Omne genus motus, et coetus experiundo,
Tandem deveniunt in taleis disposituras,
Qualibus haec rebus consistit summa creata. (I., 1023-7.)
[563] V., 853; IV., 780-800; V., 1025.
[564] Just the same remark applies to the monads of Leibnitz. Each monad reflects all the others, and infers that its reflections represent a reality from the infinite creative power of God. Descartes’ appeal to the divine veracity represents the same method in a less developed stage. The root-idea here is to be sought for, not in Greek thought but in the Christian doctrine of a supernatural revelation.
[565] The formal cause of a thing is its species, the concept under which it is immediately subsumed; the efficient cause is what brings it into existence. Thus the formal cause of a man is humanity, the efficient cause, his father.
[566] Eth., I., prop. xvi.; II., prop. iii.; prop. v.; prop. xviii., schol.; prop. xxviii.; prop. xl., schol. ii.; V., prop. xxix., schol.; prop. xl., schol. (The passage last referred to is the clearest and most decisive.)
[567] See the passage from the Republic quoted above.
[568] The tendency of logicians is now, contrariwise, to force reasoning into parallelism with mathematical physics by interpreting the proposition as an equation between subject and predicate.
[569] III., prop. ii., schol.