For a man may conceive two bodies at a
distance, so as they may approach one another, without touching or
displacing any solid thing, till their superficies come to meet;
whereby, I think, we have the clear idea of space without solidity.
For (not to go so far as annihilation of any particular body) I ask,
whether a man cannot have the idea of the motion of one single body
alone, without any other succeeding immediately into its place? I
think it is evident he can: the idea of motion in one body no more
including the idea of motion in another, than the idea of a square
figure in one body includes the idea of a square figure in another.
I do not ask, whether bodies do so exist, that the motion of one
body cannot really be without the motion of another. To determine this
either way, is to beg the question for or against a vacuum. But my
question is,- whether one cannot have the idea of one body moved,
whilst others are at rest? And I think this no one will deny. If so,
then the place it deserted gives us the idea of pure space without
solidity; whereinto any other body may enter, without either
resistance or protrusion of anything. When the sucker in a pump is
drawn, the space it filled in the tube is certainly the same whether
any other body follows the motion of the sucker or not: nor does it
imply a contradiction that, upon the motion of one body, another
that is only contiguous to it should not follow it.
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