Now, as they struggle to negate each other, each of the two opposing representations is, as Herbart puts it, inhibited (gehemmt) by the other (PsW: 130; SW V: 274, f.). We may liken his conception of consciousness, then, to a single, general psychic activity—call it “representing”—which, like the surface of a pool in a rainstorm, is disturbed by multitudinous sensory contact with realia. Each disturbance has the effect of differentiating the “surface”; and since that surface just is the activity of representing, each individual ripple takes part in that activity. Which is to say: instead of a general, undifferentiated representing activity of pure consciousness, we now have in each disturbance a particular instance of representing, i.e., a representation. Just as the ripples caused by two raindrops will interfere and conflict with each other, they nevertheless share a common substrate—the water—that makes both their being and conflict possible in the first place: they are ripples of water. So too each representation, as a ripple of consciousness, shares in the latter’s essence, viz., the activity of representing (here the analogy to water breaks down, since water is not per se an activity). This active nature helps explain why Herbart often seems to suggest that individual representations possess their own energy or will[11] to survive and prevail over others. It is simply a manifestation of consciousness’s own activity and “will” to maintain its essential simplicity, which is why he calls representations “self-preservings of the soul”.