thinking substance and extended substance are one and the same substance, compre-
hended now under this attribute, now under that. So, too, a mode of Extension and the idea
of that mode are one and the same thing, expressed in two ways. This truth seems to have
been glimpsed by some of the Hebrews, who hold that God, God’s intellect, and the things
understood by God are one and the same. For example, a circle existing in Nature and the
idea of the existing circle—which is also in God—are one and the same thing, explicated
through different attributes. And so, whether we conceive Nature under the attribute of
Extension or under the attribute of Thought or under any other attribute, we find one and
the same order, or one and the same connection of causes—that is, the same things fol-
lowing one another. When I said that God is the cause, e.g., of the idea of a circle only
insofar as he is a thinking thing, and of a circle only insofar as he is an extended thing, my
reason was simply this, that the formal being of the idea of a circle can be perceived only
through another mode of thinking as its proximate cause, and that mode through another,
and so ad infinitum, with the result that as long as things are considered as modes of
thought, we must explicate the order of the whole of Nature, or the connection of causes,
through the attribute of Thought alone; and insofar as things are considered as modes of
Extension, again the order of the whole of Nature must be explicated through the attribute
of Extension only. The same applies to other attributes. Therefore God, insofar as he con-
sists of infinite attributes, is in fact the cause of things as they are in themselves. For the
present, I cannot give a clearer explanation.
PROPOSITION 8:The ideas of nonexisting individual things or modes must be compre-
hended in the infinite idea of God in the same way as the formal essences of individual
things or modes are contained in the attributes of God.
Proof: This proposition is obvious from the preceding one, but may be understood
more clearly from the preceding Scholium.
Corollary: Hence it follows that as long as individual things do not exist except
insofar as they are comprehended in the attributes of God, their being as objects of
thought—that is, their ideas—do not exist except insofar as the infinite idea of
God exists; and when individual things are said to exist not only insofar as they are
comprehended in the attributes of God but also insofar as they are said to have duration,
their ideas also will involve the existence through which they are said to have duration.
Scholium: Should anyone want an example for a clearer understanding of this mat-
ter, I can think of none at all that would adequately explicate the point with which I am
here dealing, for it has no parallel. Still, I shall try to illustrate it as best I can. The nature
of a circle is such that the rectangles formed from the segments of its intersecting chords
are equal. Hence an infinite number of equal rectangles are contained in a circle, but none
of them can be said to exist except insofar as the circle exists, nor again can the idea of any
one of these rectangles be said to exist except insofar as it is comprehended in the idea of
the circle. Now of this infinite number of intersecting chords let two, E and D, exist.
498 BARUCHSPINOZA
DE