existence.

"It is in preserving the memory of things that we are called upon to
compare them and then to judge of them.

"Thought is produced immediately after perception, and the recollection,
very often automatic, that it creates within us.

"It is the inception of the idea which it engenders by a series of
results.

"Thought permits the mind to exercise its judgment without allowing
itself to be influenced by the greatness or humility of the idea.

"By virtue of corresponding recollections, it will associate the present
perception with the past representations, and will take an extension,
more or less pronounced, according to the degree of intellectuality of
the thinker, and according to the importance of the object of its
reflections.

"But rarely does the idea present itself alone.

"One thought almost always produces the manifestation of similar
thoughts, which group themselves around the first idea as birds of the
same race direct their flight toward the same country.

"Thought is the manifestation of the intellectual life; it palpitates in
the brain of men as does the heart in the breast.

"It is thought which distinguishes men from animals, who have only