3IO ANTIENT METAPHYSICS. Book IV. 



felf, fubftantlally and eflcnlially, every where prefent, as Sir Ifaac 

 Newton has well exprefTed it *. How this fhouldbe, we cannot com- 

 prehend ; but no more can we comprehend how our Mind Ihould 

 tranfport itfelf to a diftant Time or Place, and pafs fo readily from 

 one of thefe diftant Times or Places to another. But it is a great 

 deal to he aflured of the fad with refped: to our own Minds ; and 

 the only way we can have any conception of the Supreme Mind, is 

 by adding as much as we can conceive to the powers of our own 

 Mind ; as, in this cafe, we conceive the Divine Mind to be not only 

 prefent, as ours is, in diftant Times and Places, but in all Times 

 and Places at the fame Time, not fucceffively, as is the cafe of our 

 Minds : And thus we ought to reafon concerning all the energies of 

 the Divine Mind. The fubftance of our Mind is like that of the 

 Divine, perfedly fimple and one, without parts, and confequently 

 indivifible ; but its energies are divided, being fucceiTive and one 

 after another : Whereas, we conceive not only the fubftance of the 

 Divine Mind to be indivifible, as all other immaterial fubftances are, 

 but alfo its energies to be fimultaneous, and not fucceffive. And it 

 is in this way, as I have juft now obferved, that Proclus and fome 

 of the commentators upon Ariftotle. have very properly diftin- 

 guiflied the Supreme Mind from our Mind. And, however incon- 

 ceivable to our weak capacities it may appear, that a Mind fliould 

 have all its Ideas prefent at once, yet there is fomething like it to be 

 obferved, even in our own Minds ; for no man can infer the con- 

 clufion of a fyllogifm, unlefs the two premifles be at the fame time 

 prefent to his Mind. 



Hitherto 



* Scholium Cenerale, in the end of his Prlncipla : Ills words are, ' Deus cfl. u- 

 ' nus et idem Deus, femper et uBique : Omniprefens eft, non per virtutem folam 

 ' fed etiam fer fubfiantiam ; nam virtus Rne/ub/lantia fubfiftere non poteft.' This, I 

 think, is excellent philofophy ; and, if God be prefent every where at the fame time, 

 ftot accidentally, hai fubjlantially, it is highly probable that the human Mind, which 

 participates fo much of Divinity, maybe prefent in the fame manner, not every 

 where, but in different places, and not at ihe/ame time, but at different times. 



