was the first to create this method is not pretended. He was anticipated by Heraclitus, who taught that contradictory propositions may be consistent.' And S. Augustine, in his Confessions, says, "You have taught me, Lord, that before you gave form to inform matter to distinguish it, it was not anything; it was neither form nor body nor spirit, nevertheless it was not altogether nothing, but the mean between being and not-being." S. Clement of Alexandria, S. Vincent of Lerins, and Lactantius, without stating the foundations of the Hegelian method, act upon it and presuppose it. The Hegelian trichotomy, fully apprehended, casts a flood of light over the argument of S. Paul, and makes intelligible to us what was probably only obscurely seen and vaguely felt by himself. Perhaps one of the greatest impediments to the acceptance of the dogma of the Incarnation is the apparent impossibility of conceiving the union of two contradictions in one person, of the finite and the infinite in Christ. As M. Larroque says: "To the dogma of the divinity of Jesus is attached that of the incarnation, which, more properly, may be said to be only another expression of the same. If Jesus is not God, it is clear that God was not incarnate in His person. Hence it is unnecessary to insist at length on what is impossible and contradictory, viz., that the infinite and perfect essence should be circumscribed and limited in a finite and imperfect essence; in other terms, that the Divinity should be added to the humanity, or, if the expression be preferred, the humanity should be added to the Divinity; or that the same being should be, at the same time, God and man. From the point of view 1 Ἡρακλεῖτος τὸ ἀντίξουν συμφέρον καὶ ἐκ τῶν διαφερόντων καλλίστην ȧpμovíav kai κávтa kaт' ëρiv ɣiveo@al.-Arist. Ethic. Nic. lib. viii. 1. 2 Confess. lib. xii. c. 3, 4. of the dogma of the Incarnation, Christ, as God, is an infinite and perfect spirit; but as man, veritable and complete, he is made of soul and body, finite and imperfect as is everything belonging to our nature. Consequently, theology is led to sustain that the human soul of Christ does not comprehend God any better than do we. It follows that, in spite of the intimate union of the two natures, and, on the other side, of the very reason of that union, there is at once, in the same person, two beings, one of whom does not know the other, and in the same individual two distinct personalities, which is downright nonsense."1 This objection rests on the assumption that the finite and the infinite mutually exclude one another, and that, therefore, their synthesis is impossible. A few considerations on the nature of infinity will make it apparent that synthesis is by no means as absurd to suppose as M. Larroque thinks. When we say that God is infinite, we do not mean that He is of immeasurable size and duration, but that He is beyond all space and time. He is neither in space nor in time; for this reason He is eternal and infinite, and therefore He is also incomprehensible.2 The difficulty lies in admitting the possibility of any being existing outside of space and time,-a difficulty so great at first sight, that it is not surprising that persons should have taken infinity to consist of extension through unbounded space and time. They suppose space and time to be realities, having true existence, and herein lies their 1 Patrice Larroque: Examen critique des doctrines de la Religion Chretienne. Bruxelles, 1864. T. i. p. 165-169. 2 Jules Simon: La Religion Naturelle, c. 2. Essais. Balmez: Fundamental Philosophy, bk. iii. cartes held the same opinion of time and space. Leibnitz: Nouveaux mistake. There are, in this world, only three manners of being-substance, quality, and relation. In other terms, we can conceive substances, the diverse qualities of these substances, and the diverse relations in which they stand to one another. Space is therefore either a substance, or a quality, or a relation. Substance is either a body or a spirit, or an union of both. Space obviously does not come within this category. It is therefore not a substance, nor is it the quality of a substance. For if it were, there would be some objects or some qualities which were without it, or which had qualities opposed to it. We are therefore brought to conclude that it is a pure relation in which one substance stands to another substance, and nothing more. If we suppose for a moment that space exists, and that God placed the world in it, why did He place it in the spot it occupies instead of any other spot, all space being alike, and no one point being preferable to any other point? God acted without having a reason, for if space is, His choice of a place was arbitrary; but God cannot act irrationally. Therefore space is not. Supposing space to exist, per se, there is no escape from this dilemma. If there were no body with extension, there would be no space; space would be possible, because the existence of bodies would be possible; but it would not become real till bodies were produced. According to Descartes, the essence of body is in extension; and as we necessarily conceive extension in space, it follows that space, body, and extension, are three essentially identical things. Extension without a body to extend is a contradiction; for a body is because it is extension, and extension is not a body, because we are supposing that there is no body. Leibnitz also thinks that space is "a relation, an order, not only between things existing, but also between possible things if they existed."1 We say of a body that it is above or below, before or behind another. For these qualifications to be intelligible, it is clear that void space is not sufficient; it must be occupied, and that by two different bodies: for all these expressions designate the relation one bears to the other. All idea of size is also relative; we say that one thing is greater or smaller than another by comparing them. Take a stick a foot long. Is it long or short? The question is absurd. It is long compared with another stick an inch long; it is short beside one a yard long. Size is therefore nothing per se but the comparison of bodies. What has been said of space applies also to time, which is the order of succession, as space is the order of contiguity. If everything were immovable, there would be no time; if all moved in the same order, simultaneously, there would be no time; but let one thing move, and another remain stationary, and time appears. Thus time implies, like size, a duality, a comparison. Time and space are closely allied; that which engenders time is movement; thus both are engendered by duality. Extension and movement are comprehended in a common term: duality, or the simplest form of multiplicity. Time is duration; but duration without something to endure is an absurdity. There can be no time without something existing, whose relation to something else it expresses. Time has no proper existence, and separated from beings, is annihilated. Hence it follows that the infinity we attribute to time has no rational foundation. Infinite time is impossible, indefinite duration is possible. 1 Nouveaux Essais, 1. ii. c. 13. Time commences with mutable things; if they perish, it perishes with them. There is no succession without mutation; and consequently, no time. Time in things is their succession. Time in the understanding is the perception of this mutation. It is nothing absolute in itself; it is the relation borne by beings to one another in the order of succession. When there is no perception of mutation, there is no knowledge of time. The chaplain who was shut into the black hole for an hour, according to the author of "Never too late to Mend," thought he had passed a twelvemonth in pitch darkness. When Doctor Faustus was borne on Satan's wings through the abyss "How long the time in passing through Whether a second or a century, For there eternity had ceased to be Articulate." If art did not furnish us with the means of measuring time, we would easily lose the faculty of appreciating it. When travelling in Icelandic deserts at Midsummer, during a fortnight of cloud, I made a day. I was without watch, and the sun was invisible. I rode till tired, then encamped, woke when refreshed, and rode again, and arrived at an inhabited fjord after what I believed to have been fourteen days, but which proved to have been only thirteen. According to an Arabian tale, a Sultan was persuaded by a dervish to plunge his head into an enchanted basin full of water. Instantly the Sultan found himself at sea swimming to save his life. Wearied with battling with the waves, he reached a shore on which he flung himself. There he was found, and made a slave of. After years of |