1922 Encyclopædia Britannica/Bergson, Henri Louis

BERGSON, HENRI LOUIS (1859-       ), French philosopher, was born in Paris Oct. 18 1859. Educated at the Lycée Corot, and the École Normale he was successively professor of philosophy at the Lycée d'Angers 1881-3, at the Lycée de Clermont 1883-8, at the Collège Rollin 1888-9, at the Lycée Henry IV. 1880-97, at the École Normale Supérieure 1897-1900 and at the Collège de France 1900-21. In 1912 he was Gifford lecturer at Edinburgh. Of the three works which constitute together the full exposition of his interpretation of experience, Les Données Immediates de la Conscience was published in 1889, Matière et Mémoire in 1896, and L'Évolution Créatrice in 1907. The English translations (Time and Free Will, Matter and Memory and Creative Evolution) all belong to 1910-1. He had published also Le Rire (1900). With the exception of a pamphlet, La Significance de la Guerre (1915), nothing more appeared until L'Energie Spirituelle (1919), with Eng. trans. Mind-Energy (1920).

For a discussion of his work, see Philosophy.