r man's reasoning faculties may
influence many of his mental activities without rising to the
level of reflective ratiocination. And thus man's communion
with the cosmos, of which he is himself a part, will be grounded
in the reason which permeates the whole.

If we go on to ask what is the relation between intuition and
conscious reflective processes, the answer would seem to be
somewhat of this kind. "Intuition, in its wide sense, furnishes
material; reason works it up. Intuition moves about in worlds
not systematised; reason reduces them to order. Reflective
thought dealing with the phenomena presented to it by sensation
has three tasks before it--to find out the nature of the objects, to
trace their causes, and to trace their effects. And whereas each
intuitional experience stands alone and isolated in its
immediacy, reason groups these single experiences together,
investigates their conditions, and makes them subserve definite
conscious purposes.

But if mystics have too often made the mistake of underrating
the powers and functions of reflective reason, the champions of
logic have also been guilty of the counter-mistake of
disparaging intuition, more especially that called mystical. That
is to say, the _form_ of thought is declared to be superior to the
_matter_ of thought--a truly remarkable contention! What is
reason if it has no material to work up? And whence comes the
material but from sensation and intuition? Moreover, even when
the material is furnished to the reasoning processes, the
conclusions arrived at have to be brought continuously and
relentlessly to the bar, not only of physical fact, but also to that
of intuition and sentiment, if serious errors are to be avoided.
Systematising and speculative zeal have a tendency to run ahead
of their data.

Bergson has done much to restore to intuition the rights which
were being filched or wrenched from it. He has shown (may it
be said conclusively?) that systematised thought is quite
unequal to grappling with the processes which constitute actual
living. Before him, Schopenhauer had poured well-deserved
contempt on the idea that the brain, an organ which can only
work for a few hours at a stretch, and is dependent on all the
accidents of the physical condition of the body, should be
considered equal to solving the problems of existence.
"Certainly" (writes Schwegler) "the highest truths of reason, the
eternal, the divine, are not to be proved by means o