The Birmingham age-herald., 1912-01-22

InElT dQHeTe0Ct u CICcdS. u may be, as some pastors think, that the twentieth century will witness still fiercer struggles between orthodox Christianity and agnosticism-the powers of dark ness" Neo-paganism among college bred men is more refined than the organism of the ancients. But the various schools of agnosticism, to all extent and purposes atheistic, are singularly insidious. The leaders of Christian thought are becoming aroused to the situation and will be pre- pared to meet their antagonists and man. tain their ground at any cost
 The Encyclopedias of France opposed organized Christianity. Rousseau and vol taire were filled with hatred of 1t. Chris- tian men and women and those high in au- thority in the church shuddered and reared for the worst, no doubt The French rev olution logically followed the teachings of the Encyclopedias, but after the rev oliItion Christianity in Europe and else where grew stronger and stronger.
 In England virile philosophers of the agnostic type wrote their books and exert ed a powerful influence over the thought of students. Huxley and Herbert spencer were much read and discussed by intel lectual men in the English speaking world, as Hegel had been in Germany.
 Now comes a new philosopher, Henri Bergson, a Frenchman, who is making some stir. The other day I read a notice of his latest book entitled, Laughter" a philosophic game of hare and hounds The reviewer says of the book: 'The au- thor, with delightful deftness and crystal line clarity. tracks the meaning of laugh ter and the nature of the comic through the mazes of the human mind, while we tag along and think we are doing it" Laughter being something that most of us know by experience Bergson's philoso- phy of it, if 1t be not too much over the heads of ordinary mortals. should be in large demand. But if this French savant about whom so much is being written in France and England, is as vague in philosophizlng on the comic as he is on "creative evolution and the soul" com- paratively few persons will be able to get through the mazes" I read in the London Times an outline of one of Berg sons lectures delivered at University col lege in the worlds great metropolis last November. The seating capacity of the auditorium of the university was not stated, but according to the Times the place was filled by an enthusiastic audi ence. In the course of his address NJ. Bergson said:
 .'It is toward action that all converges. The soul-essentially action. will. liberty is, then the creative force par excellence, the productive agent of novelty in the world. It creates acts, and it can, in ad- diton. create itself-not only modify it's quality, but also increase it's intensity. With little will one can do much if one places the will in the right direction. For this force-the will-has this excep- tional character, that it's intensity depends on its direction, and that it's quality may become the creator of quantity.
 "Now, whence comes this force? What is the origin of souls? Shall we suppose with Plotinus that they reside in the suprasensible world and that they have fallen into bodies? It is unnecessary to have recourse to allegories of this nature. It is enough to observe, as was done in the first lecture that the concepts of null tiplicity and of unity apply strictly only to matter. for which they were made; and that, in the world of the mind, they are often napplicable. This is true of the inner life of each one of us, which is neither one nor manifold. If, then, we take all human souls, real and possible, we find that they are far from being as distinct from each other as we believe. We must then, figure to ourselves, in the beginning d general misrepresentation of souls; and this misrepresentation is the very principle of life.
 This principle produces life, and all the evolution of life, by it's entrance into matter First seized by matter. it has become it's prisoner. It seeks to free itself and at the same time to divide and to dis tinguish Qhanks to matter) that which was in it in the state of reciprocal pene- tration. Thus alone, moreover, could the elements which it virtually bore in it in- tensify themselves.
 ''The history of this great effort is the very history of the evolution of life on our planet. We see that this principle must have left many things on the way. Certain lines of evolution seem to have failed. But on the line of evolution which leads to man the liberation has been ac- complished, and thus personalities have been able to constitute themselves So that if we could seize in one simple unique vision this line of evolution we should have before us, as it were, telegraph wire on which has travelled dispatch sent off as long ago as the first beginning of 1ife-a message which was then confused, a message of which part has been lost on the way, but which has at last found. in the human race, the appropriate recep- tive apparatus Loud cheers.)
 Bergson Is said to be a man of attractive personality and fiery eloauence, and 1t may be that the charm of his oratory stirred the audience to applause l hard ly think that those who listened could have felt any wiser than they were before. A month later the Fortnghtly Review published 15 page essay on Bergson and his philosophy. It was glowing appre- ciation. The writer was Joseph Solomon. He began by saying: The news that an original philosopher and an original phi losophy have lately risen in France is slowly traveling through this country. M. Bergson has visited London. A transla- ton of Bsrgson's works into English has been executed and published" MT. Solo, mon then mentions the books-one on .'Conscience," published in 1889; "Matiere ct Meiniore published in 1896; and 'Crea- tive Evolution." published in 1901. These works according to the Fortnightly Re-