lations between substances. On the
face of it space has nothing to do with substances, but only with their
attributes. What I mean is, that if you choose--as I think wrongly--to
construe our experience of nature as an awareness of the attributes of
substances, we are by this theory precluded from finding any analogous
direct relations between substances as disclosed in our experience. What
we do find are relations between the attributes of substances. Thus if
matter is looked on as substance in space, the space in which it finds
itself has very little to do with the space of our experience.

The above argument has been expressed in terms of the relational theory
of space. But if space be absolute--namely, if it have a being
independent of things in it--the course of the argument is hardly
changed. For things in space must have a certain fundamental relation to
space which we will call occupation. Thus the objection that it is the
attributes which are observed as related to space, still holds.

The scientific doctrine of matter is held in conjunction with an
absolute theory of time. The same arguments apply to the relations
between matter and time as apply to the relations between space and
matter. There is however (in the current philosophy) a difference in the
connexions of space with matter from those of time with matter, which I
will proceed to explain.

Space is not merely an ordering of material entities so that any one
entity bears certain relations to other material entities. The
occupation of space impresses a certain character on each material
entity in itself. By reason of its occupation of space matter has
extension. By reason of its extension each bit of matter is divisible
into parts, and each part is a numerically distinct entity from every
other such part. Accordingly it would seem that every material entity is
not really one entity. It is an essential multiplicity of entities.
There seems to be no stopping this dissociation of matter into
multiplicities short of finding each ultimate entity occupying one
individual point. This essential multiplicity of material entities is
certainly not what is meant by science, nor does it correspond to
anything disclosed in sense-awareness. It is absolutely necessary that
at a certain stage in this dissociation of matter a halt should be
called, and that the material entities thus obtained should be treated
as units. The stage of arrest may be arbitrary or may be set