Philosophical Works · Chapter
LV explained
This chapter explains how duration, order, and number can be distinctly conceived by not mixing them with the concept of substance.
What happens
This chapter explains how duration, order, and number can be distinctly conceived by not mixing them with the concept of substance. Duration is a mode of conceiving a thing insofar as it continues to exist, while order and number are merely modes of considering things arranged or counted, not realities separate from the things themselves.
Themes in this chapter
Reason and Method
The chapter demonstrates the method of clear and distinct conception by separating modes like duration, order, and number from the concept of substance.
Characters to notice
- Narrator
The narrator explains the distinct conception of duration, order, and number as modes of thinking about things.
Key passages
“We will also have most distinct conceptions of duration, order, and number, if, in place of mixing up with our notions of them that which properly belongs to the concept of substance, we merely think that the duration of a thing is a mode under which we conceive this thing, in so far as it continues to exist; and, in like manner, that order and number are not in reality different from things disposed in order and numbered, but only modes under which we diversely consider these things.”
We can clearly understand duration, order, and number if we do not confuse them with substance. Duration is just the way we think of something as continuing to exist; order and number are not separate realities but ways we consider things that are arranged or counted.
This passage clarifies that duration, order, and number are modes of thought about things, not independent substances.