ember 1648, More wrote:
". . . this indefinite extension is either _simpliciter_ infinite, or
only in respect to us. If you understand extension to be infinite
_simpliciter_, why do you obscure your thought by too low and too modest
words? If it is infinite only in respect to us, extension, in reality,
will be finite; for our mind is the measure neither of the things nor of
truth. . . ." Unsatisfied by his first answer from Descartes (5 February
1649), he urges his point again (5 March): if extension can describe
matter, the same quality must apply to the immaterial and yet be only
one of many attributes of Spirit. In his second letter to More
(15 April), Descartes answers firmly: "It is repugnant to my concept to
attribute any limit to the world, and I have no other measure than my
perception for what I have to assert or to deny. I say, therefore, that
the world is indeterminate or indefinite, because I do not recognize in
it any limits. But I dare not call it infinite as I perceive that God is
greater than the world, not in respect to His extension, because, as I
have already said, I do not acknowledge in God any proper [extension],
but in respect to His perfection . . . . It is repugnant to my mind
. . . it implies a contradiction, that the world be finite or limited,
because I cannot but conceive a space outside the boundaries of the
world wherever I presuppose them." More plainly fails to understand the
basic dualism inherent in Cartesian philosophy and to sense the
irrelevance of his questions. While Descartes is really disposing of the
spiritual world in order to get on with his analysis of finite
experience, More is keenly attempting to reconcile neo-Platonism with
the lively claims of matter. His effort can be read as the brave attempt
to harmonize an older mode of thought with the urgency of the 'new
philosophy' which called the rest in doubt. More saw this conflict and
the implications of it with a kind of clarity that other men of his age
hardly possessed. But the way of Descartes, which at first seemed to him
so promising, certainly did not lead to the kind of harmony which he
sought.

More's original enthusiasm for Descartes declined as he understood
better that the Cartesian world in practice excluded spirits and souls.
Because Descartes could find no necessary place even for God Himself,
More styled him, in _Enchiridion Metaphysicum_ (1671), the "Prince of
the Nullibists"; these men "readily acknowledge