quote · Words worth keeping

Although time is included among continuous quantities, being indivisible and immaterial it does not altogether fall into the scope of geometry,—by which it is divided into figures and bodies of infinite variety, which are seen to be continuous inasmuch as they are visible and material,—but it agrees only with its first principles, i.e. with the point and the line; the point in time may be compared to an instant, and the line to the length of a certain quantity of time. Just as the point is the beginning and end of a line, so is an instant the beginning and end of any given space of time; and just as a line is infinitely divisible, so can a given space of time be likewise divided, and as the divisions of the line are in proportion to each other, so likewise are the divisions of time.

Although time is included among continuous quantities, being indivisible and immaterial it does not altogether fall into the scope of geometry,—by which it is divided into figures and bodies of infinite variety, which are seen to be continuous inasmuch as they are visible and material,—but it agrees only with its first principles, i.e. with the point and the line; the point in time may be compared to an instant, and the line to the length of a certain quantity of time. Just as the point is the beginning and end of a line, so is an instant the beginning and end of any given space of time; and just as a line is infinitely divisible, so can a given space of time be likewise divided, and as the divisions of the line are in proportion to each other, so likewise are the divisions of time.