who, having found the hypothesis made
+and demonstrated, have thought out a new method
+of verification.<a name="FNanchor_116_116" id="FNanchor_116_116"></a><a href="#Footnote_116_116" class="fnanchor">[116]</a> The scientific imagination becomes
+poorer as we follow it down this scale, which, however,
+bears no relation to exactness of reasoning and
+firmness of method.</p>
+
+<p>Neglecting species and varieties, we may reduce
+the fundamental characters of the scientific imagination
+to the following:<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_250" id="Page_250">[250]</a></span></p>
+
+<p>For its material, it has concepts, the degree of
+abstraction of which varies with the nature of the
+science.</p>
+
+<p>It employs only those associational forms that
+have an objective basis, although its mission is to
+form new combinations, "the discoveries consisting
+of the relation of ideas, capable of being united,
+which hitherto have been isolated."<a name="FNanchor_117_117" id="FNanchor_117_117"></a><a href="#Footnote_117_117" class="fnanchor">[117]</a> (Laplace.)
+All association with an affective basis is strictly excluded.</p>
+
+<p>It aims toward objectivity: in its conjectural construction
+it attempts to reproduce the order and connection
+of things. Whence its natural affinity for
+realistic art, which is midway between fiction and
+reality.</p>
+
+<p>It is unifying, and so just the opposite of the
+esthetic imagination, which is rather developmental.
+It puts forward the master idea (Claude Bernard's
+<i>id&eacute;e directrice</i>), a center of attraction and impulse
+that enlivens the entire work. The principle of
+unity, without which no creation succeeds, is nowhere
+more visible than in the scientific imagination.<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_251" id="Page_251">[251]</a></span>
+Even when illusory, it is useful. Pasteur, scrupulous
+scientist that he was, did not hesitate to say:
+"The experimenter's illusions are a part of his
+power: they are the preconceived ideas serving as
+guides for him."</p>
+
+
+<h3>V</h3>
+
+<p>It does not seem to me wrong to regard the
+imagination of the metaphysician as a variety of
+the scientific imagination. Both arise from one and
+the same requirement. Several times before this
+we have emphasized this point&mdash;that the various
+forms of imagination are not the work of an alleged
+"creative instinct," but that each particular one has
+arisen from a special need. The scientific imagination
+has for its prime motive the need of <i>partial</i>
+knowledge or explanation; the metaphysical imagination
+has for its prime motive the need of a <i>total</i>
+or complete explanation. The latter is no longer an
+endeavor on a restricted group of phenomena, but
+a conjecture as to the totality of things, as aspiration
+toward completely unified knowledge, a need
+of final explanation that, for certain minds, is just
+as imperious as any other need.</p>
+
+<p>This necessity is expressed by the creation of a
+cosmic or human hypothesis constructed after the
+type and methods of scientific hypotheses, but radically
+subjective in its origin&mdash;only apparently objective.
+<i>It is a rationalized myth.</i></p>
+
+<p>The three moments requisite for the constitution
+of a science are found here, but in a modified form:<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_252" id="Page_252">[252]</a></span>
+reflection replaces observation, the choice of the
+hypothesis becomes all-important, and its application
+to everything corresponds to scientific proof.</p>
+
+<p>(1) The first moment or preparatory stage, does
+not belong to our subject. It requires, however, a
+word in passing. In all science, whether well or ill
+established, firm or weak, we start from facts derived
+from observation or experiment. Here, facts
+are replaced by general ideas. The terminus of
+every science is, then, the starting-point of philosophical
+speculation:&mdash;metaphysics begins where
+each separate science ends; and the limits of the latter
+are theories, hypotheses. These hypotheses become
+working material for metaphysics which, consequently,
+is an hypothesis built on hypotheses, a
+conjecture grafted on conjecture, a work of imagination
+superimposed on works of imagination. Its
+principal source, then, is imagination, to which reflection
+applies itself.</p>
+
+<p>Metaphysicians, indeed, hold that the object of
+their researches, far from being symbolic and abstract,
+as in science, or fictitious and imaginary,
+as in art, is the very essence of things,&mdash;absolute
+reality. Unfortunately, they have never proven that
+it suffices to seek in order to find, and to wish in
+order to get.</p>
+
+<p>(2) The second stage is critical. It is concerned
+with finding the principle that rules and explains
+everything. In the invention of his theory the metaphysician
+gives his measure, and permits us to value
+his imaginative power. But the hypothesis, which<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_253" id="Page_253">[253]</a></span>
+in science is always provisional and revocable, is
+here the supreme reality, the fixed position, the <i>inconcussum
+quid</i>.</p>
+
+<p>The choice of the principle depends on several
+causes: The chief of these is the creator's individuality.
+Every metaphysician has a point of view,
+a personal way of contemplating and interpreting the
+totality of things, a belief that tends to recruit adherents.</p>
+
+<p>Secondary causes are: the influence of earlier systems,
+the sum of acquired knowledge, the social
+<i>milieu</i>, the variable predominance of religions,
+sciences, morality, esthetic culture.</p>
+
+<p>Without troubling ourselves with classifications,
+otherwise very numerous, into which we may group
+systems (idealism, materialism, monism, etc.) we
+shall, for our purpose, divide metaphysicians into
+the imaginative and rational, according as the
+imagination is superior to the reason or the reason
+rules the imagination. The differences between
+these two types of mind, already clearly shown in the
+choice of the hypothesis, are proven in its development.</p>
+
+<p>(3) The fundamental principle, indeed, must
+come out of its state of involution and justify its
+universal validity by explaining everything. This
+is the third moment, when the scientific process of
+verification is replaced by a process of construction.</p>
+
+<p>All imaginative metaphysics have a dynamic basis,
+e.g., the Platonic <i>Ideas</i>, Leibniz' <i>Monadology</i>, the
+<i>Nature-philosophy</i> of Schelling, Schopenhauer's<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_254" id="Page_254">[254]</a></span>
+<i>Will</i>, and Hartmann's <i>Unconscious</i>, the mystics, the
+systems that assume a world-soul, etc. Semi-abstract,
+semi-poetic constructions, they are permeated
+with imagination not only in the general conception,
+but also in the numberless details of its application.
+Such are the "fulgurations" of Leibniz, those very
+rich digressions of Schopenhauer, etc. They have
+the fascination of a work of art as much as that of
+science, and this is no longer questioned by metaphysicians
+themselves;<a name="FNanchor_118_118" id="FNanchor_118_118"></a><a href="#Footnote_118_118" class="fnanchor">[118]</a> they are living things.</p>
+
+<p>Rational metaphysics, on the other hand, have a
+chilly aspect, which brings them nearer the abstract
+sciences. Such are most of the mechanical conceptions,
+the Hegelian <i>Dialectic</i>, Spinoza's construction
+<i>more geometrico</i>, the <i>Summa</i> of the Middle
+Ages. These are buildings of concepts solidly cemented
+together with logical relations. But art is
+not wholly absent; it is seen in the systematic concatenation,
+in the beautiful ordering, in the symmetry
+of division, in the skill with which the generative
+principle is constantly brought in, in showing
+it ever-present, explaining everything. It has been
+possible to compare these systems with the architecture
+of the Gothic cathedrals, in which the dominant
+idea is incessantly repeated in the numberless
+details of the construction, and in the branching
+multiplicity of ornamentation.</p>
+
+<p>Further, whatever view we adopt as to its ultimate
+value, it must be recognized that the imagination
+<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_255" id="Page_255">[255]</a></span>of the great metaphysicians, by the originality
+and fearlessness of its conceptions, by its skill in
+perfecting all parts of its work, is inferior to no
+other form. It is equal to the highest, if it does not
+indeed surpass them.</p>
+
+<div class="footnotes"><h3>FOOTNOTES:</h3>
+
+<div class="footnote"><p><a name="Footnote_109_109" id="Footnote_109_109"></a><a href="#FNanchor_109_109"><span class="label">[109]</span></a> See Part I, <a href="#Page_31">chapter II</a>.</p></div>
+
+<div class="footnote"><p><a name="Footnote_110_110" id="Footnote_110_110"></a><a href="#FNanchor_110_110"><span class="label">[110]</span></a> Cf. the Preface to Kant's <i>Critique of Pure Reason</i>. "Our
+reason ... is always troubled with questions which cannot
+be ignored, because they spring from the very nature of
+reason, and which cannot be answered, because they transcend
+the powers of human reason." (Tr.)</p></div>
+
+<div class="footnote"><p><a name="Footnote_111_111" id="Footnote_111_111"></a><a href="#FNanchor_111_111"><span class="label">[111]</span></a> In the rare <i>Notes</i> that he has left, James Watt writes that
+one afternoon he had gone out for a stroll on the Green at
+Glasgow, and his thoughts were absorbed with the experiments
+in which he was busied, trying to prevent the cooling of the
+cylinder. The thought then came to him that steam, being an
+elastic fluid, should expand and be precipitated in a space formerly
+void; and having made a vacuum in a separate vessel
+and opened communication between the steam of the cylinder
+and the vacant space, we see what should follow. Thus, having
+imagined the masterpiece of his discovery, he enumerates the
+processes that, employed in turn, allowed him to perfect it.</p></div>
+
+<div class="footnote"><p><a name="Footnote_112_112" id="Footnote_112_112"></a><a href="#FNanchor_112_112"><span class="label">[112]</span></a> For further information we refer to the <i>Logique de l'hypoth&egrave;se</i>,
+by E. Naville, from which are borrowed most of the
+facts here given.</p></div>
+
+<div class="footnote"><p><a name="Footnote_113_113" id="Footnote_113_113"></a><a href="#FNanchor_113_113"><span class="label">[113]</span></a> This much-criticised defect has been only partially overcome
+in our methods of education through "object" lessons,
+and, if we may call them so, evolutionary methods, showing to
+the child "wie es eigentlich gewesen." Cf. J. Dewey, "<i>The
+School and Society</i>." (Tr.)</p></div>
+
+<div class="footnote"><p><a name="Footnote_114_114" id="Footnote_114_114"></a><a href="#FNanchor_114_114"><span class="label">[114]</span></a> See above, Part Two, <a href="#Page_140">chapter IV</a>.</p></div>
+
+<div class="footnote"><p><a name="Footnote_115_115" id="Footnote_115_115"></a><a href="#FNanchor_115_115"><span class="label">[115]</span></a> Preface to the <i>Critique of Pure Reason</i>.</p></div>
+
+<div class="footnote"><p><a name="Footnote_116_116" id="Footnote_116_116"></a><a href="#FNanchor_116_116"><span class="label">[116]</span></a> Colozza, <i>L'immaginazione nella Scienza</i> (Paravia, 1900),
+pp. 89 ff. In this author will be found abundant details respecting
+famous discoveries or experiments&mdash;those of Galileo,
+Franklin, Grimaldi, etc.</p></div>
+
+<div class="footnote"><p><a name="Footnote_117_117" id="Footnote_117_117"></a><a href="#FNanchor_117_117"><span class="label">[117]</span></a> Here is an example in confirmation, taken from Duclaux's
+book on Pasteur: Herschel established a relation between the
+crystalline structure of quartz and the rotatory power of the
+substance; later on, Biot established it for sugar, tartaric
+acid, etc.&mdash;i.e., for substances in solution, whence he concluded
+that the rotatory power is due to the form of the molecule
+itself, not to the arrangement of the molecules in relation to
+one another. Pasteur discovered a relation between molecular
+dyssymmetry and hemiedry, and the study of hemiedry in crystals
+led him logically to that of fermentation and spontaneous generation.</p></div>
+
+<div class="footnote"><p><a name="Footnote_118_118" id="Footnote_118_118"></a><a href="#FNanchor_118_118"><span class="label">[118]</span></a> On this point cf. Fouill&eacute;e, <i>L'Avenir de la Metaphysique</i>,
+pp. 79 ff.</p></div>
+</div>
+
+
+<hr style="width: 65%;" /><p><span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_256" id="Page_256">[256]</a></span></p>
+<h2>CHAPTER V</h2>
+
+<h3>THE PRACTICAL AND MECHANICAL IMAGINATION</h3>
+
+
+<p>The study of the practical imagination is not
+without difficulties. First of all, it has not hitherto
+attracted psychologists, so that we enter the field
+at random, and wander unguided in an unexplored
+region. But the principal obstacle is in the lack of
+determination of this form of imagination, and in
+the absence of boundary lines. Where does it begin,
+and where does it end? Penetrating all our
+life even in its least details, it is likely to lead us
+astray through the diversity, often insignificant, of
+its manifestations. To convince ourselves of this
+fact, let us take a man regarded as least imaginative:&mdash;subtract
+the moments when his consciousness
+is busied with perceptions, memories,
+emotions, logical thought and action&mdash;all the rest
+of his mental life must be put down to the credit
+of the imagination. Even thus limited, this function
+is not a negligible quantity:&mdash;it includes the
+plans and constructions for the future, and all the
+dreams of escaping from the present; and there is
+no man but makes such. This had to be mentioned<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_257" id="Page_257">[257]</a></span>
+on account of its very triteness, because it is often
+forgotten, and consequently the field of the creative
+imagination is unduly restricted, being limited little
+by little to exceptional cases.</p>
+
+<p>It must, however, be recognized that these small
+facts teach us little. Consequently, following our
+adopted procedure, dwelling longest on the clearer
+and more evident cases in which the work of creating
+appears distinctly, we shall rapidly pass over
+the lower forms of the practical imagination, in order
+to dwell on the higher form&mdash;technical or mechanical
+imagination.</p>
+
+
+<h3>I</h3>
+
+<p>If we take an ordinary imaginative person,&mdash;understanding
+by this expression, one whom his nature
+singles out for no special invention&mdash;we see that
+he excels in the small inventions, adapted for a
+moment, for a detail, for the petty needs constantly
+arising in human life. It is a fruitful, ingenious, industrious
+mind, one that knows how to "take hold
+of things." The active, enterprising American, capable
+of passing from one occupation to another according
+to circumstances, opportunity, or imagined
+profits, furnishes a good example.</p>
+
+<p>If we descend from this form of sane imagination
+toward the morbid forms, we meet first the
+unstable&mdash;knights of industry, hunters of adventure,
+inventors frequently of questionable means,
+people hungry for change, always imagining what
+they haven't, trying in turn all professions, becoming
+<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_258" id="Page_258">[258]</a></span>workmen, soldiers, sailors, merchants, etc., not
+from expediency, but from natural instability.</p>
+
+<p>Further down are found the acknowledged
+"freaks" at the brink of insanity, who are but the
+extreme form of the unstable, and who, after having
+wasted haphazard much useless imagination, end
+in an insane asylum or worse still.</p>
+
+<p>Let us consider these three groups together. Let
+us eliminate the intellectual and moral qualities
+characteristic of each group, which establish notable
+differences between them, and let us consider only
+their inventive capacity as applied to practical life.
+One character common to all is mobility&mdash;the tendency
+to change. It is a matter of current observation
+that men of lively imagination are changeable.
+Common opinion, which is also the opinion of moralists
+and of most psychologists, attributes this mobility,
+this instability, to the imagination. This, in
+my opinion, is just upside down. <i>It is not because
+they have an active imagination that they are
+changeable, but it is because they are changeable that
+their imagination is active.</i> We thus return to the
+<i>motor</i> basis of all creative work. Each new or
+merely modified disposition becomes a center of attraction
+and pull. Doubtless the inner push is a
+necessary condition, but it is not sufficient. If
+there were not within them a sufficient number of
+concrete, abstract, or semi-abstract representations,
+susceptible of various combinations, nothing would
+happen; but the origin of invention and of its frequent
+or constant changes of direction lies in the<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_259" id="Page_259">[259]</a></span>
+emotional and motor constitution, not in the quantity
+or quality of representations. I shall not dwell
+longer on a subject already treated,<a name="FNanchor_119_119" id="FNanchor_119_119"></a><a href="#Footnote_119_119" class="fnanchor">[119]</a> but it was
+proper to show, in passing, that common opinion
+starts from an erroneous conception of the primary
+conditions of invention&mdash;whether great or small,
+speculative or practical.</p>
+
+<p>In the immense empire of the practical imagination,
+superstitious beliefs form a goodly province.</p>
+
+<p>What is superstition? By what positive signs
+do we recognize it? An exact definition and a sure
+criterion are impossible. It is a flitting notion that
+depends on the times, places, and nature of minds.
+Has it not often been said that the religion of one
+is superstition to another, and <i>vice vers&acirc;</i>? This,
+too, is only a single instance from among many
+others; for the common opinion that restricts superstition
+within the bounds of religious faith is an incomplete
+view. There are peculiar beliefs, foreign
+to every dogma and every religious feeling, from
+which the most radical freethinker is not exempt;
+for example, the superstitions of gamblers. Indeed,
+at the bottom of all such beliefs, we always find the
+vague, semi-conscious notion of a mysterious power&mdash;destiny,
+fate, chance.</p>
+
+<p>Without taking the trouble to set arbitrary limits,
+let us take the facts as they are, without possible
+question, i.e., imaginary creations, subjective fancies,
+having reality only for those admitting them.
+Even a summary collection of past and present superstitions
+<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_260" id="Page_260">[260]</a></span>would fill a library. Aside from those
+having a frankly religious mark, others almost as
+numerous surround civil life, birth, marriage, death,
+appearance and healing of diseases, <i>dies fasti atque
+nefasti</i>, propitious or fateful words, auguries drawn
+from the meeting or acts of certain animals. The
+list would be endless.<a name="FNanchor_120_120" id="FNanchor_120_120"></a><a href="#Footnote_120_120" class="fnanchor">[120]</a></p>
+
+<p>All that can be attempted here is a determination
+of the principal condition of that state of mind,
+the psychology of which is in the last analysis very
+simple. We shall thus answer in an indirect and
+incomplete manner the question of criterion.</p>
+
+<p>First, since we hold that the origin of all imaginative
+creation is a need, a desire, a tendency, where
+then is the origin of that inexhaustible fount of
+fancies? <i>In the instinct for individual preservation</i>,
+orientated in the direction of the future. Man
+seeks to divine future events, and by various means
+to act on the order of things to modify it for his
+own advantage or to appease his evil fate.</p>
+
+<p>As for the mental mechanism that, set in motion
+by this desire, produces the vain images of the
+superstitious, it implies:</p>
+
+<p>(1) A deep idea of causality, reduced to a <i>post
+hoc, ergo propter hoc</i>. Herodotus says of the Egyptian
+priests: "They have discovered more prodigies
+and presages than any other people, because, when
+some extraordinary thing appears, they note it as<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_261" id="Page_261">[261]</a></span>
+well as all the events following it, so that if a similar
+prodigy appears anew, they expect to see the
+same events reproduced." It is the hypothesis of an
+indissoluble association between two or more events,
+assumed without verification, without criticism. This
+manner of thinking depends on the weakness of the
+logical faculties or on the excessive influence of the
+feelings.</p>
+
+<p>(2) The abuse of reasoning by analogy. This
+great artisan of the imagination is satisfied with
+likenesses so vague and agreements so strange, that
+it dares everything. Resemblance is no longer a
+quality of things imposed on the mind, but an hypothesis
+of the mind imposed on things. Astrology
+groups into "constellations" stars that are billions of
+miles apart, believes that it discovers there an animal
+shape, human or any other, and deduces therefrom
+alleged "influences." This star is reddish
+(Mars), sign of blood; this other is of a pure, brilliant
+silvery light (Venus) or livid (Saturn), and
+acts in a different way. We know what clever
+structures of conjectures and prognoses have been
+built on these foundations. Need we mention the
+Middle Age practice of charms, which even in our
+day still has adherents among cultured people?
+The physicians of the time of Charles II, says Lang,
+gave their patients "mummy powder" (pulverized
+mummies) because the mummies, having lasted a
+long time, must prolong life.<a name="FNanchor_121_121" id="FNanchor_121_121"></a><a href="#Footnote_121_121" class="fnanchor">[121]</a> Gold in solution has<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_262" id="Page_262">[262]</a></span>
+been esteemed as a medicine&mdash;gold, being a perfect
+substance, should produce perfect health. In
+order to get rid of a disease nothing is more frequent
+among primitive men than to picture the sick
+person on wood or on the ground, and to strike
+the injured part with an arrow or knife, in order
+to annihilate the sickening principle.</p>
+
+<p>(3) Finally, there is the magic influence ascribed
+to certain words. It is the triumph of the theory
+of <i>nomina numina</i>; we need not return to it. But
+the working of the mind on words, erecting them
+into entities, conferring life and power on them&mdash;in
+a word, the activity that creates myths and is
+the final basis of all constructive imagination&mdash;appears
+also here.<a name="FNanchor_122_122" id="FNanchor_122_122"></a><a href="#Footnote_122_122" class="fnanchor">[122]</a></p>
+
+
+<h3>II</h3>
+
+<p>Up to this point we have considered the practical
+imagination only in its somewhat petty aspect in
+small inventions or as semi-morbid in superstitious<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_263" id="Page_263">[263]</a></span>
+fancies. We now come to its higher form, mechanical
+invention.</p>
+
+<p>This subject has not been studied by psychologists.
+Not that they have misunderstood its r&ocirc;le, which
+is, after all, very evident; but they limit themselves
+to speak of it cursorily, without emphasizing it.</p>
+
+<p>In order to appreciate its importance, I see no
+other way than to put ourselves face to face with
+the works that it has produced, to question the history
+of discovery and useful arts, to profit by the
+disclosures of inventors and their biographers.</p>
+
+<p>Of a work of this kind, which would be very long
+because the materials are scattered, we can give here
+only a rough sketch, merely to take therefrom what
+is of interest for psychology and what teaches us
+in regard to the characters peculiar to this type of
+imagination.</p>
+
+<p>The erroneous view that opposes imagination to
+the useful, and claims that they are mutually exclusive,
+is so widespread and so persistent, that we
+shall seem to many to be expressing a paradox when
+we say that if we could strike the balance of the
+imagination that man has spent and made permanent
+in esthetic life on the one hand, and in technical
+and mechanical invention on the other, the
+balance would be in favor of the latter. This assertion,
+however, will not seem paradoxical to those
+who have considered the question. Why, then, the
+view above mentioned? Why are people inclined
+to believe that our present subject, if not entirely
+foreign to the imagination, is only an impoverished<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_264" id="Page_264">[264]</a></span>
+form of it? I account for it by the following reasons:</p>
+
+<p>Esthetic imagination, when fully complete, is
+simply <i>fixed</i>, i.e., remains a fictitious matter recognized
+as such. It has a frankly subjective, personal
+character, arbitrary in its choice of means. A work
+of art&mdash;a poem, a novel, a drama, an opera, a picture,
+a statue&mdash;might have been otherwise than it
+is. It is possible to modify the general plan, to
+add or reduce an episode, to change an ending.
+The novelist who in the course of his work changes
+his characters; the dramatic author who, in deference
+to public sentiment, substitutes a happy <i>deno&ucirc;ement</i>
+in place of a catastrophe, furnish na&iuml;ve
+testimony of this freedom of imagination. Moreover,
+artistic creation, expressing itself in words,
+sounds, lines, forms, colors, is cast in a mould that
+allows it only a feeble "material" reality.</p>
+
+<p>The mechanical imagination is objective&mdash;it must
+be embodied, take on a form that gives it a place
+side by side with products of nature. It is arbitrary
+neither in its choice nor in its means; it is not a free
+creature having its end in itself. In order to succeed,
+it is subjected to rigorous physical conditions,
+to a determinism. It is at this cost that it becomes
+a reality, and as we instinctively establish an antithesis
+between the imaginary and the real, it seems
+that mechanical invention is outside the realm of the
+imagination. Moreover, it requires the constant
+intervention of calculation, of reasoning, and lastly,
+of a manual operation of supreme importance. We<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_265" id="Page_265">[265]</a></span>
+may say without exaggerating that the success of
+many mechanical creations depends on the skillful
+manipulation of materials. But this last moment,
+because it is decisive, should not make us forget its
+antecedents, especially the initial moment, which is,
+for psychology, similar to all other instances of invention,
+when the idea arises, tending to become
+objective.</p>
+
+<p>Otherwise, the differences here pointed out between
+the two forms of imagination&mdash;esthetic and
+mechanical&mdash;are but relative. The former is not
+independent of technical apprenticeship, often of
+long duration (e.g., in music, sculpture, painting).
+As for the latter, we should not exaggerate its determinism.
+Often the same end can be reached by
+different inventions&mdash;by means differently imagined,
+through different mental constructions; and it follows
+that, after all allowances are made, these differently
+realized imaginations are equally useful.</p>
+
+<p>The difference between the two types is found in
+the nature of the need or desire stimulating the invention,
+and secondly in the nature of the materials
+employed. Others have confounded two distinct
+things&mdash;liberty of imagination, which belongs rather
+to esthetic creation, and quality and power of imagination,
+which may be identical in both cases.</p>
+
+<p>I have questioned certain inventors very skillful in
+mechanics, addressing myself to those, preferably,
+whom I knew to be strangers to any preconceived
+psychological theory. Their replies agree, and
+prove that the birth and development of mechanical<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_266" id="Page_266">[266]</a></span>
+invention are very strictly like those found in other
+forms of constructive imagination. As an example,
+I cite the following statement of an engineer, which
+I render literally:</p>
+
+<p>"The so-called creative imagination surely proceeds
+in very different ways, according to temperament,
+aptitudes, and, in the same individual, following
+the mental disposition, the <i>milieu</i>.</p>
+
+<p>"We may, however, as far as regards mechanical
+inventions, distinguish four sufficiently clear phases&mdash;the
+germ, incubation, flowering, and completion.</p>
+
+<p>"By germ I mean the first idea coming to the
+mind to furnish a solution for a problem that the
+whole of one's observations, studies, and researches
+has put before one, or that, put by another, has
+struck one.</p>
+
+<p>"Then comes incubation, often very long and
+painful, or, again, even unconscious. Instinctively
+as well as voluntarily one brings to the solution of
+the problem all the materials that the eyes and ears
+can gather.</p>
+
+<p>"When this latent work is sufficiently complete,
+the idea suddenly bursts forth, it may be at the end
+of a voluntary tension of mind, or on the occasion of
+a chance remark, tearing the veil that hides the surmised
+image.</p>
+
+<p>"But this image always appears simple and clear.
+In order to get the ideal solution into practice, there
+is required a struggle against matter, and the bringing
+to an issue is the most thankless part of the inventor's
+work.<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_267" id="Page_267">[267]</a></span></p>
+
+<p>"In order to give consistence and body to the idea
+caught sight of enthusiastically in an aureole, one
+must have patience, a perseverance through all trials.
+One must view on all sides the mechanical agencies
+that should serve to set the image together, until the
+latter has attained the simplicity that alone makes
+invention viable. In this work of bringing to a
+head, the same spirit of invention and imagination
+must be constantly drawn upon for the solution of
+all the details, and it is against this arduous requirement
+that the great majority of inventors rebel again
+and again.</p>
+
+<p>"This is then, I believe, how one may in a general
+way understand the genesis of an invention. It follows
+from this that here, as almost everywhere, the
+imagination acts through association of ideas.</p>
+
+<p>"Thanks to a profound acquaintance with known
+mechanical methods, the inventor succeeds, through
+association of ideas, in getting novel combinations
+producing new effects, towards the realization of
+which his mind has in advance been bent."</p>
+
+<p>But for a slightly explored subject, the foregoing
+remarks are not enough. It is necessary to determine
+more precisely the general and special characters
+of this form of imagination.</p>
+
+
+<h3><i>1. General Characters</i></h3>
+
+<p>I term general characters those that the mechanical
+imagination possesses in common with the best
+known, least questioned forms of the constructive
+imagination. In order to be convinced that, so far<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_268" id="Page_268">[268]</a></span>
+as concerns these characters it does not differ from
+the rest, let us take, for the sake of comparison,
+esthetic imagination, since it is agreed, rightly or
+wrongly, that this is the model <i>par excellence</i>. We
+shall see that the essential psychological conditions
+coincide in the two instances.</p>
+
+<p>The mechanical imagination thus has like the other
+its ideal, i.e., a perfection conceived and put
+forward as capable, little by little, of being realized.
+The idea is at first hidden; it is, to use our correspondent's
+phrase, "the germ," the principle of unity,
+center of attraction, that suggests, excites, and
+groups appropriate associations of images, in which
+it is enwrapped and organized into a structure, an
+<i>ensemble</i> of means converging toward a common
+end. It thus presupposes a dissociation of experience.
+The inventor undoes, decomposes, breaks
+up in thought, or makes of experience a tool, an
+instrument, a machine, an agency for building anew
+with the d&eacute;bris.</p>
+
+<p>The practical imagination is no more foreign to
+inspiration than the esthetic imagination. The history
+of useful inventions is full of men who suffered
+privations, persecution, ruin; who fought to
+the bitter end against relatives and friends&mdash;drawn
+by the need of creating, fascinated not by the hope
+of future gain but by the idea of an imposed mission,
+of a destiny they had to fulfill. What more
+have poets and artists done? The fixed and irresistible
+idea has led more than one to a foreseen
+death, as in the discovery of explosives, the first<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_269" id="Page_269">[269]</a></span>
+attempts at lightning conductors, aeronautics, and
+many others. Thus, from a true intuition, primitive
+civilizations have put on a level great poets
+and great inventors, erected into divinities or demi-gods
+historical or legendary personages in whom the
+genius of discovery is personified:&mdash;among the Hindoos,
+Vicavakarma; among the Greeks, Hephaestos,
+Prometheus, Triptolemus, Daedalus and Icarus. The
+Chinese, despite their dry imagination, have done
+the same; and we find the same condition in Egypt,
+Assyria, and everywhere. Moreover, the practical
+and mechanical arts have passed through a first
+period of no-change, during which the artisan, subjected
+to fixed rules and an undisputed tradition,
+considers himself an instrument of divine revelation.<a name="FNanchor_123_123" id="FNanchor_123_123"></a><a href="#Footnote_123_123" class="fnanchor">[123]</a>
+Little by little he has emerged from that
+theological age, to enter the humanistic age, when,
+being fully conscious of being the author of his
+work, he labors freely, changes and modifies according
+to his own inspiration.</p>
+
+<p>Mechanical and industrial imagination, like esthetic
+imagination, has its preparatory period, its
+zenith and decline: the periods of the precursors, of
+the great inventors, and of mere perfectors. At
+first a venture is made, effort is wasted with small
+result,&mdash;the man has come too early or lacks clear
+vision; then a great imaginative mind arises, blossoms;
+after him the work passes into the hands of
+<i>dii minores</i>, pupils or imitators, who add, abridge,<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_270" id="Page_270">[270]</a></span>
+modify: such is the order. The many-times written
+history of the application of steam, from the
+time of the eolipile of Hero of Alexandria to the
+heroic period of Newcomen and Watt, and the improvements
+made since their time, is one proof of
+the statement. Another example:&mdash;the machine for
+measuring duration is at first a simple clepsydra;
+then there are added marks indicating the subdivisions
+of time, then a water gauge causes a hand to
+move around a dial, then two hands for the hours
+and minutes; then comes a great moment&mdash;by the
+use of weights the clepsydra becomes a clock, at
+first massive and cumbersome, later lightened, becoming
+capable, with Tycho-Brah&eacute;, of marking seconds;
+and then another moment&mdash;Huyghens invents
+the spiral spring to replace the weights, and the
+clock, simplified and lightened, becomes the watch.</p>
+
+
+<h3><i>2. Special Characters</i></h3>
+
+<p>The special characteristics of the mechanical
+imagination being the marks belonging to this type,
+we shall study them at greater length.</p>
+
+<p>(I) There is first of all, at least in great inventors,
+an inborn quality,&mdash;that is, a natural disposition,&mdash;that
+does not originate in experience and
+owes the latter only its development. This quality
+is a bent in a practical, useful direction; a tendency
+to act, not in the realm of dreams or human feeling,
+not on individuals or social groups, not toward the
+attainment of theoretical knowledge of nature, but<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_271" id="Page_271">[271]</a></span>
+to become master over natural forces, to transform
+them and adapt them toward an end.</p>
+
+<p>Every mechanical invention arises from a need:
+from the strict necessity for individual preservation
+in the case of primitive man who wages war against
+the powers of nature; from the desire for well-being
+and the necessity for luxury in growing civilization;
+from the need of creating little engines, imitating
+instruments and machines, in the child. In a word,
+<i>every particular invention, great or small, arises
+from a particular need</i>; for, we repeat again, there
+is no creative instinct in general. A man distinguished
+for various inventions along practical lines,
+writes: "As far as my memory allows, I can state
+that in my case conception always results from a
+material or mental need.<a name="FNanchor_124_124" id="FNanchor_124_124"></a><a href="#Footnote_124_124" class="fnanchor">[124]</a> It springs up suddenly.
+Thus, in 1887, a speech of Bismarck made me so
+angry that I immediately thought of arming my<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_272" id="Page_272">[272]</a></span>
+country with a repeating rifle. I had already made
+various applications to the ministry of war, when
+I learned that the Lebel system had just been
+adopted. My patriotism was fully satisfied, but I
+still have the design of the gun that I invented."
+This communication mentions two or three other inventions
+that arose under analogous circumstances,
+but have had a chance of being adopted.</p>
+
+<p>Among the requisite qualities I mention the natural
+and necessary pre&euml;minence of certain groups of
+sensations or images (visual, tactile, motor) that
+may be decisive in determining the direction of the
+inventor.</p>
+
+<p>(II) Mechanical invention grows by successive
+stratifications and additions, as in the sciences, but
+more completely. It is a fine verification of the
+"subsidiary law of growing complexity" previously
+discussed.<a name="FNanchor_125_125" id="FNanchor_125_125"></a><a href="#Footnote_125_125" class="fnanchor">[125]</a> If we measure the distance traversed
+since the distant ages when man was naked and
+unarmed before nature to the present time of the
+reign of machinery, we are astonished at the amount
+of imagination produced and expended, often uselessly
+lavished, and we ask ourselves how such a
+work could have been misunderstood or so lightly
+appreciated. It does not pertain to our subject to
+make even a summary table of this long development.
+The reader can consult the special works
+which, unfortunately, are most often fragmentary
+and lack a general view. So we should feel grateful
+to a historian of the useful arts, L. Bourdeau, for<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_273" id="Page_273">[273]</a></span>
+having attempted to separate out the philosophy of
+the subject, and for having fastened it down in the
+following formulas:<a name="FNanchor_126_126" id="FNanchor_126_126"></a><a href="#Footnote_126_126" class="fnanchor">[126]</a></p>
+
+<p>(a) The exploitation of the powers of nature is
+made according to their degree of power.</p>
+
+<p>(b) The extension of working instruments has
+followed a logical evolution in the direction of growing
+complexity and perfection.</p>
+
+<p>Man, according to the observations of M. Bourdeau,
+has applied his creative activity to natural
+forces and has set them to work according to a regular
+order, viz.:</p>
+
+<p>(1) Human forces, the only ones available during
+the "state of nature" and the savage state. Before
+all else, man created weapons: the most circumscribed
+primitive races have invented engines
+for attack and defense&mdash;of wood, bone, stone, as
+they were able. Then the weapon became a tool
+by special adaptation:&mdash;the battle-club serves as a
+lever, the tomahawk as a hammer, the flint ax as a
+hatchet, etc. In this manner there is gradually
+formed an arsenal of instruments. "Inferior to
+most animals as regards certain work that would
+have to be done with the aid of our organic resources
+alone, we are superior to all as soon as we set our
+tools at work. If the rodents with their sharp teeth
+cut wood better than we can, we do it still better
+with the ax, the chisel, the saw. Some birds, with<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_274" id="Page_274">[274]</a></span>
+the help of a strong beak, by repeated blows, penetrate
+the trunk of a tree: but the auger, the gimlet,
+the wimble do the same work better and more
+quickly. The knife is superior to the carnivore's
+teeth for tearing meat; the hoe better than the mole's
+paw for digging earth, the trowel than the beaver's
+tail for beating and spreading mortar. The oar permits
+us to rival the fish's fin; the sail, the wing of
+the bird. The distaff and spindle allow our imitating
+the industry of insect spinners; etc. Man
+thus reproduces and sums up in his technical contrivances
+the scattered perfections of the animal
+world. He even succeeds in surpassing them, because,
+in the form of tools, he uses substances and
+combinations of effects that cannot figure as part of
+an organism."<a name="FNanchor_127_127" id="FNanchor_127_127"></a><a href="#Footnote_127_127" class="fnanchor">[127]</a> It is scarcely likely that most of
+these inventions arose from a voluntary imitation of
+animals: but even supposing such an origin, there
+would still remain a fine place for personal creative
+work. Man has produced by conscious effort what
+life realizes by methods that escape us; so that the
+creative imagination in man is a <i>succedaneum</i> of the
+generative powers of nature.</p>
+
+<p>(2) During the pastoral stage man brought animals
+under subjection and discipline. An animal
+is a machine, ready-made, that needs only to be
+trained to obedience; but this training has required
+and stimulated all sorts of inventions, from the harness
+with which to equip it, to the chariots, wagons,
+and roads with which and on which it moves.<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_275" id="Page_275">[275]</a></span></p>
+
+<p>(3) Later, the natural motors&mdash;air and water&mdash;have
+furnished new material for human ingenuity,
+e.g., in navigation; wind- and water-mills, used at
+first to grind grain, then for a multitude of uses&mdash;sawing,
+milling, lifting hammers; etc.</p>
+
+<p>(4) Lastly, much later, come products of an already
+mature civilization, artificial motors, explosives,&mdash;powder
+and all its derivatives and substitutes&mdash;steam,
+which has made such great
+progress.</p>
+
+<p>If the reader please to represent to himself well
+the immense number of facts that we have just indicated
+in a few lines; if he please to note that
+every invention, great or small, before becoming a
+fixed and realized thing, was at first an imagination,
+a mere contrivance of the brain, an assembly of new
+combinations or new relations, he will be forced to
+admit that nowhere&mdash;not excepting even esthetic
+production&mdash;has man imagined to such a great extent.</p>
+
+<p>One of the reasons&mdash;though not the only one&mdash;that
+supports the contrary opinion is, that by the
+very law of their growing complexity, inventions
+are grafted one on another. In all the useful arts
+improvements have been so slow, and so gradually
+wrought, that each one of them passed unperceived,
+without leaving its author the credit for its discovery.
+The immense majority of inventions are
+anonymous&mdash;some great names alone survive. But,
+whether individual or collective, imagination remains
+imagination. In order that the plow, at first<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_276" id="Page_276">[276]</a></span>
+a simple piece of wood hardened by the fire and
+pushed along with the human hand, should become
+what it is to-day, through a long series of modifications
+described in the special works, who knows
+how many imaginations have labored! In the same
+way, the uncertain flame of a resinous branch guiding
+vaguely in the night leads us, through a long
+series of inventions, to gas and electric lighting.
+All objects, even the most ordinary and most common
+that now serve us in our everyday-life, are <i>condensed
+imagination</i>.</p>
+
+<p>(III) More than any other form, mechanical
+imagination depends strictly on physical conditions.
+It cannot rest content with combining images, it
+postulates material factors that impose themselves
+unyieldingly. Compared to it, the scientific imagination
+has much more freedom in the building of
+its hypotheses. In general, every great invention
+has been preceded by a period of abortive attempts.
+History shows that the so-called "initial moment"
+of a mechanical discovery, followed by its improvements,
+is the moment ending a series of unsuccessful
+trials: we thus skip a phase of pure imagination,
+of imaginative construction that has not been able
+to enter into the mold of an appropriate determinism.
+There must have existed innumerable inventions
+that we might term mechanical romances,
+which, however, we cannot refer to because they
+have left us no trace, not being born viable. Others
+are known as curiosities because they have
+blazed the path. We know that Otto de Guericke<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_277" id="Page_277">[277]</a></span>
+made four fruitless attempts before discovering his
+air-pump. The brothers Montgolfier were possessed
+with the desire to make "imitation clouds," like
+those they saw moving over the Alps. "In order
+to imitate nature," they at first enclosed water-vapor
+in a light, stout case, which fell on cooling.
+Then they tried hydrogen; then the production of a
+gas with electrical properties; and so on. Thus,
+after a succession of hypotheses and failures, they
+finally succeeded. From the end of the sixteenth
+century there was offered the possibility of communicating
+at a distance by means of electricity.
+"In a work published in 1624 the Jesuit, Father
+Leurechon, described an imaginary apparatus (by
+means of which, he said, people could converse at a
+distance) for the aid of lovers who, by the connection
+of their movements, would cause a needle to
+move about a dial on which would be written the
+letters of the alphabet; and the drawing accompanying
+the text is almost a picture of Breguet's telegraph."
+But the author considered it impossible
+"in the absence of lovers having such ability."<a name="FNanchor_128_128" id="FNanchor_128_128"></a><a href="#Footnote_128_128" class="fnanchor">[128]</a></p>
+
+<p>Mechanical inventions that fail correspond to
+erroneous or unverified scientific hypotheses. They
+do not emerge from the stage of pure imagination,<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_278" id="Page_278">[278]</a></span>
+but they are instructive to the psychologist because
+they give in bare form the initial work of the constructive
+imagination in the technical field.</p>
+
+<p>There still remain the requirements of reasoning,
+of calculation, of adaptation to the properties of
+matter. But, we repeat, this determinism has several
+possible forms&mdash;one can reach the same goal
+through different means. Besides, these determining
+conditions are not lacking in any type of imagination;
+there is only a difference as between lesser
+and greater. Every imaginative construction from
+the moment that it is little more than a group of
+fancies, a spectral image haunting a dreamer's brain,
+must take on a body, submit to external conditions
+on which it depends, and which materialize it somewhat.
+In this respect, architecture is an excellent
+example. It is classed among the fine arts; but it
+is subject to so many limitations that its process
+of invention strongly resembles technical and mechanical
+creations. Thus it has been possible to say
+that "Architecture is the least personal of all the
+arts." "Before being an art it is an industry in the
+sense that it has nearly always a useful end that is
+imposed on it and rules its manifestations. Whatever
+it builds&mdash;a temple, a theater, a palace&mdash;it must
+before all else subordinate its work to the end assigned
+to it in advance. This is not all:&mdash;it must
+take account of materials, climate, soil, location,
+habits&mdash;of all things that may require much skill,
+tact, calculation, which, however, do not interest<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_279" id="Page_279">[279]</a></span>
+art as such, and do not permit architecture to manifest
+its purely esthetic qualities."<a name="FNanchor_129_129" id="FNanchor_129_129"></a><a href="#Footnote_129_129" class="fnanchor">[129]</a></p>
+
+<p>Thus, at bottom, there is an identity of nature
+between the constructive imagination of the mechanic
+and that of the artist: the difference is only
+in the end, the means, and the conditions. The
+formula, <i>Ars homo additus naturae</i>, has been too
+often restricted to esthetics&mdash;it should comprehend
+everything artificial. Esthetes, doubtless, hold that
+their imagination has for them a loftier quality&mdash;a
+disputed question that psychology need not discuss;
+for it, the essential mechanism is the same in
+the two cases: a great mechanic is a poet in his own
+way, because he makes instruments imitating life.
+"Those constructions that at other times are the
+marvel of the ignorant crowd deserve the admiration
+of the reflecting:&mdash;Something of the power that
+has organized matter seems to have passed into combinations
+in which nature is imitated or surpassed.
+Our machines, so varied in form and in function,
+are the representatives of a new kingdom intermediate
+between senseless and animate forms, having
+the passivity of the former and the activity of the
+latter, and exploiting everything for our sake. They
+are counterfeits of animate beings, capable of giving
+inert substances a regular functioning. Their
+skeleton of iron, organs of steel, muscles of leather,
+soul of fire, panting or smoking breath, rhythm of
+movement&mdash;sometimes even the shrill or plaintive<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_280" id="Page_280">[280]</a></span>
+cries expressing effort or simulating pain:&mdash;all that
+contributes to give them a fantastic likeness to life&mdash;a
+specter and dream of inorganic life."<a name="FNanchor_130_130" id="FNanchor_130_130"></a><a href="#Footnote_130_130" class="fnanchor">[130]</a></p>
+
+<div class="footnotes"><h3>FOOTNOTES:</h3>
+
+<div class="footnote"><p><a name="Footnote_119_119" id="Footnote_119_119"></a><a href="#FNanchor_119_119"><span class="label">[119]</span></a> See above, Part One, <a href="#Page_31">chapter II</a>.</p></div>
+
+<div class="footnote"><p><a name="Footnote_120_120" id="Footnote_120_120"></a><a href="#FNanchor_120_120"><span class="label">[120]</span></a> For a complete and recent study of the question, see A. Lehmann,
+<i>Aberglaube und Zauberei von den &auml;ltesten Zeiten bis in
+die Gegenwart</i>, 1898.</p></div>
+
+<div class="footnote"><p><a name="Footnote_121_121" id="Footnote_121_121"></a><a href="#FNanchor_121_121"><span class="label">[121]</span></a> Lang, <i>op. cit.</i>, I, 96. There will be found many other facts
+of this kind.</p></div>
+
+<div class="footnote"><p><a name="Footnote_122_122" id="Footnote_122_122"></a><a href="#FNanchor_122_122"><span class="label">[122]</span></a> If this book were not merely an essay, we should have had
+to study language as an instrument of the practical life in its
+relations to the creative imagination, especially the function of
+analogy, in the extension and transformation of the meanings
+of words. Works on linguistics are full of evidence on this
+point. One could do better still by attending exclusively to the
+vernacular, to slang, which shows us creative force in action.
+"Slang," says one philologist, "has the property of figuring,
+expressing, and picturing language.... With it, however
+low its origin, one could reconstruct a people or a society."
+Its principal, not only, means, are metaphor and allegory. It
+lends itself equally to methods that degrade or ennoble existing
+words, but with a very marked preference for the worse or
+degrading meanings.</p></div>
+
+<div class="footnote"><p><a name="Footnote_123_123" id="Footnote_123_123"></a><a href="#FNanchor_123_123"><span class="label">[123]</span></a> Ample information on this point will be found in the work
+of Espinas, <i>Les Origines de la Technologie</i>.</p></div>
+
+<div class="footnote"><p><a name="Footnote_124_124" id="Footnote_124_124"></a><a href="#FNanchor_124_124"><span class="label">[124]</span></a> The same correspondent, without my having asked him in
+regard to this, gives me the following details: "When about
+seven years old I saw a locomotive, its fire and smoke. My
+father's stove also made fire and smoke, but lacked wheels. If,
+then, I told my father, we put wheels under the stove, it would
+move like a locomotive. Later, when about thirteen, the sight of
+a steam threshing-machine suggested to me the idea of making
+a horseless wagon. I began a childish construction of one,
+which my father made me give up," etc. The tendency toward
+mechanical invention shows itself very early in some children&mdash;we
+gave examples of it before. Our inventor adds: "My
+imagination was strongest at about the age of 25 to 35 (I am
+now 45 years old). After that time it seems to me that the
+remainder of life is good only for producing less important
+conceptions, forming a natural consequence of the principal conceptions
+born of the period of youth."</p></div>
+
+<div class="footnote"><p><a name="Footnote_125_125" id="Footnote_125_125"></a><a href="#FNanchor_125_125"><span class="label">[125]</span></a> See above, Part Two, <a href="#Page_167">chapter V</a>.</p></div>
+
+<div class="footnote"><p><a name="Footnote_126_126" id="Footnote_126_126"></a><a href="#FNanchor_126_126"><span class="label">[126]</span></a> L. Bourdeau, <i>Les Forces de l'Industrie</i>, Paris, 1884. This
+very substantial work, abounding in facts, conceived after a
+systematic plan, has aided us much in this study.</p></div>
+
+<div class="footnote"><p><a name="Footnote_127_127" id="Footnote_127_127"></a><a href="#FNanchor_127_127"><span class="label">[127]</span></a> <i>Op. cit.</i>, pp. 45-46.</p></div>
+
+<div class="footnote"><p><a name="Footnote_128_128" id="Footnote_128_128"></a><a href="#FNanchor_128_128"><span class="label">[128]</span></a> Quoted by L. Bourdeau (<i>op. cit.</i>, p. 354), who also mentions
+many other attempts: an anonymous Scot in 1753, Lesage of
+Geneva, 1780, Lhomond (France, 1787), Battencourt (Spain,
+1787), Reiser, a German (1794), Salva (Madrid, 1796). The
+insufficient study of dynamic electricity did not permit them
+to succeed.</p></div>
+
+<div class="footnote"><p><a name="Footnote_129_129" id="Footnote_129_129"></a><a href="#FNanchor_129_129"><span class="label">[129]</span></a> E. Veron, <i>L'Esth&eacute;tique</i>, p. 315.</p></div>
+
+<div class="footnote"><p><a name="Footnote_130_130" id="Footnote_130_130"></a><a href="#FNanchor_130_130"><span class="label">[130]</span></a> L. Bourdeau, <i>op. cit.</i>, p. 233.</p></div>
+</div>
+
+
+<hr style="width: 65%;" /><p><span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_281" id="Page_281">[281]</a></span></p>
+<h2>CHAPTER VI</h2>
+
+<h3>THE COMMERCIAL IMAGINATION</h3>
+
+
+<p>Taking the word "commercial" in its broadest
+signification, I understand by this expression all
+those forms of the constructive imagination that
+have for their chief aim the production and distribution
+of wealth, all inventions making for individual
+or collective enrichment. Even less studied
+than the form preceding, this imaginative manifestation
+reveals as much ingenuity as any other. The
+human mind is largely busied in that way. There
+are inventors of all kinds&mdash;the great among these
+equal those whom general opinion ranks as highest.
+Here, as elsewhere, the great body invent nothing,
+live according to tradition, in routine and imitation.</p>
+
+<p>Invention in the commercial or financial field is
+subject to various conditions with which we are not
+concerned:</p>
+
+<p>(1) External conditions:&mdash;Geographical, political,
+economic, social, etc., varying according to
+time, place, and people. Such is its external determinism&mdash;human
+and social here in place of cosmic,
+physical, as in mechanical invention.<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_282" id="Page_282">[282]</a></span></p>
+
+<p>(2) Internal, psychological conditions, most of
+which are foreign to the primary and essential inventive
+act:&mdash;on one hand, foresight, calculation,
+strength of reasoning;&mdash;in a word, capacity for reflection;
+on the other hand, assurance, recklessness,
+soaring into the unknown&mdash;in a word, strong capacity
+for action. Whence arise, if we leave out the
+mixed forms, two principal types&mdash;the calculating,
+the venturesome. In the former the rational element
+is first. They are cautious, calculating, selfish
+exploiters, with no great moral or social preoccupations.
+In the latter, the active and emotional element
+predominates. They have a broader sweep.
+Of this sort were the merchant-sailors of Tyre,
+Carthage, and Greece; the merchant-travelers of the
+Middle Ages, the mercantile and gain-hungry explorers
+of the fifteenth, sixteenth, and seventeenth
+centuries; later, in a changed form, the organizers of
+great companies, the inventors of monopolies,
+American "trusts," etc. These are the great imaginative
+minds.</p>
+
+<p>Eliminating, then, from our subject, what is not
+the purely imaginative element in order to study
+it alone, I see only two points for us to treat, if we
+would avoid repetition&mdash;at the initial moment of invention,
+the intuitive act that is its germ; during
+the period of development and organization, the
+necessary and exclusive r&ocirc;le of schematic images.</p>
+
+
+<h3>I</h3>
+
+<p>By "intuition" we generally understand a practical,
+<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_283" id="Page_283">[283]</a></span>immediate judgment that goes straight to the
+goal. Tact, wisdom, scent, divination, are synonymous
+or equivalent expressions. First let us note
+that intuition does not belong exclusively to this
+part of our subject, for it is found <i>in parvo</i> throughout;
+but in commercial invention it is preponderating
+on account of the necessity of perceiving quickly
+and surely, and of grasping chances. "Genius for
+business," someone has said, "consists in making
+exact hypotheses regarding the fluctuations of
+values." To characterize the mental state is easy,
+if it is a matter merely of giving examples; very
+difficult, if one attempts to discover its mechanism.</p>
+
+<p>The physician who in a trice diagnoses a disease,
+who, on a higher level, groups symptoms in order
+to deduce a new disease from them, like Duchenne
+de Boulogne; the politician who knows human nature,
+the merchant who scents a good venture, etc.,
+furnish examples of intuition. It does not depend
+on the degree of culture;&mdash;not to mention women,
+whose insight into practical matters is well known,
+there are ignorant people&mdash;peasants, even savages&mdash;who,
+in their limited sphere, are the equals of fine
+diplomats.</p>
+
+<p>But all these facts teach us nothing concerning its
+psychological nature. Intuition presupposes acquired
+experience of a special nature that gives the
+judgment its validity and turns it in a particular
+direction. Nevertheless, this accumulated knowledge
+of itself gives no evidence as to the future.
+Now, every intuition is an anticipation of the future,<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_284" id="Page_284">[284]</a></span>
+resulting from only two processes:&mdash;inductive or deductive
+reasoning, e.g., the chemist foreseeing a
+reaction; imagination, i.e., a representative construction.
+Which is the chief process here? Evidently
+the former, because it is not a matter of fancied
+hypothesis, but of adaptation of former experience
+to a new case. Intuition resembles logical
+operations much more than it does imaginative combinations.
+We may liken it to unconscious reasoning,
+if we are not afraid of the seeming contradiction
+of this expression which supposes a logical
+operation without consciousness of the middle term.
+Although questionable, it is perhaps to be preferred
+to other proposed explanations&mdash;such as automatism,
+habit, "instinct," "nervous connections." Carpenter,
+who as promoter of "unconscious cerebration,"
+deserves to be consulted, likens this state to
+reflection. In ending, he reprints a letter that
+John Stuart Mill wrote to him on the subject, in
+which he says in substance that this capacity is found
+in persons who have experience and lean toward
+practical things, but attach little importance to
+theory.<a name="FNanchor_131_131" id="FNanchor_131_131"></a><a href="#Footnote_131_131" class="fnanchor">[131]</a></p>
+
+<p>Every intuition, then, becomes concrete as a judgment,
+equivalent to a conclusion. But what seems
+obscure and even mysterious in it is the fact that,
+from among many possible solutions, it finds at the
+first shot the proper one. In my opinion this difficulty
+arises largely from a partial comprehension
+of the problem. By "intuition" people mean only<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_285" id="Page_285">[285]</a></span>
+cases in which the divination is correct; they forget
+the other, far more numerous, cases that are failures.
+The act by which one reaches a conclusion is a special
+case of it. What constitutes the originality of
+the operation is not its accuracy, but its <i>rapidity</i>&mdash;the
+latter is the essential character, the former accessory.</p>
+
+<p>Further, it must be acknowledged that the gift of
+seeing correctly is an inborn quality, vouchsafed to
+one, denied to another:&mdash;people are born with it,
+just as they are born right-or left-handed: experience
+does not give it&mdash;only permits it to be put to
+use. As for knowing why the intuitive act now succeeds
+and at another time fails, that is a question
+that comes down to the natural distinction between
+accurate and erroneous minds, which we do not need
+to examine here.</p>
+
+<p>Without dwelling longer on this initial stage, let
+us return to the commercial imagination, and follow
+it in its development.</p>
+
+
+<h3>II</h3>
+
+<p>The human race passed through a pre-commercial
+age. The Australians, Fuegians, and their class
+seem to have had no idea whatever of exchange.
+This primitive period, which was long, corresponds
+to the age of the horde or large clan. Commercial
+invention, arising like the other forms from needs,&mdash;simple
+and indispensable at first, artificial and superfluous
+later,&mdash;could not arise in that dim period
+when the groups had almost their sole relations with<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_286" id="Page_286">[286]</a></span>
+one another as war. Nothing called it to arise. But
+at a higher stage the rudimentary form of commerce,
+exchange in kind or truck, appeared early
+and almost everywhere. Then this long, cumbersome,
+inconvenient method gave place to a more
+ingenious invention&mdash;the employment of "standard
+values," beings or material objects serving as a
+common measure for all the rest:&mdash;their choice varied
+with the time, place, and people&mdash;e.g., certain
+shells, salt, cocoa-seeds, cloth, straw-matting, cattle,
+slaves, etc.; but this innovation held all the remainder
+in the germ, for it was the first attempt at substitution.
+But during the earliest period of commercial
+evolution the chief effort at invention consisted
+of finding increasingly more simple methods
+in the mechanism of exchange. Thus, there succeeded
+to these disparate values, the precious metals,
+in the form of powder and ingots, subject to theft
+and the inconveniences of weighing. Then, money
+of fixed denomination, struck under the authority of
+a chief or of a social group. Finally, gold and silver
+are replaced by the letter of credit, the bank check,
+and the numerous forms of fiduciary money.<a name="FNanchor_132_132" id="FNanchor_132_132"></a><a href="#Footnote_132_132" class="fnanchor">[132]</a></p>
+<p><span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_287" id="Page_287">[287]</a></span></p>
+<p>Every one of these forward steps is due to inventors.
+I say inventors, in the plural, because it
+is proven that every change in the means of exchange
+has been imagined several times, in several
+ages&mdash;though in the same way&mdash;on the surface of
+our earth.</p>
+
+<p>Summing up&mdash;the inventive labor of this period
+is reduced to creating increasingly more simple and
+more rapid methods of <i>substitution</i> in the commercial
+mechanism.</p>
+
+<p>The appearance of commerce on a large scale has
+depended on the state of agriculture, industry, ways
+of communication, social and economic conditions
+and political extension. It came into being toward
+the end of the Roman Republic. After the interruption
+of the Middle Ages the activity is taken up
+again by the Italian cities, the Hanseatic League,
+etc.; in the fifteenth century with the great maritime
+discoveries; in the sixteenth century by the <i>Conquistadores</i>,
+hungering for adventure and wealth;
+later on, by the mixed expeditions, whose expenses
+are defrayed by merchants in common, and which
+are often accompanied by armed bands that fight
+for them; lastly comes the incorporation of great
+companies that have been wittily dubbed "<i>Conquistadores</i>
+of the counting-house."</p>
+
+<p>We now come to the moment when commercial
+invention attains its complex form and must move
+great masses. Taken as a whole, its psychological
+mechanism is the same as that of any other creative
+work. In the first instance, the idea arises, from<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_288" id="Page_288">[288]</a></span>
+inspiration, from reflection, or by chance. Then
+comes a period of fermenting during which the inventor
+sketches his construction in images, represents
+to himself the material to be worked upon, the
+grouping of stockholders, the making up of a capital,
+the mechanism of buying and selling, etc. All
+this differs from the genesis of an esthetic or mechanical
+work only in the end, or in the nature of the
+images. In the second phase it is necessary to proceed
+to execution&mdash;a castle in the air must be made
+a solid structure. Then appear a thousand obstructions
+in the details that must be overcome. As
+everywhere else, minor inventions become grafted
+on the principal invention; the author lets us see the
+poverty or richness in resource of his mind. Finally,
+the work is triumphant, fails, or is only half-successful.</p>
+
+<p>Did it keep only to these general traits, commercial
+imagination would be merely the reiteration,
+with slight changes, of forms already studied; but
+it has characteristics all its own that must be distinguished.</p>
+
+<p>(1) It is a combining or tactical imagination.
+Heretofore, we have met nothing like it. This special
+mark is derived from the very nature of its
+determinism, which is very different from that limiting
+the scientific or mechanical imagination. Every
+commercial project, in order to emerge from the internal,
+purely imaginative phase, and become a
+reality, requires "coming to a head," very exact
+calculation of frequently numerous, divergent, even<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_289" id="Page_289">[289]</a></span>
+contrary elements. The American dealer speculating
+in grain is under the absolute necessity of being
+quickly and surely informed regarding the agricultural
+situation in all countries of the world that
+are rich in grain, that export or import; in regard
+to the probable chances of rain or drouth; the tariff
+duties of the various countries, etc. Lacking that,
+he buys and sells haphazard. Moreover, as he deals
+in enormous quantities, the least error means great
+losses, the smallest profit on a unit is of account,
+and is multiplied and increased into a noticeable
+gain.</p>
+
+<p>Besides that initial intuition that shows opportune
+business and moments, commercial imagination presupposes
+a well-studied, detailed campaign for attack
+and defense, a rapid and reliable glance at
+every moment of execution in order to incessantly
+modify this plan&mdash;it is a kind of war. All this
+totality of special conditions results from a general
+condition,&mdash;namely, competition, strife. We shall
+come back to this point at the end of the chapter.</p>
+
+<p>Let us follow to the end the working of this
+creative imagination. Like the other forms, this
+kind of invention arises from a need, a desire&mdash;that
+of the spreading of "self-feeling," of the expansion
+of the individual under the form of enrichment.
+But this tendency, and with it the resulting imaginative
+creation, can undergo changes.</p>
+
+<p>It is a well-known law of the emotional life that
+what is at first sought as a means may become an
+end and be desired for itself. A very sensual passion
+<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_290" id="Page_290">[290]</a></span>may at length undergo a sort of idealization;
+people study a science at first because it is useful, and
+later because of its fascination; and we may desire
+money in order to spend it, and later in order to
+hoard it. Here it is the same: the financial inventor
+is often possessed with a kind of intoxication&mdash;he
+no longer labors for lucre, but for art; he becomes,
+in his own way, an author of romance. His imagination,
+set at the beginning toward gain, now seeks
+only its complete expansion, the assertion and eruption
+of its creative power, the pleasure of inventing
+for invention's sake,<a name="FNanchor_133_133" id="FNanchor_133_133"></a><a href="#Footnote_133_133" class="fnanchor">[133]</a> daring the extraordinary,
+the unheard-of&mdash;it is the victory of pure construction.
+The natural equilibrium between the three
+necessary elements of creation&mdash;mobility, combination
+of images, calculation&mdash;is destroyed. The rational
+element gives way, is obliterated, and the
+speculator is launched into adventure with the possibility
+of a dazzling success or astounding catastrophe.
+But let us note well that the primary and sole
+cause of this change is in the affective and motor
+element, in an hypertrophy of the lust for power, in
+an unmeasured and morbid want of expansion of
+self. Here, as everywhere, the source of invention
+is the emotional nature of the inventor.</p>
+
+<p>(2) A second special character of commercial
+imagination is the exclusive employment of schematic
+representations. Although this process is also
+met with in the sciences and especially in social<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_291" id="Page_291">[291]</a></span>
+inventions, the imaginative type that we are now
+considering has the privilege of using them without
+exception. This, then, is the proper moment
+for a description.</p>
+
+<p>By "schematic images" I mean those that are, by
+their very nature, intermediate between the concrete
+image and the pure concept, but approach more
+nearly the concept. We have already pointed out
+very different kinds of representations&mdash;concrete
+images, material pertaining to plastic and mechanical
+imagination; the emotional abstractions of the diffluent
+imagination; affective images, the type of
+which is found in musicians; symbolic images, familiar
+in mystics. It may seem improper to add
+another class to this list, but it is not a meaningless
+subtlety. Indeed, there are no images in general
+that, according to the ordinary conception, would
+be copies of reality. Even their separation into
+visual, auditory, motor, etc., is not sufficient, because
+it distinguishes them only with regard to their
+<i>origin</i>. There are other differences. We have seen
+that the image, like everything living, undergoes
+corrosions, damages, twisting, and transformation:
+whence it comes about that this remainder of former
+impressions varies according to its composition, i.e.,
+in simplicity, complexity, grouping of its constitutive
+elements, etc., and takes on many aspects. On
+the other hand, as the difference between the chief
+types of creative imagination depends in part on the
+materials employed&mdash;on the nature of the images
+that serve in mental building&mdash;a precise determination
+<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_292" id="Page_292">[292]</a></span>of the nature of the images belonging to each
+type is not an idle operation.</p>
+
+<p>In order to clearly explain what we mean by
+schematic images, let us represent by a line, <i>PC</i>, the
+scale of images according to the degree of complexity,
+from the percept, <i>P</i>, to the concept, <i>C</i>.</p>
+
+<p class='center'>
+P&mdash;&mdash;&mdash;&mdash;&mdash;&mdash;X&mdash;&mdash;G&mdash;&mdash;S&mdash;&mdash;C<br />
+</p>
+
+<p>As far as I am aware, this determination of all
+the degrees has never been made. The work would
+be delicate; I do not regard it as impossible. I
+have no intention to undertake it, even as I do not
+pretend that I have given above the complete list
+of the various forms of images.</p>
+
+<p>If, then, we consider the foregoing figure merely
+as a means of representing the gradation to the eye,
+the image in moving, by hypothesis, from the moment
+of perception, <i>P</i>, is less and less in contact
+with reality, becomes simplified, impoverished, and
+loses some of its constitutive elements. At <i>X</i> it
+crosses the middle threshold to approach nearer and
+nearer to the concept. At <i>G</i> let us locate generic
+images, primitive forms of generalization, whose
+nature and process of becoming are well-known;<a name="FNanchor_134_134" id="FNanchor_134_134"></a><a href="#Footnote_134_134" class="fnanchor">[134]</a>
+we should place farther along, at <i>S</i>, schematic
+images, which require a higher function of mind.
+Indeed, the generic image results from a spontaneous
+fusion of like or very analogous images&mdash;such
+as the vague representation of the oak, the horse,<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_293" id="Page_293">[293]</a></span>
+the negro, etc.; it belongs to only one class of objects.
+The schematic image results from a voluntary
+act; it is not limited to exact resemblances&mdash;it
+rises into abstraction; so it is scarcely accompanied
+by a fleeting representation of concrete objects&mdash;it
+is almost reduced to the word. At a higher level,
+it is freed from all sensuous elements or pictures,
+and is reduced, in the present instance, to the mere
+notion of value&mdash;it is not different from a pure concept.
+While the artist and the mechanic build with
+concrete images, the commercial imagination can
+act directly neither on things nor on their immediate
+representations, because from the time that it
+goes beyond the primitive age it requires a substitution
+of increasing generality; materials become
+values that are in turn reducible to symbols. Consequently,
+it proceeds as in the stating and solving
+of abstract problems in which, after having substituted
+for things and their relations figures and
+letters, calculation works with signs, and indirectly
+with things.</p>
+
+<p>Aside from the first moment of invention, the
+finding of the idea&mdash;an invariable psychological
+state&mdash;it must be recognized that in its development
+and detailed construction the commercial imagination
+is made up chiefly of calculations and combinations
+that hardly permit concrete images. If we
+admit, then,&mdash;and this is unquestionable&mdash;that these
+are the materials <i>par excellence</i> of the creative imagination,
+we shall be disposed to hold that the imaginative
+type we are now studying is a kind of involution,
+<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_294" id="Page_294">[294]</a></span>a case of impoverishment&mdash;an unacceptable
+thesis as regards the invention itself, but strictly
+acceptable as regards the conditions that necessity
+imposes upon it.</p>
+
+<p>In closing, let us note that financial imagination
+does not always have as its goal the enriching of an
+individual or of a closely limited group of associates:
+it can aim higher, act on greater masses, address
+itself strenuously to a problem as complex as
+the reformation of the finances of a powerful state.
+All the civilized nations count in their history men
+who imagined a financial system and succeeded,
+with various fortunes, in making it prevail. The
+word "system," consecrated by usage, makes unnecessary
+any comment, and relates this form of
+imagination to that of scientists and philosophers.
+Every system rests on a master-conception, on an
+ideal, a center about which there is assembled the
+mental construction made up of imagination and
+calculation which, if circumstances permit, must
+take shape, must show that it can live.</p>
+
+<p>Let us call to mind the author of the first, or at
+least, of the most notorious of these "systems."
+Law claimed that he was applying "the methods of
+philosophy, the principles of Descartes, to social
+economy, abandoned hitherto to chance and empiricism."
+His ideal was the institution of <i>credit</i>
+by the state. Commerce, said he, was during its
+first stage the exchange of merchandise in kind;
+in a second stage, exchange by means of another,
+more manageable, commodity or universal value, security
+<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_295" id="Page_295">[295]</a></span>equivalent to the object it represented; it
+must enter a third stage when exchange will be
+made by a purely conventional sign having no value
+of its own. Paper represents money, just as the
+latter represents goods, "with the difference that
+the paper is not security, but a simple promise, constituting
+credit." The state must do systematically
+what individuals have done instinctively; but it
+must also do what individuals cannot do&mdash;create
+currency by printing on the paper of exchange the
+seal of public authority. We know the history of
+the downfall of this system, the eulogies and criticisms
+it has received:&mdash;but because of the originality
+and boldness of his views, the inexhaustible fecundity
+of his lesser inventions, Law holds an undisputed
+place among the great imaginative minds.</p>
+
+
+<h3>III</h3>
+
+<p>We said above that commerce, in its higher manifestations,
+is a kind of war.<a name="FNanchor_135_135" id="FNanchor_135_135"></a><a href="#Footnote_135_135" class="fnanchor">[135]</a> Here, then, would
+be the place to study the military imagination. The
+subject cannot be treated save by a man of the profession,
+so I shall limit myself to a few brief remarks
+based on personal information, or gleaned
+from authorities.</p>
+
+<p>Between the various types of imagination hitherto
+studied we have shown great differences as regards<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_296" id="Page_296">[296]</a></span>
+their external conditions. While the so-called forms
+of pure imagination, whence esthetic, mythic, religious,
+mystic creations arise, can realize themselves
+by submitting to material conditions that are simple
+and not very exacting, the others can become embodied
+only when they satisfy an <i>ensemble</i> of numerous,
+inevitable, rigorously determined conditions;
+the goal is fixed, the materials are rigid, there is
+little choice of the appropriate means. If there be
+added to the inflexible laws of nature unforeseen
+human passions and determinations, as in political
+or social invention, or the offensive combination of
+opponents, as in commerce and war; then the imaginative
+construction is confronted with problems of
+constantly growing complexity. The most ingenious
+inventor cannot invent an object as a whole,
+letting his work develop through an immanent
+logic:&mdash;the early plan must be continually modified
+and readapted; and the difficulty arises not merely
+from the multiple elements of the problem to be
+solved, but from ceaseless changes in their positions.
+So one can advance only step by step, and go forward
+by calculations and strict examination of possibilities.
+Hence it results that underneath this
+thick covering of material and intellectual conditions
+(calculation, reasoning), spontaneity (the aptness
+for finding new combinations, "that art of inventing
+without which we hardly advance"<a name="FNanchor_136_136" id="FNanchor_136_136"></a><a href="#Footnote_136_136" class="fnanchor">[136]</a>) reveals
+itself to few clear-sighted persons; but, in spite
+of everything, this creative power is everywhere,<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_297" id="Page_297">[297]</a></span>
+flowing like subterranean streams, a vivifying
+agency.</p>
+
+<p>These general remarks, although not applicable
+exclusively to the military imagination, find their
+justification in it, because of its extreme complexity.
+Let us rapidly enumerate, proceeding from without
+inwards, the enormous mass of representations that
+it has to move and combine in order to make its
+construction adequate to reality, able at a precise
+moment to cease being a dream:&mdash;(1) Arms, engines,
+instruments of destruction and supply, varying
+according to time, place, richness of the country,
+etc. (2) The equally variable human element&mdash;mercenaries,
+a national army; strong, tried troops
+or weak and new. (3) The general principles of
+war, acquired by the study of the masters. (4) More
+personal is the power of reflection, the habitual
+solving of tactical and strategic problems. "Battles,"
+said Napoleon, "are thought out at length, and in
+order to be successful it is necessary that we think
+several times in regard to what may happen." All
+the foregoing should be headed "science." Advancing
+more and more within the secret psychology
+of the individual, we come to art, the characteristic
+work of pure imagination. (5) Let us note the
+exact, rapid intuition at the commencement of the
+opportune moments. (6) Lastly, the creative element,
+the conception, a natural gift bearing the hall-mark
+of each inventor. Thus "the Napoleonic esthetics
+was always derived from a single concept,
+based on a principle that may be summed up thus:<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_298" id="Page_298">[298]</a></span>&mdash;Strict
+economy wherever it can be done; expenditure
+without limit on the decisive point. This principle
+inspires the strategy of the master; it directs
+everything, especially his battle-tactics, in which it
+is synthetized and summed up."<a name="FNanchor_137_137" id="FNanchor_137_137"></a><a href="#Footnote_137_137" class="fnanchor">[137]</a></p>
+
+<p>Such, in analytical terms, appears the hidden
+spring that makes everything move, and it is to be
+attributed neither to experience nor to reasoning,
+nor to wise combinations, for it arises from the innermost
+depths of the inventor. "The principle
+exists in him in a latent state, i.e., in the depths of
+the unconscious, and unconsciously it is that he
+applies it, when the shock of the circumstances, of
+goal and means, causes to flash from his brain the
+spark stimulating the artistic solution <i>par excellence</i>,
+one that reaches the limits of human perfection."<a name="FNanchor_138_138" id="FNanchor_138_138"></a><a href="#Footnote_138_138" class="fnanchor">[138]</a></p>
+
+<div class="footnotes"><h3>FOOTNOTES:</h3>
+
+<div class="footnote"><p><a name="Footnote_131_131" id="Footnote_131_131"></a><a href="#FNanchor_131_131"><span class="label">[131]</span></a> Carpenter, <i>Mental Physiology</i>, chapter XI (end).</p></div>
+
+<div class="footnote"><p><a name="Footnote_132_132" id="Footnote_132_132"></a><a href="#FNanchor_132_132"><span class="label">[132]</span></a> Historically, the evolution has not always proceeded strictly
+in this order, which, however, seems the most logical one.
+Negotiable drafts were known to the Assyrians and Carthaginians.
+For thousands of years Egypt used ingots, not real
+money, but it was acquainted with fiduciary money. In the
+new world, the Peruvians made use of the scale, the Aztecs
+were ignorant of its use, etc. For details, see Letourneau,
+<i>L'&Eacute;volution du commerce dans les diverses races humaines</i>,
+Paris, 1897, especially pp. 264, 330, 354, 384, etc.</p></div>
+
+<div class="footnote"><p><a name="Footnote_133_133" id="Footnote_133_133"></a><a href="#FNanchor_133_133"><span class="label">[133]</span></a> This condition has been well-described by various novelists,
+among them Zola, in <i>Money</i>.</p></div>
+
+<div class="footnote"><p><a name="Footnote_134_134" id="Footnote_134_134"></a><a href="#FNanchor_134_134"><span class="label">[134]</span></a> For further details on this point, we refer the reader to
+our <i>Evolution of General Ideas</i> (chapter I).</p></div>
+
+<div class="footnote"><p><a name="Footnote_135_135" id="Footnote_135_135"></a><a href="#FNanchor_135_135"><span class="label">[135]</span></a> A general, a former professor in the War College, told me
+that when he heard a great merchant tell of the quick and sure
+service of his commercial information, the conception of the
+whole, and the care in all the details of his operations, he could
+not keep from exclaiming, "Why, that is war!"</p></div>
+
+<div class="footnote"><p><a name="Footnote_136_136" id="Footnote_136_136"></a><a href="#FNanchor_136_136"><span class="label">[136]</span></a> Leibniz.</p></div>
+
+<div class="footnote"><p><a name="Footnote_137_137" id="Footnote_137_137"></a><a href="#FNanchor_137_137"><span class="label">[137]</span></a> General Bonnal, <i>Les Ma&icirc;tres de la Guerre</i>, 1899, p. 137.
+"In him (Napoleon)," says the writer, "there was something
+of the poet, and one could explain all his acts by means of
+this singular complex, a medley of imagination, passion, and
+calculation. The dreams of an Ossian with the positive cast
+of mind of a mathematician and the passions of a Corsican&mdash;such
+were the heterogeneous elements that clashed in that
+powerful organization" (p. 151).</p></div>
+
+<div class="footnote"><p><a name="Footnote_138_138" id="Footnote_138_138"></a><a href="#FNanchor_138_138"><span class="label">[138]</span></a> <i>Op. cit.</i>, p. 6.</p></div>
+</div>
+
+
+<hr style="width: 65%;" /><p><span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_299" id="Page_299">[299]</a></span></p>
+<h2>CHAPTER VII</h2>
+
+<h3>THE UTOPIAN IMAGINATION<a name="FNanchor_139_139" id="FNanchor_139_139"></a><a href="#Footnote_139_139" class="fnanchor">[139]</a></h3>
+
+
+<p>When the human mind creates, it can use only
+two classes of ideas as materials to embody its idea,
+viz.:</p>
+
+<p>(1) Natural phenomena, the forces of the organic
+and inorganic worlds. In its scientific form,
+seeking to explain, to know, it ends in the hypothesis,
+a disinterested creation. In its industrial aspect,
+aiming towards application and utilization, it ends
+in practical, interested inventions.</p>
+
+<p>(2) Human, i.e., psychic elements&mdash;instincts,
+passions, feelings, ideas, and actions. Esthetic creation
+is the disinterested form, social invention is the
+utilitarian form.</p>
+
+<p>Consequently, we may say that invention in
+science resembles invention in the fine arts, both
+being speculative; and that mechanical and industrial
+invention approaches social invention through
+a common tendency toward the practical. I shall
+not insist on this distinction, which, to be definite,<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_300" id="Page_300">[300]</a></span>
+rests only on partial characters; I merely wish to
+mention that invention, whose r&ocirc;le in social, political
+and moral evolution is large, must, in order
+to be a success, adopt certain processes while neglecting
+others. This the Utopians do not do.</p>
+
+<p>The development of human societies depends on
+a multitude of factors, such as race, geographic and
+economic conditions, war, etc., which we need
+neither enumerate nor study. One only belongs to
+our topic&mdash;the successive appearance of idealistic
+conceptions that, like all other creations of mind,
+tend to realize themselves, the moral ideal consisting
+of new combinations arising from the predominance
+of one feeling, or from an unconscious elaboration
+(inspiration), or from analogy.</p>
+
+<p>At the beginning of civilizations we meet semi-historic,
+semi-legendary persons&mdash;Manu, Zoroaster,
+Moses, Confucius, etc., who were inventors or reformers
+in the social and moral spheres. That a
+part of the inventions attributed to them must be
+credited to predecessors or successors is probable;
+but the invention, no matter who is its author, remains
+none the less invention. We have said elsewhere,
+and may repeat, that the expression <i>inventor</i>
+in morals may seem strange to some, because we are
+imbued with the notion of a knowledge of good and
+evil that is innate, universal, bestowed on all men
+and in all times. If we admit, on the other hand,
+as observation compels us to do, not a ready-made
+morality, but a morality in the making, it must be,
+indeed, the <i>creation</i> of an individual or of a group.<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_301" id="Page_301">[301]</a></span>
+Everybody recognizes inventors in geometry, in
+music, in the plastic and mechanic arts; but there
+have also been men who, in their moral dispositions,
+were very superior to their contemporaries, and
+were promoters, initiators.<a name="FNanchor_140_140" id="FNanchor_140_140"></a><a href="#Footnote_140_140" class="fnanchor">[140]</a> For reasons of which
+we are ignorant, analogous to those that produce a
+great poet or a great painter, there arise moral
+geniuses who feel strongly what others do not feel
+at all, just as does a great poet, in comparison with
+the crowd. But it is not enough that they feel: they
+must create, they must realize their ideal in a belief
+and in rules of conduct accepted by other men. All
+the founders of great religions were inventors of
+this kind. Whether the invention comes from
+themselves alone, or from a collectivity of which
+they are the sum and incarnation, matters little. In
+them moral invention has found its complete form;
+like all invention, it is organic. The legend relates
+that Buddha, possessed with the desire of finding
+the perfect road of salvation for himself and all other
+men, gives himself up, at first, to an extravagant
+asceticism. He perceives the uselessness of this
+and renounces it. For seven years he meditates,
+then he beholds the light. He comes into possession
+of knowledge of the means that give freedom
+from <i>Karma</i> (the chain of causes and effects), and
+from the necessity of being born again. Soon he
+renounces the life of contemplation, and during fifty
+years of ceaseless wanderings preaches, makes converts,
+<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_302" id="Page_302">[302]</a></span>organizes his followers. Whether true or
+false historically, this tale is psychologically exact.
+A fixed and besetting idea, trial followed by failure,
+the decisive moment of <i>Eureka!</i> then the inner revelation
+manifests itself outwardly, and through the
+labors of the master and his disciples becomes complete,
+imposes itself on millions of men. In what
+respect does this mode of creation differ from others,
+at least in the practical order?</p>
+
+<p>Thus, from the viewpoint of our present study,
+we may divide ethics into living and dead. Living
+ethics arise from needs and desires, stimulate an
+imaginative construction that becomes fixed in actions,
+habits and laws; they offer to men a concrete,
+positive ideal which, under various and often contrary
+aspects, is always happiness. The lifeless
+ethics, from which invention has withdrawn, arise
+from reflection upon, and the rational codification of,
+living ethics. Stored away in the writings of philosophers,
+they remain theoretical, speculative, without
+appreciable influence on the masses, mere material
+for dissertation and commentary.</p>
+
+<p>In proportion as we recede from distant origins
+the light grows, and invention in the social and
+moral order becomes manifest as the work of two
+principal categories of minds&mdash;the fantastic, the
+positive. The former, purely imaginative beings,
+visionaries, utopians, are closely related to poets and
+artists. The latter, practical creators or reformers,
+capable of organizing, belong to the family of inventors
+<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_303" id="Page_303">[303]</a></span>in the industrial-commercial-mechanical order.</p>
+
+
+<h3>I</h3>
+
+<p>The chimerical form of imagination, applied to
+the social sciences, is the one that, taking account
+neither of the external determinism nor of practical
+requirements, spreads out freely. Such are the creators
+of ideal republics, seeking for a lost or to-be-discovered-in-the-future
+golden age, constructing, as
+their fancy pleases, human societies in their large
+outlines and in their details. They are social novelists,
+who bear the same relation to sociologists that
+poets do to critics. Their dreams, subjected merely
+to the conditions of an inner logic, have lived only
+within themselves, an ideal life, without ever passing
+through the test of application. It is the
+creative imagination in its unconscious form, restrained
+to its first phase.</p>
+
+<p>Nothing is better known than their names and
+their works: The <i>Republic</i> of Plato, Thomas More's
+<i>Utopia</i>, Campanella's <i>City of the Sun</i>, Harrington's
+<i>Oceana</i>, Fenelon's <i>Salente</i>, etc.<a name="FNanchor_141_141" id="FNanchor_141_141"></a><a href="#Footnote_141_141" class="fnanchor">[141]</a> However idealistic
+they may be, one could easily show that all the
+materials of their ideal are taken from the surrounding
+reality, they bear the stamp of the <i>milieu</i>, be it<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_304" id="Page_304">[304]</a></span>
+Greek, English, Christian, etc., in which they lived,
+and it should not be forgotten that in the Utopians
+everything is not chimerical&mdash;some have been revealers,
+others have acted as stimuli or ferments.
+True to its mission, which is to make innovations,
+the constructive imagination is a spur that arouses;
+it hinders social routine and prevents stagnation.</p>
+
+<p>Among the creators of ideal societies there is one,
+almost contemporary, who would deserve a study
+of individual psychology&mdash;Ch. Fourier. If it is a
+question merely of fertility in pure construction, I
+doubt whether we could find one superior to him&mdash;he
+is equal to the highest, with the special characteristic
+of being at the same time exuberant to delirium
+and exact in details to the least minuti&aelig;. He
+is such a fine type of the imaginative intellect that he
+deserves that we stop a moment.</p>
+
+<p>His cosmogony seems the work of an omnipotent
+demiurge fashioning the universe at will. His conception
+of the future world with its "counter-cast"
+creations, where the present ugliness and troubles
+of animal reign become changed into their opposites,
+where there will be "anti-lions," "anti-crocodiles,"
+"anti-whales," etc., is one example of hundreds
+showing his inexhaustible richness in fantastic visions:
+the work of an imagination that is hot and
+overflowing, with no rational preoccupation.</p>
+
+<p>On the other hand, his psychogony, based on the
+idea of metempsychosis borrowed from the Orient,
+gives itself up to numerical vagaries. Assuming for
+every soul a periodical rebirth, he assigns it first a<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_305" id="Page_305">[305]</a></span>
+period of "ascending subversion," the first phase
+of which lasts five thousand years, the second thirty-six
+thousand; then comes a period of completion,
+9,000 years; and then a period of "descending subversion,"
+whose first stage is 27,000 years, and the
+second 4,000 years&mdash;a total of 81,000 years. This
+form of imagination is already known to us.<a name="FNanchor_142_142" id="FNanchor_142_142"></a><a href="#Footnote_142_142" class="fnanchor">[142]</a></p>
+
+<p>The principal part of his psychology, the theory
+of the emotions, questionable in many respects, is
+relatively rational. But in the construction of human
+society, the duality of his imagination&mdash;powerful
+and minute&mdash;reappears. We know his methodical
+organization: the <i>group</i>, composed of seven to
+nine persons; the <i>series</i>, comprising twenty-four to
+thirty-two groups; a <i>phalanx</i> that includes eighteen
+groups, constituting the phalanstery; the small city,
+a general center of phalanges; the provincial city,
+the imperial capital, the universal metropolis. He
+has a passion for classification and ordering; "his
+phalanstery works like a clock."</p>
+
+<p>This rare imaginative type well deserved a few
+remarks, because of its mixture of apparent exactness
+and a natural, unconscious utopianism and extravagance.
+For, beneath all these pulsating inventions
+of precise, petty details, the foundation is none
+the less a purely speculative construction of the
+mind. Let us add an incredible abuse of analogy,
+that chief intellectual instrument of invention, of
+which only the reading of his books can give an<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_306" id="Page_306">[306]</a></span>
+idea.<a name="FNanchor_143_143" id="FNanchor_143_143"></a><a href="#Footnote_143_143" class="fnanchor">[143]</a> Heinrich Heine said of Michelet, "He has a
+Hindoo imagination." The term would apply still
+better to Fourier, in whom coexist unchecked profusion
+of images and the taste for numerical accumulations.
+People have tried to explain this abundance
+of figures and calculation as a professional
+habit&mdash;he was for a long time a bookkeeper or
+cashier, always an excellent accountant. But this
+is taking the effect for cause. This dualism existed
+in the very nature of his mind, and he took advantage
+of it in his calling. The study of the
+numerical imagination<a name="FNanchor_144_144" id="FNanchor_144_144"></a><a href="#Footnote_144_144" class="fnanchor">[144]</a> has shown how it is frequently
+met with among orientals, whose imaginative
+development is unquestioned, and we have seen
+why the idealistic imagination agrees so well with
+the indefinite series of numbers and makes use of it
+as a vehicle.</p>
+
+
+<h3>II</h3>
+
+<p>With practical inventors and reformers the ideal
+falls&mdash;not that they sacrifice it for their personal
+interests, but because they have a comprehension of
+possibilities. The imaginative construction must be
+corrected, narrowed, mutilated, if it is to enter into<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_307" id="Page_307">[307]</a></span>
+the narrow frame of the conditions of existence, until
+it becomes adapted and determined. This process
+has been described several times, and it is needless
+to repeat it here in other terms. Nevertheless, the
+ideal&mdash;understanding by this term the unifying
+principle that excites creative work and supports it
+in its development&mdash;undergoes metamorphosis and
+must be not only individual but collective; the creation
+does not realize itself save through a "communion
+of minds," by a co-operation of feelings and
+of wills; the work of one conscious individual must
+become the work of a social consciousness.</p>
+
+<p>That form of imagination, creating and organizing
+social groups, manifests itself in various degrees
+according to the tendency and power of creators.</p>
+
+<p>There are the founders of small societies, religious
+in form&mdash;the Essenes, the earliest Christian
+communities, the monastic orders of the Orient and
+Occident, the great Catholic or Mohammedan congregations,
+the semi-lay, semi-religious sects like
+the Moravian Brotherhood, the Shakers, Mormons,
+etc. Less complete because it does not cover the
+individual altogether in all the acts of life is the
+creation of secret associations, professional unions,
+learned societies, etc. The founder conceives an
+ideal of complete living or one limited to a given
+end, and puts it into practice, having for material
+men grouped of their free choice, or by co&ouml;ptation.</p>
+
+<p>There is invention operating on great masses&mdash;social
+or political invention strictly so called&mdash;ordinarily
+<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_308" id="Page_308">[308]</a></span>not proposed but imposed, which, however,
+despite its coercive power, is subject to requirements
+even more numerous than mechanical, industrial, or
+commercial invention. It has to struggle against
+natural forces, but most of all against human forces&mdash;inherited
+habits, customs, traditions. It must
+make terms with dominant passions and ideas, finding
+its justification, like all other creation, only in
+success.</p>
+
+<p>Without entering into the details of this inevitable
+determination, which would require useless repetition,
+we may sum up the r&ocirc;le of the constructive
+imagination in social matters by saying that it has
+undergone a regression&mdash;i.e., that its area of development
+has been little by little narrowed; not that
+inventive genius, reduced to pure construction in
+images, has suffered an eclipse, but on its part it
+has had to make increasingly greater room for experiment,
+rational elements, calculation, inductions
+and deductions that permit foresight&mdash;for practical
+necessities.</p>
+
+<p>If we omit the spontaneous, instinctive, semi-conscious
+invention of the earliest ages, that was
+sufficient for primitive societies, and keep to creations
+that were the result of reflection and of great
+pretension, we can roughly distinguish three successive
+periods:</p>
+
+<p>(1) A very long idealistic phase (Antiquity, Renaissance)
+when triumphed the pure imagination,
+and the play of the free fancy that spends itself in
+social novels. Between the creation of the mind<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_309" id="Page_309">[309]</a></span>
+and the life of contemporary society there was no
+relation; they were worlds apart, strangers to one
+another. The true Utopians scarcely troubled themselves
+to make applications. Plato and More&mdash;would
+they have wished to realize their dreams?</p>
+
+<p>(2) An intermediate phase, when an attempt is
+made to pass from the ideal to the practical, from
+pure speculation to social facts. Already, in the
+eighteenth century, some philosophers (Locke,
+Rousseau) drew up constitutions, at the request of
+interested persons. During this period, when the
+work of the imagination, instead of merely becoming
+fixed in books, tends to become objectified in
+acts, we find many failures and some successes. Let
+us recall the fruitless attempts of the "phalansteries"
+in France, in Algeria, Brazil, and in the
+United States. Robert Owen was more fortunate;<a name="FNanchor_145_145" id="FNanchor_145_145"></a><a href="#Footnote_145_145" class="fnanchor">[145]</a>
+in four years he reformed New Larnak, after his
+ideal, and with varying fortune founded short-lived
+colonies. Saint-Simonism has not entirely died out;
+the primitive civilization after his ideal rapidly disappeared,
+but some of his theories have filtered into
+or have become incorporated with other doctrines.</p>
+
+<p>(3) A phase in which imaginative creation becomes
+subordinated to practical life: The conception
+of society ceases to be purely idealistic or constructed
+<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_310" id="Page_310">[310]</a></span><i>a priori</i> by deduction from a single principle;
+it recognizes the conditions of its environment,
+adapts itself to the necessities of its development.
+It is the passage from the absolutely autonomous
+state of the imagination to a period when it submits
+to the laws of a rational imperative. In other
+words, the transition from the esthetic to the scientific,
+and especially the practical, form. Socialism
+is a well-known and excellent example of this.
+Compare its former utopias, down to about the middle
+of the last century, with its contemporary forms,
+and without difficulty we can appreciate the amount
+of imaginative elements lost in favor of an at least
+equivalent quantity of rational elements and positive
+calculations.</p>
+
+<div class="footnotes"><h3>FOOTNOTES:</h3>
+
+<div class="footnote"><p><a name="Footnote_139_139" id="Footnote_139_139"></a><a href="#FNanchor_139_139"><span class="label">[139]</span></a> This title, as will be seen later, corresponds only in part
+to the contents of this chapter.</p></div>
+
+<div class="footnote"><p><a name="Footnote_140_140" id="Footnote_140_140"></a><a href="#FNanchor_140_140"><span class="label">[140]</span></a> For facts in support, see the <i>Psychology of the Emotions</i>,
+Second Part, chapter VIII.</p></div>
+
+<div class="footnote"><p><a name="Footnote_141_141" id="Footnote_141_141"></a><a href="#FNanchor_141_141"><span class="label">[141]</span></a> Our author does not mention Bacon's <i>New Atlantis</i>, one of
+the best specimens of its kind. "Wisest Verulam," active
+and distinguished in so many fields, is not amenable to rules,
+and is here found among "idealists," as elsewhere among the
+foremost empiricists and iconoclasts. (Tr.)</p></div>
+
+<div class="footnote"><p><a name="Footnote_142_142" id="Footnote_142_142"></a><a href="#FNanchor_142_142"><span class="label">[142]</span></a> See above, Part III, <a href="#Page_221">chapter III</a>.</p></div>
+
+<div class="footnote"><p><a name="Footnote_143_143" id="Footnote_143_143"></a><a href="#FNanchor_143_143"><span class="label">[143]</span></a> We recommend to the reader the "Epilogue sur l'Analogie,"
+in <i>Le Monde Industriel</i>, pp. 244 ff., where he will learn
+that the "goldfinch depicts the child born of poor parents;
+the pheasant represents the jealous husband; the cock is the
+symbol of the man of the world; the cabbage is the emblem of
+mysterious love," etc. There are several pages in this tone,
+with alleged reasons in support of the statements.</p></div>
+
+<div class="footnote"><p><a name="Footnote_144_144" id="Footnote_144_144"></a><a href="#FNanchor_144_144"><span class="label">[144]</span></a> See above, <a href="#Page_195">chapter II</a>.</p></div>
+
+<div class="footnote"><p><a name="Footnote_145_145" id="Footnote_145_145"></a><a href="#FNanchor_145_145"><span class="label">[145]</span></a> For an excellent account of the principles of these movements,
+see Rae, <i>Contemporary Socialism</i>; for Owen's ideals,
+his <i>Autobiography</i>; and for an account of some of the trials,
+Bushee's "Communistic Societies in the United States,"
+<i>Political Science Quarterly</i>, vol. XX, pp. 625 ff. (Tr.)</p></div>
+</div>
+
+
+<hr style="width: 65%;" /><p><span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_311" id="Page_311">[311]</a></span></p>
+<h2>CONCLUSION.</h2><p><span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_312" id="Page_312">[312]</a></span></p>
+
+
+<hr style="width: 65%;" /><p><span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_313" id="Page_313">[313]</a></span></p>
+<h2>CONCLUSION</h2>
+
+
+<h3>I</h3>
+
+<h3><span class="smcap">The Foundations of the Creative Imagination</span></h3>
+
+<p>Why is the human mind able to create? In a
+certain sense this question may seem idle, childish,
+and even worse. We might just as well ask why
+does man have eyes and not an electric apparatus
+like the torpedo? Why does he perceive directly
+sounds but not the ultra-red and ultra-violet rays?
+Why does he perceive changes of odors but not magnetic
+changes? And so on <i>ad infinitum</i>. We will
+put the question in a very different manner: Being
+given the physical and mental constitution of man
+such as it is at present, how is the creative imagination
+a natural product of this constitution?</p>
+
+<p>Man is able to create for two principal reasons.
+The first, motor in nature, is found in the action
+of his needs, appetites, tendencies, desires. The
+second is the possibility of a spontaneous revival of
+images that become grouped in new combination.</p>
+
+<p>1. We have already shown in detail<a name="FNanchor_146_146" id="FNanchor_146_146"></a><a href="#Footnote_146_146" class="fnanchor">[146]</a> that the<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_314" id="Page_314">[314]</a></span>
+hypothesis of a "creative instinct," if the expression
+is used not as an abbreviated or metaphorical formula
+but in the strict sense, is a pure chimera, an
+empty entity. In studying the various types of imagination
+we have always been careful to note that
+every mode of creation may be reduced, as regards
+its beginnings, to a tendency, a want, a special, determinate
+desire. Let us recall for the last time these
+initial conditions of all invention&mdash;these desires, conscious
+or not, that excite it.</p>
+
+<p>The wants, tendencies, desires&mdash;it matters not
+which term we adopt&mdash;the whole of which constitutes
+the instinct of individual preservation, have
+been the generators of all inventions dealing with
+food-getting, housing, making of weapons, instruments,
+and machines.</p>
+
+<p>The need for individual and social expansion or
+extension has given rise to military, commercial,
+and industrial invention, and in its disinterested
+form, esthetic creation.</p>
+
+<p>As for the sexual instinct, its psychic fertility is
+in no way less than the physical&mdash;it is an inexhaustible
+source of imagination in everyday life as well as
+in art.</p>
+
+<p>The wants of man in contact with his fellows
+have engendered, through instinctive or reflective
+action, the numerous social and practical creations
+regulating human groups, and they are rough or
+complex, stable or unstable, just or unjust, kindly
+or harsh.</p>
+
+<p>The need of knowing and of explaining, well or<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_315" id="Page_315">[315]</a></span>
+ill, has created myths, religions, philosophical systems,
+scientific hypotheses.</p>
+
+<p>Every want, tendency or desire may, then, become
+creative, by itself or associated with others,
+and into these final elements it is that analysis
+must resolve "creative spontaneity." This vague expression
+corresponds to a <i>sum</i>, not to a special property.<a name="FNanchor_147_147" id="FNanchor_147_147"></a><a href="#Footnote_147_147" class="fnanchor">[147]</a>
+Every invention, then, has a <i>motor</i> origin;
+<i>the ultimate basis of the constructive imagination is
+motor</i>.</p>
+
+<p>2. But needs and desires by themselves cannot
+create&mdash;they are only a stimulus and a spring.
+Whence arises the need of a second condition&mdash;the
+spontaneous revival of images.</p>
+
+<p>In many animals that are endowed only with
+memory the return of images is always provoked.
+Sensation from without or from within bring them<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_316" id="Page_316">[316]</a></span>
+into consciousness under the form, pure and simple,
+of former experience; whence we have reproduction,
+repetition without new associations. People
+of slight imagination and used to routine approach
+this mental condition. But, as a matter of
+fact, man from his second year on, and some higher
+animals, go beyond this stage&mdash;they are capable of
+spontaneous revival. By this term I mean that revival
+that comes about abruptly, without <i>apparent</i>
+antecedents. We know that these act in a latent
+form, and consist of thinking by analogy, affective
+dispositions, unconscious elaboration. This sudden
+appearance excites other states which, grouped into
+new associations, contain the first elements of the
+creative act.</p>
+
+<p>Taken altogether, and however numerous its
+manifestations, the constructive imagination seems
+to me reducible to three forms, which I shall call
+<i>sketched</i>, <i>fixed</i>, <i>objectified</i>, according as it remains
+an internal fancy, or takes on a material but contingent
+and unstable form, or is subjected to the
+conditions of a rigorous internal or external determinism.</p>
+
+<p>(a) The <i>sketched</i> form is primordial, original,
+the simplest of all; it is a nascent moment or first
+attempt. It appears first of all in dreaming&mdash;an
+embryonic, unstable and unco&ouml;rdinated manifestation
+of the creative imagination&mdash;a transition-stage
+between passive reproduction and organized construction.
+A step higher is revery, whose flitting
+images, associated by chance, without personal intervention,
+<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_317" id="Page_317">[317]</a></span>are nevertheless vivid enough to exclude
+from consciousness every impression of the external
+world&mdash;so much so that the day-dreamer re-enters
+it only with a shock of surprise. More coherent are
+the imaginary constructions known as "castles in
+Spain"&mdash;the works of a wish considered unrealizable,
+fancies of love, ambition, power and wealth,
+the goal of which seems to be forever beyond our
+reach. Lastly, still higher, come all the plans for
+the future conceived vaguely and as barely possible&mdash;foreseeing
+the end of a sickness, of a business
+enterprise, of a political event, etc.</p>
+
+<p>This vague and "outline" imagination, penetrating
+our entire life, has its peculiar characters&mdash;the
+unifying principle is <i>nil</i> or ephemeral, which fact always
+reduces it to the dream as a type; it does not
+externalize itself, does not change into acts, a consequence
+of its basically chimerical nature or of
+weakness of will, which reduces it to a strictly internal
+and individual existence. It is needless to say
+that this kind of imagination is a permanent and
+definite form with the dreamers living in a world of
+ceaselessly reappearing images, having no power to
+organize them, to change them into a work of art,
+a theory, or a useful invention.</p>
+
+<p>The "sketched" form is or remains an elementary,
+primitive, automatic form. Conformably to the general
+law ruling the development of mind&mdash;passage
+from indefinite to definite, from the incoherent to
+the coherent, from spontaneity to reflection, from
+the reflex to the voluntary period&mdash;the imagination<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_318" id="Page_318">[318]</a></span>
+comes out of its swaddling-clothes, is changed&mdash;through
+the intervention of a teleological act that
+assigns it an end; through the union of rational elements
+that subdue it for an adaptation. Then appear
+the other two forms.</p>
+
+<p>(b) The <i>fixed</i> form comprises mythic and esthetic
+creations, philosophical and scientific hypotheses.
+While the "outline" imagination remains an internal
+phenomenon, existing only in and for a single individual,
+the fixed form is projected outwards, made
+something else. The former has no reality other
+than the momentary belief accompanying it; the latter
+exists by itself, for its creator and for others;
+the work is accepted, rejected, examined, criticised.
+Fiction rests on the same level as reality. Do not
+people discuss seriously the objective value of certain
+myths, and of metaphysical theories? the action of a
+novel or drama as though it were a matter of real
+events? the character of the <i>dramatis personae</i> as
+though they were living flesh and blood?</p>
+
+<p>The fixed imagination moves in an elastic frame.
+The material elements circumscribing it and composing
+it have a certain fluidity; they are language,
+writing, musical sounds, colors, forms, lines. Furthermore,
+we know that its creations, in spite of the
+spontaneous adherence of the mind accepting them,
+are the work of a free will; they could have been
+otherwise&mdash;they preserve an indelible imprint of
+contingency and subjectivity.</p>
+
+<p>(c) This last mark is rubbed out without disappearing
+(for a thing imagined is always a personal<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_319" id="Page_319">[319]</a></span>
+thing) in the objectified form that comprises successful
+practical inventions&mdash;whether mechanical, industrial,
+commercial, military, social, or political.
+These have no longer an arbitrary, borrowed reality;
+they have their place in the totality of physical
+and social phenomena. They resemble creations of
+nature, subject like them to fixed conditions of
+existence and to a limited determinism. We shall
+not dwell longer on this last character, so often
+pointed out.</p>
+
+<p>In order the better to comprehend the distinction
+between the three forms of imagination let us
+borrow for a moment the terminology of spiritualism
+or of the common dualism&mdash;merely as a means
+of explaining the matter clearly. The "outline"
+imagination is a soul without a body, a pure
+spirit, without determination in space. The "fixed"
+imagination is a soul or spirit surrounded by an
+almost immaterial sheath, like angels or demons,
+genii, shadows, the "double" of savages, the <i>peresprit</i>
+of spiritualists, etc. The <i>objectified</i> imagination
+is soul and body, a complete organization after
+the pattern of living people; the ideal is incarnated,
+but it must undergo transformation, reductions and
+adaptations, in order that it may become practical&mdash;just
+as the soul, according to spiritualism, must bend
+to the necessities of the body, to be at the same time
+the servant of, and served by, the bodily organs.</p>
+
+<p>According to general opinion the great imaginers
+are found only in the first two classes, which is,
+in the strict sense of the word, true; in the full<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_320" id="Page_320">[320]</a></span>
+sense of the word false. As long as it remains "outline,"
+or even "fixed," the constructive imagination
+can reign as supreme mistress. Objectified, it still
+rules, but shares its power with competitors; it
+avails nought without them, they can do nothing
+without it. What deceives us is the fact that we see
+it no longer in the open. Here the imaginative
+stroke resembles those powerful streams of water
+that must be imprisoned in a complicated network
+of canals and ramifications varying in shape and
+in diameter before bursting forth in multiple jets
+and in liquid architecture.<a name="FNanchor_148_148" id="FNanchor_148_148"></a><a href="#Footnote_148_148" class="fnanchor">[148]</a></p>
+
+
+<h3>II</h3>
+
+<h3><span class="smcap">The Imaginative Type.</span></h3>
+
+<p>Let us try now, by way of conclusion, to present
+to the reader a picture of the whole of the imaginative
+life in all its degrees.</p>
+
+<p>If we consider the human mind principally under
+its intellectual aspect&mdash;i.e., insofar as it knows and
+thinks, deducting its emotions and voluntary activity&mdash;the
+observation of individuals distinguishes
+some very clear varieties of mentality.</p>
+
+<p>First, those of a "positive" or realistic turn of
+mind, living chiefly on the external world, on what<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_321" id="Page_321">[321]</a></span>
+is perceived and what is immediately deducible
+therefrom&mdash;alien or inimical to vain fancy; some of
+them flat, limited, of the earth earthy; others, men
+of action, energetic but limited by real things.</p>
+
+<p>Second, abstract minds, "quintessence abstractors,"
+with whom the internal life is dominant in the form
+of combinations of concepts. They have a schematic
+representation of the world, reduced to a hierarchy
+of general ideas, noted by symbols. Such are the
+pure mathematicians, the pure metaphysicians. If
+these two tendencies exist together, or, as happens,
+are grafted one on the other, without anything to
+counterbalance them, the abstract spirit attains its
+perfect form.</p>
+
+<p>Midway between these two groups are the imaginers
+in whom the internal life predominates in the
+form of combinations of images, which fact distinguishes
+them clearly from the abstractors. The
+former alone interest us, and we shall try to trace
+this imaginative type in its development from the
+normal or average stage to the moment when ever-growing
+exuberance leads us into pathology.</p>
+
+<p>The explanation of the various phases of this development
+is reducible to a well-known psychologic
+law&mdash;the natural antagonism between sensation and
+image, between phenomena of peripheral origin and
+phenomena of central origin; or, in a more general
+form, between the outer and inner life. I shall not
+dwell long on this point, which Taine has so admirably
+treated.<a name="FNanchor_149_149" id="FNanchor_149_149"></a><a href="#Footnote_149_149" class="fnanchor">[149]</a> He has shown in detail how the<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_322" id="Page_322">[322]</a></span>
+image is a spontaneously arising sensation, one that
+is, however, aborted by the opposing shock of real
+sensation, which is its reducer, producing on it an
+arresting action and maintaining it in the condition
+of an internal, subjective fact. Thus, during the
+waking hours, the frequency and intensity of impressions
+from without press the images back to the
+second level; but during sleep, when the external
+world is as it were suppressed, their hallucinatory
+tendency is no longer kept in check, and the world
+of dreams is momentarily the reality.</p>
+
+<p>The psychology of the imaginer reduces itself to
+a progressively increasing interchange of r&ocirc;les.
+Images become stronger and stronger states; perceptions,
+more and more feeble. In this movement
+opposite to nature I note four steps, each of which
+corresponds to particular conditions: (1) The quantity
+of images; (2) quantity and intensity; (3)
+quantity, intensity and duration; (4) complete systematization.</p>
+
+<p>(1) In the first place the predominance of imagination
+is marked only by the quantity of representations
+invading consciousness; they teem, break
+apart, become associated, combine easily and in various
+ways. All the imaginative persons who have
+given us their experiences either orally or in writing
+agree in regard to the extreme ease of the formation
+of associations, not in repeating past expedience,
+but in sketching little romances.<a name="FNanchor_150_150" id="FNanchor_150_150"></a><a href="#Footnote_150_150" class="fnanchor">[150]</a> From
+among many examples I choose one. One of my<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_323" id="Page_323">[323]</a></span>
+correspondents writes that if at church, theatre, on
+a street, or in a railway station, his attention is attracted
+to a person&mdash;man or woman&mdash;he immediately
+makes up, from the appearance, carriage and attractiveness
+his or her present or past, manner of
+life, occupation&mdash;representing to himself the part of
+the city he or she must dwell in, the apartments,
+furniture, etc.&mdash;a construction most often erroneous;
+I have many proofs of it. Surely this disposition
+is normal; it departs from the average only by an
+excess of imagination that is replaced in others by
+an excessive tendency to observe, to analyze, or to
+criticise, reason, find fault. In order to take the
+decisive step and become abnormal one condition
+more is necessary&mdash;intensity of the representations.</p>
+
+<p>2. Next, the interchange of place, indicated
+above, occurs. Weak states (images) become
+strong; strong states (perceptions) become weak.
+The impressions from without are powerless to fulfill
+their regular function of inhibition. We find
+the simplest example of this state in the exceptional
+persistence of certain dreams. Ordinarily, our nocturnal
+imaginings vanish as empty phantasmagorias
+at the inrush of the perceptions and habits of daily
+life&mdash;they seem like faraway phantoms, without objective
+value. But, in the struggle occurring, on
+waking, between images and perceptions, the latter
+are not always victorious. There are dreams&mdash;i.e.,
+imaginary creations&mdash;that remain firm in face of
+reality, and for some time go along parallel with it.
+Taine was perhaps the first to see the importance<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_324" id="Page_324">[324]</a></span>
+of this fact. He reports that his relative, Dr. Baillarger,
+having dreamt that one of his friends had
+been appointed editor of a journal, announced the
+news seriously to several persons, and doubt arose
+in his mind only toward the end of the afternoon.
+Since then contemporary psychologists have gathered
+various observations of this kind.<a name="FNanchor_151_151" id="FNanchor_151_151"></a><a href="#Footnote_151_151" class="fnanchor">[151]</a> The emotional
+persistence of certain dreams is known. So-and-so,
+one of our neighbors, plays in a dream an
+odious r&ocirc;le; we may have a feeling of repulsion or
+spite toward him persisting throughout the day.
+But this triumph of the image, accidental and
+ephemeral in normal man, is frequent and stable
+in the imaginers of the second class. Many among
+them have asserted that this internal world is the
+only reality. G&eacute;rard de Nerval "had very early the
+conviction that the majority is mistaken, that the
+material universe in which it believes, because its
+eyes see it and its hands touch it, is nothing but
+phantoms and appearances. For him the invisible
+world, on the contrary, was the only one not chimerical."
+Likewise, Edgar Allan Poe: "The real
+things of the world would affect me like visions, and
+only so; while the wild ideas of the land of dreams
+became in turn not only the feeding ground of my
+daily existence but positively the sole and entire
+existence itself." Others describe their life as "a<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_325" id="Page_325">[325]</a></span>
+permanent dream." We could multiply examples.
+Aside from the poets and artists, the mystics would
+furnish copious examples. Let us take an exaggerated
+instance: This permanent dream is, indeed,
+only a part of their existence; it is above all active
+through its intensity; but, while it lasts, it absorbs
+them so completely that they enter the external
+world only with a sudden, violent and painful shock.</p>
+
+<p>(3) If the changing of images into strong states
+preponderating in consciousness is no longer an
+episode but a lasting disposition, then the imaginative
+life undergoes a partial systematization that
+approaches insanity. Everyone may be "absorbed"
+for a moment; the above-mentioned authors are so
+frequently. On a higher level this invading supremacy
+of the internal life becomes a habit. This third
+degree is but the second carried to excess.</p>
+
+<p>Some cases of double personality (those of Azam,
+Reynolds) are known in which the second state is at
+first embryonic and of short duration; then its
+appearances are repeated, its sphere becomes extended.
+Little by little it engrosses the greater part
+of life; it may even entirely supplant the earlier self.
+The growing working of the imagination is similar
+to this. Thanks to two causes acting in unison,
+temperament and habit, the imaginative and internal
+life tends to become systematized and to encroach
+more and more on the real, external life. In an
+account by F&eacute;r&eacute;<a name="FNanchor_152_152" id="FNanchor_152_152"></a><a href="#Footnote_152_152" class="fnanchor">[152]</a> one may follow step by step this<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_326" id="Page_326">[326]</a></span>
+work of systematization which we abridge here to
+its chief characteristics.</p>
+
+<p>The subject, M......, a man thirty-seven years
+old, had from childhood a decided taste for solitude.
+Seated in an out-of-the-way corner of the house or
+out of doors, "he commenced from that time on to
+build castles in Spain that little by little took on a
+considerable importance in his life. His constructions
+were at first ephemeral, replaced every day by
+new ones. They became progressively more consistent....
+When he had well entered into
+his imaginary r&ocirc;le, he often succeeded in continuing
+his musing in the presence of other people. At
+college, whole hours would be spent in this way;
+often he would see and hear nothing." Married, the
+head of a prosperous business house, he had some
+respite; then he returned to his former constructions.
+"They commenced by being, as before, not
+very durable or absorbing; but gradually they
+acquired more intensity and duration, and lastly
+became fixed in a definite form."</p>
+
+<p>"To sum up, here is what this ideal life, lasting
+almost from his fourth year, meant: M...... had
+built at Chaville, on the outskirts of the forest, an
+imaginary summer residence surrounded by a garden.
+By successive additions the pavilion became
+a ch&acirc;teau; the garden, a park; servants, horses,
+water-fixtures came to ornament the domain. The
+furnishings of the inside had been modified at the
+same time. A wife had come to give life to the
+picture; two children had been born. Nothing was<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_327" id="Page_327">[327]</a></span>
+wanting to this household, only the being true....
+One day he was in his imaginary salon at
+Chaville, occupied in watching an upholsterer who
+was changing the arrangement of the tapestry. He
+was so absorbed in the matter that he did not notice
+a man coming toward him, and at the question,
+'M......, if you please&mdash;?' he answered, without
+thinking, 'He is at Chaville.' This reply, given in
+public, aroused in him a real terror. 'I believe that
+I was foolish,' he said. Coming to himself, he
+declared that he was ready to do anything to get rid
+of his ideas."</p>
+
+<p>Here the imaginative type is at its maximum, at
+the brink of insanity without being over it. Associations
+and combinations of images form the entire
+content of consciousness, which remains impervious
+to impressions from without. Its world becomes
+<i>the</i> world. The parasitic life undermines and corrodes
+the other in order to become established in its
+place&mdash;it grows, its parts adhere more closely, it
+forms a compact mass&mdash;the imaginary systematization
+is complete.</p>
+
+<p>(4) The fourth stage is an exaggeration of the
+foregoing. The <i>completely</i> systematized and permanent
+imaginative life excludes the other. This is
+the extreme form, the beginning of insanity, which
+is outside our subject, from which pathology has
+been excluded.</p>
+
+<p>Imagination in the insane would deserve a special
+study, that would be lengthy, because there is no
+form of imagination that insanity has not adopted.<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_328" id="Page_328">[328]</a></span>
+In no period have insane creations been lacking in
+the practical, religious, or mystic life, in poetry, the
+fine arts, and in the sciences; in industrial, commercial,
+mechanical, military projects, and in plans
+for social and political reform. We should, then,
+be abundantly supplied with facts.<a name="FNanchor_153_153" id="FNanchor_153_153"></a><a href="#Footnote_153_153" class="fnanchor">[153]</a></p>
+
+<p>It would be difficult, for, if in ordinary life we
+are often perplexed to decide whether a man is sane
+or not, how much more then, when it is a question
+of an inventor, of an act of the creative faculty,
+i.e., of a venture into the unknown! How many
+innovators have been regarded as insane, or as at<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_329" id="Page_329">[329]</a></span>
+least unbalanced, visionary! We cannot even invoke
+success as a criterion. Many non-viable or abortive
+inventions have been fathered by very sane minds,
+and people regarded as insane have vindicated their
+imaginative constructions through success.</p>
+
+<p>Let us leave these difficulties of a subject that is
+not our own, in order to determine merely the
+psychological criterion belonging to the fourth stage.</p>
+
+<p>How may we rightly assert that a form of
+imaginative life is clearly pathologic? In my opinion,
+the answer must be sought in the nature and
+degree of belief accompanying the labor of creating.
+It is an axiom unchallenged by anyone&mdash;whether
+idealist or realist of any shade of belief&mdash;that nothing
+has existence for us save through the consciousness
+we have of it; but for realism&mdash;and experimental
+psychology is of necessity realistic&mdash;there are
+two distinct forms of existence.</p>
+
+<p>One, subjective, having no reality except in consciousness,
+for the one experiencing it, its reality
+being due only to belief, to that first affirmation of
+the mind so often described.</p>
+
+<p>The other, objective, existing in consciousness
+and outside of it, being real not only for me but
+for all those whose constitution is similar or analogous
+to mine.</p>
+
+<p>This much borne in mind, let us compare the last
+two degrees of the development of the imaginative
+life.</p>
+
+<p>For the imaginer of the third stage, the two forms
+of existence are not confounded. He distinguishes<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_330" id="Page_330">[330]</a></span>
+<i>two</i> worlds, preferring one and making the best of
+the other, but believing in both. He is conscious
+of passing from one to the other. There is an
+alternation. The observation of F&eacute;r&eacute;, although
+extreme, is a proof of this.</p>
+
+<p>At the fourth stage, in the insane, imaginative
+labor&mdash;the only kind with which we are concerned&mdash;is
+so systematized that the distinction between
+the two kinds of existence has disappeared. All the
+phantoms of his brain are invested with objective
+reality. Occurrences without, even the most extraordinary,
+do not reach one in this stage, or else are
+interpreted in accordance with the diseased fancy.
+There is no longer any alternation.<a name="FNanchor_154_154" id="FNanchor_154_154"></a><a href="#Footnote_154_154" class="fnanchor">[154]</a></p>
+
+<p>By way of summary we may say: The creative
+imagination consists of the property that images
+have of gathering in new combinations, through the
+effect of a spontaneity whose nature we have attempted
+to describe. It always tends to realize itself
+in degrees that vary from mere momentary belief
+to complete objectivity. Throughout its multiple
+manifestations, it remains identical with itself in its
+basic nature, in its constitutive elements. The
+diversity of its deeds depends on the end desired,
+the conditions required for its attainment, materials
+employed which, as we have seen, under the collective
+<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_331" id="Page_331">[331]</a></span>name "representations" are very unlike one
+another, not only as regards their sensuous origin
+(visual, auditory, tactile, etc.) but also as regards
+their psychologic nature (concrete, symbolic, affective,
+emotional-abstract images; generic and schematic
+images, concepts&mdash;each group itself having
+shades or degrees).</p>
+
+<p>This constructive activity, applying itself to everything
+and radiating in all directions, is in its early,
+typical form a mythic creation. It is an invincible
+need of man to reflect and reproduce his own nature
+in the world surrounding him. The first application
+of his mind is thinking by analogy, which vivifies
+everything after the human model and attempts to
+know everything according to arbitrary resemblances.
+Myth-making activity, which we have
+studied in the child and in primitive man, is the
+embryonic form whence arise by a slow evolution
+religious creations&mdash;gross or refined; esthetic development,
+which is a fallen, impoverished mythology;
+the fantastic conceptions of the world that may
+little by little become scientific conceptions, with,
+however, an irreducible residuum of hypotheses.
+Alongside of these creations, all bordering upon
+what we have called the fixed form, there are practical,
+objective creations. As for the latter, we
+could not trace them to the same mythic source
+except by dialectic subtleties which we renounce.
+The former arise from an internal efflorescence; the
+latter from urgent life-needs; they appear later and<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_332" id="Page_332">[332]</a></span>
+are a bifurcation of the early trunk: but the same
+sap flows in both branches.</p>
+
+<p>The constructive imagination penetrates every
+part of our life, whether individual or collective,
+speculative and practical, in all its forms&mdash;<span class="smcap">it is
+everywhere</span>.</p>
+
+<div class="footnotes"><h3>FOOTNOTES:</h3>
+
+<div class="footnote"><p><a name="Footnote_146_146" id="Footnote_146_146"></a><a href="#FNanchor_146_146"><span class="label">[146]</span></a> See above, Part I, <a href="#Page_31">chapter II</a>.</p></div>
+
+<div class="footnote"><p><a name="Footnote_147_147" id="Footnote_147_147"></a><a href="#FNanchor_147_147"><span class="label">[147]</span></a> It is a postulate of contemporary physiology that all the
+neurones taken together cannot spontaneously, that is, of themselves,
+give rise to any movement&mdash;they receive from without,
+and expend their energy outwards. Nevertheless, between the
+two moments that, in reflex and instinctive actions, seem continuous,
+a third interposes, which, for the higher psychic acts,
+may be of long duration. Thus, reasonings in logical form and
+reflection regarding a decision to be made have a feeble tendency
+to become changed into acts; their motor effects are
+indirect, and at a long range. But this intermediate moment
+is <i>par excellence</i> the moment for psychology. It is also the
+moment of the personal equation: every man receives, transforms,
+and restores outwards according to his own organization,
+temperament, idiosyncrasies, character&mdash;in a word, according
+to his personality, of which needs, tendencies, desires,
+are the direct and immediate expression. So we come back, by
+another route, to the same definition of spontaneity.</p></div>
+
+<div class="footnote"><p><a name="Footnote_148_148" id="Footnote_148_148"></a><a href="#FNanchor_148_148"><span class="label">[148]</span></a> Besides these three principal forms, there are intermediate
+forms, transitions from one category to another, that are hard
+to classify: certain mythic creations are half-sketched, half-fixed;
+and we find religious and social and political conceptions,
+partly theoretic or fixed, partly practical or objective.</p></div>
+
+<div class="footnote"><p><a name="Footnote_149_149" id="Footnote_149_149"></a><a href="#FNanchor_149_149"><span class="label">[149]</span></a> Taine, <i>On Intelligence</i>, Part I, Book II, ch. I.</p></div>
+
+<div class="footnote"><p><a name="Footnote_150_150" id="Footnote_150_150"></a><a href="#FNanchor_150_150"><span class="label">[150]</span></a> See <a href="#Page_353">Appendix E</a>.</p></div>
+
+<div class="footnote"><p><a name="Footnote_151_151" id="Footnote_151_151"></a><a href="#FNanchor_151_151"><span class="label">[151]</span></a> Sante de Santis, <i>I Sogni</i>, chapter X; Dr. Tissi&eacute;, <i>Les R&ecirc;ves</i>,
+esp. p. 165, the case of a merchant who dreams of having paid
+a certain debt, and several weeks afterward meets his creditor,
+and maintains that they are even, giving way only to proof.</p></div>
+
+<div class="footnote"><p><a name="Footnote_152_152" id="Footnote_152_152"></a><a href="#FNanchor_152_152"><span class="label">[152]</span></a> For the complete account, see his <i>Pathologie des &eacute;motions</i>,
+pp. 345-49. (Paris, F. Alcan.)</p></div>
+
+<div class="footnote"><p><a name="Footnote_153_153" id="Footnote_153_153"></a><a href="#FNanchor_153_153"><span class="label">[153]</span></a> Dr. Max Simon, in an article on "Imagination in Insanity"
+(<i>Annales m&eacute;dico-psychologiques</i>, December, 1876), holds
+that every kind of mental disease has its own form of imagination
+that expresses itself in stories, compositions, sketches,
+decorations, dress, and symbolic attributes. The maniac invents
+complicated and improbable designs; the persecuted,
+symbolic designs, strange writings, bordering on the horrible;
+megalomaniacs look for the effect of everything they say and
+do; the general paralytic lives in grandeur and attributes
+capital importance to everything; lunatics love the na&iuml;ve and
+childishly wonderful.
+</p><p>
+There are also great imaginers who, having passed through
+a period of insanity, have strongly regretted it "as a state
+in which the soul, more exalted and more refined, perceives
+invisible relations and enjoys spectacles that escape the material
+eyes." Such was G&eacute;rard de Nerval. As for Charles Lamb, he
+would assert that he should be envied the days spent in an
+insane asylum. "Sometimes," he said in a letter to Coleridge,
+"I cast a longing glance backwards to the condition in which
+I found myself; for while it lasted I had many hours of pure
+happiness. Do not believe, Coleridge, that you have tasted the
+grandeur and all the transport of fancy if you have not been
+insane. Everything seems to me now insipid in comparison."
+Quoted by A. Barine, <i>N&eacute;vros&eacute;s</i>, p. 326.</p></div>
+
+<div class="footnote"><p><a name="Footnote_154_154" id="Footnote_154_154"></a><a href="#FNanchor_154_154"><span class="label">[154]</span></a> There has often been cited the instance of certain maniacs
+at Charenton, who, during the Franco-Prussian War, despite
+the stories that were told them, the papers that they read, and
+the shells bursting under the walls of the asylum, maintained
+that the war was only imagined, and that all was only a contrivance
+of their persecutors.</p></div>
+</div>
+
+
+<hr style="width: 65%;" /><p><span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_333" id="Page_333">[333]</a></span></p>
+<p><span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_334" id="Page_334">[334]</a></span></p>
+<h2>APPENDICES</h2>
+
+
+
+<hr style="width: 65%;" /><p><span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_335" id="Page_335">[335]</a></span></p>
+<h2>APPENDIX A</h2>
+
+<h3><span class="smcap">The Various Forms of Inspiration</span><a name="FNanchor_155_155" id="FNanchor_155_155"></a><a href="#Footnote_155_155" class="fnanchor">[155]</a></h3>
+
+
+<p>Among the descriptions of the inspired state
+found in various authors, I select only three, which
+are brief and have each a special character.</p>
+
+<p>I. Mystic inspiration, in a passive form, in
+Jacob Boehme (<i>Aurora</i>): "I declare before God
+that I do not myself know how the thing arises
+within me, without the participation of my will. I
+do not even know that which I must write. If I
+write, it is because the Spirit moves me and communicates
+to me a great, wonderful knowledge.
+Often I do not even know whether I dwell in spirit
+in this present world and whether it is I myself that
+have the fortune to possess a certain and solid
+knowledge."</p>
+
+<p>II. Feverish and painful inspiration in Alfred
+de Musset: "Invention annoys me and makes me
+tremble. Execution, always too slow for my wish,
+makes my heart beat awfully, and weeping, and
+keeping myself from crying aloud, I am delivered
+of an idea that is intoxicating me, but of which I<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_336" id="Page_336">[336]</a></span>
+am mortally ashamed and disgusted next morning.
+If I change it, it is worse, it deserts me&mdash;it is much
+better to forget it and wait for another; but this
+other comes to me so confused and misshapen that
+my poor being cannot contain it. It presses and
+tortures me, until it has taken realizable proportions,
+when comes the other pain, of bringing forth,
+a truly physical suffering that I cannot define. And
+that is how my life is spent when I let myself be
+dominated by this artistic monster in me. It is
+much better, then, that I should live as I have
+imagined living, that I go to all kinds of excess, and
+that I kill this never-dying worm that people like
+me modestly term their inspiration, but which I
+call, plainly, my weakness."<a name="FNanchor_156_156" id="FNanchor_156_156"></a><a href="#Footnote_156_156" class="fnanchor">[156]</a></p>
+
+<p>III. The poet Grillparzer<a name="FNanchor_157_157" id="FNanchor_157_157"></a><a href="#Footnote_157_157" class="fnanchor">[157]</a> analyzes the condition,
+thus:</p>
+
+<p>"Inspiration, properly so called, is the concentration
+of all the faculties and aptitudes on a single
+point which, for the moment, should include the
+rest of the world less than represent it. The
+strengthening of the state of the soul comes from
+the fact that its various faculties, instead of being
+disseminated over the whole world, find themselves
+contained within the limits of a single object, touch
+one another, reciprocally upholding, re&euml;nforcing,
+completing themselves. Thanks to this isolation,
+the object emerges out of the average level of its<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_337" id="Page_337">[337]</a></span>
+<i>milieu</i>, is illumined all around and put in relief&mdash;it
+takes body, moves, lives. But to attain this is necessary
+the concentration of all the faculties. It is only
+when the art-work has been a world for the artist
+that it is also a world for others."</p>
+
+<div class="footnotes"><h3>FOOTNOTES:</h3>
+
+<div class="footnote"><p><a name="Footnote_155_155" id="Footnote_155_155"></a><a href="#FNanchor_155_155"><span class="label">[155]</span></a> See Part One, <a href="#Page_50">chapter III</a>.</p></div>
+
+<div class="footnote"><p><a name="Footnote_156_156" id="Footnote_156_156"></a><a href="#FNanchor_156_156"><span class="label">[156]</span></a> George Sand, <i>Elle et Lui</i>, I.</p></div>
+
+<div class="footnote"><p><a name="Footnote_157_157" id="Footnote_157_157"></a><a href="#FNanchor_157_157"><span class="label">[157]</span></a> In Oelzelt-Newin, <i>op. cit.</i>, p. 49.</p></div>
+</div>
+
+
+<hr style="width: 65%;" /><p><span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_338" id="Page_338">[338]</a></span></p>
+<h2>APPENDIX B</h2>
+
+<h3><span class="smcap">On the Nature of the Unconscious Factor</span></h3>
+
+
+<p>We have seen that in the question of the unconscious
+there must be recognized a positive part&mdash;facts,
+and an hypothetical part&mdash;theories.<a name="FNanchor_158_158" id="FNanchor_158_158"></a><a href="#Footnote_158_158" class="fnanchor">[158]</a></p>
+
+<p>Insofar as the facts are concerned, it would be
+well, I think, to establish two categories&mdash;(1) static
+unconscious, comprising habits, memory, and, in
+general, all that is organized knowledge. It is a
+state of preservation, of rest; very relatively, since
+representations suffer incessant corrosion and
+change. (2) Dynamic unconscious, which is a
+state of latent activity, of elaboration and incubation.
+We might give a multitude of proofs of this
+unconscious rumination. The well-known fact that
+an intellectual work gains by being interrupted;
+that in resuming it one often finds it cleared up,
+changed, even accomplished, was explained by some
+psychologists prior to Carpenter by "the resting of
+the mind." It would be just as valid to say that a
+traveler covers leagues by lying abed. The author<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_339" id="Page_339">[339]</a></span>
+just mentioned<a name="FNanchor_159_159" id="FNanchor_159_159"></a><a href="#Footnote_159_159" class="fnanchor">[159]</a> has brought together many observations
+in which the solution of a mathematical,
+mechanical, commercial problem appeared suddenly
+after hours and days of vague, undefinable uneasiness,
+the cause of which is unknown, which, however,
+is only the result of an underlying cerebral
+working; for the trouble, sometimes rising to
+anguish, ceases as soon as the unawaited conclusion
+has entered consciousness. The men who think the
+most are not those who have the clearest and "most
+conscious" ideas, but those having at their disposal
+a rich fund of unconscious elaboration. On the
+other hand, shallow minds have a naturally poor
+unconscious fund, capable of but slight development;
+they give out immediately and rapidly all that they
+are able to give; they have no reserve. It is useless
+to allow them time for reflection or invention. They
+will not do better; they may do worse.</p>
+
+<p>As to the nature of the unconscious working, we
+find disagreement and darkness. One may doubtless
+maintain, theoretically, that in the inventor everything
+goes on in subconsciousness and in unconsciousness,
+just as in consciousness itself, with the
+exception that a message does not arrive as far as
+the self; that the labor that may be followed, in
+clear consciousness, in its progress and retreats,
+remains the same when it continues unknown to us.
+This is possible. Yet it must at least be recognized
+that consciousness is rigorously subject to the condition
+<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_340" id="Page_340">[340]</a></span>of time, the unconscious is not. This difference,
+not to mention others, is not negligible, and
+could well arouse other problems.</p>
+
+<p>The contemporary theories regarding the nature
+of the unconscious seem to me reducible to two
+principal positions&mdash;one psychological, the other
+physiological.</p>
+
+<p>1. The physiological theory is simple and
+scarcely permits any variations. According to it,
+unconscious activity is simply cerebral; it is an
+"unconscious cerebration." The psychic factor,
+which ordinarily accompanies the activity of the
+nervous centers, is absent. Although I incline
+toward this hypothesis, I confess that it is full of
+difficulties.</p>
+
+<p>It has been proven through numerous experiments
+(F&eacute;r&eacute;, Binet, Mosso, Janet, Newbold, etc.) that
+"unconscious sensations"<a name="FNanchor_160_160" id="FNanchor_160_160"></a><a href="#Footnote_160_160" class="fnanchor">[160]</a> act, since they produce
+the same reactions as conscious sensations, and
+Mosso has been able to maintain that "the testimony
+of consciousness is less certain than that of the
+sphygmograph." But the particular instance of
+invention is very different; for it does not merely
+suppose the adaptation to an end which the physiological
+factor would suffice to explain; it implies a
+series of adaptations, corrections, rational operations,
+<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_341" id="Page_341">[341]</a></span>of which nervous activity alone furnishes us
+no example.<a name="FNanchor_161_161" id="FNanchor_161_161"></a><a href="#Footnote_161_161" class="fnanchor">[161]</a></p>
+
+<p>2. The psychological theory is based on an
+equivocal use of the word consciousness. Consciousness
+has one definite mark&mdash;it is an internal
+event existing, not by itself, but for me and insofar
+as it is known by me. But the psychological theory
+of the unconscious assumes that if we descend from
+clear consciousness progressively to obscure consciousness,
+to the subconscious, to the unconscious
+that manifests itself only through its motor reactions,
+the first state thus successively impoverished,
+still remains, down to its final term, identical in its
+basis with consciousness. It is an hypothesis that
+nothing justifies.</p>
+
+<p>No difficulty arises when we bear in mind the
+legitimate distinction between consciousness of self
+and consciousness in general, the former entirely
+subjective, the latter in a way objective (the consciousness
+of a man captivated by an attractive
+scene; better yet, the fluid form of revery or of the
+awaking from syncope). We may admit that this<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_342" id="Page_342">[342]</a></span>
+evanescent consciousness, affective in nature, felt
+rather than perceived, is due to a lack of synthesis,
+of relations among the internal states, which remain
+isolated, unable to unite into a whole.</p>
+
+<p>The difficulty commences when we descend into
+the region of the subconscious, which allows stages
+whose obscurity increases in proportion as we move
+away from clear consciousness, "like a lake in which
+the action of light is always nearing extinction" (in
+double coexisting personalities, automatic writing,
+mediums, etc.). Here some postulate two currents
+of consciousness existing at the same time in one
+person without reciprocal connection. Others suppose
+a "field of consciousness" with a brilliant center
+and extending indefinitely toward the dim distance.
+Still others liken the phenomenon to the movement
+of waves, whose summit alone is lighted up. Indeed,
+the authors declare that with these comparisons
+and metaphors they make no pretense of
+explaining; but certainly they all reduce unconsciousness
+to consciousness, as a special to a general
+case, and what is that if not explaining?</p>
+
+<p>I do not intend to enumerate all the varieties of
+the psychological theory. The most systematic, that
+of Myers, accepted by Delboef and others, is full of
+a biological mysticism all its own. Here it is in
+substance: In every one of us there is a conscious
+self adapted to the needs of life, and potential selves
+constituting the subliminal consciousness. The latter,
+much broader in scope than personal consciousness,
+has dependent on it the entire vegetative life<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_343" id="Page_343">[343]</a></span>&mdash;circulation,
+trophic actions, etc. Ordinarily the conscious
+self is on the highest level, the subliminal
+consciousness on the second; but in certain extraordinary
+states (hypnosis, hysteria, divided consciousness,
+etc.) it is just the reverse. Here is the
+bold part of the hypothesis: Its authors suppose
+that the supremacy of the subliminal consciousness
+is a reversion, a return to the ancestral. In the
+higher animals and in primitive man, according to
+them, all trophic actions entered consciousness and
+were regulated by it. In the course of evolution this
+became organized; the higher consciousness has
+delegated to the subliminal consciousness the care
+of silently governing the vegetative life. But in
+case of mental disintegration there occurs a return
+to the primitive state. In this manner they explain
+burns through suggestion, stigmata, trophic changes
+of a miraculous appearance, etc. It is needless to
+dwell on this conception of the unconscious. It has
+been vehemently criticised, notably by Bramwell,
+who remarks that if certain faculties could little by
+little fall into the domain of subliminal consciousness
+because they were no longer necessary for the
+struggle for life, there are nevertheless faculties so
+essential to the well-being of the individual that we
+ask ourselves how they have been able to escape
+from the control of the will. If, for example, some
+lower type had the power of arresting pain, how
+could it lose it?</p>
+
+<p>At the foundation of the psychological theory in
+all its forms is the unexpressed hypothesis that<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_344" id="Page_344">[344]</a></span>
+consciousness may be likened to a quantity that
+forever decreases without reaching zero. This is a
+postulate that nothing justifies. The experiments
+of psychophysicists, without solving the question,
+would support rather the opposite view. We know
+that the "threshold of consciousness" or minimum
+perceptible quantity, appears and disappears suddenly;
+the excitation is not felt under a determinate
+limit. Likewise in regard to the "summit of perception"
+or maximum perceptible, any increase of
+excitation is no longer felt if above a determinate
+limit. Moreover, in order that an increase or
+diminution be felt between these two extreme limits,
+it is necessary that both have a constant relation&mdash;differential
+threshold&mdash;as is expressed in Weber's
+law. All these facts, and others that I omit, are not
+favorable to the thesis of growing or diminishing
+continuity of consciousness. It has even been maintained
+that consciousness "has an aversion for continuity."</p>
+
+<p>To sum up: The two rival theories are equally
+unable to penetrate into the inner nature of the
+unconscious factor. We have thus had to limit
+ourselves to taking it as a fact of experience and to
+assign it its place in the complex function that
+produces invention.</p>
+
+<p>The observations of Flournoy (in his book, mentioned
+above, Part I, <a href="#Page_50">chapter III</a>) have a particular
+interest in relation to our subject. His medium,
+Hel&egrave;ne S......&mdash;very unlike others, who are satisfied
+with forecasts of the future, disclosures of<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_345" id="Page_345">[345]</a></span>
+unknown past events, counsel, prognosis, evocation,
+etc., without creating anything, in the proper sense&mdash;is
+the author of three or four novels, one of
+which, at least, is invented out of whole cloth&mdash;revelations
+in regard to the planet Mars, its countries,
+inhabitants, dwellings, etc. Although the
+descriptions and pictures of Hel&egrave;ne S. are found
+on comparison to be borrowed from our terrestrial
+globe, and transposed and changed, as Flournoy has
+well shown, it is certain that in this "Martian
+novel," to say nothing of the others, there is a
+richness of invention that is rare among mediums:
+the creative imagination in its subliminal (unconscious)
+form encloses the other in its &eacute;clat. We
+know how much the cases of mediums teach us in
+regard to the unconscious life of the mind. Here
+we are permitted, as an exceptional case, to penetrate
+into the dark laboratory of romantic invention,
+and we can appreciate the importance of the labor
+that is going on there.</p>
+
+<div class="footnotes"><h3>FOOTNOTES:</h3>
+
+<div class="footnote"><p><a name="Footnote_158_158" id="Footnote_158_158"></a><a href="#FNanchor_158_158"><span class="label">[158]</span></a> See Part I, <a href="#Page_50">Chapter III</a>.</p></div>
+
+<div class="footnote"><p><a name="Footnote_159_159" id="Footnote_159_159"></a><a href="#FNanchor_159_159"><span class="label">[159]</span></a> <i>Mental Physiology</i>, Book II, chapter 13.</p></div>
+
+<div class="footnote"><p><a name="Footnote_160_160" id="Footnote_160_160"></a><a href="#FNanchor_160_160"><span class="label">[160]</span></a> This expression is put in quotation marks because in American
+and English usage "sensation" is defined in terms of
+consciousness, and such an expression as "unconscious sensation"
+is paradoxical, and would lead to futile discussion. (Tr.)</p></div>
+
+<div class="footnote"><p><a name="Footnote_161_161" id="Footnote_161_161"></a><a href="#FNanchor_161_161"><span class="label">[161]</span></a> For the detailed criticism of unconscious cerebration, see
+Boris Sidis, <i>The Psychology of Suggestion: A research into
+the subconscious nature of Man and Society</i>, New York, Appletons,
+1898, pp. 121-127. The author, who assumes the co&euml;xistence
+of two selves&mdash;one waking, the other subwaking, and who
+attributes to the latter all weakness and vice (according to him
+the unconscious is incapable of rising above mere association
+by contiguity; it is "stupid," "uncritical," "credulous,"
+"brutal," etc.) would be greatly puzzled to explain its r&ocirc;le in
+creative activity.</p></div>
+</div>
+
+
+<hr style="width: 65%;" /><p><span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_346" id="Page_346">[346]</a></span></p>
+<h2>APPENDIX C</h2>
+
+<h3><span class="smcap">Cosmic and Human Imagination</span><a name="FNanchor_162_162" id="FNanchor_162_162"></a><a href="#Footnote_162_162" class="fnanchor">[162]</a></h3>
+
+
+<p>For Froschammer, <i>Fancy</i> is the original principle
+of things. In his philosophical theory it plays
+the same part as Hegel's <i>Idea</i>, Schopenhauer's <i>Will</i>,
+Hartmann's <i>Unconscious</i>, etc. It is, at first, objective&mdash;in
+the beginning the universal creative power
+is immanent in things, just as there is contained in
+the kernel the principle that shall give the plant its
+form and construct its organism; it spreads out into
+the myriads of vegetable and animal existences that
+have been succeeded or that still live on the surface
+of the Cosmos. The first organized beings must
+have been very simple; but little by little the objective
+imagination increases its energy by exercising
+it; it invents and realizes increasingly more complex
+images that attest the progress of its artistic genius.
+So Darwin was right in asserting that a slow evolution
+raises up organized beings towards fulness of
+life and beauty of form.</p>
+
+<p>Step by step, it succeeds in becoming conscious
+of itself in the mind of man&mdash;it becomes subjective.<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_347" id="Page_347">[347]</a></span>
+Generative power, at first diffused throughout the
+organism, becomes localized in the generative
+organs, and becomes established in sex. "The brain,
+in living beings, may form a pole opposed to the
+reproductive organs, especially when these beings
+are very high in the organic scale." Thus changed,
+the generative power has become capable of perceiving
+new relations, of bringing forth internal worlds.
+In nature and in man it is the same principle that
+causes living forms to appear&mdash;objective images in a
+way, and subjective images, a kind of living forms
+that arise and die in the mind.<a name="FNanchor_163_163" id="FNanchor_163_163"></a><a href="#Footnote_163_163" class="fnanchor">[163]</a></p>
+
+<p>This metaphysical theory, one of the many varieties
+of <i>mens agitat molem</i>, being, like every other, a
+personal conception, it is superfluous to discuss or
+criticise its evident anthropomorphism. But, since
+we are dealing with hypotheses, I venture to risk a
+comparison between embryological development in
+physiology, instinct in psychophysiology, and the
+creative imagination in psychology. These three
+phenomena are creations, i.e., a disposition of certain
+materials following a determinate type.</p>
+
+<p>In the first case, the ovum after fertilization is
+subject to a rigorously determined evolution whence
+arises such and such an individual with its specific
+and personal characters, its hereditary influences,<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_348" id="Page_348">[348]</a></span>
+etc. Every disturbing factor in this evolution produces
+deviations, monstrosities, and the creation
+does not attain the normal. Embryology can follow
+these changes step by step. There remains one
+obscure point in any event, and that is, the nature
+of what the ancients called the <i>nisus formativus</i>.</p>
+
+<p>In the case of instinct, the initial moment is an
+external or internal sensation, or rather, a representation&mdash;the
+image of a nest to be built, in the case
+of the bird; of a tunnel to be dug, for the ant; of a
+comb to be made, for the bee and the wasp; of a
+web to be spun, for the spider, etc. This initial
+state puts into action a mechanism determined by the
+nature of each species, and ends in creations of
+special kinds. However, variations of instinct, its
+adaptation to various conditions, show that the conditions
+of the determinism are less simple, that the
+creative activity is endowed with a certain plasticity.</p>
+
+<p>In the third case, creative imagination, the ideal,
+a sketched construction, is the equivalent of the
+ovum; but it is evident that the plasticity of the
+creative imagination is much greater than that of
+instinct. The imagination may radiate in several
+very different ways, and the plan of the invention,
+as we have seen,<a name="FNanchor_164_164" id="FNanchor_164_164"></a><a href="#Footnote_164_164" class="fnanchor">[164]</a> may arise as a whole and develop
+regularly in an embryological manner, or else present
+itself in a fragmentary, partial form that becomes
+complete after a series of attractions.</p>
+
+<p>Perhaps an identical process, forming three<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_349" id="Page_349">[349]</a></span>
+stages&mdash;a lower, middle, and higher&mdash;is at the root
+of all three cases. But this is only a speculative
+hypothesis, foreign to psychology proper.</p>
+
+<div class="footnotes"><h3>FOOTNOTES:</h3>
+
+<div class="footnote"><p><a name="Footnote_162_162" id="Footnote_162_162"></a><a href="#FNanchor_162_162"><span class="label">[162]</span></a> See above, Part One, <a href="#Page_65">Chapter IV</a>.</p></div>
+
+<div class="footnote"><p><a name="Footnote_163_163" id="Footnote_163_163"></a><a href="#FNanchor_163_163"><span class="label">[163]</span></a> Those who, not having the courage to read the 575 pages
+of Froschammer's book, want more details, may profitably consult
+the excellent analysis that S&eacute;ailles has given (<i>Rev. Philos.</i>,
+March, 1878, pp. 198-220). See also Ambrosi, <i>Psicologia dell'
+immaginazione nella storia della filosofia</i>, pp. 472-498.</p></div>
+
+<div class="footnote"><p><a name="Footnote_164_164" id="Footnote_164_164"></a><a href="#FNanchor_164_164"><span class="label">[164]</span></a> See above, Part II, <a href="#Page_140">chapter IV</a>.</p></div>
+</div>
+
+
+<hr style="width: 65%;" /><p><span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_350" id="Page_350">[350]</a></span></p>
+<h2>APPENDIX D</h2>
+
+<h3><span class="smcap">Evidence in Regard to Musical Imagination</span><a name="FNanchor_165_165" id="FNanchor_165_165"></a><a href="#Footnote_165_165" class="fnanchor">[165]</a></h3>
+
+
+<p>The question asked above,<a name="FNanchor_166_166" id="FNanchor_166_166"></a><a href="#Footnote_166_166" class="fnanchor">[166]</a> Does the experiencing
+of purely musical sounds evoke images, universally,
+and of what nature and under what conditions?
+seemed to me to enter a more general field&mdash;the
+affective imagination&mdash;which I intend to study elsewhere
+in a special work. For the time being I limit
+myself to observations and information that I have
+gathered, picking from them several that I give here
+for the sake of shedding light on the question. I
+give first the replies of musicians; then, those of
+non-musicians.</p>
+
+<p>1. M. Lionel Dauriac writes me: "The question
+that you ask me is complex. I am not a 'visualizer;'
+I have infrequent hypnagogic hallucinations,
+and they are all of the auditory type.</p>
+
+<p>"... Symphonic music aroused in me no
+image of the visual type while I remained the
+amateur that you knew from 1876 to 1898. When
+that amateur began to reflect methodically on the<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_351" id="Page_351">[351]</a></span>
+art of his taste, he recognized in music a power of
+suggesting:</p>
+
+<p>"1. Sonorous, non-musical images&mdash;thunder,
+clock. Example, the overture of <i>William Tell</i>.</p>
+
+<p>"2. Psychic images&mdash;suggestion of a mental
+state&mdash;anger, love, religious feeling.</p>
+
+<p>"3. Visual images, whether following upon the
+psychic image or through the intermediation of a
+programme.</p>
+
+<p>"Under what condition, in a symphonic work, is
+the visual image, introduced by the psychic image,
+produced? In the event of a break in the melodic
+web (see my <i>Psychologie dans l'Op&eacute;ra</i>, pp. 119-120).
+Here are given, without orderly arrangement,
+some of the ideas that have come to me:</p>
+
+<p>"Beethoven's <i>symphony in C major</i> appears to me
+purely musical&mdash;it is of a sonorous design. The
+<i>symphony in D major</i> (the second) suggests to me
+visual-motor images&mdash;I set a ballet to the first part
+and keep track altogether of the ballet that I picture.
+The <i>Heroic Symphony</i> (aside from the funeral
+march, the meaning of which is indicated in the
+title) suggests to me images of a military character,
+ever since the time that I noticed that the fundamental
+theme of the first portion is based on notes
+of perfect harmony&mdash;trumpet-notes and, by association,
+military. The <i>finale</i> of this symphony, which
+I consider superior to other parts, does not cause me
+to see anything. <i>Symphony in B flat major</i>&mdash;I see
+nothing there&mdash;this may be said without qualification.
+<i>Symphony in C minor</i>&mdash;it is dramatic, although
+<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_352" id="Page_352">[352]</a></span>the melodic web is never broken. The first
+part suggests the image, not of Fate knocking at
+the gate, as Beethoven said, but of a soul overcome
+with the crises of revolt, accompanied by a hope of
+victory. Visual images do not come except as
+brought by psychic images."</p>
+
+<p>F. G., a musician, always sees&mdash;that is the rule,
+notably in the <i>Pastoral</i>, and in the <i>Heroic Symphony</i>.
+In Bach's <i>Passion</i> he beholds the scene of
+the mystic lamb.</p>
+
+<p>A composer writes me: "When I compose or
+play music of my own composition I behold dancing
+figures; I see an orchestra, an audience, etc. When
+I listen to or play music by another composer I do
+not see anything." This communication also mentions
+three other musicians who see nothing.</p>
+
+<p>2. D......, so little of a musician that I had
+some trouble to make him understand the term
+"symphonic music," never goes to concerts. However,
+he went once, fifteen years ago, and there remains
+in his memory very clearly the principal
+phrase of a minuet (he hums it)&mdash;he cannot recall
+it without seeing people dancing a minuet.</p>
+
+<p>M. O. L...... has been kind enough to question
+in my behalf sixteen non-musical persons. Here
+are the results of his inquiry:</p>
+
+<p>Eight see curved lines.</p>
+
+<p>Three see images, figures springing in the air,
+fantastic designs.</p>
+
+<p>Two see the waves of the ocean.</p>
+
+<p>Three do not see anything.</p>
+
+<div class="footnotes"><h3>FOOTNOTES:</h3>
+
+<div class="footnote"><p><a name="Footnote_165_165" id="Footnote_165_165"></a><a href="#FNanchor_165_165"><span class="label">[165]</span></a> See Part Three, <a href="#Page_195">Chapter II</a>.</p></div>
+
+<div class="footnote"><p><a name="Footnote_166_166" id="Footnote_166_166"></a><a href="#FNanchor_166_166"><span class="label">[166]</span></a> <i>Ibid.</i>, <a href="#Page_236">IV</a>.</p></div>
+</div>
+
+
+<hr style="width: 65%;" /><p><span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_353" id="Page_353">[353]</a></span></p>
+<h2>APPENDIX E</h2>
+
+<h3><span class="smcap">The Imaginative Type and Association of Ideas</span><a name="FNanchor_167_167" id="FNanchor_167_167"></a><a href="#Footnote_167_167" class="fnanchor">[167]</a></h3>
+
+
+<p>I have questioned a very great number of imaginative
+persons, well known to me as such, and have
+chosen preferably those who, not making a profession
+of creating, let their fancy wander as it wills,
+without professional care. In all the mechanism is
+the same, differing scarcely more than temperament
+and degree of culture. Here are two examples.</p>
+
+<p>B......, forty-six years of age, is acquainted
+with a large part of Europe, North America,
+Oceania, Hindoostan, Indo-China, and North
+Africa, and has not passed through these countries
+on the run, but, because of his duties, resided there
+some time. It is worthy of remark, as will be seen
+from the following observation, that the remembrance
+of such various countries does not have first
+place in this brilliant, fanciful personage&mdash;which
+fact is an argument in favor of the very personal
+character of the creative imagination.</p>
+
+<p>"In a general way, imagination, very lively in<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_354" id="Page_354">[354]</a></span>
+me, functions by association of ideas. Memory or
+the outer world furnishes me some data. On this
+data there is not always, though there should be,
+imaginative work proper, and then things remain
+as they are, without end.</p>
+
+<p>"But when I meet a construction&mdash;it matters little
+whether ancient or in the course of erection&mdash;the
+formula, 'That ought to be fixed,' is one that rises
+mechanically to my mind in such a case; often it
+happens that I think aloud and say it, although
+alone. When going away from the architectural
+subject<a name="FNanchor_168_168" id="FNanchor_168_168"></a><a href="#Footnote_168_168" class="fnanchor">[168]</a> under consideration, I make up infinite
+variations upon it, one after another. Sometimes
+the things start from a reflex...."</p>
+
+<p>After having noted his preference for the architecture
+of the Middle Ages, B...... adds (here he
+touches on the unconscious factor):</p>
+
+<p>"Were I to explain or attempt to explain how the
+Middle Ages have such an attraction for my mind,
+I should see therein an atavistic accumulation of
+religious feeling fixed in my family, on the female
+side no doubt, and of religiousness in ecclesiastical
+architecture&mdash;these touch.</p>
+
+<p>"Another example illustrating the r&ocirc;le of association
+of ideas in the same matter. One Sunday
+night I left Noumea in the carriage of Dr. F......
+who was going to visit a nunnery five leagues from
+there. At the moment of our arrival the doctor
+asked what time it was. 'Half-past two,' I said,
+looking at my watch. As we stopped in the convent<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_355" id="Page_355">[355]</a></span> court
+in front of the chapel I <i>heard</i> the lusty conclusion
+of a psalm. 'They are singing vespers,' I
+remarked to the doctor. He commenced to laugh.
+'What time are vespers sung in your town?' 'At
+half-past two,' I answered. I opened the chapel
+door in order to show the doctor that vespers had
+just been held: the chapel was vacant. As I stood
+there, somewhat non-plussed, the doctor remarked,
+'Cerebral automatism.'</p>
+
+<p>"I may add here, <i>by association</i> of ideas. The
+doctor had seen through me, and had with fine
+insight perceived <i>why</i> I had <i>heard</i> the end of the
+psalm. The incident made a great impression on
+me, all the more as ever since the age of eight my
+memory testifies to a like hallucination, but of sight
+in place of hearing. It was at L...... that on
+Good Friday they rang at the cathedral with all
+their might. It was the very moment before the
+bells remain silent for three days, and it is known
+that this silence, ordained in the liturgy, is explained
+to children by telling them that during these
+two days the bells have flown to Rome. Naturally
+I was treated to this little tale, and as they finished
+telling it, I <i>saw</i> a bell flying at an angle that I
+could still describe.</p>
+
+<p>"But this transforming power of my imagination
+is not present in me to the same extent as regards
+all things. It is much more operative in relation to
+Romano-Gothic architecture, mystic literature, and
+sociological knowledge than in relation, for instance,
+to my memories of travels. When I see<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_356" id="Page_356">[356]</a></span>
+again, in the mind's eye, the Isle of Bourbon,
+Niagara, Tahiti, Calcutta, Melbourne, the Pyramids
+and the Sphinx, the graphic representation is intellectually
+perfect. The objects live again in all their
+external surroundings. I feel the <i>Khamsinn</i>, the
+desert wind that scorched me at the foot of Pompey's
+Column; I hear the sea breaking into foam on
+the barrier reef of Tahiti. But the image does not
+lead to evocation of related or parallel ideas.</p>
+
+<p>"When, on the other hand, I take a walk over
+the Comburg moor, the castle weighs upon me in all
+its massiveness; the recollections of the <i>M&eacute;moires
+d'Outre-tombe</i> besiege me like living pictures. I
+see, like Chateaubriand himself, the family of great
+famished lords in their feudal castle. With Chateaubriand
+I return in the twinkling of an eye to the
+Niagara that we have both seen. In the fall of the
+waters I find the deep and melancholy note that he
+himself found; and after that I think of that dark
+cathedral of Dol that evidently suggested to the
+author his <i>G&eacute;nie du Christianisme</i>.</p>
+
+<p>"In literature, things are very unequally suggestive
+to me. Classic literature has only few paths
+outwards for me&mdash;Tacitus, Lucretius, Juvenal,
+Homer, and Saint-Simon excepted. I read the
+other authors of this class partly for themselves,
+without making a comparison. On the other hand,
+the reading of Dante, Shakespeare, St. Jerome's
+compact verses on the Hebrew, and Middle Age
+prose excites within me a whole world of ideas, like
+Wagner's music, <i>canto-fermo</i>, and Beethoven. Certain
+<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_357" id="Page_357">[357]</a></span>things form a link for me from one order of
+ideas to another. For example, Michaelangelo and
+the Bible, Rembrandt and Balzac, Puvis de Chavannes
+and the Merovingian narratives.</p>
+
+<p>"To sum up: There are in me certain <i>milieux</i>
+especially favorable to imagination. When any circumstance
+brings me into one of them, it is rare that
+an imaginative network does not occur; and, if one
+is produced, association of ideas will perform the
+work. When I give myself up to serious work, I
+have to mistrust myself: and in this connection I
+shall surprise people when I say that in the class of
+ideas above indicated the subject exciting the most
+ideas in me is sociology."</p>
+
+<p>M......, sixty years of age, artistic temperament.
+Because of the necessities of life, he has
+followed a profession entirely opposite to his bent.
+He has given me his "confession" in the form of
+fragmentary notes made day by day. Many are
+<i>moral</i> remarks on the subject of his imagination&mdash;I
+leave them out. I note especially the unconquerable
+tendency to make up little romances and some
+details in regard to visual representation, and a
+dislike for numbers.</p>
+
+<p>"It happens that I experience sharp regret when I
+see the photograph of a monument, e.g., the Pantheon,
+the proportions of which I have constructed
+according to the descriptions of the monument and
+the idea that I had of the life of the Greeks. The
+photograph mars my dream.</p>
+
+<p>"From the seen to the unknown. In the S. G.<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_358" id="Page_358">[358]</a></span>
+library. A slender young woman, smartly dressed&mdash;spotless
+black gloves&mdash;between her fingers a small
+pencil and a tiny note-book. What business has this
+affectation this morning in a classic and dull building,
+in a common environment of poor workmen?
+She is not a servant-maid, and not a teacher. Now
+for the solution of the unknown. I follow the
+woman to her family, into her home, and it is quite
+a task.</p>
+
+<p>"In the same library. I want to get an address
+from the <i>Almanach Bottin</i>. A young man, perhaps
+a student, has borrowed the ridiculous volume.
+Bent over it, his hands in his hair, he turns the
+leaves with the sage leisure of a scholar looking for
+a commentary. From the empty dictionary he often
+draws out a letter. He must have received this
+letter this morning from the country. His family
+advises him to apply to so-and-so. It is a question
+of money and employment. He must locate the
+people who, provincial ignorance said, are near him.
+And so goes the wandering imagination.</p>
+
+<p>"When I feel myself drawn to anyone, I prefer
+seeing images or portraits rather than the reality.
+That is how I avoid making unforeseen discoveries
+that would spoil my model.</p>
+
+<p>"If I make numerical calculations, in the absence
+of concrete factors, the imagination goes afield, and
+the figures group themselves mechanically, harkening
+to an inner voice that arranges them in order to
+get the sense.</p>
+
+<p>"There may be an imagination devoted to arithmetical
+<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_359" id="Page_359">[359]</a></span>calculations&mdash;forms, beings intrude, even
+the outline of the figure 3, for example; and then
+the addition or any other calculation is ruined.</p>
+
+<p>"I revert to the impossibility of making an addition
+without a swerve of imagination, because
+plastic figures are always ready before the calculator.
+The man of imagination is always constructing
+by means of plastic images.<a name="FNanchor_169_169" id="FNanchor_169_169"></a><a href="#Footnote_169_169" class="fnanchor">[169]</a> Life possesses
+him, intoxicates him, so he never gets tired."</p>
+
+<p class='center'>THE END</p>
+
+<div class="footnotes"><h3>FOOTNOTES:</h3>
+
+<div class="footnote"><p><a name="Footnote_167_167" id="Footnote_167_167"></a><a href="#FNanchor_167_167"><span class="label">[167]</span></a> See Conclusion, <a href="#Page_320">II</a>, above.</p></div>
+
+<div class="footnote"><p><a name="Footnote_168_168" id="Footnote_168_168"></a><a href="#FNanchor_168_168"><span class="label">[168]</span></a> B...... is not an architect.</p></div>
+
+<div class="footnote"><p><a name="Footnote_169_169" id="Footnote_169_169"></a><a href="#FNanchor_169_169"><span class="label">[169]</span></a> We see that the speaker is a visualizer.</p></div>
+</div>
+
+
+<hr style="width: 65%;" /><p><span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_360" id="Page_360">[360]</a></span></p>
+
+<h2>INDEX.</h2>
+
+
+<p><span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_361" id="Page_361">[361]</a></span>
+Absent images, Association of, <a href="#Page_94">94</a>.<br />
+<br />
+Abstraction, <a href="#Page_15">15</a>;<br />
+<span style="margin-left: 1em;">Late appearance of, <a href="#Page_146">146</a>.</span><br />
+<br />
+Abulics, <a href="#Page_11">11</a>.<br />
+<br />
+Activity, normal end of imagination, <a href="#Page_11">11</a>.<br />
+<br />
+Adaptation of means to end, <a href="#Page_264">264</a>.<br />
+<br />
+Advance plans in commerce, <a href="#Page_288">288</a>.<br />
+<br />
+Adventure, Eras of, <a href="#Page_287">287</a>.<br />
+<br />
+Affective states, R&ocirc;le of, <a href="#Page_8">8</a>.<br />
+<br />
+Alcoholic liquors, <a href="#Page_74">74</a>.<br />
+<br />
+Alembert, d', <a href="#Page_87">87</a>.<br />
+<br />
+Alexander, <a href="#Page_138">138</a>, <a href="#Page_142">142</a>, <a href="#Page_143">143</a>.<br />
+<br />
+Alfieri, <a href="#Page_56">56</a>.<br />
+<br />
+Allen, <a href="#Page_150">150</a>.<br />
+<br />
+Americans, change occupations, <a href="#Page_257">257</a>.<br />
+<br />
+Analogy, <a href="#Page_299">299</a>;<br />
+<span style="margin-left: 1em;">Abuse of, <a href="#Page_305">305</a>;</span><br />
+<span style="margin-left: 1em;">based on qualitative resemblance, <a href="#Page_26">26</a>;</span><br />
+<span style="margin-left: 1em;">essential to creative imagination, <a href="#Page_25">25</a>;</span><br />
+<span style="margin-left: 1em;">not trustworthy in science, <a href="#Page_27">27</a>;</span><br />
+<span style="margin-left: 1em;">R&ocirc;le of, in primitive life, <a href="#Page_125">125</a>;</span><br />
+<span style="margin-left: 1em;">Thinking by, <a href="#Page_117">117</a>.</span><br />
+<br />
+Anatomical conditions, <a href="#Page_65">65</a>.<br />
+<br />
+Anger, <a href="#Page_34">34</a>.<br />
+<br />
+Animal fancy, <a href="#Page_97">97</a>.<br />
+<br />
+Animals, Association fibers or centers, lacking in, <a href="#Page_100">100</a>;<br />
+<span style="margin-left: 1em;">Discoveries of, <a href="#Page_98">98</a>;</span><br />
+<span style="margin-left: 1em;">Imagination in, <a href="#Page_93">93</a>, <a href="#Page_94">94</a>;</span><br />
+<span style="margin-left: 1em;">Usefulness of, to man, <a href="#Page_274">274</a>.</span><br />
+<br />
+Animism, <a href="#Page_107">107</a>, <a href="#Page_189">189</a>;<br />
+<span style="margin-left: 1em;">of primitives, <a href="#Page_123">123</a>.</span><br />
+<br />
+Anticipations of later inventions, <a href="#Page_277">277</a>.<br />
+<br />
+Apollo, <a href="#Page_50">50</a>.<br />
+<br />
+Apperception, Importance of, <a href="#Page_16">16</a>.<br />
+<br />
+<i>Apprehensio simplex</i>, a logical figment, <a href="#Page_110">110</a>.<br />
+<br />
+Arago, <a href="#Page_145">145</a>.<br />
+<br />
+Aristotle, vi, <a href="#Page_134">134</a>, <a href="#Page_141">141</a>.<br />
+<br />
+Art, Indefiniteness of modern, <a href="#Page_203">203</a>;<br />
+<span style="margin-left: 1em;">Realistic, <a href="#Page_250">250</a>;</span><br />
+<span style="margin-left: 1em;">Various theories of, <a href="#Page_46">46</a>.</span><br />
+<br />
+Artificial motors, Use of, a late development, <a href="#Page_275">275</a>.<br />
+<br />
+Aryan race, <a href="#Page_129">129</a>.<br />
+<br />
+Association, <a href="#Page_22">22</a>, <a href="#Page_23">23</a>;<br />
+<span style="margin-left: 1em;">Forms of, <a href="#Page_196">196</a>;</span><br />
+<span style="margin-left: 1em;">Laws of, <a href="#Page_23">23</a>;</span><br />
+<span style="margin-left: 1em;">of ideas, <a href="#Page_59">59</a>, <a href="#Page_353">353</a>;</span><br />
+<span style="margin-left: 1em;">of ideas, Criticism of the term, <a href="#Page_23">23</a>;</span><br />
+<span style="margin-left: 1em;">of ideas, Discovery depends on, <a href="#Page_250">250</a>;</span><br />
+<span style="margin-left: 1em;">suggests cause, <a href="#Page_261">261</a>.</span><br />
+<br />
+Associational systems, <a href="#Page_67">67</a>.<br />
+<br />
+Astral influences, <a href="#Page_261">261</a>.<br />
+<br />
+Asyllogistic deduction, <a href="#Page_283">283</a>.<br />
+<br />
+Attention, <a href="#Page_86">86</a>.<br />
+<br />
+Australians, <a href="#Page_285">285</a>.<br />
+<br />
+Automatisms, <a href="#Page_71">71</a>.<br />
+<br />
+Azam, <a href="#Page_325">325</a>.<br />
+<br />
+<br />
+Bach, <a href="#Page_69">69</a>, <a href="#Page_214">214</a>, <a href="#Page_216">216</a>.<br />
+<br />
+Bacon, Roger, <a href="#Page_245">245</a>, <a href="#Page_303">303</a> <a href="#Footnote_141_141">n.</a><br />
+<br />
+Baillarger, Dr., <a href="#Page_324">324</a>.<br />
+<br />
+Baldwin, <a href="#Page_104">104</a>.<br />
+<br />
+Barter, <a href="#Page_286">286</a>.<br />
+<br />
+Baudelaire, <a href="#Page_39">39</a>, <a href="#Page_55">55</a>.<br />
+<br />
+Beethoven, <a href="#Page_52">52</a>, <a href="#Page_71">71</a>, <a href="#Page_148">148</a>, <a href="#Page_218">218</a>.<br />
+<br />
+Bernard, Claude, <a href="#Page_52">52</a>;<br />
+<span style="margin-left: 1em;"><i>id&eacute;e directrice</i> of, <a href="#Page_250">250</a>.</span><br />
+<br />
+Binet, <a href="#Page_340">340</a>.<br />
+<br />
+Bipartite division of the brain, <a href="#Page_67">67</a>.<br />
+<br />
+Bismarck, <a href="#Page_271">271</a>.<br />
+<br />
+Blood circulation, Importance of, <a href="#Page_70">70</a>.<br />
+<br />
+<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_362" id="Page_362">[362]</a></span>Boehme, Jacob, <a href="#Page_335">335</a>.<br />
+<br />
+Bonnal, <a href="#Page_298">298</a> <a href="#Footnote_137_137">n.</a><br />
+<br />
+Borgia, Lucretia, <a href="#Page_139">139</a>.<br />
+<br />
+Bossuet, <a href="#Page_225">225</a>.<br />
+<br />
+Boulogne, De, <a href="#Page_283">283</a>.<br />
+<br />
+Bourdeau, L., <a href="#Page_272">272</a>.<br />
+<br />
+Brain- development and abstraction, <a href="#Page_100">100</a>;<br />
+<span style="margin-left: 1em;">regions, Development of, <a href="#Page_67">67</a>;</span><br />
+<span style="margin-left: 1em;">weights, <a href="#Page_66">66</a>.</span><br />
+<br />
+Bramwell, <a href="#Page_343">343</a>.<br />
+<br />
+Breguet, <a href="#Page_277">277</a>.<br />
+<br />
+Brown-S&eacute;quard, <a href="#Page_77">77</a>.<br />
+<br />
+Buddha, Life of, <a href="#Page_301">301</a>.<br />
+<br />
+Buffon, <a href="#Page_52">52</a>, <a href="#Page_73">73</a>.<br />
+<br />
+Byron, <a href="#Page_145">145</a>.<br />
+<br />
+<br />
+Cabalists, <a href="#Page_234">234</a>.<br />
+<br />
+Cabalistic mysticism, <a href="#Page_226">226</a>.<br />
+<br />
+Cabanis, <a href="#Page_78">78</a>.<br />
+<br />
+Campanella, <a href="#Page_303">303</a>.<br />
+<br />
+Carlyle, <a href="#Page_150">150</a>, <a href="#Page_186">186</a>.<br />
+<br />
+Carpenter, <a href="#Page_284">284</a>, <a href="#Page_339">339</a>.<br />
+<br />
+Carthage, <a href="#Page_282">282</a>.<br />
+<br />
+Categories of images, <a href="#Page_16">16</a>.<br />
+<br />
+Causality, Search for, <a href="#Page_260">260</a>.<br />
+<br />
+Charcot, <a href="#Page_6">6</a>.<br />
+<br />
+Charlemagne, <a href="#Page_138">138</a>.<br />
+<br />
+Chateaubriand, <a href="#Page_76">76</a>.<br />
+<br />
+Chatterton, <a href="#Page_145">145</a>.<br />
+<br />
+Cherubini, <a href="#Page_145">145</a>.<br />
+<br />
+Child, Adult misinterpretation of, <a href="#Page_104">104</a>;<br />
+<span style="margin-left: 1em;">Creative imagination in the, <a href="#Page_103">103</a> ff.;</span><br />
+<span style="margin-left: 1em;">Exaggeration of his intelligence, <a href="#Page_115">115</a>;</span><br />
+<span style="margin-left: 1em;">Oscillation of belief and doubt in the, <a href="#Page_113">113</a>;</span><br />
+<span style="margin-left: 1em;">Stages of development, <a href="#Page_105">105</a>.</span><br />
+<br />
+Child-study, Difficulties of, <a href="#Page_104">104</a>.<br />
+<br />
+Chopin, <a href="#Page_52">52</a>, <a href="#Page_215">215</a>.<br />
+<br />
+Chorea, <a href="#Page_101">101</a>.<br />
+<br />
+Cid, The, <a href="#Page_140">140</a>.<br />
+<br />
+Classes of discoverers, <a href="#Page_249">249</a>.<br />
+<br />
+Classification, <a href="#Page_181">181</a>.<br />
+<br />
+Coleridge, <a href="#Page_37">37</a>.<br />
+<br />
+Colored hearing, <a href="#Page_38">38</a>.<br />
+<br />
+Columbus, Christopher, <a href="#Page_89">89</a>.<br />
+<br />
+Commerce, Combative element in, <a href="#Page_295">295</a>.<br />
+<br />
+Commercial imagination, Conditions of, <a href="#Page_281">281</a>;<br />
+<span style="margin-left: 1em;">development due to increasing substitution, <a href="#Page_287">287</a>;</span><br />
+<span style="margin-left: 1em;">development, Stages of, <a href="#Page_285">285</a>.</span><br />
+<br />
+Common factor in comparison, <a href="#Page_40">40</a>.<br />
+<br />
+Complementary scientists, <a href="#Page_246">246</a>.<br />
+<br />
+Complete images impossible, <a href="#Page_16">16</a>.<br />
+<br />
+Comte, <a href="#Page_146">146</a>.<br />
+<br />
+Condillac, <a href="#Page_243">243</a>.<br />
+<br />
+Confucius, <a href="#Page_300">300</a>.<br />
+<br />
+Confusion of impressions, <a href="#Page_18">18</a>.<br />
+<br />
+Conjecture, beginning of science, <a href="#Page_245">245</a>.<br />
+<br />
+Conscious imagination, a special case, <a href="#Page_58">58</a>.<br />
+<br />
+Constellation, <a href="#Page_59">59</a>, <a href="#Page_126">126</a>.<br />
+<br />
+Constitutions by philosophers, <a href="#Page_309">309</a>.<br />
+<br />
+Contiguity and resemblance, <a href="#Page_24">24</a>.<br />
+<br />
+Contrapuntists, <a href="#Page_214">214</a>.<br />
+<br />
+Contrast, Association by, <a href="#Page_40">40</a>.<br />
+<br />
+Cooperation, <a href="#Page_309">309</a>;<br />
+<span style="margin-left: 1em;">of intellect and feeling, <a href="#Page_43">43</a>.</span><br />
+<br />
+Copernicus, <a href="#Page_246">246</a>.<br />
+<br />
+Counter-world, <a href="#Page_304">304</a>.<br />
+<br />
+Creation hindered by complete redintegration, <a href="#Page_22">22</a>;<br />
+<span style="margin-left: 1em;">in physiological inhibition, <a href="#Page_6">6</a>;</span><br />
+<span style="margin-left: 1em;">Motor basis of, <a href="#Page_258">258</a>;</span><br />
+<span style="margin-left: 1em;">Physiological and imaginative, <a href="#Page_76">76</a>;</span><br />
+<span style="margin-left: 1em;">versus repetition, <a href="#Page_5">5</a>.</span><br />
+<br />
+Creative imagination, a growth, <a href="#Page_9">9</a>;<br />
+<span style="margin-left: 1em;">Composite character of, <a href="#Page_12">12</a>;</span><br />
+<span style="margin-left: 1em;">conditioned by knowledge, <a href="#Page_173">173</a>;</span><br />
+<span style="margin-left: 1em;">either esthetic or practical, <a href="#Page_44">44</a>;</span><br />
+<span style="margin-left: 1em;">implies feeling, <a href="#Page_32">32</a>;</span><br />
+<span style="margin-left: 1em;">Neglect of, by writers on psychology, <a href="#Page_vii">vii</a>;</span><br />
+<span style="margin-left: 1em;">Reasons for, <a href="#Page_313">313</a>.</span><br />
+<br />
+Creative instinct, non-existent, <a href="#Page_42">42</a>.<br />
+<br />
+Crisis, not essential, <a href="#Page_58">58</a>.<br />
+<br />
+Critical stage of investigation, <a href="#Page_252">252</a>.<br />
+<br />
+Cromwell, <a href="#Page_144">144</a>.<br />
+<br />
+Cumulative inventions, <a href="#Page_272">272</a>.<br />
+<br />
+Curiosity, <a href="#Page_99">99</a>;<br />
+<span style="margin-left: 1em;">of primitive man, <a href="#Page_45">45</a>, <a href="#Page_131">131</a>.</span><br />
+<br />
+Cuvier, <a href="#Page_183">183</a>.<br />
+<br />
+<br />
+Daedalus, <a href="#Page_269">269</a>.<br />
+<br />
+Dante, <a href="#Page_205">205</a>.<br />
+<br />
+Darwin, <a href="#Page_117">117</a>, <a href="#Page_346">346</a>.<br />
+<br />
+Dauriac, <a href="#Page_350">350</a>.<br />
+<br />
+Deduction, Process of, <a href="#Page_283">283</a>.<br />
+<br />
+Deffant, Madame du, <a href="#Page_48">48</a>.<br />
+<br />
+Deities, Coalescence of, <a href="#Page_200">200</a>;<br />
+<span style="margin-left: 1em;">Momentary, <a href="#Page_199">199</a>;</span><br />
+<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_363" id="Page_363">[363]</a></span><span style="margin-left: 1em;">Multiplicity of Roman, <a href="#Page_125">125</a>.</span><br />
+<br />
+Delboef, <a href="#Page_342">342</a>.<br />
+<br />
+DeQuincy, <a href="#Page_55">55</a>.<br />
+<br />
+Descartes, <a href="#Page_73">73</a>, <a href="#Page_294">294</a>.<br />
+<br />
+Determinism, Neglect of, by idealists, <a href="#Page_303">303</a>;<br />
+<span style="margin-left: 1em;">of art, <a href="#Page_278">278</a>;</span><br />
+<span style="margin-left: 1em;">of invention, <a href="#Page_264">264</a>.</span><br />
+<br />
+Dewey, John, <a href="#Page_132">132</a> <a href="#Footnote_62_62">n.</a><br />
+<br />
+<i>Dialectic</i>, Hegelian, <a href="#Page_254">254</a>.<br />
+<br />
+Diffluent imagination, <a href="#Page_196">196</a> ff.<br />
+<br />
+<i>Dii minores</i>, <a href="#Page_269">269</a>.<br />
+<br />
+Disinterestedness of the artist, <a href="#Page_35">35</a>.<br />
+<br />
+Dissociation, <a href="#Page_15">15</a>, <a href="#Page_268">268</a>;<br />
+<span style="margin-left: 1em;">by concomitant variations, <a href="#Page_21">21</a>;</span><br />
+<span style="margin-left: 1em;">of series, <a href="#Page_19">19</a>.</span><br />
+<br />
+Double personality, <a href="#Page_325">325</a>.<br />
+<br />
+Dreams, <a href="#Page_38">38</a>;<br />
+<span style="margin-left: 1em;">Emotional persistence of, <a href="#Page_324">324</a>.</span><br />
+<br />
+Drugs, Effect of, <a href="#Page_55">55</a>;<br />
+<span style="margin-left: 1em;">Use of, as excitants, <a href="#Page_70">70</a>.</span><br />
+<br />
+Dualism of Fourier, <a href="#Page_306">306</a>.<br />
+<br />
+D&uuml;rer, <a href="#Page_145">145</a>.<br />
+<br />
+<br />
+Egypt, <a href="#Page_135">135</a>.<br />
+<br />
+Egyptian conception of causality, <a href="#Page_260">260</a>.<br />
+<br />
+Emotion, and sensation, <a href="#Page_38">38</a>;<br />
+<span style="margin-left: 1em;">material for imagination, <a href="#Page_33">33</a>;</span><br />
+<span style="margin-left: 1em;">presupposes unsatisfied needs, <a href="#Page_32">32</a>;</span><br />
+<span style="margin-left: 1em;">Realization of, <a href="#Page_80">80</a>.</span><br />
+<br />
+Emotional abstraction, <a href="#Page_196">196</a>;<br />
+<span style="margin-left: 1em;">factor, <a href="#Page_31">31</a> ff.</span><br />
+<br />
+Empedocles, <a href="#Page_136">136</a>.<br />
+<br />
+Epic, Rise of the, <a href="#Page_138">138</a>.<br />
+<br />
+Essenes, <a href="#Page_307">307</a>.<br />
+<br />
+Esthetic imagination,<br />
+<span style="margin-left: 1em;">contrasted to mechanical, <a href="#Page_264">264</a>;</span><br />
+<span style="margin-left: 1em;">Fixity of, <a href="#Page_264">264</a>.</span><br />
+<br />
+Ethics, Living and dead, <a href="#Page_302">302</a>.<br />
+<br />
+Euclid, <a href="#Page_244">244</a>, <a href="#Page_245">245</a>.<br />
+<br />
+Eureka, Moment of, <a href="#Page_247">247</a>, <a href="#Page_302">302</a>.<br />
+<br />
+Evolution of commerce, Law's statement of, <a href="#Page_294">294</a>.<br />
+<br />
+Exact knowledge requisite in commerce, <a href="#Page_289">289</a>.<br />
+<br />
+Expansion of self, <a href="#Page_314">314</a>.<br />
+<br />
+Experience requisite for literary invention, <a href="#Page_146">146</a>.<br />
+<br />
+External factors, <a href="#Page_21">21</a>.<br />
+<br />
+<br />
+Facts and general ideas, <a href="#Page_252">252</a>.<br />
+<br />
+Faith, <a href="#Page_112">112</a>;<br />
+<span style="margin-left: 1em;">-cure, <a href="#Page_6">6</a>;</span><br />
+<span style="margin-left: 1em;">highest in semi-science, <a href="#Page_241">241</a>;</span><br />
+<span style="margin-left: 1em;">R&ocirc;le of, <a href="#Page_7">7</a>.</span><br />
+<br />
+Fancy, <a href="#Page_346">346</a>;<br />
+<span style="margin-left: 1em;">in animals, <a href="#Page_97">97</a>;</span><br />
+<span style="margin-left: 1em;">Source of, <a href="#Page_260">260</a>.</span><br />
+<br />
+Fear, <a href="#Page_34">34</a>.<br />
+<br />
+Fenelon, <a href="#Page_303">303</a>.<br />
+<br />
+F&eacute;r&eacute;, <a href="#Page_325">325</a>, <a href="#Page_340">340</a>.<br />
+<br />
+Fiduciary money, <a href="#Page_286">286</a>.<br />
+<br />
+Fixed ideas, <a href="#Page_88">88</a>, <a href="#Page_89">89</a>.<br />
+<br />
+Flechsig, <a href="#Page_67">67</a>, <a href="#Page_68">68</a>, <a href="#Page_100">100</a>, <a href="#Page_103">103</a>.<br />
+<br />
+Flournoy, <a href="#Page_38">38</a>, <a href="#Page_344">344</a>.<br />
+<br />
+Forel, <a href="#Page_96">96</a>.<br />
+<br />
+Fouill&eacute;e, <a href="#Page_193">193</a>.<br />
+<br />
+Fourier, <a href="#Page_304">304</a>.<br />
+<br />
+French, not strong in imagination, <a href="#Page_193">193</a>;<br />
+<span style="margin-left: 1em;">Revolution, <a href="#Page_151">151</a>.</span><br />
+<br />
+Fresnel, <a href="#Page_145">145</a>.<br />
+<br />
+Fromentin, <a href="#Page_17">17</a>.<br />
+<br />
+Froschammer, <a href="#Page_75">75</a>, <a href="#Page_346">346</a>.<br />
+<br />
+Fuegians, <a href="#Page_285">285</a>.<br />
+<br />
+<br />
+Gauss, <a href="#Page_69">69</a>, <a href="#Page_183">183</a>.<br />
+<br />
+Gautier, Th&eacute;ophile, <a href="#Page_55">55</a>, <a href="#Page_189">189</a>, <a href="#Page_190">190</a>.<br />
+<br />
+Gavarni, <a href="#Page_187">187</a>.<br />
+<br />
+Generic image, <a href="#Page_18">18</a>.<br />
+<br />
+Genius, and brain structure, <a href="#Page_68">68</a>;<br />
+<span style="margin-left: 1em;">depends on subliminal imagination, <a href="#Page_57">57</a>;</span><br />
+<span style="margin-left: 1em;">exceptional, <a href="#Page_149">149</a>;</span><br />
+<span style="margin-left: 1em;">No common measure of, <a href="#Page_143">143</a>.</span><br />
+<br />
+Geniuses, of judgment, <a href="#Page_142">142</a>;<br />
+<span style="margin-left: 1em;">of mastery over men, and matter, <a href="#Page_142">142</a>.</span><br />
+<br />
+Gilman, <a href="#Page_219">219</a> <a href="#Footnote_98_98">n.</a><br />
+<br />
+Gnostics, <a href="#Page_234">234</a>.<br />
+<br />
+Goethe, <a href="#Page_29">29</a>, <a href="#Page_149">149</a>, <a href="#Page_150">150</a>, <a href="#Page_216">216</a>.<br />
+<br />
+Gold, Curative powers of, <a href="#Page_261">261</a>.<br />
+<br />
+Goncourt, <a href="#Page_74">74</a>.<br />
+<br />
+Goya, <a href="#Page_39">39</a>, <a href="#Page_206">206</a>.<br />
+<br />
+Greece, <a href="#Page_282">282</a>.<br />
+<br />
+Greek republics, <a href="#Page_151">151</a>.<br />
+<br />
+Gr&eacute;try, <a href="#Page_73">73</a>.<br />
+<br />
+Grillparzer, <a href="#Page_85">85</a>, <a href="#Page_336">336</a>.<br />
+<br />
+Groos, <a href="#Page_35">35</a>, <a href="#Page_47">47</a>, <a href="#Page_99">99</a>, <a href="#Page_227">227</a>.<br />
+<br />
+Guericke, Otto de, <a href="#Page_276">276</a>.<br />
+<br />
+<br />
+Habits, <a href="#Page_22">22</a>.<br />
+<br />
+Hamilton, <a href="#Page_19">19</a>, <a href="#Page_58">58</a>, <a href="#Page_60">60</a>.<br />
+<br />
+Handel, <a href="#Page_145">145</a>.<br />
+<br />
+Hanseatic League, <a href="#Page_287">287</a>.<br />
+<br />
+Harrington, <a href="#Page_303">303</a>.<br />
+<br />
+Hartmann, <a href="#Page_254">254</a>, <a href="#Page_346">346</a>.<br />
+<br />
+Ha&uuml;y, <a href="#Page_247">247</a>.<br />
+<br />
+<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_364" id="Page_364">[364]</a></span>Haydn, <a href="#Page_145">145</a>.<br />
+<br />
+Hegel, <a href="#Page_254">254</a>, <a href="#Page_346">346</a>.<br />
+<br />
+Heine, <a href="#Page_306">306</a>.<br />
+<br />
+Hellenic imagination, anthropomorphic, <a href="#Page_202">202</a>.<br />
+<br />
+Helmholtz, <a href="#Page_20">20</a>, <a href="#Page_87">87</a>, <a href="#Page_142">142</a>.<br />
+<br />
+Henry IV, <a href="#Page_139">139</a>.<br />
+<br />
+Heph&aelig;stos, <a href="#Page_269">269</a>.<br />
+<br />
+Hercules, <a href="#Page_137">137</a>.<br />
+<br />
+Hero, <a href="#Page_270">270</a>.<br />
+<br />
+Herodotus, <a href="#Page_260">260</a>.<br />
+<br />
+Hesiod, <a href="#Page_130">130</a>.<br />
+<br />
+Hindoo imagination, symbolic, <a href="#Page_202">202</a>.<br />
+<br />
+Hindoos, <a href="#Page_128">128</a>.<br />
+<br />
+Hodgson, <a href="#Page_35">35</a>.<br />
+<br />
+H&ouml;ffding, <a href="#Page_41">41</a>.<br />
+<br />
+Hoffman, <a href="#Page_39">39</a>, <a href="#Page_206">206</a>.<br />
+<br />
+<i>Homo duplex</i>, <a href="#Page_43">43</a>.<br />
+<br />
+Homonomy, <a href="#Page_120">120</a>.<br />
+<br />
+Howe, <a href="#Page_60">60</a> <a href="#Footnote_23_23">n.</a><br />
+<br />
+Huber, <a href="#Page_96">96</a>.<br />
+<br />
+Hugo, Victor, <a href="#Page_188">188</a>, <a href="#Page_189">189</a>, <a href="#Page_216">216</a>, <a href="#Page_229">229</a>;<br />
+<span style="margin-left: 1em;">Animism in, <a href="#Page_189">189</a>.</span><br />
+<br />
+Human force, beginning of invention, <a href="#Page_273">273</a>.<br />
+<br />
+Hume, <a href="#Page_111">111</a>.<br />
+<br />
+Huyghens, <a href="#Page_270">270</a>.<br />
+<br />
+Hyper&aelig;mia, <a href="#Page_70">70</a>.<br />
+<br />
+Hyperesthesia, Temporary, <a href="#Page_74">74</a>.<br />
+<br />
+Hypermnesia, <a href="#Page_54">54</a>.<br />
+<br />
+Hypothesis, <a href="#Page_251">251</a>;<br />
+<span style="margin-left: 1em;">Progressive, <a href="#Page_244">244</a>.</span><br />
+<br />
+<br />
+Icarus, <a href="#Page_269">269</a>.<br />
+<br />
+Idea and emotion, Equivalence of, <a href="#Page_80">80</a>.<br />
+<br />
+Ideal modified in practice, <a href="#Page_306">306</a>.<br />
+<br />
+Idealistic conceptions, <a href="#Page_300">300</a>.<br />
+<br />
+Idealization, Process of, <a href="#Page_38">38</a>.<br />
+<br />
+Illusion, <a href="#Page_107">107</a>;<br />
+<span style="margin-left: 1em;">and legend, <a href="#Page_137">137</a>;</span><br />
+<span style="margin-left: 1em;">Conscious, of mystic, <a href="#Page_228">228</a>.</span><br />
+<br />
+Illusions, valuable to scientist, <a href="#Page_251">251</a>.<br />
+<br />
+Image, Modification of, <a href="#Page_18">18</a>, <a href="#Page_291">291</a>.<br />
+<br />
+Images, <a href="#Page_80">80</a>;<br />
+<span style="margin-left: 1em;">abbreviations of reality, <a href="#Page_232">232</a>;</span><br />
+<span style="margin-left: 1em;">Categories of, <a href="#Page_16">16</a>;</span><br />
+<span style="margin-left: 1em;">Concrete, <a href="#Page_222">222</a>;</span><br />
+<span style="margin-left: 1em;">provoked, <a href="#Page_188">188</a>;</span><br />
+<span style="margin-left: 1em;">sketched type, <a href="#Page_81">81</a>;</span><br />
+<span style="margin-left: 1em;">Symbolic, <a href="#Page_222">222</a>;</span><br />
+<span style="margin-left: 1em;">Visual, provoked by music, <a href="#Page_217">217</a>.</span><br />
+<br />
+Imagination, and abulia, <a href="#Page_11">11</a>;<br />
+<span style="margin-left: 1em;">and foresight, <a href="#Page_284">284</a>;</span><br />
+<span style="margin-left: 1em;">anthropocentric, <a href="#Page_10">10</a>;</span><br />
+<span style="margin-left: 1em;">basis of the cosmic process, <a href="#Page_75">75</a>;</span><br />
+<span style="margin-left: 1em;">Commercial, <a href="#Page_281">281</a>;</span><br />
+<span style="margin-left: 1em;">complete in animals, <a href="#Page_95">95</a>;</span><br />
+<span style="margin-left: 1em;">condensed in common objects, <a href="#Page_276">276</a>;</span><br />
+<span style="margin-left: 1em;">Conditions of, <a href="#Page_44">44</a>;</span><br />
+<span style="margin-left: 1em;">Development of, <a href="#Page_167">167</a> ff.;</span><br />
+<span style="margin-left: 1em;">Diffluent, <a href="#Page_196">196</a> ff.;</span><br />
+<span style="margin-left: 1em;">Esthetic, <a href="#Page_264">264</a>;</span><br />
+<span style="margin-left: 1em;">fixed form, <a href="#Page_318">318</a>;</span><br />
+<span style="margin-left: 1em;">in animals, <a href="#Page_93">93</a>;</span><br />
+<span style="margin-left: 1em;">in experimentation, <a href="#Page_248">248</a>;</span><br />
+<span style="margin-left: 1em;">in primitive man, <a href="#Page_118">118</a>;</span><br />
+<span style="margin-left: 1em;">Mechanical and technical, <a href="#Page_257">257</a>;</span><br />
+<span style="margin-left: 1em;">Motives of different sorts of, <a href="#Page_251">251</a>;</span><br />
+<span style="margin-left: 1em;">Musical, <a href="#Page_212">212</a> ff., <a href="#Page_350">350</a>;</span><br />
+<span style="margin-left: 1em;">Mystic, <a href="#Page_221">221</a> ff.;</span><br />
+<span style="margin-left: 1em;">Mystical, different from religious, <a href="#Page_231">231</a>;</span><br />
+<span style="margin-left: 1em;">not opposed to the useful, <a href="#Page_263">263</a>;</span><br />
+<span style="margin-left: 1em;">Numerical, <a href="#Page_207">207</a> ff.;</span><br />
+<span style="margin-left: 1em;">Periods of development of, <a href="#Page_144">144</a>;</span><br />
+<span style="margin-left: 1em;">Plastic, <a href="#Page_184">184</a> ff.;</span><br />
+<span style="margin-left: 1em;">Poetical, <a href="#Page_267">267</a>;</span><br />
+<span style="margin-left: 1em;">Practical, <a href="#Page_256">256</a> ff.;</span><br />
+<span style="margin-left: 1em;">present in all activities, <a href="#Page_viii">viii</a>;</span><br />
+<span style="margin-left: 1em;">Quality of, same in many lives, <a href="#Page_265">265</a>;</span><br />
+<span style="margin-left: 1em;">Scientific, <a href="#Page_236">236</a> ff.;</span><br />
+<span style="margin-left: 1em;">sketched form, <a href="#Page_316">316</a>;</span><br />
+<span style="margin-left: 1em;">substitute for reason, <a href="#Page_29">29</a>;</span><br />
+<span style="margin-left: 1em;">Varieties of, <a href="#Page_180">180</a>.</span><br />
+<br />
+Imaginative type, <a href="#Page_320">320</a>.<br />
+<br />
+Imitation, through pleasure, <a href="#Page_98">98</a>.<br />
+<br />
+Imitative music, <a href="#Page_214">214</a>.<br />
+<br />
+Impersonality, <a href="#Page_52">52</a>, <a href="#Page_86">86</a>.<br />
+<br />
+Incomplete images, <a href="#Page_18">18</a>.<br />
+<br />
+Incubation, Periods of, <a href="#Page_278">278</a>.<br />
+<br />
+Individual variations, <a href="#Page_179">179</a>.<br />
+<br />
+Individuality of genius, <a href="#Page_149">149</a>.<br />
+<br />
+Inductive reasoning, <a href="#Page_132">132</a>.<br />
+<br />
+Infantile insanity, <a href="#Page_101">101</a>.<br />
+<br />
+Inhibition by representation, <a href="#Page_6">6</a>.<br />
+<br />
+Initial moment of discovery, <a href="#Page_276">276</a>.<br />
+<br />
+Inspiration, <a href="#Page_50">50</a>, <a href="#Page_85">85</a>;<br />
+<span style="margin-left: 1em;">and intoxication, <a href="#Page_55">55</a>;</span><br />
+<span style="margin-left: 1em;">Characteristic of, <a href="#Page_57">57</a>;</span><br />
+<span style="margin-left: 1em;">characterized by suddenness and impersonality, <a href="#Page_51">51</a>;</span><br />
+<span style="margin-left: 1em;">resembles somnambulism, <a href="#Page_56">56</a>;</span><br />
+<span style="margin-left: 1em;">Subjective feeling of, untrustworthy, <a href="#Page_59">59</a>.</span><br />
+<br />
+Instinct, <a href="#Page_75">75</a>;<br />
+<span style="margin-left: 1em;">answer to specific needs, <a href="#Page_42">42</a>;</span><br />
+<span style="margin-left: 1em;">Creative, <a href="#Page_313">313</a>;</span><br />
+<span style="margin-left: 1em;">Resemblance of invention to, <a href="#Page_48">48</a>.</span><br />
+<br />
+Intellectual factor, <a href="#Page_15">15</a>.<br />
+<br />
+Intuition, <a href="#Page_282">282</a>, <a href="#Page_285">285</a>.<br />
+<br />
+Introspectors, <a href="#Page_321">321</a>.<br />
+<br />
+Intentional combination of images, <a href="#Page_95">95</a>.<br />
+<br />
+Interest, a factor in creation, <a href="#Page_82">82</a>.<br />
+<br />
+<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_365" id="Page_365">[365]</a></span>Interesting, defined, <a href="#Page_36">36</a>.<br />
+<br />
+Invention arises to satisfy a need, <a href="#Page_271">271</a>;<br />
+<span style="margin-left: 1em;">Higher forms of, <a href="#Page_140">140</a> ff.;</span><br />
+<span style="margin-left: 1em;">in morals, <a href="#Page_300">300</a>;</span><br />
+<span style="margin-left: 1em;">in successive parts, <a href="#Page_296">296</a>;</span><br />
+<span style="margin-left: 1em;">of monopolies, <a href="#Page_282">282</a>;</span><br />
+<span style="margin-left: 1em;">Pain of, <a href="#Page_51">51</a>;</span><br />
+<span style="margin-left: 1em;">Spontaneity of, <a href="#Page_51">51</a>;</span><br />
+<span style="margin-left: 1em;">subjected to tradition, <a href="#Page_269">269</a>.</span><br />
+<br />
+Inventions, Amplifiers of, <a href="#Page_270">270</a>;<br />
+<span style="margin-left: 1em;">largely anonymous, <a href="#Page_275">275</a>;</span><br />
+<span style="margin-left: 1em;">Mechanical, neglected by psychologists, <a href="#Page_263">263</a>;</span><br />
+<span style="margin-left: 1em;">Stratification of, <a href="#Page_272">272</a>.</span><br />
+<br />
+Inventors deified, <a href="#Page_269">269</a>;<br />
+<span style="margin-left: 1em;">Oddities of, <a href="#Page_72">72</a>.</span><br />
+<br />
+<br />
+James, William, <a href="#Page_21">21</a>, <a href="#Page_25">25</a>, <a href="#Page_37">37</a>, <a href="#Page_83">83</a>, <a href="#Page_112">112</a>.<br />
+<br />
+Janet, <a href="#Page_340">340</a>.<br />
+<br />
+Jealousy, stimulates imagination, <a href="#Page_34">34</a>.<br />
+<br />
+Jord&aelig;ns, <a href="#Page_145">145</a>.<br />
+<br />
+Joy, <a href="#Page_34">34</a>.<br />
+<br />
+<br />
+Kant, <a href="#Page_248">248</a>.<br />
+<br />
+Kepler, <a href="#Page_246">246</a>, <a href="#Page_247">247</a>.<br />
+<br />
+Klopstock, <a href="#Page_215">215</a>.<br />
+<br />
+K&uuml;hn, <a href="#Page_129">129</a>.<br />
+<br />
+<br />
+Lagrange, <a href="#Page_71">71</a>.<br />
+<br />
+Lamennais, <a href="#Page_73">73</a>.<br />
+<br />
+Lang, <a href="#Page_128">128</a>, <a href="#Page_261">261</a>.<br />
+<br />
+Language, Origin of, <a href="#Page_120">120</a>.<br />
+<br />
+Laplace, <a href="#Page_250">250</a>.<br />
+<br />
+Larvated epilepsy, <a href="#Page_141">141</a>.<br />
+<br />
+Lavoisier, <a href="#Page_246">246</a>.<br />
+<br />
+Law, <a href="#Page_294">294</a>.<br />
+<br />
+Lazarus, <a href="#Page_47">47</a>.<br />
+<br />
+Leibniz, <a href="#Page_73">73</a>, <a href="#Page_74">74</a>, <a href="#Page_146">146</a>, <a href="#Page_253">253</a>, <a href="#Page_296">296</a> <a href="#Footnote_136_136">n.</a><br />
+<br />
+L&eacute;lut, <a href="#Page_141">141</a>.<br />
+<br />
+Leurechon, <a href="#Page_277">277</a>.<br />
+<br />
+Liebig, <a href="#Page_244">244</a>.<br />
+<br />
+Linn&aelig;us, <a href="#Page_183">183</a>.<br />
+<br />
+Literal mysticism, <a href="#Page_226">226</a>.<br />
+<br />
+Localization, <a href="#Page_65">65</a>.<br />
+<br />
+Loch Lomond, <a href="#Page_58">58</a>.<br />
+<br />
+Locke, <a href="#Page_309">309</a>.<br />
+<br />
+Lombroso, <a href="#Page_141">141</a>, <a href="#Page_142">142</a>.<br />
+<br />
+Louis XIV, <a href="#Page_150">150</a>.<br />
+<br />
+Love, <a href="#Page_34">34</a>;<br />
+<span style="margin-left: 1em;">and hate, <a href="#Page_134">134</a>.</span><br />
+<br />
+Love-plays, <a href="#Page_99">99</a>.<br />
+<br />
+<br />
+Machiavelli, <a href="#Page_73">73</a>.<br />
+<br />
+Machines, counterfeits of human beings, <a href="#Page_279">279</a>.<br />
+<br />
+Man and animals, Specific quality of, <a href="#Page_273">273</a>.<br />
+<br />
+Manu, <a href="#Page_300">300</a>.<br />
+<br />
+Mastery, Spirit of, <a href="#Page_114">114</a>.<br />
+<br />
+Materials of imagination, <a href="#Page_299">299</a>.<br />
+<br />
+Maury, A., <a href="#Page_6">6</a> <a href="#Footnote_1_1">n.</a><br />
+<br />
+Mechanic and poet, <a href="#Page_279">279</a>.<br />
+<br />
+Mechanical aptitude, <a href="#Page_145">145</a>.<br />
+<br />
+Mechanical imagination, Ideal of, <a href="#Page_268">268</a>.<br />
+<br />
+Mediate association, <a href="#Page_59">59</a>.<br />
+<br />
+Memory, Predominant tendencies in, <a href="#Page_61">61</a>;<br />
+<span style="margin-left: 1em;">untrustworthy, <a href="#Page_17">17</a>.</span><br />
+<br />
+Men, Great, as makers of history, <a href="#Page_150">150</a>.<br />
+<br />
+Mendelssohn, <a href="#Page_145">145</a>, <a href="#Page_213">213</a> <a href="#Footnote_96_96">n.</a>, <a href="#Page_215">215</a>, <a href="#Page_216">216</a>.<br />
+<br />
+Mental chemistry, <a href="#Page_82">82</a>.<br />
+<br />
+Merchant sailors, <a href="#Page_282">282</a>.<br />
+<br />
+Metamorphosis, <a href="#Page_28">28</a>;<br />
+<span style="margin-left: 1em;">of deities, <a href="#Page_129">129</a>;</span><br />
+<span style="margin-left: 1em;">Regressive, <a href="#Page_171">171</a>.</span><br />
+<br />
+Metaphysical speculation, <a href="#Page_251">251</a>;<br />
+<span style="margin-left: 1em;">thought, Stages of, <a href="#Page_252">252</a>.</span><br />
+<br />
+Metaphysics, <a href="#Page_252">252</a> ff.<br />
+<br />
+Methods of invention, <a href="#Page_243">243</a>.<br />
+<br />
+Meynert, <a href="#Page_100">100</a>.<br />
+<br />
+Michaelangelo, <a href="#Page_145">145</a>, <a href="#Page_148">148</a>, <a href="#Page_149">149</a>.<br />
+<br />
+Michelet, <a href="#Page_186">186</a>, <a href="#Page_306">306</a>.<br />
+<br />
+Middle Ages, predominantly imaginative, <a href="#Page_174">174</a>.<br />
+<br />
+Military invention, <a href="#Page_295">295</a>;<br />
+<span style="margin-left: 1em;">Conditions of, <a href="#Page_297">297</a>.</span><br />
+<br />
+Mill, John Stuart, <a href="#Page_82">82</a>, <a href="#Page_284">284</a>.<br />
+<br />
+Milton, <a href="#Page_73">73</a>.<br />
+<br />
+Mimicry, <a href="#Page_98">98</a>.<br />
+<br />
+Mind, Varieties of, <a href="#Page_320">320</a>.<br />
+<br />
+Mission, Consciousness of, <a href="#Page_148">148</a>.<br />
+<br />
+Misunderstanding of the new, <a href="#Page_151">151</a>.<br />
+<br />
+Mobility of inventors, <a href="#Page_258">258</a>.<br />
+<br />
+Monadology, <a href="#Page_253">253</a>.<br />
+<br />
+Money, Invention of, <a href="#Page_286">286</a>;<br />
+<span style="margin-left: 1em;">sought as an end, <a href="#Page_289">289</a>.</span><br />
+<br />
+Monge, <a href="#Page_237">237</a>.<br />
+<br />
+Moses, <a href="#Page_300">300</a>.<br />
+<br />
+More, <a href="#Page_303">303</a>, <a href="#Page_309">309</a>.<br />
+<br />
+Morgan, Lloyd, <a href="#Page_99">99</a>.<br />
+<br />
+Mormons, <a href="#Page_307">307</a>.<br />
+<br />
+Monoideism, <a href="#Page_87">87</a>.<br />
+<br />
+Montgolfier, <a href="#Page_277">277</a>.<br />
+<br />
+Moral geniuses, <a href="#Page_301">301</a>.<br />
+<br />
+<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_366" id="Page_366">[366]</a></span>Moravian brotherhood, <a href="#Page_307">307</a>.<br />
+<br />
+Mosso, <a href="#Page_71">71</a>, <a href="#Page_340">340</a>.<br />
+<br />
+Motor elements in all representation, <a href="#Page_4">4</a>;<br />
+<span style="margin-left: 1em;">elements, R&ocirc;le of, <a href="#Page_7">7</a>;</span><br />
+<span style="margin-left: 1em;">manifestation basis of creation, <a href="#Page_9">9</a>.</span><br />
+<br />
+Movements, Importance of, in imagination, <a href="#Page_3">3</a>.<br />
+<br />
+Mozart, <a href="#Page_73">73</a>, <a href="#Page_145">145</a>.<br />
+<br />
+M&uuml;ller, Max, <a href="#Page_120">120</a>, <a href="#Page_129">129</a>, <a href="#Page_130">130</a>.<br />
+<br />
+Mummy powder, <a href="#Page_261">261</a>.<br />
+<br />
+M&uuml;nsterberg, <a href="#Page_60">60</a>.<br />
+<br />
+Muses, <a href="#Page_50">50</a>.<br />
+<br />
+Music an emotional language, <a href="#Page_220">220</a>;<br />
+<span style="margin-left: 1em;">Precocity in, <a href="#Page_144">144</a>.</span><br />
+<br />
+Musical imagination, <a href="#Page_212">212</a>, <a href="#Page_350">350</a>.<br />
+<br />
+Musset, Alfred de, <a href="#Page_335">335</a>.<br />
+<br />
+Myers, <a href="#Page_342">342</a>.<br />
+<br />
+Mystic imagination, <a href="#Page_221">221</a> ff., <a href="#Page_335">335</a>.<br />
+<br />
+Mystics, Abuse of allegory, by, <a href="#Page_225">225</a>;<br />
+<span style="margin-left: 1em;">Belief of, <a href="#Page_227">227</a>;</span><br />
+<span style="margin-left: 1em;">Metaphorical style of, <a href="#Page_224">224</a>.</span><br />
+<br />
+Mysticism by suggestion, <a href="#Page_229">229</a>.<br />
+<br />
+Myth, defined, <a href="#Page_123">123</a>;<br />
+<span style="margin-left: 1em;">Depersonification of, <a href="#Page_133">133</a>;</span><br />
+<span style="margin-left: 1em;">in Plato, <a href="#Page_134">134</a>;</span><br />
+<span style="margin-left: 1em;">in science, <a href="#Page_134">134</a>;</span><br />
+<span style="margin-left: 1em;">Subjective and objective factors in, <a href="#Page_122">122</a>.</span><br />
+<br />
+Myths, Significance of, <a href="#Page_119">119</a>;<br />
+<span style="margin-left: 1em;">Variations in, <a href="#Page_127">127</a>.</span><br />
+<br />
+Myth-making activity, <a href="#Page_viii">viii</a>, <a href="#Page_331">331</a>.<br />
+<br />
+<br />
+Napoleon, <a href="#Page_10">10</a>, <a href="#Page_66">66</a>, <a href="#Page_71">71</a>, <a href="#Page_142">142</a>;<br />
+<span style="margin-left: 1em;">his war practice, <a href="#Page_298">298</a>.</span><br />
+<br />
+Natural, and human phenomena, <a href="#Page_299">299</a>;<br />
+<span style="margin-left: 1em;">law, Uniformity of, opposed to dissociation, <a href="#Page_21">21</a>;</span><br />
+<span style="margin-left: 1em;">motors, Use of, <a href="#Page_275">275</a>.</span><br />
+<br />
+Naville, <a href="#Page_245">245</a>.<br />
+<br />
+Need of knowing, <a href="#Page_314">314</a>.<br />
+<br />
+Neglect of details in sensation, <a href="#Page_20">20</a>.<br />
+<br />
+Nerval, G&eacute;rard de, <a href="#Page_229">229</a>, <a href="#Page_324">324</a>.<br />
+<br />
+Nervous overflow, <a href="#Page_71">71</a>.<br />
+<br />
+New Larnak, <a href="#Page_309">309</a>.<br />
+<br />
+Newbold, <a href="#Page_340">340</a>.<br />
+<br />
+Newcomen, <a href="#Page_270">270</a>.<br />
+<br />
+Newton, <a href="#Page_58">58</a>, <a href="#Page_87">87</a>, <a href="#Page_146">146</a>.<br />
+<br />
+Nietzsche, <a href="#Page_150">150</a>.<br />
+<br />
+<i>Nomina Numina</i>, <a href="#Page_120">120</a>, <a href="#Page_262">262</a>.<br />
+<br />
+Nordau, <a href="#Page_142">142</a>.<br />
+<br />
+Numerical imagination, <a href="#Page_207">207</a> ff.;<br />
+<span style="margin-left: 1em;">mysticism, <a href="#Page_226">226</a>;</span><br />
+<span style="margin-left: 1em;">series unlimited, <a href="#Page_207">207</a>.</span><br />
+<br />
+<br />
+Objective study of inventors, <a href="#Page_71">71</a>.<br />
+<br />
+Oddities of inventors, <a href="#Page_72">72</a>.<br />
+<br />
+Oelzelt-Newin, <a href="#Page_33">33</a>, <a href="#Page_95">95</a>.<br />
+<br />
+Old age, Effect of, on imagination, <a href="#Page_77">77</a>.<br />
+<br />
+Organic conditions, <a href="#Page_65">65</a>.<br />
+<br />
+Orientation conditioned by individual organization, <a href="#Page_48">48</a>;<br />
+<span style="margin-left: 1em;">Personal, <a href="#Page_270">270</a>.</span><br />
+<br />
+Owen, Robert, <a href="#Page_309">309</a>.<br />
+<br />
+<br />
+Paradox of belief, <a href="#Page_242">242</a>.<br />
+<br />
+Paralysis by ideas, <a href="#Page_6">6</a>.<br />
+<br />
+Pascal, <a href="#Page_146">146</a>, <a href="#Page_244">244</a>.<br />
+<br />
+Pasteur, <a href="#Page_142">142</a>, <a href="#Page_143">143</a>, <a href="#Page_251">251</a>.<br />
+<br />
+Pathological view of genius, <a href="#Page_141">141</a>.<br />
+<br />
+Pathology and physiology, <a href="#Page_74">74</a>.<br />
+<br />
+Perception, <a href="#Page_15">15</a>;<br />
+<span style="margin-left: 1em;">and conception, <a href="#Page_184">184</a>;</span><br />
+<span style="margin-left: 1em;">and imagination, <a href="#Page_106">106</a>.</span><br />
+<br />
+Perez, B., <a href="#Page_115">115</a>.<br />
+<br />
+Persistence of ideas due to feeling, <a href="#Page_79">79</a>.<br />
+<br />
+Personification, <a href="#Page_186">186</a>;<br />
+<span style="margin-left: 1em;">characteristic of aborigines and children, <a href="#Page_27">27</a>;</span><br />
+<span style="margin-left: 1em;">source of myth, <a href="#Page_28">28</a>.</span><br />
+<br />
+Phalanges, Organization of society into, <a href="#Page_305">305</a>.<br />
+<br />
+Philippe, J., <a href="#Page_17">17</a> <a href="#Footnote_4_4">n.</a><br />
+<br />
+Philosophy, a transformation of mystic ideas, <a href="#Page_233">233</a>.<br />
+<br />
+Phlogiston, <a href="#Page_248">248</a>.<br />
+<br />
+Physiological states, <a href="#Page_70">70</a>.<br />
+<br />
+Physiology and pathology, <a href="#Page_74">74</a>.<br />
+<br />
+Plastic art and mythology, <a href="#Page_191">191</a>;<br />
+<span style="margin-left: 1em;">imagination, <a href="#Page_184">184</a> f.</span><br />
+<br />
+Plato, <a href="#Page_134">134</a>, <a href="#Page_303">303</a>, <a href="#Page_309">309</a>.<br />
+<br />
+Platonic ideas, <a href="#Page_81">81</a>, <a href="#Page_253">253</a>.<br />
+<br />
+Play, <a href="#Page_47">47</a>, <a href="#Page_97">97</a>;<br />
+<span style="margin-left: 1em;">Uses of, for man, <a href="#Page_114">114</a>.</span><br />
+<br />
+Plotinus, <a href="#Page_234">234</a>.<br />
+<br />
+Poe, <a href="#Page_39">39</a>, <a href="#Page_206">206</a>, <a href="#Page_324">324</a>.<br />
+<br />
+Poet, a workman, <a href="#Page_190">190</a>.<br />
+<br />
+Poetical imagination, general characters, <a href="#Page_267">267</a>;<br />
+<span style="margin-left: 1em;">Inspiration in, <a href="#Page_268">268</a>;</span><br />
+<span style="margin-left: 1em;">special characters, <a href="#Page_270">270</a>.</span><br />
+<br />
+Poetical invention, Stages of, <a href="#Page_266">266</a>.<br />
+<br />
+Polyideism, <a href="#Page_87">87</a>.<br />
+<br />
+<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_367" id="Page_367">[367]</a></span>Polynomy, <a href="#Page_120">120</a>.<br />
+<br />
+Poncelet, <a href="#Page_143">143</a>.<br />
+<br />
+Positive minds, <a href="#Page_318">318</a>.<br />
+<br />
+Powers of nature, Exploitation of <a href="#Page_271">271</a>.<br />
+<br />
+Practical imagination, Ubiquity of, <a href="#Page_254">254</a>.<br />
+<br />
+Practice, essential in motor creation, <a href="#Page_186">186</a>.<br />
+<br />
+Precocity, <a href="#Page_144">144</a>;<br />
+<span style="margin-left: 1em;">in poetry, <a href="#Page_145">145</a>;</span><br />
+<span style="margin-left: 1em;">of mathematicians, <a href="#Page_147">147</a>.</span><br />
+<br />
+Pre-Raphaelites, <a href="#Page_204">204</a>.<br />
+<br />
+Preyer, <a href="#Page_117">117</a>.<br />
+<br />
+Primitive man, <a href="#Page_45">45</a>;<br />
+<span style="margin-left: 1em;">and myth, <a href="#Page_118">118</a> ff.</span><br />
+<br />
+Principle of unity, <a href="#Page_250">250</a>.<br />
+<br />
+Progressive stages of imagination, <a href="#Page_84">84</a>.<br />
+<br />
+Prometheus, <a href="#Page_269">269</a>.<br />
+<br />
+Provoked revival, <a href="#Page_94">94</a>.<br />
+<br />
+Pseudo-science, <a href="#Page_240">240</a>.<br />
+<br />
+Psychic atoms, <a href="#Page_19">19</a>;<br />
+<span style="margin-left: 1em;">paralysis, <a href="#Page_6">6</a>.</span><br />
+<br />
+Psychological regressions, <a href="#Page_248">248</a>.<br />
+<br />
+Puberty, Influence of, on imagination, <a href="#Page_76">76</a>.<br />
+<br />
+Pythagoras, <a href="#Page_226">226</a>, <a href="#Page_246">246</a>.<br />
+<br />
+Pythagoreans, <a href="#Page_134">134</a>.<br />
+<br />
+<br />
+Qualities, Attribution of, to objects, <a href="#Page_124">124</a>.<br />
+<br />
+<br />
+Raphael, <a href="#Page_145">145</a>.<br />
+<br />
+Rational Metaphysics, <a href="#Page_234">234</a>.<br />
+<br />
+Reason, Objectivity of, <a href="#Page_10">10</a>.<br />
+<br />
+Reciprocal working of scientific and practical discoveries, <a href="#Page_249">249</a>.<br />
+<br />
+Recuperative theory of play, <a href="#Page_97">97</a>.<br />
+<br />
+Redintegration, Law of, <a href="#Page_19">19</a>;<br />
+<span style="margin-left: 1em;">Total, <a href="#Page_36">36</a>.</span><br />
+<br />
+Regis, <a href="#Page_54">54</a>.<br />
+<br />
+Religion, Universality of, <a href="#Page_128">128</a>.<br />
+<br />
+Renaissance, <a href="#Page_151">151</a>, <a href="#Page_175">175</a>.<br />
+<br />
+Reni, Guido, <a href="#Page_73">73</a>.<br />
+<br />
+Repetition versus creation, <a href="#Page_5">5</a>, <a href="#Page_23">23</a>.<br />
+<br />
+Representation and belief inseparable, <a href="#Page_110">110</a>.<br />
+<br />
+Representations, Interchange of, <a href="#Page_323">323</a>;<br />
+<span style="margin-left: 1em;">Number of, <a href="#Page_322">322</a>.</span><br />
+<br />
+Revery, <a href="#Page_38">38</a>, <a href="#Page_198">198</a>, <a href="#Page_316">316</a>.<br />
+<br />
+Reymond, Du Bois, <a href="#Page_52">52</a>.<br />
+<br />
+Reynolds, <a href="#Page_6">6</a>, <a href="#Page_325">325</a>.<br />
+<br />
+Roland, <a href="#Page_138">138</a>.<br />
+<br />
+Roman Republic, <a href="#Page_151">151</a>.<br />
+<br />
+Romans, <a href="#Page_125">125</a>.<br />
+<br />
+Romanes, <a href="#Page_94">94</a>, <a href="#Page_95">95</a>, <a href="#Page_96">96</a>.<br />
+<br />
+Romantic invention, <a href="#Page_115">115</a>.<br />
+<br />
+R&ouml;ntgen, <a href="#Page_142">142</a>.<br />
+<br />
+Rossini, <a href="#Page_73">73</a>.<br />
+<br />
+Rousseau, <a href="#Page_309">309</a>.<br />
+<br />
+Rubens, <a href="#Page_145">145</a>.<br />
+<br />
+R&uuml;dinger, <a href="#Page_69">69</a>.<br />
+<br />
+<br />
+Saint-Simonism, <a href="#Page_309">309</a>.<br />
+<br />
+Sand, George, <a href="#Page_52">52</a>, <a href="#Page_215">215</a>.<br />
+<br />
+Satanic literature, <a href="#Page_206">206</a>.<br />
+<br />
+Schelling, <a href="#Page_253">253</a>.<br />
+<br />
+Schematic images, <a href="#Page_18">18</a>, <a href="#Page_291">291</a>.<br />
+<br />
+Schiller, <a href="#Page_47">47</a>, <a href="#Page_72">72</a>, <a href="#Page_73">73</a>, <a href="#Page_145">145</a>.<br />
+<br />
+Schopenhauer, <a href="#Page_37">37</a>, <a href="#Page_149">149</a>, <a href="#Page_150">150</a>, <a href="#Page_253">253</a>, <a href="#Page_346">346</a>.<br />
+<br />
+Schubert, <a href="#Page_145">145</a>.<br />
+<br />
+Schumann, <a href="#Page_215">215</a>.<br />
+<br />
+Science, <a href="#Page_45">45</a>;<br />
+<span style="margin-left: 1em;">Conjecture beginning of, <a href="#Page_245">245</a>;</span><br />
+<span style="margin-left: 1em;">prescribes conditions and limits to imagination, <a href="#Page_236">236</a>;</span><br />
+<span style="margin-left: 1em;">Three movements in growth of, <a href="#Page_239">239</a>.</span><br />
+<br />
+Scientific imagination, <a href="#Page_236">236</a> ff.<br />
+<br />
+Scripture, <a href="#Page_60">60</a>.<br />
+<br />
+Self-feeling, <a href="#Page_35">35</a>.<br />
+<br />
+Semi-science, <a href="#Page_240">240</a>.<br />
+<br />
+Seneca, <a href="#Page_141">141</a>.<br />
+<br />
+Sensation changed in memory, <a href="#Page_17">17</a>.<br />
+<br />
+Sensorial insanity, <a href="#Page_101">101</a>.<br />
+<br />
+Sexual instinct, <a href="#Page_314">314</a>.<br />
+<br />
+Shakers, <a href="#Page_307">307</a>.<br />
+<br />
+Shakespeare, <a href="#Page_143">143</a>, <a href="#Page_186">186</a>.<br />
+<br />
+Shelly, <a href="#Page_56">56</a>.<br />
+<br />
+Social aims in finance, <a href="#Page_294">294</a>;<br />
+<span style="margin-left: 1em;">invention, limited by the past, <a href="#Page_308">308</a>;</span><br />
+<span style="margin-left: 1em;">wants, <a href="#Page_314">314</a>.</span><br />
+<br />
+Socialism, Utopian and scientific, <a href="#Page_310">310</a>.<br />
+<br />
+Societies for special ends, <a href="#Page_307">307</a>.<br />
+<br />
+Sorrow, <a href="#Page_34">34</a>.<br />
+<br />
+Special modes of scientific imagining, <a href="#Page_237">237</a>.<br />
+<br />
+Specific, not general imagination, <a href="#Page_179">179</a>.<br />
+<br />
+Spencer, <a href="#Page_47">47</a>, <a href="#Page_131">131</a>, <a href="#Page_150">150</a>.<br />
+<br />
+Spinoza, <a href="#Page_110">110</a>, <a href="#Page_143">143</a>, <a href="#Page_254">254</a>.<br />
+<br />
+Spirits, Belief in, <a href="#Page_51">51</a>.<br />
+<br />
+<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_368" id="Page_368">[368]</a></span>Spontaneity, <a href="#Page_296">296</a>.<br />
+<br />
+Spontaneous revival, <a href="#Page_94">94</a>, <a href="#Page_315">315</a>.<br />
+<br />
+Spontaneous variations, <a href="#Page_140">140</a>.<br />
+<br />
+Stages of passage from percept to concept, <a href="#Page_292">292</a>.<br />
+<br />
+Stallo, <a href="#Page_134">134</a>.<br />
+<br />
+State credit, Law's system of, <a href="#Page_294">294</a>.<br />
+<br />
+Stewart, Dugald, <a href="#Page_111">111</a>.<br />
+<br />
+Stigmata, etc., unprecedented in individual's experience, <a href="#Page_7">7</a>.<br />
+<br />
+Stigmatized individuals, <a href="#Page_6">6</a>.<br />
+<br />
+Subjective factors, <a href="#Page_20">20</a>.<br />
+<br />
+Subliminal imagination, <a href="#Page_57">57</a>.<br />
+<br />
+Sully, <a href="#Page_21">21</a>.<br />
+<br />
+<i>Summa</i>, <a href="#Page_254">254</a>.<br />
+<br />
+Summary, <a href="#Page_330">330</a>.<br />
+<br />
+Superstition and religion, <a href="#Page_259">259</a>.<br />
+<br />
+Symbolism of Hindoos, <a href="#Page_202">202</a>.<br />
+<br />
+<br />
+Taine, <a href="#Page_18">18</a>, <a href="#Page_111">111</a>, <a href="#Page_117">117</a>, <a href="#Page_129">129</a>, <a href="#Page_150">150</a>, <a href="#Page_200">200</a>.<br />
+<br />
+Teleological character of will and imagination, <a href="#Page_10">10</a>.<br />
+<br />
+Thales, <a href="#Page_134">134</a>.<br />
+<br />
+Titchener, <a href="#Page_83">83</a>.<br />
+<br />
+Tolstoi, <a href="#Page_151">151</a>.<br />
+<br />
+Tools, <a href="#Page_274">274</a>.<br />
+<br />
+Tours, Moreau de, <a href="#Page_55">55</a>, <a href="#Page_78">78</a>, <a href="#Page_141">141</a>.<br />
+<br />
+Triptolemus, <a href="#Page_269">269</a>.<br />
+<br />
+Tropisms, <a href="#Page_75">75</a>.<br />
+<br />
+Tycho-Brah&eacute;, <a href="#Page_73">73</a>, <a href="#Page_246">246</a>, <a href="#Page_270">270</a>.<br />
+<br />
+Tylor, <a href="#Page_99">99</a>, <a href="#Page_123">123</a>, <a href="#Page_125">125</a>, <a href="#Page_131">131</a>, <a href="#Page_139">139</a>.<br />
+<br />
+Tyndall, <a href="#Page_238">238</a>.<br />
+<br />
+Tyre, <a href="#Page_282">282</a>.<br />
+<br />
+<br />
+Unconscious, Nature of the, <a href="#Page_339">339</a>;<br />
+<span style="margin-left: 1em;">physiological theory, <a href="#Page_340">340</a>, <a href="#Page_341">341</a>.</span><br />
+<br />
+Unconscious cerebration, <a href="#Page_53">53</a>;<br />
+<span style="margin-left: 1em;">factor, <a href="#Page_50">50</a> ff.;</span><br />
+<span style="margin-left: 1em;">factor, not a distinct element in invention, <a href="#Page_64">64</a>.</span><br />
+<br />
+Units of exchange, <a href="#Page_286">286</a>.<br />
+<br />
+Unity, Principle of, <a href="#Page_79">79</a>.<br />
+<br />
+<i>Universale post rem</i>, <a href="#Page_84">84</a>.<br />
+<br />
+Utopias, based on author's <i>milieu</i>, <a href="#Page_303">303</a>.<br />
+<br />
+Utopian imagination, <a href="#Page_299">299</a>.<br />
+<br />
+Utopians, indifferent to realization, <a href="#Page_309">309</a>.<br />
+<br />
+<br />
+Van Dyck, <a href="#Page_145">145</a>.<br />
+<br />
+Vaucanson, <a href="#Page_48">48</a>.<br />
+<br />
+Vedic epoch, <a href="#Page_129">129</a>.<br />
+<br />
+Vesication, <a href="#Page_5">5</a>, <a href="#Page_7">7</a>.<br />
+<br />
+Vicavakarma, <a href="#Page_269">269</a>.<br />
+<br />
+Vico, <a href="#Page_174">174</a>.<br />
+<br />
+Vignoli, <a href="#Page_128">128</a>.<br />
+<br />
+Vinci, Leonardo da, <a href="#Page_58">58</a>, <a href="#Page_149">149</a>.<br />
+<br />
+<i>Vis a fronte</i> and <i>a tergo</i>, <a href="#Page_11">11</a>.<br />
+<br />
+Vocation, Change of, <a href="#Page_172">172</a>;<br />
+<span style="margin-left: 1em;">Choice of, <a href="#Page_144">144</a>.</span><br />
+<br />
+Voltaire, <a href="#Page_150">150</a>.<br />
+<br />
+Voluntary activity analogous to creative imagination, <a href="#Page_9">9</a>.<br />
+<br />
+Von Baer, <a href="#Page_210">210</a>.<br />
+<br />
+Von Hartmann, <a href="#Page_224">224</a>.<br />
+<br />
+<br />
+Wagner, <a href="#Page_145">145</a>.<br />
+<br />
+Wahle, <a href="#Page_62">62</a>.<br />
+<br />
+Wallace, <a href="#Page_96">96</a>, <a href="#Page_99">99</a>.<br />
+<br />
+Wallaschek, <a href="#Page_99">99</a>.<br />
+<br />
+Watch, Evolution of the, <a href="#Page_270">270</a>.<br />
+<br />
+Watt, James, <a href="#Page_66">66</a>, <a href="#Page_244">244</a>, <a href="#Page_270">270</a>.<br />
+<br />
+Wealth, desired from artistic motives, <a href="#Page_290">290</a>.<br />
+<br />
+Weber, E. F., <a href="#Page_5">5</a>, <a href="#Page_145">145</a>, <a href="#Page_216">216</a>.<br />
+<br />
+Weismann, <a href="#Page_148">148</a>.<br />
+<br />
+Wernicke, <a href="#Page_100">100</a>.<br />
+<br />
+Wiertz, <a href="#Page_39">39</a>, <a href="#Page_206">206</a>.<br />
+<br />
+Will, The broad meaning of, <a href="#Page_112">112</a>;<br />
+<span style="margin-left: 1em;">a coordinating function, <a href="#Page_9">9</a>;</span><br />
+<span style="margin-left: 1em;">Effect of, on physiological functioning, <a href="#Page_5">5</a>.</span><br />
+<br />
+Words, R&ocirc;le of, <a href="#Page_96">96</a>.<br />
+<br />
+Wundt, <a href="#Page_24">24</a>, <a href="#Page_40">40</a>, <a href="#Page_182">182</a>.<br />
+<br />
+<br />
+Zeller, <a href="#Page_226">226</a>.<br />
+<br />
+Ziehen, <a href="#Page_61">61</a>, <a href="#Page_62">62</a>.<br />
+<br />
+Zoroaster, <a href="#Page_300">300</a>.<br />
+</p>
+
+
+
+<div class='transnote'>
+<a name="transnote" id="transnote"></a><h3>Transcriber's Notes:</h3>
+
+<p>Page <a href="#Page_23">23</a>: <a href="#Footnote_8_8">Fn. 8</a>: Phychology amended to Psychology</p>
+<p>Page <a href="#Page_25">25</a>: Missing footnote marker in original. Added footnote marker after James quote.</p>
+<p>Page <a href="#Page_35">35</a>: casual amended to causal</p>
+<p>Page <a href="#Page_38">38</a>: haphazard amended to haphazardly; grouping amended to groupings</p>
+<p>Page <a href="#Page_39">39</a>: subejct amended to subject</p>
+<p>Page <a href="#Page_54">54</a>: vender <i>sic</i></p>
+<p>Page <a href="#Page_56">56</a>: "Under the influence of alcoholic drinks and of
+poisonous intoxicants attention and will always fall into
+exhaustion." <i>sic</i> Possibly the word "does" or similar
+is missing before "and," or "and" is superfluous.</p>
+<p>Page <a href="#Page_55">55</a>: subtances amended to substances</p>
+<p>Page <a href="#Page_75">75</a>: images amended to image</p>
+<p>Page <a href="#Page_84">84</a>: unisersale amended to universale</p>
+<p>Page <a href="#Page_85">85</a>: The following lines transposed: "which, for the
+time being, should represent the" and "all the forces and
+capacities upon a single point"</p>
+<p>Page <a href="#Page_123">123</a>: fill amended to fills</p>
+<p>Page <a href="#Page_151">151</a>: duplicate "the" removed ("the the deep working of
+the masses")</p>
+<p>Page <a href="#Page_155">155</a>: Section II amended to IV</p>
+<p>Page <a href="#Page_163">163</a>: Section III amended to V</p>
+<p>Page <a href="#Page_193">193</a>: Saxin amended to Saxon</p>
+<p>Page <a href="#Page_200">200</a>: everyone amended to every one</p>
+<p>Page <a href="#Page_208">208</a>: apalling amended to appalling</p>
+<p>Page <a href="#Page_213">213</a>: Missing footnote marker in original. Added
+footnote marker after last paragraph on page.</p>
+<p>Page <a href="#Page_226">226</a>: caballists amended to cabalists</p>
+<p>Page <a href="#Page_229">229</a>: plant and tree amended to plants and trees</p>
+<p>Page <a href="#Page_236">236</a>: In Chapter IV, "The Scientific Imagination," there
+are sections II, III, IV and V, but no section I.</p>
+<p>Page <a href="#Page_250">250</a>: dyssymetry amended to dyssymmetry</p>
+<p>Page <a href="#Page_280">280</a>: Missing footnote marker in original. Added
+footnote marker after "... inorganic life."</p>
+<p>Page <a href="#Page_286">286</a>: <a href="#Footnote_132_132">Fn. 132</a>: Evolution amended to &Eacute;volution</p>
+<p>Page <a href="#Page_292">292</a>: acording amended to according</p>
+<p>Page <a href="#Page_294">294</a>: managable amended to manageable</p>
+<p>Page <a href="#Page_297">297</a>: opoprtune amended to opportune</p>
+<p>Page <a href="#Page_319">319</a>: or amended to of ("the double of savages")</p>
+<p>Page <a href="#Page_321">321</a>: quintescence amended to quintessence</p>
+<p>Page <a href="#Page_338">338</a>: Footnote marker and number added to note on page.
+Footnote marker added at end of first paragraph.</p>
+<p>Page <a href="#Page_348">348</a>: quivalent amended to equivalent</p>
+<p>Page <a href="#Page_351">351</a>: l'Opera amended to l'Op&eacute;ra</p>
+<p>Page <a href="#Page_365">365</a>: Lammennais amended to Lamennais</p>
+<p>Page <a href="#Page_365">365</a>: Michelangelo amended to Michaelangelo</p>
+<p>Part II, Chapter II: The chapter heading in the <a href="#Page_xiv">table of
+contents</a> differs from that shown on page <a href="#Page_102">102</a>. Left as is.</p>
+
+<p>Accented letters, italicisation and the punctuation of
+abbreviations have been standardised.</p>
+
+<p>Where a word is spelt differently and there is an equal
+number of instances, the variant spellings have been left as
+is: Hephaestos/Heph&aelig;stos; Jordaens/Jord&aelig;ns;
+Linnaeus/Linn&aelig;us.</p>
+</div>
+
+
+
+
+
+
+
+
+<pre>
+
+
+
+
+
+End of Project Gutenberg's Essay on the Creative Imagination, by Th. Ribot
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+Project Gutenberg's Essay on the Creative Imagination, by Th. Ribot
+
+This eBook is for the use of anyone anywhere at no cost and with
+almost no restrictions whatsoever.  You may copy it, give it away or
+re-use it under the terms of the Project Gutenberg License included
+with this eBook or online at www.gutenberg.org
+
+
+Title: Essay on the Creative Imagination
+
+Author: Th. Ribot
+
+Translator: Albert H. N. Baron
+
+Release Date: August 25, 2008 [EBook #26430]
+
+Language: English
+
+Character set encoding: ASCII
+
+*** START OF THIS PROJECT GUTENBERG EBOOK ESSAY ON THE CREATIVE IMAGINATION ***
+
+
+
+
+Produced by Clare Boothby and the Online Distributed
+Proofreading Team at http://www.pgdp.net
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+
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+  +------------------------------------------------------------+
+  | Transcriber's Note:                                        |
+  |                                                            |
+  | Obvious typographical errors have been corrected in        |
+  | this text. For a complete list, please see the bottom of   |
+  | this document.                                             |
+  |                                                            |
+  | The children's letters on page 108 have been reproduced in |
+  | this text as diagrams.                                     |
+  +------------------------------------------------------------+
+
+
+
+
+ESSAY ON THE CREATIVE IMAGINATION
+
+BY
+
+TH. RIBOT
+
+
+TRANSLATED FROM THE FRENCH
+
+BY
+
+ALBERT H. N. BARON
+FELLOW IN CLARK UNIVERSITY
+
+
+LONDON
+KEGAN PAUL, TRENCH, TRUBNER & CO., LTD.
+1906
+
+COPYRIGHT BY
+THE OPEN COURT PUBLISHING CO.
+CHICAGO, U. S. A.
+1906
+_All rights reserved._
+
+
+TO THE MEMORY OF MY TEACHER
+AND FRIEND,
+
+Arthur Allin, Ph. D.,
+
+PROFESSOR OF PSYCHOLOGY AND EDUCATION,
+UNIVERSITY OF COLORADO,
+
+WHO FIRST INTERESTED ME IN THE PROBLEMS OF PSYCHOLOGY,
+THIS BOOK IS DEDICATED, WITH REVERENCE
+AND GRATITUDE, BY
+
+THE TRANSLATOR.
+
+
+
+
+TRANSLATOR'S PREFACE.
+
+
+The name of Th. Ribot has been for many years well known in America, and
+his works have gained wide popularity. The present translation of one of
+his more recent works is an attempt to render available in English what
+has been received as a classic exposition of a subject that is often
+discussed, but rarely with any attempt to understand its true nature.
+
+It is quite generally recognized that psychology has remained in the
+semi-mythological, semi-scholastic period longer than most attempts at
+scientific formulization. For a long time it has been the "spook
+science" _per se_, and the imagination, now analyzed by M. Ribot in such
+a masterly manner, has been one of the most persistent, apparently real,
+though very indefinite, of psychological spooks. Whereas people have
+been accustomed to speak of the imagination as an entity _sui generis_,
+as a lofty something found only in long-haired, wild-eyed "geniuses,"
+constituting indeed the center of a cult, our author, Prometheus-like,
+has brought it down from the heavens, and has clearly shown that
+_imagination is a function of mind common to all men in some degree_,
+and that it is shown in as highly developed form in commercial leaders
+and practical inventors as in the most bizarre of romantic idealists.
+The only difference is that the manifestation is not the same.
+
+That this view is not entirely original with M. Ribot is not to his
+discredit--indeed, he does not claim any originality. We find the view
+clearly expressed elsewhere, certainly as early as Aristotle, that the
+greatest artist is he who actually embodies his vision and will in
+permanent form, preferably in social institutions. This idea is so
+clearly enunciated in the present monograph, which the author modestly
+styles an essay, that when the end of the book is reached but little
+remains of the great imagination-ghost, save the one great mystery
+underlying all facts of mind.
+
+That the present rendering falls far below the lucid French of the
+original, the translator is well aware; he trusts, however, that the
+indulgent reader will take into account the good intent as offsetting in
+part, at least, the numerous shortcomings of this version.
+
+I wish here to express my obligation to those friends who encouraged me
+in the congenial task of translation.
+
+A. H. N. B.
+
+
+
+
+AUTHOR'S PREFACE
+
+
+Contemporary psychology has studied the purely reproductive imagination
+with great eagerness and success. The works on the different
+image-groups--visual, auditory, tactile, motor--are known to everyone,
+and form a collection of inquiries solidly based on subjective and
+objective observation, on pathological facts and laboratory experiments.
+The study of the creative or constructive imagination, on the other
+hand, has been almost entirely neglected. It would be easy to show that
+the best, most complete, and most recent treatises on psychology devote
+to it scarcely a page or two; often, indeed, do not even mention it. A
+few articles, a few brief, scarce monographs, make up the sum of the
+past twenty-five years' work on the subject. The subject does not,
+however, at all deserve this indifferent or contemptuous attitude. Its
+importance is unquestionable, and even though the study of the creative
+imagination has hitherto remained almost inaccessible to experimentation
+strictly so-called, there are yet other objective processes that permit
+of our approaching it with some likelihood of success, and of continuing
+the work of former psychologists, but with methods better adapted to
+the requirements of contemporary thought.
+
+The present work is offered to the reader as an essay or first attempt
+only. It is not our intention here to undertake a complete monograph
+that would require a thick volume, but only to seek the underlying
+conditions of the creative imagination, showing that it has its
+beginning and principal source in the natural tendency of images to
+become objectified (or, more simply, in the motor elements inherent in
+the image), and then following it in its development under its manifold
+forms, whatever they may be. For I cannot but maintain that, at present,
+the psychology of the imagination is concerned almost wholly with its
+part in esthetic creation and in the sciences. We scarcely get beyond
+that; its other manifestations have been occasionally mentioned--never
+investigated. Yet invention in the fine arts and in the sciences is only
+a special case, and possibly not the principal one. We hope to show that
+in practical life, in mechanical, military, industrial, and commercial
+inventions, in religious, social, and political institutions, the human
+mind has expended and made permanent as much imagination as in all other
+fields.
+
+The constructive imagination is a faculty that in the course of ages has
+undergone a reduction--or at least, some profound changes. So, for
+reasons indicated later on, the mythic activity has been taken in this
+work as the central point of our topic, as the primitive and typical
+form out of which the greater number of the others have arisen. The
+creative power is there shown entirely unconfined, freed from all
+hindrance, careless of the possible and the impossible; in a pure state,
+unadulterated by the opposing influence of imitation, of ratiocination,
+of the knowledge of natural laws and their uniformity.
+
+In the first or analytical part, we shall try to resolve the
+constructive imagination into its constitutive factors, and study each
+of them singly.
+
+The second or genetic part will follow the imagination in its
+development as a whole from the dimmest to the most complex forms.
+
+Finally, the third or concrete part, will be no longer devoted to the
+imagination, but to imaginative beings, to the principal types of
+imagination that observation shows us.
+
+May, 1900.
+
+
+
+
+ANALYTICAL TABLE OF CONTENTS.
+
+
+
+                                                              PAGE
+
+Translator's Preface                                             v
+
+Author's Preface                                               vii
+
+
+INTRODUCTION.
+
+THE MOTOR NATURE OF THE CONSTRUCTIVE IMAGINATION.
+
+  Transition from the reproductive to the creative
+  imagination.--Do all representations contain motor
+  elements?--Unusual effects produced by images: vesication,
+  stigmata; their conditions; their meaning for our
+  subject.--The imagination is, on the intellectual side,
+  equivalent to will. Proof: Identity of development;
+  subjective, personal character of both; teleologic
+  character; analogy between the abortive forms of the
+  imagination and abulias.                                       3
+
+
+FIRST PART.
+
+ANALYSIS OF THE IMAGINATION.
+
+
+CHAPTER I.
+
+THE INTELLECTUAL FACTOR.
+
+  Dissociation, preparatory work.--Dissociation in complete,
+  incomplete and schematic images.--Dissociation in series.
+  Its principal causes: internal or subjective, external or
+  objective.--Association: its role reduced to a single
+  question, the formation of new combinations.--The principal
+  intellectual factor is thinking by analogy. Why it is an
+  almost inexhaustible source of creation. Its mechanism. Its
+  processes reducible to two, viz.: personification,
+  transformation.                                               15
+
+
+CHAPTER II.
+
+THE EMOTIONAL FACTOR.
+
+  The great importance of this element.--All forms of the
+  creative imagination imply affective elements. Proofs: All
+  affective conditions may influence the imagination. Proofs:
+  Association of ideas on an emotional basis; new combinations
+  under ordinary and extraordinary forms.--Association by
+  contrast.--The motor element in tendencies.--There is no
+  creative instinct; invention has not _a_ source, but
+  _sources_, and always arises from a need.--The work of the
+  imagination reduced to two great classes, themselves
+  reducible to special needs.--Reasons for the prejudice in
+  favor of a creative instinct.                                 31
+
+
+CHAPTER III.
+
+THE UNCONSCIOUS FACTOR.
+
+  Various views of the "inspired state." Its essential
+  characteristics; suddenness, impersonality.--Its relations
+  to unconscious activity.--Resemblances to hypermnesia, the
+  initial state of alcoholic intoxication and somnambulism on
+  waking.--Disagreements concerning the ultimate nature of
+  unconsciousness: two hypotheses.--The "inspired state" is
+  not a cause, but an index.--Associations in unconscious
+  form.--Mediate or latent association: recent experiments and
+  discussions on this subject.--"Constellation" the result of
+  a summation of predominant tendencies. Its mechanism.         50
+
+
+CHAPTER IV.
+
+THE ORGANIC CONDITIONS OF THE IMAGINATION.
+
+  Anatomical conditions: various hypotheses. Obscurity of the
+  question. Flechsig's theory.--Physiological conditions: are
+  they cause, effect, or accompaniment? Chief factor: change
+  in cerebral and local circulation.--Attempts at
+  experimentation.--The oddities of inventors brought under
+  two heads: the explicable and inexplicable. They are helpers
+  of inspiration.--Is there any analogy between physical and
+  psychic creation? A philosophical hypothesis on the
+  subject.--Limitation of the question. Impossibility of an
+  exact answer.                                                 65
+
+
+CHAPTER V.
+
+THE PRINCIPLE OF UNITY.
+
+  Importance of the unifying principle. It is a fixed idea or
+  a fixed emotion.--Their equivalence.--Distinction between
+  the synthetic principle and the ideal, which is the
+  principle of unity in motion: the ideal is a construction in
+  images, merely outlined.--The principal forms of the
+  unifying principles: unstable, organic or middle, extreme or
+  semi-morbid.--Obsession of the inventor and the sick:
+  insufficiency of a purely psychological criterion.            79
+
+
+SECOND PART.
+
+THE DEVELOPMENT OF THE IMAGINATION.
+
+
+CHAPTER I.
+
+IMAGINATION IN ANIMALS.
+
+  Difficulties of the subject.--The degree of imagination in
+  animals.--Does creative synthesis exist in them? Affirmation
+  and denials.--The special form of animal imagination is
+  motor, and shows itself through play: its numerous
+  varieties.--Why the animal imagination must be above all
+  motor: lack of intellectual development.--Comparison with
+  young children, in whom the motor system predominates: the
+  roles of movements in infantile insanity.                     93
+
+
+CHAPTER II.
+
+IMAGINATION IN THE CHILD.
+
+  Division of its development into four principal
+  periods.--Transition from passive to creative imagination:
+  perception and illusion.--Animating everything: analysis of
+  the elements constituting this moment: the role of
+  belief.--Creation in play: period of imitation, attempts at
+  invention.--Fanciful invention.                              103
+
+
+CHAPTER III.
+
+PRIMITIVE MAN AND THE CREATION OF MYTHS.
+
+  The golden age of the creative imagination.--Myths:
+  hypotheses as to the origin: the myth is the psycho-physical
+  objectification of man in the phenomena that he perceives.
+  The role of imagination.--How myths are formed. The moment
+  of creation: two operations--animating everything,
+  qualifying everything. Romantic invention lacking in peoples
+  without imagination. The role of analogy and of association
+  through "constellation."--The evolution of myths: ascension,
+  acme, decline.--The explanatory myths undergo a radical
+  transformation: the work of depersonification of the myth.
+  Survivals.--The non-explanatory myths suffer a partial
+  transformation: Literature is a fallen and rationalized
+  mythology.--Popular imagination and legends: the legend is
+  to the myth what illusion is to hallucination.--Unconscious
+  processes that the imagination employs in order to create
+  legends: fusion, idealization.                               118
+
+
+CHAPTER IV.
+
+THE HIGHER FORMS OF INVENTION.
+
+  Is a psychology of great inventors possible? Pathological
+  and physiological theories of genius.--General characters of
+  great inventors. Precocity: chronological order of the
+  development of the creative power. Psychological reasons
+  for this order. Why the creator commences by
+  imitating.--Necessity or fatalism of vocation.--The
+  representative character of great creators. Discussion as to
+  the origin of this character--is it in the individual or in
+  the environment?--Mechanism of creation. Two principal
+  processes--complete, abridged. Their three phases; their
+  resemblances and differences.--The role of chance in
+  invention: it supposes the meeting of two factors--one
+  internal, the other external.--Chance is an occasion for,
+  not an agent of, creation.                                   140
+
+
+CHAPTER V.
+
+LAW OF THE DEVELOPMENT OF THE IMAGINATION.
+
+  Is the creative imagination, in its evolution, subject to
+  any law?--It passes through two stages separated by a
+  critical phase.--Period of autonomy; critical period; period
+  of definite constitution. Two cases: decay or transformation
+  through logical form, through deviation.--Subsidiary law of
+  increasing complexity.--Historical verification.             167
+
+
+THIRD PART.
+
+THE PRINCIPAL TYPES OF IMAGINATION.
+
+PRELIMINARY.
+
+  The need of a concrete study.--The varieties of the creative
+  imagination, analogous to the varieties of character.        179
+
+
+CHAPTER I.
+
+THE PLASTIC IMAGINATION.
+
+  It makes use of clear images, well determined in space, and
+  of associations of objective relations.--Its external
+  character.--Inferiority of the affective element.--Its
+  principal manifestations: in the arts dealing with form; in
+  poetry (transformation of sonorous into visual images); in
+  myths with clear outline; in mechanical invention.--The dry
+  and rational imagination its elements.                       184
+
+
+CHAPTER II.
+
+THE DIFFLUENT IMAGINATION.
+
+  It makes use of vague images linked according to the least
+  rigorous modes of association. Emotional abstractions; their
+  nature.--Its characteristic of inwardness.--Its principal
+  manifestations: revery, the romantic spirit, the chimerical
+  spirit; myths and religious conceptions, literature and the
+  fine arts (the symbolists), the class of the marvelous and
+  fantastic.--Varieties of the diffluent imagination: first,
+  numerical imagination; its nature; two principal forms,
+  cosmogonic and scientific conceptions; second, musical
+  imagination, the type of the affective imagination. Its
+  characteristics; it does not develop save after an interval
+  of time.--Natural transposition of events in
+  musicians.--Antagonism between true musical imagination and
+  plastic imagination. Inquiry and facts on the subject.--Two
+  great types of imagination.                                  195
+
+
+CHAPTER III.
+
+MYSTIC IMAGINATION.
+
+  Its elements; its special characteristics.--Thinking
+  symbolically.--Nature of this symbolism.--The mystic changes
+  concrete images into symbolic images.--Their obscurity;
+  whence it arises.--Extraordinary abuse of analogy.--Mystic
+  labor on letters, numbers, etc.--Nature and extent of the
+  belief accompanying this form of imagination: it is
+  unconditional and permanent.--The mystic conception of the
+  world a general symbolism.--Mystic imagination in religion
+  and in metaphysics.                                          221
+
+
+CHAPTER IV.
+
+THE SCIENTIFIC IMAGINATION.
+
+  It is distinguishable into genera and species.--The need for
+  monographs that have not yet appeared.--The imagination in
+  growing sciences--belief is at its maximum; in the organized
+  sciences--the negative role of method.--The conjectural
+  phase; proof of its importance.--Abortive and dethroned
+  hypotheses.--The imagination in the processes of
+  verification.--The metaphysician's imagination arises from
+  the same need as the scientist's.--Metaphysics is a
+  rationalized myth.--Three moments.--Imaginative and
+  rationalist.                                                 236
+
+
+CHAPTER V.
+
+THE PRACTICAL AND MECHANICAL IMAGINATION.
+
+  Indetermination of this imaginative form.--Inferior forms:
+  the industrious, the unstable, the eccentric. Why people of
+  lively imagination are changeable.--Superstitious beliefs.
+  Origin of this form of imagination--its mental mechanism and
+  its elements.--The higher form--mechanical imagination.--Man
+  has expended at least as much imagination there as in
+  esthetic creation.--Why the contrary view
+  prevails.--Resemblances between these two forms of
+  imagination.--Identity of development. Detail
+  observation--four phases.--General characters. This form, at
+  its best, supposes inspiration; periods of preparation, of
+  maturity, and of decline.--Special characters: invention
+  occurs in layers. Principal steps of its development.--It
+  depends strictly on physical conditions.--A phase of pure
+  imagination--mechanical romances. Examples.--Identical
+  nature of the imagination of the mechanic and that of the
+  artist.                                                      256
+
+
+CHAPTER VI.
+
+THE COMMERCIAL IMAGINATION.
+
+  Its internal and external conditions.--Two classes of
+  creators--the cautious, the daring.--The initial moment of
+  invention.--The importance of the intuitive
+  mind.--Hypotheses in regard to its psychologic nature.--Its
+  development: the creation of increasingly more simple
+  processes of substitution.--Characters in common with the
+  forms of creation already studied.--Characters peculiar to
+  it--the combining imagination of the tactician; it is a form
+  of war.--Creative intoxication.--Exclusive use of schematic
+  representations.--Remarks on the various types of
+  images.--The creators of great financial systems.--Brief
+  remarks on the military imagination.                         281
+
+
+CHAPTER VII.
+
+THE UTOPIAN IMAGINATION.
+
+  Successive appearances of ideal conceptions.--Creators in
+  ethics and in the social realm.--Chimerical forms. Social
+  novelists.--Ch. Fourrier, type of the great
+  imaginer.--Practical invention--the collective
+  ideal.--Imaginative regression.                              299
+
+
+CONCLUSION.
+
+I. _The foundations of the creative imagination._
+
+  Why man is able to create: two principal
+  conditions.--"Creative spontaneity," which resolves itself
+  into needs, tendencies, desires.--Every imaginative creation
+  has a motor origin.--The spontaneous revival of images.--The
+  creative imagination reduced to three forms: outlined,
+  fixed, objectified. Their peculiar characteristics.          313
+
+II. _The imaginative type._
+
+  A view of the imaginative life in all its stages.--Reduction
+  to a psychologic law.--Four stages characterized: 1, by the
+  _quantity_ of images; 2, by their _quantity and intensity_;
+  3, by quantity, intensity and duration; 4, by the complete
+  and permanent systematization of the imaginary
+  life.--Summary.                                              320
+
+
+APPENDICES.
+
+
+OBSERVATIONS AND DOCUMENTS.
+
+  A. The various forms of inspiration.                         335
+
+  B. On the nature of the unconscious factor. Two
+  categories--static unconscious, dynamic
+  unconscious.--Theories as to the nature of the
+  unconscious.--Objections, criticisms.                        338
+
+  C. Cosmic and human imagination.                             346
+
+  D. Evidence in regard to musical imagination.                350
+
+  E. The imaginative type and association of ideas.            353
+
+
+
+
+INTRODUCTION
+
+
+
+
+INTRODUCTION
+
+THE MOTOR NATURE OF THE CONSTRUCTIVE IMAGINATION
+
+I
+
+
+It has been often repeated that one of the principal conquests of
+contemporary psychology is the fact that it has firmly established the
+place and importance of movements; that it has especially through
+observation and experiment shown the representation of a movement to be
+a movement begun, a movement in the nascent state. Yet those who have
+most strenuously insisted on this proposition have hardly gone beyond
+the realm of the passive imagination; they have clung to facts of pure
+reproduction. My aim is to extend their formula, and to show that it
+explains, in large measure at least, the origin of the creative
+imagination.
+
+Let us follow step by step the passage from reproduction pure and simple
+to the creative stage, showing therein the persistence and preponderance
+of the motor element in proportion as we rise from mere repetition to
+invention.
+
+First of all, do all representations include motor elements? Yes, I
+say, because every perception presupposes movements to some extent, and
+representations are the remnants of past perceptions. Certain it is
+that, without our examining the question in detail, this statement holds
+good for the great majority of cases. So far as visual and tactile
+images are concerned there is no possible doubt as to the importance of
+the motor elements that enter into their composition. The eye is very
+poorly endowed with movements for its office as a higher sense-organ;
+but if we take into account its intimate connection with the vocal
+organs, so rich in capacity for motor combinations, we note a kind of
+compensation. Smell and taste, secondary in human psychology, rise to a
+very high rank indeed among many animals, and the olfactory apparatus
+thus obtains with them a complexity of movements proportionate to its
+importance, and one that at times approaches that of sight. There yet
+remains the group of internal sensations that might cause discussion.
+Setting aside the fact that the vague impressions bound up with chemical
+changes within the tissues are scarcely factors in representation, we
+find that the sensations resulting from changes in respiration,
+circulation, and digestion are not lacking in motor elements. The mere
+fact that, in some persons, vomiting, hiccoughs, micturition, etc., can
+be caused by perceptions of sight or of hearing proves that
+representations of this character have a tendency to become translated
+into acts.
+
+Without emphasizing the matter we may, then, say that this thesis rests
+on a weighty mass of facts; that the motor element of the image tends to
+cause it to lose its purely "inner" character, to objectify it, to
+externalize it, to project it outside of ourselves.
+
+It should, however, be noted that what has just been said does not take
+us beyond the reproductive imagination--beyond memory. All these revived
+images are _repetitions_; but the creative imagination requires
+something _new_--this is its peculiar and essential mark. In order to
+grasp the transition from reproduction to production, from repetition to
+creation, it is necessary to consider other, more rare, and more
+extraordinary facts, found only among some favored beings. These facts,
+known for a long time, surrounded with some mystery, and attributed in a
+vague manner "to the power of the imagination," have been studied in our
+own day with much more system and exactness. For our purpose we need to
+recall only a few of them.
+
+Many instances have been reported of tingling or of pains that may
+appear in different parts of the body solely through the effect of the
+imagination. Certain people can increase or inhibit the beating of their
+hearts at will, i.e., by means of an intense and persistent
+representation. The renowned physiologist, E. F. Weber, possessed this
+power, and has described the mechanism of the phenomenon. Still more
+remarkable are the cases of vesication produced in hypnotized subjects
+by means of suggestion. Finally, let us recall the persistent story of
+the stigmatized individuals, who, from the thirteenth century down to
+our own day, have been quite numerous and present some interesting
+varieties--some having only the mark of the crucifix, others of the
+scourging, or of the crown of thorns.[1] Let us add the profound changes
+of the organism, results of the suggestive therapeutics of
+contemporaries; the wonderful effects of the "faith cure," i.e., the
+miracles of all religions in all times and in all places; and this brief
+list will suffice to recall certain creative activities of the human
+imagination that we have a tendency to forget.
+
+It is proper to add that the image acts not altogether in a positive
+manner. Sometimes it has an inhibitory power. A vivid representation of
+a movement arrested is the beginning of the stoppage of that movement;
+it may even end in complete arrest of the movement. Such are the cases
+of "paralysis by ideas" first described by Reynolds, and later by
+Charcot and his school under the name of "psychic paralysis." The
+patient's inward conviction that he cannot move a limb renders him
+powerless for any movement, and he recovers his motor power only when
+the morbid representation has disappeared.
+
+These and similar facts suggest a few remarks.
+
+First, that we have here creation in the strict sense of the word,
+though it be limited to the organism. What appears is _new_. Though one
+may strictly maintain that from our own experience we have a knowledge
+of formication, rapid and slow beating of the heart, even though we may
+not be able ordinarily to produce them at will, this position is
+absolutely untenable when we consider cases of vesication, stigmata, and
+other alleged miraculous phenomena: _these are without precedent in the
+life of the individual_.
+
+Second, in order that these unusual states may occur, there are required
+additional elements in the producing mechanism. At bottom this mechanism
+is very obscure. To invoke "the power of the imagination" is merely to
+substitute a word where an explanation is needed. Fortunately, we do not
+need to penetrate into the inmost part of this mystery. It is enough for
+us to make sure of the facts, to prove that they have a representation
+as the starting point, and to show that the representation by itself is
+not enough. What more then is needed? Let us note first of all that
+these occurrences are rare. It is not within the power of everybody to
+acquire stigmata or to become cured of a paralysis pronounced incurable.
+This happens only to those having an ardent faith, a strong desire _that
+it shall come to pass_. This is an indispensable psychic condition. What
+is concerned in such a case is not a single state, but a double one: an
+image followed by a particular emotional state (desire, aversion, etc.).
+In other words, there are two conditions: In the first are concerned the
+motor elements included in the image, the remains of previous
+perceptions; in the second, there are concerned the foregoing, _plus_
+affective states, tendencies that sum up the individual's energy. It is
+the latter fact that explains their power.
+
+To conclude: This group of facts shows us the existence, beyond images,
+of another factor, instinctive or emotional in form, which we shall have
+to study later and which will lead us to the ultimate source of the
+creative imagination.
+
+I fear that the distance between the facts here given and the creative
+imagination proper will seem to the reader very great indeed. And why
+so? First, because the creative activity here has as its only material
+the organism, and is not separated from the creator. Then, too, because
+these facts are extremely simple, and the creative imagination, in the
+ordinary sense, is extremely complex; here there is one operating cause,
+a single representation more or less complex, while in imaginative
+creation we have several co-operating images with combinations,
+coordination, arrangement, grouping. But it must not be forgotten that
+our present aim is simply to find _a transition stage_[2] between
+reproduction and production; to show the common origin of the two forms
+of imagination--the purely representative faculty and the faculty of
+creating by means of the intermediation of images;--and to show at the
+same time the work of separation, of severance between the two.
+
+
+II
+
+Since the chief aim of this study is to prove that the basis of
+invention must be sought in motor manifestations, I shall not hesitate
+to dwell on it, and I take the subject up again under another, clearer,
+more precise, and more psychological form, in putting the following
+question: Which one among the various modes of mind-activity offers the
+closest analogy to the creative imagination? I unhesitatingly answer,
+_voluntary activity_: Imagination, in the intellectual order, is the
+equivalent of will in the realm of movements. Let us justify this
+comparison by some proof.
+
+1. Likeness of development in the two instances. Growth of voluntary
+control is progressive, slow, crossed and checked. The individual has to
+become master of his muscles and by their agency extend his sway over
+other things. Reflexes, instinctive movements, and movements expressive
+of emotion constitute the primary material of voluntary movements. The
+will has no movements of its own as an inheritance: it must coordinate
+and associate, since it separates in order to form new associations. It
+reigns by right of conquest, not by right of birth. In like manner, the
+creative imagination does not rise completely armed. Its raw materials
+are images, which here correspond to muscular movements. It goes through
+a period of trial. It always is, at the start (for reasons indicated
+later on), an imitation; it attains its complex forms only through a
+process of growth.
+
+2. But this first comparison does not go to the bottom of the matter;
+there are yet deeper analogies. First, the completely subjective
+character of both instances. The imagination is subjective, personal,
+anthropocentric; its movement is from within outwards toward an
+objectification. The understanding, i.e., the intellect in the
+restricted sense, has opposite characteristics--it is objective,
+impersonal, receives from outside. For the creative imagination the
+inner world is the regulator; there is a preponderance of the inner over
+the outer. For the understanding, the outside world is the regulator;
+there is a preponderance of the outer over the inner. The world of my
+imagination is _my_ world as opposed to the world of my understanding,
+which is the world of all my fellow creatures. On the other hand, as
+regards the will, we might repeat exactly, word for word, what we have
+just said of the imagination. This is unnecessary. Back of both, then,
+we have our true cause, whatever may be our opinion concerning the
+ultimate nature of causation and of will.
+
+3. Both imagination and will have a teleological character, and act only
+with a view toward an end, being thus the opposite of the understanding,
+which, as such, limits itself to proof. We are always wanting something,
+be it worthless or important. We are always inventing for an
+end--whether in the case of a Napoleon imagining a plan of campaign, or
+a cook making up a new dish. In both instances there is now a simple end
+attained by immediate means, now a complex and distant goal
+presupposing subordinate ends which are means in relation to the final
+end. In both cases there is a _vis a tergo_ designated by the vague term
+"spontaneity," which we shall attempt to make clear later, and a _vis a
+fronte_, an attracting movement.
+
+4. Added to this analogy as regards their nature, there are other,
+secondary likenesses between the abortive forms of the creative
+imagination and the impotent forms of the will. In its normal and
+complete form will culminates in an act; but with wavering characters
+and sufferers from abulia deliberation never ends, or the resolution
+remains inert, incapable of realization, of asserting itself in
+practice. The creative imagination also, in its complete form, has a
+tendency to become objectified, to assert itself in a work that shall
+exist not only for the creator but for everybody. On the contrary, with
+dreamers pure and simple, the imagination remains a vaguely sketched
+inner affair; it is not embodied in any esthetic or practical invention.
+Revery is the equivalent of weak desires; dreamers are the abulics of
+the creative imagination.
+
+It is unnecessary to add that the similarity established here between
+the will and the imagination is only partial and has as its aim only to
+bring to light the role of the motor elements. Surely no one will
+confuse two aspects of our psychic life that are so distinct, and it
+would be foolish to delay in order to enumerate the differences. The
+characteristic of novelty should by itself suffice, since it is the
+special and indispensable mark of invention, and for volition is only
+accessory: The extraction of a tooth requires of the patient as much
+effort the second time as the first, although it is no longer a novelty.
+
+After these preliminary remarks we must go on to the analysis of the
+creative imagination, in order to understand its nature in so far as
+that is accessible with our existing means. It is, indeed, a tertiary
+formation in mental life, if we assume a primary layer (sensations and
+simple emotions), and a secondary (images and their associations,
+certain elementary logical operations, etc.). Being composite, it may be
+decomposed into its constituent elements, which we shall study under
+these three headings, viz., the intellectual factor, the affective or
+emotional factor, and the unconscious factor. But that is not enough;
+the analysis should be completed by a synthesis. All imaginative
+creation, great or small, is organic, requires a unifying principle:
+there is then also a synthetic factor, which it will be necessary to
+determine.
+
+FOOTNOTES:
+
+[1] A. Maury, in his book _L'Astronomie et la Magie_, enumerates
+fifty cases.
+
+[2] There are still others, as we shall see later on.
+
+
+
+
+PART ONE
+
+ANALYSIS OF THE IMAGINATION
+
+
+
+
+CHAPTER I
+
+THE INTELLECTUAL FACTOR.
+
+I
+
+
+Considered under its intellectual aspect, that is, in so far as it
+borrows its elements from the understanding, the imagination presupposes
+two fundamental operations--the one, negative and preparatory,
+dissociation; the other, positive and constitutive, association.
+
+Dissociation is the "abstraction" of the older psychologists, who well
+understood its importance for the subject with which we are now
+concerned. Nevertheless, the term "dissociation" seems to me preferable,
+because it is more comprehensive. It designates a genus of which the
+other is a species. It is a spontaneous operation and of a more radical
+nature than the other. Abstraction, strictly so-called, acts only on
+isolated states of consciousness; dissociation acts, further, on series
+of states of consciousness, which it sorts out, breaks up, dissolves,
+and through this preparatory work makes suitable for entering into new
+combinations.
+
+Perception is a synthetic process, but dissociation (or abstraction) is
+already present in embryo in perception, just because the latter is a
+complex state. Everyone perceives after an individual fashion, according
+to his constitution and the impression of the moment. A painter, a
+sportsman, a dealer, and an uninterested spectator do not see a given
+horse in the same manner: the qualities that interest one are unnoticed
+by another.[3]
+
+The image being a simplification of sensory data, and its nature
+dependent on that of previous perceptions, it is inevitable that the
+work of dissociation should go on in it. But this is far too mild a
+statement. Observation and experiment show us that in the majority of
+cases the process grows wonderfully. In order to follow the progressive
+development of this dissolution, we may roughly differentiate images
+into three categories--complete, incomplete, and schematic--and study
+them in order.
+
+The group of images here termed _complete_ comprises first, objects
+repeatedly presented in daily experience--my wife's face, my inkstand,
+the sound of a church bell or of a neighboring clock, etc. In this class
+are also included the images of things that we have perceived but a few
+times, but which, for additional reasons, have remained clean-cut in our
+memory. Are these images complete, in the strict sense of the word? They
+cannot be; and the contrary belief is a delusion of consciousness that,
+however, disappears when one confronts it with the reality. The mental
+image can contain all the qualities of an object in even less degree
+than the perception; the image is the result of selection, varying with
+every case. The painter Fromentin, who was proud that he found after two
+or three years "an exact recollection" of things he had barely noticed
+on a journey, makes elsewhere, however, the following confession: "My
+memory of things, although very faithful, has never the certainty
+admissible as documentary evidence. The weaker it grows, the more is it
+changed in becoming the property of my memory and the more valuable is
+it for the work that I intend for it. In proportion as the exact form
+becomes altered, another form, partly real, partly imaginary, which I
+believe preferable, takes its place." Note that the person speaking thus
+is a painter endowed with an unusual visual memory; but recent
+investigations have shown that among men generally the so-called
+complete and exact images undergo change and warping. One sees the truth
+of this statement when, after a lapse of some time, one is placed in the
+presence of the original object, so that comparison between the real
+object and its image becomes possible.[4] Let us note that in this group
+_the image always corresponds to certain individual objects_; it is not
+the same with the other two groups.
+
+The group of _incomplete_ images, according to the testimony of
+consciousness itself, comes from two distinct sources--first, from
+perceptions insufficiently or ill-fixed; and again, from impressions of
+like objects which, when too often repeated, end by becoming confused.
+The latter case has been well described by Taine. A man, says he, who,
+having gone through an avenue of poplars wants to picture a poplar; or,
+having looked into a poultry-yard, wishes to call up a picture of a hen,
+experiences a difficulty--his different memories rise up. The experiment
+becomes a cause of effacement; the images canceling one another decline
+to a state of imperceptible tendencies which their likeness and
+unlikeness prevent from predominating. Images become blunted by their
+collision just as do bodies by friction.[5]
+
+This group leads us to that of _schematic_ images, or those entirely
+without mark--the indefinite image of a rosebush, of a pin, of a
+cigarette, etc. This is the greatest degree of impoverishment; the
+image, deprived little by little of its own characteristics, is nothing
+more than a shadow. It has become that transitional form between image
+and pure concept that we now term "generic image," or one that at least
+resembles the latter.
+
+The image, then, is subject to an unending process of change, of
+suppression and addition, of dissociation and corrosion. This means
+that it is not a dead thing; it is not at all like a photographic plate
+with which one may reproduce copies indefinitely. Being dependent on the
+state of the brain, the image undergoes change like all living
+substance,--it is subject to gains and losses, especially losses. But
+each of the foregoing three classes has its use for the inventor. They
+serve as material for different kinds of imagination--in their concrete
+form, for the mechanic and the artist; in their schematic form, for the
+scientist and for others.
+
+Thus far we have seen only a part of the work of dissociation and,
+taking it all in all, the smallest part. We have, seemingly, considered
+images as isolated facts, as psychic atoms; but that is a purely
+theoretic position. Images are not solitary in actual life; they form
+part of a chain, or rather of a woof or net, since, by reason of their
+manifold relations they may radiate in all directions, through all the
+senses. Dissociation, then, works also upon _series_, cuts them up,
+mangles them, breaks them, and reduces them to ruins.
+
+The ideal law of the recurrence of images is that known since Hamilton's
+time under the name of "law of redintegration,"[6] which consists in the
+passing from a part to the whole, each element tending to reproduce the
+complete state, each member of a series the whole of that series. If
+this law existed alone, invention would be forever forbidden to us; we
+could not emerge from repetition; we should be condemned to monotony.
+But there is an opposite power that frees us--it is dissociation.
+
+It is very strange that, while psychologists have for so long a time
+studied the laws of association, no one has investigated whether the
+inverse process, dissociation, also has not laws of its own. We can not
+here attempt such a task, which would be outside of our province; it
+will suffice to indicate in passing two general conditions determining
+the association of series.
+
+First, there are the internal or subjective causes. The revived image of
+a face, a monument, a landscape, an occurrence, is, most often, only
+partial. It depends on various conditions that revive the essential part
+and drop the minor details, and this "essential" which survives
+dissociation depends on subjective causes, the principal ones of which
+are at first practical, utilitarian reasons. It is the tendency already
+mentioned to ignore what is of no value, to exclude that from
+consciousness. Helmholtz has shown that in the act of seeing, various
+details remain unnoticed because they are immaterial in the concerns of
+life; and there are many other like instances. Then, too, emotional
+reasons governing the attention orientate it exclusively in one
+direction--these will be studied in the course of this work. Lastly,
+there are logical or intellectual reasons, if we understand by this term
+the law of mental inertia or the law of least resistance by means of
+which the mind tends toward the simplification and lightening of its
+labor.
+
+Secondly, there are external or objective causes which are variations in
+experience. When two or more qualities or events are given as constantly
+associated in experience we do not dissociate them. The uniformity of
+nature's laws is the great opponent of dissociation. Many truths (for
+example, the existence of the antipodes) are established with
+difficulty, because it is necessary to break up closely knit
+associations. The oriental king whom Sully mentions, who had never seen
+ice, refused to credit the existence of solid water. A total impression,
+the elements of which had never been given us separately in experience,
+would be unanalyzable. If all cold objects were moist, and all moist
+objects cold; if all liquids were transparent and all non-liquids
+opaque, we should find it difficult to distinguish cold from moisture
+and liquidity from transparency. On his part, James adds further that
+what has been associated sometimes with one thing and sometimes with
+another tends to become dissociated from both. This might be called a
+law of association by concomitant variations.[7]
+
+In order to thoroughly comprehend the absolute necessity for
+dissociation, let us note that total redintegration is _per se_ a
+hindrance to creation. Examples are given of people who can easily
+remember twenty or thirty pages of a book, but if they want a particular
+passage they are unable to pick it out--they must begin at the beginning
+and continue down to the required place. Excessive ease of retention
+thus becomes a serious inconvenience. Besides these rare cases, we know
+that ignorant people, those intellectually limited, give the same
+invariable story of every occurrence, in which all the parts--the
+important and the accessory, the useful and the useless--are on a dead
+level. They omit no detail, they cannot select. Minds of this kind are
+inapt at invention. In short, we may say that there are two kinds of
+memory: one is completely systematized, e.g., habits, routine, poetry
+or prose learned by heart, faultless musical rendering, etc. The
+acquisition forms a compact whole and cannot enter into new
+combinations. The other is not systematized; it is composed of small,
+more or less coherent groups. This kind of memory is plastic and capable
+of becoming combined in new ways.
+
+We have enumerated the spontaneous, natural causes of association,
+omitting the voluntary and artificial causes, which are but their
+imitations. As a result of these various causes, images are taken to
+pieces, shattered, broken up, but made all the readier as materials for
+the inventor. This is a process analogous to that which, in geologic
+time, produces new strata through the wearing away of old rocks.
+
+
+II
+
+Association is one of the big questions of psychology; but as it does
+not especially concern our subject, it will be discussed in strict
+proportion to its use here. Nothing is easier than limiting ourselves.
+Our task is reducible to a very clear and very brief question: What are
+the forms of association that give rise to new combinations and under
+what influences do they arise? All other forms of association, those
+that are only repetitions, should be eliminated. Consequently, this
+subject can not be treated in one single effort; it must be studied, in
+turn, in its relations to our three factors--intellectual, emotional,
+unconscious.
+
+It is generally admitted that the expression "association of ideas" is
+faulty.[8] It is not comprehensive enough, association being active also
+in psychic states other than ideas. It seems indicative rather of mere
+juxtaposition, whereas associated states modify one another by the very
+fact of their being connected. But, as it has been confirmed by long
+usage, it would be difficult to eliminate the phrase.
+
+On the other hand, psychologists are not at all agreed as regards the
+determination of the principal laws or forms of association. Without
+taking sides in the debate, I adopt the most generally accepted
+classification, the one most suitable for our subject--the one that
+reduces everything to the two fundamental laws of contiguity and
+resemblance. In recent years various attempts have been made to reduce
+these two laws to one, some reducing resemblance to contiguity; others,
+contiguity to resemblance. Putting aside the ground of this discussion,
+which seems to me very useless, and which perhaps is due to excessive
+zeal for unity, we must nevertheless recognize that this discussion is
+not without interest for the study of the creative imagination, because
+it has well shown that each of the two fundamental laws has a
+characteristic mechanism.
+
+Association by contiguity (or continuity), which Wundt calls external,
+is simple and homogeneous. It reproduces the order and connection of
+things; it reduces itself to habits contracted by our nervous system.
+
+Is association by resemblance, which Wundt calls internal, strictly
+speaking, an elementary law? Many doubt it. Without entering into the
+long and frequently confused discussions to which this subject has given
+rise, we may sum up their results as follows: In so-called association
+by resemblance it is necessary to distinguish three moments--(a) That of
+the presentation; a state _A_ is given in perception or
+association-by-contiguity, and forms the starting point. (b) That of the
+work of assimilation; _A_ is recognized as more or less like a state _a_
+previously experienced. (c) As a consequence of the coexistence of _A_
+and _a_ in consciousness, they can later be recalled reciprocally,
+although the two original occurrences _A_ and _a_ have previously never
+existed together, and sometimes, indeed, may not possibly have existed
+together. It is evident that the crucial moment is the second, and that
+it consists of an act of active assimilation. Thus James maintains that
+"it is a relation that the mind perceives after the fact, just as it may
+perceive the relations of superiority, of distance, of causality, of
+container and content, of substance and accident, or of contrast between
+an object, and some second object which the associative machinery calls
+up."[9]
+
+Association by resemblance presupposes a joint labor of association and
+dissociation--it is an active form. Consequently it is the principal
+source of the material of the creative imagination, as the sequel of
+this work will sufficiently show.
+
+After this rather long but necessary preface, we come to the
+intellectual factor rightly so termed, which we have been little by
+little approaching. The essential, fundamental element of the creative
+imagination in the intellectual sphere is the capacity of thinking by
+analogy; that is, by partial and often accidental resemblance. By
+analogy we mean an imperfect kind of resemblance: like is a genus of
+which analogue is a species.
+
+Let us examine in some detail the mechanism of this mode of thought in
+order that we may understand how analogy is, by its very nature, an
+almost inexhaustible instrument of creation.
+
+1. Analogy may be based solely on the _number of attributes compared_.
+Let _a b c d e f_ and _r s t u d v_ be two beings or objects, each
+letter representing symbolically one of the constitutive attributes. It
+is evident that the analogy between the two is very weak, since there is
+only one common element, _d_. If the number of the elements common to
+both increases, the analogy will grow in the same proportion. But the
+agreement represented above is not infrequent among minds unused to a
+somewhat severe discipline. A child sees in the moon and stars a mother
+surrounded by her daughters. The aborigines of Australia called a book
+"mussel," merely because it opens and shuts like the valves of a
+shellfish.[10]
+
+2. Analogy may have for its basis the _quality_ or _value_ of the
+compound attributes. It rests on a variable element, which oscillates
+from the essential to the accidental, from the reality to the
+appearance. To the layman, the likeness between cetacians and fishes are
+great; to the scientist, slight. Here, again, numerous agreements are
+possible, provided one take no account either of their solidity or their
+frailty.
+
+3. Lastly, in minds without power, there occurs a semi-unconscious
+operation that we may call a transfer through the omission of the middle
+term. There is analogy between _a b c d e_ and _g h a i f_ through the
+common letter _a_; between _g h a i f_ and _x y f z q_ through the
+common letter _f_; and finally an analogy becomes established between _a
+b c d e_ and _x y f z q_ for no other reason than that of their common
+analogy with _g h a i f_. In the realm of the affective states,
+transfers of this sort are not at all rare.
+
+Analogy, an unstable process, undulating and multiform, gives rise to
+the most unforeseen and novel groupings. Through its pliability, which
+is almost unlimited, it produces in equal measure absurd comparisons and
+very original inventions.
+
+After these remarks on the mechanism of thinking by analogy, let us
+glance at the processes it employs in its creative work. The problem is,
+apparently, inextricable. Analogies are so numerous, so various, so
+arbitrary, that we may despair of finding any regularity whatever in
+creative work. Despite this it seems, however, reducible to two
+principal types or processes, which are personification, and
+transformation or metamorphosis.
+
+Personification is the earlier process. It is radical, always identical
+with itself, but transitory. It goes out from ourselves toward other
+things. It consists in attributing life to everything, in supposing in
+everything that shows signs of life--and even in inanimate
+objects--desires, passions, and acts of will analogous to ours, acting
+like ourselves in view of definite ends. This state of mind is
+incomprehensible to an adult civilized man; but it must be admitted,
+since there are facts without number that show its existence. We do not
+need to cite them--they are too well known. They fill the works of
+ethnologists, of travelers in savage lands, of books of mythology.
+Besides, all of us, at the commencement of our lives, during our
+earliest childhood, have passed through this inevitable stage of
+universal animism. Works on child-psychology abound in observations that
+leave no possible room for doubt on this point. The child endows
+everything with life, and he does so the more in proportion as he is
+more imaginative. But this stage, which among civilized people lasts
+only a brief period, remains in the primitive man a permanent
+disposition and one that is always active. This process of
+personification is the perennial fount whence have gushed the greater
+number of myths, an enormous mass of superstitions, and a large number
+of esthetic productions. To sum up in a word, all things that have been
+invented _ex analogia hominis_.
+
+Transformation or metamorphosis is a general, permanent process under
+many forms, proceeding not from the thinking subject towards objects,
+but from one object to another, from one thing to another. It consists
+of a transfer through partial resemblance. This operation rests on two
+fundamental bases--depending at one time on vague resemblances (a cloud
+becomes a mountain, or a mountain a fantastic animal; the sound of the
+wind a plaintive cry, etc.), or again, on a resemblance with a
+predominating emotional element: A perception provokes a feeling, and
+becomes the mark, sign, or plastic form thereof (the lion represents
+courage; the cat, artifice; the cypress, sorrow; and so on). All this,
+doubtless, is erroneous or arbitrary; but the function of the
+imagination is to invent, not to perceive. All know that this process
+creates metaphors, allegories, symbols; it should not, however, be
+believed on that account that it remains restricted to the realm of art
+or of the development of language. We meet it every moment in practical
+life, in mechanical, industrial, commercial, and scientific invention,
+and we shall, later, give a large number of examples in support of this
+statement.
+
+Let us note, briefly, that analogy, as an imperfect form of
+resemblance--as was said above, if we assume among the objects compared a
+totality of likenesses and differences in varying proportions--necessarily
+allows all degrees. At one end of the scale, the comparison is made
+between valueless or exaggerated likenesses. At the other end, analogy is
+restricted to exact resemblance; it approaches cognition, strictly so
+called; for example, in mechanical and scientific invention. Hence it is
+not at all surprising that the imagination is often a substitute for, and
+as Goethe expressed it, "a forerunner of," reason. Between the creative
+imagination and rational investigation there is a community of
+nature--both presuppose the ability of seizing upon likenesses. On the
+other hand, the predominance of the exact process establishes from the
+outset a difference between "thinkers" and imaginative dreamers
+("visionaries").[11]
+
+FOOTNOTES:
+
+[3] Cf. the well-known aphorism, "_Apperception ist alles_." (Tr.)
+
+[4] See especially J. Philippe, "La deformation et les
+transformations des images" in _Revue Philosophique_, May and
+November, 1897. Although these investigations had in view only
+visual representations, it is not at all doubtful that the results
+hold good for others, especially those of hearing (voice, song,
+harmony).
+
+[5] _On Intelligence_, Vol. I, Bk. ii, Chap. 2.
+
+[6] In his recent history of the theories of the imagination, _La
+psicologia dell' immaginazione, nella storia filosofia_ (Rome, 1898)
+Ambrosi shows that this law is found already formulated in the
+_Psychologia Empirica_ of Christian Wolff [d. 1754]: "_Perceptio
+praeterita integra recurrit cujus praesens continet partem._"
+
+[7] Sully, _Human Mind_, I, p. 365; James, _Psychology_, I, p. 502.
+
+[8] For a good criticism of the term, consult Titchener, _Outlines
+of Psychology_ (New York, 1896), p. 190.
+
+[9] For the discussions on the reduction to a unity, a detailed
+bibliography will be found in Jodl, _Lehrbuch der Psychologie_
+(Stuttgart, 1896), p. 490. On the comparison of the two laws, James,
+_op. cit._, I, 590; Sully, _op. cit._, I, 331 ff; Hoeffding,
+_Psychologie_, 213 ff. (Eng. ed. _Outlines of Psychology_, pp. 152
+ff.).
+
+[10] Note here a characteristically naive working of the primitive
+intellect in explaining the unknown in terms of the known. Cf. Part
+II, Chap. iii, below. (Tr.)
+
+[11] It is yet, and will probably long remain, an open question
+whether we can draw any clear distinction between the two kinds of
+mind here discussed. The author is careful to base his distinction
+on the "predominance" of the "rational" or of the "imaginative"
+process. So-called "thinkers," who _do_ nothing, can not, certainly,
+be ranked with the persons of great intellectual attainment through
+whose efforts the progress of the world is made; on the other hand,
+the author seeks to make _results_ or accomplishments the crucial
+test of true imagination (see Introduction).
+
+As regards the relative value or rank of the two bents of mind there
+has ever been, and probably forever will be, great difference of
+opinion. Even in this intensely "practical" age there is an
+undercurrent of feeling that the narrowly "practical" individual is
+not the final ideal, and the innermost conviction of many is the
+same as that of the poet who declares that "a dreamer lives forever,
+but a thinker dies in a day." (Tr.)
+
+
+
+
+CHAPTER II
+
+THE EMOTIONAL FACTOR.
+
+
+The influence of emotional states on the working of the imagination is a
+matter of current observation. But it has been studied chiefly by
+moralists, who most often have criticised or condemned it as an endless
+cause of mistakes. The point of view of the psychologist is altogether
+different. He does not need at all to investigate whether emotions and
+passions give rise to mental phantoms--which is an indisputable
+fact--but _why_ and _how_ they arise. For, the emotional factor yields
+in importance to no other; it is the ferment without which no creation
+is possible. Let us study it in its principal forms, although we may not
+be able at this moment to exhaust the topic.
+
+
+I
+
+It is necessary to show at the outset that the influence of the
+emotional life is unlimited, that it penetrates the entire field of
+invention with no restriction whatever; that this is not a gratuitous
+assertion, but is, on the contrary, strictly justified by facts, and
+that we are right in maintaining the following two propositions:
+
+1. _All forms of the creative imagination imply elements of feeling._
+
+This statement has been challenged by authoritative psychologists, who
+hold that "emotion is added to imagination in its esthetic aspect, not
+in its mechanical and intellectual form." This is an error of fact
+resulting from the confusion, or from the imperfect analysis, of two
+distinct cases. In the case of non-esthetic creation, the role of the
+emotional life is simple; in esthetic creation, the role of emotional
+element is double.
+
+Let us consider invention, first, in its most general form. The
+emotional element is the primal, original factor; for all invention
+presupposes a want, a craving, a tendency, an unsatisfied impulse, often
+even a state of gestation full of discomfort. Moreover, it is
+concomitant, that is, under its form of pleasure or of pain, of hope, of
+spite, of anger, etc., it accompanies all the phases or turns of
+creation. The creator may, haphazard, go through the most diverse forms
+of exaltation and depression; may feel in turn the dejection of repulse
+and the joy of success; finally the satisfaction of being freed from a
+heavy burden. I challenge anyone to produce a solitary example of
+invention wrought out _in abstracto_, and free from any factors of
+feeling. Human nature does not allow such a miracle.
+
+Now, let us take up the special case of esthetic creation, and of forms
+approaching thereto. Here again we find the original emotional element
+as at first motor, then attached to various aspects of creation, as an
+accompaniment. But, _in addition, affective states become material for
+the creative activity_. It is a well-known fact, almost a rule, that the
+poet, the novelist, the dramatist, and the musician--often, indeed, even
+the sculptor and the painter--experience the thoughts and feeling of
+their characters, become identified with them. There are, then, in this
+second instance, two currents of feeling--the one, constituting emotion
+as material for art, the other, drawing out creative activity and
+developing along with it.
+
+The difference between the two cases that we have distinguished consists
+in this and nothing more than this. The existence of an emotion-content
+belonging to esthetic production changes in no way the psychologic
+mechanism of invention generally. Its absence in other forms of
+imagination does not at all prevent the necessary existence of affective
+elements everywhere and always.
+
+2. _All emotional dispositions whatever may influence the creative
+imagination._
+
+Here, again, I find opponents, notably Oelzelt-Newin, in his short and
+substantial monograph on the imagination.[12] Adopting the twofold
+division of emotions as sthenic and asthenic, or exciting and
+depressing, he attributes to the first the exclusive privilege of
+influencing creative activity; but though the author limits his study
+exclusively to the esthetic imagination, his thesis, even understood
+thus, is untenable. The facts contradict it completely, and it is easy
+to demonstrate that all forms of emotion, without exception, act as
+leaven for imagination.
+
+No one will deny that fear is the type of asthenic manifestations. Yet
+is it not the mother of phantoms, of numberless superstitions, of
+altogether irrational and chimerical religious practices?
+
+Anger, in its exalted, violent form, is rather an agent of destruction,
+which seems to contradict my thesis; but let us pass over the storm,
+which is always of short duration, and we find in its place milder
+intellectualized forms, which are various modifications of primitive
+fury, passing from the acute to the chronic state: envy, jealousy,
+enmity, premeditated vengeance, and so forth. Are not these dispositions
+of the mind fertile in artifices, stratagems, inventions of all kinds?
+To keep even to esthetic creation, is it necessary to recall the saying
+_facit indignatio versum_?
+
+It is not necessary to demonstrate the fecundity of joy. As for love,
+everyone knows that its work consists of creating an imaginary being,
+which is substituted for the beloved object; then, when the passion has
+vanished, the disenchanted lover finds himself face to face with the
+bare reality.
+
+Sorrow rightly belongs in the category of depressing emotions, and yet,
+it has as great influence on invention as any other emotion. Do we not
+know that melancholy and even profound sorrow has furnished poets,
+musicians, painters, and sculptors with their most beautiful
+inspirations? Is there not an art frankly and deliberately pessimistic?
+And this influence is not at all limited to esthetic creation. Dare we
+hold that hypochondria and insanity following upon the delirium of
+persecution are devoid of imagination? Their morbid character is, on the
+contrary, the well whence strange inventions incessantly bubble.
+
+Lastly, that complex emotion termed "self-feeling," which reduces itself
+finally to the pleasure of asserting our power and of feeling its
+expansion, or to the pitiable feeling of our shackled, enfeebled power,
+leads us directly to the motor elements that are the fundamental
+conditions of invention. Above all, in this personal feeling, there is
+the satisfaction of being a causal factor, i.e., a creator, and every
+creator has a consciousness of his superiority over non-creators.
+However petty his invention, it confers upon him a superiority over
+those who have invented nothing. Although we have been surfeited with
+the repeated statement that the characteristic mark of esthetic creation
+is "being disinterested," it must be recognized, as Groos has so truly
+remarked,[13] that the artist does not create out of the simple pleasure
+of creating, but in order that he may behold a mastery over other
+minds.[14] Production is the natural extension of "self-feeling," and
+the accompanying pleasure is the pleasure of conquest.
+
+Thus, on condition that we extend "imagination" to its full sense,
+without limiting it unduly to esthetics, there is, among the many forms
+of the emotional life, not one that may not stimulate invention. It
+remains to see this emotional factor at work,--to note how it can give
+rise to new combinations; and this brings us to the association of
+ideas.
+
+
+II
+
+We have said above that the ideal and theoretic law of the recurrence of
+images is that of "total redintegration," as e.g., recalling all the
+incidents of a long voyage in chronological order, with neither
+additions nor omissions. But this formula expresses what ought to be,
+not what actually occurs. It supposes man reduced to a state of pure
+intelligence, and sheltered from all disturbing influences. It suits the
+completely systematized forms of memory, hardened into routine and
+habit; but, outside of these cases, it remains an abstract concept.
+
+To this law of ideal value, there is opposed the real and practical law
+that actually obtains in the revival of images. It is rightly styled the
+"law of interest" or the affective law, and may be stated thus: In every
+past event the interesting parts alone revive, or with more intensity
+than the others. "Interesting" here means _what affects us in some way
+under a pleasing or painful form_. Let us note that the importance of
+this fact has been pointed out not by the associationists (a fact
+especially worth remembering) but by less systematic writers, strangers
+to that school,--Coleridge, Shadworth Hodgson, and before them,
+Schopenhauer. William James calls it the "ordinary or mixed
+association."[15] The "law of interest" doubtless is less exact than the
+intellectual laws of contiguity and resemblance. Nevertheless, it seems
+to penetrate all the more in later reasoning. If, indeed, in the problem
+of association we distinguish these three things--facts, laws,
+causes--the practical law brings us near to causes.
+
+Whatever the truth may be in this matter, the emotional factor brings
+about new combinations by several processes.
+
+There are the ordinary, simple cases, with a natural, emotional
+foundation, depending on momentary dispositions. They exist because of
+the fact that representations that have been accompanied by the same
+emotional state tend later to become associated: the emotional
+resemblance reunites and links disparate images. This differs from
+association by contiguity, which is a repetition of experience, and from
+association by resemblance in the intellectual sense. The states of
+consciousness become combined, not because they have been previously
+given together, not because we perceive the agreement of resemblance
+between them, but because they have a common _emotional_ note. Joy,
+sorrow, love, hatred, admiration, ennui, pride, fatigue, etc., may
+become a center of attraction that groups images or events having
+otherwise no rational relations between them, but having the same
+emotional stamp,--joyous, melancholy, erotic, etc. This form of
+association is very frequent in dreams and reveries, i.e., in a state
+of mind in which the imagination enjoys complete freedom and works
+haphazard. We easily see that this influence, active or latent, of the
+emotional factor, must cause entirely unexpected grouping to arise, and
+offers an almost unlimited field for novel combinations, the number of
+images having a common emotional factor being very great.
+
+There are unusual and remarkable cases with an exceptional emotional
+base. Of such is "colored hearing." We know that several hypotheses have
+been offered in regard to the origin of this phenomenon.
+Embryologically, it would seem to be the result of an incomplete
+separation between the sense of sight and that of hearing, and the
+survival, it is said, from a distant period of humanity, when this state
+must have been the rule; anatomically, the result of supposed
+anastamoses between the cerebral centers for visual and auditory
+sensations; physiologically, the result of nervous irradiation;
+psychologically, the result of association. This latter hypothesis seems
+to account for the greater number of instances, if not for all; but, as
+Flournoy has observed, it is a matter of "affective" imagination. Two
+sensations absolutely unlike (for instance, the color blue and the
+sound _i_) may resemble one another through the equal retentive quality
+that they possess in the organism of some favored individuals, and this
+emotional factor becomes a bond of association. Observe that this
+hypothesis explains also the much more unusual cases of "colored" smell,
+taste, and pain; that is, an abnormal association between given colors
+and tastes, smells, or pains.
+
+Although we meet them only as exceptional cases, these modes of
+association are susceptible to analysis, and seem clear, almost
+self-evident, if we compare them with other, subtle, refined, barely
+perceptible cases, the origin of which is a subject for supposition, for
+guessing rather than for clear comprehension. It is, moreover, a sort of
+imagination belonging to very few people: certain artists and some
+eccentric or unbalanced minds, scarcely ever found outside the esthetic
+or practical life. I wish to speak of the forms of invention that permit
+only fantastic conceptions, of a strangeness pushed to the extreme
+(Hoffman, Poe, Baudelaire, Goya, Wiertz, etc.), or surprising,
+extraordinary thoughts, known of no other men (the symbolists and
+decadents that flourish at the present time in various countries of
+Europe and America, who believe, rightly or wrongly, that they are
+preparing the esthetics of the future). It must be here admitted that
+there exists an altogether special manner of _feeling_, dependent on
+temperament at first, which many cultivate and refine as though it were
+a precious rarity. There lies the true source of their invention.
+Doubtless, to assert this pertinently, it would be necessary to
+establish the direct relations between their physical and psychical
+constitution and that of their work; to note even the particular states
+at the moment of the creative act. To me at least, it seems evident that
+the novelty, the strangeness of combinations, through its deep
+subjective character, indicates an emotional rather than an intellectual
+origin. Let us merely add that these abnormal manifestations of the
+creative imagination belong to the province of pathology rather than to
+that of psychology.
+
+Association by contrast is, from its very nature, vague, arbitrary,
+indeterminate. It rests, in truth, on an essentially subjective and
+fleeting conception, that of contrariety, which it is almost impossible
+to delimit scientifically; for, most often, contraries exist only by and
+for us. We know that this form of association is not primary and
+irreducible. It is brought down by some to contiguity, by most others to
+resemblance. These two views do not seem to me irreconcilable. In
+association by contrast we may distinguish two layers,--the one,
+superficial, consists of contiguity: all of us have in memory associated
+couples, such as large-small, rich-poor, high-low, right-left, etc.,
+which result from repetition and habit; the other, deep, is resemblance;
+_contrast exists only where a common measure between two terms is
+possible_. As Wundt remarks, a wedding may be compared to a burial (the
+union and separation of a couple), but not to a toothache. There is
+contrast between two colors, contrast between sounds, but not between a
+sound and a color, at least in that there may not be a common basis to
+which we may relate them, as in the previously given instances of
+"colored" sound. In association by contrast, there are conscious
+elements opposed to one another, and below, an unconscious element,
+resemblance,--not clearly and logically perceived, but felt--that evokes
+and relates the conscious elements.
+
+Whether this explanation be right or not, let us remark that association
+by contrast could not be left out, because its mechanism, full of
+unforeseen possibilities, lends itself easily to novel relations.
+Otherwise, I do not at all claim that it is entirely dependent upon the
+emotional factor. But, as Hoeffding observes,[16] the special property of
+the emotional life is moving among contraries; it is altogether
+determined by the great opposition between pleasure and pain. Thus, the
+effects of contrasts are much stronger than in the realm of sensation.
+This form of association predominates in esthetic and mythic creation,
+that is to say, in creation of the free fancy; it becomes dimmed in the
+precise forms of practical, mechanical, and scientific invention.
+
+
+III
+
+Hitherto we have considered the emotional factor under a single aspect
+only--the purely emotional--that which is manifested in consciousness
+under an agreeable or disagreeable or mixed form. But thoughts,
+feelings, and emotions include elements that are deeper--motor, i.e.,
+impulsive or inhibitory--which we may neglect the less since it is in
+movements that we seek the origin of the creative imagination. This
+motor element is what current speech and often even psychological
+treatises designate under the terms "creative instinct," "inventive
+instinct;" what we express in another form when we say that creators are
+guided by instinct and "are pushed like animals toward the
+accomplishment of certain acts."
+
+If I mistake not, this indicates that the "creative instinct" exists in
+all men to some extent--feeble in some, perceptible in others, brilliant
+in the great inventors.
+
+For I do not hesitate to maintain that the creative instinct, taken in
+this strict meaning, compared to animal instinct, is a mere figure of
+speech, an "entity" regarded as a reality, an abstraction. There are
+needs, appetites, tendencies, desires, common to all men, which, in a
+given individual at a given moment can result in a creative act; but
+there is no special psychic manifestation that may be the "creative
+instinct." What, indeed, could it be? Every instinct has its own
+particular end:--hunger, thirst, sex, the specific instincts of the bee,
+ant, beaver, consist of a group of movements adapted for a determinate
+end that is always the same. Now, what would be a creative instinct _in
+general_ which, by hypothesis, could produce in turn an opera, a
+machine, a metaphysical theory, a system of finance, a plan of military
+campaign, and so forth? It is a pure fancy. Inventive genius has not _a_
+source, but _sources_.
+
+Let us consider from our present viewpoint the human duality, the _homo
+duplex_:
+
+Suppose man reduced to a state of pure intelligence, that is, capable of
+perceiving, remembering, associating, dissociating, reasoning, and
+nothing else. All creative activity is then impossible, because there is
+nothing to solicit it.
+
+Suppose, again, man reduced to organic manifestations; he is then no
+more than a bundle of wants, appetites, instincts,--that is, of motor
+activities, blind forces that, lacking a sufficient cerebral organ, will
+produce nothing.
+
+The cooperation of both these factors is indispensable: without the
+first, nothing begins; without the second, nothing results. I hold that
+it is in needs that we must seek for the primary cause of all
+inventions; it is evident that the motor element alone is insufficient.
+If the needs are strong, energetic, they may determine a production, or,
+if the intellectual factor is insufficient, may spoil it. Many want to
+make discoveries but discover nothing. A want so common as hunger or
+thirst suggests to one some ingenious method of satisfying it; another
+remains entirely destitute.
+
+In short, in order that a creative act occur, there is required, first,
+a need; then, that it arouse a combination of images; and lastly, that
+it objectify and _realize_ itself in an appropriate form.
+
+We shall try later (in the Conclusion) to answer the question, _Why_ is
+one imaginative? In passing, let us put the opposite question, Why is
+one _not_ imaginative? One may possess in the mind an inexhaustible
+treasure of facts and images and yet produce nothing: great travelers,
+for example, who have seen and heard much, and who draw from their
+experiences only a few colorless anecdotes; men who were partakers in
+great political events or military movements, who leave behind only a
+few dry and chilly memoirs; prodigies of reading, living encyclopedias,
+who remain crushed under the load of their erudition. On the other hand,
+there are people who easily move and act, but are limited, lacking
+images and ideas. Their intellectual poverty condemns them to
+unproductiveness; nevertheless, being nearer than the others to the
+imaginative type, they bring forth childish or chimerical productions.
+So that we may answer the question asked above: The non-imaginative
+person is such from lack of materials or through the absence of
+resourcefulness.
+
+Without contenting ourselves with these theoretical remarks, let us
+rapidly show that it is thus that these things actually happen. All the
+work of the creative imagination may be classed under two great
+heads--esthetic inventions and practical inventions; on the one hand,
+what man has brought to pass in the domain of art, and on the other
+hand, all else. Though this division may appear strange, and
+unjustifiable, it has reason for its being, as we shall see hereafter.
+
+Let us consider first the class of non-esthetic creations. Very
+different in nature, all the products of this group coincide at one
+point:--they are of practical utility, they are born of a vital need, of
+one of the conditions of man's existence. There are first the inventions
+"practical" in the narrow sense--all that pertains to food, clothing,
+defense, housing, etc. Every one of these special needs has stimulated
+inventions adapted to a special end. Inventions in the social and
+political order answer to the conditions of collective existence; they
+arise from the necessity of maintaining the coherence of the social
+aggregate and of defending it against inimical groups. The work of the
+imagination whence have arisen the myths, religious conceptions, and the
+first attempts at a scientific explanation may seem at first
+disinterested and foreign to practical life. This is an erroneous
+supposition. Man, face to face with the higher powers of nature, the
+mystery of which he does not penetrate, has a _need_ of acting upon it;
+he tries to conciliate them, even to turn them to his service by magic
+rites and operations. _His_ curiosity is not at all theoretic; he does
+not aim to know for the sake of knowing, but in order to act upon the
+outside world and to draw profit therefrom. To the numerous questions
+that necessity puts to him his imagination alone responds, because his
+reason is shifting and his scientific knowledge _nil_. Here, then,
+invention again results from urgent needs.
+
+Indeed, in the course of the nineteenth century and on account of
+growing civilization all these creations reach a second moment when
+their origin is hidden. Most of our mechanical, industrial and
+commercial inventions are not stimulated by the immediate necessity of
+living, by an urgent need; it is not a question of existence but of
+better existence. The same holds true of social and political inventions
+which arise from the increasing complexity and the new requirements of
+the aggregates forming great states. Lastly, it is certain that
+primitive curiosity has partially lost its utilitarian character in
+order to become, in some men at least, the taste for pure
+research--theoretical, speculative, disinterested. But all this in no
+way affects our thesis, for it is a well-known elementary psychological
+law that upon primitive wants are grafted acquired wants fully as
+imperative. The primitive need is modified, metamorphosed, adapted;
+there remains of it, nonetheless, the fundamental activity toward
+creation.
+
+Let us now consider the class of esthetic creations. According to the
+generally accepted theory which is too well known for me to stop to
+explain it, art has its beginning in a superfluous, bounding activity,
+useless as regards the preservation of the individual, which is shown
+first in the form of play. Then, through transformation and
+complication, play becomes primitive art, dancing, music, and poetry at
+the same time, closely united in an apparently indissoluble unity.
+Although the theory of the absolute inutility of art has met some strong
+criticism, let us accept it for the present. Aside from the true or
+false character of inutility, the psychological mechanism remains the
+same here as in the preceding cases; we shall only say that in place of
+a vital need it is a need of _luxury_ acting, but it acts only because
+it is in man.
+
+Nevertheless, the inutility of play is far from proven biologically.
+Groos, in his two excellent works on the subject,[17] has maintained
+with much power the opposite view. According to him the theory of
+Schiller and Spencer, based on the expenditure of superfluous activity
+and the opposite theory of Lazarus, who reduces play to a
+relaxation--that is, a recuperation of strength--are but partial
+explanations. Play has a positive use. In man there exist a great number
+of instincts that are not yet developed at birth. An incomplete being,
+he must have education of his capacities, and this is obtained through
+play, _which is the exercise of the natural tendencies of human
+activities_. In man and in the higher animals plays are a preparation, a
+prelude to the active functions of life. _There is no instinct of play
+in general, but there are special instincts that are manifested under
+the forms of play._ If we admit this explanation, which does not lack
+potency, the work of the esthetic imagination itself would be reduced
+to a biological necessity, and there would be no reason for making a
+separate category of it. Whichever view we may adopt, it still remains
+established that any invention is reducible, directly or indirectly, to
+a particular, determinate need, and that to allow man a special
+instinct, the definite specific character of which should be stimulation
+to creative activity, is a fantastic notion.
+
+Whence, then, comes this persistent and in some respects seductive idea
+that creation is an instinctive result? Because a happy invention has
+characteristics that evidently relate it to instinctive activity in the
+strict sense of the word. First, precocity, of which we shall later give
+numerous examples, and which resembles the innateness of instinct.
+Again, orientation in a single direction: the inventor is, so to speak,
+polarized; he is the slave of music, of mechanics, of mathematics; often
+inapt at everything outside his own particular sphere. We know the
+witticism of Madame du Deffant on Vaucanson, who was so awkward, so
+insignificant when he ventured outside of mechanics. "One should say
+that this man had manufactured himself." Finally, the ease with which
+invention often (not always) manifests itself makes it resemble the work
+of a pre-established mechanism.
+
+But these and similar characteristics may be lacking. They are necessary
+for instinct, not for invention. There are great creators who have been
+neither precocious nor confined in a narrow field, and who have given
+birth to their inventions painfully, laboriously. Between the mechanism
+of instinct and that of imaginative creation there are frequently great
+analogies but not identity of nature. Every tendency of our
+organization, useful or hurtful, may become the beginning of a creative
+act. Every invention arises from a particular need of human nature,
+acting within its own sphere and for its own special end.
+
+If now it should be asked why the creative imagination directs itself
+preferably in one line rather than in another--toward poetry or physics,
+trade or mechanics, geometry or painting, strategy or music, etc.--we
+have nothing in answer. It is a result of the individual organization,
+the secret of which we do not possess. In ordinary life we meet people
+visibly borne along toward love or good cheer, toward ambition, riches
+or good works; we say that they are "so built," that such is their
+character. At bottom the two questions are identical, and current
+psychology is not in a position to solve them.
+
+FOOTNOTES:
+
+[12] _Ueber Phantasievorstellungen_, Graz, 1889, p. 48.
+
+[13] _Die Spiele der Thiere_, Jena, 1896. The subject has been very
+well treated by this author, pp. 294-301.
+
+[14] The "disinterested" view is found widely advocated or hinted at
+in literature. Cf. Goethe's "Der Saenger" (Tr.).
+
+[15] _Psychology_, I, 571 ff.
+
+[16] Hoeffding, _Psychologie_, p. 219; _Eng. trans._, p. 161.
+
+[17] Groos, _Die Spiele der Thiere_, 1896, and _Die Spiele der
+Menschen_, 1899 (Eng. trans., Appletons, New York, 1898, 1901).
+
+
+
+
+CHAPTER III
+
+THE UNCONSCIOUS FACTOR
+
+I
+
+
+By this term I designate principally, not exclusively, what ordinary
+speech calls "inspiration." In spite of its mysterious and
+semi-mythological appearance, the term indicates a positive fact, one
+that is ill-understood in a deep sense, like all that is near the roots
+of creation. This concept has its history, and if it is permissible to
+apply a very general formula to a particular case we may say that it has
+developed according to the law of the three states assumed by the
+positivists.
+
+In the beginning, inspiration is literally ascribed to the
+gods--among the Greeks to Apollo and the Muses, and in like manner
+under various polytheistic religions. Later, the gods become
+supernatural spirits, angels, saints, etc. In one way or another it
+is always regarded as external and superior to man. In the
+beginnings of all inventions--agriculture, navigation, medicine,
+commerce, legislation, fine arts--there is a belief in revelation;
+the human mind considers itself incapable of having discovered all
+that. Creation has arisen, we do not know how, in a total ignorance
+of the processes.
+
+Later on these higher beings become empty formulas, mere survivals;
+there remain only the poets to invoke their aid, through the force of
+tradition, without believing in them. But side by side with these formal
+survivals there remains a mysterious ground which is translated by vague
+expressions and metaphors, such as "enthusiasm," "poetic frenzy,"
+"possession by a spirit," "being overcome," "having the devil inside
+one," "the spirit whispers as it lists," etc. Here we have come out of
+the supernatural without, however, attempting a positive (i.e., a
+scientific) explanation.
+
+Lastly, in the third stage, we try to sound this unknown. Psychology
+sees in it a special manifestation of the mind, a particular,
+semi-conscious, semi-unconscious state which we must now study.
+
+At first sight, and considered in its negative aspect, inspiration
+presents a very definite character. It does not depend on the individual
+will. As in the case of sleep or digestion, we may try to call it forth,
+encourage it, maintain it; but not always with success. Inventors, great
+and small, never cease to complain over the periods of unproductiveness
+which they undergo in spite of themselves. The wiser among them watch
+for the moment; the others attempt to fight against their evil fate and
+to create despite nature.
+
+Considered in its positive aspect, inspiration has two essential
+marks--suddenness and impersonality.
+
+(a) It makes a sudden eruption into consciousness, but one presupposing
+a latent, frequently long, labor. It has its analogues among other
+well-known psychic states; for example, a passion that is forgotten,
+which, after a long period of incubation, reveals itself through an act;
+or, better, a sudden resolve after endless deliberation which did not
+seem able to come to a head. Again, there may be absence of effort and
+of appearance of preparation. Beethoven would strike haphazard the keys
+of a piano or would listen to the songs of birds. "With Chopin," says
+George Sand, "creation was spontaneous, miraculous; he wrought without
+foreseeing. It would come complete, sudden, sublime." One might pile up
+like facts in abundance. Sometimes, indeed, inspiration bursts forth in
+deep sleep and awakens the sleeper, and lest we may suppose this
+suddenness to be especially characteristic of artists we see it in all
+forms of invention. "You feel a little electric shock striking you in
+the head, seizing your heart at the same time--that is the moment of
+genius" (Buffon). "In the course of my life I have had some happy
+thoughts," says Du Bois Reymond, "and I have often noted that they would
+come to me involuntarily, and when I was not thinking of the subject."
+Claude Bernard has voiced the same thought more than once.
+
+(b) Impersonality is a deeper character than the preceding. It reveals a
+power superior to the conscious individual, strange to him although
+acting through him: a state which many inventors have expressed in the
+words, "I counted for nothing in that." The best means of recognizing it
+would be to write down some observations taken from the inspired
+individuals themselves. We do not lack them, and some have the virtue of
+good observation.[18] But that would lead us too far afield. Let us only
+remark that this unconscious impulse acts variously according to the
+individual. Some submit to it painfully, striving against it just like
+the ancient pythoness at the time of giving her oracle. Others,
+especially in religious inspiration, submit themselves entirely with
+pleasure or else sustain it passively. Still others of a more analytic
+turn have noted the concentration of all their faculties and capacities
+on a single point. But whatever characteristics it takes on, remaining
+impersonal at bottom and unable to appear in a fully conscious
+individual, we must admit, unless we wish to give it a supernatural
+origin, that inspiration is derived from the unconscious activity of the
+mind. In order to make sure of its nature it would then be necessary to
+make sure first of the nature of the unconscious, which is one of the
+enigmas of psychology.
+
+I put aside all the discussions on the subject as tiresome and useless
+for our present aim. Indeed, they reduce themselves to these two
+principal propositions: for some the unconscious is a purely
+physiological activity, a "cerebration"; for others it is a gradual
+diminution of consciousness which exists without being bound to me--i.e.,
+to the principal consciousness. Both these are full of difficulties
+and present almost insurmountable objections.[19]
+
+Let us take the "unconscious" as a fact and let us limit ourselves to
+clearing it up, relating inspiration to mental states that have been
+judged worthy of explaining it.
+
+1. Hypermnesia, or exaltation of memory, in spite of what has been said
+about it, teaches us nothing in regard to the nature of inspiration or
+of invention in general. It is produced in hypnotism, mania, the excited
+period of "circular insanity," at the beginning of general paralysis,
+and especially under the form known as "the gift of tongues" in
+religious epidemics. We find, it is true, some observations (among
+others one by Regis of an illiterate newspaper vender composing pieces
+of poetry of his own), indicating that a heightened memory sometimes
+accompanies a certain tendency toward invention. But hypermnesia, pure
+and simple, consists of an extraordinary flood of memories totally
+lacking that essential mark of creation--new combinations. It even
+appears that in the two instances there is rather an antagonism since
+heightened memory comes near to the ideal law of total redintegration,
+which is, as we know, a hindrance to invention. They are alike only with
+respect to the great mass of separable materials, but where the
+principle of unity is wanting there can be no creation.
+
+2. Inspiration has often been likened to the state of excitement
+preceding intoxication. It is a well-known fact that many inventors have
+sought it in wine, alcoholic liquors, toxic substances like hashish,
+opium, ether, etc. It is unnecessary to mention names. The abundance of
+ideas, the rapidity of their flow, the eccentric spurts and caprices,
+novel ideas, strengthening of the vital and emotional tone, that brief
+state of bounding fancy of which novelists have given such good
+descriptions, make evident to the least observing that under the
+influence of intoxication the imagination works to a much greater extent
+than ordinarily. Yet how pale that is compared to the action of the
+intellectual poisons above mentioned, especially hashish. The
+"artificial paradise" of DeQuincy, Moreau de Tours, Theophile Gautier,
+Baudelaire and others have made known to all an enormous expansion of
+the imagination launched into a giddy course without limits of time and
+space.
+
+Strictly, these are facts representing only a stimulated, artificial,
+temporary inspiration. They do not take us into its true nature; at the
+most they may teach us concerning some of their physiological
+conditions. It is not even an inspiration in the strict sense, but
+rather a beginning, an embryo, an outline, analogous to the creations
+produced in dreams which are found very incoherent when we awake. One of
+the essential conditions of creation, a principal element--the directing
+principle that organizes and unifies--is lacking. Under the influence
+of alcoholic drinks and of poisonous intoxicants attention and will
+always fall into exhaustion.
+
+3. With greater reason it has been sought to explain inspiration by
+comparison with certain forms of somnambulism, and it has been said that
+"it is only the lowest degree of the latter state, somnambulism in a
+waking state. In inspiration it is as though a strange personality were
+speaking to the author; in somnambulism it is the stranger himself who
+talks or holds the pen, who speaks or writes--in a word, does the
+work."[20] It would thus be the modified form of a state that is the
+culmination of subconscious activity and a state of double personality.
+As this last explanatory expression is wonderfully abused, and is called
+upon to serve in all conditions, preciseness is indispensable.
+
+The inspired individual is like an awakened dreamer--he lives in his
+dream. (Of this we might cite seemingly authentic examples: Shelly,
+Alfieri, etc.) Psychologically, this means that there is in him a double
+inversion of the normal state.
+
+To begin with, consciousness monopolized by the number and intensity of
+its images is closed to the influences of the outside world, or else
+receives them only to make them enter the web of its dream. The internal
+life annihilates the external, which is just the opposite of ordinary
+life.
+
+Further, the unconscious or subconscious activity passes to the first
+plane, plays the first part, while preserving its impersonal character.
+
+This much allowed, if we would go further, we are thrown into increasing
+difficulties. The existence of an unconscious working is beyond doubt;
+facts in profusion could be given in support of this obscure elaboration
+which enters consciousness only when all is done. But what is the nature
+of this work? Is it purely physiological? Is it psychological? We come
+to two opposing theses. Theoretically, we may say that everything goes
+on in the realm of the unconscious just as in consciousness, _only
+without a message to me_; that in clear consciousness the work may be
+followed up step by step, while in unconsciousness it proceeds likewise,
+but unknown to us. It is evident that all this is purely hypothetical.
+
+Inspiration resembles a cipher dispatch which the unconscious activity
+transmits to the conscious process, which translates it. Must we admit
+that in the deep levels of the unconscious there are formed only
+fragmentary combinations and that they reach complete systematization
+only in clear consciousness, or, rather, is the creative labor identical
+in both cases? It is difficult to decide. It seems to be accepted that
+genius, or at least richness, in invention depends on the subliminal
+imagination,[21] not on the other, which is superficial in nature and
+soon exhausted. The one is spontaneous, true; the other, artificial,
+feigned. "Inspiration" signifies unconscious imagination, and is only a
+special case of it. Conscious imagination is a kind of perfected state.
+
+To sum up, inspiration is the result of an underhand process existing in
+men, in some to a very great degree. The nature of this work being
+unknown, we can conclude nothing as to the ultimate nature of
+inspiration. On the other hand, we may in a positive manner fix the
+value of the phenomenon in invention, all the more as we are inclined to
+over-value it. We should, indeed, note that inspiration is not a cause
+but an effect--more exactly, a moment, a crisis, a critical stage; it is
+an _index_. It marks either the end of an unconscious elaboration which
+may have been very short or very long, or else the beginning of a
+conscious elaboration which will be very short or very long (this is
+seen especially in cases of creation suggested by chance). On the one
+hand, it never has an absolute beginning; on the other hand, it never
+delivers a finished work; the history of inventions sufficiently proves
+this. Furthermore, one may pass beyond it; many creations long in
+preparation seem without a crisis, strictly so called; such as Newton's
+law of attraction, Leonardo da Vinci's "Last Supper," and the "Mona
+Lisa." Finally, many have felt themselves really inspired without
+producing anything of value.[22]
+
+
+II
+
+What has been said up to this point does not exhaust the study of the
+unconscious factor as a source of new combinations. Its role can be
+studied under a simpler and more limited form. For this purpose we need
+to return for the last time to association of ideas. The final reason
+for association (outside of contiguity, in part at least) must be sought
+in the temperament, character, individuality of the subject, often even
+in the _moment_; that is, in a passing influence, hardly perceptible
+because it is unconscious or subconscious. These momentary dispositions
+in latent form can excite novel relations in two ways--through mediate
+association and through a special mode of grouping which has recently
+received the name "constellation."
+
+1. Mediate association has been well known since the time of Hamilton,
+who was the first to determine its nature and to give a personal example
+that has become classic. Loch Lomond recalled to him the Prussian system
+of education because, when visiting the lake, he had met a Prussian
+officer who conversed with him on the subject. His general formula is
+this: _A_ recalls _C_, although there is between them neither contiguity
+nor resemblance, but because a middle term, _B_, which does not enter
+consciousness, serves as a transition between _A_ and _C_. This mode of
+association seemed universally accepted when, latterly, it has been
+attacked by Muensterberg and others. People have had recourse to
+experimentation, which has given results only in slight agreement.[23]
+For my own part, I count myself among those contemporaries who admit
+mediate association, and they are the greater number. Scripture, who has
+made a special study of the subject, and who has been able to note all
+the intermediate conditions between almost clear consciousness and the
+unconscious, considers the existence of mediate association as proven.
+In order to pronounce as an illusion a fact that is met with so often in
+daily experience, and one that has been studied by so many excellent
+observers, there is required more than experimental investigations (the
+conditions of which are often artificial and unnatural), some of which,
+moreover, conclude for the affirmative.
+
+This form of association is produced, like the others, now by
+contiguity, now by resemblance. The example given by Hamilton belongs to
+the first type. In the experiments by Scripture are found some of the
+second type--e.g., a red light recalled, through the vague memory of a
+flash of strontium light, a scene of an opera.
+
+It is clear that by its very nature mediate association can give rise to
+novel combinations. Contiguity itself, which is usually only repetition,
+becomes the source of unforeseen relations, thanks to the elimination of
+the middle term. Nothing, moreover, proves that there may not sometimes
+be several latent intermediate terms. It is possible that _A_ should
+call up _D_ through the medium of _b_ and _c_, which remain below the
+threshold of consciousness. It seems even impossible not to admit this
+in the hypothesis of the subconscious, where we see only the two end
+links of the chain, without being able to allow a break of continuity
+between them.
+
+2. In his determination of the regulating causes of association of
+ideas, Ziehen designates one of these under the name of "constellation,"
+which has been adopted by some writers. This may be enunciated thus: The
+recall of an image, or of a group of images, is in some cases the result
+of a sum of predominant tendencies.
+
+An idea may become the starting point of a host of associations. The
+word "Rome" can call up a hundred. Why is one called up rather than
+another, and at such a moment rather than at another? There are some
+associations based on contiguity and on resemblance which one may
+foresee, but how about the rest? Here is an idea _A_; it is the center
+of a network; it can radiate in all directions--_B, C, D, E, F, etc._
+Why does it call up now _B_, later _F_?
+
+It is because every image is comparable to a force, which may pass from
+the latent to the active condition, and in this process may be
+reinforced or checked by other images. There are simultaneous and
+inhibitory tendencies. _B_ is in a state of tension and _C_ is not; or
+it may be that _D_ exerts an arresting influence on _C_. Consequently
+_C_ cannot prevail. But an hour later conditions have changed and
+victory rests with _C_. This phenomenon rests on a physiological basis:
+the existence of several currents diffusing themselves through the brain
+and the possibility of receiving simultaneous excitations.[24]
+
+A few examples will make plainer this phenomenon of reinforcement, in
+consequence of which an association prevails. Wahle reports that the
+Gothic _Hotel de Ville_, near his house, had never suggested to him the
+idea of the Doges' Palace at Venice, in spite of certain architectural
+likenesses, until a certain day when this idea broke upon him with much
+clearness. He then recalled that two hours before he had observed a lady
+wearing a beautiful brooch in the form of a gondola. Sully rightly
+remarks that it is much easier to recall the words of a foreign language
+when we return from the country where it is spoken than when we have
+lived a long time in our own, because the tendency toward recollection
+is reinforced by the recent experience of the words heard, spoken,
+read, and a whole array of latent dispositions that work in the same
+direction.
+
+In my opinion we would find the finest examples of "constellation,"
+regarded as a creative element, in studying the formation and
+development of myths. Everywhere and always man has had for material
+scarcely anything save natural phenomena--the sky, land, water, stars,
+storms, wind, seasons, life, death, etc. On each of these themes he
+builds thousands of explanatory stories, which vary from the grandly
+imposing to the laughably childish. Every myth is the work of a human
+group which has worked according to the tendencies of its special genius
+under the influence of various stages of intellectual culture. No
+process is richer in resources, of freer turn, or more apt to give what
+every inventor promises--the novel and unexpected.
+
+To sum up: The initial element, external or internal, excites
+associations that one cannot always foresee, because of the numerous
+orientations possible; an analogous case to that which occurs in the
+realm of the will when there are present reasons for and against, acting
+and not acting, one direction or another, now or later--when the final
+resolution cannot be predicted, and often depends on imperceptible
+causes.
+
+In conclusion, I anticipate a possible question: "Does the unconscious
+factor differ in nature from the two others (intellectual and
+emotional)?" The answer depends on the hypothesis that one holds as to
+the nature of the unconscious itself. According to one view it would be
+especially physiological, consequently different; according to another,
+the difference can exist only _in the processes_: unconscious
+elaboration is reducible to intellectual or emotional processes the
+preparatory work of which is slighted, and which enters consciousness
+ready made. Consequently, the unconscious factor would be a special form
+of the other two rather than a distinct element in invention.
+
+FOOTNOTES:
+
+[18] Several of them will be found in Appendix A at the end of this
+work.
+
+[19] On this subject see Appendix B.
+
+[20] Dr. Chabaneix, _Le subconscient sur les artistes, les savants,
+et les ecrivains_, Paris, 1897, p. 87.
+
+[21] The recent case, studied with so much ability by M. Flournoy in
+his book, "_Des Indes a la planete Mars_" (1900), is an example of
+the subliminal creative imagination, and of the work it is capable
+of doing by itself.
+
+[22] We shall return to this point in another part of this work. See
+Part II, chapter iv.
+
+[23] Thus Howe (_American Journal of Psychology_, vi, 239 ff.), has
+published some investigations in the negative. One series of 557
+experiments gave him eight apparently mediate associations; after
+examination, he reduced them to a single one, which seemed to him
+doubtful. Another series of 961 experiments gives 72 cases, for
+which he offers an explanation other than mediate association. On
+the other hand, Aschaffenburg admits them to the extent of four per
+cent.; the association-time is longer than for average associations
+(_Psychologische Arbeiten_, I and II). Consult especially Scripture,
+_The New Psychology_, chapter xiii, with experiments in support of
+his conclusion.
+
+[24] Ziehen, _Leitfaden der physiologischen Psychologie_, 4th
+edition, 1898, pp. 164, 174. Also, Sully, _Human Mind_, I, 343.
+
+
+
+
+CHAPTER IV
+
+THE ORGANIC CONDITIONS OF THE IMAGINATION
+
+
+Whatever opinion we may hold concerning the nature of the unconscious,
+since that form of activity is related more than any other to the
+physiological conditions of the mental life, the present time is
+suitable for an exposition of the hypotheses that it is permissible to
+express concerning the organic bases of the imagination. What we may
+regard as positive, or even as probable, is very little.
+
+
+I
+
+First, the anatomical conditions. Is there a "seat" of the imagination?
+Such is the form of the question asked for the last twenty years. In
+that period of extreme and closely bounded localization men strained
+themselves to bind down every psychic manifestation to a strictly
+determined point of the brain. Today the problem presents itself no
+longer in this simple way. As at present we incline toward scattered
+localization, functional rather than properly anatomical, and as we
+often understand by "center" the synergic action of several centers
+differently grouped according to the individual case, our question
+becomes equivalent to: "Are there certain portions of the brain having
+an exclusive or preponderating part in the working of the creative
+imagination?" Even in this form the question is hardly acceptable.
+Indeed, the imagination is not a primary and relatively simple function
+like that of visual, auditory and other sensations. We have seen that it
+is a state of tertiary formation and very complex. There is required,
+then, (1) that the elements constituting imagination be determined in a
+rigorous manner, but the foregoing analysis makes no pretense of being
+definitive; (2) that each of these constitutive elements may be strictly
+related to its anatomic conditions. It is evident that we are far from
+possessing the secret of such a mechanism.
+
+An attempt has been made to put the question in a more precise and
+limited form by studying the brains of men distinguished in different
+lines. But this method, in avoiding the difficulty, answers our question
+indirectly only. Most often great inventors possess qualities besides
+imagination indispensable for success (Napoleon, James Watt, etc.). How
+draw a dividing line so as to assign to the imagination only its
+rightful share? In addition, the anatomical determination is beset with
+difficulties.
+
+A method flourishing very greatly about the middle of the nineteenth
+century consisted of weighing carefully a large number of brains and
+drawing various conclusions as to intellectual superiority or
+inferiority from a comparison of the weights. We find on this point
+numerous documents in the special works published during the period
+mentioned. But this method of weights has given rise to so many
+surprises and difficulties in the way of explanation that it has been
+quite necessary to give it up, since we see in it only another element
+of the problem.
+
+Nowadays we attribute the greatest importance to the morphology of the
+brain, to its histological structure, the marked development of certain
+regions, the determination not only of centers but of connections and
+associations between centers. On this last point contemporary anatomists
+have given themselves up to eager researches, and, although the cerebral
+architecture is not conceived by all in the same way, it is proper for
+psychology to note that all with their "centers" or "associational
+system" try to translate into their own language the complex conditions
+of mental life. Since we must choose from among these various anatomical
+views let us accept that of Flechsig, one of the most renowned and one
+having also the advantage of putting directly the problem of the organic
+conditions of the imagination.
+
+We know that Flechsig relies on the embryological method--that is, on
+the development--in the order of time, of nerves and centers. For him
+there exist on the one hand sensitive regions (sensory-motor), occupying
+about a third of the cortical surface; on the other hand,
+association-centers, occupying the remaining part.
+
+So far as the sensory centers are concerned, development occurs in the
+following order: Organic sensations (middle of cerebral cortex), smell
+(base of the brain and part of the frontal lobes), sight (occipital
+lobe), hearing (first temporal). Whence it results that in a definite
+part of the brain the body comes to proper consciousness of its
+impulses, wants, appetites, pains, movements, etc., and that this part
+develops first--"knowledge of the body precedes that of the outside
+world."
+
+In what concerns the associational centers, Flechsig supposes three
+regions: The great posterior center (parieto-occipito-temporal);
+another, much smaller, anterior or frontal; and a middle center, the
+smallest of all (the Island of Reil). Comparative anatomy proves that
+the associational centers are more important than those of sensation.
+Among the lower mammals they develop as we go up the scale: "That which
+makes the psychic man may be said to be the centers of association that
+he possesses." In the new-born child the sensitive centers are isolated,
+and, in the absence of connections between them, the unity of the self
+cannot be manifested; there is a plurality of consciousness.
+
+This much admitted, let us return to our special question, which
+Flechsig asks in these words: "On what does genius rest? Is it based on
+a special structure in the brain, or rather on special irritability?
+that is, according to our present notions, on chemical factors? We may
+hold the first opinion with all possible force. Genius is always united
+to a special structure, to a particular organization of the brain." All
+parts of this organ do not have the same value. It has been long
+admitted that the frontal part may serve as a measure of intellectual
+capacity; but we must allow, contrariwise, that there are other regions,
+"principally a center located under the protuberance at the top of the
+head, which is very much developed in all men of genius whose brains
+have been studied down to our day. In Beethoven, and probably also in
+Bach, the enormous development of this part of the brain is striking. In
+great scientists like Gauss the centers of the posterior region of the
+brain and those of the frontal region are strongly developed. The
+scientific genius thus shows proportions of brain-structure other than
+the artistic genius."[25] There would then be, according to our author,
+a preponderance of the frontal and parietal regions--the former obtain
+especially among artists; the latter among scientists. Already, twenty
+years before Flechsig, Ruedinger had noted the extraordinary development
+of the parietal convolutions in eminent men after a study of eighteen
+brains. All the convolutions and fissures were so developed, said he,
+that the parieto-occipital region had an altogether peculiar character.
+
+By way of summary we must bear in mind that, as regards anatomical
+conditions, even when depending on the best of sources, we can at
+present give only fragmentary, incomplete, hypothetical views.
+
+Let us now go on to the physiology.
+
+
+II
+
+We might have rightly asked whether the physiological states existing
+along with the working of the creative imagination are the cause,
+effect, or merely the accompaniment of this activity. Probably all the
+three conditions are met with. First, concomitance is an accomplished
+fact, and we may consider it as an organic manifestation parallel to
+that of the mind. Again, the employment of artificial means to excite
+and maintain the effervescence of the imagination assigns a causal or
+antecedent position to the physiologic conditions. Lastly, the psychic
+activity may be initial and productive of changes in the organism, or,
+if these already exist, may augment and prolong them.
+
+The most instructive instances are those indicated by very clear
+manifestations and profound modifications of the bodily condition. Such
+are the moments of inspiration or simply those of warmth from work which
+arise in the form of sudden impulses.
+
+The general fact of most importance consists of changes in the blood
+circulation. Increase of intellectual activity means an increase of work
+in the cortical cells, dependent on a congested, sometimes a temporarily
+anaemic state. Hyperaemia seems rather the rule, but we also know that
+slight anaemia increases cortical excitability. "Weak, contracted pulse;
+pale, chilly skin; overheated head; brilliant, sunken, roving eyes,"
+such is the classic, frequently quoted description of the physiological
+state during creative labor. There are numerous inventors who, of their
+own accord, have noted these changes--irregular pulse, in the case of
+Lagrange; congestion of the head, in Beethoven, who made use of cold
+douches to relieve it, etc. This elevation of the vital tone, this
+nervous tension, translates itself also into motor form through
+movements analogous to reflexes, without special end, mechanically
+repeated and always the same in the same man--e.g., movement of the
+feet, hands, fingers; whittling the table or the arms of a chair (as in
+the case of Napoleon when he was elaborating a plan of campaign), etc.
+It is a safety-valve for the excessive flow of nervous impulse, and it
+is admitted that this method of expenditure is not useless for
+preserving the understanding in all its clearness. In a word, increase
+of the cerebral circulation is the formula covering the majority of
+observations on this subject.
+
+Does experimentation, strictly so called, teach us anything on this
+point? Numerous and well-known physiological researches, especially
+those of Mosso, show that all intellectual, and, most of all, emotional,
+work, produces cerebral congestion; that the brain-volume increases, and
+the volume of the peripheral organs diminishes. But that tells us
+nothing particularly about the imagination, which is but a special case
+under the rule. Latterly, indeed, it has been proposed to study
+inventors by an objective method through the examination of their
+several circulatory, respiratory, digestive apparatus; their general
+and special sensibility; the modes of their memory and forms of
+association, their intellectual processes, etc. But up to this time no
+conclusion has been drawn from these individual descriptions that would
+allow any generalization. Besides, has an experiment, in the strict
+sense of the word, ever been made at the "psychological moment"? I know
+of none. Would it be possible? Let us admit that by some happy chance
+the experimenter, using all his means of investigation, can have the
+subject under his hand at the exact moment of inspiration--of the
+sudden, fertile, brief creative impulse--would not the experiment itself
+be a disturbing cause, so that the result would be _ipso facto_
+vitiated, or at least unconvincing?
+
+There still remains a mass of facts deserving summary notice--the
+oddities of inventors. Were we to collect only those that may be
+regarded as authentic we could make a thick volume. Despite their
+anecdotal character these evidences do not seem to be unworthy of some
+regard.
+
+It is impossible to enter here upon an enumeration that would be
+endless. After having collected for my own information a large number of
+these strange peculiarities, it seems to me that they are reducible to
+two categories:
+
+(1) Those inexplicable freaks dependent on the individual constitution,
+and more often probably also on experiences in life the memory of which
+has been lost. Schiller, for example, kept rotten apples in his work
+desk.
+
+(2) The others, more numerous, are easy to explain. They are
+physiological means consciously or unconsciously chosen to aid creative
+work; they are auxiliary helpers of the imagination.
+
+The most frequent method consists of artificially increasing the flow of
+blood to the brain. Rousseau would think bare-headed in full sunshine;
+Bossuet would work in a cold room with his head wrapped in furs; others
+would immerse their feet in ice-cold water (Gretry, Schiller). Very
+numerous are those who think "horizontally"--that is, lying stretched
+out and often flattened under their blankets (Milton, Descartes,
+Leibniz, Rossini, etc.)
+
+Some require motor excitation; they work only when walking,[26] or else
+prepare for work by physical exercise (Mozart). For variety's sake, let
+us note those who must have the noise of the streets, crowds, talk,
+festivities, in order to invent. For others there must be external pomp
+and a personal part in the scene (Machiavelli, Buffon). Guido Reni would
+paint only when dressed in magnificent style, his pupils crowded about
+him and attending to his wants in respectful silence.
+
+On the opposite side are those requiring retirement, silence,
+contemplation, even shadowy darkness, like Lamennais. In this class we
+find especially scientists and thinkers--Tycho-Brahe, who for twenty-one
+years scarcely left his observatory; Leibniz, who could remain for
+three days almost motionless in an armchair.
+
+But most methods are too artificial or too strong not to become quickly
+noxious. Every one knows what they are--abuse of wine, alcoholic
+liquors, narcotics, tobacco, coffee, etc., prolonged periods of
+wakefulness, less for increasing the time for work than to cause a state
+of hyperesthesia and a morbid sensibility (Goncourt).
+
+Summing up: The organic bases of the creative imagination, if there are
+any specially its own, remain to be determined. For in all that has been
+said we have been concerned only with some conditions of the general
+working of the mind--assimilation as well as invention. The
+eccentricities of inventors studied carefully and in a detailed manner
+would finally, perhaps, be most instructive material, because it would
+allow us to penetrate into their inmost individuality. Thus, the
+physiology of the imagination quickly becomes pathology. I shall not
+dwell on this, having purposely eliminated the morbid side of our
+subject. It will, however, be necessary to return thereto, touching upon
+it in another part of this essay.
+
+
+III
+
+There remains a problem, so obscure and enigmatic that I scarcely
+venture to approach it, in the analogy that most languages--the
+spontaneous expression of a common thought--establish between
+physiologic and psychic creation. Is it only a superficial likeness, a
+hasty judgment, a metaphor, or does it rest on some positive basis?
+Generally, the various manifestations of mental activity have as their
+precursor an unconscious form from which they arise. The sensitiveness
+belonging to living substance, known by the names heliotropism,
+chemotropism, etc., is like a sketch of sensation and of the reactions
+following it; organic memory is the basis and the obliterated form of
+conscious memory. Reflexes introduce voluntary activity; appetitions and
+hidden tendencies are the forerunners of effective psychology. Instinct,
+on several sides, is like an unconscious and specific trial of reason.
+Has the creative power of the human mind also analogous antecedents, a
+physiological equivalent?
+
+One metaphysician, Froschammer, who has elevated the creative
+imagination to the rank of primary world-principle, asserts this
+positively. For him there is an objective or cosmic imagination working
+in nature, producing the innumerable varieties of vegetable and animal
+forms; transformed into subjective imagination it becomes in the human
+brain the source of a new form of creation. "The very same principle
+causes the living forms to appear--a sort of objective image--and the
+subjective images, a kind of living form."[27] However ingenious and
+attractive this philosophical theory may be, it is evidently of no
+positive value for psychology.
+
+Let us stick to experience. Physiology teaches that generation is a
+"prolonged nutrition," a surplus, as we see so plainly in the lower
+forms of agamous generation (budding, division). The creative
+imagination likewise presupposes a superabundance of psychic life that
+might otherwise spend itself in another way. Generation in the physical
+order is a spontaneous, natural tendency, although it may be stimulated,
+successfully or otherwise, by artificial means. We can say as much of
+the other. This list of resemblances it would be easy to prolong. But
+all this is insufficient for the establishment of a thorough identity
+between the two cases and the solution of the question.
+
+It is possible to limit it, to put it into more precise language. Is
+there a connection between the development of the generative function
+and that of the imagination? Even in this form the question scarcely
+permits any but vague answers. In favor of a connection we may allege:
+
+(1) The well-known influence of puberty on the imagination of both
+sexes, expressing itself in day-dreams, in aspirations toward an
+unattainable ideal,[28] in the genius for invention that love bestows
+upon the least favored. Let us recall also the mental troubles, the
+psychoses designated by the name hebephrenia. With adolescence coincides
+the first flowering of the fancy which, having emerged from its
+swaddling-clothes of childhood, is not yet sophisticated and
+rationalized.
+
+It is not a matter of indifference for the general thesis of the present
+work to note that this development of the imagination depends wholly on
+the first effervescence of the emotional life. That "influence of the
+feelings on the imagination" and of "the imagination on the feelings" of
+which the moralists and the older psychologists speak so often is a
+vague formula for expressing this fact--that the motor element included
+in the images is reinforced.
+
+(2) _Per contra_, the weakening of the generative power and of the
+constructive imagination coincide in old age, which is, in a word, a
+decay of nutrition, a progressive atrophy. It is proper not to omit the
+influence of castration. According to the theory of Brown-Sequard, it
+produces an abatement of the nutritive functions through the suppression
+of an internal stimulus; and, although its relations to the imagination
+have not been especially studied, it is not rash to admit that it is an
+arresting cause.
+
+However, the foregoing merely establishes, between the functions
+compared, a concomitance in the general course of their evolution and in
+their critical periods; it is insufficient for a conclusion. There
+would be needed clear, authentic and sufficiently numerous observations
+proving that individuals bereft of imagination of the creative type have
+acquired it suddenly through the sole fact of their sexual influences,
+and, inversely, that brilliant imaginations have faded under the
+contrary conditions. We find some of these evidences in Cabanis,[29]
+Moreau de Tours and various alienists; they would seem to be in favor of
+the affirmative, but some seem to me not sure enough, others not
+explicit enough. Despite my investigations on this point, and inquiry of
+competent persons, I do not venture to draw a definite conclusion. I
+leave the question open; it will perhaps tempt another more fortunate
+investigator.
+
+FOOTNOTES:
+
+[25] Flechsig, _Gehirn und Seele_, 1896.
+
+[26] Is it possible that this would explain the fact of Aristotle
+lecturing to his pupils while walking about, thus giving the name
+"peripatetic" to his school and system? (Tr.)
+
+[27] _Die Phantasie als Grundprincip der Weltprocesses_, Muenchen,
+1877. For other details on the subject, see Appendix C.
+
+[28] A passage from Chateaubriand (cited by Paulhan, _Rev. Philos._,
+March, 1898, p. 237) is a typical description of the situation: "The
+warmth of my (adolescent) imagination, my shyness, and solitude,
+caused me, instead of casting myself on something without, to fall
+back upon myself. Wanting a real object, I evoked through the power
+of my desires, a phantom, which thenceforth never left me; I made a
+woman, composed of all the women that I had already seen. That
+charming idea followed me everywhere, though invisible; I conversed
+with her as with a real being; she would change according to my
+frenzy. Pygmalion was less enamored of his statue."
+
+[29] Cabanis, _Rapports du Physique et du Moral_, edition Peisse,
+pp. 248-249, an anecdote that he relates after Buffon. Analogous,
+but less clear, facts may also be found in Moreau de Tours'
+_Psychologie morbide_.
+
+
+
+
+CHAPTER V
+
+THE PRINCIPLE OF UNITY
+
+
+The psychological nature of the imagination would be very imperfectly
+known were we limited to the foregoing analytical study. Indeed, all
+creation whatever, great or small, shows an organic character; it
+implies a unifying, synthetic principle. Every one of the three
+factors--intellectual, emotional, unconscious--works not as an isolated
+fact on its own account; they have no worth save through their union,
+and no signification save through their common bearing. This principle
+of unity, which all invention demands and requires, is at one time
+intellectual in nature, i.e., as a fixed idea; at another time
+emotional, i.e., as a fixed emotion or passion. These terms--fixed
+idea, fixed emotion--are somewhat absolute and require restrictions and
+reservations, which will be made in what follows.
+
+The distinction between the two is not at all absolute. Every fixed idea
+is supported and maintained by a need, a tendency, a desire; i.e., by
+an affective element. For it is idle fancy to believe in the
+_persistence_ of an idea which, by hypothesis, would be a purely
+intellectual state, cold and dry. The principle of unity in this form
+naturally predominates in certain kinds of creation: in the practical
+imagination wherein the end is clear, where images are direct
+substitutes for things, where invention is subjected to strict
+conditions under penalty of visible and palpable check; in the
+scientific and metaphysical imagination, which works with concepts and
+is subject to the laws of rational logic.
+
+Every fixed emotion should realize itself in an idea or image that gives
+it body and systematizes it, without which it remains diffuse; and all
+affective states can take on this permanent form which makes a unified
+principle of them. The simple emotions (fear, love, joy, sorrow, etc.),
+the complex or derived emotions (religious, esthetic, intellectual
+ideas) may equally monopolize consciousness in their own interests.
+
+We thus see that these two terms--fixed idea, fixed emotion--are almost
+equivalent, for they both imply inseparable elements, and serve only to
+indicate the preponderance of one or the other element.
+
+This principle of unity, center of attraction and support of all the
+working of the creative imagination--that is, a subjective principle
+tending to become objectified--is the ideal. In the complete sense of
+the word--not restrained merely to esthetic creation or made synonymous
+with perfection as in ethics--the ideal is a construction in images that
+should become a reality. If we liken imaginative creation to
+physiological generation, the ideal is the ovum awaiting fertilization
+in order to begin its development.
+
+We could, to be more exact, make a distinction between the synthetic
+principle and the ideal conception which is a higher form of it. The
+fixation of an end and the discovery of appropriate means are the
+necessary and sufficient conditions for all invention. A creation,
+whatever it be, that looks only to present success, can satisfy itself
+with a unifying principle that renders it viable and organized, but we
+can look higher than the merely necessary and sufficient.
+
+The ideal is the principle of unity in motion in its historic evolution;
+like all development, it advances or recedes according to the times.
+Nothing is less justified than the conception of a fixed archetype (an
+undisguised survival of the Platonic Ideas), illuminating the inventor,
+who reproduces it as best he can. The ideal is a nonentity; it arises in
+the inventor and through him; its life is a _becoming_.
+
+Psychologically, it is a construction in images belonging to the merely
+sketched or outlined type.[30] It results from a double activity,
+negative and positive, or dissociation and association, the first cause
+and origin of which is found in a _will that it shall be so_; it is the
+motor tendency of images in the nascent state engendering the ideal.
+The inventor cuts out, suppresses, sifts, according to his temperament,
+character, taste, prejudices, sympathies and antipathies--in short, his
+_interest_. In this separation, already studied, let us note one
+important particular. "We know nothing of the complex psychic production
+that may simply be the sum of component elements and in which they would
+remain with their own characters, with no modification. The nature of
+the components disappears in order to give birth to a novel phenomenon
+that has its own and particular features. The construction of the ideal
+is not a mere grouping of past experiences; in its totality it has its
+own individual characteristics, among which we no more see the composing
+lines than we see the components, oxygen and hydrogen, in water. In no
+scientific or artistic production, says Wundt, does the whole appear as
+made up of its parts, like a mosaic."[31] In other words, it is a case
+of mental chemistry. The exactness of this expression, which is due, I
+believe, to J. Stuart Mill, has been questioned. Still it answers to
+positive facts; for example, in perception, to the phenomena of contrast
+and their analogues; juxtaposition or rapid succession of two different
+colors, two different sounds, of tactile, olfactory, gustatory
+impressions different in quality, produces a particular state of
+consciousness, similar to a combination. Harmony or discord does not,
+indeed, exist in each separate sound, but only in the relations and
+sequence of sounds--it is a _tertium quid_. We have heretofore, in the
+discussion of association of ideas, very frequently represented the
+states of consciousness as fixed elements that approach one another,
+cohere, separate, come together anew, but always unalterable, like
+atoms. It is not so at all. Consciousness, says Titchener, resembles a
+fresco in which the transition between colors is made through all kinds
+of intermediate stages of light and shade.... The idea of a pen or of an
+inkwell is not a stable thing clearly pictured like the pen or inkwell
+itself. More than any one else, William James has insisted on this point
+in his theory of "fringes" of states of consciousness. Outside of the
+given instances we could find many others among the various
+manifestations of the mental life. It is not, then, at all chimerical to
+assume in psychology an equivalent of chemical combination. In a complex
+state there is, in addition to the component elements, the result of
+their reciprocal influences, of their varying relations. Too often we
+forget this resultant.
+
+At bottom the ideal is an individual concept. If objection is offered
+that an ideal common to a large mass of men is a fact of common
+experience (e.g., idealists and realists in the fine arts, and even
+more so religious, moral, social and political concepts, etc.), the
+answer is easy: There are families of minds. They have a common ideal
+because, in certain matters, they have the same way of feeling and
+thinking. It is not a transcendental idea that unites them; but this
+result occurs because from their common aspirations the collective ideal
+becomes disengaged; it is, in scholastic terminology, a _universale post
+rem_.
+
+The ideal conception is the first moment of the creative act, which is
+not yet battling with the conditions of the actual. It is only the
+internal vision of an individual mind that has not yet been projected
+externally with a form and body. We know how the passage from the
+internal to the external life has given rise among inventors to
+deceptions and complaints. Such was the imaginative construction that
+could not, unchanged, enter into its mould and become a reality.
+
+Let us now examine the various forms of this coagulating[32] principle
+in advancing from the lowest to the highest, from the unity vaguely
+anticipated to the absolute and tyrannical masterful unity. Following a
+method that seems to me best adapted for these ill-explained questions I
+shall single out only the principal forms, which I have reduced to
+three--the unstable, the organic or middle, and the extreme or
+semi-morbid unity.
+
+(1) The unstable form has its starting point directly and immediately in
+the reproductive imagination without creation. It assembles its
+elements somewhat by chance and stitches together the bits of our life;
+it ends only in beginnings, in attempts. The unity-principle is a
+momentary disposition, vacillating and changing without cessation
+according to the external impressions or modifications of our vital
+conditions and of our humor. By way of example let us recall the state
+of the day-dreamer building castles in the air; the delirious
+constructions of the insane, the inventions of the child following all
+the fluctuations of chance, of its caprice; the half-coherent dreams
+that seem to the dreamer to contain a creative germ. In consequence of
+the extreme frailty of the synthetic principle the creative imagination
+does not succeed in accomplishing its task and remains in a condition
+intermediate between simple association of ideas and creation proper.
+
+(2) The organic or middle form may be given as the type of the unifying
+power. Ultimately it reduces itself to attention and presupposes nothing
+more, because, thanks to the process of "localization," which is the
+essential mark of attention, it makes itself a center of attraction,
+grouping about the leading idea the images, associations, judgments,
+tendencies and voluntary efforts. "Inspiration," the poet Grillparzer
+used to say, "is a concentration of all the forces and capacities upon a
+single point which, for the time being, should represent the world
+rather than enclose it. The reinforcement of the state of the mind comes
+from the fact that its several powers, instead of spreading themselves
+over the whole world, are contained within the bounds of a single
+object, touch one another, reciprocally help and reinforce each
+other."[33] What the poet here maintains as regards esthetics only is
+applicable to all the _organic_ forms of creation--that is to those
+ruled by an immanent logic, and, like them, resembling works of Nature.
+
+In order to leave no doubt as to the identity of attention and
+imaginative synthesis, and in order to show that it is normally the true
+unifying principle, we offer the following remarks:
+
+Attention is at times spontaneous, natural, without effort, simply
+dependent on the interest that a thing excites in us--lasting as long as
+it holds us in subjection, then ceasing entirely. Again, it is
+voluntary, artificial, an imitation of the other, precarious and
+intermittent, maintained with effort--in a word, laborious. The same is
+true of the imagination. The moment of inspiration is ruled by a perfect
+and spontaneous unity; its impersonality approaches that of the forces
+of Nature. Then appears the personal moment, the detailed working and
+long, painful, intermittent resumptions, the miserable turns of which so
+many inventors have described. The analogy between the two cases seems
+to me incontestable.
+
+Next let us note that psychologists always adduce the same examples when
+they wish to illustrate on the one hand, the processes of the
+persistent, tenacious attention, and, on the other hand, the
+developmental labor without which creative work does not come to pass:
+"Genius is only long patience," the saying of Newton; "always thinking
+of it," and like expressions of d'Alembert, Helmholtz and others,
+because in the one case as in the other the fundamental condition is the
+existence of a fixed, ever-active idea, notwithstanding its relaxations
+and its incessant disappearances into the unconscious with return to
+consciousness.
+
+(3) The extreme form, which from its nature is semi-morbid, becomes in
+its highest degree plainly pathological; the unifying principle changes
+to a condition of obsession.
+
+The normal state of our mind is a plurality of states of consciousness
+(polyideism). Through association there is a radiation in every
+direction. In this totality of coexisting images no one long occupies
+first place; it is driven away by others, which are displaced in turn by
+still others emerging from the penumbra. On the contrary, in attention
+(relative monoideism) a single image retains first place for a long time
+and tends to have the same importance again. Finally, in a condition of
+obsession (absolute monoideism) the fixed idea defies all rivalry and
+rules despotically. Many inventors have suffered painfully this tyranny
+and have vainly struggled to break it. The fixed idea, once settled,
+does not permit anything to dislodge it save for the moment and with
+much pain. Even then it is displaced only apparently, for it persists in
+the unconscious life where it has thrust its deep roots.
+
+At this stage the unifying principle, although it can act as a stimulus
+for creation, is no longer normal. Consequently, a natural question
+arises: Wherein is there a difference between the obsession of the
+inventor and the obsession of the insane, who most generally destroys in
+place of creating?
+
+The nature of fixed ideas has greatly occupied contemporary alienists.
+For other reasons and in their own way they, too, have been led to
+divide obsession into two classes, the intellectual and emotional,
+according as the idea or the affective state predominates. Then they
+have been led to ask: Which of these two elements is the primitive one?
+For some it is the idea. For others, and it seems that these are the
+more numerous, the affective state is in general the primary fact; the
+obsession always rests on a basis of morbid emotion and in a retention
+of impressions.[34]
+
+But whatever opinion we may hold on this point, the difficulty of
+establishing a dividing line between the two forms of obsession above
+mentioned remains the same. Are there characters peculiar to each one?
+
+It has been said: "The physiologically fixed idea is normally longed
+for, often sought, in all cases accepted, and it does not break the
+unity of the self." It does not impose itself fatally on consciousness;
+the individual knows the value thereof, knows where it leads him, and
+adapts his conduct to its requirements. For example, Christopher
+Columbus.
+
+The pathological fixed idea is "parasitic," automatic, discordant,
+irresistible. Obsession is only a special case of psychic
+disintegration, a kind of doubling of consciousness. The individual
+becomes a person "possessed," whose self has been confiscated for the
+sake of the fixed idea, and whose submission to his situation is wrought
+with pain.
+
+In spite of this parallel the distinguishing criterion between the two
+is very vague, because from the sane to the delirious idea the
+transitions are very numerous. We are obliged to recognize "that with
+certain workers--who are rather taken up with the elaboration of their
+work, and not masters directing it, quitting it, and resuming it at
+their pleasure--an artistic, scientific, or mechanical conception
+succeeds in haunting the mind, imposing itself upon it even to the
+extent of causing suffering." In reality, pure psychology is unable to
+discover a positive difference between obsession leading to creative
+work and the other forms, because in both cases the mental mechanism is,
+at bottom, the same. The criterion must be sought elsewhere. For that we
+must go out of the internal world and proceed objectively. We must judge
+the fixed idea not in itself but by its effects. What does it produce in
+the practical, esthetic, scientific, moral, social, religious field? It
+is of value according to its fruits. If objection be made to this change
+of front we may, in order to stick to a strictly psychological point of
+view, state that it is certain that as soon as it passes beyond a middle
+point, which it is difficult to determine, the fixed idea profoundly
+troubles the mechanism of the mind. In imaginative persons this is not
+rare, which partly explains why the pathological theory of genius (of
+which we shall speak later) has been able to rally so many to its
+support and to allege so many facts in its favor.
+
+FOOTNOTES:
+
+[30] For the distinction between this form of imagination and the
+two others (fixed, objectified), I refer the reader to the
+Conclusion of this work, where the subject will be treated in
+detail.
+
+[31] Colozza, _L'immaginazione nella Scienza_, Rome, 1900, pp. 111
+ff.
+
+[32] This unifying, organizing, creative principle is so active in
+certain minds that, placed face to face with any work whatever--novel,
+picture, monument, scientific or philosophic theory, financial or
+political institution--while believing that they are merely
+considering it, they spontaneously remake it. This characteristic of
+their psychology distinguishes them from mere critics.
+
+[33] Oelzelt-Newin, _op. cit._, p. 49.
+
+[34] Pitres et Regis, _Semeiologie des obsessions et des idees
+fixes_, 1878. Seglas, _Lecons cliniques sur les maladies mentales_,
+1895. Raymond et Janet, _Nevroses et idees fixes_, 1898.
+
+
+
+
+SECOND PART
+
+THE DEVELOPMENT OF THE IMAGINATION.
+
+
+
+
+CHAPTER I
+
+IMAGINATION IN ANIMALS
+
+
+Up to this point the imagination has been treated analytically only.
+This process alone would give us but a very imperfect idea of its
+essentially concrete and lively nature were we to stop here. So this
+part continues the subject in another shape. I shall attempt to follow
+the imagination in its ascending development from the lowest to the most
+complex forms, from the animal to the human infant, to primitive man,
+thence to the highest modes of invention. It will thus be exhibited in
+the inexhaustible variety of its manifestations which the abstract and
+simplifying process of analysis does not permit us to suspect.
+
+
+I
+
+I shall not dwell at length on the imagination of animals, not only
+because the question is much involved but also because it is hardly
+liable to a positive solution. Even eliminating mere anecdotes and
+doubtful observations, there is no lack of verified and authentic
+material, but it still remains to interpret them. As soon as we begin to
+conjecture we know how difficult it is to divest ourselves of all
+anthropomorphism.
+
+The question has been formulated, even if not treated, with much system
+by Romanes in his _Mental Evolution in Animals_.[35] Taking
+"imagination" in its broadest sense, he recognizes four stages:
+
+1. Provoked revival of images. For example, the sight of an orange
+reminds one of its taste. This is a low form of memory, resting on
+association by contiguity. It is met with very far down in the animal
+scale, and the author furnishes abundant proof of it.
+
+2. Spontaneous revival. An object present calls up an absent object.
+This is a higher form of memory, frequent in ants, bees, wasps, etc.,
+which fact explains the mistrustful sagacity of wild animals. At night,
+the distant baying of a hound stops the fox in his course, because all
+the dangers he has undergone are represented in his mind.
+
+These two stages do not go beyond memory pure and simple, i.e.,
+reproductive imagination. The other two constitute the higher
+imagination.
+
+3. The capacity of associating absent images, without suggestion derived
+from without, through an internal working of the mind. It is the lower
+and primitive form of the creative imagination, which may be called a
+passive synthesis. In order to establish its existence, Romanes reminds
+us that dreams have been proven in dogs, horses, and a large number of
+birds; that certain animals, especially in anger, seem to be subject to
+delusions and pursued by phantoms; and lastly, that in some there is
+produced a condition resembling nostalgia, expressing itself in a
+violent desire to return to former haunts, or in a wasting away
+resulting from the absence of accustomed persons and things. All these
+facts, especially the latter, can hardly be explained without a vivid
+recollection of the images of previous life.
+
+4. The highest stage consists of intentionally reuniting images in order
+to make novel combinations from them. This may be called an active
+synthesis, and is the true creative imagination. Is this sometimes found
+in the animal kingdom? Romanes very clearly replies, no; and not without
+offering a plausible reason. For creation, says he, there must first be
+capacity for abstraction, and, without speech, abstraction is very weak.
+One of the conditions for creative imagination is thus wanting in the
+higher animals.
+
+We here come to one of those critical moments, so frequent in animal
+psychology, when one asks, Is this character exclusively human, or is it
+found in embryo in lower forms? Thus it has been possible to support a
+theory opposing that of Romanes. Certain animals, says Oelzelt-Newin,
+fulfill all the conditions necessary for creative imagination--subtle
+senses, good memory, and appropriate emotional states.[36] This
+assertion is perhaps true, but it is purely dialectic. It is equivalent
+to saying that the thing is possible; it does not establish it as a
+fact. Besides, is it very certain that all the conditions for creative
+imagination are present here, since we have just shown that there is
+lack of abstraction? The author, who voluntarily limits his study to
+birds and the construction of their nests, maintains, against Wallace
+and others, that nest-building requires "the mysterious synthesis of
+representations." We might with equal reason bring the instances of
+other building animals (bees, wasps, white ants, the common ants,
+beavers, etc.). It is not unreasonable to attribute to them an
+anticipated representation of their architecture. Shall we say that it
+is "instinctive," consequently unconscious? At least, may we not group
+under this head, changes and adaptations to new conditions which these
+animals succeed in applying to the typical plans of their construction?
+Observations and even systematic experiments (like those of Huber,
+Forel, _et al._) show that, reduced to the alternative of the
+impossibility of building or the modification of their habits, certain
+animals modify them. Judging from this, how refuse them invention
+altogether? This contradicts in no way the very just reservation of
+Romanes. It is sufficient to remark that abstraction or dissociation has
+stages, that the simplest are accessible to the animal intelligence. If,
+in the absence of words, the logic of concepts is forbidden it, there
+yet remains the logic of images,[37] which is sufficient for slight
+innovations. In a word, animals can invent according to the extent that
+they can dissociate.
+
+In our opinion, if we may with any truthfulness attribute a creative
+power to animals, we must seek it elsewhere. Generally speaking, we
+attribute only a mediocre importance to a manifestation that might very
+well be the proper form of animal fancy. It is purely motor, and
+expresses itself through the various kinds of play.
+
+Although play may be as old as mankind, its psychology dates only from
+the nineteenth century. We have already seen that there are three
+theories concerning its nature--it is "expenditure of superfluous
+activity," "a mending, restoring of strength, a recuperation," "an
+apprenticeship, a preliminary exercise for the active functions of life
+and for the development of our natural gifts."[38] The last position,
+due to Groos, does not rule out the other two; it holds the first valid
+for the young, the second for adults; but it comprehends both in a more
+general explanation.
+
+Let us leave this doctrinal question in order to call attention to the
+variety and richness of form of play in the animal world. In this
+respect the aforementioned book of Groos is a rich mine of evidence to
+which I would refer the reader. I limit myself to summing up his
+classification. He distinguishes nine classes of play, viz.: (1) Those
+that are at bottom experimental, consisting of trials at hazard without
+immediate end, often giving the animal a certain knowledge of the
+properties of the external world. This is the introduction to an
+experimental physics, optics, and mechanics for the brood of animals.
+(2) Movements or changes of place executed of their own accord--a very
+general fact as is proven by the incessant movements of butterflies,
+flies, birds, and even fishes, which often appear to play in the water
+rather than to seek prey; the mad running of horses, dogs, etc., in free
+space. (3) Mimicry of hunting, i.e., playing with a living or dead
+prey: the dog and cat following moving objects, a ball, feather, etc.
+(4) Mimic battles, teasing and fighting without anger. (5) Architectural
+art, revealing itself especially in the building of nests: certain birds
+ornament them with shining objects (stones, bits of glass), by a kind of
+anticipation of the esthetic feeling. (6) Doll-play is universal in
+mankind, whether civilized or savage. Groos believes he has found its
+equivalent in certain animals. (7) Imitation through pleasure, so
+familiar in monkeys (grimaces); singing-birds which counterfeit the
+voices of a large number of beasts. (8) Curiosity, which is the only
+mental play one meets in animals--the dog watching, from a wall or
+window, what is going on in the street. (9) Love-plays, "which differ
+from the others in that they are not mere exercises, but have in view a
+real object." They have been well-known since Darwin's time, he
+attributing to them an esthetic value which has been denied by Wallace,
+Tylor, Lloyd Morgan, Wallaschek, and Groos.
+
+Let us recapitulate in thought the immense quantity of motor expressions
+included in these nine categories and let us note that they have the
+following characters in common: They are grouped in combinations that
+are often new and unforeseen; they are not a repetition of daily life,
+acts necessary for self-preservation. At one time the movements are
+combined simultaneously (exhibition of beautiful colors), again (and
+most often) successively (amorous parades, fights, flight, dancing,
+emission of noises, sounds or songs); but, under one form or another,
+there is _creation_, _invention_. Here, the imagination acts in its
+purely motor character; it consists of a small number of images that
+become translated into actions, and serve as a center for their
+grouping; perhaps even the image itself is hardly conscious, so that all
+is limited to a spontaneous production and a collection of motor
+phenomena.
+
+It will doubtless be said that this form of imagination belongs to a
+very shallow, poor psychology. It cannot be otherwise. It is necessary
+that imaginative production be found reduced to its simplest expression
+in animals, and the motor form must be its special characteristic mark.
+It cannot have any others for the following reasons: incapacity for the
+work that necessarily precedes abstraction or dissociation, breaking
+into bits the data of experience, making them raw material for the
+future construction; lack of images, and especially fewness of possible
+combinations of images. This last point is proven alike from the data of
+animal psychology and of comparative anatomy. We know that the nervous
+elements in the brain serving as connections between sensory
+regions--whether one conceive of them as centers (Flechsig), or as
+bundles of commisural fibers (Meynert, Wernicke)--are hardly outlined in
+the lower mammalia and attain only a mediocre development in the higher
+forms.
+
+By way of corroboration of the foregoing, let us compare the higher
+animals with young children: this comparison is not based on a few
+far-fetched analogies, but in a thorough resemblance in nature. Man,
+during the first years of his life, has a brain but slightly
+differentiated, especially as regards connections, a very poor supply of
+images, a very weak capacity for abstraction. His intellectual
+development is much inferior to that of reflex, instinctive, impulsive,
+and imitative movements. In consequence of this predominance of the
+motor system, the simple and imperfect images, in children as in
+animals, tend to be immediately changed into movements. Even most of
+their inventions in play are greatly inferior to those enumerated above
+under nine distinct heads.
+
+A serious argument in favor of the prevalence of imagination of the
+motor type in the child is furnished by the principal part taken by
+movements in infantile insanity: a remark made by many alienists. The
+first stage of this madness, they say, is found in the convulsions that
+are not merely a physical ailment, but "a muscular delirium." The
+disturbance of the automatic and instinctive functions of the child is
+so often associated with muscular disturbances that at this age the
+mental disorders correspond to the motor ganglionic centers situated
+below those parts that later assume the labor of analysis and of
+imagination. The disturbances are in the primary centers of organization
+and according to the symptoms lack those analytic or constructive
+qualities, those ideal forms, that we find in adult insanity. If we
+descend to the lowest stage of human life--to the baby--we see that
+insanity consists almost entirely of the activity of a muscular group
+acting on external objects. The insane baby bites, kicks, and these
+symptoms are the external measure of the degree of its madness.[39] Has
+not chorea itself been called a muscular insanity?
+
+Doubtless, there likewise exists in the child a sensorial madness
+(illusions, hallucinations); but by reason of its feeble intellectual
+development the delirium causes a disorder of movements rather than of
+images; its insane imagination is above all a motor insanity.
+
+To hold that the creative imagination belonging to animals consists of
+new combinations of movements is certainly an hypothesis. Nevertheless,
+I do not believe that it is merely a mental form without foundation, if
+we take into account the foregoing facts. I consider it rather as a
+point in favor of the motor theory of invention. It is a singular
+instance in which the original form of creation is shown bare. If we
+wanted to discover it, it would be necessary to seek it where it is
+reduced to the greatest simplicity--in the animal world.
+
+FOOTNOTES:
+
+[35] Chapter X.
+
+[36] _Op. cit._, Appendix.
+
+[37] For a more detailed study of this subject, the reader is
+referred to the author's _Evolution of General Ideas_ (English
+trans., Open Court Publishing Co., Chicago), chapter I, section I.
+
+[38] A rather extended study of the subject by H. A. Carr will be
+found in the _Investigations of the Department of Psychology and
+Education of the University of Colorado_, vol. I, Number 2, 1902.
+The late Professor Arthur Allin devoted much time to the
+investigation of play. See his brief article entitled "Play" in the
+_University of Colorado Studies_, vol. I, 1902, pp. 58-73. (Tr.)
+
+[39] Hack Tuke, "Insanity of Children," in _Dictionary of
+Psychological Medicine_.
+
+
+
+
+CHAPTER II
+
+THE CREATIVE IMAGINATION IN THE CHILD
+
+
+At what age, in what form, under what conditions does the creative
+imagination make its appearance? It is impossible to answer this
+question, which, moreover, has no justification. For the creative
+imagination develops little by little out of pure reproduction by an
+evolutionary process, not by sudden eruption. Nevertheless, its
+evolution is very slow on account of causes both organic and
+psychological.
+
+We could not dwell long on the organic causes without falling into
+tiresome repetitions. The new-born infant is a spinal being, with an
+unformed diffluent brain, composed largely of water. Reflex life itself
+is not complete in him, and the cortico-motor system only hinted at; the
+sensory centers are undifferentiated, the associational systems remain
+isolated for a long time after birth. We have given above Flechsig's
+observation on this point.
+
+The psychological causes reduce themselves to the necessity for a
+consolidation of the primary and secondary operations of the mind,
+without which the creative imagination cannot take form. To be precise,
+we might distinguish, as does Baldwin, four epochs in the mental
+development of the child: (1) affective (rudimentary sensory processes,
+pleasures and pains, simple motor adaptations); (2) and (3) objective,
+in which the author establishes two grades, (a) appearance of special
+senses, of memory, instincts primarily defensive, and imitation; (b)
+complex memory, complicated movements, offensive activities, rudimentary
+will; (4) subjective or final (conscious thought, constitutive will,
+ideal emotions). If we accept this scheme as approximately correct, the
+_moment_ of imagination must be assigned to the third period (the second
+stage of the objective epoch) which fulfills all the sufficient and
+necessary conditions for its origination and for its rise above pure
+reproduction.
+
+Whatever the propitious age may be, the study of the child-imagination
+is not without difficulties. In order to enter into the child-mind, we
+must become like a child; as it is, we are limited to an interpretation
+of it in terms of the adult, with much false interpretation possible,
+agreeing too much or too little with the facts. Furthermore, the
+children studied live and grow up in a civilized environment. The result
+is that the development of their imagination is rarely unhampered and
+complete; for as soon as their fancy passes the middle level, the
+rationalizing education of parents and teachers is eager to master and
+control it. In truth it gives its full measure and reveals itself in
+the fulness of growth only among primitive peoples. With us it is
+checked in its flight by an antagonistic power, which treats it as a
+harbinger of insanity. Finally, children are not equally well-suited for
+this study; we must make a distinction between the imaginative and
+non-imaginative, and the latter should be eliminated.
+
+When we have thus chosen suitable subjects, observation shows from the
+start sufficiently distinct varieties, different orientations of the
+imagination depending on intellectual causes, such as the predominance
+of visual or acoustic or tactile-motor images making for mechanical
+invention; or dependent on emotional causes, that is, of character,
+according as the latter is timid, joyous, exuberant, retired, healthy,
+sickly, etc.
+
+If we now attempt to follow the development of the child-imagination, we
+may distinguish four principal stages, without assigning them,
+otherwise, a rigorous chronological order.
+
+1. The first stage consists of the passage from passive to creative
+imagination. Its history would be long were we to include all the hybrid
+forms that are made up partly of memories, partly of new groupings,
+being at the same time repetition and construction. Even in the adult,
+they are very frequent. I know a person who is always afraid of being
+smothered, and for this reason urgently asks that in his coffin his
+shirt be not tight at the neck: this odd prepossession of the mind
+belongs neither to memory nor to imagination. This particular case
+illustrates in a very clear form the nature of the first flights of the
+mind attempting to exercise its imaginative powers. Without enumerating
+other facts of this kind, it is more desirable to follow the
+imagination's development, limiting ourselves to two forms of the
+psychic life--perception and illusion. The necessary presence of the
+image in these two forms has been so often proven by contemporary
+psychology that a few words to recall this to mind will be sufficient.
+
+There seems to be a radical difference between perception, which seizes
+reality, and imagination. Nevertheless, it is generally admitted that in
+order to rise above sensation to perception, there must be a synthesis
+of images. To put it more simply, two elements are required--one, coming
+from without, the physiological stimulus acting on the nerves and the
+sensory centers, which becomes translated in consciousness through the
+vague state that goes by the name "sensation"; the other, coming from
+within, adds to the sensations present appropriate images, remnants of
+former experiences. So that perception requires an apprenticeship; we
+must feel, then imperfectly perceive, in order to finally perceive well.
+The sensory datum is only a fraction of the total fact; and in the
+operation we call "perceiving," that is, apprehending an object
+directly, a part only of the object is represented.
+
+This, however, does not go beyond reproductive imagination. The decisive
+step is taken in illusion. We know that illusion has as a basis and
+support a modification of the external senses which are metamorphosed,
+amplified by an immediate construction of the mind: a branch of a tree
+becomes a serpent, a distant noise seems the music of an orchestra.
+Illusion has as broad a field as perception, since there is no
+perception but may undergo this erroneous transformation, and it is
+produced by the same mechanism, but with interchange of the two terms.
+In perception, the chief element is the sensory, and the representative
+element is secondary; in illusion, we have just the opposite condition:
+what one takes as perceived is merely imagined--the imagination assumes
+the principal role. Illusion is the type of the transitional forms, of
+the mixed cases, that consist of constructions made up of memories,
+without being, in the strict sense, creations.
+
+2. The creative imagination asserts itself with its peculiar
+characteristics only in the second stage, in the form of animism or the
+attributing of life to everything. This turn of the mind is already
+known to us, though mentioned only incidentally. As the state of the
+child's mind at that period resembles that which in primitive man
+creates myths, we shall return to it in the next chapter. Works on
+psychology abound in facts demonstrating that this primitive tendency to
+attribute life and even personality to everything is a necessary phase
+that the mind must undergo--long or short in duration, rich or poor in
+inventions, according to the level of the child's imagination. His
+attitude towards his dolls is the common example of this state, and
+also the best example, because it is universal, being found in all
+countries without exception, among all races of men. It is needless to
+pile up facts on an uncontroverted point.[40] Two will suffice; I choose
+them on account of their extravagance, which shows that at this
+particular moment animism, in certain minds, can dare anything. "One
+little fellow, aged one year eight months, conceived a special fondness
+for the letter W, addressing it thus: 'Dear old boy W.' Another little
+boy well on in his fourth year, when tracing a letter L, happened to
+slip, so that the horizontal limb formed an angle, thus:
+
+    |
+    |
+    +---+
+        |
+
+He instantly saw the resemblance to the sedentary human form, and said:
+'Oh, he's sitting down.' Similarly, when he made an F turn the wrong way
+and then put the correct form to the left, thus,
+
+    +---   ---+
+    |         |
+    +--     --+
+    |         |
+
+he exclaimed, 'They're talking together!'" One of Sully's correspondents
+says: "I had the habit of attributing intelligence not only to all
+living creatures ... but even to stones and manufactured articles. I
+used to feel how dull it must be for the pebbles in the causeway to lie
+still and only see what was round about. When I walked out with a basket
+for putting flowers in, I used sometimes to pick up a pebble or two and
+carry them out to have a change."
+
+Let us stop a moment in order to try to determine the nature of this
+strange mental state, all the more as we shall meet it again in
+primitive man, and since it presents the creative imagination at its
+beginning.
+
+a. The first element is a fixed idea, or rather, an image, or group of
+images, that takes possession of consciousness to the exclusion of
+everything else:--it is the analogue of the state of suggestion in the
+hypnotized subject, with this sole difference--that the suggestion does
+not come from without, from another, but from the child itself--it is
+auto-suggestion. The stick that the child holds between his legs becomes
+for him an imaginary steed. The poverty of his mental development makes
+all the easier this contraction of the field of his consciousness, which
+assures the supremacy of the image.
+
+b. This has as its basis a reality that it includes. This is an
+important detail to note, because this reality, however tiny, gives
+objectivity to the imaginary creation and incorporates it with the
+external world. The mechanism is like that which produces illusion, but
+with a stable character excluding correction. The child transforms a bit
+of wood or paper into another self, because he perceives only the
+phantom he has created; that is, the images, not the material exciting
+them, haunt his brain.
+
+c. Lastly, this creative power investing the image with all its
+attributes of real existence is derived from a fundamental fact--the
+state of belief, i.e., adherence of the mind founded on purely
+subjective conditions. It does not come within my province to treat
+incidentally such a large question. Neglected by the older physiology,
+whose faculty-method inclined it toward this omission, belief or faith
+has recently become the object of numerous studies.[41] I necessarily
+limit myself to remarking that but for this psychic state, the nature of
+the imagination is totally incomprehensible. The peculiarity of the
+imagination is the production of a reality of human origin, and it
+succeeds therein only because of the faith accompanying the image.
+
+Representation and belief are not completely separated; it is the nature
+of the image to appear at first as a real object. This psychological
+truth, though proven through observation, has made itself acceptable
+only with great difficulty. It has had to struggle on the one hand
+against the prejudices of common-sense for which imagination is
+synonymous with sham and vain appearance and opposed to the real as
+non-being to being; on the other hand, against a doctrine of the
+logicians who maintain that the idea is at first merely conceived with
+no affirmation of existence or non-existence (_apprehensio simplex_).
+This position, legitimate in logic, which is an abstract science, is
+altogether unacceptable in psychology, a concrete science. The
+psychological viewpoint giving the true nature of the image has
+prevailed little by little. Spinoza already asserts "that
+representations considered by themselves contain no errors," and he
+"denies that it is possible to perceive [represent] without affirming."
+More explicitly, Hume assigns belief to our subjective dispositions:
+Belief does not depend on the nature of the idea, but on the manner in
+which we conceive it. Existence is not a quality added to it by us; it
+is founded on habit and is irresistible. The difference between fiction
+and belief consists of a feeling added to the latter but not to the
+former. Dugald Stewart treats the question purely as a psychologist
+following the experimental method. He enumerates very many facts whence
+he concludes that imagination is always accompanied by an act of belief,
+but for which fact the more vivid the image, the less one would believe
+it; but just the contrary happens--the strong representation commands
+persuasion like sensation itself. Finally, Taine treats the subject
+methodically, by studying the nature of the image and its primitive
+character of hallucination.[42] At present, I think, there is no
+psychologist who does not regard as proven that the image, when it
+enters consciousness, has two moments. During the first, it is
+objective, appearing as a full and complete reality; during the second,
+which is definitive, it is deprived of its objectivity, reduced to a
+completely internal event, through the effect of other states of
+consciousness which oppose and finally annihilate its objective
+character. There is an affirmation, then negation; impulse, then
+inhibition.
+
+Faith, being only a mode of existence, an attitude of the mind, owes its
+creative and vivifying power to general dispositions of our
+constitution. Besides the intellectual element which is its content, its
+material--the thing affirmed or denied--there are tendencies and other
+affective factors (desire, fear, love, etc.) giving the image its
+intensity, and assuring it success in the struggle against other states
+of consciousness. There are active faculties that we sometimes designate
+by the name "will," understanding by the term, as James says, not only
+deliberate volition, but all the factors of belief (hope, fear,
+passions, prejudices, sectarian feeling, and so forth),[43] and this has
+justly given rise to the truthful saying that the test of belief is
+action.[44] This explains how in love, religion, in the moral life, in
+politics, and elsewhere, belief can withstand the logical assaults of
+the rationalizing intelligence--its power is found everywhere. It lasts
+as long as the mind waits and consents; but, as soon as these affective
+and active dispositions disappear in life's experience, faith falls with
+them, leaving in its place a formless content, an empty and dead
+representation.
+
+After this, is it necessary to remark that belief depends peculiarly on
+the motor elements of our organization and not on the intellectual? As
+there is no imagination without belief, nor belief without imagination,
+we return by another route to the thesis supported in the first part of
+this essay, that creative activity depends on the motor nature of
+images.
+
+Insofar as concerns the special case of the child, the first of the two
+moments (the affirming) that the image undergoes in consciousness is all
+in all for him, the second (the rectifying) is nothing: there is
+hypertrophy of one, atrophy of the other. For the adult the contrary is
+true--in many cases, indeed, in consequence of experience and habit, the
+first moment, wherein the image should be affirmed as a reality, is only
+virtual, is literally atrophied. We must, however, remark that this
+applies only partially to the ignorant and even less to the savage.
+
+We might, nevertheless, ask ourselves if the child's belief in his
+phantoms is complete, entire, absolute, unreserved. Is the stick that he
+bestrides perfectly identified with a horse? Was Sully's child, that
+showed its doll a series of engravings to choose from, completely
+deceived? It seems that we must rather admit an intermittence, an
+alteration between affirmation and negation. On the one hand, the
+skeptical attitude of those who laugh at it displeases the child, who is
+like a devout believer whose faith is being broken down. On the other
+hand, doubt must indeed arise in him from time to time, for without
+this, rectification could never occur--one belief opposes the other or
+drives it away. This second work proceeds little by little, but then,
+under this form, imagination retreats.
+
+3. The third stage is that of play, which, in chronological order,
+coincides with the one just preceding. As a form of creation it is
+already known to us, but in passing from animals to children, it grows
+in complexity and becomes intellectualized. It is no longer a simple
+combination of images.
+
+Play serves two ends--for experimenting: as such it is an introduction
+to knowledge, gives certain vague notions concerning the nature of
+things; for creating: this is its principal function.
+
+The human child, like the animal, expends itself in movements, forms
+associations new to it, simulates defence, flight, attack; but the child
+soon passes beyond this lower stage, in order to construct by means of
+images (ideally). He begins by imitating: this is a physiological
+necessity, reasons for which we shall give later (see chapter iv.
+_infra_). He constructs houses, boats, gives himself up to large plans;
+but he imitates most in his own person and acts, making himself in turn
+soldier, sailor, robber, merchant, coachman, etc.
+
+To the period of imitation succeed more serious attempts--he acts with a
+"spirit of mastery," he is possessed by his idea which he tends to
+realize. The personal character of creation is shown in that he is
+really interested only in a work that emanates from himself and of
+which he feels himself the cause. B. Perez relates that he wanted to
+give a lesson to his nephew, aged three and a half years, whose
+inventions seemed to him very poor. Perez scratched in the sand a trench
+resembling a river, planted little branches on both banks, and had water
+flow through it; put a bridge across, and launched boats. At each new
+act the child would remain cool, his admiration would always have to be
+waited for. Out of patience, he remarked shortly that "this isn't at all
+entertaining." The author adds: "I believed it useless to persist, and I
+trampled under foot, laughing at myself, my awkward attempt at a
+childish construction."[45] "I had already read it in many a book, but
+this time I had learned from experience that the free initiative of
+children is always superior to the imitations we pretend to make for
+them. In addition, this experience and others like it have taught me
+that their creative force is much weaker than has been said."
+
+4. At the fourth stage appears romantic invention, which requires a more
+refined culture, being a purely internal, wholly imaginative (i.e.,
+cast in images) creation. It begins at about three or four years of age.
+We know the taste of imaginative children for stories and legends, which
+they have repeated to them until surfeited: in this respect they
+resemble semi-civilized people, who listen greedily to rhapsodies for
+hours at a time, experiencing all the emotions appropriate to the
+incidents of the tale. This is the prelude to creation, a semi-passive,
+semi-active state, an apprentice period, which will permit them to
+create in their own turn. Thus the first attempts are made with
+reminiscences, and imitated rather than created.
+
+Of this we find numerous examples in the special works. A child of three
+and a half saw a lame man going along a road, and exclaimed: "Look at
+that poor ole man, mamma, he has dot [got] a bad leg." Then the romance
+begins: He was on a high horse; he fell on a rock, struck his poor leg;
+he will have to get some powder to heal it, etc. Sometimes the invention
+is less realistic. A child of three often longed to live like a fish in
+the water, or like a star in the sky. Another, aged five years nine
+months, having found a hollow rock, invented a fairy story: the hole was
+a beautiful hall inhabited by brilliant mysterious personages, etc.[46]
+
+This form of imagination is not as common as the others. It belongs to
+those whom nature has well endowed. It forecasts a development of mind
+above the average. It may even be the sign of an inborn vocation and
+indicate in what direction the creative activity will be orientated.
+
+Let us briefly recall the creative role of the imagination in language,
+through the intervening of a factor already studied--thinking by
+analogy, an abundant source of often picturesque metaphors. A child
+called the cork of a bottle "door;" a small coin was called by a little
+American a "baby dollar;" another, seeing the dew on the grass, said,
+"The grass is crying."
+
+The extension of the meaning of words has been studied by Taine, Darwin,
+Preyer, and others. They have shown that its psychological mechanism
+depends sometimes on the perception of resemblance, again on association
+by contiguity, processes that appear and intermingle in an unforeseen
+manner. Thus, a child applies the word "mambro" at first to his nurse,
+then to a sewing machine that she uses, then by analogy to an organ that
+he sees on the street adorned with a monkey, then to his toys
+representing animals.[47] We have elsewhere given more similar cases,
+where we perceive the fundamental difference between thought by imagery
+and rational thought.
+
+To conclude: At this period the imagination is the master-faculty and
+the highest form of intellectual development. It works in two
+directions, one principal--it creates plays, invents romances, and
+extends language; the other secondary--it contains a germ of thought and
+ventures a fanciful explanation of the world which can not yet be
+conceived according to abstract notions and laws.
+
+FOOTNOTES:
+
+[40] One will find a large number of examples in Sully's work,
+_Studies of Childhood_, Chapter ii, entitled "The Age of
+Imagination." Most of the observations given in the present chapter
+have been borrowed from this author.
+
+[41] Apropos of this subject compare especially the recent studies
+by William James, _Varieties of Religious Experience_. (Tr.)
+
+[42] Spinoza, _Ethics_, II, 49, _Scholium_; Hume, _Human
+Understanding_, Part III, Section VII ff.; Dugald Stewart, _Elements
+of the Philosophy of the Human Mind_, Vol. I, Ch. III; Taine, _On
+Intelligence_, Part II.
+
+[43] James, _The Will to Believe and Other Essays_, p. 10.
+
+[44] Payot, _De la croyance_, 139 ff.
+
+[45] B. Perez, _Les trois premieres annees de l'enfant_, p. 323.
+
+[46] Sully, _op. cit._, pp. 59-61. Compayre, _L'evolution
+intellectuelle et morale de l'enfant_, p. 145.
+
+(Some time ago the writer was riding on a train, when the engine,
+for some reason or other, began to slow up, jerking, puffing, almost
+groaning, until it finally came to a full stop. The groaning
+continued. A little girl of about three called to her mother,
+"Too-too sick, too-too sick," and when finally the train started on
+again, the child was overjoyed that "too-too" was well again. (Tr.))
+
+[47] Sully, _op. cit._, p. 164.
+
+
+
+
+CHAPTER III
+
+PRIMITIVE MAN AND THE CREATION OF MYTHS
+
+
+We come now to a unique period in the history of the development of the
+imagination--its golden age. In primitive man, still confined in
+savagery or just starting toward civilization, it reaches its full bloom
+in the creation of myths; and we are rightly astonished that
+psychologists, obstinately attached to esthetics, have neglected such an
+important form of activity, one so rich in information concerning the
+creative imagination. Where, indeed, find more favorable conditions for
+knowing it?
+
+Man, prior to civilization, is a purely imaginative being; that is, the
+imagination marks the summit of his intellectual development. He does
+not go beyond this stage, but it is no longer an enigma as in animals,
+nor a transitory phase as in the civilized child who rapidly advances to
+the age of reason; it is a fixed state, permanent and lasting throughout
+life.[48] It is there revealed to us in its entire spontaneity: it has
+free rein; it can create without imitation or tradition; it is not
+imprisoned in any conventional form; it is sovereign. As primitive man
+has knowledge neither of nature nor of its laws, he does not hesitate to
+embody the most senseless imaginings flitting through his brain. The
+world is not, for him, a totality of phenomena subject to laws, and
+nothing limits or hinders him.
+
+This working of the pure imagination, left to itself and unadulterated
+by the intrusion and tyranny of rational elements, becomes translated
+into one form--the creation of myths; an anonymous, unconscious work,
+which, as long as its rule lasts, is sufficient in every way,
+comprehends everything--religion, poetry, history, science, philosophy,
+law.
+
+Myths have the advantage of being the incarnation of pure imagination,
+and, moreover, they permit psychologists to study them objectively.
+Thanks to the labors of the nineteenth century, they offer an almost
+inexhaustible content. While past ages forgot, misunderstood,
+disfigured, and often despised myths as aberrations of the human mind,
+as unworthy of an hour's attention, it is no longer necessary in our
+time to show their interest and importance, even for psychology, which,
+however, has not as yet drawn all the benefit possible from them.
+
+But before commencing the psychological study of the genesis and
+formation of myths considered as an objective emanation of the creative
+imagination, we must briefly summarize the hypotheses at present offered
+for their origin. We find two principal ones--the one, etymological,
+genealogical, or linguistic; the other, ethno-psychological, or
+anthropological.[49]
+
+The first, whose principal though not sole champion is Max Mueller, holds
+that myths are the result of a disease of language--words become things,
+"nomina numina." This transformation is the effect of two principal
+linguistic causes--(a) Polynomy; several words for one thing. Thus the
+sun is designated by more than twenty names in the Vedas; Apollo,
+Phaethon, Hercules are three personifications of the sun; _Varouna_
+(night) and _Yama_ (death) express at first the same conception, and
+have become two distinct deities. In short, every word tends to become
+an entity having its attributes and its legends. (b) Homonomy, a single
+word for several things. The same adjective, "shining," refers to the
+sun, a fountain, spring, etc. This is another source of confusion. Let
+us also add metaphors taken literally, plays upon words, wrong
+construction, etc.
+
+The opponents of this doctrine maintain that in the formation of myths,
+words represent scarcely five per cent. Whatever may be the worth of
+this assertion, the purely philological explanation remains without
+value for psychology: it is neither true nor false--it does not solve
+the question; it merely avoids it. The word is only an occasion, a
+vehicle; without the working of the mind exciting it, nothing would
+change. Moreover, Max Mueller himself has recently recognized this.[50]
+
+The anthropological theory, much more general than the foregoing,
+penetrates further to psychological origins--it leads us to the first
+advances of the human mind. It regards the myth not as an accident of
+primitive life, but as a natural function, a mode of activity proper to
+man during a certain period of his development. Later, the mythic
+creations seem absurd, often immoral, because they are survivals of a
+distant epoch, cherished and consecrated through tradition, habits, and
+respect for antiquity. According to the definition that seems to me best
+adapted for psychology, the myth is "the psychological objectification
+of man in all the phenomena that he can perceive."[51] It is a
+humanization of nature according to processes peculiar to the
+imagination.
+
+Are these two views irreconcilable? It does not seem so to me, provided
+we accept the first as only a partial explanation. In any event, both
+schools agree on one point important for us--that the material for myths
+is furnished by the observation of natural phenomena, including the
+great events of human life: birth, sickness, death, etc. This is the
+objective factor. The creation of myths has its explanation in the
+nature of human imagination--this is the subjective factor. We can not
+deny that most works on mythology have a very decided tendency to give
+the greater importance to the first factor; in which respect they need a
+little psychology. The periodic returns of the dawn, the sun, the moon
+and stars, winds and storms, have their effect also, we may suppose, on
+monkeys, elephants, and other animals supposedly the most intelligent.
+Have they inspired myths? Just the opposite: "the surprising monotony of
+the ideas that the various races have made final causes of phenomena, of
+the origin and destiny of man, whence it results that the numberless
+myths are reduced to a very small number of types,"[52] shows that it is
+the human imagination that takes the principal part and that it is on
+the whole perhaps not so rich as we are pleased to say--that it is even
+very poor, compared to the fecundity of nature.
+
+Let us now study the psychology of this creative activity, reducing it
+to these two questions: How are myths formed? What line does their
+evolution follow?
+
+
+I
+
+The psychology of the origin of the myth, of the work that causes its
+rise, may theoretically, and for the sake of facilitating analysis, be
+regarded as two principal moments--that of creation proper, and that of
+romantic invention.
+
+a. The moment of creation presupposes two inseparable operations which,
+however, we have to describe separately. The first consists of
+attributing life to all things, the second of assigning qualities to all
+things.
+
+Animating everything, that is attributing life and action to everything,
+representing everything to one's self as living and acting--even
+mountains, rocks, and other objects (seemingly) incapable of movement.
+Of this inborn and irresistible tendency there are so many facts in
+proof that an enumeration is needless: it is the rule. The evidence
+gathered by ethnologists, mythologists, and travelers fills large
+volumes. This state of mind does not particularly belong to long-past
+ages. It is still in existence, it is contemporary, and if we would see
+it with our own eyes it is not at all necessary to plunge into virgin
+countries, for there are frequent reversions even in civilized lands. On
+the whole, says Tylor, it must be regarded as conceded that to the lower
+races of humanity the sun and stars, the trees and rivers, the winds and
+clouds, become animated creatures living like men and beasts,
+fulfilling their special function in creation--or rather that what the
+human eye can reach is only the instrument or the matter of which some
+gigantic being, like a man, hidden behind the visible things, makes use.
+The grounds on which such ideas are based cannot be regarded as less
+than a poetic fancy or an ill-understood metaphor; they depend on a vast
+philosophy of nature, certainly rude and primitive, but coherent and
+serious.
+
+The second operation of the mind, inseparable, as we have said, from the
+first, attributes to these imaginary beings various qualities, but all
+important to man. They are good or bad, useful or hurtful, weak or
+powerful, kind or cruel. One remains stupefied before the swarming of
+these numberless genii whom no natural phenomenon, no act of life, no
+form of sickness escapes, and these beliefs remain unbroken even among
+the tribes that are in contact with old civilizations.[53] Primitive man
+lives and moves among the ceaseless phantoms of his own imagination.[54]
+
+Lastly, the psychological mechanism of the creative moment is very
+simple. It depends on a single factor previously studied--thinking by
+analogy. It is a matter first of all--and this is important--of
+conceiving beings analogous to ourselves, cast in our mould, cut after
+our pattern; that is, feeling and acting; then qualifying them and
+determining them according to the attributes of our own nature. But the
+logic of images, very different from that of reason, concludes an
+objective resemblance; it regards as alike, what seem alike; it
+attributes to an internal linking of images, the validity of an
+objective connection between things. Whence arises the discord between
+the imagined world and the world of reality. "Analogies that for us are
+only fancies were for the man of past ages real" (Tylor).
+
+b. In the genesis of myths, the second moment is that of fanciful
+invention. Entities take form; they have a history and adventures: they
+become the stuff for a romance. People of poor and dry imagination do
+not reach the second period. Thus, the religion of the Romans peopled
+the universe with an innumerable quantity of genii. No object, no act,
+no detail, but had its own presiding genius. There was one for
+germinating grain, for sprouting grain, for grain in flower, for
+blighted grain; for the door, its hinges, its lock, etc. There was a
+myriad of misty, formless entities. This is animism arrested at its
+first stage; abstraction has killed imagination.
+
+Who created those legends and tales of adventure constituting the
+subject-matter of mythology? Probably inspired individuals, priests or
+prophets. They came perhaps from dreams, hallucinations, insane
+attacks--they are derived from several sources. Whatever their origin,
+they are the work of imaginative minds _par excellence_ (we shall study
+them later) who, confronted with any event whatever, must, because of
+their nature, construct a romance.
+
+Besides analogy, this imaginative creation has as its principal source
+the associational form already described under the name "constellation."
+We know that it is based on the fact that, in certain cases, the
+arousing of an image-group is the result of a tendency prevailing at a
+given instant over several that are possible. This operation has already
+been expounded theoretically with individual examples in support.[55]
+But in order to gauge its importance, we must see it act in large
+masses. Myths allow us to do this. Ordinarily they have been studied in
+their historical development according to their geographical
+distribution or ethnic character. If we proceed otherwise, if we
+consider only their content--i.e., the very few themes upon which the
+human imagination has labored, such as celestial phenomena, terrestrial
+disturbances, floods, the origin of the universe, of man, etc.--we are
+surprised at the wonderful richness of variety. What diversity in the
+solar myths, or those of creation, of fire, of water! These variations
+are due to multiple causes, which have orientated the imagination now in
+one direction, now in another. Let us mention the principal ones: Racial
+characteristics--whether the imagination is clear or mobile, poor or
+exuberant; the manner of living--totally savage, or on a level of
+civilization; the physical environment--external nature cannot be
+reflected in the brain of a Hindoo in the same way as in that of a
+Scandinavian; and lastly, that assemblage of considerable and unexpected
+causes grouped under the term "chance."
+
+The variable combinations of these different factors, with the
+predominance of one or the other, explain the multiplicity of the
+imaginative conceptions of the world, in contrast to the unity and
+simplicity of scientific conceptions.
+
+
+II
+
+The form of imagination now occupying our attention by reason of its
+non-individual, anonymous, collective character, attains a long
+development that we may follow in its successive phases of ascent,
+climax, and decline. To begin with, is it necessarily inherent in the
+human mind? Are there races or groups of men totally devoid of myths?
+which is a slightly different question from that usually asked, "Are
+there tribes totally devoid of religious thoughts?" Although it is very
+doubtful that there are such now, it is probable that there were in the
+beginning, when man had scarcely left the brute level--at least if we
+agree with Vignoli[56] that we already find in the higher animals
+embryonic forms of animism.
+
+In any event, mythic creation appears early. We can infer this from the
+signs of puerility of certain legends. Savages who could not know
+themselves--the Iroquois, the Australian aborigines, the natives of the
+Andaman Islands--believed that the earth was at first sterile and dry,
+all the water having been swallowed by a gigantic frog or toad which was
+compelled, by queer stratagems, to regurgitate it. These are little
+children's imaginings. Among the Hindoos the same myth takes the form of
+an alluring epic--the dragon watching over the celestial waters, of
+which he has taken possession, is wounded by Indra after a heroic
+battle, and restores them to the earth.
+
+Cosmogonies, Lang remarks, furnish a good example of the development of
+myths; it is possible to mark out stages and rounds according to the
+degree of culture and intelligence. The natives of Oceania believe that
+the world was created and organized by spiders, grasshoppers, and various
+birds. More advanced peoples regard powerful animals as gods in disguise
+(such are certain Mexican divinities). Later, all trace of animal worship
+disappears, and the character of the myth is purely anthropomorphic.[57]
+Kuehn, in a special work, has shown how the successive stages of social
+evolution express themselves in the successive stages of mythology--myths
+of cannibals, of hunters, of herders, land-tillers, sailors. Speaking of
+pure savagery, Max Mueller[58] admits at least two periods--pan-Aryan and
+Indo-Iranian--prior to the Vedic period. In the course of this slow
+evolution the work of the imagination passes little by little from
+infancy, becomes more and more complex, subtle and refined.
+
+In the Aryan race, the Vedic epoch, despite its sacerdotal ritualism, is
+considered as the period _par excellence_ of mythic efflorescence. "The
+myth," says Taine, "is not here (in the Vedas) a disguise, but an
+expression; no language is more true and more supple: it permits a
+glimpse of, or rather causes us to discern, the forms of mist, the
+movements of the air, change of seasons, all the accidents of sky, fire,
+storm: external nature has never found a mode of thought so graceful and
+flexible for reflecting itself thereby in all the inexhaustible variety
+of her appearances. However changeable nature may be, the imagination is
+equally so."[59] It animates everything--not only fire in general,
+_Agni_, but also the seven forms of flame, the wood that lights it, the
+ten fingers of the sacrificing priest, the prayer itself, and even the
+railing surrounding the altar. This is one example among many others.
+The partisans of the linguistic theory have been able to maintain that
+at this moment every word is a myth, because every word is a name
+designating a quality or an act, transformed by the imagination into
+substance. Max Mueller has translated a page of Hesiod, substituting the
+analytic, abstract, rational language of our time for the image-making
+names. Immediately, all the mythical material vanishes. Thus, "Selene
+kisses the sleeping Endymion" becomes the dry formula, "It is night."
+The most skilled linguists often declare themselves unable to change the
+pliant tongue of the imaginative age into our algebraic idioms.[60]
+Thought by imagery cannot remain itself and at the same time take on a
+rational dress.
+
+The mental state that marks the zenith of the free development of the
+imagination, is at present met with only in mystics and in some poets.
+Language has, however, preserved numerous vestiges of it in current
+expressions, the mythic signification of which has been lost--the sun
+rises, the sea is treacherous, the wind is mad, the earth is thirsty,
+etc.
+
+To this triumphant period there succeeds among the races that have made
+progress in evolution, i.e., that have been able to rise above the age
+of (pure) imagination, the period of waning, of regression, of decline.
+In order to understand it and perceive the how and why of it, let us
+first note that myths are reducible to two great categories:
+
+a. The explicative myths, arising from utility, from the necessity of
+knowing. _These undergo a radical transformation._
+
+b. The non-explicative myths, resulting from a need of luxury, from a
+pure desire to create: these undergo only a _partial_ transformation.
+
+Let us follow them in the accomplishment of their destinies.
+
+a. The myths of the first class, answering the various needs of knowing
+in order afterwards to act, are much the more numerous.... Is primitive
+man by nature curious? The question has been variously answered; thus,
+Tylor says yes; Spencer, no.[61] The affirmative and negative answers
+are not, perhaps, irreconcilable, if we take account of the differences
+in races. Taking it generally, it is hard to believe that he is not
+curious--he holds his life at that price. He is in the presence of the
+universe just as we are when confronted with an unknown animal or fruit.
+Is it useful or hurtful? He has all the more need for a conception of
+the world since he feels himself dependent on everything. While our
+subordination as regards nature is limited by the knowledge of her laws,
+he is on account of his animism in a position similar to ours before an
+assembly of persons whom we have to approach or avoid, conciliate or
+yield to. It is necessary that he be _practically_ curious--that is
+indispensable for his preservation. There has been alleged the
+indifference of primitive man to the complicated engines of civilization
+(a steamboat, a watch, etc.). This shows, not lack of curiosity, but
+absence of intelligence or interest for what he does not consider
+immediately useful for his needs.
+
+His conception of the world is a product of the imagination, because no
+other is possible for him. The problem is imperatively set, he solves it
+as best he can; the myth is a response to a host of theoretical and
+practical needs. For him, the imaginative explanation takes the place of
+the rational explanation which is yet unborn, and which for great
+reasons can not arise--first, because the poverty of his experience,
+limited to a small circle, engenders a multitude of erroneous
+associations, which remain unbroken in the absence of other experiences
+to contradict and shatter them; secondly, because of the extreme
+weakness of his logic and especially of his conception of causality,
+which most often reduces itself to a _post hoc, ergo propter hoc_.
+Whence we have the thorough subjectivity of his interpretation of the
+world.[62] In short, primitive man makes without exception or reserve,
+and in terms of images, what science makes provisionally, with reserves,
+and by means of concepts--namely, hypotheses.
+
+Thus, the explicative myths are as we see, an epitome of a practical
+philosophy, proportioned to the requirements of the man of the earliest,
+or slightly-cultured ages. Then comes the period of critical
+transformation: a slow, progressive substitution of a rational
+conception of the world for the imaginative conception. It results from
+a work of _depersonification_ of the myth, which little by little loses
+its subjective, anthropomorphic character in order to become all the
+more objective, without ever succeeding therein completely.
+
+This transformation occurs thanks to two principal supports: methodical
+and prolonged observation of phenomena, which suggests the objective
+notion of stability and law, opposed to the caprices of animism
+(example: the work of the ancient astronomers of the Orient); the
+growing power of reflection and of logical rigor, at least in
+well-endowed races.
+
+It does not concern the subject in hand to trace here the fortunes of
+the old battle whereby the imagination, assailed by a rival power, loses
+little by little its position and preponderance in the interpretation of
+the world. A few remarks will suffice.
+
+To begin with, the myth is transformed into philosophic speculation, but
+without total disappearance, as is seen in the mystic speculations of
+the Pythagoreans, in the cosmology of Empedocles, ruled by two
+human-like antitheses, Love and Hate. Even to Thales, an observing,
+positive spirit that calculates eclipses, the world is full of
+_daemons_, remains of primitive animism.[63] In Plato, even leaving out
+his theory of Ideas, the employment of myth is not merely a playful
+mannerism, but a real survival.
+
+This work of elimination, begun by the philosophers, is more firmly
+established in the first attempts of pure science (the Alexandrian
+mathematicians; naturalists like Aristotle; certain Greek physicians).
+Nevertheless, we know how imaginary concepts remained alive in physics,
+chemistry, biology, down to the sixteenth century; we know the bitter
+struggle that the two following centuries witnessed against occult
+qualities and loose methods. Even in our day, Stallo has been able to
+propose to write a treatise "On Myth in Science." Without speaking at
+this time of the hypotheses admitted as such and on account of their
+usefulness, there yet remain in the sciences many latent signs of
+primitive anthropomorphism. At the beginning of the nineteenth century
+people believed in several "properties of matter" that we now regard as
+merely modes of energy. But this latter notion, an expression of
+permanence underneath the various manifestations of nature, is for
+science only an abstract, symbolical formula: if we attempt to embody
+it, to make it concrete and representable, then, whether we will or no,
+it resolves itself into the feeling of muscular effort, that is, takes
+on a human character. To produce no other examples, we see that so far
+as concerns the last term of this slow regression, the imagination is
+not yet completely annulled, although it may have had to recede
+incessantly before a more solid and better armed rival.
+
+b. In addition to the explanatory myths, there are those having no claim
+to be in this class, although they have perhaps been originally
+suggested by some phenomenon of animate or inanimate nature. They are
+much less numerous than the others, since they do not answer multiple
+necessities of life. Such are the epic or heroic stories, popular tales,
+romances (which are found as early as ancient Egypt): it is the first
+appearance of that form of esthetic activity destined later to become
+literature. Here, the mythic activity suffers only a superficial
+metamorphosis--the essence is not changed. Literature is mythology
+transformed and adapted to the variable conditions of civilization. If
+this statement appear doubtful or disrespectful, we should note the
+following.
+
+Historically, from myths wherein there figure at first only divine
+personages, there arise the epics of the Hindoos, Greeks, Scandinavians,
+etc., in which the gods and heroes are confounded, live in the same
+world, on a level. Little by little the divine character is rubbed out;
+the myth approaches the ordinary conditions of human life, until it
+becomes the romantic novel, and finally the realistic story.
+
+Psychologically, the imaginative work that has at first created the gods
+and superior beings before whom man bows because he has unconsciously
+produced them, becomes more and more humanized as it becomes conscious;
+but it cannot cease being a projection of the feelings, ideas, and
+nature of man into the fictitious beings upon whom the belief of their
+creator and of his hearers confers an illusory and fleeting existence.
+The gods have become puppets whose master man feels himself, and whom he
+treats as he likes. Throughout the manifold techniques, esthetics,
+documentary collections, reproductions of the social life, the creative
+activity of the earliest time remains at bottom unchanged. Literature is
+a decadent and rationalized mythology.
+
+
+III
+
+Does the mythic activity of ancient times still exist among civilized
+peoples, unmodified as in literary creation, but in its pure form, as a
+non-individual, collective, anonymous, unconscious, work? Yes; as the
+popular imagination, when creating legends. In passing from natural
+phenomena to historic events and persons, the constructive imagination
+takes a slightly different position which we may characterize thus:
+legend is to myth what illusion is to hallucination.
+
+The psychological mechanism is the same in both cases. Illusion and
+legend are partial imaginations, hallucination and myth are total
+imaginations. Illusion may vary in all shades between exact perception
+and hallucination; legend can run all the way from exact history to pure
+myth. The difference between illusion and hallucination is sometimes
+imperceptible; the same is sometimes true of legend and myth. Sensory
+illusion is produced by an addition of images changing perception;
+legend is also produced by an addition of images changing the historic
+personage or event. The only difference, then, is in the material used;
+in one case, a datum of sense, a natural phenomenon; in the other, a
+fact of history, a human event.
+
+The psychological genesis of legends being thus established in general,
+what, according to the facts, are the unconscious processes that the
+imagination employs for creating them? We may distinguish two principal
+ones.
+
+The first process is a fusion or combination. The myth precedes the
+fact; the historical personage or event enters into the mould of a
+pre-existing myth. "It is necessary that the mythic form be fashioned
+before one may pour into it, in a more or less fluid state, the historic
+metal." Imagination had created a solar mythology long before it could
+be incarnated by the Greeks in Hercules and his exploits. "There was
+historically a Roland, perhaps even an Arthur, but the greater part of
+the great deeds that the poetry of the Middle Ages attributes to them
+had been accomplished long before by mythological heroes whose very
+names had been forgotten."[64] At one time the man is completely hidden
+by the myth and becomes absolutely legendary; again, he assumes only an
+aureole that transfigures him. This is exactly what occurs in the
+simpler phenomenon of sensory illusion: now the real (the perception) is
+swamped by the images, is transformed, and the objective element reduced
+to almost nothing; at another time, the objective element remains
+master, but with numerous deformations.
+
+The second process is idealization, which can act conjointly with the
+other. Popular imagination incarnates in a real man its ideal of
+heroism, of loyalty, of love, of piety, or of cowardice, cruelty,
+wickedness, and other abnormalities. The process is more complex. It
+presupposes in addition to mythic creation a labor of abstraction,
+through which a dominating characteristic of the historic personage is
+chosen and everything else is suppressed, cast into oblivion: the ideal
+becomes a center of attraction about which is formed the legend, the
+romantic tale. Compare the Alexander, the Charlemagne, the Cid of the
+Middle Age traditions to the character of history.
+
+Even much nearer to us, this process of extreme simplification--which
+the law of mental inertia or of least effort is sufficient to
+explain--always persists: Lucretia Borgia remains the type of
+debauchery, Henry IV of good fellowship, etc. The protests of historians
+and the documentary evidence that they produce avail nothing: the work
+of the imagination resists everything.
+
+To conclude: We have just passed over a period of mental evolution
+wherein the creative imagination reigns exclusively, explains
+everything, is sufficient for everything. It has been said that the
+imagination is "a temporary derangement." It seems so to us, although it
+is often an effort toward wisdom, i.e., toward the comprehension of
+things. It would be more correct to say, with Tylor, that it represents
+a state intermediate between that of a man of our time, prosaic and
+well-to-do, and that of a furious madman, or of a man in the delirium of
+fever.
+
+FOOTNOTES:
+
+[48] Primitive man has been defined as "he for whom sensuous data
+and images surpass in importance rational concepts." From this
+standpoint, many contemporary poets, novelists, and artists would be
+primitive. The mental state of the human individual is not enough
+for such a determination; we must also take account of the
+(comparative) simplicity of the social environment.
+
+[49] Let us mention the euhemeristic theory of Herbert Spencer,
+taken up recently by Grant Allen (_The Evolution of the Idea of
+God_, 1897), who brings down all religious and mythic concepts from
+a single origin--the worship of the dead.
+
+[50] "When I tried to briefly characterize mythology in its inner
+nature, I called it a disease of language rather than a disease of
+thought. The expression was strange but intentionally so, meant to
+arouse attention and to provoke opposition. For me, language and
+thought are inseparable." _Nouvelles etudes de Mythologie_, p. 51.
+
+[51] Vignoli, _Mito e Scienza_, p. 27.
+
+[52] Marillier, Preface to the French translation of Andrew Lang's
+_Myth, Ritual, and Religion_.
+
+[53] On this point consult a work very rich in information, W.
+Crooke's book, _Popular Religion and Folk-lore of Northern India_,
+1897.
+
+[54] "The Indian traversing the Montana never feels himself alone.
+Legions of beings accompany him. All of the nature to whom he owes
+his soul speaks to him through the noise of the wind, in the roaring
+of the waterfall. The insect like the bird--everything, even to the
+bending twig wet with dew--for him has language, distinct
+personality. The forest is alive in its depths, has caprices,
+periods of anger; it avoids the thicket under the tread of the
+huntsman, or again presses him more closely, drags him into infected
+swamps, into closed bogs, where miserable goblins exhaust all their
+witchcraft upon him, drink his blood by attaching their lips to the
+wounds made by briers. The Indian knows all that; he knows those
+dread genii by name." Monnier, _Des Andes au Para_, p. 300.
+
+[55] See Part I, Chapter IV.
+
+[56] _Op. cit._, pp. 23-24.
+
+[57] Lang, _op. cit._, I, 162, and _passim_.
+
+[58] Max Mueller, _op cit._, p. 12.
+
+[59] _Nouveaux Essais_, p. 320.
+
+[60] See Lang, _Myth, Ritual and Religion_, I, p. 234, a passage
+from the _Rig-Veda_, with four very different translations by Max
+Mueller, Wilson, Benfrey, and Langlois.
+
+[61] On curiosity as the beginning of knowledge, compare the
+position held by Plato. (Tr.)
+
+[62] On this general subject consult the interesting though somewhat
+general article by Professor John Dewey, "The Interpretation of the
+Savage Mind," in the _Psychological Review_, May, 1903. The author
+justly criticises the current description of savages in negative
+terms, and contends that there is general misunderstanding of the
+true nature of the savage and of his activities. (Tr.)
+
+[63] It is now well accepted that Thales cannot be regarded as
+propounding a materialistic theory when he declares that everything
+is derived from water; for with him, "water" stands not merely for
+the substance that we call chemically "H2O," but for the "spirit
+that is in water" as well--the water-spirit is the _Grundprincip_.
+(Tr.)
+
+[64] Max Mueller, _op. cit._, 39, 47-48, 59-60.
+
+
+
+
+CHAPTER IV
+
+THE HIGHER FORMS OF INVENTION
+
+
+We now pass from primitive to civilized man, from collective to
+individual creation, the characters of which it remains for us to study
+as we find them in great inventors who exhibit them on a large scale.
+Fortunately, we may dismiss the treatment of the oft-discussed,
+never-solved problem of the psychological nature of genius. As we have
+already noted, there enter into its composition factors other than the
+creative imagination, although the latter is not the least among them.
+Besides, great men being exceptions, anomalies, or as the current
+expression has it, "spontaneous variations," we may ask _in limine_
+whether their psychology is explicable by means of simple formulae, as
+with the average man, or whether even monographs teach us no more
+concerning their nature than general theories that are never applicable
+to all cases. Taking genius, then, as synonymous with great inventor,
+accepting it _de facto_ historically and psychologically, our task is
+limited to the attempt to separate characters that seem, from
+observation and experiment, to belong to it as peculiarly its own.
+
+Putting aside vague dissertations and dithyrambics in favor of theories
+with a scientific tendency as to the nature of genius, we meet first the
+one attributing to it a pathological origin. Hinted at in antiquity
+(Aristotle, Seneca, etc.), suggested in the oft-expressed comparison
+between inspiration and insanity, it has reached, as we know--through
+timid, reserved, and partial statements (Lelut)--its complete expression
+in the famous formula of Moreau de Tours, "Genius is a neurosis."
+
+Neuropathy was for him the exaggeration of vital properties and
+consequently the most favorable condition for the hatching of works of
+genius. Later, Lombroso, in a book teeming with doubtful or manifestly
+false evidence, finding his predecessor's theory too vague, attempts to
+give it more precision by substituting for neurosis in general a
+specific neurosis--larvated epilepsy. Alienists, far from eagerly
+accepting this view, have set themselves to combat it and to maintain
+that Lombroso has compromised everything in wanting to make the term too
+precise. There are several possible hypotheses, they say: either the
+neuropathic state is the direct, immediate cause of which the higher
+faculties of genius are effects; or, the intellectual superiority,
+through the excessive labor and excitation it involves, causes
+neuropathic disturbances; or, there is no relation of cause and effect
+between genius and neurosis, but mere coexistence, since there are found
+very mediocre neuropaths, and men above the average without a neurotic
+blemish; or, the two states--the one psychic, the other
+physiological--are both effects, resulting from organic conditions that
+produce according to circumstances genius, insanity, and divers nervous
+troubles. Every one of these hypotheses can allege facts in its favor.
+We must, however, recognize that in most men of genius are found so many
+peculiarities, physical eccentricities and disorders of all kinds that
+the pathologic theory retains much probability.
+
+There remain for consideration the sane geniuses who, despite many
+efforts and subtleties, have not yet been successfully brought under the
+foregoing formula, and who have made possible the enunciation of another
+theory. Recently, Nordau, rejecting the theory of his master Lombroso,
+has maintained that it is just as reasonable to say that "genius is a
+neurosis" as that "athleticism is a cardiopathy" because many athletes
+are affected with heart disease. For him, "the essential elements of
+genius are judgment and will." Following this definition, he establishes
+the following hierarchy of men of genius: At the highest rung of the
+ladder are those in whom judgment and will are equally powerful; men of
+action who make world-history (Alexander, Cromwell, Napoleon)--these are
+masters of men. On the second level are found the geniuses of judgment,
+with no hyper-development of will--these are masters of matter (Pasteur,
+Helmholtz, Roentgen). On the third step are geniuses of judgment without
+energetic will--thinkers and philosophers. What then shall we do with
+the emotional geniuses--the poets and artists? Theirs is not genius in
+the strict sense, "because it creates nothing new and exercises no
+influence on phenomena." Without discussing the value of this
+classification, without examining whether it is even possible,--since
+there is no common measure between Alexander, Pasteur, Shakespeare, and
+Spinoza,--and whether, on the other hand, common opinion is not right in
+putting on the same level the great creators, whoever they be, solely
+because they are far above the average, this remark is absolutely
+necessary: In the definition above cited the creative faculty _par
+excellence_--imagination--necessary to all inventors, is entirely left
+out.
+
+We can, however, derive some benefit from this arbitrary division.
+Although it is impossible to admit that "emotional geniuses" create
+nothing new and have no influence on society, they do form a special
+group. Creative work requires of them a nervous excitability and a
+predominance of affective states that rapidly become morbid. In this way
+they have provided the pathological theory with most of its facts. It
+would perhaps be necessary to recognize distinctions between the various
+forms of invention. They require very different organic and psychic
+conditions in order that some may profit by morbid dispositions that are
+far from useful to others. This point should deserve a special study
+never made hitherto.
+
+
+I
+
+We shall reduce to three the characters ordinarily met in most great
+inventors. No one of them is without exception.
+
+1. _Precocity_, which is reducible to innateness. The natural bent
+becomes manifest as soon as circumstances allow--it is the sign of the
+true vocation. The story is the same in all cases: at one moment the
+flash occurs; but this is not as frequent as is supposed. False
+vocations abound. If we deduct those attracted through imitation,
+environmental influence, exhortations and advice, chance, the attraction
+of immediate gain, aversion to a career imposed from without which they
+shun and adoption of an opposite one, will there remain many natural and
+irresistible vocations?
+
+We have seen above that[65] the passage from reproductive to
+constructive imagination takes place toward the end of the third year.
+According to some authors, this initial period should be followed by a
+depression about the fifth year; thenceforward the upward progress is
+continuous. But the creative faculty, from its nature and content,
+develops in a very clear, chronological order. Music, plastic arts,
+poetry, mechanical invention, scientific imagination--such is the usual
+order of appearance.
+
+In music, with the exception of a few child-prodigies, we hardly find
+personal creation before the age of twelve or thirteen. As examples of
+precocity may be cited: Mozart, at the age of three; Mendelssohn, five;
+Haydn, four; Handel, twelve; Weber, twelve; Schubert, eleven; Cherubini,
+thirteen; and many others. Those late in developing--Beethoven, Wagner,
+etc.--are fewer by far.[66]
+
+In the plastic arts, vocation and creative aptitude are shown
+perceptibly later, on the average about the fourteenth year: Giotto, at
+ten; Van Dyck, ten; Raphael, eight; Guerchin, eight; Greuze, eight;
+Michaelangelo, thirteen; Albrecht Duerer, fifteen; Bernini, twelve;
+Rubens and Jordaens being also precocious.
+
+In poetry we find no work having any individual character before
+sixteen. Chatterton died at that age, perhaps the only example of so
+young a poet leaving any reputation. Schiller and Byron also began at
+sixteen. Besides this, we know that the talent for versification, at
+least as imitation, is very early in developing.
+
+In mechanical arts children have early a remarkable capacity for
+understanding and imitating. At nine, Poncelet bought a watch that was
+out of order in order to study it, then took it apart and put it
+together correctly. Arago tells that at the same age Fresnel was called
+by his comrades a "man of genius," because he had determined by correct
+experiments "the length and caliber of children's elder-wood toy cannon
+giving the longest range; also, which green or dry woods used in the
+manufacture of bows have most strength and lasting power." In general,
+the average of mechanical invention is later, and scarcely comes earlier
+than that of scientific discovery.
+
+The form of abstract imagination requisite for invention in the sciences
+has no great personal value before the twentieth year: there are a
+goodly number, however, who have given proof of it before that
+age--Pascal, Newton, Leibniz, Gauss, Auguste Comte, etc. Almost all are
+mathematicians.
+
+These chronological variations result not from chance, but from
+psychological conditions necessary for the development of each form of
+imagination. We know that the acquisition of musical sounds is prior to
+speech: many children can repeat a scale correctly before they are able
+to talk. On the other hand, as dissolution follows evolution in inverse
+order,[67] aphasic patients lacking the most common words, can
+nevertheless sing. Sound-images are thus organized before all others,
+and the creative power when acting in this direction finds very early
+material for its use. For the plastic arts a longer apprenticeship is
+necessary for the education of the senses and movements. To acquire
+manual dexterity one must become skilled in observing form, combinations
+of lines and colors, and apt at reproducing them. Poetry and first
+attempts at novel-writing presuppose some experience of the passions of
+human life and a certain reflection of which the child is incapable.
+Invention in the mechanic arts, as in the plastic arts, requires the
+education of the senses and movements; and, further, calculation,
+rational combination of means, rigorous adaptation to practical
+necessities. Lastly, scientific imagination is nothing without a high
+development of the capacity for abstraction, which is a matter of slow
+growth. Mathematicians are the most precocious because their material is
+the most simple; they have no need, as in the case of the experimental
+sciences, of an extended knowledge of facts, which is acquired only with
+time.
+
+At this period of its development the imagination is in large part
+imitation. We must explain this paradox. The creator begins by
+imitating: this is such a well-known fact that it is needless to give
+proof of it, and it is subject to few exceptions. The most original mind
+is, at first, consciously or unconsciously somebody's disciple. It is
+necessarily so. Nature gives only one thing, "the creative instinct;"
+that is, the need of producing in a determined line. This internal
+factor alone is insufficient. Aside from the fact that the imagination
+at first has at its disposal only a very limited material, it lacks
+technique, the processes indispensable for realizing itself. As long as
+the creator has not found the suitable form into which to cast his
+creation he must indeed borrow it from another; his ideas must suffer
+the necessity of a provisional shelter. This explains how it is that
+later the inventor, reaching full consciousness of himself, in order to
+complete mastery of his methods, often breaks with his models, and burns
+what he at first adorned.
+
+
+II
+
+A second character consists of the necessity, the fatality of creation.
+Great inventors feel that they have a task to accomplish; they feel that
+they are charged with a mission. On this point we have a large number of
+testimonials and avowals. In the darkest days of his life Beethoven,
+haunted by the thought of suicide, wrote, "Art alone has kept me back.
+It seemed to me that I could not leave the world before producing all
+that I felt within me." Ordinarily, inventors are apt in only one line;
+even when they have a certain versatility, they remain bound to their
+own peculiar manner--they have their mark--like Michaelangelo; or, if
+they attempt to change it, if they try to be unfaithful as respects
+their vocation, they fall much below themselves.
+
+This characteristic of irresistible impulsion which makes the genius
+create not because he wants to, but because he must do it, has often
+been likened to instinct. This very widespread view has been examined
+before (Part I, Chapter ii).
+
+We have seen that there is no creative instinct in general, but
+_particular_ tendencies, orientated in a definite direction, which in
+most respects resemble instinct. It is contrary to experience and logic
+to admit that the creative genius follows any path whatever at his
+choice--a proposition that Weismann, in his horror of inheritance of
+acquired characters (which are a kind of innateness) is not afraid to
+support. That is true only of the man of talent, a matter of education
+and circumstances. The distinction between these two orders of
+creators--the great and the ordinary--has been made too often to need
+repetition, although it is proper to recognize that it is not always
+easy in practice, that there are names that cause us to hesitate, which
+we class somewhat at hazard. Yet genius remains, as Schopenhauer used to
+say, _monstrum per excessum_; excessive development in one direction.
+Hypertrophy of a special aptitude often makes genius fall, as far as the
+others are concerned, below the average level. Even those exceptional
+men who have given proof of multiple aptitudes, such as Vinci,
+Michaelangelo, Goethe, etc., always have a predominating tendency which,
+in common opinion, sums them up.
+
+
+III
+
+A third characteristic is the clearly defined _individuality_ of the
+great creator. He is the man of his work; he has done this or that: that
+is his mark. He is "representative." There is no other opinion as to
+this; what is a subject of discussion is the _origin_, not the nature of
+this individuality. The Darwinian theory as to the all-powerful action
+of environment has led to the question whether the representative
+character of great inventors comes from themselves, and from them alone,
+or must not rather be sought in the unconscious influence of the race
+and epoch of which they are at a given instant only brighter sparks.
+This debate goes beyond the bounds of our subject. To decide whether
+social changes are due mostly to the accumulated influences of some
+individuals and their initiative, or to the environment, to
+circumstances, to hereditary transmission, is not a problem for
+psychology to solve. We can not, however, totally avoid this discussion,
+for it touches the very springs of creation.
+
+Is the inventive genius the highest degree of personality or a synthesis
+of masses?--the result of himself or of others?--the expression of an
+individual activity or of a collective activity? In short, should we
+look for his representative character within him or without? Both these
+alternatives have authoritative supporters.
+
+For Schopenhauer, Carlyle (_Hero-worship_), Nietzsche, _et al._, the
+great man is an autonomous product, a being without a peer, a demigod,
+"_Uebermensch_." He can be explained neither by heredity, nor by
+environment.
+
+For others (Taine, Spencer, Grant, Allen, _et al._), the important
+factor is seen in the race and external conditions. Goethe held that a
+whole family line is summarized some day in a single one of its members,
+and a whole people in one or several men. For him, Louis XIV and
+Voltaire are respectively the French king and writer _par excellence_.
+"The alleged great men," says Tolstoi, "are only the labels of history,
+they give their names to events."[68]
+
+Each party explains the same facts according to its own principle and in
+its own peculiar way. The great historic epochs are rich in great men
+(the Greek republics of the fourth century B. C., the Roman Republic,
+the Renaissance, French Revolution, etc.). Why? Because, say some,
+periods put into ferment by the deep working of the masses make this
+blossoming possible. Because, say the others, this flowering modifies
+profoundly the social and intellectual condition of the masses and
+raises their level. For the former the ferment is deep down; for the
+latter it is on top.
+
+Without presuming to solve this vexed question, I lean toward the view
+of individualism pure and simple. It seems to me very difficult to admit
+that the great creator is only the result of his environment. Since this
+influence acts on many others, it is very necessary that, in great men,
+there should be in addition a personal factor. Besides, in opposition to
+the exclusively environmental theory we may bring the well-known fact
+that most innovators and inventors at first arouse opposition. We know
+the invariable sentence on everything novel--it is "false" or "bad;"
+then it is adopted with the statement that it had been known for a long
+time. In the hypothesis of collective invention, it seems that the mass
+of people should applaud inventors, recognizing itself in them, seeing
+its confused thought take form and body: but most often the contrary
+happens. The misoneism of crowds seems to me one of the strongest
+arguments in favor of the individual character of invention.
+
+We can doubtless distinguish two cases--in the first, the creator sums
+up and clearly translates the aspirations of his _milieu_; in the
+second, he is in opposition to it because he goes beyond it. How many
+innovators have been disappointed because they came before their time!
+But this distinction does not reach to the bottom of the question, and
+is not at all sufficient as an answer.
+
+Let us leave this problem, which, on account of its complexity, we can
+hardly solve through peremptory reasoning, and let us try to examine
+_objectively_ the relation between creation and environment in order
+that we may see to what extent the creative imagination, without losing
+its individual character--which is impossible--depends on the
+intellectual and social surrounding.
+
+If, with the American psychologists,[69] we term the disposition for
+innovating a "spontaneous variation"--a Darwinian term explaining
+nothing, but convenient--we may enunciate the following law:
+
+_The tendency toward spontaneous variation (invention) is always in
+inverse ratio to the simplicity of the environment._
+
+The savage environment is in its nature very simple, consequently
+homogeneous. The lower races show a much smaller degree of
+differentiation than the higher; in them, as Jastrow says, physical and
+psychic maturity is more precocious, and as the period just before the
+adult age is the plastic period _per se_, this diminishes the chances of
+a departure from the common type. Thus comparison between whites and
+blacks, between primitive and civilized peoples, shows that, for equal
+populations, there is an enormous disproportion as to the number of
+innovators.
+
+The barbarian environment is much more complex and heterogeneous: it
+contains all the rudiments of civilized life. Consequently, it favors
+more individual variations and is richer in superior men. But these
+variations are rarely produced outside of a very restricted
+field--political, military, religious. So it seems impossible to agree
+with Joly[70] that neither primitive nor barbarian peoples produce
+superior minds, "unless," as he says, "by this name we mean those that
+simply surpass their congeners." But is there a criterion other than
+that? I see none. Greatness is altogether a relative idea; and would not
+our great creators seem, to beings better endowed than we, very small?
+
+The civilized environment, requiring division of labor and consequently
+a constantly growing complexity of heterogeneous elements, is an open
+door for all vocations. Doubtless, the social spirit always retains
+something of that tendency toward stagnation that is the rule in lower
+social orders; it is more favorable to tradition than to innovation. But
+the inevitable necessity of a warm competition between individuals and
+peoples is a natural antidote for that natural inertia; it favors useful
+variations. Moreover, civilization means evolution; consequently the
+conditions under which the imagination is active change with the times.
+Let us suppose, Weismann justly says, that in the Samoan Islands there
+were born a child having the singular and extraordinary genius of
+Mozart. What could he accomplish? At the most, extend the gamut of three
+or four tones to seven, and create a few more complex melodies; but he
+would be as unable to compose symphonies as Archimedes would have been
+to invent an electric dynamo. How many creators have been wrecked
+because the conditions necessary for their inventions were lacking?
+Roger Bacon foresaw several of our great discoveries; Cardan, the
+differential calculus; Van Helmont, chemistry; and it has been possible
+to write a book on the forerunners of Darwin.[71] We talk so much of the
+free flight of imagination, of the all-comprehensive power of the
+creator, that we forget the sociological conditions--not to mention
+others--on which they are every moment dependent. In this respect, no
+invention is personal in the strict sense; there always remains in it a
+little of that anonymous collaboration the highest expression of which,
+as we have seen, is the mythic activity.
+
+By way of summary, and whatever be the causes, we may say that there is
+a universal tendency in all living matter toward variation, whether we
+consider vegetables, animals, or the physical and mental man. The need
+of innovating is only a special case, rare in the lower races, frequent
+in the higher. This tendency toward variation is fundamental or
+superficial: As fundamental, it corresponds to genius, and survives
+through processes analogous to natural selection, i.e., by its own
+power. As superficial, it corresponds to talent, survives and prospers
+chiefly through the help of circumstances and environment. Here, the
+orientation comes from without, not from within. According as the spirit
+of the time inclines rather to poetry or painting, or music, or
+scientific research, or industry, or military art, minds of the second
+order are dragged into the current--showing that a goodly part of their
+power is in the aptness, not for invention, but for _imitation_.
+
+
+IV
+
+The determination of the characters belonging to the inventive genius
+has necessitated some seemingly irrelevant remarks on the action of the
+environment. Let us return to invention, strictly so-called.
+
+For inventing there is always required a natural aptitude, sometimes, a
+happy chance.
+
+The natural disposition should be accepted as a fact. Why does a man
+create? Because he is capable of forming new combinations of ideas.
+However naive this answer may be, there is no other. The only thing
+possible, is the determination of the conditions necessary and
+sufficient for producing novel combinations: this has been done in the
+first part of this book, and there is no occasion for going over it
+again. But there is another aspect in creative work to be
+considered--its psychological _mechanism_, and the form of its
+development.
+
+Every normal person creates little or much. He may, in his ignorance,
+invent what has been already done a thousand times. Even if this is not
+a creation as regards the species, it is none the less such for the
+individual. It is wrong to say, as has been said, that an invention "is
+a new and important idea." _Novelty_ only is essential--that is the
+psychological mark: importance and utility are accessory, merely social
+marks. Invention is thus unduly limited when we attribute it to great
+inventors only. At this moment, however, we are concerned only with
+these, and in them the mechanism of invention is easier to study.
+
+We have already seen how false is the theory that holds that there is
+always a sudden stroke of inspiration, followed by a period of rapid or
+slow execution. On the contrary, observation reveals many processes
+that apparently differ less in the _content_ of invention than according
+to individual temperament. I distinguish two general processes of which
+the rest are variations. In all creation, great or small, there is a
+directing idea, an "ideal"--understanding the word not in its
+transcendental sense, but merely as synonymous with end or goal--or more
+simply, a problem to solve. The _locus_ of the idea, of the given
+problem, is not the same in the two processes. In the one I term
+"complete" the ideal is at the beginning: in the "abridged" it is in the
+middle. There are also other differences which the following tables will
+make more clear:
+
+  _First Process_ (_complete_).
+
+  1st phase                 2nd phase        3d phase
+  IDEA                      INVENTION,       VERIFICATION,
+  (commencement)             or                or
+  Special incubation        DISCOVERY        APPLICATION
+  of more or less           (end)
+  duration
+
+The idea excites attention and takes a fixed character. The period of
+brooding begins. For Newton it lasted seventeen years, and at the time
+of definitely establishing his discovery by calculation he was so
+overcome with emotion that he had to assign to another the task of
+completing it. The mathematician Hamilton tells us that his method of
+quaternians burst upon him one day, completely finished, while he was
+near a bridge in Dublin. "In that moment I had the result of fifteen
+years' labor." Darwin gathers material during his voyages, spends a
+long time observing plants and animals, then through the chance reading
+of Malthus' book, hits upon and formulates his theory. In literary and
+artistic creation similar examples are frequent.[72]
+
+The second phase is only an instant, but essential--the moment of
+discovery, when the creator exclaims his "Eureka!"[73] With it, the work
+is virtually or really ended.
+
+  _Second Process_ (_abridged_).
+
+  1st phase                 2nd phase                 3rd phase
+  General preparation       IDEA (commencement)       CONSTRUCTIVE
+  (unconscious)             INSPIRATION                 and
+                            ERUPTION                  DEVELOPING
+                                                      period.
+
+This is the process in intuitive minds. Such seems to have been the case
+of Mozart, Poe, etc. Without attempting what would be a tedious
+enumeration of examples, we may say that this form of creation comprises
+two classes--those coming to maturity through an internal impulse, a
+sudden stroke of inspiration, and those who are suddenly illumined by
+chance. The two processes differ superficially rather than essentially.
+Let us briefly compare them.
+
+With some, the first phase is long and fully conscious; in others it
+seems negligible, equal to zero--there is nothing of it because there
+exists a natural or acquired tendency toward equilibrium. "For a long
+time," says Schumann, "I had the habit of racking my brain, and now I
+scarcely need to scratch my forehead. Everything runs naturally."[74]
+
+The second phase is almost the same in both cases: it is only an
+instant, but it is essential--it is the moment of imaginative synthesis.
+
+Lastly, the third phase is very short for some, because the main labor
+is already done, and there remains only the finishing touch or the
+verification. It is long for others, because they must pass from the
+perceived idea to complete realization, and because the preparatory work
+is faulty; so that for these the second creative process is shortened in
+appearance only.
+
+Such seem to me the two principal forms of the mechanism of creation.
+These are genera; they include species and varieties that a patient and
+minute study of the processes peculiar to various inventors would reveal
+to us. We must bear in mind that this work makes no claim of being a
+monograph on invention, but merely a sketch.[75]
+
+The two processes above described seem to correspond on the whole to
+the oft-made distinction between the intuitive or spontaneous, and the
+combining or reflective imagination.
+
+The intuitive, essentially synthetic form, is found principally in the
+purely imaginative types, children and savages. The mind proceeds from
+the whole to details. The generative idea resembles those concepts
+which, in the sciences, are of wide range because they condense a
+generalization rich in consequences. The subject is at first
+comprehended as a whole; development is organic, and we may compare it
+to the embryological process that causes a living being to arise from
+the fertilized ovum, analogous to an immanent logic. As a type of this
+creative form there has often been given a letter wherein Mozart
+explains his mode of conception. Recently (and that is why I do not
+reprint it here) it has been suspected of being apocryphal. I regret
+this--it was worthy of being authentic. According to Goethe,
+Shakespeare's _Hamlet_ could have been created only through an intuitive
+process, etc.
+
+The combining, discursive imagination proceeds from details to the
+vaguely-perceived unity. It starts from a fragment that serves as a
+matrix, and becomes completed little by little. An adventure, an
+anecdote, a scene, a rapid glance, a detail, suggests a literary or
+artistic creation; but the organic form does not appear in a trice. In
+science, Kepler furnishes a good example of this combining imagination.
+It is known that he devoted a part of his life trying strange
+hypotheses, until the day when, having discovered the elliptical orbit
+of Mars, all his former work took shape and became an organized system.
+Did we want to make use once more of an embryological comparison, it
+would be necessary to look for it in the strange conceptions of ancient
+cosmogonies: they believed that from an earthly slime arose parts of
+bodies and separate organs which through a mysterious attraction and
+happy chance ended by sticking together, and forming living bodies.[76]
+
+It is an accepted view that of these two modes, one, the abridged or
+intuitive process, is superior to the other. I confess to having held
+this prejudice. On examination, I find it doubtful, even false. There is
+a _difference_, not any "higher" and "lower."
+
+First of all, both these forms of creation are necessary. The intuitive
+process can suffice for an invention of short duration: a rhyme, a
+story, a profile, a _motif_, an ornamental stroke, a little mechanical
+contrivance, etc. But as soon as the work requires time and development
+the discursive process becomes absolutely necessary: with many inventors
+one easily perceives the change from one form to the other. We have seen
+that in the case of Chopin, "creation was spontaneous, miraculous,"
+coming complete and sudden. But George Sand adds: "The crisis over, then
+commenced the most heartrending labor at which I have ever been
+present," and she pictures him to us agonized, for days and weeks,
+running after the bits of lost inspiration. Goethe, likewise, in a
+letter to Humboldt regarding his Faust, which occupied him for sixty
+years, full of interruptions and gaps: "The difficulty has been to get
+through strength of will what is really to be gotten only by a
+spontaneous act of nature." Zola, according to his biographer, Toulouse,
+"imagines a novel, always starting out with a general idea that
+dominates the work; then, from induction to induction, he draws out of
+it the characters and all the story."
+
+To sum up: Pure intuition and pure combination are exceptional;
+ordinarily, it is a mixed process in which one of the two elements
+prevails and permits its qualification. If we note, in addition, that it
+would be easy to group under these two headings names of the first rank,
+we shall conclude that the difference is altogether in the _mechanism_,
+not in the _nature_ of creation, and is consequently accessory; and that
+this difference is reducible to natural dispositions, which we may
+contrast as follows:
+
+Ready-witted minds,          Logically-developing
+  excelling in conception,     minds, excelling in
+  making the whole almost      elaboration.
+  out of one piece.
+
+Work primarily unconscious.  Patience the preponderating
+                               role.
+
+                             Work primarily conscious.
+
+Actions quick.               Actions slow.
+
+
+V
+
+"Were we to raise monuments to inventors in the arts and sciences, there
+would be fewer statues to men than to children, animals, and especially
+_fortune_." In this wise expressed himself one of the sage thinkers of
+the eighteenth century, Turgot. The importance of the last factor has
+been much exaggerated. Chance may be taken in two senses--one general,
+the other narrow.
+
+(1) In its broad meaning, chance depends on entirely internal, purely
+psychic circumstances. We know that one of the best conditions for
+inventing is abundance of material, accumulated experience,
+knowledge--which augment the chances of original association of ideas.
+It has even been possible to maintain that the nature of memory implies
+the capacity of creating in a special direction. The revelations of
+inventors or of their biographers leave no doubt as to the necessity of
+a large number of sketches, trials, preliminary drawings, no matter
+whether it is a matter of industry, commerce, a machine, a poem, an
+opera, a picture, a building, a plan of campaign, etc. "Genius for
+discovery," says Jevons, depends on the number of notions and chance
+thoughts coming to the inventor's mind. To be fertile in
+hypotheses--that is the first requirement for finding something new. The
+inventor's brain must be full of forms, of melodies, of mechanical
+agents, of commercial combinations, of figures, etc., according to the
+nature of his work. "But it is very rare that the ideas we find are
+exactly those we were seeking. In order to find, _we must think along
+other lines_."[77] Nothing is more true.
+
+So much for chance within: it is indisputable, whatever may have been
+said of it, but it depends finally on individuality--from it arises the
+non-anticipated synthesis of ideas. The abundance of memory-ideas, we
+know, is not a sufficient condition for creation; it is not even a
+necessary condition. It has been remarked that a relative ignorance is
+sometimes useful for invention: it favors assurance. There are
+inventions, especially scientific and industrial, that could not have
+been made had the inventors been arrested by the ruling and presumably
+invincible dogmas. The inventor was all the more free the more he was
+unaware of them. Then, as it was quite necessary to bow before the
+accomplished fact, theory was broadened to include the new discovery and
+explain it.
+
+(2) Chance, in the narrow sense, is a fortunate occurrence stimulating
+invention: but to attribute to it the greater part, is a partial,
+erroneous view. Here, what we call chance, is the meeting and
+convergence of _two_ factors--one internal (individual genius), the
+other, external (the fortuitous occurrence).
+
+It is impossible to determine all that invention owes to chance in this
+sense. In primitive humanity its influence must have been enormous: the
+use of fire, the manufacture of weapons, of utensils, the casting of
+metals: all that came about through accidents as simple as, for example,
+a tree falling across a stream suggesting the first idea of a bridge.
+
+In historic times--and to keep merely to the modern period--the
+collection of authentic facts would fill a large volume. Who does not
+know of Newton's apple, Galileo's lamp, Galvani's frog? Huygens declared
+that, were it not for an unforeseen combination of circumstances, the
+invention of the telescope would require "a superhuman genius;" it is
+known that we owe it to children who were playing with pieces of glass
+in an optician's shop. Schoenbein discovered ozone, thanks to the
+phosphorous odor of air traversed by electric sparks. The discoveries of
+Grimaldi and of Fresnel in regard to interferences, those of Faraday, of
+Arago, of Foucault, of Fraunhofer, of Kirchoff, and of hundreds of
+others owed something to "fortune." It is said that the sight of a crab
+suggested to Watt the idea of an ingenious machine. To chance, also,
+many poets, novelists, dramatists, and artists have owed the best part
+of their inspirations: literature and the arts abound in fictitious
+characters whose real originals are known.
+
+So much for the external, fortuitous factor; its role is clear. That of
+the internal factor is less so. It is not at all apparent to the
+ordinary mind, escaping the unreflecting. Yet it is extremely important.
+The same fortuitous event passes by millions of men without exciting
+anything. How many of Pisa's inhabitants had seen the lamp of their
+cathedral before Galileo! He does not necessarily find who wants to
+find. The happy chance comes only to those worthy of it. In order to
+profit thereby, one must first possess the spirit of observation,
+wide-awake attention, that isolates and fixates the accident; then, if
+it is a matter of scientific or practical inventions, the penetration
+that seizes upon relations and finds unforeseen resemblances; if it
+concerns esthetic productions, the imagination that constructs,
+organizes, gives life.
+
+Without repeating an evident truism, although it is often misunderstood,
+we ought to end by remarking that _chance is an occasion for, not an
+agent of, creation_.
+
+FOOTNOTES:
+
+[65] See above, Chapter II.
+
+[66] Some of these and the following figures are borrowed from
+Oelzelt-Newin, _op. cit._, pp. 70 ff.
+
+[67] Compare the well-known theory of Dr. Hughlings-Jackson. (Tr.)
+
+[68] For an elaborate and interesting discussion of this subject,
+see Tolstoi's _Physiology of War_. As showing the later trend of
+thought on this general theme, see the excellent summary by
+Professor Seligman, _The Economic Interpretation of History_. (Tr.)
+
+[69] William James, _The Will to Believe and other Essays_, pp. 218
+ff.; Jastrow, _Psych. Rev._, May, 1898, p. 307; J. Royce, _ibid._,
+March, 1898; Baldwin, _Social and Ethical Interpretations_, etc.
+
+[70] Joly, _Psychologie des grands hommes_.
+
+[71] Osborn, _From the Greeks to Darwin_.
+
+[72] Such, according to Binet and Passy, seem to be the cases of the
+Goncourts, Pailleron, etc. See "Psychologie des auteurs
+dramatiques," in _L'annee psychologique_, I, 96.
+
+[73] Compare the striking instance of this moment as given by
+Froebel, in his _Autobiography_, in connection with his idea of the
+Kindergarten. (Tr.)
+
+[74] Quoted by Arreat, _Memoire et Imagination_, p. 118. (Paris, F.
+Alcan.)
+
+[75] Paulhan ("De l'invention," _Rev. Philos._, December, 1898, pp.
+590 ff.) distinguishes three kinds of development in invention: (1)
+Spontaneous or reasoned--the directing idea persists to the end; (2)
+transformation, which comprises several contradictory evolutions
+succeeding and replacing one another in consequence of impressions
+and feelings; (3) deviation, which is a composite of the two
+preceding forms.
+
+[76] Cf. the well-known doctrine of Empedocles. (Tr.)
+
+[77] P. Souriau, _Theorie de l'invention_, pp. 6-7.
+
+
+
+
+CHAPTER V
+
+LAW OF THE DEVELOPMENT OF THE IMAGINATION
+
+
+Is imagination, so often called "a capricious faculty," subject to some
+law? The question thus asked is too simple, and we must make it more
+precise.
+
+As the direct cause of invention, great or small, the imagination acts
+without assignable determination; in this sense it is what is known as
+"spontaneity"--a vague term, which we have attempted to make clear. Its
+appearance is irreducible to any law; it results from the often
+fortuitous convergence of various factors previously studied.
+
+Leaving aside the moment of origin, does the inventive power, considered
+in its individual and specific development, seem to follow any law, or,
+if this term appear too ambitious, does it present, in the course of its
+evolution, any perceptible regularity? Observation separates out an
+empirical law; that is, extracts directly an abridged formula that is
+only a condensation of facts. We may enunciate it thus: The creative
+imagination in its complete development passes through two periods
+separated by a critical phase: a period of autonomy or efflorescence, a
+critical moment, a period of definitive constitution presenting several
+aspects.
+
+This formula, being only a summary of experience, should be justified
+and explained by the latter. For this purpose we can borrow facts from
+two distinct sources: (a) individual development, which is the safest,
+clearest, and easiest to observe; (b) the development of the species, or
+historical development, according to the accepted principle that
+phylogenesis and ontogenesis follow the same general line.
+
+
+I
+
+_First Period._ We are already acquainted with it: it is the imaginative
+age. In normal man, it begins at about the age of three, and embraces
+infancy, adolescence, youth: sometimes a longer, sometimes a shorter
+period. Play, romantic invention, mythic and fantastic conceptions of
+the world sum it up first; after that, in most, imagination is dependent
+on the influence of the passions, and especially sexual love. For a long
+time it remains without any rational element.
+
+Nevertheless, little by little, the latter wins a place.
+Reflection--including under the term the working of the
+intelligence--begins very late, grows slowly, and the proportion as it
+asserts itself, gains an influence over the imaginative activity and
+tends to reduce it. This growing antagonism is represented in the
+following figure.
+
+The curve IM is that of the imagination during this first period. It
+rises at first very slowly, then attains a rapid ascent and keeps at a
+height that marks its greatest attainment in this earliest form. The
+dotted line RX represents the rational development that begins later,
+advances much more slowly, but progressively, and reaches at X the level
+of the imaginative curve. The two intellectual forms are present like
+two rivals. The position MX on the ordinate marks the beginning of the
+second period.
+
+[Illustration]
+
+_Second Period._ This is a critical period of indeterminate length, in
+any case, always much briefer than the other two. This critical moment
+can be characterized only by its causes and results. Its causes are, in
+the physiological sphere, the formation of an organism and a fully
+developed brain; in the psychologic order, the antagonism between the
+pure subjectivity of the imagination and the objectivity of
+ratiocinative processes; in other words, between mental instability and
+stability. As for the results, they appear only in the third period, the
+resultant of this obscure, metamorphic stage.
+
+_Third Period._ It is definite: in some way or another and in some
+degree the imagination has become rationalized, but this change is not
+reducible to a single formula.
+
+(1) The creative imagination falls, as is indicated in the figure, where
+the imagination curve MN' descends rapidly toward the line of abcissas
+without ever reaching it. This is the most general case; only truly
+imaginative minds are exceptions. One falls little by little into the
+prose of practical life--such is the downfall of love which is treated
+as a phantom, the burial of the dreams of youth, etc. This is a
+regression, not an end; for the creative imagination disappears
+completely in no man; it only becomes accessory.
+
+(2) It keeps up but becomes transformed; it adapts itself to the
+conditions of rational thought; it is no longer pure imagination, but
+becomes a mixed form--the fact is indicated in the diagram by the union
+of the two lines, MN, the imagination, and XO, the rational. This is the
+case with truly imaginative beings, in whom inventive power long remains
+young and fresh.
+
+This period of preservation, of definitive constitution with rational
+transformation, presents several varieties. First, and simplest,
+_transformation into logical form_. The creative power manifested in the
+first stage remains true to itself, and always follows the same trend.
+Such are the precocious inventors, those whose vocation appeared early
+and never changed direction. Invention loses its childish or juvenile
+character in becoming virile; there are no other changes. Compare
+Schiller's _Robbers_, written in his teens, with his _Wallenstein_,
+dating from his fortieth year; or the vague sketches of the adolescent
+James Watt with his inventions as a man.
+
+Another case is the _metamorphosis_ or _deviation_ of creative power. We
+know what numbers of men who have left a great name in science,
+politics, mechanical or industrial invention started out with mediocre
+efforts in music, painting, and especially poetry, the drama, and
+fiction. The imaginative impulse did not discover its true direction at
+the outset; it imitated while trying to invent. What has been said above
+concerning the chronological development of the imagination would be
+tiresome repetition. The need of creating followed from the first the
+line of least resistance, where it found certain materials ready to
+hand. But in order to arrive to full consciousness of itself it needed
+more time, more knowledge, more accumulated experience.
+
+We might here ask whether the contrary case is also met with; i.e.,
+where the imagination, in this third period, would return to the
+inclinations of the first period. This regressive metamorphosis--for I
+cannot style it otherwise--is rare but not without examples. Ordinarily
+the creative imagination, when it has passed its adult stage, becomes
+attenuated by slow atrophy without undergoing serious change of form.
+Nevertheless, I am able to cite the case of a well-known scholar who
+began with a taste for art, especially plastic art, went over rapidly
+to literature, devoted his life to biologic studies, in which he gained
+a very deserved reputation; then, in turn, became totally disgusted with
+scientific research, came back to literature and finally to the arts,
+which have entirely monopolized him.
+
+Finally--for there are very many forms--in some the imagination, though
+strong, scarcely passes beyond the first stage, always retains its
+youthful, almost childish form, hardly modified by a minimum of
+rationality. Let us note that it is not a question here of the
+characteristic ingenuousness of some inventors, which has caused them to
+be called "grown-up children," but of the candor and inherent simplicity
+of the imagination itself. This exceptional form is hardly reconcilable
+except with esthetic creation. Let us add the mystic imagination. It
+could furnish examples, less in its religious conceptions, which are
+without control, than in its reveries of a scientific turn. Contemporary
+mystics have invented adaptations of the world that take us back to the
+mythology of early times. This prolonged childhood of the imagination,
+which is, in a word, an anomaly, produces curiosities rather than
+lasting works.
+
+At this third period in the development of the imagination appears a
+second, subsidiary law, that of _increasing complexity_; it follows a
+progressive line from the simple to the complex. Indeed, it is not,
+strictly speaking, a law of the imagination but of the rational
+development exerting an influence on it by a counter-action. It is a
+law of the mind that _knows_, not of one that _imagines_.
+
+It is needless to show that theoretical and practical intelligence
+develops as an increasing complex. But from the time that the mind
+distinguishes clearly between the possible and the impossible, between
+the fancied and the real--which is a capacity wanting in primitive
+man--as soon as man has formed rational habits and has undergone
+experience the impress of which is ineffaceable, the creative
+imagination is subject, _nolens volens_, to new conditions; it is no
+longer absolute mistress of itself, it has lost the assurance of its
+infancy, and is under the rules of logical thought, which draws it along
+in its train. Aside from the exceptions given above--and even they are
+partial exceptions only--creative power depends on the ability to
+understand, which imposes upon it its form and developmental law. In
+literature and in the arts comparison between the simplicity of
+primitive creations and the complexity of advanced civilizations has
+become commonplace. In the practical, technical, scientific and social
+worlds the higher up we go the more we have to know in order to create,
+and in default of this condition we merely repeat when we think we are
+inventing.
+
+
+II
+
+Historically considered, in the species, the development of the
+imagination follows the same line of progress as in the individual. We
+will not repeat it; it would be mere reiteration in a vaguer form of
+what we have just said. A few brief notes will suffice.
+
+Vico--whose name deserves to be mentioned here because he was the first
+to see the good that we can get from myths for the study of the
+imagination--divided the course of humanity into three successive ages:
+divine or theocratic, heroic or fabulous, human or historic, after which
+the cycle begins over again. Although this too hypothetic conception is
+now forgotten, it is sufficient for our purposes. What, indeed, are
+those first two stages that have everywhere and always been the
+harbingers and preparers of civilization, if not the triumphant period
+of the imagination? It has produced myths, religions, legends, epics and
+martial narratives, and imposing monuments erected in honor of gods and
+heroes. Many nations whose evolution has been incomplete have not gone
+beyond this stage.
+
+Let us now consider this question under a more definite, more limited,
+better known form--the history of intellectual development in Europe
+since the fall of the Roman Empire. It shows very distinctly our three
+periods.
+
+No one will question the preponderance of the imagination during the
+middle Ages: intensity of religious feeling, ceaselessly repeated
+epidemics of superstition; the institution of chivalry, with all its
+accessories; heroic poetry, chivalric romances; courts of love,
+efflorescence of Gothic art, the beginning of modern music, etc. On the
+other hand, the _quantity_ of imagination applied during this epoch to
+practical, industrial, commercial invention is very small. Their
+scientific culture, buried in Latin jargon, is made up partly of antique
+traditions, partly of fancies; what the ten centuries added to positive
+science is almost _nil_. Our figure, with its two curves, one
+imaginative, the other rational, thus applies just as well to historical
+development as to individual development during this first period.
+
+No more will anyone question that the Renaissance is a critical moment,
+a transition period, and a transformation analogous to that which we
+have noted in the individual, when there rises, opposed to imagination,
+a rival power.
+
+Finally, it will be admitted without dissent that during the modern
+period social imagination has become partly decayed, partly
+rationalized, under the influence of two principal factors--one
+scientific, the other economic. On the one hand the development of
+science, on the other hand the great maritime discoveries, by
+stimulating industrial and commercial inventions, have given the
+imagination a new field of activity. There have arisen points of
+attraction that have drawn it into other paths, have imposed upon it
+other forms of creation that have often been neglected or misunderstood
+and that we shall study in the Third Part.
+
+
+
+
+THIRD PART
+
+THE PRINCIPAL TYPES OF IMAGINATION
+
+
+
+
+PRELIMINARY
+
+
+After having studied the creative imagination in its constitutive
+elements and in its development we purpose, in this last part,
+describing its principal forms. This will be neither analytic nor
+genetic but concrete. The reader need not fear wearisome repetition; our
+subject is sufficiently complex to permit a third treatment without
+reiteration.
+
+The expression "creative imagination," like all general terms, is an
+abbreviation and an abstraction. There is no "imagination in general,"
+but only _men who imagine_, and who do so in different ways; the reality
+is in them. The diversities in creation, however numerous, should be
+reducible to types that are _varieties_ of imagination, and the
+determination of these varieties is analogous to that of character as
+related to will. Indeed, when we have settled upon the physiological and
+psychological conditions of voluntary activity we have only done a work
+in _general_ psychology. Men being variously constituted, their modes of
+action bear the stamp of their individuality; in each one there is a
+personal factor that, whatever its ultimate nature, puts its mark on the
+will and makes it energetic or weak, rapid or slow, stable or unstable,
+continuous or intermittent. The same is true of the creative
+imagination. We cannot know it completely without a study of its
+varieties, without a special psychology, toward which the following
+chapters are an attempt.
+
+How are we to determine these varieties? Many will be inclined to think
+that the method is indicated in advance. Have not psychologists
+distinguished, according as one or another of image-groups
+preponderates, visual, auditory, motor and mixed types? Is not the way
+clear and is it not well enough to go in this direction? However natural
+this solution may appear, it is illusory and can lead to naught. It
+rests on the equivocal use of the word "imagination," which at one time
+means mere reproduction of images, and at another time creative
+activity, and which, consequently, keeps up the erroneous notion that in
+the creative imagination images, the raw materials, are the essential
+part. The materials, no doubt, are not a negligible element, but by
+themselves they cannot reveal to us the species and varieties that have
+their origin in an anterior and superior tendency of mind. We shall see
+in the sequel that the very nature of constructive imagination may
+express itself indifferently in sounds, words, colors, lines, and even
+numbers. The method that should allege to settle the various
+orientations of creative activity according to the nature of images
+would no more go to the bottom of the matter than would a classification
+of architecture according to the materials employed (as rock, brick,
+iron, wood, etc.) with no regard for differences of style.
+
+This method aside, since the determination must be made according to the
+individuality of the architect, what method shall we follow? The matter
+is even more perplexing than the study of character. Although various
+authors have treated the latter subject (we have attempted it
+elsewhere), no one of the proposed classifications has been universally
+accepted. Nevertheless, despite their differences, they coincide in
+several points, because these have the advantage of resting on a common
+basis--the large manifestations of human nature, feeling, doing,
+thinking. In our subject I find nothing like this and I seek in vain for
+a point of support. Classifications are made according to the essential
+dominating attributes; but, as regards the varieties of the creative
+imagination, what are they?
+
+We may, indeed, as was said above, distinguish two great classes--the
+intuitive and the combining. From another point of view we may
+distinguish invention of free range (esthetic, religious, mystic) from
+invention more or less restricted (mechanical, scientific, commercial,
+military, political, social). But these two divisions are too general,
+leading to nothing. A true classification should be in touch with facts,
+and this one soars too high.
+
+Leaving, then, to others, more skilled or more fortunate, the task of a
+rational and systematic determination, if it be possible, we shall try
+merely to distinguish and describe the principal forms, such as
+experience gives them to us, emphasizing those that have been neglected
+or misinterpreted. What follows is thus neither a classification nor
+even a complete enumeration.
+
+We shall study at first two general forms of the creative
+imagination--the plastic and the diffluent--and later, special forms,
+determined by their content and subject.
+
+       *       *       *       *       *
+
+Wundt, in a little-noticed passage of his _Physiological Psychology_,
+has undertaken to determine the composition of the "principal forms of
+talent," which he reduces to four:
+
+The first element is imagination. It may be intuitive, "that is,
+conferring on representations a clearness of sense-perception," or
+combining; "then it operates on multiple combinations of images." A very
+marked development in both directions at the same time is uncommon; the
+author assigns reasons for this.
+
+The second element is understanding (_Verstand_). It may be
+inductive--i.e., inclining toward the collection of facts in order to
+draw generalizations from them--or deductive, taking general concepts
+and laws to trace their consequences.
+
+If the intuitive imagination is joined to the inductive spirit we have
+the talent for observation of the naturalist, the psychologist, the
+pedagogue, the man of affairs.
+
+If the intuitive imagination is combined with the deductive spirit we
+have the analytical talent of the systematic naturalist, of the
+geometrician. In Linnaeus and Cuvier the intuitive element predominates;
+in Gauss, the analytical element.
+
+The combining imagination joined to the inductive spirit constitutes
+"the talent for invention strictly so-called," in industry, in the
+technique of science; it gives the artist and the poet the power of
+composing their works.
+
+The combining imagination plus the deductive spirit gives the
+speculative talent of the mathematician and philosopher; deduction
+predominates in the former, imagination in the latter.[78]
+
+FOOTNOTES:
+
+[78] Wundt, _Physiologische Psychologie_, 4th German edition, Vol.
+II, pp. 490-95.
+
+
+
+
+CHAPTER I
+
+THE PLASTIC IMAGINATION
+
+I
+
+
+By "plastic imagination" I understand that which has for its special
+characters clearness and precision of form; more explicitly those forms
+whose materials are clear images (whatever be their nature), approaching
+perception, giving the impression of reality; in which, too, there
+predominate _associations with objective relations_, determinable with
+precision. The plastic mark, therefore, is in the images, and in the
+modes of association of images. In somewhat rough terms, requiring
+modifications which the reader himself can make, it is the imagination
+that materializes.
+
+Between perception--a very complex synthesis of qualities, attributes
+and relations--and conception--which is only the consciousness of a
+quality, quantity, or relation, often of only a single word accompanied
+by vague outlines and a latent, potential knowledge; between concrete
+and abstract, the image occupies an intermediate position and can run
+from one pole to another, now full of reality, now almost as poor and
+pale as a concept. The representation here styled plastic descends
+towards its point of origin; it is an external imagination, arising from
+sensation rather than from feeling and needing to become objective.
+
+Thus its general characters are easy of determination. First and
+foremost, it makes use of visual images; then of motor images; lastly,
+in practical invention, of tactile images. In a word, the three groups
+of images present to a great extent the character of externality and
+objectivity. The clearness of form of these three groups proceeds from
+their origin, because they arise from sensation well determined in
+space--sight, movement, touch. Plastic imagination depends most on
+spatial conditions. We shall see that its opposite, diffluent
+imagination, is that which depends least upon that factor, or is most
+free from it. Among these naturally objective elements the plastic
+imagination chooses the most objective, which fact gives its creations
+an air of reality and life.
+
+The second characteristic is inferiority of the affective element; it
+appears only intermittently and is entirely blotted out before sensory
+impression. This form of the creative imagination, coming especially
+from sensation, aims especially at sensation. Thus it is rather
+superficial, greatly devoid of that internal mark that comes from
+feeling.
+
+But if it chance that both sensory and affective elements are equal in
+power; if there is at the same time intense vision adequate to reality,
+and profound emotion, violent shock, then there arise extraordinary
+imaginative personages, like Shakespeare, Carlyle, Michelet. It is
+needless to describe this form of imagination, excellent pen-pictures of
+which have been given by the critics;[79] let us merely note that its
+psychology reduces itself to an alternately ascending and descending
+movement between the two limiting points of perception and idea. The
+ascending process assigns to inanimate objects life, desires and
+feelings. Thus Michelet: "The great streams of the Netherlands, _tired_
+with their very long course, _perish_ as though from _weariness_ in the
+_unfeeling_ ocean."[80] Elsewhere, the great folio begets the octavo,
+"which becomes the parent of the small volume, of booklets, of ephemeral
+pamphlets, invisible spirits flying in the night, creating under the
+very eyes of tyrants the circulation of liberty." The descending process
+materializes abstractions, gives them body, makes them flesh and bone;
+the Middle Ages become "a poor child, torn from the bowels of
+Christianity, born amidst tears, grown up in prayer and revery, in
+anguish of heart, dying without achieving anything." In this dazzle of
+images there is a momentary return to primitive animism.
+
+
+II
+
+In order to more fully understand the plastic imagination, let us take
+up its principal manifestations.
+
+1. First, the arts dealing with form, where its necessity is evident.
+The sculptor, painter, architect, must have visual and tactile-motor
+images; it is the material in which their creations are wrapped up. Even
+leaving out the striking acts requiring such a sure and tenacious
+external vision (portraits executed from memory, exact remembrance of
+faces at the end of twenty years, as in the case of Gavarni, etc.[81]),
+and limiting ourselves merely to the usual, the plastic arts demand an
+observant imagination. For the majority of men the concrete image of a
+face, a form, a color, usually remains vague and fleeting; "red, blue,
+black, white, tree, animal, head, mouth, arm, etc., are scarcely more
+than words, symbols expressing a rough synthesis. For the painter, on
+the other hand, images have a very high precision of details, and what
+he sees beneath the words or in real objects are analyzed facts,
+positive elements of perception and movement."[82]
+
+The role of tactile-motor images is not insignificant. There has often
+been cited the instance of sculptors who, becoming blind, have
+nevertheless been able to fashion busts of close resemblance to the
+original. This is memory of touch and of the muscular sense, entirely
+equivalent to the visual memory of the portrait painters mentioned
+above. Practical knowledge of design and modeling--i.e., of contour and
+relief--though resulting from natural or acquired disposition, depends
+on cerebral conditions, the development of definite sensory-motor
+regions and their connections; and on psychological conditions--the
+acquisition and organization of appropriate images. "We learn to paint
+and carve," wrote a contemporary painter, "as we do sewing, embroidery,
+sawing, filing and turning." In short, like all manual labor requiring
+associated and combined acts.
+
+2. Another form of plastic imagination uses words as means for evoking
+vivid and clear impressions of sight, touch, movement; it is the poetic
+or literary form. Of it we find in Victor Hugo a finished type. As all
+know, we need only open his works at hazard to find a stream of
+glittering images. But what is their nature? His recent biographers,
+guided by contemporary psychology, have well shown that they always
+paint scenes or movements. It is unnecessary to give proofs. Some facts
+have a broader range and throw light upon his psychology. Thus we are
+told that "he never dictates or rhymes from memory and composes only in
+writing, for he believes that writing has its own features, and he
+wants to _see the words_. Theophile Gautier, who knows and understands
+him so well, says: 'I also believe that in the sentence we need most of
+all an _ocular_ rhythm. A book is made to be read, not to be spoken
+aloud.'" It is added that "Victor Hugo never spoke his verses but wrote
+them out and would often illustrate them on the margin, as if he needed
+to fixate the image in order to find the appropriate word."[83]
+
+After visual representations come those of movement: the steeple
+_pierces_ the horizon, the mountain _rends_ the cloud, the mountain
+_raises himself_ and looks about, "the cold caverns open their mouths
+_drowsily_," the wind lashes the rock into tears with the waterfall, the
+thorn is an enraged plant, and so on indefinitely.
+
+A more curious fact is the transposition of sonorous sensations or
+images of sound, and like them without form or figure, into visual and
+motor images: "The _ruffles_ of sound that the fifer cuts out; the flute
+_goes up_ to alto like a frail capital on a column." This thoroughly
+plastic imagination remains identical with itself while reducing
+everything spontaneously, unconsciously, to spatial terms.
+
+In literature this altogether foreign mode of creative activity has
+found its most complete expression among the _Parnassiens_ and their
+congeners, whose creed is summed up in the formula, faultless form and
+impassiveness. Theophile Gautier claims that "a poet, no matter what may
+be said of him, is a _workman_; it is not necessary that he have more
+intelligence than a laborer and have knowledge of a state other than his
+own, without which he does badly. I regard as perfectly absurd the mania
+that people have of hoisting them (the poets) up onto an ideal pedestal;
+_nothing is less ideal than a poet_. For him words have in themselves
+and outside the meaning they express, their own beauty and value, just
+like precious stones not yet cut and mounted in bracelets, necklaces and
+rings; they charm the understanding that looks at them and takes them
+from the finger to the little pile where they are put aside for future
+use." If this statement, whether sincere or not, is taken literally, I
+see no longer any difference, save as regards the materials employed,
+between the imagination of poets and the imagination active in the
+mechanical arts. For the usefulness of the one and the "uselessness" of
+the other is a characteristic foreign to invention itself.
+
+3. In the teeming mass of myths and religious conceptions that the
+nineteenth century has gathered with so much care we could establish
+various classifications--according to race, content, intellectual level;
+and, in a more artificial manner but one suitable for our subject,
+according to the degree of precision or fluidity.
+
+Neglecting intermediate forms, we may, indeed, divide them into two
+groups; some are clear in outline, are consistent, relatively logical,
+resembling a definite historical relation; others are vague, multiform,
+incoherent, contradictory; their characters change into one another, the
+tales are mixed and are imperceptible in the whole.
+
+The former types are the work of the plastic imagination. Such are, if
+we eliminate oriental influences, most of the myths belonging to Greece
+when, on emerging from the earliest period, they attained their definite
+constitution. It has been held that the plastic character of these
+religious conceptions is an effect of esthetic development: statues,
+bas-reliefs, poetry, and even painting, have made definite the
+attributes of the gods and their history. Without denying this influence
+we must nevertheless understand that it is only auxiliary. To those who
+would challenge this opinion let us recall that the Hindoos have had
+gigantic poems, have covered their temples with numberless sculptures,
+and yet their fluid mythology is the opposite of the Greek. Among the
+peoples who have incarnated their divinities in no statue, in no human
+or animal form, we find the Germans and the Celts. But the mythology of
+the former is clear, well kept within large lines; that of the latter is
+fleeting and inconsistent--the despair of scholars.[84]
+
+It is, then, certain that myths of the plastic kind are the fruits of an
+innate quality of mind, of a mode of feeling and of translating, at a
+given moment in its history, the preponderating characters of a race; in
+short, of a form of imagination and ultimately of a special cerebral
+structure.
+
+4. The most complete manifestation of the plastic imagination is met
+with in mechanical invention and what is allied thereto, in consequence
+of the need of very exact representations of qualities and relations.
+But this is a specialized form, and, as its importance has been too
+often misunderstood, it deserves a separate study. (See Chapter V,
+_infra_.)
+
+
+III
+
+Such are the principal traits of this type of imagination: clearness of
+outline, both of the whole and of the details. It is not identical with
+the form called realistic--it is more comprehensive; it is a genus of
+which "realism" is a species. Moreover, the latter expression being
+reserved by custom for esthetic creation, I purposely digress in order
+to dwell on this point: that the esthetic imagination has no essential
+character belonging exclusively to it, and that it differs from other
+forms (scientific, mechanical, etc.) only in its materials and in its
+end, not in its primary nature.
+
+On the whole, the plastic imagination could be summed up in the
+expression, _clearness in complexity_. It always preserves the mark of
+its original source--i.e., in the creator and those disposed to enjoy
+and understand him it tends to approach the clearness of perception.
+
+Would it be improper to consider as a variety of the genus a mode of
+representation that could be expressed as _clearness in simplicity_? It
+is the dry and rational imagination. Without depreciating it we may say
+that it is rather a condition of imaginative poverty. We hold with
+Fouillee that the average Frenchman furnishes a good example of it. "The
+Frenchman," says he, "does not usually have a very strong imagination.
+His internal vision has neither the hallucinative intensity nor the
+exuberant fancy of the German and Anglo-Saxon mind; it is an
+intellectual and distant view rather than a sensitive resurrection or an
+immediate contact with, and possession of, the things themselves.
+Inclined to deduce and construct, our intellect excels less in
+representing to itself real things than in discovering relations between
+possible or necessary things. In other words, it is a logical and
+combining imagination that takes pleasure in what has been termed the
+abstract view of life. The Chateaubriands, Hugos, Flauberts, Zolas, are
+exceptional with us. We reason more than we imagine."[85]
+
+Its psychological constitution is reducible to two elements: slightly
+concrete images, _schemas_ approaching general ideas; for their
+association, relations predominantly rational, more the products of the
+logic of the intellect than of the logic of the feelings. It lacks the
+sudden, violent shock of emotion that gives brilliancy to images, making
+them arise and grouping them in unforeseen combinations. It is a form of
+invention and construction that is more the work of reason than of
+imagination proper.
+
+Consequently, is it not paradoxical to relate it to plastic imagination,
+as species to genus? It would be idle to enter upon a discussion of the
+subject here without attempting a classification; let us merely note the
+likenesses and differences. Both are above all objective--the first,
+because it is sensory; the other, because it is rational. Both make use
+of analogous modes of association, dependent more on the nature of
+things than on the personal impression of the subject. Opposition exists
+only on one point: the former is made up of vivid images that approach
+perception; the latter is made up of internal images bordering upon
+concepts. Rational imagination is plastic imagination desiccated and
+simplified.
+
+FOOTNOTES:
+
+[79] Thus Taine says of Carlyle: "He cannot stick to simple
+expression; at every step he drops into figures, gives body to every
+idea, must touch forms. We see that he is possessed and haunted by
+glittering or saddening visions; in him every thought is an
+explosion; a flood of seething passion reaches the boiling-point in
+his brain, which overflows, and the torrent of images runs over the
+banks and rushes with all its mud and all its splendor. He cannot
+reason, he must paint." Despite the vigor of this sketch, the
+perusal of ten pages of _Sartor Resartus_ or of the _French
+Revolution_ teaches more in regard to the nature of this imagination
+than all the commentaries.
+
+[80] For a point of view in criticism that has seemed correct to
+many on this matter, compare the well-known chapter on the "Pathetic
+Fallacy" by Ruskin, in his _Modern Painters_. (Tr.)
+
+[81] Arreat (_Psychologie du peintre_, pp. 62 ff.) gives a large
+number of examples of this.
+
+[82] _Ibid._, p. 115.
+
+[83] For further details on this point, consult Mabilleau, _Victor
+Hugo_, 2nd part, chaps. II, III, IV.--Renouvier, in the book devoted
+to the poet, asserts that "on account of his aptitude for
+representing to himself the details of a figure, order and position
+in space, beyond any present sensation," Victor Hugo could have
+become a mathematician of the highest order.
+
+[84] As bearing out the position of the author, we may also call
+attention to the fact that while the Hebrew race has had very slight
+development in the plastic arts, yet its mythology has always taken
+a very definite form, even when dealing with the vaguest and most
+abstract subjects. (Tr.)
+
+[85] Fouillee, _Psychologie du peuple francais_, p. 185.
+
+
+
+
+CHAPTER II
+
+THE DIFFLUENT IMAGINATION
+
+I
+
+
+The diffluent imagination is another general form, but one that is
+completely opposed to the foregoing. It consists of vaguely-outlined,
+indistinct images that are evoked and joined according to the least
+rigorous modes of association. It presents, then, two things for our
+consideration--the nature of the images and of their associations.
+
+(1) It employs neither the clear-cut, concrete, reality-penetrated
+images of the plastic imagination, nor the semi-schematic
+representations of the rational imagination, but those midway in that
+ascending and descending scale extending from perception to conception.
+This determination, however, is insufficient, and we can make it more
+precise. Analysis, indeed, discovers a certain class of ill-understood
+images, which I call emotional abstractions, and which are the proper
+material for the diffluent imagination. These images are reduced to
+certain qualities or attributes of things, taking the place of the
+whole, and chosen from among the others for various reasons, the origin
+of which is affective. We shall comprehend their nature better through
+the following comparison:
+
+Intellectual or rational abstraction results from the choice of a
+fundamental, or at least principal, character, which becomes the
+substitute for all the rest that is omitted. Thus, extension,
+resistance, or impenetrability, come to represent, through
+simplification and abbreviation, what we call "matter."
+
+Emotional abstraction, on the other hand, results from the permanent or
+temporary predominance of an emotional state. Some aspect of a thing,
+essential or not, comes into relief, solely because it is in direct
+relation to the disposition of our sensibility, with no other
+preoccupation; a quality, an attribute is spontaneously, arbitrarily
+selected because it impresses us at the given instant--in the final
+analysis, because it somehow pleases or displeases us. The images of
+this class have an "impressionist" mark. They are abstractions in the
+strict sense--i.e., extracts from and simplifications of the sensory
+data. They act less through a direct influence than by evoking,
+suggesting, whispering; they permit a glance, a passing glimpse: we may
+justly call them crepuscular or twilight ideas.
+
+(2) As for the forms of association, the relations linking these images,
+they do not depend so much on the order and connections of things as on
+the changing dispositions of the mind. They have a very marked subjective
+character. Some depend on the intellectual factor; the most usual are
+based on chance, on distant and vacillating analogies--further down, even
+on assonance and alliteration. Others depend on the affective factor and
+are ruled by the disposition of the moment: association by contrast,
+especially those alike in emotional basis, which have been previously
+studied. (First Part, Chapter II.)
+
+Thus the diffluent imagination is, trait for trait, the opposite of the
+plastic imagination. It has a general character of inwardness because it
+arises less from sensation than from feeling, often from a simple and
+fugitive impression. Its creations have not the organic character of the
+other, lacking a stable center of attraction; but they act by diffusion
+and inclusion.
+
+
+II
+
+By its very nature it is _de jure_, if not _de facto_, excluded from
+certain territories--if it ventures therein it produces only abortions.
+This is true of the practical sphere, which permits neither vague images
+nor approximate constructions; and of the scientific world, where the
+imagination may be used only to create a theory or invent processes of
+discovery (experiments, schemes of reasoning). Even with these
+exceptions there is still left for it a very wide range.
+
+Let us rapidly pass over some very frequent, very well-known
+manifestations of the diffluent imagination--those obliterated forms in
+which it does not reach complete development and cannot give the full
+measure of its power.
+
+(1) Revery and related states. This is perhaps the purest specimen of
+the kind, but it remains embryonic.
+
+(2) The romantic turn of mind. This is seen in those who, confronted by
+any event whatever or an unknown person, make up, spontaneously,
+involuntarily, in spite of themselves, a story out of whole cloth. I
+shall later give examples of it according to the written testimony of
+several people.[86] In whatever concerns themselves or others they
+create an imagined world, which they substitute for the real.
+
+(3) The fantastic mind. Here we come away from the vague forms; the
+diffluent imagination becomes substantial and asserts itself through its
+permanence. At bottom this fantastic form is the romantic spirit tending
+toward objectification. The invention, which was at first only a
+thoroughly internal construction and recognized as such, aspires to
+become external, to become realized, and when it ventures into a world
+other than its own, one requiring the rigorous conditions of the
+practical imagination, it is wrecked, or succeeds only through chance,
+and that very rarely. To this class belong those inventors, known to
+everyone, who are fertile in methods of enriching themselves or their
+country by means of agricultural, mining, industrial or commercial
+enterprises; the makers of the utopias of finance, politics, society,
+etc. It is a form of imagination unnaturally oriented toward the
+practical.[87]
+
+(4) The list increases with myths and religious conceptions; the
+imagination in its diffuse form here finds itself on its own ground.
+
+Depending on linguistics, it has recently been maintained that, among
+the Aryans at least, the imagination created at first only momentary
+gods (_Augenblicksgoetter_).[88] Every time that primitive man, in the
+presence of a phenomenon, experienced a perceptible emotion, he
+translated it by a name, the manifestation of what was imagined the
+divine part in the emotion felt. "Every religious emotion gives rise to
+a new name--i.e., a new divinity. But the religious imagination is
+never identical with itself; though produced by the same phenomenon, it
+translates itself, at two different moments, by two different words." As
+a consequence, "during the early periods of the human race, religious
+names must have been applied not to _classes_ of beings or events but to
+_individual_ beings or events. Before worshipping the comet or the
+fig-tree, men must have worshiped each one of the comets they beheld
+crossing the sky, every one of the fig-trees that their eyes saw."
+Later, with advancing capacity for generalization, these "instantaneous"
+divinities would be condensed into more consistent gods. If this
+hypothesis, which has aroused many criticisms, be sound--if this state
+were met with--it would be the ideal type of imaginative instability in
+the religious order.
+
+Nearer to us, authentic evidence shows that certain peoples, at given
+stages of their history, have created such vague, fluid myths, that we
+cannot succeed in delimiting them. Every god can change himself into
+another, different, or even opposite, one. The Semitic religions might
+furnish examples of this. There has been established the identity of
+Istar, Astarte, Tanit, Baalath, Derketo, Mylitta, Aschera, and still
+others. But it is in the early religion of the Hindoos that we perceive
+best this kaleidoscopic process applied to divine beings. In the vedic
+hymns not only are the clouds now serpents, now cows and later
+fortresses (the retreats of dark Asuras), but we see Agni (fire)
+becoming Kama (desire or love), and Indra becoming Varuna, and so on.
+"We cannot imagine," says Taine, "such a great clearness. The myth here
+is not a disguise, but an expression; no language is more true and more
+supple. It permits a glimpse of, or rather, it causes us to discern the
+forms of clouds, movements of the air, changes of seasons, all the
+happenings of sky, fire, storm: external nature has never met a mind so
+impressionable and pliant in which to mirror itself in all the
+inexhaustible variety of its appearances. However changeable nature may
+be, this imagination corresponds to it. It has no fixed gods; they are
+changeable like the things themselves; they blend one into another.
+Everyone of them is in turn the supreme deity; no one of them is a
+distinct personality; everyone is only a moment of nature, able,
+according to the apperception of the moment, to include its neighbor or
+be included by it. In this fashion they swarm and teem. Every moment of
+nature and every apperceptive moment may furnish one of them."[89] Let
+us, indeed, note that, for the worshiper, the god to whom he addresses
+himself and while he is praying, is always the greatest and most
+powerful. The assignment of attributes passes suddenly from one to the
+other, regardless of contradiction. In this versatility some writers
+believe they have discovered a vague pantheistic conception. Nothing is
+more questionable, fundamentally, than this interpretation. It is more
+in harmony with the psychology of these naive minds to assume simply an
+extreme state of "impressionism," explicable by the logic of feeling.
+
+Thus, there is a complete antithesis between the imagination that has
+created the clear-cut and definite polytheism of the Greeks and that
+whence have issued those fluctuating divinities that allow the
+presentation of the future doctrine of _Maya_, of universal
+illusion--another more refined form of the diffluent imagination.
+Finally, let us note that the Hellenic imagination realized its gods
+through anthropomorphism--they are the ideal forms of human
+attributes[90]--majesty, beauty, power, wisdom, etc. The Hindoo
+imagination proceeds through symbolism: its divinities have several
+heads, several arms, several legs, to symbolize limitless intelligence,
+power, etc.; or better still, animal forms, as e.g., Ganesa, the god of
+wisdom, with the head of the elephant, reputed the wisest of animals.
+
+(5) It would be easy to show by the history of literature and the fine
+arts that the vague forms have been preferred according to peoples,
+times, and places. Let us limit ourselves to a single contemporary
+example that is complete and systematically created--the art of the
+"symbolists." It is not here a question of criticism, of praise, or even
+of appreciation, but merely of a consideration of it as a psychological
+fact likely to instruct us in regard to the nature of the diffluent
+imagination.
+
+This form of art despises the clear and exact representation of the
+outer world: it replaces it by a sort of music that aspires to express
+the changing and fleeting inwardness of the human soul. It is the school
+of the subject "who wants to know only mental states." To that end, it
+makes use of a natural or artificial lack of precision: everything
+floats in a dream, men as well as things, often without mark in time and
+space. Something happens, one knows not where or when; it belongs to no
+country, is of no period in time: it is _the_ forest, _the_ traveler,
+_the_ city, _the_ knight, _the_ wood; less frequently, even _He_, _She_,
+_It_. In short, all the vague and unstable characters of the pure,
+content-less affective state. This process of "suggestion" sometimes
+succeeds, sometimes fails.
+
+The word is the sign _par excellence_. As, according to the symbolists,
+it should give us emotions rather than representations, it is necessary
+that it lose, partially, its intellectual function and undergo a new
+adaptation.
+
+A principal process consists of employing usual words and changing their
+ordinary acceptation, or rather, associating them in such a way that
+they lose their precise meaning, and appear vague and mysterious: these
+are the words "written in the depths." The writers do not name--they
+leave it for us to infer. "They banish commonplaces through lack of
+precision, and leave to things only the power of moving." A rose is not
+described by the particular sensations that it causes, but by the
+general condition that it excites.
+
+Another method is the employment of new words or words that have fallen
+into disuse. Ordinary words retain, in spite of everything, somewhat of
+their customary meaning, associations and thoughts condensed in them
+through long habit; words forgotten during four or five centuries
+escape this condition--they are coins without fixed value.
+
+Lastly, a still more radical method is the attempt to give to words an
+exclusively emotional valuation. Unconsciously or as the result of
+reflection some symbolists have come to this extreme trial, which the
+logic of events imposed upon them. Ordinarily, thought expresses itself
+in words; feeling, in gestures, cries, interjections, change of tone: it
+finds its complete and classic expression in music. The symbolists want
+to transfer the role of sound to words, to make of them the instrument
+for translating and suggesting emotion through sound alone: words have
+to act not as signs but as sounds: they are "musical notes in the
+service of an impassioned psychology."
+
+All this, indeed, concerns only imagination expressing itself in words;
+but we know that the symbolic school has applied itself to the plastic
+arts, to treat them in its own way. The difference, however, is in the
+vesture that the esthetic ideal assumes. The pre-Raphaelites have
+attempted, by effacing forms, outlines, semblances, colors, "to cause
+things to appear as mere sources of emotion," in a word, to _paint_
+emotions.
+
+To sum up--In this form of the diffluent imagination the emotional
+factor exercises supreme authority.
+
+May the type of imagination, the chief manifestations of which we have
+just enumerated, be considered as identical with the idealistic
+imagination? This question is similar to that asked in the preceding
+chapter, and permits the same answer. In idealistic art, doubtless, the
+material element furnished in perception (form, color, touch, effort) is
+minimized, subtilized, sublimated, refined, so as to approach as nearly
+as possible to a purely internal state. By the nature of its favorite
+images, by its preference for vague associations and uncertain
+relations, it presents all the characteristics of diffluent imagination;
+but the latter covers a much broader field: it is the genus of which the
+other is a species. Thus, it would be erroneous to regard the fantastic
+imagination as idealistic; it has no claim to the term: on the contrary,
+it believes itself adapted for practical work and acts in that
+direction.
+
+In addition, it must be recognized that were we to make a complete
+review of all the forms of esthetic creation, we should frequently be
+embarrassed to classify them, because there are among them, as in the
+case of characters, mixed or composite forms. Here, for example, are two
+kinds seemingly belonging to the diffluent imagination which, however,
+do not permit it to completely include them.
+
+(a) The "wonder" class (fairy-tales, the Thousand and One Nights,
+romances of chivalry, Ariosto's poem, etc.) is a survival of the mythic
+epoch, when the imagination is given free play without control or check;
+whereas, in the course of centuries, art--and especially literary
+creation--becomes, as we have already said, a decadent and rationalized
+mythology. This form of invention consists neither of idealizing the
+external world, nor reproducing it with the minuteness of realism, but
+_remaking_ the universe to suit oneself, without taking into account
+natural laws, and despising the impossible: it is a liberated realism.
+Often, in an environment of pure fancy, where only caprice reigns, the
+characters appear clear, well-fashioned, living. The "wonder" class
+belongs, then, to the vague as well as to the plastic imagination; more
+or less to one or to the other, according to the temperament of the
+creator.
+
+(b) The fantastic class develops under the same conditions. Its chiefs
+(Hoffmann, Poe, _et al._) are classed by critics as realists. They are
+such by virtue of their vision, intensified to hallucination, the
+precision in details, the rigorous logic of characters and events: they
+rationalize the improbable.[91] On the other hand, the environment is
+strange, shrouded in mystery: men and things move in an unreal
+atmosphere, where one feels rather than perceives. It is thus proper to
+remark that this class easily glides into the deeply sad, the horrible,
+terrifying, nightmare-producing, "satanic literature;" Goya's paintings
+of robbers and thieves being garroted; Wiertz, a genius bizarre to the
+point of extravagance, who paints only suicides or the heads of
+guillotined criminals.
+
+Religious conceptions could also furnish a fine lot of examples: Dante's
+_Inferno_, the twenty-eight hells of Buddhism, which are perhaps the
+masterpieces of this class, etc. But all this belongs to another
+division of our subject, one that I have expressly eliminated from this
+essay--the pathology of the creative imagination.
+
+
+III
+
+There yet remains for us to study two important varieties that I connect
+with the diffluent imagination.
+
+NUMERICAL IMAGINATION
+
+Under this head I designate the imagination that takes pleasure in the
+unlimited--in infinity of time and space--under the form of number. It
+seems at first that these two terms--imagination and number--must be
+mutually exclusive. Every number is precise, rigorously determined,
+since we can always reduce it to a relation with unity; it owes nothing
+to fancy. But the _series_ of numbers is unlimited in two directions:
+starting from any term in the series, we may go on ever increasingly or
+ever decreasingly. The working of the mind gives rise to a possible
+infinity that is limitless: it thus traces a route for the movement of
+the imagination. The number, or rather the series of numbers, is less an
+object than a vehicle.
+
+This form of imagination is produced in two principal ways--in religious
+conceptions and cosmogonies, and in science.
+
+(1) Numerical imagination has nowhere been more exuberant than among the
+peoples of the Orient. They have played with number with magnificent
+audacity and prodigality. Chaldean cosmogony relates that _Oannes_, the
+Fish-god, devoted 259,200 years to the education of mankind, then came a
+period of 432,000 years taken up with the reigns of mythical personages,
+and at the end of these 691,000 years, the deluge renewed the face of the
+earth. The Egyptians, also, were liberal with millions of years, and in
+the face of the brief and limited chronology of the Greeks (another kind
+of imagination) were wont to exclaim, "You, O Greeks, you are only
+children!" But the Hindoos have done better than all that. They have
+invented enormous units to serve as basis and content for their numerical
+fancies: the _Koti_, equivalent to ten millions; the _Kalpa_ (or the age
+of the world between two destructions), 4,328,000,000 years. Each _Kalpa_
+is merely one of 365 days of divine life: I leave to the reader, if he is
+so inclined, the work of calculating this appalling number. The Djanas
+divide time into two periods, one ascending, the other descending: each is
+of fabulous duration, 2,000,000,000,000,000 oceans of years; each ocean
+being itself equivalent to 1,000,000,000,000,000 years. "If there were a
+lofty rock, sixteen miles in each dimension, and one touched it once in a
+hundred years with a bit of the finest Benares linen, it would be reduced
+to the size of a wango-stone before a fourth of one of these _Kalpas_ had
+rolled by." In the sacred books of Buddhism, poor, dry, colorless, as they
+ordinarily are, imagination in its numerical forms is triumphant. The
+_Lalitavistara_ is full of nomenclatures and enumerations of fatiguing
+monotony: Buddha is seated on a rock shaded by 100,000 parasols,
+surrounded by minor gods forming an assemblage of 68,000 _Kotis_ (i.e.,
+680,000,000 persons), and--this surpasses all the rest--"he had
+experienced many vicissitudes during 10,100,000,000 _Kalpas_." This makes
+one dizzy.
+
+(2) Numerical imagination in the sciences does not take on these
+delirious forms; it has the advantage of resting on an objective basis:
+it is the substitute of an unrepresentable reality. Scientific culture,
+which people often accuse of stifling imagination, on the contrary opens
+to it a field much vaster than esthetics. Astronomy delights in
+infinitudes of time and space: it sees worlds arise, burn at first with
+the feeble light of a nebular mass, glow like suns, become chilled,
+covered with spots, and then become condensed. Geology follows the
+development of our earth through upheavals and cataclysms: it foresees a
+distant future when our globe, deprived of the atmospheric vapors that
+protect it, will perish of cold. The hypotheses of physics and chemistry
+in regard to atoms and molecules are not less reckless than the
+speculations of the Hindoo imagination. "Physicists have determined the
+volume of a molecule, and referring to the numbers that they give, we
+find that a cube, a millimeter each way (scarcely the volume of a
+silkworm's egg), would contain a number of molecules at least equal to
+the cube of 10,000,000--i.e., unity followed by twenty-one zeros. One
+scientist has calculated that if one had to count them and could
+separate in thought a million per second, it would take more than
+250,000,000 years: the being who commenced the task at the time that our
+solar system could have been no more than a formless nebula, would not
+yet have reached the end."[92] Biology, with its protoplasmic elements,
+its plastids, gemmules, hypotheses on hereditary transmission by means
+of infinitesimal subdivisions; the theory of evolution, which speaks
+off-hand of periods of a hundred thousand years; and many other
+scientific theses that I omit, offer fine material for the numerical
+imagination.
+
+More than one scientist has even made use of this form of imagination
+for the pleasure of developing a purely fanciful notion. Thus Von Baer,
+supposing that we might perceive the portions of duration in another
+way, imagines the changes that would result therefrom in our outlook on
+nature: "Suppose we were able, within the length of a second, to note
+10,000 events distinctly, instead of barely 10, as now; if our life were
+then destined to hold the same number of impressions, it might be 1,000
+times as short. We should live less than a month, and personally know
+nothing of the change of seasons. If born in winter, we should believe
+in summer as we now believe in the heats of the Carboniferous era. The
+motions of organic beings would be so slow to our senses as to be
+inferred, not seen. The sun would stand still in the sky, the moon be
+almost free from change, and so on. But now reverse the hypothesis and
+suppose a being to get only one 1,000th part of the sensations that we
+get in a given time, and consequently to live 1,000 times as long.
+Winters and summers will be to him like quarters of an hour. Mushrooms
+and the swifter-growing plants will shoot into being so rapidly as to
+appear instantaneous creations; annual shrubs will rise and fall from
+the earth like restlessly boiling water springs; the motions of animals
+will be as invisible as are to us the movements of bullets and
+cannonballs; the sun will scour through the sky like a meteor, leaving a
+fiery trail behind him, etc."[93]
+
+The psychologic conditions of this variety of the creative imagination
+are, then, these: Absence of limitation in time and space, whence the
+possibility of an endless movement in all directions, and the
+possibility of filling either with a myriad of dimly-perceived events.
+These events not being susceptible of clear representation as to their
+nature and quantity, escaping even a schematic representation, the
+imagination makes its constructions with substitutes that are, in this
+case, numbers.
+
+
+IV
+
+MUSICAL IMAGINATION
+
+Musical imagination deserves a separate monograph. As the task requires,
+in addition to psychological capacity, a profound knowledge of musical
+history and technique, it cannot be undertaken here. I purpose only one
+thing, namely, to show that it has its own individual mark--that it is
+the type of affective imagination.
+
+I have elsewhere[94] attempted to prove that, contrary to the general
+opinion of psychologists, there exists, in many men at least, an
+affective memory; that is, a memory of emotions strictly so called, and
+not merely of the intellectual conditions that caused and accompanied
+them. I hold that there exists also a form of the creative imagination
+that is purely emotional--the contents of which are wholly made up of
+states of mind, dispositions, wants, aspirations, feelings, and emotions
+of all kinds, and that it is the characteristic of the composer of
+genius, of the born musician.
+
+The musician sees in the world what concerns him. "He carries in his
+head a coherent system of tone-images, in which every element has its
+place and value; he perceives delicate differences of sound, of
+_timbre_; he succeeds, through exercise, in penetrating into their most
+varied combinations, and the knowledge of harmonious relations is for
+him what design and the knowledge of color are for the painter:
+intervals and harmony, rhythm and tone-qualities are, as it were,
+standards to which he relates his present perceptions and which he
+causes to enter into the marvelous constructions of his fancy."[95]
+
+These sound-elements and their combinations are the words of a special
+language that is very clear for some, impenetrable for others. People
+have spoken to a tiresome extent of the vagueness of musical expression;
+some have been pleased to hold that every one may interpret it in his
+own way. We must surely recognize that emotional language does not
+possess the precision of intellectual language; but in music it is the
+same as in any other idiom: there are those who do not understand at
+all; those who half understand and consequently always give wrong
+renderings; and those who understand well--and in this last category
+there are grades as varying as the aptitude for perceiving the delicate
+and subtle shades of speech.[96]
+
+The materials necessary for this form of imaginative construction are
+gathered slowly. Many centuries passed between the early ages when man's
+voice and the simple instruments imitating it translated simple
+emotions, to the period when the efforts of antiquity and of the middle
+ages finally furnished the musical imagination with the means of
+expressing itself completely, and allowed complex and difficult
+constructions in sound. The development of music--slow and belated as
+compared to the other arts--has perhaps been due, in part at least, to
+the fact that the affective imagination, its chief province (imitative,
+descriptive, picturesque music being only an episode and accessory),
+being made up, contrary to sensorial imagination, of tenuous, subtle,
+fugitive states, has been long in seeking its methods of analysis and of
+expression. However it be, Bach and the contrapuntists, by their
+treatment in an independent manner of the different voices constituting
+harmony, have opened a new path. Henceforth melody will be able to
+develop and give rise to the richest combinations. We shall be able to
+associate various melodies, sing them at the same time, or in
+alternation, assign them to various instruments, vary indefinitely the
+pitch of singing and concerted voices. The boundless realm of musical
+combinations is open; it has been worth while to take the trouble to
+invent. Modern polyphony with its power of expressing at the same time
+different, even opposing, feelings is a marvelous instrument for a form
+of imagination which, alien to the forms clear-cut in space, moves only
+in time.
+
+What furnishes us the best entrance into the psychology of this form of
+imagination is the natural transposition operative in musicians. It
+consists in this: An external or internal impression, any occurrence
+whatever, even a metaphysical idea, undergoes change of a certain kind,
+which the following examples will make better understood than any amount
+of commentary.
+
+Beethoven said of Klopstock's _Messiah_, "always _maestoso_, written in
+_D flat major_." In his fourth symphony he expressed musically the
+destiny of Napoleon; in the ninth symphony he tries to give a proof of
+the existence of God. By the side of a dead friend, in a room draped in
+black, he improvises the _adagio_ of the sonata in _C sharp minor_. The
+biographers of Mendelssohn relate analogous instances of transposition
+under musical form. During a storm that almost engulfed George Sand,
+Chopin, alone in the house, under the influence of his agony, and half
+unconsciously, composed one of his _Preludes_. The case of Schumann is
+perhaps the most curious of all: "From the age of eight, he would amuse
+himself with sketching what might be called musical portraits, drawing
+by means of various turns of song and varied rhythms the shades of
+character, and even the physical peculiarities, of his young comrades.
+He sometimes succeeded in making such striking resemblances that all
+would recognize, with no further designation, the figure indicated by
+the skillful fingers that genius was already guiding." He said later: "I
+feel myself affected by all that goes on in the world--men, politics,
+literature; I reflect on all that in my own way and it issues outwards
+in the form of music. That is why many of my compositions are so hard to
+understand: they relate to events of distant interest, though important;
+but everything remarkable that is furnished me by the period I must
+express musically." Let us recall again that Weber interpreted in one of
+the finest scenes of his _Freyschuetz_ (the bullet-casting scene) "a
+landscape that he had seen near the falls of Geroldsau, at the hour when
+the moon's rays cause the basin in which the water rushes and boils to
+glisten like silver."[97] In short, the events go into the composer's
+brain, mix there, and come out changed into a musical structure.
+
+The plastic imagination furnishes us a counter-proof: it transposes
+inversely. The musical impression traverses the brain, sets it in
+turmoil, but comes out transformed into visual images. We have already
+cited examples from Victor Hugo (ch. I); Goethe, we know, had poor
+musical gifts. After having the young Mendelssohn render an overture
+from Bach, he exclaimed, "How pompous and grand that is! It seems to me
+like a procession of grand personages, in gala attire, descending the
+steps of a gigantic staircase."
+
+We might generalize the question and ask whether or no there exists a
+natural antagonism between true musical imagination and plastic
+imagination. An answer in the affirmative seems scarcely liable to be
+challenged. I had undertaken an investigation which, at the outset, made
+for a different goal. It happens that it answered clearly enough the
+question propounded above: the conclusion has arisen of itself,
+unsought; which fact saves me from any charge of a preconceived opinion.
+
+The question asked orally of a large number of people was this: "Does
+hearing or even remembering a bit of _symphonic_ music excite visual
+images in you and of what kind are they?" For self evident reasons
+dramatic music was expressly excluded: the appearance of the theater,
+stage, and scenery impose on the observer visual perceptions that have a
+tendency to be repeated later in the form of memories.
+
+The result of observation and of the collected answers are summed up as
+follows:
+
+Those who possess great musical culture and--this is by far more
+important--taste or passion for music, generally have no visual images.
+If these arise, it is only momentarily, and by chance. I give a few of
+the answers: "I see absolutely nothing; I am occupied altogether with
+the pleasure of the music: I live entirely in a world of sound. In
+accordance with my knowledge of harmony, I analyze the harmonies but
+not for long. I follow the development of the phrasing." "I see nothing:
+I am given up wholly to my impressions. I believe that the chief effect
+of music is to heighten in everyone the predominating feelings."
+
+Those who possess little musical culture, and especially those having
+little taste for music, have very clear visual representations. It must
+nevertheless be admitted that it is very hard to investigate these
+people. Because of their anti-musical natures, they avoid concerts, or
+at the most, resign themselves to sit through an opera. However, since
+the nature and quality of the music does not matter here, we may quote:
+"Hearing a Barbary organ in the street, I picture the instrument to
+myself. I see the man turning the crank. If military music sounds from
+afar, I _see_ a regiment marching." An excellent pianist plays for a
+friend Beethoven's sonata in C sharp minor, putting into its execution
+all the pathos of which he is capable. The other sees in it "the tumult
+and excitement of a fair." Here the musical rendering is misinterpreted
+through misapprehension. I have several times noted this--in people
+familiar with design or painting, music calls up pictures and various
+scenes; one of these persons says that he is "besieged by visual
+images." Here the hearing of music evidently acts as excitant.[98]
+
+In a word, insofar as it is permissible in psychology to make use of
+general formulas--and with the proviso that they apply to most, not to
+all cases--we may say that during the working of the musical imagination
+the appearance of visual images is the exception; that when this form of
+imagination is weak, the appearance of images is the rule.
+
+Furthermore, this result of observation is altogether in accord with
+logic. There is an irreducible antithesis between affective imagination,
+the characteristic of which is interiority, and visual imagination,
+basically objective. Intellectual language--speech--is an arrangement
+of words that stand for objects, qualities, relations, extracts of
+things: in order to be understood they must call up in consciousness the
+corresponding images. Emotional language--music--is an appropriate
+ordering of successive or simultaneous sounds, of melodies and harmonies
+that are signs of affective states: in order to be understood, they must
+call up in consciousness the corresponding affective modifications. But,
+in the non-musically inclined, the evocative power is small--sonorous
+combinations excite only superficial and unstable internal states. The
+exterior excitation, that of the sounds, follows the line of least
+resistance, and acting according to the psychic nature of the
+individual, tends to arouse objective images, pictures, visual
+representations, well or ill adapted.
+
+To sum up: In contrast to sensorial imagination, which has its origin
+without, affective imagination begins within. The _stuff_ of its
+creation is found in the mental states enumerated above, and in their
+innumerable combinations, which it expresses and fixes in language
+peculiar to itself, of which it has been able to make wonderful use.
+Taking it altogether, the only great division possible between the
+different types of imagination is perhaps reducible to this: To speak
+more exactly, there are exterior and interior imaginations. These two
+chapters have given a sketch of them. There now remains for us to study
+the less general forms of the creative power.
+
+FOOTNOTES:
+
+[86] See Appendix E.
+
+[87] Let us cite merely the case of Balzac who, says one of his
+biographers, "was always odd." He buys a property, in order to start
+a dairy there with "the best cows in the world," from which he
+expects to receive a net income of 3,000 francs. In addition,
+high-grade vegetable gardens, same income; vineyard, with Malaga
+plants, which should bring about 2,000 fr. He has the commune of
+Sevres deed over to him a walnut tree, worth annually 2,000 francs
+to him, because all the townspeople dump their rubbish there. And so
+on, until at the end of four years he sees himself obliged to sell
+his domain for 3,000 francs, after spending on it thrice that sum.
+
+[88] Usener, _Goetternamen_, 1896.
+
+[89] _Nouveaux Essais de critique_, p. 320.
+
+[90] Or, as it has been expressed, "human qualities raised to their
+highest power." (Tr.)
+
+[91] The same statement holds good as regards the "Temptations of
+Saint Anthony" and other analogous subjects that have often
+attracted painters.
+
+[92] R. Dubois, _Lecons de physiologie generale et comparee_, p.
+286.
+
+[93] Von Baer, in James, _Psychology_, I, 639.
+
+[94] _Psychology of the Emotions_, Part I, Chapter IX.
+
+[95] Arreat, _Memoire et Imagination_, p. 118.
+
+[96] Mendelssohn wrote to an author who composed verses for his
+_Lieder_: "Music is more definite than speech, and to want to
+explain it by means of words is to make the meaning obscure. I do
+not think that words suffice for that end, and were I persuaded to
+the contrary, I would not compose music. There are people who accuse
+music of being ambiguous, who allege that words are always
+understood: for me it is just the other way; words seem to me vague,
+ambiguous, unintelligible, if we compare them to the true music that
+fills the soul with a thousand things better than words. What the
+music that I like expresses to me seems to me too _definite_, rather
+than too indefinite, for anyone to be able to match words to it."
+
+[97] Oelzelt-Newin, _op. cit._, pp. 22-23. For analogous facts from
+contemporary musicians, see Paulhan, _Rev. Phil._, 1898, pp. 234-35.
+
+[98] For the sake of brevity and clearness I do not give here the
+observations and evidence. They will be found at the end of this
+work, as Appendix D.
+
+Under the title "An experimental test of musical expressiveness,"
+Gilman, in _American Journal of Psychology_, vol. IV, No. 4, and vol.
+V, No. 1 (1892-3), has studied from another point of view the effect
+of music on various listeners. Eleven selections were given; I note
+that three or four at the most excited visual images--ten (perhaps
+eleven), emotional states. More recently, the _Psychological Review_
+(September, 1898, pp. 463 ff.) has published a personal observation of
+Macdougal in which sight-images accompany the hearing of music only
+exceptionally and under special conditions. The author characterizes
+himself as a "poor visualizer;" he declares that music arouses in him
+only very rarely visual representations; "even then they are
+fragmentary, consisting of simple forms without bond between them,
+appearing on a dark background, remaining visible for a moment or two,
+and soon disappearing." But, having gone to the concert fatigued and
+jaded, he sees nothing during the first number: the visions begin
+during the _andante_ of the second, and accompany "in profusion" the
+rendering of the third. (See Appendix D.) May we not assume that the
+state of fatigue, by lowering the vital tone, which is the basis of
+the emotional life, likewise diminishes the tendency of affective
+dispositions to arise again under the form of memory? On the other
+hand, sensory images remain without opposition and come to the front;
+at least, unless they are reenforced by a state of semi-morbid
+excitation.
+
+
+
+
+CHAPTER III.
+
+THE MYSTIC IMAGINATION
+
+
+Mystic imagination deserves a place of honor, as it is the most complete
+and most daring of purely theoretic invention. Related to diffluent
+imagination, especially in the latter's affective form, it has its own
+special characters, which we shall try to separate out.
+
+Mysticism rests essentially on two modes of mental life--feeling, which
+we need not study; and imagination, which, in the present instance,
+represents the intellectual factor. Whether the part of consciousness
+that this state of mind requires and permits be imaginative in nature
+and nothing else it is easy to find out. Indeed, the mystic considers
+the data of sense as vain appearances, or at the most as signs revealing
+and frequently laying bare the world of reality. He therefore finds no
+solid support in perception. On the other hand, he scorns reasoned
+thought, looking upon it as a cripple, halting half-way. He makes
+neither deductions nor inductions, and does not draw conclusions after
+the method of scientific hypotheses. The conclusion, then, is that he
+imagines, i.e., that he realizes a construction in images that is for
+him knowledge of the world; and he never proceeds, and does not proceed
+here, save _ex analogia hominis_.
+
+
+I
+
+The root of the mystic imagination consists of a tendency to incarnate
+the ideal in the sensible, to discover a hidden "idea" in every material
+phenomenon or occurrence, to suppose in things a supranatural principle
+that reveals itself to whoever may penetrate to it. Its fundamental
+character, from which the others are derived, is thus a way of thinking
+_symbolically_; but the algebraist also thinks by means of symbols, yet
+is not on that account a mystic. The nature of this symbolism must,
+then, be determined.
+
+In doing so, let us note first of all that our images--understanding the
+word "image" in its broadest sense--may be divided into two distinct
+groups:
+
+(1) _Concrete_ images, earliest to be received, being representations of
+greatest power, residues of our perceptions, with which they have a
+direct and immediate relation.
+
+(2) _Symbolic_ images, or signs, of secondary acquirement, being
+representations of lesser power, having only indirect and mediate
+relations with things.
+
+Let us make the differences between the two clear by a few simple
+examples.
+
+Concrete images are: In the visual sphere, the recollection of faces,
+monuments, landscapes, etc.; in the auditory sphere, the remembrance of
+the sounds of the sea, wind, the human voice, a melody, etc.; in the
+motor sphere, the tossings one feels when resting after having been at
+sea, the illusions of those who have had limbs amputated, etc.
+
+Symbolic images are: In the visual order, written words, ideographic
+signs, etc.; in the auditory order, spoken words or verbal images; in
+the motor order, significant gestures, and even better, the
+finger-language of deaf-mutes.
+
+Psychologically, these two groups are not identical in nature. Concrete
+images result from a persistence of perceptions and draw from the latter
+all their validity; symbolic images result from a mental synthesis, from
+an association of perception and image, or of image and image. If they
+have not the same origin, no more do they disappear in the same way, as
+is proven by very numerous examples of aphasia.
+
+The originality of mystic imagination is found in this fact: It
+transforms concrete images into symbolic images, and uses them as such.
+It extends this process even to perceptions, so that all manifestations
+of nature or of human art take on a value as signs or symbols. We shall
+later find numerous examples of this. Its mode of expression is
+necessarily synthetic. In itself, and because of the materials that it
+makes use of, it differs from the affective imagination previously
+described; it also differs from sensuous imagination, which makes use
+of forms, movements, colors, as having a value of their own; and from
+the imagination developing in the functions of words, through an
+analytic process. It has thus a rather special mark.
+
+Other characters are related to this one of symbolism, or else are
+derived from it, viz.:
+
+(1) An external character: the manner of writing and of speaking, the
+mode of expression, whatever it is. "The dominant style among mystics,"
+says von Hartmann, "is metaphorical in the extreme--now flat and
+ordinary, more often turgid and emphatic. Excess of imagination betrays
+itself there, ordinarily, in the thought and in the form in which that
+is rendered.... A sign of mysticism which it has been believed may often
+be taken as an essential sign, is obscurity and unintelligibility of
+language. We find it in almost all those who have written."[99] We might
+add that even in the plastic arts, symbolists and "_decadents_" have
+attempted, as far as possible, methods that merely indicate and suggest
+or hint instead of giving real, definite objects: which fact makes them
+inaccessible to the greater number of people.
+
+This characteristic of obscurity is due to two causes. First, mystical
+imagination is guided by the logic of feeling, which is purely
+subjective, full of leaps, jerks, and gaps. Again, it makes use of the
+language of images, especially visual images--a language whose ideal is
+vagueness, just as the ideal of verbal language is precision. All this
+can be summed up in a phrase--the subjective character inherent in the
+symbol. While seeming to speak like everyone else, the mystic uses a
+personal idiom: things becoming symbols at the pleasure of his fancy, he
+does not use signs that have a fixed and universally admitted value. It
+is not surprising if we do not understand him.
+
+(2) An extraordinary abuse of analogy and comparison in their various
+forms (allegory, parable, etc.)--a natural consequence of a mode of
+thinking that proceeds by means of symbols, not concepts. It has been
+said, and rightly, that "the only force that makes the vast field of
+mysticism fruitful is analogy."[100] Bossuet, a great opponent of
+mystics, had already remarked: "One of the characteristics of these
+authors is the pushing of allegories to the extreme limit." With warm
+imagination, having at their disposal overexcited senses, they are
+lavish of changes of expressions and figures, hoping thereby to explain
+the world's mysteries. We know to what inventive labors the Vedas, the
+Bible, the Koran, and other sacred books have given rise. The
+distinction between literal and figurative sense, which is boundlessly
+arbitrary, has given commentators a freedom to imagine equal to that of
+the myth-creators.
+
+All this is yet very reasonable; but the imagination left to itself
+stops at no extravagance. After having strained the meaning of
+expressions, the imaginative mind exercises itself on words and letters.
+Thus, the cabalists would take the first or the last letters of the
+words composing a verse, and would form with them a new word which was
+to reveal the hidden meaning. Again, they would substitute for the
+letters composing words the numbers that these letters represent in the
+Hebrew numerical system and form the strangest combinations with them.
+In the _Zohar_, all the letters of the alphabet come before God, each
+one begging to be chosen as the creative element of the universe.
+
+Let us also bring to mind numerical mysticism, different from numerical
+imagination heretofore studied. Here, number is no longer the means that
+mind employs in order to soar in time and space; it becomes a symbol and
+material for fanciful construction. Hence arise those "sacred numbers"
+teeming in the old oriental religions:--3, symbol of the trinity; 4,
+symbol of the cosmic elements; 7, representing the moon and the planets,
+etc.[101] Besides these fantastic meanings, there are more complicated
+inventions--calculating, from the letters of one's name, the years of
+life of a sick person, the auspices of a marriage, etc. The Pythagorean
+philosophy, as Zeller has shown, is the systematic form of this
+mathematical mysticism, for which numbers are not symbols of
+quantitative relations, but the very essence of things.
+
+This exaggerated symbolism, which makes the works of mystics so fragile,
+and which permits the mind to feed only on glimpses, has nevertheless an
+undeniable source of energy in its enchanting capacity to suggest.
+Without doubt suggestion exists also in art, but much more weakly, for
+reasons that we shall indicate.
+
+(3) Another characteristic of mystic imagination is the nature and the
+great degree of belief accompanying it. We already know[102] that when
+an image enters consciousness, even in the form of a recollection, of a
+purely passive reproduction, it appears at first, and for a moment, just
+as real as a percept. Much more so, in the case of imaginative
+constructions. But this illusion has degrees, and with mystics it
+attains its maximum.
+
+In the scientific and practical world, the work of the imagination is
+accompanied by only a conditional and provisional belief. The
+construction in images must justify its existence, in the case of the
+scientist, by explaining; and in the case of the man of affairs, by
+being embodied in an invention that is useful and answers its purpose.
+
+In the esthetic field, creation is accompanied by a momentary belief.
+Fancy, remarks Groos, is necessarily joined to appearance. Its special
+character does not consist merely in freedom in images; what
+distinguishes it from association and from memory is this--that what is
+merely representative is taken for the reality. The creative artist has
+a conscious illusion (_bewusste Selbsttaeuschung_): _the esthetic
+pleasure is an oscillation between the appearance and the reality_.[103]
+
+Mystic imagination presupposes an unconditioned and permanent belief.
+Mystics are believers in the true sense--they have faith. This character
+is peculiar to them, and has its origin in the intensity of the
+affective state that excites and supports this form of invention.
+Intuition becomes an object of knowledge only when clothed in images.
+There has been much dispute as to the objective value of those symbolic
+forms that are the working material of the mystic imagination. This
+contest does not concern us here; but we may make the positive statement
+that the constructive imagination has never obtained such a frequently
+hallucinatory form as in the mystics. Visions, touch-illusions, external
+voices, inner and "wordless" voices, which we now regard as psycho-motor
+hallucinations--all that we meet every moment in their works, until they
+become commonplace. But as to the nature of these psychic states there
+are only two solutions possible--one, naturalistic, that we shall
+indicate; the other, supernatural, which most theologians hold, and
+which regards these phenomena as valid and true revelation. In either
+case, the mystic imagination seems to us naturally tending toward
+objectification. It tends outwardly, by a spontaneous movement that
+places it on the same level as reality. Whichever conclusion we adopt,
+no imaginative type has the same great gift of energy and permanence in
+belief.
+
+
+II
+
+Mystic imagination, working along the lines peculiar to it, produces
+cosmological, religious, and metaphysical constructions, a summary
+exposition of which will help us understand its true nature.
+
+(1) The all-embracing cosmological form is the conception of the world
+by a purely imaginative being. It is rare, abnormal, and is nowadays met
+with only in a few artists, dreamers, or morbidly esthetic persons, as a
+kind of survival and temporary form. Thus, Victor Hugo sees in each
+letter of the alphabet the pictured imitation of one of the objects
+essential to human knowledge: "_A_ is the head, the gable, the
+cross-beam, the arch, _arx_; _D_ is the back, _dos_; _E_ is the
+basement, the console, etc., so that man's house and its architecture,
+man's body and its structure, and then justice, music, the church, war,
+harvesting, geometry, mountains, etc.--all that is comprised in the
+alphabet through the mystic virtue of form."[104] Even more radical is
+Gerard de Nerval (who, moreover, was frequently subject to
+hallucinations): "At certain times everything takes on for me a new
+aspect--secret voices come out of plant, tree, animals, from the
+humblest insects, to caution and encourage me. Formless and lifeless
+objects have mysterious turns the meaning of which I understand." To
+others, contemporaries, "the real world is a fairy land."
+
+The middle ages--a period of lively imagination and slight rational
+culture--overflowed in this direction. "Many thought that on this earth
+everything is a sign, a figure, and that the visible is worth nothing
+except insofar as it covers up the invisible." Plants, animals--there is
+nothing that does not become subject for interpretation; all the members
+of the body are emblems; the head is Christ, the hairs are the saints,
+the legs are the apostles, the eye is contemplation, etc. There are
+extant special books in which all that is seriously explained. Who does
+not know the symbolism of the cathedrals, and the vagaries to which it
+has given rise? The towers are prayer, the columns the apostles, the
+stones and the mortar the assembly of the faithful; the windows are the
+organs of sense, the buttresses and abutments are the divine assistance;
+and so on to the minutest detail.
+
+In our day of intense intellectual development, it is not given to many
+to return sincerely to a mental condition that recalls that of the
+earliest times. Even if we come near it, we still find a difference.
+Primitive man puts life, consciousness, activity, into everything;
+symbolism does likewise, but it does not believe in an autonomous,
+distinct, particular soul inherent in each thing. The absence of
+abstraction and generalization, characteristic of humanity in its early
+beginnings, when it peoples the world with myriads of animate beings,
+has disappeared. Every source of activity revealed by symbols appears
+as a fragmentary manifestation; it descends from a single primary,
+personal or impersonal, spring. At the root of this imaginative
+construction there is always either theism or pantheism.
+
+(2) Mystical imagination has often and erroneously been identified with
+religious imagination. Although it may be held that every religion, no
+matter how dull and poor, presupposes a latent mysticism, because it
+supposes an Unknown beyond the reach of sense, there are religions very
+slightly mystical in fact--those of savages, strictly utilitarian; among
+barbarians, the martial cults of the Germans and the Aztecs; among
+civilized races, Rome and Greece.[105] However, even though the mystic
+imagination is not confined to the bounds of religious thought, history
+shows us that there it attains its completest expansion.
+
+To be brief, and to keep strictly within our subject, let us note that
+in the completely developed great religions there has arisen opposition
+between the rationalists and the imaginative expounders, between the
+dogmatists and the mystics. The former, rational architects, build by
+means of abstract ideas, logical relations and methods, by deduction and
+induction; the others, imaginative builders, care little for this
+learned magnificence--they excel in vivid creations because the moving
+energy with them is in their feelings, "in their hearts;" because they
+speak a language made up of concrete images, and consequently their
+wholly symbolic speech is at the same time an original construction. The
+mystic imagination is a transformation of the mythic imagination, the
+myth changing into symbols. It cannot escape the necessity of this. On
+the other hand, the affective states cannot longer remain vague,
+diffuse, purely internal; they must become fixed in time and space, and
+condensed into images forming a personality, legend, event, or rite.
+Thus, Buddha represents the tendencies towards pity and resignation,
+summing up the aspirations for final rest. On the other hand, abstract
+ideas, pure concepts, being repugnant to the mystic's nature, it is also
+necessary that they take on images through which they may be seen--e.g.,
+the relations between God and man, in the various forms of
+communion; the idea of divine protection in incarnations, mediators,
+etc. But the images made use of are not dry and colorless like words
+that by long use have lost all direct representative value and are
+merely marks or tags. Being symbolic, i.e., concrete, they are, as we
+have seen, direct substitutes for reality, and they differ as much from
+words as sketching and drawing differ from our alphabetical signs, which
+are, however, their derivatives or abbreviations.
+
+It must, however, be noted that if "the mystic fact is a naive effort to
+apprehend the absolute, a mode of symbolic, not dialectic, thinking,
+that lives on symbols and finds in them the only fitting
+expression,"[106] it seems that this imaginative phase has been to some
+minds only an internal form, for they have attempted to go beyond it
+through ecstacy, aspiring to grasp the ultimate principle as a pure
+unity, without image and without form,[107] which metaphysical realism
+hopes to attain by other methods and by a different route. However
+interesting they may be for psychology, these attempts, luring one on
+further and further, by their seeming or real elimination of every
+symbolic element, become foreign to our subject, and we cannot consider
+them at greater length here.
+
+(3) "History shows that philosophy has done nothing but transform ideas
+of mystic production, substituting for the form of images and
+undemonstrated statements the form of assertions of a rational
+system."[108] This declaration of a metaphysician saves us from dwelling
+on the subject long.
+
+When we seek the difference between religious and metaphysical or
+philosophical symbolism, we find it in the nature of the constitutive
+elements. Turned in the direction of religion, mystic symbolism
+presupposes two principal elements--imagination and feeling; turned in
+a metaphysical direction, it presupposes imagination and a very small
+rational element. This substitution involves appreciable deviation
+from the primitive type. The construction is of greater logical
+regularity. Besides, and this is the important characteristic, the
+subject-matter--though still resembling symbolic images--tends to
+become concepts: such are vivified abstractions, allegorical beings,
+hereditary entities of spirits and of gods. In short, metaphysical
+mysticism is a transition-form towards metaphysical rationalism,
+although these two tendencies have always been inimical in the history
+of philosophy, just as in the history of religion.
+
+In this imaginative plan of the world we may recognize stages according
+to the increasing weakness of the systems, depending on the number and
+quality of the hypotheses. For example, the progression is apparent
+between Plotinus and the frenzied creations of the Gnostics and the
+Cabalists. With the latter, we come into a world of unbridled fancy
+which, in place of human romances, invents cosmic romances. Here appear
+the allegorical beings mentioned above, half concept, half symbol; the
+ten Sephiros of the Cabala, immutable forms of being; the _syzygies_ or
+couples of Gnosticism--soul and reflection, depth and silence, reason
+and life, inspiration and truth, etc.; the absolute manifesting itself
+by the unfolding of fifty-two attributes, each unfolding comprising
+seven _eons_, corresponding to the 364 days of the year, etc. It would
+be wearisome to follow these extravagant thoughts, which, though the
+learned may treat them with some respect, have for the psychologist only
+the interest of pathologic evidence. Moreover, this form of mystic
+imagination presents too little that is new for us to speak of it
+without repeating ourselves.
+
+To conclude: The mystic imagination, in its alluring freedom, its
+variety, and its richness, is second to no form, not even to esthetic
+invention, which, according to common prejudice, is the type _par
+excellence_. Following the most venturesome methods of analogy, it has
+constructed conceptions of the world made up almost wholly of feelings
+and images--symbolic architectures.
+
+FOOTNOTES:
+
+[99] _Philosophy of the Unconscious_, I, part 2, ch. IX.
+
+[100] J. Darmesteter, in Recejac, _Essai sur les fondements de la
+connaissance mystique_, p. 124.
+
+[101] In such notions may perhaps be best found the genesis of the
+present superstitions in regard to "lucky" and "unlucky" numbers,
+like the number 13, which have such persistence. (Tr.)
+
+[102] See Part Two, chapter II.
+
+[103] Groos, _Die Spiele der Thiere_, pp. 308-312.
+
+[104] Mabilleau, _op. cit._, p. 132.
+
+[105] If we leave out oriental influences and the Mysteries, which,
+according to Aristotle, were not dogmatic teaching, but a show, an
+assemblage of symbols, acting by evocation, or suggestion, following
+the special mode of mystic imagination that we already know.
+
+[106] Recejac, _op. cit._, pp. 139 ff.
+
+[107] One at once calls to mind Plotinus, whose highest philosophy
+is a kind of indescribable ecstacy. (Tr.)
+
+[108] Hartmann, _op. cit._, vol. I, part 2, chapter IX.
+
+
+
+
+CHAPTER IV
+
+THE SCIENTIFIC IMAGINATION
+
+
+It is quite generally recognized that imagination is indispensable in
+all sciences; that without it we could only copy, repeat, imitate; that
+it is a stimulus driving us onward and launching us into the unknown. If
+there does exist a very widespread prejudice to the contrary--if many
+hold that scientific culture throttles imagination--we must look for the
+explanation of this view first, in the equivocation, pointed out several
+times, that makes the essence of the creative imagination consist of
+images, which are here most often replaced by abstractions or extracts
+of things--whence it results that the created work does not have the
+living forms of religion, of art, or even of mechanical invention; and
+then, in the rational requirements regulating the development of the
+creative faculty--it may not wander at will. In either case its end is
+determined, and in order to exist, i.e., in order to be accepted, the
+invention must become subject to preestablished rules.
+
+This variety of imagination being, after the esthetic form, the one
+that psychologists have best described, we may therefore be brief. A
+complete study of the subject, however, remains yet to be made. Indeed,
+we may remark that there is no "scientific imagination" in general, that
+its form must vary according to the nature of the science, and that,
+consequently, it really resolves itself into a certain number of genera
+and even of species. Whence arises the need of monographs, each one of
+which should be the work of a competent man.
+
+No one will question that mathematicians have a way of thinking all
+their own; but even this is too general. The arithmetician, the
+algebraist, and more generally the analyst, in whom invention obtains in
+the most abstract form of discontinuous functions--symbols and their
+relations--cannot imagine like the geometrician. One may well speak of
+the ideal figures of geometry--the empirical origin of which is no
+longer anywhere contested--but we cannot escape from representing them
+as somehow in space. Does anyone think that Monge, the creator of
+descriptive geometry, who by his work has aided builders, architects,
+mechanics, stone cutters in their labors, could have the same type of
+imagination as the mathematician who has been given up all his life to
+the theory of number? Here, then, are at least two well-marked
+varieties, to say nothing of mixed forms. The physicist's imagination is
+necessarily more concrete; since he is incessantly obliged to refer to
+the data of sense or to that totality of visual, tactile, motor,
+acoustic, thermic, etc., representations that we term the "properties
+of matter." Our eye, says Tyndall, cannot see sound waves contract and
+dilate, but we construct them in thought--i.e., by means of visual
+images. The same remarks are true of chemists. The founders of the
+atomic theory certainly _saw_ atoms, and pictured them in the mind's
+eye, and their arrangement in compound bodies. The complexity of the
+imagination increases still more in the geologist, the botanist, the
+zoologist; it approaches more and more, with its increasing details, to
+the level of perception. The physician, in whom science becomes also an
+art, has need of visual representations of the exterior and interior,
+microscopic and macroscopic, of the various forms of diseased
+conditions; auditory representations (auscultation); tactile
+representations (touch, reverberation, etc.); and let us also add that
+we are not speaking merely of diagnosis of diseases, which is a matter
+of reproductive imagination, but of the discovery of a new pathologic
+"entity," proven and made certain from the symptoms. Lastly, if we do
+not hesitate to give a very broad extension to the term "scientific,"
+and apply it also to invention in social matters, we shall see that the
+latter is still more exacting, for one must represent to oneself not
+only the elements of the past and of the present, but in addition
+construct a picture of the future according to probable inductions and
+deductions.
+
+It might be objected that the foregoing enumeration proves a great
+variety in the _content_ of creative imagination but not in the
+imagination itself, and that nothing has proven that, under all these
+various aspects, there does not exist a so-called scientific
+imagination, that always remains identical. This position is untenable.
+For we have seen above[109] that there exists no creative instinct in
+general, no one mere indeterminate "creative power," but only wants
+that, in certain cases, excite novel combinations of images. The nature
+of the separable materials, then, is a factor of the first importance;
+it is determining, and indicates to the mind the direction in which it
+is turned, and all treason in this regard is paid for by aborted
+construction, by painful labor for some petty result. Invention,
+separated from what gives it body and soul, is nothing but a pure
+abstraction.
+
+The monographs called for above would, then, be a not unneeded work. It
+is only from them collectively that the role of the imagination in the
+sciences could be completely shown, and we might by abstraction separate
+out the characters common to all varieties--the essential marks of this
+imaginative type.
+
+Mathematics aside, all the sciences dealing with facts--from astronomy
+to sociology--suppose three moments, namely, observation, conjecture,
+verification. The first depends on external and internal sense, the
+second on the creative imagination, the third on rational operations,
+although the imagination is not entirely barred from it. In order to
+study its influence on scientific development, we shall study it (a) in
+the sciences in process of formation; (b) in the established sciences;
+(c) in the processes of verification.
+
+
+II
+
+It has often been said that the perfection of a science is measured by
+the amount of mathematics it requires; we might say, conversely, that
+its lack of completeness is measured by the amount of imagination that
+it includes. It is a psychological necessity. Where the human mind
+cannot explain or prove, there it invents; preferring a semblance of
+knowledge to its total absence.[110] Imagination fulfills the function
+of a substitute; it furnishes a subjective, conjectural solution in
+place of an objective, rational explanation. This substitution has
+degrees:
+
+(1) The sway of the imagination is almost complete in the
+pseudo-sciences (alchemy, astrology, magic, occultism, etc.), which it
+would be more proper to call embryonic sciences, for they were the
+beginnings of more exact disciplines and their fancies have not been
+without use. In the history of science, this is the golden age of the
+creative imagination, corresponding to the myth-making period already
+studied.
+
+(2) The semi-sciences, incompletely proved (certain portions of
+biology, psychology, sociology, etc.), although they show a regression
+of imaginative explanation repulsed by the hitherto absent or
+insufficient experimentation, nevertheless abound in hypotheses, that
+succeed, contradict, destroy one another. It is a commonplace truism
+that does not need to be dwelt on--they furnish _ad libitum_ examples of
+what has been rightly termed scientific mythology.
+
+Aside from the quantity of imagination expended, often without great
+profit, there is another character to be noted--the nature of the belief
+that accompanies imaginative creation. We have already seen repeatedly
+that the intensity of the imaginary conception is in direct ratio to the
+accompanying belief, or rather, that the two phenomena are really
+one--merely the two aspects of one and the same state of consciousness.
+But faith--i.e., the adherence of the mind to an undemonstrated
+assertion--is here at its maximum.
+
+There are in the sciences hypotheses that are not believed in, that are
+preserved for their didactic usefulness, because they furnish a simple
+and convenient method of explanation. Thus the "properties of matter"
+(heat, electricity, magnetism, etc.), regarded by physicists as distinct
+qualities even in the first half of the last century; the "two electric
+fluids;" cohesion, affinity, etc., in chemistry--these are some of the
+convenient and admitted expressions to which, however, we attach no
+explanatory value.
+
+There is also to be mentioned the hypothesis held as an approximation
+of reality--this is the truly scientific position. It is accompanied by
+a provisional and ever-revocable belief. This is admitted, in principle
+at least, by all scientists, and has been put into practice by many of
+them.
+
+Lastly, there is the hypothesis regarded as the truth itself--one that
+is accompanied by a complete, absolute, belief. But daily observation
+and history show us that in the realm of embryonic and ill-proven
+sciences this disposition is more flourishing than anywhere else. _The
+less proof there is, the more we believe._ This attitude, however wrong
+from the standpoint of the logician, seems to the psychologist natural.
+The mind clings tenaciously to the hypothesis because the latter is its
+own creation, or, because in adopting it, it seems to the mind that it
+should have itself discovered the hypothesis, so much does the latter
+harmonize with its inner states. Let us take the hypothesis of
+evolution, for example: we need not mention its high philosophical
+bearing, and the immense influence that it exerts on almost all forms of
+human thought. Nevertheless, it still remains an hypothesis; but for
+many it is an indisputable and inviolable dogma, raised far above all
+controversy. They accept it with the uncompromising fervor of believers:
+a new proof of the underlying connection between imagination and
+belief--they increase and decrease _pari passu_.
+
+
+III
+
+Should we assign as belonging solely to the imagination every invention
+or discovery--in a word, whatever is new--in the well-organized sciences
+that form a body of solid, constantly-broadening doctrine? It is a hard
+question. That which raises scientific knowledge above popular knowledge
+is the use of an experimental method and rigorous reasoning processes;
+but, is not induction and deduction going from the known to the unknown?
+Without desiring to depreciate the method and its value, it must
+nevertheless be admitted that it is preventive, not inventive. It
+resembles, says Condillac, the parapets of a bridge, which do not help
+the traveler to walk, but keep him from falling over. It is of value
+especially as a habit of mind. People have wisely discoursed on the
+"methods" of invention. There are none; but for which fact we could
+manufacture inventors just as we make mechanics and watchmakers. It is
+the imagination that invents, that provides the rational faculties with
+their materials, with the position, and even the solution of their
+problems. Reasoning is only a means for control and proof; it transforms
+the work of the imagination into acceptable, logical results. If one has
+not imagined beforehand, the logical method is aimless and useless, for
+we cannot reason concerning the completely unknown. Even when a problem
+seems to advance towards solution wholly through the reason, the
+imagination ceaselessly intervenes in the form of a succession of
+groupings, trials, guesses, and possibilities that it proposes. The
+function of method is to determine its value, to accept or reject
+it.[111]
+
+Let us show by a few examples that conjecture, the work of the combining
+imagination, is at the root of the most diverse scientific
+inventions.[112]
+
+Every mathematical invention is at first only an hypothesis that must be
+demonstrated, i.e., must be brought under previously established
+general principles: prior to the decisive moment of rational
+verification it is only a thing imagined. "In a conversation concerning
+the place of imagination in scientific work," says Liebig, "a great
+French mathematician expressed the opinion to me that the greater part
+of mathematical truth is acquired not through deduction, but through the
+imagination. He might have said 'all the mathematical truths,' without
+being wrong." We know that Pascal discovered the thirty-second
+proposition of Euclid all by himself. It is true that it has been
+concluded, wrongly perhaps, that he had also discovered all the earlier
+ones, the order followed by the Greek geometrician not being necessary,
+and not excluding other arrangements. However it be, reasoning alone was
+not enough for that discovery. "Many people," says Naville, "of whom I
+am one, might have thought hard all their lives without finding out the
+thirty-two propositions of Euclid." This fact alone shows clearly the
+difference between invention and demonstration, imagination and reason.
+
+In the sciences dealing with facts, all the best-established
+experimental truths have passed through a conjectural stage. History
+permits no doubt on this point. What makes it appear otherwise is the
+fact that for centuries there has gradually come to be formed a body of
+solid belief, making a whole, stored away in classic treatises from
+which we learn from childhood, and in which they seem to be arranged of
+themselves. We are not told of the series of checks and failures through
+which[113] they have passed. Innumerable are the inventions that
+remained for a long time in a state of conjecture, matters of pure
+imagination, because various circumstances did not permit them to take
+shape, to be demonstrated and verified. Thus, in the thirteenth century,
+Roger Bacon had a very clear idea of a construction on rails similar to
+our railroads; of optical instruments that would permit, as does the
+telescope, to see very far, and to discover the invisible. It is even
+claimed that he must have foreseen the phenomena of interferences, the
+demonstration of which had to be awaited ten centuries.
+
+On the other hand, there are guesses that have met success without much
+delay, but in which the imaginative phase--that of the invention
+preceding all demonstration--is easy to locate. We know that
+Tycho-Brahe, lacking inventive genius but rich in capacity for exact
+observation, met Kepler, an adventurous spirit: together, the two made a
+complete scientist. We have seen how Kepler, guided by a preconceived
+notion of the "harmony of the spheres," after many trials and
+corrections, ended by discovering his laws. Copernicus recognized
+expressly that his theory was suggested to him by an hypothesis of
+Pythagoras--that of a revolution of the earth about a central fire,
+assumed to be in a fixed position. Newton imagined his hypothesis of
+gravitation from the year 1666 on, then abandoned it, the result of his
+calculations disagreeing with observation; finally he took it up again
+after a lapse of a few years, having obtained from Paris the new measure
+of the terrestrial meridian that permitted him to prove his guess. In
+relating his discoveries, Lavoisier is lavish in expressions that leave
+no doubt as to their originally conjectural character. "He _suspects_
+that the air of the atmosphere is not a simple thing, but is composed of
+two very different substances." "He _presumes_ that the permanent
+alkalies (potash, soda) and the earths (lime, magnesia) should not be
+considered simple substances." And he adds: "What I present here is at
+the most no more than a mere _conjecture_." We have mentioned above the
+case of Darwin. Besides, the history of scientific discoveries is full
+of facts of this sort.
+
+The passage from the imaginative to the rational phase may be slow or
+sudden. "For eight months," says Kepler, "I have seen a first glimmer;
+for three months, daylight; for the last week I see the sunlight of the
+most wonderful contemplation." On the other hand, Hauey drops a bit of
+crystallized calcium spar, and, looking at one of the broken prisms,
+cries out, "All is found!" and immediately verifies his quick intuition
+in regard to the true nature of crystallization. We have already
+indicated[114] the psychological reasons for these differences.
+
+Underneath all the reasoning, inductions, deductions, calculations,
+demonstrations, methods, and logical apparatus of every sort, there is
+something animating them that is not understood, that is the work of
+that complex operation--the constructive imagination.
+
+To conclude: The hypothesis is a creation of the mind, invested with a
+provisional reality that may, after verification, become permanent.
+False hypotheses are characterized as imaginary, by which designation is
+meant that they have not become freed from the first state. But for
+psychology they are different neither in their origin nor in their
+nature from those scientific hypotheses that, subjected to the power of
+reason or of experiment, have come out victorious. Besides, in addition
+to abortive hypotheses, there are dethroned ones. What theory was more
+clinging, more fascinating in its applications, than that of phlogiston?
+Kant[115] praised it as one of the greatest discoveries of the
+eighteenth century. The development of the sciences is replete with
+these downfalls. They are psychological regressions: the invention,
+considered for a time as adequate to reality, decays, returns to the
+imaginative phase whence it seems to have emerged, and remains pure
+imagination.
+
+
+IV
+
+Imagination is not absent from the third stage of scientific research,
+in demonstration and experimentation, but here we must be brief, (1)
+because it passes to a minor place, yielding its rank to other modes of
+investigation, and (2) because this study would have to become doubly
+employed with the practical and mechanical imagination, which will
+occupy our attention later. The imagination is here only an auxiliary, a
+useful instrument, serving:
+
+(1) In the sciences of reasoning, to discover ingenious methods of
+demonstration, stratagems for avoiding or overcoming difficulties.
+
+(2) In the experimental sciences for inventing methods of research or of
+control--whence its analogy, above mentioned, to the practical
+imagination. Furthermore, the reciprocal influence of these two forms of
+imagination is a matter of common observation: a scientific discovery
+permits the invention of new instruments; the invention of new
+instruments makes possible experiments that are increasingly more
+complicated and delicate.
+
+One remark further: This constructive imagination at the third stage is
+the only one met with in many scientists. They lack genius for
+invention, but discover details, additions, corrections, improvements. A
+recent author distinguishes (a) those who have created the hypothesis,
+prepared the experiments, and imagined the appropriate apparatus; (b)
+those who have imagined the hypothesis and the experiment, but use means
+already invented; and (c) those who, having found the hypothesis made
+and demonstrated, have thought out a new method of verification.[116]
+The scientific imagination becomes poorer as we follow it down this
+scale, which, however, bears no relation to exactness of reasoning and
+firmness of method.
+
+Neglecting species and varieties, we may reduce the fundamental
+characters of the scientific imagination to the following:
+
+For its material, it has concepts, the degree of abstraction of which
+varies with the nature of the science.
+
+It employs only those associational forms that have an objective basis,
+although its mission is to form new combinations, "the discoveries
+consisting of the relation of ideas, capable of being united, which
+hitherto have been isolated."[117] (Laplace.) All association with an
+affective basis is strictly excluded.
+
+It aims toward objectivity: in its conjectural construction it attempts
+to reproduce the order and connection of things. Whence its natural
+affinity for realistic art, which is midway between fiction and reality.
+
+It is unifying, and so just the opposite of the esthetic imagination,
+which is rather developmental. It puts forward the master idea (Claude
+Bernard's _idee directrice_), a center of attraction and impulse that
+enlivens the entire work. The principle of unity, without which no
+creation succeeds, is nowhere more visible than in the scientific
+imagination. Even when illusory, it is useful. Pasteur, scrupulous
+scientist that he was, did not hesitate to say: "The experimenter's
+illusions are a part of his power: they are the preconceived ideas
+serving as guides for him."
+
+
+V
+
+It does not seem to me wrong to regard the imagination of the
+metaphysician as a variety of the scientific imagination. Both arise
+from one and the same requirement. Several times before this we have
+emphasized this point--that the various forms of imagination are not the
+work of an alleged "creative instinct," but that each particular one has
+arisen from a special need. The scientific imagination has for its prime
+motive the need of _partial_ knowledge or explanation; the metaphysical
+imagination has for its prime motive the need of a _total_ or complete
+explanation. The latter is no longer an endeavor on a restricted group
+of phenomena, but a conjecture as to the totality of things, as
+aspiration toward completely unified knowledge, a need of final
+explanation that, for certain minds, is just as imperious as any other
+need.
+
+This necessity is expressed by the creation of a cosmic or human
+hypothesis constructed after the type and methods of scientific
+hypotheses, but radically subjective in its origin--only apparently
+objective. _It is a rationalized myth._
+
+The three moments requisite for the constitution of a science are found
+here, but in a modified form: reflection replaces observation, the
+choice of the hypothesis becomes all-important, and its application to
+everything corresponds to scientific proof.
+
+(1) The first moment or preparatory stage, does not belong to our
+subject. It requires, however, a word in passing. In all science,
+whether well or ill established, firm or weak, we start from facts
+derived from observation or experiment. Here, facts are replaced by
+general ideas. The terminus of every science is, then, the
+starting-point of philosophical speculation:--metaphysics begins where
+each separate science ends; and the limits of the latter are theories,
+hypotheses. These hypotheses become working material for metaphysics
+which, consequently, is an hypothesis built on hypotheses, a conjecture
+grafted on conjecture, a work of imagination superimposed on works of
+imagination. Its principal source, then, is imagination, to which
+reflection applies itself.
+
+Metaphysicians, indeed, hold that the object of their researches, far
+from being symbolic and abstract, as in science, or fictitious and
+imaginary, as in art, is the very essence of things,--absolute reality.
+Unfortunately, they have never proven that it suffices to seek in order
+to find, and to wish in order to get.
+
+(2) The second stage is critical. It is concerned with finding the
+principle that rules and explains everything. In the invention of his
+theory the metaphysician gives his measure, and permits us to value his
+imaginative power. But the hypothesis, which in science is always
+provisional and revocable, is here the supreme reality, the fixed
+position, the _inconcussum quid_.
+
+The choice of the principle depends on several causes: The chief of
+these is the creator's individuality. Every metaphysician has a point of
+view, a personal way of contemplating and interpreting the totality of
+things, a belief that tends to recruit adherents.
+
+Secondary causes are: the influence of earlier systems, the sum of
+acquired knowledge, the social _milieu_, the variable predominance of
+religions, sciences, morality, esthetic culture.
+
+Without troubling ourselves with classifications, otherwise very
+numerous, into which we may group systems (idealism, materialism,
+monism, etc.) we shall, for our purpose, divide metaphysicians into the
+imaginative and rational, according as the imagination is superior to
+the reason or the reason rules the imagination. The differences between
+these two types of mind, already clearly shown in the choice of the
+hypothesis, are proven in its development.
+
+(3) The fundamental principle, indeed, must come out of its state of
+involution and justify its universal validity by explaining everything.
+This is the third moment, when the scientific process of verification is
+replaced by a process of construction.
+
+All imaginative metaphysics have a dynamic basis, e.g., the Platonic
+_Ideas_, Leibniz' _Monadology_, the _Nature-philosophy_ of Schelling,
+Schopenhauer's _Will_, and Hartmann's _Unconscious_, the mystics, the
+systems that assume a world-soul, etc. Semi-abstract, semi-poetic
+constructions, they are permeated with imagination not only in the
+general conception, but also in the numberless details of its
+application. Such are the "fulgurations" of Leibniz, those very rich
+digressions of Schopenhauer, etc. They have the fascination of a work of
+art as much as that of science, and this is no longer questioned by
+metaphysicians themselves;[118] they are living things.
+
+Rational metaphysics, on the other hand, have a chilly aspect, which
+brings them nearer the abstract sciences. Such are most of the
+mechanical conceptions, the Hegelian _Dialectic_, Spinoza's construction
+_more geometrico_, the _Summa_ of the Middle Ages. These are buildings
+of concepts solidly cemented together with logical relations. But art is
+not wholly absent; it is seen in the systematic concatenation, in the
+beautiful ordering, in the symmetry of division, in the skill with which
+the generative principle is constantly brought in, in showing it
+ever-present, explaining everything. It has been possible to compare
+these systems with the architecture of the Gothic cathedrals, in which
+the dominant idea is incessantly repeated in the numberless details of
+the construction, and in the branching multiplicity of ornamentation.
+
+Further, whatever view we adopt as to its ultimate value, it must be
+recognized that the imagination of the great metaphysicians, by the
+originality and fearlessness of its conceptions, by its skill in
+perfecting all parts of its work, is inferior to no other form. It is
+equal to the highest, if it does not indeed surpass them.
+
+FOOTNOTES:
+
+[109] See Part I, chapter II.
+
+[110] Cf. the Preface to Kant's _Critique of Pure Reason_. "Our
+reason ... is always troubled with questions which cannot be
+ignored, because they spring from the very nature of reason, and
+which cannot be answered, because they transcend the powers of human
+reason." (Tr.)
+
+[111] In the rare _Notes_ that he has left, James Watt writes that
+one afternoon he had gone out for a stroll on the Green at Glasgow,
+and his thoughts were absorbed with the experiments in which he was
+busied, trying to prevent the cooling of the cylinder. The thought
+then came to him that steam, being an elastic fluid, should expand
+and be precipitated in a space formerly void; and having made a
+vacuum in a separate vessel and opened communication between the
+steam of the cylinder and the vacant space, we see what should
+follow. Thus, having imagined the masterpiece of his discovery, he
+enumerates the processes that, employed in turn, allowed him to
+perfect it.
+
+[112] For further information we refer to the _Logique de
+l'hypothese_, by E. Naville, from which are borrowed most of the
+facts here given.
+
+[113] This much-criticised defect has been only partially overcome
+in our methods of education through "object" lessons, and, if we may
+call them so, evolutionary methods, showing to the child "wie es
+eigentlich gewesen." Cf. J. Dewey, "_The School and Society_." (Tr.)
+
+[114] See above, Part Two, chapter IV.
+
+[115] Preface to the _Critique of Pure Reason_.
+
+[116] Colozza, _L'immaginazione nella Scienza_ (Paravia, 1900), pp.
+89 ff. In this author will be found abundant details respecting
+famous discoveries or experiments--those of Galileo, Franklin,
+Grimaldi, etc.
+
+[117] Here is an example in confirmation, taken from Duclaux's book
+on Pasteur: Herschel established a relation between the crystalline
+structure of quartz and the rotatory power of the substance; later
+on, Biot established it for sugar, tartaric acid, etc.--i.e., for
+substances in solution, whence he concluded that the rotatory power
+is due to the form of the molecule itself, not to the arrangement of
+the molecules in relation to one another. Pasteur discovered a
+relation between molecular dyssymmetry and hemiedry, and the study
+of hemiedry in crystals led him logically to that of fermentation
+and spontaneous generation.
+
+[118] On this point cf. Fouillee, _L'Avenir de la Metaphysique_, pp.
+79 ff.
+
+
+
+
+CHAPTER V
+
+THE PRACTICAL AND MECHANICAL IMAGINATION
+
+
+The study of the practical imagination is not without difficulties.
+First of all, it has not hitherto attracted psychologists, so that we
+enter the field at random, and wander unguided in an unexplored region.
+But the principal obstacle is in the lack of determination of this form
+of imagination, and in the absence of boundary lines. Where does it
+begin, and where does it end? Penetrating all our life even in its least
+details, it is likely to lead us astray through the diversity, often
+insignificant, of its manifestations. To convince ourselves of this
+fact, let us take a man regarded as least imaginative:--subtract the
+moments when his consciousness is busied with perceptions, memories,
+emotions, logical thought and action--all the rest of his mental life
+must be put down to the credit of the imagination. Even thus limited,
+this function is not a negligible quantity:--it includes the plans and
+constructions for the future, and all the dreams of escaping from the
+present; and there is no man but makes such. This had to be mentioned
+on account of its very triteness, because it is often forgotten, and
+consequently the field of the creative imagination is unduly restricted,
+being limited little by little to exceptional cases.
+
+It must, however, be recognized that these small facts teach us little.
+Consequently, following our adopted procedure, dwelling longest on the
+clearer and more evident cases in which the work of creating appears
+distinctly, we shall rapidly pass over the lower forms of the practical
+imagination, in order to dwell on the higher form--technical or
+mechanical imagination.
+
+
+I
+
+If we take an ordinary imaginative person,--understanding by this
+expression, one whom his nature singles out for no special invention--we
+see that he excels in the small inventions, adapted for a moment, for a
+detail, for the petty needs constantly arising in human life. It is a
+fruitful, ingenious, industrious mind, one that knows how to "take hold
+of things." The active, enterprising American, capable of passing from
+one occupation to another according to circumstances, opportunity, or
+imagined profits, furnishes a good example.
+
+If we descend from this form of sane imagination toward the morbid
+forms, we meet first the unstable--knights of industry, hunters of
+adventure, inventors frequently of questionable means, people hungry for
+change, always imagining what they haven't, trying in turn all
+professions, becoming workmen, soldiers, sailors, merchants, etc., not
+from expediency, but from natural instability.
+
+Further down are found the acknowledged "freaks" at the brink of
+insanity, who are but the extreme form of the unstable, and who, after
+having wasted haphazard much useless imagination, end in an insane
+asylum or worse still.
+
+Let us consider these three groups together. Let us eliminate the
+intellectual and moral qualities characteristic of each group, which
+establish notable differences between them, and let us consider only
+their inventive capacity as applied to practical life. One character
+common to all is mobility--the tendency to change. It is a matter of
+current observation that men of lively imagination are changeable.
+Common opinion, which is also the opinion of moralists and of most
+psychologists, attributes this mobility, this instability, to the
+imagination. This, in my opinion, is just upside down. _It is not
+because they have an active imagination that they are changeable, but it
+is because they are changeable that their imagination is active._ We
+thus return to the _motor_ basis of all creative work. Each new or
+merely modified disposition becomes a center of attraction and pull.
+Doubtless the inner push is a necessary condition, but it is not
+sufficient. If there were not within them a sufficient number of
+concrete, abstract, or semi-abstract representations, susceptible of
+various combinations, nothing would happen; but the origin of invention
+and of its frequent or constant changes of direction lies in the
+emotional and motor constitution, not in the quantity or quality of
+representations. I shall not dwell longer on a subject already
+treated,[119] but it was proper to show, in passing, that common opinion
+starts from an erroneous conception of the primary conditions of
+invention--whether great or small, speculative or practical.
+
+In the immense empire of the practical imagination, superstitious
+beliefs form a goodly province.
+
+What is superstition? By what positive signs do we recognize it? An
+exact definition and a sure criterion are impossible. It is a flitting
+notion that depends on the times, places, and nature of minds. Has it
+not often been said that the religion of one is superstition to another,
+and _vice versa_? This, too, is only a single instance from among many
+others; for the common opinion that restricts superstition within the
+bounds of religious faith is an incomplete view. There are peculiar
+beliefs, foreign to every dogma and every religious feeling, from which
+the most radical freethinker is not exempt; for example, the
+superstitions of gamblers. Indeed, at the bottom of all such beliefs, we
+always find the vague, semi-conscious notion of a mysterious
+power--destiny, fate, chance.
+
+Without taking the trouble to set arbitrary limits, let us take the
+facts as they are, without possible question, i.e., imaginary
+creations, subjective fancies, having reality only for those admitting
+them. Even a summary collection of past and present superstitions would
+fill a library. Aside from those having a frankly religious mark, others
+almost as numerous surround civil life, birth, marriage, death,
+appearance and healing of diseases, _dies fasti atque nefasti_,
+propitious or fateful words, auguries drawn from the meeting or acts of
+certain animals. The list would be endless.[120]
+
+All that can be attempted here is a determination of the principal
+condition of that state of mind, the psychology of which is in the last
+analysis very simple. We shall thus answer in an indirect and incomplete
+manner the question of criterion.
+
+First, since we hold that the origin of all imaginative creation is a
+need, a desire, a tendency, where then is the origin of that
+inexhaustible fount of fancies? _In the instinct for individual
+preservation_, orientated in the direction of the future. Man seeks to
+divine future events, and by various means to act on the order of things
+to modify it for his own advantage or to appease his evil fate.
+
+As for the mental mechanism that, set in motion by this desire, produces
+the vain images of the superstitious, it implies:
+
+(1) A deep idea of causality, reduced to a _post hoc, ergo propter hoc_.
+Herodotus says of the Egyptian priests: "They have discovered more
+prodigies and presages than any other people, because, when some
+extraordinary thing appears, they note it as well as all the events
+following it, so that if a similar prodigy appears anew, they expect to
+see the same events reproduced." It is the hypothesis of an indissoluble
+association between two or more events, assumed without verification,
+without criticism. This manner of thinking depends on the weakness of
+the logical faculties or on the excessive influence of the feelings.
+
+(2) The abuse of reasoning by analogy. This great artisan of the
+imagination is satisfied with likenesses so vague and agreements so
+strange, that it dares everything. Resemblance is no longer a quality of
+things imposed on the mind, but an hypothesis of the mind imposed on
+things. Astrology groups into "constellations" stars that are billions
+of miles apart, believes that it discovers there an animal shape, human
+or any other, and deduces therefrom alleged "influences." This star is
+reddish (Mars), sign of blood; this other is of a pure, brilliant
+silvery light (Venus) or livid (Saturn), and acts in a different way. We
+know what clever structures of conjectures and prognoses have been built
+on these foundations. Need we mention the Middle Age practice of charms,
+which even in our day still has adherents among cultured people? The
+physicians of the time of Charles II, says Lang, gave their patients
+"mummy powder" (pulverized mummies) because the mummies, having lasted a
+long time, must prolong life.[121] Gold in solution has been esteemed
+as a medicine--gold, being a perfect substance, should produce perfect
+health. In order to get rid of a disease nothing is more frequent among
+primitive men than to picture the sick person on wood or on the ground,
+and to strike the injured part with an arrow or knife, in order to
+annihilate the sickening principle.
+
+(3) Finally, there is the magic influence ascribed to certain words. It
+is the triumph of the theory of _nomina numina_; we need not return to
+it. But the working of the mind on words, erecting them into entities,
+conferring life and power on them--in a word, the activity that creates
+myths and is the final basis of all constructive imagination--appears
+also here.[122]
+
+
+II
+
+Up to this point we have considered the practical imagination only in
+its somewhat petty aspect in small inventions or as semi-morbid in
+superstitious fancies. We now come to its higher form, mechanical
+invention.
+
+This subject has not been studied by psychologists. Not that they have
+misunderstood its role, which is, after all, very evident; but they
+limit themselves to speak of it cursorily, without emphasizing it.
+
+In order to appreciate its importance, I see no other way than to put
+ourselves face to face with the works that it has produced, to question
+the history of discovery and useful arts, to profit by the disclosures
+of inventors and their biographers.
+
+Of a work of this kind, which would be very long because the materials
+are scattered, we can give here only a rough sketch, merely to take
+therefrom what is of interest for psychology and what teaches us in
+regard to the characters peculiar to this type of imagination.
+
+The erroneous view that opposes imagination to the useful, and claims
+that they are mutually exclusive, is so widespread and so persistent,
+that we shall seem to many to be expressing a paradox when we say that
+if we could strike the balance of the imagination that man has spent and
+made permanent in esthetic life on the one hand, and in technical and
+mechanical invention on the other, the balance would be in favor of the
+latter. This assertion, however, will not seem paradoxical to those who
+have considered the question. Why, then, the view above mentioned? Why
+are people inclined to believe that our present subject, if not entirely
+foreign to the imagination, is only an impoverished form of it? I
+account for it by the following reasons:
+
+Esthetic imagination, when fully complete, is simply _fixed_, i.e.,
+remains a fictitious matter recognized as such. It has a frankly
+subjective, personal character, arbitrary in its choice of means. A work
+of art--a poem, a novel, a drama, an opera, a picture, a statue--might
+have been otherwise than it is. It is possible to modify the general
+plan, to add or reduce an episode, to change an ending. The novelist who
+in the course of his work changes his characters; the dramatic author
+who, in deference to public sentiment, substitutes a happy _denouement_
+in place of a catastrophe, furnish naive testimony of this freedom of
+imagination. Moreover, artistic creation, expressing itself in words,
+sounds, lines, forms, colors, is cast in a mould that allows it only a
+feeble "material" reality.
+
+The mechanical imagination is objective--it must be embodied, take on a
+form that gives it a place side by side with products of nature. It is
+arbitrary neither in its choice nor in its means; it is not a free
+creature having its end in itself. In order to succeed, it is subjected
+to rigorous physical conditions, to a determinism. It is at this cost
+that it becomes a reality, and as we instinctively establish an
+antithesis between the imaginary and the real, it seems that mechanical
+invention is outside the realm of the imagination. Moreover, it requires
+the constant intervention of calculation, of reasoning, and lastly, of a
+manual operation of supreme importance. We may say without exaggerating
+that the success of many mechanical creations depends on the skillful
+manipulation of materials. But this last moment, because it is decisive,
+should not make us forget its antecedents, especially the initial
+moment, which is, for psychology, similar to all other instances of
+invention, when the idea arises, tending to become objective.
+
+Otherwise, the differences here pointed out between the two forms of
+imagination--esthetic and mechanical--are but relative. The former is
+not independent of technical apprenticeship, often of long duration (e.g.,
+in music, sculpture, painting). As for the latter, we should not
+exaggerate its determinism. Often the same end can be reached by
+different inventions--by means differently imagined, through different
+mental constructions; and it follows that, after all allowances are
+made, these differently realized imaginations are equally useful.
+
+The difference between the two types is found in the nature of the need
+or desire stimulating the invention, and secondly in the nature of the
+materials employed. Others have confounded two distinct things--liberty
+of imagination, which belongs rather to esthetic creation, and quality
+and power of imagination, which may be identical in both cases.
+
+I have questioned certain inventors very skillful in mechanics,
+addressing myself to those, preferably, whom I knew to be strangers to
+any preconceived psychological theory. Their replies agree, and prove
+that the birth and development of mechanical invention are very
+strictly like those found in other forms of constructive imagination. As
+an example, I cite the following statement of an engineer, which I
+render literally:
+
+"The so-called creative imagination surely proceeds in very different
+ways, according to temperament, aptitudes, and, in the same individual,
+following the mental disposition, the _milieu_.
+
+"We may, however, as far as regards mechanical inventions, distinguish
+four sufficiently clear phases--the germ, incubation, flowering, and
+completion.
+
+"By germ I mean the first idea coming to the mind to furnish a solution
+for a problem that the whole of one's observations, studies, and
+researches has put before one, or that, put by another, has struck one.
+
+"Then comes incubation, often very long and painful, or, again, even
+unconscious. Instinctively as well as voluntarily one brings to the
+solution of the problem all the materials that the eyes and ears can
+gather.
+
+"When this latent work is sufficiently complete, the idea suddenly
+bursts forth, it may be at the end of a voluntary tension of mind, or on
+the occasion of a chance remark, tearing the veil that hides the
+surmised image.
+
+"But this image always appears simple and clear. In order to get the
+ideal solution into practice, there is required a struggle against
+matter, and the bringing to an issue is the most thankless part of the
+inventor's work.
+
+"In order to give consistence and body to the idea caught sight of
+enthusiastically in an aureole, one must have patience, a perseverance
+through all trials. One must view on all sides the mechanical agencies
+that should serve to set the image together, until the latter has
+attained the simplicity that alone makes invention viable. In this work
+of bringing to a head, the same spirit of invention and imagination must
+be constantly drawn upon for the solution of all the details, and it is
+against this arduous requirement that the great majority of inventors
+rebel again and again.
+
+"This is then, I believe, how one may in a general way understand the
+genesis of an invention. It follows from this that here, as almost
+everywhere, the imagination acts through association of ideas.
+
+"Thanks to a profound acquaintance with known mechanical methods, the
+inventor succeeds, through association of ideas, in getting novel
+combinations producing new effects, towards the realization of which his
+mind has in advance been bent."
+
+But for a slightly explored subject, the foregoing remarks are not
+enough. It is necessary to determine more precisely the general and
+special characters of this form of imagination.
+
+
+_1. General Characters_
+
+I term general characters those that the mechanical imagination
+possesses in common with the best known, least questioned forms of the
+constructive imagination. In order to be convinced that, so far as
+concerns these characters it does not differ from the rest, let us take,
+for the sake of comparison, esthetic imagination, since it is agreed,
+rightly or wrongly, that this is the model _par excellence_. We shall
+see that the essential psychological conditions coincide in the two
+instances.
+
+The mechanical imagination thus has like the other its ideal, i.e., a
+perfection conceived and put forward as capable, little by little, of
+being realized. The idea is at first hidden; it is, to use our
+correspondent's phrase, "the germ," the principle of unity, center of
+attraction, that suggests, excites, and groups appropriate associations
+of images, in which it is enwrapped and organized into a structure, an
+_ensemble_ of means converging toward a common end. It thus presupposes
+a dissociation of experience. The inventor undoes, decomposes, breaks up
+in thought, or makes of experience a tool, an instrument, a machine, an
+agency for building anew with the debris.
+
+The practical imagination is no more foreign to inspiration than the
+esthetic imagination. The history of useful inventions is full of men
+who suffered privations, persecution, ruin; who fought to the bitter end
+against relatives and friends--drawn by the need of creating, fascinated
+not by the hope of future gain but by the idea of an imposed mission, of
+a destiny they had to fulfill. What more have poets and artists done?
+The fixed and irresistible idea has led more than one to a foreseen
+death, as in the discovery of explosives, the first attempts at
+lightning conductors, aeronautics, and many others. Thus, from a true
+intuition, primitive civilizations have put on a level great poets and
+great inventors, erected into divinities or demi-gods historical or
+legendary personages in whom the genius of discovery is
+personified:--among the Hindoos, Vicavakarma; among the Greeks,
+Hephaestos, Prometheus, Triptolemus, Daedalus and Icarus. The Chinese,
+despite their dry imagination, have done the same; and we find the same
+condition in Egypt, Assyria, and everywhere. Moreover, the practical and
+mechanical arts have passed through a first period of no-change, during
+which the artisan, subjected to fixed rules and an undisputed tradition,
+considers himself an instrument of divine revelation.[123] Little by
+little he has emerged from that theological age, to enter the humanistic
+age, when, being fully conscious of being the author of his work, he
+labors freely, changes and modifies according to his own inspiration.
+
+Mechanical and industrial imagination, like esthetic imagination, has
+its preparatory period, its zenith and decline: the periods of the
+precursors, of the great inventors, and of mere perfectors. At first a
+venture is made, effort is wasted with small result,--the man has come
+too early or lacks clear vision; then a great imaginative mind arises,
+blossoms; after him the work passes into the hands of _dii minores_,
+pupils or imitators, who add, abridge, modify: such is the order. The
+many-times written history of the application of steam, from the time of
+the eolipile of Hero of Alexandria to the heroic period of Newcomen and
+Watt, and the improvements made since their time, is one proof of the
+statement. Another example:--the machine for measuring duration is at
+first a simple clepsydra; then there are added marks indicating the
+subdivisions of time, then a water gauge causes a hand to move around a
+dial, then two hands for the hours and minutes; then comes a great
+moment--by the use of weights the clepsydra becomes a clock, at first
+massive and cumbersome, later lightened, becoming capable, with
+Tycho-Brahe, of marking seconds; and then another moment--Huyghens
+invents the spiral spring to replace the weights, and the clock,
+simplified and lightened, becomes the watch.
+
+
+_2. Special Characters_
+
+The special characteristics of the mechanical imagination being the
+marks belonging to this type, we shall study them at greater length.
+
+(I) There is first of all, at least in great inventors, an inborn
+quality,--that is, a natural disposition,--that does not originate in
+experience and owes the latter only its development. This quality is a
+bent in a practical, useful direction; a tendency to act, not in the
+realm of dreams or human feeling, not on individuals or social groups,
+not toward the attainment of theoretical knowledge of nature, but to
+become master over natural forces, to transform them and adapt them
+toward an end.
+
+Every mechanical invention arises from a need: from the strict necessity
+for individual preservation in the case of primitive man who wages war
+against the powers of nature; from the desire for well-being and the
+necessity for luxury in growing civilization; from the need of creating
+little engines, imitating instruments and machines, in the child. In a
+word, _every particular invention, great or small, arises from a
+particular need_; for, we repeat again, there is no creative instinct in
+general. A man distinguished for various inventions along practical
+lines, writes: "As far as my memory allows, I can state that in my case
+conception always results from a material or mental need.[124] It
+springs up suddenly. Thus, in 1887, a speech of Bismarck made me so
+angry that I immediately thought of arming my country with a repeating
+rifle. I had already made various applications to the ministry of war,
+when I learned that the Lebel system had just been adopted. My
+patriotism was fully satisfied, but I still have the design of the gun
+that I invented." This communication mentions two or three other
+inventions that arose under analogous circumstances, but have had a
+chance of being adopted.
+
+Among the requisite qualities I mention the natural and necessary
+preeminence of certain groups of sensations or images (visual, tactile,
+motor) that may be decisive in determining the direction of the
+inventor.
+
+(II) Mechanical invention grows by successive stratifications and
+additions, as in the sciences, but more completely. It is a fine
+verification of the "subsidiary law of growing complexity" previously
+discussed.[125] If we measure the distance traversed since the distant
+ages when man was naked and unarmed before nature to the present time of
+the reign of machinery, we are astonished at the amount of imagination
+produced and expended, often uselessly lavished, and we ask ourselves
+how such a work could have been misunderstood or so lightly appreciated.
+It does not pertain to our subject to make even a summary table of this
+long development. The reader can consult the special works which,
+unfortunately, are most often fragmentary and lack a general view. So we
+should feel grateful to a historian of the useful arts, L. Bourdeau,
+for having attempted to separate out the philosophy of the subject, and
+for having fastened it down in the following formulas:[126]
+
+(a) The exploitation of the powers of nature is made according to their
+degree of power.
+
+(b) The extension of working instruments has followed a logical
+evolution in the direction of growing complexity and perfection.
+
+Man, according to the observations of M. Bourdeau, has applied his
+creative activity to natural forces and has set them to work according
+to a regular order, viz.:
+
+(1) Human forces, the only ones available during the "state of nature"
+and the savage state. Before all else, man created weapons: the most
+circumscribed primitive races have invented engines for attack and
+defense--of wood, bone, stone, as they were able. Then the weapon became
+a tool by special adaptation:--the battle-club serves as a lever, the
+tomahawk as a hammer, the flint ax as a hatchet, etc. In this manner
+there is gradually formed an arsenal of instruments. "Inferior to most
+animals as regards certain work that would have to be done with the aid
+of our organic resources alone, we are superior to all as soon as we set
+our tools at work. If the rodents with their sharp teeth cut wood better
+than we can, we do it still better with the ax, the chisel, the saw.
+Some birds, with the help of a strong beak, by repeated blows,
+penetrate the trunk of a tree: but the auger, the gimlet, the wimble do
+the same work better and more quickly. The knife is superior to the
+carnivore's teeth for tearing meat; the hoe better than the mole's paw
+for digging earth, the trowel than the beaver's tail for beating and
+spreading mortar. The oar permits us to rival the fish's fin; the sail,
+the wing of the bird. The distaff and spindle allow our imitating the
+industry of insect spinners; etc. Man thus reproduces and sums up in his
+technical contrivances the scattered perfections of the animal world. He
+even succeeds in surpassing them, because, in the form of tools, he uses
+substances and combinations of effects that cannot figure as part of an
+organism."[127] It is scarcely likely that most of these inventions
+arose from a voluntary imitation of animals: but even supposing such an
+origin, there would still remain a fine place for personal creative
+work. Man has produced by conscious effort what life realizes by methods
+that escape us; so that the creative imagination in man is a
+_succedaneum_ of the generative powers of nature.
+
+(2) During the pastoral stage man brought animals under subjection and
+discipline. An animal is a machine, ready-made, that needs only to be
+trained to obedience; but this training has required and stimulated all
+sorts of inventions, from the harness with which to equip it, to the
+chariots, wagons, and roads with which and on which it moves.
+
+(3) Later, the natural motors--air and water--have furnished new
+material for human ingenuity, e.g., in navigation; wind- and
+water-mills, used at first to grind grain, then for a multitude of
+uses--sawing, milling, lifting hammers; etc.
+
+(4) Lastly, much later, come products of an already mature civilization,
+artificial motors, explosives,--powder and all its derivatives and
+substitutes--steam, which has made such great progress.
+
+If the reader please to represent to himself well the immense number of
+facts that we have just indicated in a few lines; if he please to note
+that every invention, great or small, before becoming a fixed and
+realized thing, was at first an imagination, a mere contrivance of the
+brain, an assembly of new combinations or new relations, he will be
+forced to admit that nowhere--not excepting even esthetic
+production--has man imagined to such a great extent.
+
+One of the reasons--though not the only one--that supports the contrary
+opinion is, that by the very law of their growing complexity, inventions
+are grafted one on another. In all the useful arts improvements have
+been so slow, and so gradually wrought, that each one of them passed
+unperceived, without leaving its author the credit for its discovery.
+The immense majority of inventions are anonymous--some great names alone
+survive. But, whether individual or collective, imagination remains
+imagination. In order that the plow, at first a simple piece of wood
+hardened by the fire and pushed along with the human hand, should become
+what it is to-day, through a long series of modifications described in
+the special works, who knows how many imaginations have labored! In the
+same way, the uncertain flame of a resinous branch guiding vaguely in
+the night leads us, through a long series of inventions, to gas and
+electric lighting. All objects, even the most ordinary and most common
+that now serve us in our everyday-life, are _condensed imagination_.
+
+(III) More than any other form, mechanical imagination depends strictly
+on physical conditions. It cannot rest content with combining images, it
+postulates material factors that impose themselves unyieldingly.
+Compared to it, the scientific imagination has much more freedom in the
+building of its hypotheses. In general, every great invention has been
+preceded by a period of abortive attempts. History shows that the
+so-called "initial moment" of a mechanical discovery, followed by its
+improvements, is the moment ending a series of unsuccessful trials: we
+thus skip a phase of pure imagination, of imaginative construction that
+has not been able to enter into the mold of an appropriate determinism.
+There must have existed innumerable inventions that we might term
+mechanical romances, which, however, we cannot refer to because they
+have left us no trace, not being born viable. Others are known as
+curiosities because they have blazed the path. We know that Otto de
+Guericke made four fruitless attempts before discovering his air-pump.
+The brothers Montgolfier were possessed with the desire to make
+"imitation clouds," like those they saw moving over the Alps. "In order
+to imitate nature," they at first enclosed water-vapor in a light, stout
+case, which fell on cooling. Then they tried hydrogen; then the
+production of a gas with electrical properties; and so on. Thus, after a
+succession of hypotheses and failures, they finally succeeded. From the
+end of the sixteenth century there was offered the possibility of
+communicating at a distance by means of electricity. "In a work
+published in 1624 the Jesuit, Father Leurechon, described an imaginary
+apparatus (by means of which, he said, people could converse at a
+distance) for the aid of lovers who, by the connection of their
+movements, would cause a needle to move about a dial on which would be
+written the letters of the alphabet; and the drawing accompanying the
+text is almost a picture of Breguet's telegraph." But the author
+considered it impossible "in the absence of lovers having such
+ability."[128]
+
+Mechanical inventions that fail correspond to erroneous or unverified
+scientific hypotheses. They do not emerge from the stage of pure
+imagination, but they are instructive to the psychologist because they
+give in bare form the initial work of the constructive imagination in
+the technical field.
+
+There still remain the requirements of reasoning, of calculation, of
+adaptation to the properties of matter. But, we repeat, this determinism
+has several possible forms--one can reach the same goal through
+different means. Besides, these determining conditions are not lacking
+in any type of imagination; there is only a difference as between lesser
+and greater. Every imaginative construction from the moment that it is
+little more than a group of fancies, a spectral image haunting a
+dreamer's brain, must take on a body, submit to external conditions on
+which it depends, and which materialize it somewhat. In this respect,
+architecture is an excellent example. It is classed among the fine arts;
+but it is subject to so many limitations that its process of invention
+strongly resembles technical and mechanical creations. Thus it has been
+possible to say that "Architecture is the least personal of all the
+arts." "Before being an art it is an industry in the sense that it has
+nearly always a useful end that is imposed on it and rules its
+manifestations. Whatever it builds--a temple, a theater, a palace--it
+must before all else subordinate its work to the end assigned to it in
+advance. This is not all:--it must take account of materials, climate,
+soil, location, habits--of all things that may require much skill, tact,
+calculation, which, however, do not interest art as such, and do not
+permit architecture to manifest its purely esthetic qualities."[129]
+
+Thus, at bottom, there is an identity of nature between the constructive
+imagination of the mechanic and that of the artist: the difference is
+only in the end, the means, and the conditions. The formula, _Ars homo
+additus naturae_, has been too often restricted to esthetics--it should
+comprehend everything artificial. Esthetes, doubtless, hold that their
+imagination has for them a loftier quality--a disputed question that
+psychology need not discuss; for it, the essential mechanism is the same
+in the two cases: a great mechanic is a poet in his own way, because he
+makes instruments imitating life. "Those constructions that at other
+times are the marvel of the ignorant crowd deserve the admiration of the
+reflecting:--Something of the power that has organized matter seems to
+have passed into combinations in which nature is imitated or surpassed.
+Our machines, so varied in form and in function, are the representatives
+of a new kingdom intermediate between senseless and animate forms,
+having the passivity of the former and the activity of the latter, and
+exploiting everything for our sake. They are counterfeits of animate
+beings, capable of giving inert substances a regular functioning. Their
+skeleton of iron, organs of steel, muscles of leather, soul of fire,
+panting or smoking breath, rhythm of movement--sometimes even the shrill
+or plaintive cries expressing effort or simulating pain:--all that
+contributes to give them a fantastic likeness to life--a specter and
+dream of inorganic life."[130]
+
+FOOTNOTES:
+
+[119] See above, Part One, chapter II.
+
+[120] For a complete and recent study of the question, see A.
+Lehmann, _Aberglaube und Zauberei von den aeltesten Zeiten bis in die
+Gegenwart_, 1898.
+
+[121] Lang, _op. cit._, I, 96. There will be found many other facts
+of this kind.
+
+[122] If this book were not merely an essay, we should have had to
+study language as an instrument of the practical life in its
+relations to the creative imagination, especially the function of
+analogy, in the extension and transformation of the meanings of
+words. Works on linguistics are full of evidence on this point. One
+could do better still by attending exclusively to the vernacular, to
+slang, which shows us creative force in action. "Slang," says one
+philologist, "has the property of figuring, expressing, and
+picturing language.... With it, however low its origin, one could
+reconstruct a people or a society." Its principal, not only, means,
+are metaphor and allegory. It lends itself equally to methods that
+degrade or ennoble existing words, but with a very marked preference
+for the worse or degrading meanings.
+
+[123] Ample information on this point will be found in the work of
+Espinas, _Les Origines de la Technologie_.
+
+[124] The same correspondent, without my having asked him in regard
+to this, gives me the following details: "When about seven years old
+I saw a locomotive, its fire and smoke. My father's stove also made
+fire and smoke, but lacked wheels. If, then, I told my father, we
+put wheels under the stove, it would move like a locomotive. Later,
+when about thirteen, the sight of a steam threshing-machine
+suggested to me the idea of making a horseless wagon. I began a
+childish construction of one, which my father made me give up," etc.
+The tendency toward mechanical invention shows itself very early in
+some children--we gave examples of it before. Our inventor adds: "My
+imagination was strongest at about the age of 25 to 35 (I am now 45
+years old). After that time it seems to me that the remainder of
+life is good only for producing less important conceptions, forming
+a natural consequence of the principal conceptions born of the
+period of youth."
+
+[125] See above, Part Two, chapter V.
+
+[126] L. Bourdeau, _Les Forces de l'Industrie_, Paris, 1884. This
+very substantial work, abounding in facts, conceived after a
+systematic plan, has aided us much in this study.
+
+[127] _Op. cit._, pp. 45-46.
+
+[128] Quoted by L. Bourdeau (_op. cit._, p. 354), who also mentions
+many other attempts: an anonymous Scot in 1753, Lesage of Geneva,
+1780, Lhomond (France, 1787), Battencourt (Spain, 1787), Reiser, a
+German (1794), Salva (Madrid, 1796). The insufficient study of
+dynamic electricity did not permit them to succeed.
+
+[129] E. Veron, _L'Esthetique_, p. 315.
+
+[130] L. Bourdeau, _op. cit._, p. 233.
+
+
+
+
+CHAPTER VI
+
+THE COMMERCIAL IMAGINATION
+
+
+Taking the word "commercial" in its broadest signification, I understand
+by this expression all those forms of the constructive imagination that
+have for their chief aim the production and distribution of wealth, all
+inventions making for individual or collective enrichment. Even less
+studied than the form preceding, this imaginative manifestation reveals
+as much ingenuity as any other. The human mind is largely busied in that
+way. There are inventors of all kinds--the great among these equal those
+whom general opinion ranks as highest. Here, as elsewhere, the great
+body invent nothing, live according to tradition, in routine and
+imitation.
+
+Invention in the commercial or financial field is subject to various
+conditions with which we are not concerned:
+
+(1) External conditions:--Geographical, political, economic, social,
+etc., varying according to time, place, and people. Such is its external
+determinism--human and social here in place of cosmic, physical, as in
+mechanical invention.
+
+(2) Internal, psychological conditions, most of which are foreign to the
+primary and essential inventive act:--on one hand, foresight,
+calculation, strength of reasoning;--in a word, capacity for reflection;
+on the other hand, assurance, recklessness, soaring into the unknown--in
+a word, strong capacity for action. Whence arise, if we leave out the
+mixed forms, two principal types--the calculating, the venturesome. In
+the former the rational element is first. They are cautious,
+calculating, selfish exploiters, with no great moral or social
+preoccupations. In the latter, the active and emotional element
+predominates. They have a broader sweep. Of this sort were the
+merchant-sailors of Tyre, Carthage, and Greece; the merchant-travelers
+of the Middle Ages, the mercantile and gain-hungry explorers of the
+fifteenth, sixteenth, and seventeenth centuries; later, in a changed
+form, the organizers of great companies, the inventors of monopolies,
+American "trusts," etc. These are the great imaginative minds.
+
+Eliminating, then, from our subject, what is not the purely imaginative
+element in order to study it alone, I see only two points for us to
+treat, if we would avoid repetition--at the initial moment of invention,
+the intuitive act that is its germ; during the period of development and
+organization, the necessary and exclusive role of schematic images.
+
+
+I
+
+By "intuition" we generally understand a practical, immediate judgment
+that goes straight to the goal. Tact, wisdom, scent, divination, are
+synonymous or equivalent expressions. First let us note that intuition
+does not belong exclusively to this part of our subject, for it is found
+_in parvo_ throughout; but in commercial invention it is preponderating
+on account of the necessity of perceiving quickly and surely, and of
+grasping chances. "Genius for business," someone has said, "consists in
+making exact hypotheses regarding the fluctuations of values." To
+characterize the mental state is easy, if it is a matter merely of
+giving examples; very difficult, if one attempts to discover its
+mechanism.
+
+The physician who in a trice diagnoses a disease, who, on a higher
+level, groups symptoms in order to deduce a new disease from them, like
+Duchenne de Boulogne; the politician who knows human nature, the
+merchant who scents a good venture, etc., furnish examples of intuition.
+It does not depend on the degree of culture;--not to mention women,
+whose insight into practical matters is well known, there are ignorant
+people--peasants, even savages--who, in their limited sphere, are the
+equals of fine diplomats.
+
+But all these facts teach us nothing concerning its psychological
+nature. Intuition presupposes acquired experience of a special nature
+that gives the judgment its validity and turns it in a particular
+direction. Nevertheless, this accumulated knowledge of itself gives no
+evidence as to the future. Now, every intuition is an anticipation of
+the future, resulting from only two processes:--inductive or deductive
+reasoning, e.g., the chemist foreseeing a reaction; imagination, i.e.,
+a representative construction. Which is the chief process here?
+Evidently the former, because it is not a matter of fancied hypothesis,
+but of adaptation of former experience to a new case. Intuition
+resembles logical operations much more than it does imaginative
+combinations. We may liken it to unconscious reasoning, if we are not
+afraid of the seeming contradiction of this expression which supposes a
+logical operation without consciousness of the middle term. Although
+questionable, it is perhaps to be preferred to other proposed
+explanations--such as automatism, habit, "instinct," "nervous
+connections." Carpenter, who as promoter of "unconscious cerebration,"
+deserves to be consulted, likens this state to reflection. In ending, he
+reprints a letter that John Stuart Mill wrote to him on the subject, in
+which he says in substance that this capacity is found in persons who
+have experience and lean toward practical things, but attach little
+importance to theory.[131]
+
+Every intuition, then, becomes concrete as a judgment, equivalent to a
+conclusion. But what seems obscure and even mysterious in it is the fact
+that, from among many possible solutions, it finds at the first shot the
+proper one. In my opinion this difficulty arises largely from a partial
+comprehension of the problem. By "intuition" people mean only cases in
+which the divination is correct; they forget the other, far more
+numerous, cases that are failures. The act by which one reaches a
+conclusion is a special case of it. What constitutes the originality of
+the operation is not its accuracy, but its _rapidity_--the latter is the
+essential character, the former accessory.
+
+Further, it must be acknowledged that the gift of seeing correctly is an
+inborn quality, vouchsafed to one, denied to another:--people are born
+with it, just as they are born right-or left-handed: experience does not
+give it--only permits it to be put to use. As for knowing why the
+intuitive act now succeeds and at another time fails, that is a question
+that comes down to the natural distinction between accurate and
+erroneous minds, which we do not need to examine here.
+
+Without dwelling longer on this initial stage, let us return to the
+commercial imagination, and follow it in its development.
+
+
+II
+
+The human race passed through a pre-commercial age. The Australians,
+Fuegians, and their class seem to have had no idea whatever of exchange.
+This primitive period, which was long, corresponds to the age of the
+horde or large clan. Commercial invention, arising like the other forms
+from needs,--simple and indispensable at first, artificial and
+superfluous later,--could not arise in that dim period when the groups
+had almost their sole relations with one another as war. Nothing called
+it to arise. But at a higher stage the rudimentary form of commerce,
+exchange in kind or truck, appeared early and almost everywhere. Then
+this long, cumbersome, inconvenient method gave place to a more
+ingenious invention--the employment of "standard values," beings or
+material objects serving as a common measure for all the rest:--their
+choice varied with the time, place, and people--e.g., certain shells,
+salt, cocoa-seeds, cloth, straw-matting, cattle, slaves, etc.; but this
+innovation held all the remainder in the germ, for it was the first
+attempt at substitution. But during the earliest period of commercial
+evolution the chief effort at invention consisted of finding
+increasingly more simple methods in the mechanism of exchange. Thus,
+there succeeded to these disparate values, the precious metals, in the
+form of powder and ingots, subject to theft and the inconveniences of
+weighing. Then, money of fixed denomination, struck under the authority
+of a chief or of a social group. Finally, gold and silver are replaced
+by the letter of credit, the bank check, and the numerous forms of
+fiduciary money.[132]
+
+Every one of these forward steps is due to inventors. I say inventors,
+in the plural, because it is proven that every change in the means of
+exchange has been imagined several times, in several ages--though in the
+same way--on the surface of our earth.
+
+Summing up--the inventive labor of this period is reduced to creating
+increasingly more simple and more rapid methods of _substitution_ in the
+commercial mechanism.
+
+The appearance of commerce on a large scale has depended on the state of
+agriculture, industry, ways of communication, social and economic
+conditions and political extension. It came into being toward the end of
+the Roman Republic. After the interruption of the Middle Ages the
+activity is taken up again by the Italian cities, the Hanseatic League,
+etc.; in the fifteenth century with the great maritime discoveries; in
+the sixteenth century by the _Conquistadores_, hungering for adventure
+and wealth; later on, by the mixed expeditions, whose expenses are
+defrayed by merchants in common, and which are often accompanied by
+armed bands that fight for them; lastly comes the incorporation of great
+companies that have been wittily dubbed "_Conquistadores_ of the
+counting-house."
+
+We now come to the moment when commercial invention attains its complex
+form and must move great masses. Taken as a whole, its psychological
+mechanism is the same as that of any other creative work. In the first
+instance, the idea arises, from inspiration, from reflection, or by
+chance. Then comes a period of fermenting during which the inventor
+sketches his construction in images, represents to himself the material
+to be worked upon, the grouping of stockholders, the making up of a
+capital, the mechanism of buying and selling, etc. All this differs from
+the genesis of an esthetic or mechanical work only in the end, or in the
+nature of the images. In the second phase it is necessary to proceed to
+execution--a castle in the air must be made a solid structure. Then
+appear a thousand obstructions in the details that must be overcome. As
+everywhere else, minor inventions become grafted on the principal
+invention; the author lets us see the poverty or richness in resource of
+his mind. Finally, the work is triumphant, fails, or is only
+half-successful.
+
+Did it keep only to these general traits, commercial imagination would
+be merely the reiteration, with slight changes, of forms already
+studied; but it has characteristics all its own that must be
+distinguished.
+
+(1) It is a combining or tactical imagination. Heretofore, we have met
+nothing like it. This special mark is derived from the very nature of
+its determinism, which is very different from that limiting the
+scientific or mechanical imagination. Every commercial project, in order
+to emerge from the internal, purely imaginative phase, and become a
+reality, requires "coming to a head," very exact calculation of
+frequently numerous, divergent, even contrary elements. The American
+dealer speculating in grain is under the absolute necessity of being
+quickly and surely informed regarding the agricultural situation in all
+countries of the world that are rich in grain, that export or import; in
+regard to the probable chances of rain or drouth; the tariff duties of
+the various countries, etc. Lacking that, he buys and sells haphazard.
+Moreover, as he deals in enormous quantities, the least error means
+great losses, the smallest profit on a unit is of account, and is
+multiplied and increased into a noticeable gain.
+
+Besides that initial intuition that shows opportune business and
+moments, commercial imagination presupposes a well-studied, detailed
+campaign for attack and defense, a rapid and reliable glance at every
+moment of execution in order to incessantly modify this plan--it is a
+kind of war. All this totality of special conditions results from a
+general condition,--namely, competition, strife. We shall come back to
+this point at the end of the chapter.
+
+Let us follow to the end the working of this creative imagination. Like
+the other forms, this kind of invention arises from a need, a
+desire--that of the spreading of "self-feeling," of the expansion of the
+individual under the form of enrichment. But this tendency, and with it
+the resulting imaginative creation, can undergo changes.
+
+It is a well-known law of the emotional life that what is at first
+sought as a means may become an end and be desired for itself. A very
+sensual passion may at length undergo a sort of idealization; people
+study a science at first because it is useful, and later because of its
+fascination; and we may desire money in order to spend it, and later in
+order to hoard it. Here it is the same: the financial inventor is often
+possessed with a kind of intoxication--he no longer labors for lucre,
+but for art; he becomes, in his own way, an author of romance. His
+imagination, set at the beginning toward gain, now seeks only its
+complete expansion, the assertion and eruption of its creative power,
+the pleasure of inventing for invention's sake,[133] daring the
+extraordinary, the unheard-of--it is the victory of pure construction.
+The natural equilibrium between the three necessary elements of
+creation--mobility, combination of images, calculation--is destroyed.
+The rational element gives way, is obliterated, and the speculator is
+launched into adventure with the possibility of a dazzling success or
+astounding catastrophe. But let us note well that the primary and sole
+cause of this change is in the affective and motor element, in an
+hypertrophy of the lust for power, in an unmeasured and morbid want of
+expansion of self. Here, as everywhere, the source of invention is the
+emotional nature of the inventor.
+
+(2) A second special character of commercial imagination is the
+exclusive employment of schematic representations. Although this process
+is also met with in the sciences and especially in social inventions,
+the imaginative type that we are now considering has the privilege of
+using them without exception. This, then, is the proper moment for a
+description.
+
+By "schematic images" I mean those that are, by their very nature,
+intermediate between the concrete image and the pure concept, but
+approach more nearly the concept. We have already pointed out very
+different kinds of representations--concrete images, material pertaining
+to plastic and mechanical imagination; the emotional abstractions of the
+diffluent imagination; affective images, the type of which is found in
+musicians; symbolic images, familiar in mystics. It may seem improper to
+add another class to this list, but it is not a meaningless subtlety.
+Indeed, there are no images in general that, according to the ordinary
+conception, would be copies of reality. Even their separation into
+visual, auditory, motor, etc., is not sufficient, because it
+distinguishes them only with regard to their _origin_. There are other
+differences. We have seen that the image, like everything living,
+undergoes corrosions, damages, twisting, and transformation: whence it
+comes about that this remainder of former impressions varies according
+to its composition, i.e., in simplicity, complexity, grouping of its
+constitutive elements, etc., and takes on many aspects. On the other
+hand, as the difference between the chief types of creative imagination
+depends in part on the materials employed--on the nature of the images
+that serve in mental building--a precise determination of the nature of
+the images belonging to each type is not an idle operation.
+
+In order to clearly explain what we mean by schematic images, let us
+represent by a line, _PC_, the scale of images according to the degree
+of complexity, from the percept, _P_, to the concept, _C_.
+
+  P------------X----G----S----C
+
+As far as I am aware, this determination of all the degrees has never
+been made. The work would be delicate; I do not regard it as impossible.
+I have no intention to undertake it, even as I do not pretend that I
+have given above the complete list of the various forms of images.
+
+If, then, we consider the foregoing figure merely as a means of
+representing the gradation to the eye, the image in moving, by
+hypothesis, from the moment of perception, _P_, is less and less in
+contact with reality, becomes simplified, impoverished, and loses some
+of its constitutive elements. At _X_ it crosses the middle threshold to
+approach nearer and nearer to the concept. At _G_ let us locate generic
+images, primitive forms of generalization, whose nature and process of
+becoming are well-known;[134] we should place farther along, at _S_,
+schematic images, which require a higher function of mind. Indeed, the
+generic image results from a spontaneous fusion of like or very
+analogous images--such as the vague representation of the oak, the
+horse, the negro, etc.; it belongs to only one class of objects. The
+schematic image results from a voluntary act; it is not limited to exact
+resemblances--it rises into abstraction; so it is scarcely accompanied
+by a fleeting representation of concrete objects--it is almost reduced
+to the word. At a higher level, it is freed from all sensuous elements
+or pictures, and is reduced, in the present instance, to the mere notion
+of value--it is not different from a pure concept. While the artist and
+the mechanic build with concrete images, the commercial imagination can
+act directly neither on things nor on their immediate representations,
+because from the time that it goes beyond the primitive age it requires
+a substitution of increasing generality; materials become values that
+are in turn reducible to symbols. Consequently, it proceeds as in the
+stating and solving of abstract problems in which, after having
+substituted for things and their relations figures and letters,
+calculation works with signs, and indirectly with things.
+
+Aside from the first moment of invention, the finding of the idea--an
+invariable psychological state--it must be recognized that in its
+development and detailed construction the commercial imagination is made
+up chiefly of calculations and combinations that hardly permit concrete
+images. If we admit, then,--and this is unquestionable--that these are
+the materials _par excellence_ of the creative imagination, we shall be
+disposed to hold that the imaginative type we are now studying is a kind
+of involution, a case of impoverishment--an unacceptable thesis as
+regards the invention itself, but strictly acceptable as regards the
+conditions that necessity imposes upon it.
+
+In closing, let us note that financial imagination does not always have
+as its goal the enriching of an individual or of a closely limited group
+of associates: it can aim higher, act on greater masses, address itself
+strenuously to a problem as complex as the reformation of the finances
+of a powerful state. All the civilized nations count in their history
+men who imagined a financial system and succeeded, with various
+fortunes, in making it prevail. The word "system," consecrated by usage,
+makes unnecessary any comment, and relates this form of imagination to
+that of scientists and philosophers. Every system rests on a
+master-conception, on an ideal, a center about which there is assembled
+the mental construction made up of imagination and calculation which, if
+circumstances permit, must take shape, must show that it can live.
+
+Let us call to mind the author of the first, or at least, of the most
+notorious of these "systems." Law claimed that he was applying "the
+methods of philosophy, the principles of Descartes, to social economy,
+abandoned hitherto to chance and empiricism." His ideal was the
+institution of _credit_ by the state. Commerce, said he, was during its
+first stage the exchange of merchandise in kind; in a second stage,
+exchange by means of another, more manageable, commodity or universal
+value, security equivalent to the object it represented; it must enter
+a third stage when exchange will be made by a purely conventional sign
+having no value of its own. Paper represents money, just as the latter
+represents goods, "with the difference that the paper is not security,
+but a simple promise, constituting credit." The state must do
+systematically what individuals have done instinctively; but it must
+also do what individuals cannot do--create currency by printing on the
+paper of exchange the seal of public authority. We know the history of
+the downfall of this system, the eulogies and criticisms it has
+received:--but because of the originality and boldness of his views, the
+inexhaustible fecundity of his lesser inventions, Law holds an
+undisputed place among the great imaginative minds.
+
+
+III
+
+We said above that commerce, in its higher manifestations, is a kind of
+war.[135] Here, then, would be the place to study the military
+imagination. The subject cannot be treated save by a man of the
+profession, so I shall limit myself to a few brief remarks based on
+personal information, or gleaned from authorities.
+
+Between the various types of imagination hitherto studied we have shown
+great differences as regards their external conditions. While the
+so-called forms of pure imagination, whence esthetic, mythic, religious,
+mystic creations arise, can realize themselves by submitting to material
+conditions that are simple and not very exacting, the others can become
+embodied only when they satisfy an _ensemble_ of numerous, inevitable,
+rigorously determined conditions; the goal is fixed, the materials are
+rigid, there is little choice of the appropriate means. If there be
+added to the inflexible laws of nature unforeseen human passions and
+determinations, as in political or social invention, or the offensive
+combination of opponents, as in commerce and war; then the imaginative
+construction is confronted with problems of constantly growing
+complexity. The most ingenious inventor cannot invent an object as a
+whole, letting his work develop through an immanent logic:--the early
+plan must be continually modified and readapted; and the difficulty
+arises not merely from the multiple elements of the problem to be
+solved, but from ceaseless changes in their positions. So one can
+advance only step by step, and go forward by calculations and strict
+examination of possibilities. Hence it results that underneath this
+thick covering of material and intellectual conditions (calculation,
+reasoning), spontaneity (the aptness for finding new combinations, "that
+art of inventing without which we hardly advance"[136]) reveals itself
+to few clear-sighted persons; but, in spite of everything, this creative
+power is everywhere, flowing like subterranean streams, a vivifying
+agency.
+
+These general remarks, although not applicable exclusively to the
+military imagination, find their justification in it, because of its
+extreme complexity. Let us rapidly enumerate, proceeding from without
+inwards, the enormous mass of representations that it has to move and
+combine in order to make its construction adequate to reality, able at a
+precise moment to cease being a dream:--(1) Arms, engines, instruments
+of destruction and supply, varying according to time, place, richness of
+the country, etc. (2) The equally variable human element--mercenaries, a
+national army; strong, tried troops or weak and new. (3) The general
+principles of war, acquired by the study of the masters. (4) More
+personal is the power of reflection, the habitual solving of tactical
+and strategic problems. "Battles," said Napoleon, "are thought out at
+length, and in order to be successful it is necessary that we think
+several times in regard to what may happen." All the foregoing should be
+headed "science." Advancing more and more within the secret psychology
+of the individual, we come to art, the characteristic work of pure
+imagination. (5) Let us note the exact, rapid intuition at the
+commencement of the opportune moments. (6) Lastly, the creative element,
+the conception, a natural gift bearing the hall-mark of each inventor.
+Thus "the Napoleonic esthetics was always derived from a single concept,
+based on a principle that may be summed up thus:--Strict economy
+wherever it can be done; expenditure without limit on the decisive
+point. This principle inspires the strategy of the master; it directs
+everything, especially his battle-tactics, in which it is synthetized
+and summed up."[137]
+
+Such, in analytical terms, appears the hidden spring that makes
+everything move, and it is to be attributed neither to experience nor to
+reasoning, nor to wise combinations, for it arises from the innermost
+depths of the inventor. "The principle exists in him in a latent state,
+i.e., in the depths of the unconscious, and unconsciously it is that he
+applies it, when the shock of the circumstances, of goal and means,
+causes to flash from his brain the spark stimulating the artistic
+solution _par excellence_, one that reaches the limits of human
+perfection."[138]
+
+FOOTNOTES:
+
+[131] Carpenter, _Mental Physiology_, chapter XI (end).
+
+[132] Historically, the evolution has not always proceeded strictly
+in this order, which, however, seems the most logical one.
+Negotiable drafts were known to the Assyrians and Carthaginians. For
+thousands of years Egypt used ingots, not real money, but it was
+acquainted with fiduciary money. In the new world, the Peruvians
+made use of the scale, the Aztecs were ignorant of its use, etc. For
+details, see Letourneau, _L'Evolution du commerce dans les diverses
+races humaines_, Paris, 1897, especially pp. 264, 330, 354, 384,
+etc.
+
+[133] This condition has been well-described by various novelists,
+among them Zola, in _Money_.
+
+[134] For further details on this point, we refer the reader to our
+_Evolution of General Ideas_ (chapter I).
+
+[135] A general, a former professor in the War College, told me that
+when he heard a great merchant tell of the quick and sure service of
+his commercial information, the conception of the whole, and the
+care in all the details of his operations, he could not keep from
+exclaiming, "Why, that is war!"
+
+[136] Leibniz.
+
+[137] General Bonnal, _Les Maitres de la Guerre_, 1899, p. 137. "In
+him (Napoleon)," says the writer, "there was something of the poet,
+and one could explain all his acts by means of this singular
+complex, a medley of imagination, passion, and calculation. The
+dreams of an Ossian with the positive cast of mind of a
+mathematician and the passions of a Corsican--such were the
+heterogeneous elements that clashed in that powerful organization"
+(p. 151).
+
+[138] _Op. cit._, p. 6.
+
+
+
+
+CHAPTER VII
+
+THE UTOPIAN IMAGINATION[139]
+
+
+When the human mind creates, it can use only two classes of ideas as
+materials to embody its idea, viz.:
+
+(1) Natural phenomena, the forces of the organic and inorganic worlds.
+In its scientific form, seeking to explain, to know, it ends in the
+hypothesis, a disinterested creation. In its industrial aspect, aiming
+towards application and utilization, it ends in practical, interested
+inventions.
+
+(2) Human, i.e., psychic elements--instincts, passions, feelings,
+ideas, and actions. Esthetic creation is the disinterested form, social
+invention is the utilitarian form.
+
+Consequently, we may say that invention in science resembles invention
+in the fine arts, both being speculative; and that mechanical and
+industrial invention approaches social invention through a common
+tendency toward the practical. I shall not insist on this distinction,
+which, to be definite, rests only on partial characters; I merely wish
+to mention that invention, whose role in social, political and moral
+evolution is large, must, in order to be a success, adopt certain
+processes while neglecting others. This the Utopians do not do.
+
+The development of human societies depends on a multitude of factors,
+such as race, geographic and economic conditions, war, etc., which we
+need neither enumerate nor study. One only belongs to our topic--the
+successive appearance of idealistic conceptions that, like all other
+creations of mind, tend to realize themselves, the moral ideal
+consisting of new combinations arising from the predominance of one
+feeling, or from an unconscious elaboration (inspiration), or from
+analogy.
+
+At the beginning of civilizations we meet semi-historic, semi-legendary
+persons--Manu, Zoroaster, Moses, Confucius, etc., who were inventors or
+reformers in the social and moral spheres. That a part of the inventions
+attributed to them must be credited to predecessors or successors is
+probable; but the invention, no matter who is its author, remains none
+the less invention. We have said elsewhere, and may repeat, that the
+expression _inventor_ in morals may seem strange to some, because we are
+imbued with the notion of a knowledge of good and evil that is innate,
+universal, bestowed on all men and in all times. If we admit, on the
+other hand, as observation compels us to do, not a ready-made morality,
+but a morality in the making, it must be, indeed, the _creation_ of an
+individual or of a group. Everybody recognizes inventors in geometry,
+in music, in the plastic and mechanic arts; but there have also been men
+who, in their moral dispositions, were very superior to their
+contemporaries, and were promoters, initiators.[140] For reasons of
+which we are ignorant, analogous to those that produce a great poet or a
+great painter, there arise moral geniuses who feel strongly what others
+do not feel at all, just as does a great poet, in comparison with the
+crowd. But it is not enough that they feel: they must create, they must
+realize their ideal in a belief and in rules of conduct accepted by
+other men. All the founders of great religions were inventors of this
+kind. Whether the invention comes from themselves alone, or from a
+collectivity of which they are the sum and incarnation, matters little.
+In them moral invention has found its complete form; like all invention,
+it is organic. The legend relates that Buddha, possessed with the desire
+of finding the perfect road of salvation for himself and all other men,
+gives himself up, at first, to an extravagant asceticism. He perceives
+the uselessness of this and renounces it. For seven years he meditates,
+then he beholds the light. He comes into possession of knowledge of the
+means that give freedom from _Karma_ (the chain of causes and effects),
+and from the necessity of being born again. Soon he renounces the life
+of contemplation, and during fifty years of ceaseless wanderings
+preaches, makes converts, organizes his followers. Whether true or
+false historically, this tale is psychologically exact. A fixed and
+besetting idea, trial followed by failure, the decisive moment of
+_Eureka!_ then the inner revelation manifests itself outwardly, and
+through the labors of the master and his disciples becomes complete,
+imposes itself on millions of men. In what respect does this mode of
+creation differ from others, at least in the practical order?
+
+Thus, from the viewpoint of our present study, we may divide ethics into
+living and dead. Living ethics arise from needs and desires, stimulate
+an imaginative construction that becomes fixed in actions, habits and
+laws; they offer to men a concrete, positive ideal which, under various
+and often contrary aspects, is always happiness. The lifeless ethics,
+from which invention has withdrawn, arise from reflection upon, and the
+rational codification of, living ethics. Stored away in the writings of
+philosophers, they remain theoretical, speculative, without appreciable
+influence on the masses, mere material for dissertation and commentary.
+
+In proportion as we recede from distant origins the light grows, and
+invention in the social and moral order becomes manifest as the work of
+two principal categories of minds--the fantastic, the positive. The
+former, purely imaginative beings, visionaries, utopians, are closely
+related to poets and artists. The latter, practical creators or
+reformers, capable of organizing, belong to the family of inventors in
+the industrial-commercial-mechanical order.
+
+
+I
+
+The chimerical form of imagination, applied to the social sciences, is
+the one that, taking account neither of the external determinism nor of
+practical requirements, spreads out freely. Such are the creators of
+ideal republics, seeking for a lost or to-be-discovered-in-the-future
+golden age, constructing, as their fancy pleases, human societies in
+their large outlines and in their details. They are social novelists,
+who bear the same relation to sociologists that poets do to critics.
+Their dreams, subjected merely to the conditions of an inner logic, have
+lived only within themselves, an ideal life, without ever passing
+through the test of application. It is the creative imagination in its
+unconscious form, restrained to its first phase.
+
+Nothing is better known than their names and their works: The _Republic_
+of Plato, Thomas More's _Utopia_, Campanella's _City of the Sun_,
+Harrington's _Oceana_, Fenelon's _Salente_, etc.[141] However idealistic
+they may be, one could easily show that all the materials of their ideal
+are taken from the surrounding reality, they bear the stamp of the
+_milieu_, be it Greek, English, Christian, etc., in which they lived,
+and it should not be forgotten that in the Utopians everything is not
+chimerical--some have been revealers, others have acted as stimuli or
+ferments. True to its mission, which is to make innovations, the
+constructive imagination is a spur that arouses; it hinders social
+routine and prevents stagnation.
+
+Among the creators of ideal societies there is one, almost contemporary,
+who would deserve a study of individual psychology--Ch. Fourier. If it
+is a question merely of fertility in pure construction, I doubt whether
+we could find one superior to him--he is equal to the highest, with the
+special characteristic of being at the same time exuberant to delirium
+and exact in details to the least minutiae. He is such a fine type of the
+imaginative intellect that he deserves that we stop a moment.
+
+His cosmogony seems the work of an omnipotent demiurge fashioning the
+universe at will. His conception of the future world with its
+"counter-cast" creations, where the present ugliness and troubles of
+animal reign become changed into their opposites, where there will be
+"anti-lions," "anti-crocodiles," "anti-whales," etc., is one example of
+hundreds showing his inexhaustible richness in fantastic visions: the
+work of an imagination that is hot and overflowing, with no rational
+preoccupation.
+
+On the other hand, his psychogony, based on the idea of metempsychosis
+borrowed from the Orient, gives itself up to numerical vagaries.
+Assuming for every soul a periodical rebirth, he assigns it first a
+period of "ascending subversion," the first phase of which lasts five
+thousand years, the second thirty-six thousand; then comes a period of
+completion, 9,000 years; and then a period of "descending subversion,"
+whose first stage is 27,000 years, and the second 4,000 years--a total
+of 81,000 years. This form of imagination is already known to us.[142]
+
+The principal part of his psychology, the theory of the emotions,
+questionable in many respects, is relatively rational. But in the
+construction of human society, the duality of his imagination--powerful
+and minute--reappears. We know his methodical organization: the _group_,
+composed of seven to nine persons; the _series_, comprising twenty-four
+to thirty-two groups; a _phalanx_ that includes eighteen groups,
+constituting the phalanstery; the small city, a general center of
+phalanges; the provincial city, the imperial capital, the universal
+metropolis. He has a passion for classification and ordering; "his
+phalanstery works like a clock."
+
+This rare imaginative type well deserved a few remarks, because of its
+mixture of apparent exactness and a natural, unconscious utopianism and
+extravagance. For, beneath all these pulsating inventions of precise,
+petty details, the foundation is none the less a purely speculative
+construction of the mind. Let us add an incredible abuse of analogy,
+that chief intellectual instrument of invention, of which only the
+reading of his books can give an idea.[143] Heinrich Heine said of
+Michelet, "He has a Hindoo imagination." The term would apply still
+better to Fourier, in whom coexist unchecked profusion of images and the
+taste for numerical accumulations. People have tried to explain this
+abundance of figures and calculation as a professional habit--he was for
+a long time a bookkeeper or cashier, always an excellent accountant. But
+this is taking the effect for cause. This dualism existed in the very
+nature of his mind, and he took advantage of it in his calling. The
+study of the numerical imagination[144] has shown how it is frequently
+met with among orientals, whose imaginative development is unquestioned,
+and we have seen why the idealistic imagination agrees so well with the
+indefinite series of numbers and makes use of it as a vehicle.
+
+
+II
+
+With practical inventors and reformers the ideal falls--not that they
+sacrifice it for their personal interests, but because they have a
+comprehension of possibilities. The imaginative construction must be
+corrected, narrowed, mutilated, if it is to enter into the narrow frame
+of the conditions of existence, until it becomes adapted and determined.
+This process has been described several times, and it is needless to
+repeat it here in other terms. Nevertheless, the ideal--understanding by
+this term the unifying principle that excites creative work and supports
+it in its development--undergoes metamorphosis and must be not only
+individual but collective; the creation does not realize itself save
+through a "communion of minds," by a co-operation of feelings and of
+wills; the work of one conscious individual must become the work of a
+social consciousness.
+
+That form of imagination, creating and organizing social groups,
+manifests itself in various degrees according to the tendency and power
+of creators.
+
+There are the founders of small societies, religious in form--the
+Essenes, the earliest Christian communities, the monastic orders of the
+Orient and Occident, the great Catholic or Mohammedan congregations, the
+semi-lay, semi-religious sects like the Moravian Brotherhood, the
+Shakers, Mormons, etc. Less complete because it does not cover the
+individual altogether in all the acts of life is the creation of secret
+associations, professional unions, learned societies, etc. The founder
+conceives an ideal of complete living or one limited to a given end, and
+puts it into practice, having for material men grouped of their free
+choice, or by cooptation.
+
+There is invention operating on great masses--social or political
+invention strictly so called--ordinarily not proposed but imposed,
+which, however, despite its coercive power, is subject to requirements
+even more numerous than mechanical, industrial, or commercial invention.
+It has to struggle against natural forces, but most of all against human
+forces--inherited habits, customs, traditions. It must make terms with
+dominant passions and ideas, finding its justification, like all other
+creation, only in success.
+
+Without entering into the details of this inevitable determination,
+which would require useless repetition, we may sum up the role of the
+constructive imagination in social matters by saying that it has
+undergone a regression--i.e., that its area of development has been
+little by little narrowed; not that inventive genius, reduced to pure
+construction in images, has suffered an eclipse, but on its part it has
+had to make increasingly greater room for experiment, rational elements,
+calculation, inductions and deductions that permit foresight--for
+practical necessities.
+
+If we omit the spontaneous, instinctive, semi-conscious invention of the
+earliest ages, that was sufficient for primitive societies, and keep to
+creations that were the result of reflection and of great pretension, we
+can roughly distinguish three successive periods:
+
+(1) A very long idealistic phase (Antiquity, Renaissance) when triumphed
+the pure imagination, and the play of the free fancy that spends itself
+in social novels. Between the creation of the mind and the life of
+contemporary society there was no relation; they were worlds apart,
+strangers to one another. The true Utopians scarcely troubled themselves
+to make applications. Plato and More--would they have wished to realize
+their dreams?
+
+(2) An intermediate phase, when an attempt is made to pass from the
+ideal to the practical, from pure speculation to social facts. Already,
+in the eighteenth century, some philosophers (Locke, Rousseau) drew up
+constitutions, at the request of interested persons. During this period,
+when the work of the imagination, instead of merely becoming fixed in
+books, tends to become objectified in acts, we find many failures and
+some successes. Let us recall the fruitless attempts of the
+"phalansteries" in France, in Algeria, Brazil, and in the United States.
+Robert Owen was more fortunate;[145] in four years he reformed New
+Larnak, after his ideal, and with varying fortune founded short-lived
+colonies. Saint-Simonism has not entirely died out; the primitive
+civilization after his ideal rapidly disappeared, but some of his
+theories have filtered into or have become incorporated with other
+doctrines.
+
+(3) A phase in which imaginative creation becomes subordinated to
+practical life: The conception of society ceases to be purely idealistic
+or constructed _a priori_ by deduction from a single principle; it
+recognizes the conditions of its environment, adapts itself to the
+necessities of its development. It is the passage from the absolutely
+autonomous state of the imagination to a period when it submits to the
+laws of a rational imperative. In other words, the transition from the
+esthetic to the scientific, and especially the practical, form.
+Socialism is a well-known and excellent example of this. Compare its
+former utopias, down to about the middle of the last century, with its
+contemporary forms, and without difficulty we can appreciate the amount
+of imaginative elements lost in favor of an at least equivalent quantity
+of rational elements and positive calculations.
+
+FOOTNOTES:
+
+[139] This title, as will be seen later, corresponds only in part to
+the contents of this chapter.
+
+[140] For facts in support, see the _Psychology of the Emotions_,
+Second Part, chapter VIII.
+
+[141] Our author does not mention Bacon's _New Atlantis_, one of the
+best specimens of its kind. "Wisest Verulam," active and
+distinguished in so many fields, is not amenable to rules, and is
+here found among "idealists," as elsewhere among the foremost
+empiricists and iconoclasts. (Tr.)
+
+[142] See above, Part III, chapter III.
+
+[143] We recommend to the reader the "Epilogue sur l'Analogie," in
+_Le Monde Industriel_, pp. 244 ff., where he will learn that the
+"goldfinch depicts the child born of poor parents; the pheasant
+represents the jealous husband; the cock is the symbol of the man of
+the world; the cabbage is the emblem of mysterious love," etc. There
+are several pages in this tone, with alleged reasons in support of
+the statements.
+
+[144] See above, chapter II.
+
+[145] For an excellent account of the principles of these movements,
+see Rae, _Contemporary Socialism_; for Owen's ideals, his
+_Autobiography_; and for an account of some of the trials, Bushee's
+"Communistic Societies in the United States," _Political Science
+Quarterly_, vol. XX, pp. 625 ff. (Tr.)
+
+
+
+
+CONCLUSION.
+
+
+
+
+CONCLUSION
+
+I
+
+THE FOUNDATIONS OF THE CREATIVE IMAGINATION
+
+
+Why is the human mind able to create? In a certain sense this question
+may seem idle, childish, and even worse. We might just as well ask why
+does man have eyes and not an electric apparatus like the torpedo? Why
+does he perceive directly sounds but not the ultra-red and ultra-violet
+rays? Why does he perceive changes of odors but not magnetic changes?
+And so on _ad infinitum_. We will put the question in a very different
+manner: Being given the physical and mental constitution of man such as
+it is at present, how is the creative imagination a natural product of
+this constitution?
+
+Man is able to create for two principal reasons. The first, motor in
+nature, is found in the action of his needs, appetites, tendencies,
+desires. The second is the possibility of a spontaneous revival of
+images that become grouped in new combination.
+
+1. We have already shown in detail[146] that the hypothesis of a
+"creative instinct," if the expression is used not as an abbreviated or
+metaphorical formula but in the strict sense, is a pure chimera, an
+empty entity. In studying the various types of imagination we have
+always been careful to note that every mode of creation may be reduced,
+as regards its beginnings, to a tendency, a want, a special, determinate
+desire. Let us recall for the last time these initial conditions of all
+invention--these desires, conscious or not, that excite it.
+
+The wants, tendencies, desires--it matters not which term we adopt--the
+whole of which constitutes the instinct of individual preservation, have
+been the generators of all inventions dealing with food-getting,
+housing, making of weapons, instruments, and machines.
+
+The need for individual and social expansion or extension has given rise
+to military, commercial, and industrial invention, and in its
+disinterested form, esthetic creation.
+
+As for the sexual instinct, its psychic fertility is in no way less than
+the physical--it is an inexhaustible source of imagination in everyday
+life as well as in art.
+
+The wants of man in contact with his fellows have engendered, through
+instinctive or reflective action, the numerous social and practical
+creations regulating human groups, and they are rough or complex, stable
+or unstable, just or unjust, kindly or harsh.
+
+The need of knowing and of explaining, well or ill, has created myths,
+religions, philosophical systems, scientific hypotheses.
+
+Every want, tendency or desire may, then, become creative, by itself or
+associated with others, and into these final elements it is that
+analysis must resolve "creative spontaneity." This vague expression
+corresponds to a _sum_, not to a special property.[147] Every invention,
+then, has a _motor_ origin; _the ultimate basis of the constructive
+imagination is motor_.
+
+2. But needs and desires by themselves cannot create--they are only a
+stimulus and a spring. Whence arises the need of a second condition--the
+spontaneous revival of images.
+
+In many animals that are endowed only with memory the return of images
+is always provoked. Sensation from without or from within bring them
+into consciousness under the form, pure and simple, of former
+experience; whence we have reproduction, repetition without new
+associations. People of slight imagination and used to routine approach
+this mental condition. But, as a matter of fact, man from his second
+year on, and some higher animals, go beyond this stage--they are capable
+of spontaneous revival. By this term I mean that revival that comes
+about abruptly, without _apparent_ antecedents. We know that these act
+in a latent form, and consist of thinking by analogy, affective
+dispositions, unconscious elaboration. This sudden appearance excites
+other states which, grouped into new associations, contain the first
+elements of the creative act.
+
+Taken altogether, and however numerous its manifestations, the
+constructive imagination seems to me reducible to three forms, which I
+shall call _sketched_, _fixed_, _objectified_, according as it remains
+an internal fancy, or takes on a material but contingent and unstable
+form, or is subjected to the conditions of a rigorous internal or
+external determinism.
+
+(a) The _sketched_ form is primordial, original, the simplest of all; it
+is a nascent moment or first attempt. It appears first of all in
+dreaming--an embryonic, unstable and uncoordinated manifestation of the
+creative imagination--a transition-stage between passive reproduction
+and organized construction. A step higher is revery, whose flitting
+images, associated by chance, without personal intervention, are
+nevertheless vivid enough to exclude from consciousness every impression
+of the external world--so much so that the day-dreamer re-enters it only
+with a shock of surprise. More coherent are the imaginary constructions
+known as "castles in Spain"--the works of a wish considered
+unrealizable, fancies of love, ambition, power and wealth, the goal of
+which seems to be forever beyond our reach. Lastly, still higher, come
+all the plans for the future conceived vaguely and as barely
+possible--foreseeing the end of a sickness, of a business enterprise, of
+a political event, etc.
+
+This vague and "outline" imagination, penetrating our entire life, has
+its peculiar characters--the unifying principle is _nil_ or ephemeral,
+which fact always reduces it to the dream as a type; it does not
+externalize itself, does not change into acts, a consequence of its
+basically chimerical nature or of weakness of will, which reduces it to
+a strictly internal and individual existence. It is needless to say that
+this kind of imagination is a permanent and definite form with the
+dreamers living in a world of ceaselessly reappearing images, having no
+power to organize them, to change them into a work of art, a theory, or
+a useful invention.
+
+The "sketched" form is or remains an elementary, primitive, automatic
+form. Conformably to the general law ruling the development of
+mind--passage from indefinite to definite, from the incoherent to the
+coherent, from spontaneity to reflection, from the reflex to the
+voluntary period--the imagination comes out of its swaddling-clothes,
+is changed--through the intervention of a teleological act that assigns
+it an end; through the union of rational elements that subdue it for an
+adaptation. Then appear the other two forms.
+
+(b) The _fixed_ form comprises mythic and esthetic creations,
+philosophical and scientific hypotheses. While the "outline" imagination
+remains an internal phenomenon, existing only in and for a single
+individual, the fixed form is projected outwards, made something else.
+The former has no reality other than the momentary belief accompanying
+it; the latter exists by itself, for its creator and for others; the
+work is accepted, rejected, examined, criticised. Fiction rests on the
+same level as reality. Do not people discuss seriously the objective
+value of certain myths, and of metaphysical theories? the action of a
+novel or drama as though it were a matter of real events? the character
+of the _dramatis personae_ as though they were living flesh and blood?
+
+The fixed imagination moves in an elastic frame. The material elements
+circumscribing it and composing it have a certain fluidity; they are
+language, writing, musical sounds, colors, forms, lines. Furthermore, we
+know that its creations, in spite of the spontaneous adherence of the
+mind accepting them, are the work of a free will; they could have been
+otherwise--they preserve an indelible imprint of contingency and
+subjectivity.
+
+(c) This last mark is rubbed out without disappearing (for a thing
+imagined is always a personal thing) in the objectified form that
+comprises successful practical inventions--whether mechanical,
+industrial, commercial, military, social, or political. These have no
+longer an arbitrary, borrowed reality; they have their place in the
+totality of physical and social phenomena. They resemble creations of
+nature, subject like them to fixed conditions of existence and to a
+limited determinism. We shall not dwell longer on this last character,
+so often pointed out.
+
+In order the better to comprehend the distinction between the three
+forms of imagination let us borrow for a moment the terminology of
+spiritualism or of the common dualism--merely as a means of explaining
+the matter clearly. The "outline" imagination is a soul without a body,
+a pure spirit, without determination in space. The "fixed" imagination
+is a soul or spirit surrounded by an almost immaterial sheath, like
+angels or demons, genii, shadows, the "double" of savages, the
+_peresprit_ of spiritualists, etc. The _objectified_ imagination is soul
+and body, a complete organization after the pattern of living people;
+the ideal is incarnated, but it must undergo transformation, reductions
+and adaptations, in order that it may become practical--just as the
+soul, according to spiritualism, must bend to the necessities of the
+body, to be at the same time the servant of, and served by, the bodily
+organs.
+
+According to general opinion the great imaginers are found only in the
+first two classes, which is, in the strict sense of the word, true; in
+the full sense of the word false. As long as it remains "outline," or
+even "fixed," the constructive imagination can reign as supreme
+mistress. Objectified, it still rules, but shares its power with
+competitors; it avails nought without them, they can do nothing without
+it. What deceives us is the fact that we see it no longer in the open.
+Here the imaginative stroke resembles those powerful streams of water
+that must be imprisoned in a complicated network of canals and
+ramifications varying in shape and in diameter before bursting forth in
+multiple jets and in liquid architecture.[148]
+
+
+II
+
+THE IMAGINATIVE TYPE.
+
+Let us try now, by way of conclusion, to present to the reader a picture
+of the whole of the imaginative life in all its degrees.
+
+If we consider the human mind principally under its intellectual
+aspect--i.e., insofar as it knows and thinks, deducting its emotions
+and voluntary activity--the observation of individuals distinguishes
+some very clear varieties of mentality.
+
+First, those of a "positive" or realistic turn of mind, living chiefly
+on the external world, on what is perceived and what is immediately
+deducible therefrom--alien or inimical to vain fancy; some of them flat,
+limited, of the earth earthy; others, men of action, energetic but
+limited by real things.
+
+Second, abstract minds, "quintessence abstractors," with whom the
+internal life is dominant in the form of combinations of concepts. They
+have a schematic representation of the world, reduced to a hierarchy of
+general ideas, noted by symbols. Such are the pure mathematicians, the
+pure metaphysicians. If these two tendencies exist together, or, as
+happens, are grafted one on the other, without anything to
+counterbalance them, the abstract spirit attains its perfect form.
+
+Midway between these two groups are the imaginers in whom the internal
+life predominates in the form of combinations of images, which fact
+distinguishes them clearly from the abstractors. The former alone
+interest us, and we shall try to trace this imaginative type in its
+development from the normal or average stage to the moment when
+ever-growing exuberance leads us into pathology.
+
+The explanation of the various phases of this development is reducible
+to a well-known psychologic law--the natural antagonism between
+sensation and image, between phenomena of peripheral origin and
+phenomena of central origin; or, in a more general form, between the
+outer and inner life. I shall not dwell long on this point, which Taine
+has so admirably treated.[149] He has shown in detail how the image is
+a spontaneously arising sensation, one that is, however, aborted by the
+opposing shock of real sensation, which is its reducer, producing on it
+an arresting action and maintaining it in the condition of an internal,
+subjective fact. Thus, during the waking hours, the frequency and
+intensity of impressions from without press the images back to the
+second level; but during sleep, when the external world is as it were
+suppressed, their hallucinatory tendency is no longer kept in check, and
+the world of dreams is momentarily the reality.
+
+The psychology of the imaginer reduces itself to a progressively
+increasing interchange of roles. Images become stronger and stronger
+states; perceptions, more and more feeble. In this movement opposite to
+nature I note four steps, each of which corresponds to particular
+conditions: (1) The quantity of images; (2) quantity and intensity; (3)
+quantity, intensity and duration; (4) complete systematization.
+
+(1) In the first place the predominance of imagination is marked only by
+the quantity of representations invading consciousness; they teem, break
+apart, become associated, combine easily and in various ways. All the
+imaginative persons who have given us their experiences either orally or
+in writing agree in regard to the extreme ease of the formation of
+associations, not in repeating past expedience, but in sketching little
+romances.[150] From among many examples I choose one. One of my
+correspondents writes that if at church, theatre, on a street, or in a
+railway station, his attention is attracted to a person--man or
+woman--he immediately makes up, from the appearance, carriage and
+attractiveness his or her present or past, manner of life,
+occupation--representing to himself the part of the city he or she must
+dwell in, the apartments, furniture, etc.--a construction most often
+erroneous; I have many proofs of it. Surely this disposition is normal;
+it departs from the average only by an excess of imagination that is
+replaced in others by an excessive tendency to observe, to analyze, or
+to criticise, reason, find fault. In order to take the decisive step and
+become abnormal one condition more is necessary--intensity of the
+representations.
+
+2. Next, the interchange of place, indicated above, occurs. Weak states
+(images) become strong; strong states (perceptions) become weak. The
+impressions from without are powerless to fulfill their regular function
+of inhibition. We find the simplest example of this state in the
+exceptional persistence of certain dreams. Ordinarily, our nocturnal
+imaginings vanish as empty phantasmagorias at the inrush of the
+perceptions and habits of daily life--they seem like faraway phantoms,
+without objective value. But, in the struggle occurring, on waking,
+between images and perceptions, the latter are not always victorious.
+There are dreams--i.e., imaginary creations--that remain firm in face
+of reality, and for some time go along parallel with it. Taine was
+perhaps the first to see the importance of this fact. He reports that
+his relative, Dr. Baillarger, having dreamt that one of his friends had
+been appointed editor of a journal, announced the news seriously to
+several persons, and doubt arose in his mind only toward the end of the
+afternoon. Since then contemporary psychologists have gathered various
+observations of this kind.[151] The emotional persistence of certain
+dreams is known. So-and-so, one of our neighbors, plays in a dream an
+odious role; we may have a feeling of repulsion or spite toward him
+persisting throughout the day. But this triumph of the image, accidental
+and ephemeral in normal man, is frequent and stable in the imaginers of
+the second class. Many among them have asserted that this internal world
+is the only reality. Gerard de Nerval "had very early the conviction
+that the majority is mistaken, that the material universe in which it
+believes, because its eyes see it and its hands touch it, is nothing but
+phantoms and appearances. For him the invisible world, on the contrary,
+was the only one not chimerical." Likewise, Edgar Allan Poe: "The real
+things of the world would affect me like visions, and only so; while the
+wild ideas of the land of dreams became in turn not only the feeding
+ground of my daily existence but positively the sole and entire
+existence itself." Others describe their life as "a permanent dream."
+We could multiply examples. Aside from the poets and artists, the
+mystics would furnish copious examples. Let us take an exaggerated
+instance: This permanent dream is, indeed, only a part of their
+existence; it is above all active through its intensity; but, while it
+lasts, it absorbs them so completely that they enter the external world
+only with a sudden, violent and painful shock.
+
+(3) If the changing of images into strong states preponderating in
+consciousness is no longer an episode but a lasting disposition, then
+the imaginative life undergoes a partial systematization that approaches
+insanity. Everyone may be "absorbed" for a moment; the above-mentioned
+authors are so frequently. On a higher level this invading supremacy of
+the internal life becomes a habit. This third degree is but the second
+carried to excess.
+
+Some cases of double personality (those of Azam, Reynolds) are known in
+which the second state is at first embryonic and of short duration; then
+its appearances are repeated, its sphere becomes extended. Little by
+little it engrosses the greater part of life; it may even entirely
+supplant the earlier self. The growing working of the imagination is
+similar to this. Thanks to two causes acting in unison, temperament and
+habit, the imaginative and internal life tends to become systematized
+and to encroach more and more on the real, external life. In an account
+by Fere[152] one may follow step by step this work of systematization
+which we abridge here to its chief characteristics.
+
+The subject, M......, a man thirty-seven years old, had from childhood a
+decided taste for solitude. Seated in an out-of-the-way corner of the
+house or out of doors, "he commenced from that time on to build castles
+in Spain that little by little took on a considerable importance in his
+life. His constructions were at first ephemeral, replaced every day by
+new ones. They became progressively more consistent.... When he had well
+entered into his imaginary role, he often succeeded in continuing his
+musing in the presence of other people. At college, whole hours would be
+spent in this way; often he would see and hear nothing." Married, the
+head of a prosperous business house, he had some respite; then he
+returned to his former constructions. "They commenced by being, as
+before, not very durable or absorbing; but gradually they acquired more
+intensity and duration, and lastly became fixed in a definite form."
+
+"To sum up, here is what this ideal life, lasting almost from his fourth
+year, meant: M...... had built at Chaville, on the outskirts of the
+forest, an imaginary summer residence surrounded by a garden. By
+successive additions the pavilion became a chateau; the garden, a park;
+servants, horses, water-fixtures came to ornament the domain. The
+furnishings of the inside had been modified at the same time. A wife had
+come to give life to the picture; two children had been born. Nothing
+was wanting to this household, only the being true.... One day he was
+in his imaginary salon at Chaville, occupied in watching an upholsterer
+who was changing the arrangement of the tapestry. He was so absorbed in
+the matter that he did not notice a man coming toward him, and at the
+question, 'M......, if you please--?' he answered, without thinking, 'He
+is at Chaville.' This reply, given in public, aroused in him a real
+terror. 'I believe that I was foolish,' he said. Coming to himself, he
+declared that he was ready to do anything to get rid of his ideas."
+
+Here the imaginative type is at its maximum, at the brink of insanity
+without being over it. Associations and combinations of images form the
+entire content of consciousness, which remains impervious to impressions
+from without. Its world becomes _the_ world. The parasitic life
+undermines and corrodes the other in order to become established in its
+place--it grows, its parts adhere more closely, it forms a compact
+mass--the imaginary systematization is complete.
+
+(4) The fourth stage is an exaggeration of the foregoing. The
+_completely_ systematized and permanent imaginative life excludes the
+other. This is the extreme form, the beginning of insanity, which is
+outside our subject, from which pathology has been excluded.
+
+Imagination in the insane would deserve a special study, that would be
+lengthy, because there is no form of imagination that insanity has not
+adopted. In no period have insane creations been lacking in the
+practical, religious, or mystic life, in poetry, the fine arts, and in
+the sciences; in industrial, commercial, mechanical, military projects,
+and in plans for social and political reform. We should, then, be
+abundantly supplied with facts.[153]
+
+It would be difficult, for, if in ordinary life we are often perplexed
+to decide whether a man is sane or not, how much more then, when it is a
+question of an inventor, of an act of the creative faculty, i.e., of a
+venture into the unknown! How many innovators have been regarded as
+insane, or as at least unbalanced, visionary! We cannot even invoke
+success as a criterion. Many non-viable or abortive inventions have been
+fathered by very sane minds, and people regarded as insane have
+vindicated their imaginative constructions through success.
+
+Let us leave these difficulties of a subject that is not our own, in
+order to determine merely the psychological criterion belonging to the
+fourth stage.
+
+How may we rightly assert that a form of imaginative life is clearly
+pathologic? In my opinion, the answer must be sought in the nature and
+degree of belief accompanying the labor of creating. It is an axiom
+unchallenged by anyone--whether idealist or realist of any shade of
+belief--that nothing has existence for us save through the consciousness
+we have of it; but for realism--and experimental psychology is of
+necessity realistic--there are two distinct forms of existence.
+
+One, subjective, having no reality except in consciousness, for the one
+experiencing it, its reality being due only to belief, to that first
+affirmation of the mind so often described.
+
+The other, objective, existing in consciousness and outside of it, being
+real not only for me but for all those whose constitution is similar or
+analogous to mine.
+
+This much borne in mind, let us compare the last two degrees of the
+development of the imaginative life.
+
+For the imaginer of the third stage, the two forms of existence are not
+confounded. He distinguishes _two_ worlds, preferring one and making
+the best of the other, but believing in both. He is conscious of passing
+from one to the other. There is an alternation. The observation of Fere,
+although extreme, is a proof of this.
+
+At the fourth stage, in the insane, imaginative labor--the only kind
+with which we are concerned--is so systematized that the distinction
+between the two kinds of existence has disappeared. All the phantoms of
+his brain are invested with objective reality. Occurrences without, even
+the most extraordinary, do not reach one in this stage, or else are
+interpreted in accordance with the diseased fancy. There is no longer
+any alternation.[154]
+
+By way of summary we may say: The creative imagination consists of the
+property that images have of gathering in new combinations, through the
+effect of a spontaneity whose nature we have attempted to describe. It
+always tends to realize itself in degrees that vary from mere momentary
+belief to complete objectivity. Throughout its multiple manifestations,
+it remains identical with itself in its basic nature, in its
+constitutive elements. The diversity of its deeds depends on the end
+desired, the conditions required for its attainment, materials employed
+which, as we have seen, under the collective name "representations" are
+very unlike one another, not only as regards their sensuous origin
+(visual, auditory, tactile, etc.) but also as regards their psychologic
+nature (concrete, symbolic, affective, emotional-abstract images;
+generic and schematic images, concepts--each group itself having shades
+or degrees).
+
+This constructive activity, applying itself to everything and radiating
+in all directions, is in its early, typical form a mythic creation. It
+is an invincible need of man to reflect and reproduce his own nature in
+the world surrounding him. The first application of his mind is thinking
+by analogy, which vivifies everything after the human model and attempts
+to know everything according to arbitrary resemblances. Myth-making
+activity, which we have studied in the child and in primitive man, is
+the embryonic form whence arise by a slow evolution religious
+creations--gross or refined; esthetic development, which is a fallen,
+impoverished mythology; the fantastic conceptions of the world that may
+little by little become scientific conceptions, with, however, an
+irreducible residuum of hypotheses. Alongside of these creations, all
+bordering upon what we have called the fixed form, there are practical,
+objective creations. As for the latter, we could not trace them to the
+same mythic source except by dialectic subtleties which we renounce. The
+former arise from an internal efflorescence; the latter from urgent
+life-needs; they appear later and are a bifurcation of the early trunk:
+but the same sap flows in both branches.
+
+The constructive imagination penetrates every part of our life, whether
+individual or collective, speculative and practical, in all its
+forms--IT IS EVERYWHERE.
+
+FOOTNOTES:
+
+[146] See above, Part I, chapter II.
+
+[147] It is a postulate of contemporary physiology that all the
+neurones taken together cannot spontaneously, that is, of
+themselves, give rise to any movement--they receive from without,
+and expend their energy outwards. Nevertheless, between the two
+moments that, in reflex and instinctive actions, seem continuous, a
+third interposes, which, for the higher psychic acts, may be of long
+duration. Thus, reasonings in logical form and reflection regarding
+a decision to be made have a feeble tendency to become changed into
+acts; their motor effects are indirect, and at a long range. But
+this intermediate moment is _par excellence_ the moment for
+psychology. It is also the moment of the personal equation: every
+man receives, transforms, and restores outwards according to his own
+organization, temperament, idiosyncrasies, character--in a word,
+according to his personality, of which needs, tendencies, desires,
+are the direct and immediate expression. So we come back, by another
+route, to the same definition of spontaneity.
+
+[148] Besides these three principal forms, there are intermediate
+forms, transitions from one category to another, that are hard to
+classify: certain mythic creations are half-sketched, half-fixed;
+and we find religious and social and political conceptions, partly
+theoretic or fixed, partly practical or objective.
+
+[149] Taine, _On Intelligence_, Part I, Book II, ch. I.
+
+[150] See Appendix E.
+
+[151] Sante de Santis, _I Sogni_, chapter X; Dr. Tissie, _Les
+Reves_, esp. p. 165, the case of a merchant who dreams of having
+paid a certain debt, and several weeks afterward meets his creditor,
+and maintains that they are even, giving way only to proof.
+
+[152] For the complete account, see his _Pathologie des emotions_,
+pp. 345-49. (Paris, F. Alcan.)
+
+[153] Dr. Max Simon, in an article on "Imagination in Insanity"
+(_Annales medico-psychologiques_, December, 1876), holds that every
+kind of mental disease has its own form of imagination that
+expresses itself in stories, compositions, sketches, decorations,
+dress, and symbolic attributes. The maniac invents complicated and
+improbable designs; the persecuted, symbolic designs, strange
+writings, bordering on the horrible; megalomaniacs look for the
+effect of everything they say and do; the general paralytic lives in
+grandeur and attributes capital importance to everything; lunatics
+love the naive and childishly wonderful.
+
+There are also great imaginers who, having passed through a period
+of insanity, have strongly regretted it "as a state in which the
+soul, more exalted and more refined, perceives invisible relations
+and enjoys spectacles that escape the material eyes." Such was
+Gerard de Nerval. As for Charles Lamb, he would assert that he
+should be envied the days spent in an insane asylum. "Sometimes," he
+said in a letter to Coleridge, "I cast a longing glance backwards to
+the condition in which I found myself; for while it lasted I had
+many hours of pure happiness. Do not believe, Coleridge, that you
+have tasted the grandeur and all the transport of fancy if you have
+not been insane. Everything seems to me now insipid in comparison."
+Quoted by A. Barine, _Nevroses_, p. 326.
+
+[154] There has often been cited the instance of certain maniacs at
+Charenton, who, during the Franco-Prussian War, despite the stories
+that were told them, the papers that they read, and the shells
+bursting under the walls of the asylum, maintained that the war was
+only imagined, and that all was only a contrivance of their
+persecutors.
+
+
+
+
+APPENDICES
+
+
+
+
+APPENDIX A
+
+THE VARIOUS FORMS OF INSPIRATION[155]
+
+
+Among the descriptions of the inspired state found in various authors, I
+select only three, which are brief and have each a special character.
+
+I. Mystic inspiration, in a passive form, in Jacob Boehme (_Aurora_): "I
+declare before God that I do not myself know how the thing arises within
+me, without the participation of my will. I do not even know that which
+I must write. If I write, it is because the Spirit moves me and
+communicates to me a great, wonderful knowledge. Often I do not even
+know whether I dwell in spirit in this present world and whether it is I
+myself that have the fortune to possess a certain and solid knowledge."
+
+II. Feverish and painful inspiration in Alfred de Musset: "Invention
+annoys me and makes me tremble. Execution, always too slow for my wish,
+makes my heart beat awfully, and weeping, and keeping myself from crying
+aloud, I am delivered of an idea that is intoxicating me, but of which
+I am mortally ashamed and disgusted next morning. If I change it, it is
+worse, it deserts me--it is much better to forget it and wait for
+another; but this other comes to me so confused and misshapen that my
+poor being cannot contain it. It presses and tortures me, until it has
+taken realizable proportions, when comes the other pain, of bringing
+forth, a truly physical suffering that I cannot define. And that is how
+my life is spent when I let myself be dominated by this artistic monster
+in me. It is much better, then, that I should live as I have imagined
+living, that I go to all kinds of excess, and that I kill this
+never-dying worm that people like me modestly term their inspiration,
+but which I call, plainly, my weakness."[156]
+
+III. The poet Grillparzer[157] analyzes the condition, thus:
+
+"Inspiration, properly so called, is the concentration of all the
+faculties and aptitudes on a single point which, for the moment, should
+include the rest of the world less than represent it. The strengthening
+of the state of the soul comes from the fact that its various faculties,
+instead of being disseminated over the whole world, find themselves
+contained within the limits of a single object, touch one another,
+reciprocally upholding, reenforcing, completing themselves. Thanks to
+this isolation, the object emerges out of the average level of its
+_milieu_, is illumined all around and put in relief--it takes body,
+moves, lives. But to attain this is necessary the concentration of all
+the faculties. It is only when the art-work has been a world for the
+artist that it is also a world for others."
+
+FOOTNOTES:
+
+[155] See Part One, chapter III.
+
+[156] George Sand, _Elle et Lui_, I.
+
+[157] In Oelzelt-Newin, _op. cit._, p. 49.
+
+
+
+
+APPENDIX B
+
+ON THE NATURE OF THE UNCONSCIOUS FACTOR
+
+
+We have seen that in the question of the unconscious there
+must be recognized a positive part--facts, and an hypothetical
+part--theories.[158]
+
+Insofar as the facts are concerned, it would be well, I think, to
+establish two categories--(1) static unconscious, comprising habits,
+memory, and, in general, all that is organized knowledge. It is a state
+of preservation, of rest; very relatively, since representations suffer
+incessant corrosion and change. (2) Dynamic unconscious, which is a
+state of latent activity, of elaboration and incubation. We might give a
+multitude of proofs of this unconscious rumination. The well-known fact
+that an intellectual work gains by being interrupted; that in resuming
+it one often finds it cleared up, changed, even accomplished, was
+explained by some psychologists prior to Carpenter by "the resting of
+the mind." It would be just as valid to say that a traveler covers
+leagues by lying abed. The author just mentioned[159] has brought
+together many observations in which the solution of a mathematical,
+mechanical, commercial problem appeared suddenly after hours and days of
+vague, undefinable uneasiness, the cause of which is unknown, which,
+however, is only the result of an underlying cerebral working; for the
+trouble, sometimes rising to anguish, ceases as soon as the unawaited
+conclusion has entered consciousness. The men who think the most are not
+those who have the clearest and "most conscious" ideas, but those having
+at their disposal a rich fund of unconscious elaboration. On the other
+hand, shallow minds have a naturally poor unconscious fund, capable of
+but slight development; they give out immediately and rapidly all that
+they are able to give; they have no reserve. It is useless to allow them
+time for reflection or invention. They will not do better; they may do
+worse.
+
+As to the nature of the unconscious working, we find disagreement and
+darkness. One may doubtless maintain, theoretically, that in the
+inventor everything goes on in subconsciousness and in unconsciousness,
+just as in consciousness itself, with the exception that a message does
+not arrive as far as the self; that the labor that may be followed, in
+clear consciousness, in its progress and retreats, remains the same when
+it continues unknown to us. This is possible. Yet it must at least be
+recognized that consciousness is rigorously subject to the condition of
+time, the unconscious is not. This difference, not to mention others, is
+not negligible, and could well arouse other problems.
+
+The contemporary theories regarding the nature of the unconscious seem
+to me reducible to two principal positions--one psychological, the other
+physiological.
+
+1. The physiological theory is simple and scarcely permits any
+variations. According to it, unconscious activity is simply cerebral; it
+is an "unconscious cerebration." The psychic factor, which ordinarily
+accompanies the activity of the nervous centers, is absent. Although I
+incline toward this hypothesis, I confess that it is full of
+difficulties.
+
+It has been proven through numerous experiments (Fere, Binet, Mosso,
+Janet, Newbold, etc.) that "unconscious sensations"[160] act, since they
+produce the same reactions as conscious sensations, and Mosso has been
+able to maintain that "the testimony of consciousness is less certain
+than that of the sphygmograph." But the particular instance of invention
+is very different; for it does not merely suppose the adaptation to an
+end which the physiological factor would suffice to explain; it implies
+a series of adaptations, corrections, rational operations, of which
+nervous activity alone furnishes us no example.[161]
+
+2. The psychological theory is based on an equivocal use of the word
+consciousness. Consciousness has one definite mark--it is an internal
+event existing, not by itself, but for me and insofar as it is known by
+me. But the psychological theory of the unconscious assumes that if we
+descend from clear consciousness progressively to obscure consciousness,
+to the subconscious, to the unconscious that manifests itself only
+through its motor reactions, the first state thus successively
+impoverished, still remains, down to its final term, identical in its
+basis with consciousness. It is an hypothesis that nothing justifies.
+
+No difficulty arises when we bear in mind the legitimate distinction
+between consciousness of self and consciousness in general, the former
+entirely subjective, the latter in a way objective (the consciousness of
+a man captivated by an attractive scene; better yet, the fluid form of
+revery or of the awaking from syncope). We may admit that this
+evanescent consciousness, affective in nature, felt rather than
+perceived, is due to a lack of synthesis, of relations among the
+internal states, which remain isolated, unable to unite into a whole.
+
+The difficulty commences when we descend into the region of the
+subconscious, which allows stages whose obscurity increases in
+proportion as we move away from clear consciousness, "like a lake in
+which the action of light is always nearing extinction" (in double
+coexisting personalities, automatic writing, mediums, etc.). Here some
+postulate two currents of consciousness existing at the same time in one
+person without reciprocal connection. Others suppose a "field of
+consciousness" with a brilliant center and extending indefinitely toward
+the dim distance. Still others liken the phenomenon to the movement of
+waves, whose summit alone is lighted up. Indeed, the authors declare
+that with these comparisons and metaphors they make no pretense of
+explaining; but certainly they all reduce unconsciousness to
+consciousness, as a special to a general case, and what is that if not
+explaining?
+
+I do not intend to enumerate all the varieties of the psychological
+theory. The most systematic, that of Myers, accepted by Delboef and
+others, is full of a biological mysticism all its own. Here it is in
+substance: In every one of us there is a conscious self adapted to the
+needs of life, and potential selves constituting the subliminal
+consciousness. The latter, much broader in scope than personal
+consciousness, has dependent on it the entire vegetative
+life--circulation, trophic actions, etc. Ordinarily the conscious self
+is on the highest level, the subliminal consciousness on the second; but
+in certain extraordinary states (hypnosis, hysteria, divided
+consciousness, etc.) it is just the reverse. Here is the bold part of
+the hypothesis: Its authors suppose that the supremacy of the subliminal
+consciousness is a reversion, a return to the ancestral. In the higher
+animals and in primitive man, according to them, all trophic actions
+entered consciousness and were regulated by it. In the course of
+evolution this became organized; the higher consciousness has delegated
+to the subliminal consciousness the care of silently governing the
+vegetative life. But in case of mental disintegration there occurs a
+return to the primitive state. In this manner they explain burns through
+suggestion, stigmata, trophic changes of a miraculous appearance, etc.
+It is needless to dwell on this conception of the unconscious. It has
+been vehemently criticised, notably by Bramwell, who remarks that if
+certain faculties could little by little fall into the domain of
+subliminal consciousness because they were no longer necessary for the
+struggle for life, there are nevertheless faculties so essential to the
+well-being of the individual that we ask ourselves how they have been
+able to escape from the control of the will. If, for example, some lower
+type had the power of arresting pain, how could it lose it?
+
+At the foundation of the psychological theory in all its forms is the
+unexpressed hypothesis that consciousness may be likened to a quantity
+that forever decreases without reaching zero. This is a postulate that
+nothing justifies. The experiments of psychophysicists, without solving
+the question, would support rather the opposite view. We know that the
+"threshold of consciousness" or minimum perceptible quantity, appears
+and disappears suddenly; the excitation is not felt under a determinate
+limit. Likewise in regard to the "summit of perception" or maximum
+perceptible, any increase of excitation is no longer felt if above a
+determinate limit. Moreover, in order that an increase or diminution be
+felt between these two extreme limits, it is necessary that both have a
+constant relation--differential threshold--as is expressed in Weber's
+law. All these facts, and others that I omit, are not favorable to the
+thesis of growing or diminishing continuity of consciousness. It has
+even been maintained that consciousness "has an aversion for
+continuity."
+
+To sum up: The two rival theories are equally unable to penetrate into
+the inner nature of the unconscious factor. We have thus had to limit
+ourselves to taking it as a fact of experience and to assign it its
+place in the complex function that produces invention.
+
+The observations of Flournoy (in his book, mentioned above, Part I,
+chapter III) have a particular interest in relation to our subject. His
+medium, Helene S......--very unlike others, who are satisfied with
+forecasts of the future, disclosures of unknown past events, counsel,
+prognosis, evocation, etc., without creating anything, in the proper
+sense--is the author of three or four novels, one of which, at least, is
+invented out of whole cloth--revelations in regard to the planet Mars,
+its countries, inhabitants, dwellings, etc. Although the descriptions
+and pictures of Helene S. are found on comparison to be borrowed from
+our terrestrial globe, and transposed and changed, as Flournoy has well
+shown, it is certain that in this "Martian novel," to say nothing of the
+others, there is a richness of invention that is rare among mediums: the
+creative imagination in its subliminal (unconscious) form encloses the
+other in its eclat. We know how much the cases of mediums teach us in
+regard to the unconscious life of the mind. Here we are permitted, as an
+exceptional case, to penetrate into the dark laboratory of romantic
+invention, and we can appreciate the importance of the labor that is
+going on there.
+
+FOOTNOTES:
+
+[158] See Part I, Chapter III.
+
+[159] _Mental Physiology_, Book II, chapter 13.
+
+[160] This expression is put in quotation marks because in American
+and English usage "sensation" is defined in terms of consciousness,
+and such an expression as "unconscious sensation" is paradoxical,
+and would lead to futile discussion. (Tr.)
+
+[161] For the detailed criticism of unconscious cerebration, see
+Boris Sidis, _The Psychology of Suggestion: A research into the
+subconscious nature of Man and Society_, New York, Appletons, 1898,
+pp. 121-127. The author, who assumes the coexistence of two
+selves--one waking, the other subwaking, and who attributes to the
+latter all weakness and vice (according to him the unconscious is
+incapable of rising above mere association by contiguity; it is
+"stupid," "uncritical," "credulous," "brutal," etc.) would be
+greatly puzzled to explain its role in creative activity.
+
+
+
+
+APPENDIX C
+
+COSMIC AND HUMAN IMAGINATION[162]
+
+
+For Froschammer, _Fancy_ is the original principle of things. In his
+philosophical theory it plays the same part as Hegel's _Idea_,
+Schopenhauer's _Will_, Hartmann's _Unconscious_, etc. It is, at first,
+objective--in the beginning the universal creative power is immanent in
+things, just as there is contained in the kernel the principle that
+shall give the plant its form and construct its organism; it spreads out
+into the myriads of vegetable and animal existences that have been
+succeeded or that still live on the surface of the Cosmos. The first
+organized beings must have been very simple; but little by little the
+objective imagination increases its energy by exercising it; it invents
+and realizes increasingly more complex images that attest the progress
+of its artistic genius. So Darwin was right in asserting that a slow
+evolution raises up organized beings towards fulness of life and beauty
+of form.
+
+Step by step, it succeeds in becoming conscious of itself in the mind of
+man--it becomes subjective. Generative power, at first diffused
+throughout the organism, becomes localized in the generative organs, and
+becomes established in sex. "The brain, in living beings, may form a
+pole opposed to the reproductive organs, especially when these beings
+are very high in the organic scale." Thus changed, the generative power
+has become capable of perceiving new relations, of bringing forth
+internal worlds. In nature and in man it is the same principle that
+causes living forms to appear--objective images in a way, and subjective
+images, a kind of living forms that arise and die in the mind.[163]
+
+This metaphysical theory, one of the many varieties of _mens agitat
+molem_, being, like every other, a personal conception, it is
+superfluous to discuss or criticise its evident anthropomorphism. But,
+since we are dealing with hypotheses, I venture to risk a comparison
+between embryological development in physiology, instinct in
+psychophysiology, and the creative imagination in psychology. These
+three phenomena are creations, i.e., a disposition of certain materials
+following a determinate type.
+
+In the first case, the ovum after fertilization is subject to a
+rigorously determined evolution whence arises such and such an
+individual with its specific and personal characters, its hereditary
+influences, etc. Every disturbing factor in this evolution produces
+deviations, monstrosities, and the creation does not attain the normal.
+Embryology can follow these changes step by step. There remains one
+obscure point in any event, and that is, the nature of what the ancients
+called the _nisus formativus_.
+
+In the case of instinct, the initial moment is an external or internal
+sensation, or rather, a representation--the image of a nest to be built,
+in the case of the bird; of a tunnel to be dug, for the ant; of a comb
+to be made, for the bee and the wasp; of a web to be spun, for the
+spider, etc. This initial state puts into action a mechanism determined
+by the nature of each species, and ends in creations of special kinds.
+However, variations of instinct, its adaptation to various conditions,
+show that the conditions of the determinism are less simple, that the
+creative activity is endowed with a certain plasticity.
+
+In the third case, creative imagination, the ideal, a sketched
+construction, is the equivalent of the ovum; but it is evident that the
+plasticity of the creative imagination is much greater than that of
+instinct. The imagination may radiate in several very different ways,
+and the plan of the invention, as we have seen,[164] may arise as a
+whole and develop regularly in an embryological manner, or else present
+itself in a fragmentary, partial form that becomes complete after a
+series of attractions.
+
+Perhaps an identical process, forming three stages--a lower, middle,
+and higher--is at the root of all three cases. But this is only a
+speculative hypothesis, foreign to psychology proper.
+
+FOOTNOTES:
+
+[162] See above, Part One, Chapter IV.
+
+[163] Those who, not having the courage to read the 575 pages of
+Froschammer's book, want more details, may profitably consult the
+excellent analysis that Seailles has given (_Rev. Philos._, March,
+1878, pp. 198-220). See also Ambrosi, _Psicologia dell'
+immaginazione nella storia della filosofia_, pp. 472-498.
+
+[164] See above, Part II, chapter IV.
+
+
+
+
+APPENDIX D
+
+EVIDENCE IN REGARD TO MUSICAL IMAGINATION[165]
+
+
+The question asked above,[166] Does the experiencing of purely musical
+sounds evoke images, universally, and of what nature and under what
+conditions? seemed to me to enter a more general field--the affective
+imagination--which I intend to study elsewhere in a special work. For
+the time being I limit myself to observations and information that I
+have gathered, picking from them several that I give here for the sake
+of shedding light on the question. I give first the replies of
+musicians; then, those of non-musicians.
+
+1. M. Lionel Dauriac writes me: "The question that you ask me is
+complex. I am not a 'visualizer;' I have infrequent hypnagogic
+hallucinations, and they are all of the auditory type.
+
+"... Symphonic music aroused in me no image of the visual type while I
+remained the amateur that you knew from 1876 to 1898. When that amateur
+began to reflect methodically on the art of his taste, he recognized in
+music a power of suggesting:
+
+"1. Sonorous, non-musical images--thunder, clock. Example, the overture
+of _William Tell_.
+
+"2. Psychic images--suggestion of a mental state--anger, love, religious
+feeling.
+
+"3. Visual images, whether following upon the psychic image or through
+the intermediation of a programme.
+
+"Under what condition, in a symphonic work, is the visual image,
+introduced by the psychic image, produced? In the event of a break in
+the melodic web (see my _Psychologie dans l'Opera_, pp. 119-120). Here
+are given, without orderly arrangement, some of the ideas that have come
+to me:
+
+"Beethoven's _symphony in C major_ appears to me purely musical--it is
+of a sonorous design. The _symphony in D major_ (the second) suggests to
+me visual-motor images--I set a ballet to the first part and keep track
+altogether of the ballet that I picture. The _Heroic Symphony_ (aside
+from the funeral march, the meaning of which is indicated in the title)
+suggests to me images of a military character, ever since the time that
+I noticed that the fundamental theme of the first portion is based on
+notes of perfect harmony--trumpet-notes and, by association, military.
+The _finale_ of this symphony, which I consider superior to other parts,
+does not cause me to see anything. _Symphony in B flat major_--I see
+nothing there--this may be said without qualification. _Symphony in C
+minor_--it is dramatic, although the melodic web is never broken. The
+first part suggests the image, not of Fate knocking at the gate, as
+Beethoven said, but of a soul overcome with the crises of revolt,
+accompanied by a hope of victory. Visual images do not come except as
+brought by psychic images."
+
+F. G., a musician, always sees--that is the rule, notably in the
+_Pastoral_, and in the _Heroic Symphony_. In Bach's _Passion_ he beholds
+the scene of the mystic lamb.
+
+A composer writes me: "When I compose or play music of my own
+composition I behold dancing figures; I see an orchestra, an audience,
+etc. When I listen to or play music by another composer I do not see
+anything." This communication also mentions three other musicians who
+see nothing.
+
+2. D......, so little of a musician that I had some trouble to make him
+understand the term "symphonic music," never goes to concerts. However,
+he went once, fifteen years ago, and there remains in his memory very
+clearly the principal phrase of a minuet (he hums it)--he cannot recall
+it without seeing people dancing a minuet.
+
+M. O. L...... has been kind enough to question in my behalf sixteen
+non-musical persons. Here are the results of his inquiry:
+
+Eight see curved lines.
+
+Three see images, figures springing in the air, fantastic designs.
+
+Two see the waves of the ocean.
+
+Three do not see anything.
+
+FOOTNOTES:
+
+[165] See Part Three, Chapter II.
+
+[166] _Ibid._, IV.
+
+
+
+
+APPENDIX E
+
+THE IMAGINATIVE TYPE AND ASSOCIATION OF IDEAS[167]
+
+
+I have questioned a very great number of imaginative persons, well known
+to me as such, and have chosen preferably those who, not making a
+profession of creating, let their fancy wander as it wills, without
+professional care. In all the mechanism is the same, differing scarcely
+more than temperament and degree of culture. Here are two examples.
+
+B......, forty-six years of age, is acquainted with a large part of
+Europe, North America, Oceania, Hindoostan, Indo-China, and North
+Africa, and has not passed through these countries on the run, but,
+because of his duties, resided there some time. It is worthy of remark,
+as will be seen from the following observation, that the remembrance of
+such various countries does not have first place in this brilliant,
+fanciful personage--which fact is an argument in favor of the very
+personal character of the creative imagination.
+
+"In a general way, imagination, very lively in me, functions by
+association of ideas. Memory or the outer world furnishes me some data.
+On this data there is not always, though there should be, imaginative
+work proper, and then things remain as they are, without end.
+
+"But when I meet a construction--it matters little whether ancient or in
+the course of erection--the formula, 'That ought to be fixed,' is one
+that rises mechanically to my mind in such a case; often it happens that
+I think aloud and say it, although alone. When going away from the
+architectural subject[168] under consideration, I make up infinite
+variations upon it, one after another. Sometimes the things start from a
+reflex...."
+
+After having noted his preference for the architecture of the Middle
+Ages, B...... adds (here he touches on the unconscious factor):
+
+"Were I to explain or attempt to explain how the Middle Ages have such
+an attraction for my mind, I should see therein an atavistic
+accumulation of religious feeling fixed in my family, on the female side
+no doubt, and of religiousness in ecclesiastical architecture--these
+touch.
+
+"Another example illustrating the role of association of ideas in the
+same matter. One Sunday night I left Noumea in the carriage of Dr.
+F...... who was going to visit a nunnery five leagues from there. At the
+moment of our arrival the doctor asked what time it was. 'Half-past
+two,' I said, looking at my watch. As we stopped in the convent court
+in front of the chapel I _heard_ the lusty conclusion of a psalm. 'They
+are singing vespers,' I remarked to the doctor. He commenced to laugh.
+'What time are vespers sung in your town?' 'At half-past two,' I
+answered. I opened the chapel door in order to show the doctor that
+vespers had just been held: the chapel was vacant. As I stood there,
+somewhat non-plussed, the doctor remarked, 'Cerebral automatism.'
+
+"I may add here, _by association_ of ideas. The doctor had seen through
+me, and had with fine insight perceived _why_ I had _heard_ the end of
+the psalm. The incident made a great impression on me, all the more as
+ever since the age of eight my memory testifies to a like hallucination,
+but of sight in place of hearing. It was at L...... that on Good Friday
+they rang at the cathedral with all their might. It was the very moment
+before the bells remain silent for three days, and it is known that this
+silence, ordained in the liturgy, is explained to children by telling
+them that during these two days the bells have flown to Rome. Naturally
+I was treated to this little tale, and as they finished telling it, I
+_saw_ a bell flying at an angle that I could still describe.
+
+"But this transforming power of my imagination is not present in me to
+the same extent as regards all things. It is much more operative in
+relation to Romano-Gothic architecture, mystic literature, and
+sociological knowledge than in relation, for instance, to my memories of
+travels. When I see again, in the mind's eye, the Isle of Bourbon,
+Niagara, Tahiti, Calcutta, Melbourne, the Pyramids and the Sphinx, the
+graphic representation is intellectually perfect. The objects live again
+in all their external surroundings. I feel the _Khamsinn_, the desert
+wind that scorched me at the foot of Pompey's Column; I hear the sea
+breaking into foam on the barrier reef of Tahiti. But the image does not
+lead to evocation of related or parallel ideas.
+
+"When, on the other hand, I take a walk over the Comburg moor, the
+castle weighs upon me in all its massiveness; the recollections of the
+_Memoires d'Outre-tombe_ besiege me like living pictures. I see, like
+Chateaubriand himself, the family of great famished lords in their
+feudal castle. With Chateaubriand I return in the twinkling of an eye to
+the Niagara that we have both seen. In the fall of the waters I find the
+deep and melancholy note that he himself found; and after that I think
+of that dark cathedral of Dol that evidently suggested to the author his
+_Genie du Christianisme_.
+
+"In literature, things are very unequally suggestive to me. Classic
+literature has only few paths outwards for me--Tacitus, Lucretius,
+Juvenal, Homer, and Saint-Simon excepted. I read the other authors of
+this class partly for themselves, without making a comparison. On the
+other hand, the reading of Dante, Shakespeare, St. Jerome's compact
+verses on the Hebrew, and Middle Age prose excites within me a whole
+world of ideas, like Wagner's music, _canto-fermo_, and Beethoven.
+Certain things form a link for me from one order of ideas to another.
+For example, Michaelangelo and the Bible, Rembrandt and Balzac, Puvis de
+Chavannes and the Merovingian narratives.
+
+"To sum up: There are in me certain _milieux_ especially favorable to
+imagination. When any circumstance brings me into one of them, it is
+rare that an imaginative network does not occur; and, if one is
+produced, association of ideas will perform the work. When I give myself
+up to serious work, I have to mistrust myself: and in this connection I
+shall surprise people when I say that in the class of ideas above
+indicated the subject exciting the most ideas in me is sociology."
+
+M......, sixty years of age, artistic temperament. Because of the
+necessities of life, he has followed a profession entirely opposite to
+his bent. He has given me his "confession" in the form of fragmentary
+notes made day by day. Many are _moral_ remarks on the subject of his
+imagination--I leave them out. I note especially the unconquerable
+tendency to make up little romances and some details in regard to visual
+representation, and a dislike for numbers.
+
+"It happens that I experience sharp regret when I see the photograph of
+a monument, e.g., the Pantheon, the proportions of which I have
+constructed according to the descriptions of the monument and the idea
+that I had of the life of the Greeks. The photograph mars my dream.
+
+"From the seen to the unknown. In the S. G. library. A slender young
+woman, smartly dressed--spotless black gloves--between her fingers a
+small pencil and a tiny note-book. What business has this affectation
+this morning in a classic and dull building, in a common environment of
+poor workmen? She is not a servant-maid, and not a teacher. Now for the
+solution of the unknown. I follow the woman to her family, into her
+home, and it is quite a task.
+
+"In the same library. I want to get an address from the _Almanach
+Bottin_. A young man, perhaps a student, has borrowed the ridiculous
+volume. Bent over it, his hands in his hair, he turns the leaves with
+the sage leisure of a scholar looking for a commentary. From the empty
+dictionary he often draws out a letter. He must have received this
+letter this morning from the country. His family advises him to apply to
+so-and-so. It is a question of money and employment. He must locate the
+people who, provincial ignorance said, are near him. And so goes the
+wandering imagination.
+
+"When I feel myself drawn to anyone, I prefer seeing images or portraits
+rather than the reality. That is how I avoid making unforeseen
+discoveries that would spoil my model.
+
+"If I make numerical calculations, in the absence of concrete factors,
+the imagination goes afield, and the figures group themselves
+mechanically, harkening to an inner voice that arranges them in order to
+get the sense.
+
+"There may be an imagination devoted to arithmetical
+calculations--forms, beings intrude, even the outline of the figure 3,
+for example; and then the addition or any other calculation is ruined.
+
+"I revert to the impossibility of making an addition without a swerve of
+imagination, because plastic figures are always ready before the
+calculator. The man of imagination is always constructing by means of
+plastic images.[169] Life possesses him, intoxicates him, so he never
+gets tired."
+
+THE END
+
+FOOTNOTES:
+
+[167] See Conclusion, II, above.
+
+[168] B...... is not an architect.
+
+[169] We see that the speaker is a visualizer.
+
+
+
+
+INDEX.
+
+
+Absent images, Association of, 94.
+
+Abstraction, 15;
+  Late appearance of, 146.
+
+Abulics, 11.
+
+Activity, normal end of imagination, 11.
+
+Adaptation of means to end, 264.
+
+Advance plans in commerce, 288.
+
+Adventure, Eras of, 287.
+
+Affective states, Role of, 8.
+
+Alcoholic liquors, 74.
+
+Alembert, d', 87.
+
+Alexander, 138, 142, 143.
+
+Alfieri, 56.
+
+Allen, 150.
+
+Americans, change occupations, 257.
+
+Analogy, 299;
+  Abuse of, 305;
+  based on qualitative resemblance, 26;
+  essential to creative imagination, 25;
+  not trustworthy in science, 27;
+  Role of, in primitive life, 125;
+  Thinking by, 117.
+
+Anatomical conditions, 65.
+
+Anger, 34.
+
+Animal fancy, 97.
+
+Animals, Association fibers or centers, lacking in, 100;
+  Discoveries of, 98;
+  Imagination in, 93, 94;
+  Usefulness of, to man, 274.
+
+Animism, 107, 189;
+  of primitives, 123.
+
+Anticipations of later inventions, 277.
+
+Apollo, 50.
+
+Apperception, Importance of, 16.
+
+_Apprehensio simplex_, a logical figment, 110.
+
+Arago, 145.
+
+Aristotle, vi, 134, 141.
+
+Art, Indefiniteness of modern, 203;
+  Realistic, 250;
+  Various theories of, 46.
+
+Artificial motors, Use of, a late development, 275.
+
+Aryan race, 129.
+
+Association, 22, 23;
+  Forms of, 196;
+  Laws of, 23;
+  of ideas, 59, 353;
+  of ideas, Criticism of the term, 23;
+  of ideas, Discovery depends on, 250;
+  suggests cause, 261.
+
+Associational systems, 67.
+
+Astral influences, 261.
+
+Asyllogistic deduction, 283.
+
+Attention, 86.
+
+Australians, 285.
+
+Automatisms, 71.
+
+Azam, 325.
+
+
+Bach, 69, 214, 216.
+
+Bacon, Roger, 245, 303 n.
+
+Baillarger, Dr., 324.
+
+Baldwin, 104.
+
+Barter, 286.
+
+Baudelaire, 39, 55.
+
+Beethoven, 52, 71, 148, 218.
+
+Bernard, Claude, 52;
+  _idee directrice_ of, 250.
+
+Binet, 340.
+
+Bipartite division of the brain, 67.
+
+Bismarck, 271.
+
+Blood circulation, Importance of, 70.
+
+Boehme, Jacob, 335.
+
+Bonnal, 298 n.
+
+Borgia, Lucretia, 139.
+
+Bossuet, 225.
+
+Boulogne, De, 283.
+
+Bourdeau, L., 272.
+
+Brain- development and abstraction, 100;
+  regions, Development of, 67;
+  weights, 66.
+
+Bramwell, 343.
+
+Breguet, 277.
+
+Brown-Sequard, 77.
+
+Buddha, Life of, 301.
+
+Buffon, 52, 73.
+
+Byron, 145.
+
+
+Cabalists, 234.
+
+Cabalistic mysticism, 226.
+
+Cabanis, 78.
+
+Campanella, 303.
+
+Carlyle, 150, 186.
+
+Carpenter, 284, 339.
+
+Carthage, 282.
+
+Categories of images, 16.
+
+Causality, Search for, 260.
+
+Charcot, 6.
+
+Charlemagne, 138.
+
+Chateaubriand, 76.
+
+Chatterton, 145.
+
+Cherubini, 145.
+
+Child, Adult misinterpretation of, 104;
+  Creative imagination in the, 103 ff.;
+  Exaggeration of his intelligence, 115;
+  Oscillation of belief and doubt in the, 113;
+  Stages of development, 105.
+
+Child-study, Difficulties of, 104.
+
+Chopin, 52, 215.
+
+Chorea, 101.
+
+Cid, The, 140.
+
+Classes of discoverers, 249.
+
+Classification, 181.
+
+Coleridge, 37.
+
+Colored hearing, 38.
+
+Columbus, Christopher, 89.
+
+Commerce, Combative element in, 295.
+
+Commercial imagination, Conditions of, 281;
+  development due to increasing substitution, 287;
+  development, Stages of, 285.
+
+Common factor in comparison, 40.
+
+Complementary scientists, 246.
+
+Complete images impossible, 16.
+
+Comte, 146.
+
+Condillac, 243.
+
+Confucius, 300.
+
+Confusion of impressions, 18.
+
+Conjecture, beginning of science, 245.
+
+Conscious imagination, a special case, 58.
+
+Constellation, 59, 126.
+
+Constitutions by philosophers, 309.
+
+Contiguity and resemblance, 24.
+
+Contrapuntists, 214.
+
+Contrast, Association by, 40.
+
+Cooperation, 309;
+  of intellect and feeling, 43.
+
+Copernicus, 246.
+
+Counter-world, 304.
+
+Creation hindered by complete redintegration, 22;
+  in physiological inhibition, 6;
+  Motor basis of, 258;
+  Physiological and imaginative, 76;
+  versus repetition, 5.
+
+Creative imagination, a growth, 9;
+  Composite character of, 12;
+  conditioned by knowledge, 173;
+  either esthetic or practical, 44;
+  implies feeling, 32;
+  Neglect of, by writers on psychology, vii;
+  Reasons for, 313.
+
+Creative instinct, non-existent, 42.
+
+Crisis, not essential, 58.
+
+Critical stage of investigation, 252.
+
+Cromwell, 144.
+
+Cumulative inventions, 272.
+
+Curiosity, 99;
+  of primitive man, 45, 131.
+
+Cuvier, 183.
+
+
+Daedalus, 269.
+
+Dante, 205.
+
+Darwin, 117, 346.
+
+Dauriac, 350.
+
+Deduction, Process of, 283.
+
+Deffant, Madame du, 48.
+
+Deities, Coalescence of, 200;
+  Momentary, 199;
+  Multiplicity of Roman, 125.
+
+Delboef, 342.
+
+DeQuincy, 55.
+
+Descartes, 73, 294.
+
+Determinism, Neglect of, by idealists, 303;
+  of art, 278;
+  of invention, 264.
+
+Dewey, John, 132 n.
+
+_Dialectic_, Hegelian, 254.
+
+Diffluent imagination, 196 ff.
+
+_Dii minores_, 269.
+
+Disinterestedness of the artist, 35.
+
+Dissociation, 15, 268;
+  by concomitant variations, 21;
+  of series, 19.
+
+Double personality, 325.
+
+Dreams, 38;
+  Emotional persistence of, 324.
+
+Drugs, Effect of, 55;
+  Use of, as excitants, 70.
+
+Dualism of Fourier, 306.
+
+Duerer, 145.
+
+
+Egypt, 135.
+
+Egyptian conception of causality, 260.
+
+Emotion, and sensation, 38;
+  material for imagination, 33;
+  presupposes unsatisfied needs, 32;
+  Realization of, 80.
+
+Emotional abstraction, 196;
+  factor, 31 ff.
+
+Empedocles, 136.
+
+Epic, Rise of the, 138.
+
+Essenes, 307.
+
+Esthetic imagination,
+  contrasted to mechanical, 264;
+  Fixity of, 264.
+
+Ethics, Living and dead, 302.
+
+Euclid, 244, 245.
+
+Eureka, Moment of, 247, 302.
+
+Evolution of commerce, Law's statement of, 294.
+
+Exact knowledge requisite in commerce, 289.
+
+Expansion of self, 314.
+
+Experience requisite for literary invention, 146.
+
+External factors, 21.
+
+
+Facts and general ideas, 252.
+
+Faith, 112;
+  -cure, 6;
+  highest in semi-science, 241;
+  Role of, 7.
+
+Fancy, 346;
+  in animals, 97;
+  Source of, 260.
+
+Fear, 34.
+
+Fenelon, 303.
+
+Fere, 325, 340.
+
+Fiduciary money, 286.
+
+Fixed ideas, 88, 89.
+
+Flechsig, 67, 68, 100, 103.
+
+Flournoy, 38, 344.
+
+Forel, 96.
+
+Fouillee, 193.
+
+Fourier, 304.
+
+French, not strong in imagination, 193;
+  Revolution, 151.
+
+Fresnel, 145.
+
+Fromentin, 17.
+
+Froschammer, 75, 346.
+
+Fuegians, 285.
+
+
+Gauss, 69, 183.
+
+Gautier, Theophile, 55, 189, 190.
+
+Gavarni, 187.
+
+Generic image, 18.
+
+Genius, and brain structure, 68;
+  depends on subliminal imagination, 57;
+  exceptional, 149;
+  No common measure of, 143.
+
+Geniuses, of judgment, 142;
+  of mastery over men, and matter, 142.
+
+Gilman, 219 n.
+
+Gnostics, 234.
+
+Goethe, 29, 149, 150, 216.
+
+Gold, Curative powers of, 261.
+
+Goncourt, 74.
+
+Goya, 39, 206.
+
+Greece, 282.
+
+Greek republics, 151.
+
+Gretry, 73.
+
+Grillparzer, 85, 336.
+
+Groos, 35, 47, 99, 227.
+
+Guericke, Otto de, 276.
+
+
+Habits, 22.
+
+Hamilton, 19, 58, 60.
+
+Handel, 145.
+
+Hanseatic League, 287.
+
+Harrington, 303.
+
+Hartmann, 254, 346.
+
+Hauey, 247.
+
+Haydn, 145.
+
+Hegel, 254, 346.
+
+Heine, 306.
+
+Hellenic imagination, anthropomorphic, 202.
+
+Helmholtz, 20, 87, 142.
+
+Henry IV, 139.
+
+Hephaestos, 269.
+
+Hercules, 137.
+
+Hero, 270.
+
+Herodotus, 260.
+
+Hesiod, 130.
+
+Hindoo imagination, symbolic, 202.
+
+Hindoos, 128.
+
+Hodgson, 35.
+
+Hoeffding, 41.
+
+Hoffman, 39, 206.
+
+_Homo duplex_, 43.
+
+Homonomy, 120.
+
+Howe, 60 n.
+
+Huber, 96.
+
+Hugo, Victor, 188, 189, 216, 229;
+  Animism in, 189.
+
+Human force, beginning of invention, 273.
+
+Hume, 111.
+
+Huyghens, 270.
+
+Hyperaemia, 70.
+
+Hyperesthesia, Temporary, 74.
+
+Hypermnesia, 54.
+
+Hypothesis, 251;
+  Progressive, 244.
+
+
+Icarus, 269.
+
+Idea and emotion, Equivalence of, 80.
+
+Ideal modified in practice, 306.
+
+Idealistic conceptions, 300.
+
+Idealization, Process of, 38.
+
+Illusion, 107;
+  and legend, 137;
+  Conscious, of mystic, 228.
+
+Illusions, valuable to scientist, 251.
+
+Image, Modification of, 18, 291.
+
+Images, 80;
+  abbreviations of reality, 232;
+  Categories of, 16;
+  Concrete, 222;
+  provoked, 188;
+  sketched type, 81;
+  Symbolic, 222;
+  Visual, provoked by music, 217.
+
+Imagination, and abulia, 11;
+  and foresight, 284;
+  anthropocentric, 10;
+  basis of the cosmic process, 75;
+  Commercial, 281;
+  complete in animals, 95;
+  condensed in common objects, 276;
+  Conditions of, 44;
+  Development of, 167 ff.;
+  Diffluent, 196 ff.;
+  Esthetic, 264;
+  fixed form, 318;
+  in animals, 93;
+  in experimentation, 248;
+  in primitive man, 118;
+  Mechanical and technical, 257;
+  Motives of different sorts of, 251;
+  Musical, 212 ff., 350;
+  Mystic, 221 ff.;
+  Mystical, different from religious, 231;
+  not opposed to the useful, 263;
+  Numerical, 207 ff.;
+  Periods of development of, 144;
+  Plastic, 184 ff.;
+  Poetical, 267;
+  Practical, 256 ff.;
+  present in all activities, viii;
+  Quality of, same in many lives, 265;
+  Scientific, 236 ff.;
+  sketched form, 316;
+  substitute for reason, 29;
+  Varieties of, 180.
+
+Imaginative type, 320.
+
+Imitation, through pleasure, 98.
+
+Imitative music, 214.
+
+Impersonality, 52, 86.
+
+Incomplete images, 18.
+
+Incubation, Periods of, 278.
+
+Individual variations, 179.
+
+Individuality of genius, 149.
+
+Inductive reasoning, 132.
+
+Infantile insanity, 101.
+
+Inhibition by representation, 6.
+
+Initial moment of discovery, 276.
+
+Inspiration, 50, 85;
+  and intoxication, 55;
+  Characteristic of, 57;
+  characterized by suddenness and impersonality, 51;
+  resembles somnambulism, 56;
+  Subjective feeling of, untrustworthy, 59.
+
+Instinct, 75;
+  answer to specific needs, 42;
+  Creative, 313;
+  Resemblance of invention to, 48.
+
+Intellectual factor, 15.
+
+Intuition, 282, 285.
+
+Introspectors, 321.
+
+Intentional combination of images, 95.
+
+Interest, a factor in creation, 82.
+
+Interesting, defined, 36.
+
+Invention arises to satisfy a need, 271;
+  Higher forms of, 140 ff.;
+  in morals, 300;
+  in successive parts, 296;
+  of monopolies, 282;
+  Pain of, 51;
+  Spontaneity of, 51;
+  subjected to tradition, 269.
+
+Inventions, Amplifiers of, 270;
+  largely anonymous, 275;
+  Mechanical, neglected by psychologists, 263;
+  Stratification of, 272.
+
+Inventors deified, 269;
+  Oddities of, 72.
+
+
+James, William, 21, 25, 37, 83, 112.
+
+Janet, 340.
+
+Jealousy, stimulates imagination, 34.
+
+Jordaens, 145.
+
+Joy, 34.
+
+
+Kant, 248.
+
+Kepler, 246, 247.
+
+Klopstock, 215.
+
+Kuehn, 129.
+
+
+Lagrange, 71.
+
+Lamennais, 73.
+
+Lang, 128, 261.
+
+Language, Origin of, 120.
+
+Laplace, 250.
+
+Larvated epilepsy, 141.
+
+Lavoisier, 246.
+
+Law, 294.
+
+Lazarus, 47.
+
+Leibniz, 73, 74, 146, 253, 296 n.
+
+Lelut, 141.
+
+Leurechon, 277.
+
+Liebig, 244.
+
+Linnaeus, 183.
+
+Literal mysticism, 226.
+
+Localization, 65.
+
+Loch Lomond, 58.
+
+Locke, 309.
+
+Lombroso, 141, 142.
+
+Louis XIV, 150.
+
+Love, 34;
+  and hate, 134.
+
+Love-plays, 99.
+
+
+Machiavelli, 73.
+
+Machines, counterfeits of human beings, 279.
+
+Man and animals, Specific quality of, 273.
+
+Manu, 300.
+
+Mastery, Spirit of, 114.
+
+Materials of imagination, 299.
+
+Maury, A., 6 n.
+
+Mechanic and poet, 279.
+
+Mechanical aptitude, 145.
+
+Mechanical imagination, Ideal of, 268.
+
+Mediate association, 59.
+
+Memory, Predominant tendencies in, 61;
+  untrustworthy, 17.
+
+Men, Great, as makers of history, 150.
+
+Mendelssohn, 145, 213 n., 215, 216.
+
+Mental chemistry, 82.
+
+Merchant sailors, 282.
+
+Metamorphosis, 28;
+  of deities, 129;
+  Regressive, 171.
+
+Metaphysical speculation, 251;
+  thought, Stages of, 252.
+
+Metaphysics, 252 ff.
+
+Methods of invention, 243.
+
+Meynert, 100.
+
+Michaelangelo, 145, 148, 149.
+
+Michelet, 186, 306.
+
+Middle Ages, predominantly imaginative, 174.
+
+Military invention, 295;
+  Conditions of, 297.
+
+Mill, John Stuart, 82, 284.
+
+Milton, 73.
+
+Mimicry, 98.
+
+Mind, Varieties of, 320.
+
+Mission, Consciousness of, 148.
+
+Misunderstanding of the new, 151.
+
+Mobility of inventors, 258.
+
+Monadology, 253.
+
+Money, Invention of, 286;
+  sought as an end, 289.
+
+Monge, 237.
+
+Moses, 300.
+
+More, 303, 309.
+
+Morgan, Lloyd, 99.
+
+Mormons, 307.
+
+Monoideism, 87.
+
+Montgolfier, 277.
+
+Moral geniuses, 301.
+
+Moravian brotherhood, 307.
+
+Mosso, 71, 340.
+
+Motor elements in all representation, 4;
+  elements, Role of, 7;
+  manifestation basis of creation, 9.
+
+Movements, Importance of, in imagination, 3.
+
+Mozart, 73, 145.
+
+Mueller, Max, 120, 129, 130.
+
+Mummy powder, 261.
+
+Muensterberg, 60.
+
+Muses, 50.
+
+Music an emotional language, 220;
+  Precocity in, 144.
+
+Musical imagination, 212, 350.
+
+Musset, Alfred de, 335.
+
+Myers, 342.
+
+Mystic imagination, 221 ff., 335.
+
+Mystics, Abuse of allegory, by, 225;
+  Belief of, 227;
+  Metaphorical style of, 224.
+
+Mysticism by suggestion, 229.
+
+Myth, defined, 123;
+  Depersonification of, 133;
+  in Plato, 134;
+  in science, 134;
+  Subjective and objective factors in, 122.
+
+Myths, Significance of, 119;
+  Variations in, 127.
+
+Myth-making activity, viii, 331.
+
+
+Napoleon, 10, 66, 71, 142;
+  his war practice, 298.
+
+Natural, and human phenomena, 299;
+  law, Uniformity of, opposed to dissociation, 21;
+  motors, Use of, 275.
+
+Naville, 245.
+
+Need of knowing, 314.
+
+Neglect of details in sensation, 20.
+
+Nerval, Gerard de, 229, 324.
+
+Nervous overflow, 71.
+
+New Larnak, 309.
+
+Newbold, 340.
+
+Newcomen, 270.
+
+Newton, 58, 87, 146.
+
+Nietzsche, 150.
+
+_Nomina Numina_, 120, 262.
+
+Nordau, 142.
+
+Numerical imagination, 207 ff.;
+  mysticism, 226;
+  series unlimited, 207.
+
+
+Objective study of inventors, 71.
+
+Oddities of inventors, 72.
+
+Oelzelt-Newin, 33, 95.
+
+Old age, Effect of, on imagination, 77.
+
+Organic conditions, 65.
+
+Orientation conditioned by individual organization, 48;
+  Personal, 270.
+
+Owen, Robert, 309.
+
+
+Paradox of belief, 242.
+
+Paralysis by ideas, 6.
+
+Pascal, 146, 244.
+
+Pasteur, 142, 143, 251.
+
+Pathological view of genius, 141.
+
+Pathology and physiology, 74.
+
+Perception, 15;
+  and conception, 184;
+  and imagination, 106.
+
+Perez, B., 115.
+
+Persistence of ideas due to feeling, 79.
+
+Personification, 186;
+  characteristic of aborigines and children, 27;
+  source of myth, 28.
+
+Phalanges, Organization of society into, 305.
+
+Philippe, J., 17 n.
+
+Philosophy, a transformation of mystic ideas, 233.
+
+Phlogiston, 248.
+
+Physiological states, 70.
+
+Physiology and pathology, 74.
+
+Plastic art and mythology, 191;
+  imagination, 184 f.
+
+Plato, 134, 303, 309.
+
+Platonic ideas, 81, 253.
+
+Play, 47, 97;
+  Uses of, for man, 114.
+
+Plotinus, 234.
+
+Poe, 39, 206, 324.
+
+Poet, a workman, 190.
+
+Poetical imagination, general characters, 267;
+  Inspiration in, 268;
+  special characters, 270.
+
+Poetical invention, Stages of, 266.
+
+Polyideism, 87.
+
+Polynomy, 120.
+
+Poncelet, 143.
+
+Positive minds, 318.
+
+Powers of nature, Exploitation of 271.
+
+Practical imagination, Ubiquity of, 254.
+
+Practice, essential in motor creation, 186.
+
+Precocity, 144;
+  in poetry, 145;
+  of mathematicians, 147.
+
+Pre-Raphaelites, 204.
+
+Preyer, 117.
+
+Primitive man, 45;
+  and myth, 118 ff.
+
+Principle of unity, 250.
+
+Progressive stages of imagination, 84.
+
+Prometheus, 269.
+
+Provoked revival, 94.
+
+Pseudo-science, 240.
+
+Psychic atoms, 19;
+  paralysis, 6.
+
+Psychological regressions, 248.
+
+Puberty, Influence of, on imagination, 76.
+
+Pythagoras, 226, 246.
+
+Pythagoreans, 134.
+
+
+Qualities, Attribution of, to objects, 124.
+
+
+Raphael, 145.
+
+Rational Metaphysics, 234.
+
+Reason, Objectivity of, 10.
+
+Reciprocal working of scientific and practical discoveries, 249.
+
+Recuperative theory of play, 97.
+
+Redintegration, Law of, 19;
+  Total, 36.
+
+Regis, 54.
+
+Religion, Universality of, 128.
+
+Renaissance, 151, 175.
+
+Reni, Guido, 73.
+
+Repetition versus creation, 5, 23.
+
+Representation and belief inseparable, 110.
+
+Representations, Interchange of, 323;
+  Number of, 322.
+
+Revery, 38, 198, 316.
+
+Reymond, Du Bois, 52.
+
+Reynolds, 6, 325.
+
+Roland, 138.
+
+Roman Republic, 151.
+
+Romans, 125.
+
+Romanes, 94, 95, 96.
+
+Romantic invention, 115.
+
+Roentgen, 142.
+
+Rossini, 73.
+
+Rousseau, 309.
+
+Rubens, 145.
+
+Ruedinger, 69.
+
+
+Saint-Simonism, 309.
+
+Sand, George, 52, 215.
+
+Satanic literature, 206.
+
+Schelling, 253.
+
+Schematic images, 18, 291.
+
+Schiller, 47, 72, 73, 145.
+
+Schopenhauer, 37, 149, 150, 253, 346.
+
+Schubert, 145.
+
+Schumann, 215.
+
+Science, 45;
+  Conjecture beginning of, 245;
+  prescribes conditions and limits to imagination, 236;
+  Three movements in growth of, 239.
+
+Scientific imagination, 236 ff.
+
+Scripture, 60.
+
+Self-feeling, 35.
+
+Semi-science, 240.
+
+Seneca, 141.
+
+Sensation changed in memory, 17.
+
+Sensorial insanity, 101.
+
+Sexual instinct, 314.
+
+Shakers, 307.
+
+Shakespeare, 143, 186.
+
+Shelly, 56.
+
+Social aims in finance, 294;
+  invention, limited by the past, 308;
+  wants, 314.
+
+Socialism, Utopian and scientific, 310.
+
+Societies for special ends, 307.
+
+Sorrow, 34.
+
+Special modes of scientific imagining, 237.
+
+Specific, not general imagination, 179.
+
+Spencer, 47, 131, 150.
+
+Spinoza, 110, 143, 254.
+
+Spirits, Belief in, 51.
+
+Spontaneity, 296.
+
+Spontaneous revival, 94, 315.
+
+Spontaneous variations, 140.
+
+Stages of passage from percept to concept, 292.
+
+Stallo, 134.
+
+State credit, Law's system of, 294.
+
+Stewart, Dugald, 111.
+
+Stigmata, etc., unprecedented in individual's experience, 7.
+
+Stigmatized individuals, 6.
+
+Subjective factors, 20.
+
+Subliminal imagination, 57.
+
+Sully, 21.
+
+_Summa_, 254.
+
+Summary, 330.
+
+Superstition and religion, 259.
+
+Symbolism of Hindoos, 202.
+
+
+Taine, 18, 111, 117, 129, 150, 200.
+
+Teleological character of will and imagination, 10.
+
+Thales, 134.
+
+Titchener, 83.
+
+Tolstoi, 151.
+
+Tools, 274.
+
+Tours, Moreau de, 55, 78, 141.
+
+Triptolemus, 269.
+
+Tropisms, 75.
+
+Tycho-Brahe, 73, 246, 270.
+
+Tylor, 99, 123, 125, 131, 139.
+
+Tyndall, 238.
+
+Tyre, 282.
+
+
+Unconscious, Nature of the, 339;
+  physiological theory, 340, 341.
+
+Unconscious cerebration, 53;
+  factor, 50 ff.;
+  factor, not a distinct element in invention, 64.
+
+Units of exchange, 286.
+
+Unity, Principle of, 79.
+
+_Universale post rem_, 84.
+
+Utopias, based on author's _milieu_, 303.
+
+Utopian imagination, 299.
+
+Utopians, indifferent to realization, 309.
+
+
+Van Dyck, 145.
+
+Vaucanson, 48.
+
+Vedic epoch, 129.
+
+Vesication, 5, 7.
+
+Vicavakarma, 269.
+
+Vico, 174.
+
+Vignoli, 128.
+
+Vinci, Leonardo da, 58, 149.
+
+_Vis a fronte_ and _a tergo_, 11.
+
+Vocation, Change of, 172;
+  Choice of, 144.
+
+Voltaire, 150.
+
+Voluntary activity analogous to creative imagination, 9.
+
+Von Baer, 210.
+
+Von Hartmann, 224.
+
+
+Wagner, 145.
+
+Wahle, 62.
+
+Wallace, 96, 99.
+
+Wallaschek, 99.
+
+Watch, Evolution of the, 270.
+
+Watt, James, 66, 244, 270.
+
+Wealth, desired from artistic motives, 290.
+
+Weber, E. F., 5, 145, 216.
+
+Weismann, 148.
+
+Wernicke, 100.
+
+Wiertz, 39, 206.
+
+Will, The broad meaning of, 112;
+  a coordinating function, 9;
+  Effect of, on physiological functioning, 5.
+
+Words, Role of, 96.
+
+Wundt, 24, 40, 182.
+
+
+Zeller, 226.
+
+Ziehen, 61, 62.
+
+Zoroaster, 300.
+
+  +--------------------------------------------------------------+
+  | Transcriber's Notes:                                         |
+  |                                                              |
+  | Page 23: Fn. 8: Phychology amended to Psychology             |
+  | Page 25: Missing footnote marker in original. Added          |
+  | footnote marker after James quote.                           |
+  | Page 35: casual amended to causal                            |
+  | Page 38: haphazard amended to haphazardly; grouping amended  |
+  | to groupings                                                 |
+  | Page 39: subejct amended to subject                          |
+  | Page 54: vender _sic_                                        |
+  | Page 56: "Under the influence of alcoholic drinks and of     |
+  | poisonous intoxicants attention and will always fall into    |
+  | exhaustion." _sic_ Possibly the word "does" or similar       |
+  | is missing before "and," or "and" is superfluous.            |
+  | Page 55: subtances amended to substances                     |
+  | Page 75: images amended to image                             |
+  | Page 84: unisersale amended to universale                    |
+  | Page 85: The following lines transposed: "which, for the     |
+  | time being, should represent the" and "all the forces and    |
+  | capacities upon a single point"                              |
+  | Page 123: fill amended to fills                              |
+  | Page 151: duplicate "the" removed ("the the deep working of  |
+  | the masses")                                                 |
+  | Page 155: Section II amended to IV                           |
+  | Page 163: Section III amended to V                           |
+  | Page 193: Saxin amended to Saxon                             |
+  | Page 200: everyone amended to every one                      |
+  | Page 208: apalling amended to appalling                      |
+  | Page 213: Missing footnote marker in original. Added         |
+  | footnotemarker after last paragraph on page.                 |
+  | Page 226: caballists amended to cabalists                    |
+  | Page 229: plant and tree amended to plants and trees         |
+  | Page 236: In Chapter IV, "The Scientific Imagination," there |
+  | are sections II, III, IV and V, but no section I.            |
+  | Page 250: dyssymetry amended to dyssymmetry                  |
+  | Page 280: Missing footnote marker in original. Added         |
+  | footnote marker after "... inorganic life."                  |
+  | Page 286: Fn. 132: Evolution amended to Evolution            |
+  | Page 292: acording amended to according                      |
+  | Page 294: managable amended to manageable                    |
+  | Page 297: opoprtune amended to opportune                     |
+  | Page 319: or amended to of ("the double of savages")         |
+  | Page 321: quintescence amended to quintessence               |
+  | Page 338: Footnote marker and number added to note on page.  |
+  | Footnote marker added at end of first paragraph.             |
+  | Page 348: quivalent amended to equivalent                    |
+  | Page 351: l'Opera amended to l'Opera                         |
+  | Page 365: Lammennais amended to Lamennais                    |
+  | Page 365: Michelangelo amended to Michaelangelo              |
+  |                                                              |
+  | Part II, Chapter II: The chapter heading in the table of     |
+  | contents differs from that shown on page 102. Left as is.    |
+  |                                                              |
+  | Accented letters, italicisation and the punctuation of       |
+  | abbreviations have been standardised.                        |
+  |                                                              |
+  | Where a word is spelt differently and there is an equal      |
+  | number of instances, the variant spellings have been left as |
+  | is: Hephaestos/Hephaestos; Jordaens/Jordaens;                  |
+  | Linnaeus/Linnaeus.                                            |
+  +--------------------------------------------------------------+
+
+
+
+
+
+End of Project Gutenberg's Essay on the Creative Imagination, by Th. Ribot
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