times as great as the other.
Lastly, if from a single point there be conceived to be drawn
two diverging lines which at first are at a definite distance
apart, but are produced to infinity, it is certain that the
distance between the two lines will be continually increased,
until at length it changes from definite to indefinable. As
these absurdities follow, it is said, from considering quantity
as infinite, the conclusion is drawn, that extended substance
must necessarily be finite, and, consequently, cannot appertain
to the nature of God.
The second argument is also drawn from God's supreme
perfection. God, it is said, inasmuch as he is a supremely
perfect being, cannot be passive ; but extended substance,
insofar as it is divisible, is passive. It follows, therefore,
that extended substance does not appertain to the essence of God.
Such are the arguments I find on the subject in writers, who
by them try to prove that extended substance is unworthy of the
divine nature, and cannot possibly appertain thereto. However, I
think an attentive reader will see that I have already answered
their propositions ; for all their arguments are founded on the
hypothesis that extended substance is composed of parts, and such
a hypothesis I have shown (Prop. xii., and Coroll. Prop. xiii.)
to be absurd. Moreover, anyone who reflects will see that all
these absurdities (if absurdities they be, which I am not now
discussing), from which it is sought to extract the conclusion
that extended substance is finite, do not at all follow from the
notion of an infinite quantity, but merely from the notion that
an infinite quantity is measurable, and composed of finite parts
: therefore, the only fair conclusion to be drawn is that
infinite quantity is not measurable, and cannot be composed of