Dialogue X

Summary

The magnificence of God in the magnitude and infinite number of His different works. The simplicity and fecundity of the ways in which He conserves and develops them. The providence of God in the first impression of motion He communicates to matter. This first step in His conduct, which is not determined by general laws, is governed by an infinite wisdom.

THEOTIMUS. What do you think, Aristes, of those general principles which Theodore proposed yesterday? Did you follow them all the time? Has their generality, their sublimity neither discouraged nor tired you? As for me, I confess to my confusion; I wanted to attend to them but they escaped me like phantoms, so that I expended a lot of effort quite uselessly.

ARISTES. When a principle has nothing which affects the senses, it is rather difficult to follow and grasp it; when what we embrace has no body, by what means do we hold it?

THEOTIMUS. We take it quite naturally to be a phantom. For as the mind is distracted the principle is eclipsed, and we are completely surprised to be holding nothing. We recapture this principle but it escapes us anew. And although it escapes us only when we close our eyes, because we close them frequently without being aware of it we think that it is the principle which vanishes. This is why we consider it like a phantom beguiling us.