Complete Essays, Literary Criticism, Cryptography, Autography, Translations & Letters
could it not be brought to support something besides? As for the quibbles, they, at least, are insupportable. But, to dismiss them; what they prove in the one case is the identical nothing which they demonstrate in the other.
Of course, no one will suppose that I here contend for the absolute impossibility of that which we attempt to convey in the word “Infinity.” My purpose is but to show the folly of endeavoring to prove Infinity itself, or even our conception of it, by any such blundering ratiocination as that which is ordinarily employed.
Nevertheless, as an individual, I may be permitted to say that I cannot conceive Infinity, and am convinced that no human being can. A mind not thoroughly self-conscious, not accustomed to the introspective analysis of its own operations, will, it is true, often deceive itself by supposing that it has entertained the conception of which we speak. In the effort to entertain it, we proceed step beyond step, we fancy point still beyond point; and so long as we continue the effort, it may be said, in fact, that we are tending to the formation of the idea designed; while the strength of the impression that we actually form or have formed it, is in the ratio of the period during which we keep up the mental endeavor. But it is in the act of discontinuing the endeavor — of fulfilling (as we think) the idea — of putting the finishing stroke (as we suppose) to the conception — that we overthrow at once the whole fabric of our fancy by resting upon some one ultimate, and therefore definite, point. This fact, however, we fail to perceive, on account of the absolute coincidence, in time, between the settling down upon the ultimate point and the act of cessation in thinking. In attempting, on the other hand, to frame the idea of a limited space, we merely converse the processes which involve the impossibility.
We believe in a God. We may or may not believe in finite or in infinite space; but our belief, in such cases, is more properly designated as faith, and is a matter quite distinct from that belief proper — from that intellectual belief — which presupposes the mental conception.
The fact is, that, upon the enunciation of any one of that class of terms to which “Infinity” belongs — the class representing thoughts of thought — he who has a right to say that he thinks at all, feels himself called on, not to entertain a conception, but simply to direct his mental vision toward some given point in the intellectual firmament, where lies a nebula never to be solved. To solve it, indeed, he makes no effort; for with a rapid instinct he comprehends, not only the impossibility, but, as regards all human purposes, the inessentiality of its solution. He perceives that the Deity has not designed it to be solved. He sees, at once, that it lies out of the brain of man, and even how, if not exactly why, it lies out of it. There are people, I am aware, who, busying themselves in attempts at the unattainable, acquire very easily, by dint of the jargon they emit, among those thinkers-that- they-think with whom darkness and depth are synonymous, a kind of cuttle-fish reputation for profundity; but the finest quality of Thought is its self-cognizance; and, with some little equivocation, it may be said that no fog of the mind can well be greater than that which, extending to the very boundaries of the mental domain, shuts out even these boundaries themselves from comprehension.
It will now be understood that in using the phrase, “Infinity of Space,” I make no call upon the reader to entertain the impossible conception of an absolute infinity. I refer simply to the “utmost conceivable expanse” of space — a shadowy and fluctuating domain, now shrinking, now swelling, with the vacillating energies of the imagination.
Hitherto, the Universe of Stars has always been considered as coincident with the Universe proper, as I have defined it in the commencement of this Discourse. It has been always either directly or indirectly assumed — at least since the dawn of intelligible Astronomy — that, were it possible for us to attain any given point in space, we should still find, on all sides of us, an interminable succession of stars. This was the untenable idea of Pascal when making perhaps the most successful attempt ever made, at periphrasing the conception for which we struggle in the word “Universe.” “It is a sphere,” he says, “of which the centre is everywhere, the circumference nowhere.” But although this intended definition is, in fact, no definition of the Universe of Stars, we may accept it, with some mental reservation, as a definition (rigorous enough for all practical purposes) of the Universe proper — that is to say, of the Universe of space. This latter, then, let us regard as “a sphere of which the centre is everywhere, the circumference nowhere.” In fact, while we find it impossible to fancy an end to space, we have no difficulty in picturing to ourselves any one of an infinity of beginnings.
As our starting-point, then, let us adopt the Godhead. Of this Godhead, in itself, he alone is not imbecile, he alone is not impious, who propounds — nothing. “Nous ne connaissons rien,” says the Baron de Bielfeld — “Nous ne connaissons rien de la nature ou de l’essence de Dieu: pour savoir ce qu’il est, il faut etre Dieu meme.” — “We know absolutely nothing of the nature or essence of God: in order to comprehend what He is, we should have to be God ourselves.”
“We should have to be God ourselves!” — With a phrase so startling as this yet ringing in my ears, I nevertheless venture to demand if this our present ignorance of the Deity is an ignorance to which the soul is everlastingly condemned.
By Him, however — now, at least, the Incomprehensible — by Him, assuming Him as Spirit, that is to say, as not Matter — a distinction which, for all intelligible purposes, will stand well instead of a definition — by Him, then, existing as Spirit, let us content ourselves with supposing to have been created, or made out of Nothing, by dint of His Volition, at some point of Space which we will take as a centre, at some period into which we do not pretend to inquire, but at all events immensely remote — by Him, then again, let us suppose to have been created — what? This is a vitally momentous epoch in our considerations. What is it that we are justified, that alone we are justified, in supposing to have been primarily created?
We have attained a point where only Intuition can aid us; but now let me recur to the idea which I have already suggested as that alone which we can properly entertain of intuition. It is but the conviction arising from those inductions or deductions of which the processes are so shadowy as to escape our consciousness, elude our reason, or defy our capacity of expression. With this understanding, I now assert that an intuition altogether irresistible, although inexpressible, forces me to the conclusion that what God originally created — that that Matter which, by dint of His Volition, He first made from His Spirit, or from Nihility, could have been nothing but Matter in its utmost conceivable state of — what? — of Simplicity.
This will be found the sole absolute assumption of my Discourse. I use the word “assumption” in its ordinary sense; yet I maintain that even this my primary proposition is very far indeed from being really a mere assumption. Nothing was ever more certainly — no human conclusion was ever, in fact, more regularly — more rigorously deduced; but, alas! the processes lie out of the human analysis — at all events are beyond the utterance of the human tongue. If, however, in the course of this Essay I succeed in showing that out of Matter in its extreme of Simplicity all things might have been, we reach directly the inference that they were, thus constructed, through the impossibility of attributing supererogation to Omnipotence.
Let us now endeavor to conceive what Matter must be, when, or if, in its absolute extreme of Simplicity. Here the Reason flies at once to Imparticularity — to a particle — to one particle — a particle of one kind — of one character — of one nature — of one size — of one form — a particle, therefore, “without form and void” — a particle positively a particle at all points — a particle absolutely unique, individual, undivided, and not indivisible only because He who created it by dint of His Will can by an infinitely less energetic exercise of the same Will, as a matter of course, divide it.
Oneness, then, is all that I predicate of the originally created Matter; but I propose to show that this Oneness is a principle abundantly sufficient to account for the constitution,