III
WHAT IS THIS PRINCIPLE?
I cannot prove synthetically the existence of the principle of action, the prime mover, the Supreme Being, as Dr. Clarke does. If this method were in the power of man, Clarke was, perhaps, worthy to employ it; but analysis seems to me more suitable for our poor ideas. It is only by ascending the stream of eternity that I can attempt to reach its source.
Having therefore recognised from movement that there is a mover; having proved from action that there is a principle of action; I seek the nature of this universal principle. And the first thing I perceive, with secret distress but entire resignation, is that, being an imperceptible part of the great whole; being, as Plato says in the Timæus, a point between two eternities; it will be impossible for me to understand this great whole, which hems me in on every side, and its master.
Yet I am a little reassured on seeing that I am able to measure the distance of the stars, and to recognise the course and the laws which keep them in their orbits. I say to myself: Perhaps, if I use my reason in good faith, I may succeed in discovering some ray of probability to lighten me in the dark night of nature. And if this faint dawn which I seek does not come to me, I shall be consoled to think that my ignorance is invincible; that knowledge which is forbidden me is assuredly useless to me; and that the great Being will not punish me for having sought a knowledge of him and failed to obtain it.
IV
WHERE IS THE FIRST PRINCIPLE? IS IT INFINITE?
I do not see the first motive and intelligent principle of the animal called man, when he demonstrates a geometrical proposition or lifts a burden. Yet I feel irresistibly that there is one in him, however subordinate. I cannot discover whether this first principle is in his heart, or in his head, or in his blood, or in his whole body. In the same way I have detected a first principle in nature, and have seen that it must necessarily be eternal. But where is it?
If it animates all existence, it is in all existence: that seems to be beyond doubt. It is in all that exists, just as movement is in the whole body of an animal, if one may use so poor a comparison.
But while it is in what exists, can it be in what does not exist? Is the universe infinite? I am told that it is; but who will prove it? I regard it as eternal, because it cannot have been made from nothing; because the great principle, “nothing comes from nothing,” is as true as that two and two make four; because, as we saw elsewhere, it is an absurd contradiction to say that the active being has spent an eternity without acting, the formative being has been eternal without forming anything, and the necessary being has been, during an eternity, a useless being.
But I see no reason why this necessary being should be infinite. Its nature seems to me to be wherever there is existence; but why, and how, an infinite existence? Newton has demonstrated the void, which had until his time been a matter of conjecture. If there is a void in nature, there may be a void outside nature. What need is there that beings should extend to infinity? What would an infinite extension be? Nor can we have infinity in number. There is no number and no extension to which I cannot add. It seems to me that in this matter the conclusion of Cudworth is preferable to that of Clarke.
God is present everywhere, says Clarke. Yes, doubtless; but everywhere where there is something, not where there is not. To be present in nothing seems to me a contradiction in terms, an absurdity. I am compelled to admit eternity, but I am not compelled to admit an actual infinity.