do not say (with M. Cousin) that the two are conjointly given in
consciousness--but the two are understood and partially apprehended by
the mind conjointly and in contrast. Though the Infinite is doubtless
negative as to a degree, it is not wholly or exclusively negative, since
it includes a necessary reference to some positive attribute, to which
the degree belongs; the positive element is not eliminated, but merely
left undetermined. The Infinite (like the Finite, [Greek: to
peperasmhenon--to hapeiron]) is a genus; it comprehends under it the
Infinitely Hard and the Infinitely Soft, the Infinitely Swift and the
Infinitely Slow--the infinite, in short, of any or all positive
attributes. It includes, doubtless, 'a farrago of contradictions;' but
so, also, does the Finite--and so, also, do the actual manifestations of
the real, concrete universe, which manifestations constitute a portion
of the Finite. Whoever attempts to give any philosophical account of the
generation of the universe, tracing its phenomena, as an aggregate, to
some ultra-phenomenal origin, must include in his scheme a _fundamentum_
for all those opposite and contradictory manifestations which experience
discloses in the universe. There always have been, and still are, many
philosophers who consider the Abstract and General to be prior both in
nature and time to the Concrete and Particular; and who hold further
that these two last are explained, when presented as determinate and
successive manifestations of the two first, which they conceive as
indeterminate and sempiternal. Now the Infinite (Ens Infinitum or Entia
Infinita, according to the point of view in which we look at it) is a
generic word, including all these supposed indeterminate antecedents;
and including therefore, of course, many contradictory agencies. But
this does not make it senseless or unmeaning; nor can we distinguish it
from 'the Infinite in some one or more given attributes,' by any other
character than by greater reach of abstraction. We cannot admit the
marked distinction which Mr Mill contends for--that the one is