distort what we knew originally: furthermore just in so far as we make
a selection among the facts, attending to some and passing over
others, we limit the field of direct knowledge which we might
otherwise have enjoyed. For these two reasons Bergson insists that it
is the business of philosophy to reverse the intellectual habit of
mind and return to the fullest possible direct knowledge of the fact.
"May not the task of philosophy, "he says," be to bring us back to a
fuller perception of reality by a certain displacement of our
attention? What would be required would be to turn our attention away
from the practically interesting aspect of the universe in order to
turn it back to what, from a practical point of view, is useless. And
this conversion of attention would be philosophy itself."[5]*

* La Perception du Changement, page 13. 24

At first sight it appears paradoxical and absurd to maintain that our
efforts to analyse, classify and explain the facts tend rather to
limit than to extend our knowledge, and furthermore distort even such
facts as we still remain acquainted with. Common sense has no doubt
that, far from limiting and distorting our knowledge, explanation is
the only possible way in which we can get beyond the little scraps of
fact which are all that we can ever know directly.

If the views of common sense on this question were formulated, which,
for the most part, they are not, they would be something like this.
Until we begin to think the facts which we know directly are all
muddled together and confused: first of all it is necessary to sort
them by picking out qualities from the general confusion in which they
are at first concealed. It is possible that during this process, which
is what is called analysis, we may be obliged, at first, to overlook