llowing Discourse comes from the same Hand with the Essays upon
Infinitude_ [1].

We consider infinite Space as an Expansion without a Circumference: We
consider Eternity, or infinite Duration, as a Line that has neither a
Beginning nor an End. In our Speculations of infinite Space, we consider
that particular Place in which we exist, as a kind of Center to the
whole Expansion. In our Speculations of Eternity, we consider the Time
which is present to us as the Middle, which divides the whole Line into
two equal Parts. For this Reason, many witty Authors compare the present
Time to an Isthmus or narrow Neck of Land, that rises in the midst of an
Ocean, immeasurably diffused on either Side of it.

Philosophy, and indeed common Sense, naturally throws Eternity under two
Divisions; which we may call in _English_, that Eternity which is past,
and that Eternity which is to come. The learned Terms of _AEternitas a
Parte ante_, and _AEternitas a Parte post_, may be more amusing to the
Reader, but can have no other Idea affixed to them than what is conveyed
to us by those Words, an Eternity that is past, and an Eternity that is
to come. Each of these Eternities is bounded at the one Extream; or, in
other Words, the former has an End, and the latter a Beginning.

Let us first of all consider that Eternity which is past, reserving that
which is to come for the Subject of another Paper. The Nature of this
Eternity is utterly inconceivable by the Mind of Man: Our Reason
demonstrates to us that it _has been_, but at the same Time can frame no
Idea of it, but what is big with Absurdity and Contradiction. We can
have no other Conception of any Duration which is past, than that all of
it was once present; and whatever was once present, is at some certain
Distance from us, and whatever is at any certain Distance from us, be
the Distance never so remote, cannot be Eternity. The very Notion of any
Duration's being past, implies that it was once present; for the Idea of
being once present, is actually included in the Idea of its being past.
This therefore is a Depth not to be sounded by human Understanding. We
are sure that there has been an Eternity, and yet contradict our selves
when we measure this Eternity by any Notion which we can frame of it.

If we go to the Bottom of this Matter, we shall find, that the
Difficulties we meet with in our Conceptions of Eternity proceed from
this single Reason, That we can have no other Idea of an