9. All the parts of extension are extension, and all the parts of
duration are duration. There is one thing more wherein space and
duration have a great conformity, and that is, though they are
justly reckoned amongst our simple ideas, yet none of the distinct
ideas we have of either is without all manner of composition: it is
the very nature of both of them to consist of parts: but their parts
being all of the same kind, and without the mixture of any other idea,
hinder them not from having a place amongst simple ideas. Could the
mind, as in number, come to so small a part of extension or duration
as excluded divisibility, that would be, as it were, the indivisible
unit or idea; by repetition of which, it would make its more
enlarged ideas of extension and duration. But, since the mind is not
able to frame an idea of any space without parts, instead thereof it
makes use of the common measures, which, by familiar use in each
country, have imprinted themselves on the memory (as inches and
feet; or cubits and parasangs; and so seconds, minutes, hours, days,
and years in duration);- the mind makes use, I say, of such ideas as
these, as simple ones: and these are the component parts of larger
ideas, which the mind upon occasion makes by the addition of such
known lengths which it is acquainted with.
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