Giap III. ANTIENT METAPHYSICS. 13 



ever may be faid of that incomprehenfible thing Matter, or the Firft 

 Matter, as it is called by fome modern philofophers, the Bodies, 

 which are made of this Matter, are not ailually fo divided. But 

 Nature has fixed fome Bounds to the dividing or breaking of things, 

 as Lucretius has exprefled it *. 



Another elTential quality of Body, and which alfo refults from its 

 property of being moved, or moveable, is, that it muft needs occupy 

 fpace ; for it is impoffible to conceive a Body in motion, without 

 occupying fpace, and different parts of fpace at different times. This 

 quality of Body, by which it occupies and extends over fo much 

 fpace, is called extenfion, and is fuch a neceflary quality of Body, 

 that Des Cartes has made it the effence of Body, and faid, that Body 

 and Extenfion are the fame thing. But this is not the opinion of the 

 Britifh philofophers, who hold that Extenfion is only a quality of 

 Body, and that there is fome thing befides, which is extended : And 

 this opinion I hold to be right. But what is this Jbme thing that is 

 extended ? The anfwer is, That it can be nothing elfe but the mat- 

 ter, ox jirjl matter^ as it is commonly called, without form, dimen- 

 fions, or qualities of any kind. This notion, therefore, of the firfl 

 matter, however incomprehenfible it may feem, and however much 

 it hath been ridiculed by our modern philofophers, as much as ano- 

 ther antient notion, that of fubjlantial forms , is a neceflary cChfe- 

 quence of their maintaining that Extenfion is not Body : And it 

 {hows, at the fame time, that, if we will fpeak accurately, and not 

 in the confufed and unphilofophical manner, in which the moderns 

 exprefs themfelves, we muft diftinguifh betwixt Body^ which un- 

 doubtedly is extended and has feveral other qualities, and Matter^ 



which 



* Lucret. lib. i. v. 562. 



At nunc nimirum frangendi reddita finis 

 Certa manet.— — 



