Before, we leave this discussion, it is important to realize that intuition, understood as my self-sympathy, like

The method of intuition the one color orange, is what Bergson calls a “component part” (The Creative Mind, pp. 170–72). Just as the
color orange is a real part of the color spectrum — the mathematical equation which defines the light waves
As we already noted, Bergson’s thought must be seen as an attempt to overcome Kant. In Bergson’s eyes, of orange, on the contrary, being not a component part, for Bergson, but a “partial expression” – my own
Kant’s philosophy is scandalous, since it eliminates the possibility of absolute knowledge and mires duration is a real part of the duration itself. From this part, I can, as Bergson would say, “dilate” or “enlarge”
metaphysics in antinomies. Bergson’s own method of intuition is supposed to restore the possibility of and move into other durations. But this starting point in a part implies – and Bergson himself never seems to
absolute knowledge – here one should see a kinship between Bergsonian intuition and what Kant calls realize this– that intuition never gives us absolute knowledge of the whole of the duration, all the component
intellectual intuition – and metaphysics. To do this, intuition in Bergson’s sense must place us above the parts of the duration. The whole is never given in an intuition; only a contracted part is given. Nevertheless,
divisions of the different schools of philosophy like rationalism and empiricism or idealism and realism. this experience is an integral one, in the sense of integrating an infinity of durations. And thus, even though
Philosophy, for Bergson, does not consist in choosing between concepts and in taking sides (The Creative we cannot know all durations, every single one that comes into existence must be related, as a part, to the
Mind, p. 175–76). These antinomies of concepts and positions, according to him, result from the normal or others. The duration is that to which everything is related and in this sense it is absolute.
habitual way our intelligence works. Here we find Bergson’s connection to American pragmatism. The
Because intuition in Bergson is “integral experience” (The Creative Mind, p. 200), it is made up of an
normal way our intelligence works is guided by needs and thus the knowledge it gathers is not disinterested;
indefinite series of acts, which correspond to the degrees of duration. This series of acts is why Bergson calls
it is relative knowledge. And how it gathers knowledge is through what Bergson calls “analysis,” that is, the
intuition a method. The first act is a kind of leap, and the idea of a leap is opposed to the idea of a re-
dividing of things according to perspectives taken. Comprehensive analytic knowledge then consists in
constitution after analysis. One should make the effort to reverse the habitual mode of intelligence and set
reconstruction or re-composition of a thing by means of synthesizing the perspectives. This synthesis, while
oneself up immediately in the duration. But then, second, one should make the effort to dilate one’s duration
helping us satisfy needs, never gives us the thing itself; it only gives us a general concept of things. Thus,
into a continuous heterogeneity. Third, one should make the effort to differentiate (as with the color orange)
intuition reverses the normal working of intelligence, which is interested and analytic (synthesis being only a
the extremes of this heterogeneity. With the second and third steps, one can see a similarity to Plato’s idea of
development of analysis). In the fourth chapter to Matter and Memory, Bergson calls this reversal of habitual
dialectic understood as collection and division. The method resembles that of the good butcher who knows
intelligence “the turn of experience” where experience becomes concerned with utility, where it becomes
how to cut at the articulations or the good tailor who knows how to sew pieces of cloth together into clothes
human experience (Matter and Memory, pp.184–85). This placement of oneself up above the turn is not easy;
that fit. On the basis of the division into extremes or into a duality, one can then confront our everyday
above all else, Bergson appreciates effort.
“mixtures” of the two extremes. Within the mixture, one makes a division or “cut” into differences in kind:
Intuition therefore is a kind of experience, and indeed Bergson himself calls his thought “the true into matter and spirit, for instance. Then one shows how the duality is actually a monism, how the two
empiricism” (The Creative Mind, p. 175). What sort of experience? In the opening pages of “Introduction to extremes are “sewn” together, through memory, in the continuous heterogeneity of duration. Indeed, for
Metaphysics,” he calls intuition sympathy (The Creative Mind, p. 159). As we have seen from our discussion Bergson, intuition is memory; it is not perception.
of multiplicity in Time and Free Will, sympathy consists in putting ourselves in the place of others.
Bergsonian intuition then consists in entering into the thing, rather than going around it from the outside. This
“entering into,” for Bergson, gives us absolute knowledge. In a moment, we are going to have to qualify this
“absoluteness.” In any case, for Bergson, intuition is entering into ourselves – he says we seize ourselves
from within – but this self-sympathy develops heterogeneously into others. In other words, when one
sympathizes with oneself, one installs oneself within duration and then feels a “certain well defined tension,
whose very determinateness seems like a choice between an infinity of possible durations” (The Creative
Mind, p. 185). In order to help us understand intuition, which is always an intuition of duration, let us return
to the color spectrum image. Bergson says that we should suppose that perhaps there is no other color than
orange. Yet, if we could enter into orange, that is, if we could sympathize with it, we would “sense ourselves
caught,” as Bergson says, “between red and yellow.” This means that if we make an effort when we perceive
orange, we sense a variety of shades. If we make more of an effort, we sense that the darkest shade of orange
is a different color, red, while the lightest is also a different color, yellow. Thus, we would have a sense,
beneath orange, of the whole color spectrum. So, likewise, I may introspect and sympathize with my own
duration; my duration may be the only one. But, if I make an effort, I sense in my duration a variety of
shades. In other words, the intuition of duration puts me in contact with a whole continuity of durations,
which I could, with effort, try to follow upwardly or downwardly, upward to spirit or downward to inert
matter (The Creative Mind, p. 187). Thus Bergsonian intuition is always an intuition of what is other. Here
we see that Bergson has not only tried to break with Kant, but also with Parmenides’s philosophy of the
same.
There is the closed morality, whose religion is static, and there is the open morality, whose religion is The psychological error then consists in externalizing an exceptional experience – which Bergson calls
dynamic. Closed morality and static religion are concerned with social cohesion. Nature has made certain “resistance to the resistances” – into a moral theory. Duty becomes severe and inflexible. But there is more to
species evolve in such a way that the individuals in these species cannot exist on their own. They are fragile this error. Kant believes that he can resolve obligation into rational elements. In the experience of resistance
and require the support of a community. One quickly thinks of bees, and Bergson, of course, refers to them. to the resistances, the individual has an illicit desire. And, since the individual is intelligent, the individual
We can see again that there are bodily needs which must be satisfied. The force of these needs is the source uses intelligence, a rational method, to act on itself. According to Bergson, what is happening here is that the
of the closed morality. Because of these needs, there is a rigidity to the rules of closed moralities. Kant’s rational method is merely restoring the force of the original tendency to obey the whole of obligation that
moral philosophy has its source in such needs. The survival of the community requires that there be strict society has inculcated in the individual. But as Bergson notes, the tendency is one thing; the rational method
obedience: the categorical imperative. Yet, although Kant’s categorical imperative is supposed to be is another. The success of the rational method, however, gives us the illusion that the force with which an
universal, it is not, according to Bergson. It is limited and particular. Closed morality really concerns the individual obeys any particular obligation comes from reason, that is, from the idea or representation, or
survival of a society, my society. Therefore, it always excludes other societies. Indeed, for Bergson, closed better still, from the formula of the obligation.
morality is always concerned with war. And static religion, the religion of closed morality, is based on what But, there is another force. The second force is what Bergson calls “the impetus of love” (The Two Sources,
Bergson calls the “fabulation function.” The fabulation function is a particular function of the imagination p. 96). The impetus of love, like joy but also like sympathy, is a creative emotion. The emotion must be
that creates “voluntary hallucinations.” The fabulation function takes our sense that there is a presence explicated into actions and representations. But, this process of explication can be extended. The
watching over us and invents images of gods. These images then insure strict obedience to the closed representations that the mystic explicates can be further explicated into formulas, for example, the formula of
morality. In short, they insure social cohesion. each person being deserving of respect and dignity. These formulas, which are the expression of creation and
But, there is another kind of morality and religion, according to Bergson. The open morality and dynamic love, are now able to be mixed with the formulas that aim solely to insure the stability of any given society.
religion are concerned with creativity and progress. They are not concerned with social cohesion, and thus Since we are now speaking only of formulas, creation and cohesion, the two forces, are mixed together in
Bergson calls this morality “open” because it includes everyone. The open morality is genuinely universal reason. As before, whereas the rational method used in the experience of resistance to the resistances comes
and it aims at peace. It aims at an “open society.” The source of the open morality is what Bergson calls to explain the force of obedience, here in the mystical experience of the impetus of love the formulas come to
“creative emotions.” The difference between creative emotions and normal emotions consists in this: in explain the force of creation. A reversal has taken place. The very forces that have generated the formulas are
normal emotions, we first have a representation which causes the feeling (I see my friend and then I feel instead now being explained by those very formulas. Indeed, this is the problem. How could some
happy); in creative emotion, we first have the emotion which then creates representations. So, Bergson gives representation of intelligence have the power to train the will? How could an idea categorically demand its
us the example of the joy of a musician who, on the basis of emotion, creates a symphony, and who then own realization? As Bergson says, “Re-establish the duality [of forces], the difficulties vanish” (The Two
produces representations of the music in the score. We can see here that Bergson has also finally explained Sources, p. 96). The two forces are, however, but two complementary manifestations of life.
how the leap of an intuition happens. The creative emotion makes one unstable and throws one out of the
habitual mode of intelligence, which is directed at needs. Indeed, in The Two Sources, Bergson compares
creative emotions to unstable mental states as those found in the mad. But what he really has in mind is
mystical experience. For Bergson, however, mystical experience is not simply a disequilibrium. Genuine
mystical experience must result in action; it cannot remain simple contemplation of God. This association of
creative emotions with mystical experience means that, for Bergson, dynamic religion is mystical. Indeed,
dynamic religion, because it is always creative, cannot be associated with any particular organized set of
doctrines. A religion with organized – and rigid — doctrines is always static.
The phrase with which we began, “moral obligation,” makes one think of Kantian duty. We have alluded to
Kant on several occasions, but, let us conclude by examining Bergson’s explicit criticism of Kant’s moral
philosophy. This criticism will demonstrate the strength of Bergson’s moral philosophy and of his thought as
a whole. According to Bergson, Kant’s theory has made a “psychological error.” In any given society, there
are many different, particular obligations. The individual in society may at some time desire to deviate from
one particular obligation. When this illicit desire arises, there will be resistance from society but also from his
habits. If the individual resists these resistances, a psychological state of tension or contraction occurs. The
individual, in other words, experiences the rigidity of the obligation. Now, according to Bergson, when
philosophers such as Kant attribute a severe aspect to duty, they have externalized this experience of
obligation’s inflexibility. In fact, for Bergson, if we ignore the multiplicity of particular obligations in any
given society, and if instead we look at what he calls “the whole of obligation” (The Two Sources, p. 25), then
we see that obedience to obligation is almost natural. According to Bergson, obligations, that is, customs,
arise because of the natural need an individual has for the stability that a society can give. As a result of this
natural need, society inculcates habits of obedience in the individual. Habituation means that obedience to the
whole of obligation is, in fact, for the individual, effortless.