In Bergson the difficulty which besets Ravaisson reappears more markedly—namely, the relation of spirit and matter to one another, and to the power at the heart of things, which, according to Bergson himself, is a spiritual principle. Here we seem forced to admit Ravaisson’s view of a “fall” or, as the theologians would say, a “Kenosis” of the deity in order to create the material universe. Yet in the processes of nature we see spirit having to fight against matter, and of this warfare Bergson makes a great point. These considerations lead to discussions which Bergson has not touched upon as yet. He does not follow Ravaisson and Boutroux into the realm of theological ideas. If he did he might have to make admissions which would compromise, or at least modify, other doctrines expressed by him. He will have none of Hegel or of the Absolute Idealism which sees the world process as a development of a Divine Idea. It is new and it is creation; there is no repetition. Even God himself _se fait_ in the process, and it may be, suggests Bergson, that love is the secret of the universe. If so we may well ask with Blondel, “If God _se fait_ in the process, then does he not already exist and, in a sense, the process with him?” Instead, however, of reverting to Ravaisson’s view of the whole affair being a search for, and return to God, Bergson claims that the development is a purely contingent one, in which a super-consciousness develops by experiment and error.
Bergson’s God, if he may be so-called, is not so much a Creator, but a power creative of creators—that is, human personalities capable of free action. The Deity is immanent in man, and, like man, is ignorant of the trend of the whole process. The universe, according to Bergson, is a very haphazard affair, in which the only permanence is change. There is no goal, and progress has little meaning if it be only and merely further change, which may be equally regress rather than progress. To live is not merely to change, but to triumph over change to set up some values as of absolute worth, and to aim at realising and furthering these. Apart from some philosophy of values the conception of progress has little meaning.
Interesting discussions of various aspects of the problem are to be found in the writings of the sociologist we have mentioned, Durkheim, particularly _La Division du Travail sociale_, _Le Suicide_ and _Les Formes élémentaires de la Vie religieuse_. There is an interesting volume by Weber, entitled _Le Rythme du Progres_, and there are the numerous books of Dr. Gustave Le Bon.