how, on the other hand, we cannot by any means get rid of that very Idea of Time, as an ever-passing, and since ever-passing, therefore also an ever-lasting SOME-THING— and let us ask ourselves whether the Ideas of Time and Eternity, or of a for-ever-passing, and an ever-lastingly passing, so indelibly impressed on our Spirit-minding, may not be simply that Spirit-minding's fundamental Consciousness and Will in regard to, and in connexion. with, its own Self-moving-Energies-the Consciousness and Will of the Body-Sense, in regard to its Life-Time, or the coursing and passing on and on of the heart's blood in Time-and the Consciousness and Will of the Soul-Affection in regard to its Life-Eternal, or the Selflaw-giving passing-on of its Affective Energies for ever and ever? And if our reply be in the affirmative, or that the Consciousness we have of Time, as an ever-passing and everlasting something, must be somehow rooted in the Self-Consciousness and Free-Will of the fundamental Soul-Affection and Body-Sense Energies, the positions of the Ideas of Time and Eternity will then also be approved of, as the Co-ordinate Poles of the Free-Will Idea, or as imaged in the plate; for that of Time, as the Negative Pole, will in that case lie appropriately as a mean betwixt the Ideas of the Body-Sense and its Instinct of Conditions; and that of Eternity, as the positive pole, will The Idea of Time not acquired from the lie quite as appropriately betwixt the Ideas of the Soul's Affection, and its Intellect of Ends. "Time is not a notion obtained by experience. Experience, that is, the impressions of sense, and our consciousness of our thoughts, gives us various perceptions; and different successive perceptions considered external, but together exemplify the notion of change. But this very connexion of different perceptions,-this successiveness,-presupposes that the perceptions exist in time. That things happen either together, or one after the other, is intelligible only by assuming time as the condition under which they are presented to us. inherent in the fundamental Spirit Energies. Thus time is a necessary condition in the presentation of all occurrences to our minds. We cannot conceive this condition to be taken away. We can conceive time to go on while nothing happens in it; but we cannot conceive anything to happen while time does not go on. It is clear from this that time is not an impression derived from experience, in the same manner in which we derive from experience our information concerning the objects which exist, and the occurrences which take place in time. The objects of experience can easily be conceived to be, or not to be :-to be absent as well as present. Time always is, and always is present, and even in our thoughts we cannot form the contrary supposition. Thus time is something distinct from the matter or substance of our experience, and may be considered as a necessary form which that matter (the experience of change) must assume, in order to be an object of contemplation to the mind. Time is one of the necessary conditions under which we apprehend the information which our Senses and Consciousness give us."—Whewell's History of Scientific Ideas, book 2, chap. VII., art. 1 and 2. "We are altogether unable to conceive time as commencing; we can easily represent to ourselves time under any relative limitation of commencement and termination, but we are conscious to ourselves of nothing more clearly, than that it would be equally possible to think without thought, as to construe to the mind an absolute commencement, or an absolute termination, of time, that is, a beginning and an end, beyond which time is conceived as non-existent. Goad imagination to the utmost, it still sinks paralysed within the bounds of time, and time survives as the condition of the thought itself in which we annihilate the universe."-Sir W. Hamilton's 38th Lecture on Metaphysics, ver. 2, p. 371. - 8. And now again, let it be still further considered, how although the Soul's Affection must as an Energy be simply a passing out and on,-the Soul itself as Being must have its Place; and that although the Body's Sense must equally as an energy be simply a passing out and on, the Body itself as Thing occupies Space ;—and it will be understood why Place and Space have been represented as the Co-ordinate Poles of the Will of Necessity, and how Place, as the Negative Pole, thus lies as a mean betwixt the Ideas of En-Souled Affection and that of the Instinct of Conditions,-whilst Space, as the positive Pole, lies as a mean betwixt the Ideas of an Em-bodied Sense and that of the intelligent minding of the Ends of its Embodiment. The Will of Necessity, or Mind-Will of Man, is in fine determined by his Soul-Embodiment, or Body Place and Space. The En-Soulment in Place and Space as an inhabitant of his Earth, and by that Earth's Place in Space; for the lines of direction, and ends of his Affection and Sense, Instinct and Intellect, are all laid within these. He must mind the necessities or unyieldingness, as necessity signifies etymologically, of his surroundings, or of the World he lives in, and make the best of them he can. His Will of Necessity is pre-eminently his every day-working, or Cosmo-logical Will. It is no longer his Spirit of Willing that is in question here, but his Mind-Will, or the Minding-Will of that Spirit ;-a Minding-Will which is of Necessity, because turning on the one hand in the pole-fixtures of Place,— the Place which each one in particular, and Man as a Whole, occupies in Space;-and on the other hand, in the pole-fixtures of the Universe of Space itself, in the fixtures that is, of the eternal and absolute. "I assert, then, that Space is not a notion obtained by experience. Idea of Space Experience gives us information concerning things without us: but our as the without, apprehending them as without us, takes for granted their existence in that of Place Space. Experience acquaints us what are the form, position, magnitude as the within of particular objects: but that they have form, position, magnitude, supposes presupposes that they are in space. We cannot derive from appearances, by the way of observation, the habit of representing things to ourselves as in space; for no single act of observation is possible any otherwise than by beginning with such a representation, and conceiving objects as already existing in space. Thus the existence of necessary truths, such as those of geometry, proves that the idea of space from which they flow is not derived from experience. Such truths are inconceivable on the supposition of their being collected from observation; for the impressions of sense include no evidence of necessity. But we can readily understand the necessary character of such truths, if we conceive that there are certain necessary conditions under which alone the mind receives the impressions of sense. Since these conditions reside in the constitution of the mind, and apply to every perception of an object to which the mind can attain, we easily see that their rules must include, not only all that has been, but all that can be matter of experience. Our sensations can each convey no information except about itself; each can contain no trace of another additional sensation; and thus no relation and connexion between two sensations can be given by the sensations themselves. But the mode in which the mind perceives these impressions as objects, may and will introduce necessary relations among them and thus by conceiving the idea of space to be a condition of perception of the mind, we can conceive the existence of necessary truths, which apply to all perceived objects."—Whewell's History of Scientific Ideas, book 2, chap. II., art. 1 and 3. [At commencement of the foregoing, it is stated that Experience gives us information concerning things without us-but our apprehending them as without us, takes for granted their existence in Space." Agreed; but does it not also take for granted our own existence-our Soul's or Mind's existence in some Place as the within from which that Soul or Mind looks out upon Space as the without? |