THE PARTS OF A MANIFOLD UNITY ARE APART ONLY FOR EXAMINATION.
Perhaps, instead of saying that the one is the cause of the other things, we would have to admit that these things are as parts and elements of the one; and that all things form a single nature in which only our thought establishes divisions; so that, by virtue of its admirable power, this nature be unity distributed in all things, appearing and becoming manifold, as if it were in movement, and that the one should cease being unity as a result of the fruitfulness of its nature. If we were to enumerate successively the parts of such a nature, we would grant to each of them a separate existence, ignoring that we had not seen the whole together. But after thus having separated the parts, we would soon reapproximate them, not for long being able to keep apart the isolated elements which tend to reunite. That is why we could not help making a whole out of them, letting them once more become unity, or rather, be unity. Besides, this will be easier to understand when we shall know what these essences are, and how many are the genera of essences; for we shall then be able to conceive their mode of existence. And as, in these matters, it is not well to limit oneself to negations, but to aim at positive knowledge, and at the full intelligence of the subject here treated, we shall have to make this inquiry.