s will be constant in proportion to the regularity with which he
sees Peter, Paul, and Simeon in this order. If it should by some means
happen that on some other evening, in the place of Simeon, he should see
James, on the following morning he will connect in his imagination with
the evening at one time Simeon and at another James, but not both
together. For he is supposed to have seen one and then the other in the
evening, but not both together. His imagination will therefore
fluctuate, and he will connect with a future evening first one and then
the other; that is to say, he will consider neither as certain, but both
as a contingency in the future.

This fluctuation of the imagination will take place in the same way if
the imagination is dealing with things which we contemplate in the same
way with reference to past or present time, and consequently we imagine
things related to time past, present, or future as contingent.

_Sub Specie AEternitatis_

It is of the nature of reason to consider things as necessary and not as
contingent. This necessity of things it perceives truly, that is to say,
as it is in itself. But this necessity of things is the necessity itself
of the eternal nature of God. Therefore it is of the nature of reason to
consider things under this form of eternity. Moreover, the foundations
of reason are notions which explain those things which are common to
all, and these things explain the essence of no individual thing, and
must therefore be conceived without any relation to time, but under a
certain form of eternity.

_The Limits of Human Knowledge_

I

The parts composing the human body pertain to the essence of the body
itself only in so far as they communicate their motions to one another
by some certain method, and not in so far as they can be considered as
individuals without relation to the human body. For the parts of the
human body are individuals, composite to a high degree, parts of which
can be separated from the human body and communicate their motions to
other bodies in another way, although the nature and form of the human
body itself is closely preserved. Therefore the idea or knowledge of
each part will be in God in so far as He is considered as affected by
another idea of an individual thing, which individual thing is prior to
the part itself in the order of Nature. The same thing may be said of
each part of the individual itself composing the human body, and
therefore th