THE
CATHOLIC WORLD.
VOL. XXI., No. 124.—JULY, 1875.
Entered according to Act of Congress, in the year 1875. by Rev. I. T. Hecker, in the Office of the Librarian of Congress, at Washington, D. C.
SPACE.
I.
Mathematicians admit three kinds of continuous quantities, viz., the quantity of space measured by local movement, the quantity of time employed in the movement, and the quantity of change in the intensity of the movement. Thus all continuity, according to them, depends on movement; so that, if there were no continuous movement, nothing could be conceived as continuous. The ancient philosophers generally admitted, and many still admit, a fourth kind of continuous quantity, viz., the quantity of matter; but it is now fully demonstrated that bodies of matter are not, and cannot be, materially continuous, even in their primitive molecules, and that therefore the quantity of matter is not continuous, but consists of a discrete number of primitive material units. Hence, matter is not divisible in infinitum, and gives no occasion to infinitesimal quantities, except inasmuch as the volumes, or quantities of space, occupied (not filled) by matter are conceived to keep within infinitesimal dimensions. We may, therefore, be satisfied that space, time, and movement alone are continuous and infinitely divisible, and that the continuity of space and time, as viewed by the mathematicians, is essentially connected with the continuity of movement. But space measured by movement is a relative space, and time—that is, the duration of movement—is a relative duration; and since everything relative presupposes something absolute which is the source of its relativity, we are naturally brought to inquire what is absolute space and absolute duration; for, without the knowledge of the absolute, the relative can be only imperfectly understood. Men of course daily speak of time and of space, and understand what they say, and are understood by others; but this does not show that they know the intimate nature, or can give the essential definition, of either time or space. S. Augustine asks: “What is time?” and he answers: “When no one asks me, I know what it is; but when you ask me, I know not.” The same is true of space. We know what it is; but it would be hard to give its true definition. As, however, a true notion of space and time and movement cannot but be of great service in the elucidation of some important questions of philosophy, we will venture to investigate the subject, in the hope that by so doing we may contribute in some manner to the development of philosophical knowledge concerning the nature of those mysterious realities which form the conditions of the existence and vicissitudes of the material world.
Opinions of Philosophers about Space.—Space is usually defined “a capacity of bodies,” and is styled “full” when a body actually occupies that capacity, “void,” or “empty,” when no body is actually present in it. Again, a space which is determined by the presence of a body, and limited by its limits, is called “real,” whilst the space which is conceived to extend beyond the limits of all existing bodies is called “imaginary.”
Whether this definition and division of space is as correct as it is common, we shall examine hereafter. Meanwhile, we must notice that there is a great disagreement among philosophers in regard to the reality and the essence of space. Some hold, with Descartes and with Leibnitz, that space is nothing else than the extension of bodies. Others hold that space is something real, and really distinct from the bodies by which it is occupied. Some, as Clarke, said that space is nothing but God’s immensity, and considered the parts of space as parts of divine immensity. Fénelon taught that space is virtually contained in God’s immensity, and that immensity is nothing but unlimited extension—which last proposition is much criticised by Balmes[115] on the ground that extension cannot be conceived without parts, whereas no parts can be conceived in God’s immensity.
Lessius, in his much-esteemed work on God’s perfections, after having shown (contrary to the opinion of some of his contemporaries) that God by his immensity exists not only within but also without the world, puts to himself the following objection: “Some will say, How can God be in those spaces outside the skies, since no spaces are to be found there which are not fictitious and imaginary?” To which he answers thus: “We deny that there are not outside of the whole world any true intervals or spaces. If air or light were diffused throughout immensity outside of the existing world, there would certainly be true spaces everywhere; and in the same manner, if there is a Spirit filling everything outside of this world, there will be true and real spaces, not corporeal but spiritual, which, however, will not be really distinct from one another, because a Spirit does not extend through space by a distribution of parts, but fills it, so to say, by its totalities.… Hence, when we say that God is outside of the existing world, and filling infinite spaces, or that God exists in imaginary spaces, we do not mean that God exists in a fictitious and chimerical thing, nor do we mean that he exists in a space really distinct from his own being; but we mean that he exists in the space which his immensity formally extends, and to which an infinite created space may correspond.… We may therefore distinguish space into created, uncreated, and imaginary. Created space embraces the whole corporeal extension of the material world. Uncreated space is nothing less than divine immensity itself, which is the primitive, intrinsic, and fundamental space, on the existence of which all other spaces depend, and which by reason of its extension is equivalent to all possible corporeal spaces, and eminently contains them all. Imaginary space is that which our imagination suggests to us as a substitute for God’s immensity, which we are unable to conceive in any other wise. For, just as we cannot conceive God’s eternity without imagining infinite time, so neither can we conceive God’s immensity without imagining infinite space.”[116]
Boscovich, in his Theory of Natural Philosophy, defines space as “an infinite possibility of ubications,” but he does not say anything in regard to the manner of accounting for such a possibility. Others, as Charleton, were of opinion that real space is constituted by the real ubication of material things, and imaginary space by the actual negation of real ubications.