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Ética, Parte II, Proposición 45

Every idea of every body, or of every particular thing actually existing, necessarily involves the eternal and infinite essence of God.

Demostración

The idea of a particular thing actually existing necessarily involves both the existence and the essence of the said thing (II. viii.). Now particular things cannot be conceived without God (I. xv.); but, inasmuch as (II. vi.) they have God for their cause, in so far as he is regarded under the attribute of which the things in question are modes, their ideas must necessarily involve (I. Ax. iv.) the conception of the attributes of those ideas--that is (I. vi.), the eternal and infinite essence of God. Q.E.D.

Escolio

By existence I do not here mean duration--that is, existence in so far as it is conceived abstractedly, and as a certain form of quantity. I am speaking of the very nature of existence, which is assigned to particular things, because they follow in infinite numbers and in infinite ways from the eternal necessity of God's nature (I. xvi.). I am speaking, I repeat, of the very existence of particular things, in so far as they are in God. For although each particular thing be conditioned by another particular thing to exist in a given way, yet the force whereby each particular thing perseveres in existing follows from the eternal necessity of God's nature (cf. I. xxiv. Coroll.).

Benedict de Spinoza, The Ethics (Ethica Ordine Geometrico Demonstrata), traducido del latín por R. H. M. Elwes.

Publicado por primera vez en The Chief Works of Benedict de Spinoza, vol. II (London: George Bell and Sons, 1884).

Esta traducción es de dominio público en Estados Unidos, donde se publicó en 1884, y en cualquier lugar donde el plazo de derechos de autor sea la vida del autor más 100 años o menos; su traductor murió en 1892.

La división en unidades, los títulos y la ubicación de las notas son de este sitio.

Texto digital: Project Gutenberg eBook #3800

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