Nothing is more suitable to that philosophy, than a modest scepticism to a certain degree, and a fair confession of ignorance in subjects, that exceed all human capacity.] I shall conclude this subject of extension with a paradox, which will easily be explained from the foregoing reasoning.

This paradox is, that if you are pleased to give to the in-visible and intangible distance, or in other words, to the capacity of becoming a visible and tangible distance, the name of a vacuum, extension and matter are the same, and yet there is a vacuum.

If you will not give it that name, motion is possible in a plenum, without any impulse in infinitum, without returning in a circle, and without penetration.

But however we may express ourselves, we must always confess, that we have no idea of any real extension without filling it with sensible objects, and conceiving its parts as visible or tangible.
As to the doctrine, that time is nothing but the manner, in which some real objects exist; we may observe, that it is liable to the same objections as the similar doctrine with regard to extension.

If it be a sufficient proof, that we have the idea of a vacuum, because we dispute and reason concerning it; we must for the same reason have the idea of time without any changeable existence; since there is no subject of dispute more frequent and common.