are distinct ages, epochs, periods of time, prior to which they did not exist; and an hour in which they began to be formed. There is also an hour in which they are broken up or come to an end, their substance being scattered to enter into combination with other particles, in other forms of some other period of duration. For all created entities or individuals,—save the universe as a whole, solar systems, and man,—have such an end. Animals have it. and almost all inorganic individua, although the latter have the longest duration.
In respect to characteristic of substance, the In- finite is one and indivisible. It does not consist of parts, or is not compounded of smaller particles. It is one purely continuous substance.9 In it, infinite things are distinctly One.
9Principia, part I. chap. II. I; A. E. 1121; and in the Writings passim.
SWEDENBORG'S COSMOLOGY.
The characteristic of finite substance is that it is framed of myriads of distinct particles. It there- fore consists of parts, or is compounded of smaller discrete particles contiguous to each other. It is not a continuous substance. 10
And finally in respect to activity or motion, the Infinite is infinitely active. It is without any pass- ivity or inertia. It is therefore frictionless. The current of its motion, as it is in itself, never bounds, never encloses, nor finites, that is, never describes a circle ; for to describe a circle of any diameter is to describe and bound an area of that diameter. In- finite motion cannot describe an area, or make an enclosed field.
On the other hand a finiting motion is a motion the current of which defines or bounds, and dis- covers lines of least resistance, of opposition, of re- action with or against the current. The simplest motion which describes a boundary is a circular motion. Therefore a finiting motion is a circling motion, or that which describes a circle or closed field of some diameter.11 The ideal of the circular
10Principia, part I. chap. II. I. 8; chap. III. 7; The In- finite, chap. I. sec. IV. 2, sec. XV. conclusion; chap. II. sec. I. 6.
11Principia, part I. chap. II. 21; chap. IV. 18. part 2. line 48.
THE FINITING OF INFINITY.
motion, that which comprises in itself every type and degree of circling motion, is the circulo-spiral, or perpetually vortical motion.
THE ACCOMMODATION OF THE INFINITE TO THE FINITE. Under which of these five definitions can we see possible a first accommodation of the In- finite to the finite, a primal finiting of the Infinity of God, which will not infringe upon the Infinity of the Creator, and which will contain the seed adequate to the purposes of creation?
The accommodation of the Infinite to the finite, under the first, second, and third heads, viz., under expanse, origin, and duration, are at once negatived; on their faces they are absurd, impossible, and in- competent to the purpose.
The accommodation of Infinity to finiteness under the fourth head, namely, character of substance, is also negatived. For since the Infinite, as Sub- stance Itself, is a unity or a one, purely continu- ous, the distinction and marking off of the portions thereof, by any means involving severance, cutting off. separation, while it would indeed finite the por- tions so given and cut off, would also finite the re- mainder; and so in destroying the continuity of the Infinite, it would essentially infringe upon the one- ness of the Creating Substance. Moreover that
SWEDENBORG'S COSMOLOGY.
which is severed from its first is by that act anni- hilated.
Under the fifth head, activity or motion, Sweden- borg places the primal accommodation of the In- finite to the finite, or the first finiting of Infinity. Under this head alone accommodation is at once possible without essential infringement of the non- finiteness and unity of the Infinite, and adequate to the purpose; at once setting aside, distinguishing and defining portions of the Infinite Substance to be the substantia prima and see l of creation; and by the very mode of defining, imparting to the por- tions thus defined and appropriated, certain active powers of motion, capable of being a further means to their self-composition or concretion into a series of derivative finites, substantial, or substantiates; and abiding as a spring of reflexing motor force in all things of creation forever. Moreover in finiting by means of motion, there is no actual severance from the substance of the Infinite.
THE PRODUCTION OF VORTEX RINGS. The first finiting of Infinity, is, according to Swedenborg, the production of minimal and simplest points of circmo- spiral motion, that is, the production of vortex rings, small as points, in the Substance of the Infinite. The interior conatus to circulation of these vortex points is circulo-spiral; so that the whole point is
THE FINITING OF INFINITY.
not only in a vortex flow, but also gyres continually around its own axis. 12
So long as the vortex flow of these minimal rings is continued and sustained by the will of God, they continue to exist as entities in the Substance of the Infinite; they continue in one aspect distinct and bounded, enclosed and limited; that is, the circling motion of their flow is a first delineation of finiting.
These simple minimal vortices were existent in the Infinite before any finite or concrete entity had existence.13 They are to be called the medium be- tween the Infinite and the finite.14 They are not only the primitives of the first substantial or com- posites of creation, but they are its force and life.15 They are immediately Divine and superlatively per- fect.16 In them are supremely involved the ends of the universe, its human result, and the providence of the future.17
The Natural Point. The natural points, there-
12 Principia, part I. Chap. II. 12. 21. 22; Chap. III. 19.
13 Principia, part I. Chap. II. 8. 12.
14 Principia, part I. Chap. II. 10.
15 Principia, part I. Chap. III. 6. 7. II. 10; The Infinite, Chap. I. sec. IV. 3.
10 Infinite, Chap. I. last page; Chap. I. sec. V.
17 The Infinite, Chap. I. sec. XI, 2. 3; Principia, part I. Chap. II. 5.
SWEDENBORG'S COSMOLOGY.
fore, are the first substance and source of that which, in its derivative composition, we call the created universe. They are the inmost, the first and primi- tive both of the spiritual world and of nature.18 They are produced by the Infinite, and are the im- mediate act of the Infinite finiting itself by reactive motion. They are in space without space; for the Infinite, prior to this first finiting, was everywhere existent without space; for space was not until the lower finite came into existence, being simultaneous and coincident with that act. They exist in all space without space in relation to the Divine; but in rela- tion to derivative creation there is in them the first beginnings and motions of space. Hence space and time have their origin in God, who is in all space and time without space and time. 19
The natural points or first simples are thus the medium between the Infinite and the finite; they are the first entia, and in their multitude and activity they so fill all the spaces of the universe that a vacuum is precluded. Their composite is the first substantial.
First substantials are the first boundary of mat-
