Duration and Rhythm

As Deleuze notes, Bergson seems committed to each of two, apparently irreconcilable, theses--that Duration is private and simple, and that Elan Vital possesses universal Duration--i. e. that there are a plurality of Durations, and that there is one Duration. However, Bergson's occasional characterization of a Duration as a Rhythm suggests an easy resolution to the apparent dichotomy. For, a given rhythm can be either composite, or part of a composite, or both, without loss of integrity. Thus, that Duration is immediately given as undivided does not preclude that it is composite as well, e. g. that it is a composite of a multiplicity of physiological rhythms, as Spinoza holds, or that it is part of some more comprehensive rhythm. On the other hand, it also follows from the interpretation of Duration as Rhythm that the distinction between Intensity and Extensity is only provisional and perspectival. Now, whether or not Deleuze or Bergson would abandon that distinction is unclear, but insistence upon it would indicate that the Inner vs. Outer distinction is more fundamental than that of Many vs. One.