Why has no one heeded these objurgations of a learned philosopher? It is because his system of polyanism makes too clear, things that it were better to leave in darkness! Charcot saw this light and he withdrew. Is not scientific prudence an excellent excuse with which to hide the soul wherever it threatens to appear? At the present time all the embarrassing facts of animism are attributed to subconscious action of the brain, a strange formula, since it is contradictory in its terms. The poly-animistic system of Durand de Gros would admirably explain our subconsciousness, without doubt, but do we ever know whither we are tending? Scientific prudence prefers to avoid the danger. If we explain subconsciousness by the inferior centers of consciousness, the matter becomes too clear. We could not invoke unconscious cerebration to explain many of the verified cases of advice and warnings, and useful premonitions, which cannot be attributed to lower centers of consciousness. In order to do this we must presuppose that these inferior centers had been put into relation with an unknown magnetizer. What a horror! Science can not envisage such an eventuality. At present subconsciousness serves us as the tart for the filling, but on condition that we tolerate the vagueness and the implications which constitute the value of the word "subconsciousness."

For subconsciousness is not the contrary of consciousness: it is simply that which is in the consciousness of others. And you see the danger. With the system of Durand de Gros we could have an intestinal consciousness very useful for our digestion: a consciousness of the kidneys, the liver, or the lungs, unconscious functions so far as we are concerned, but conscious on the part of the agents who maintain them. So far, so good, but this leaves us without defense against the rising tide of phenomena which was so easily rejected in this domain without a proprietor. When a writing medium produced a remarkable message, it was said, "It is subconsciousness." But it was well understood that this consciousness dwelt in unknown regions. Can we now say, "It is the spleen of Miss X. that sends her news of her mother, imitating the signature of an unknown?" No, this would be difficult. The spleen is very necessary, but it is slightly lymphatic and conscientiously keeps guard over the white corpuscles of the blood: it never leaves these occupations to take up the pen.

I know very well that we could easily find fault here. In the case at issue, we might say that all the faculties which concur in normal writing act unconsciously in mechanical writing. But this is absurd, because those faculties are purely motive and know only movement and do not know the meaning of the message. That is attributing much indeed to motive consciousness, to believe it capable of coordinating ideas, imitating signatures, or speaking foreign languages. A motive ganglion which speaks Greek, or which improvises a whole system of philosophy, cannot have a very tranquil consciousness.

This is where these experiments lead us into truth. They show us that the table, or the organs, are only simple agents of transmission, and that the motive agent is frequently found in the thought of a living person. Here is a whole course of study, already outlined. A movement is conscious when it emanates from our own thought, and subconscious when we discover its origin in a foreign thought.

I do not say an exterior thought, because our motive centers, for example, are wills foreign to ourselves, and yet within our organs. In daily speech one constantly makes the mistake of speaking of the body as it were oneself. It is important to remember that the body is only the implement of psychic force which constitutes the "ego" on the mental plane; the fact that consciousness is not in the instrument is already scientifically attested, but scientists do not wish to acknowledge it because it is difficult to take a step backward. It is certain that radio-activity, in changing our manner of seeing, will drive materialism from its last entrenchment: the atom is disappearing from the physical plane, it is nothing more than a creation like the celestial nebulae.

Everything, then, comes from the invisible: there is in the invisible something almost immaterial, which condenses, and the being does not act differently from the atom. There are psychic nebulas which precede the apparition of the first organic forms, and preside at their evolution. There is a nebula which precedes the birth of the child and presides over the development of the foetus in the womb of the mother. In experimenting with psychic phenomena, we see also that a psychic nebula precedes the formation of that which Mr. Richet calls the ectoplasm.

In brief, the feeble atom, which represents a condensation of formidable energy, sums up within itself the process of planetary formations. Living organisms are a condensation of the creative idea which tends to manifest itself, and we know that each embryonic phase of the child represents the succession of animal forces in the order in which they have appeared upon earth. Here I seem to see a ray of light; the same biogenetic law explains the formation of the body of the child, the genesis of animal species, the condensation of planets. The planet is a slow materialization - organized beings are slow materializations - the embryonic process is a rapid materialization.

The spiritualistic materialization, still more rapid, is an imperfect creation, like physiological neoplasms, which appear sometimes in living bodies, and which are like an accident in nature, a plethoric superfetation, subject to abortion. We shall say nothing of the slow materialization of the planetary nebula, which is an evident fact. Let us seek to explain the materialization of beings in accord with ontogenetic facts.

We do not have to inquire as to what may be the psychic substance. It exists, that is enough. Be it material, pure spirit, or cosmic force, we leave this discussion to the philosophers and are content to submit it to their observations. The preceding observations oblige us to admit that this is the force which creates organic movement. One working hypothesis, then, shall be that psychic substance exists before the object which it puts in movement, that is to say, before the organic formation. Before any creation, the soul has been obliged to manifest itself slowly, in the simple concretion of a primitive cell. The animic substance acting upon all the planet, has of necessity formed throughout the earth a multitude of simple concretions.