is, one partakes of being, which is not the same with one; the words
'being' and 'one' have different meanings. Observe the consequence: In
the one of being or the being of one are two parts, being and one, which
form one whole. And each of the two parts is also a whole, and involves
the other, and may be further subdivided into one and being, and is
therefore not one but two; and thus one is never one, and in this way the
one, if it is, becomes many and infinite. Again, let us conceive of a one
which by an effort of abstraction we separate from being: will this
abstract one be one or many? You say one only; let us see. In the first
place, the being of one is other than one; and one and being, if different,
are so because they both partake of the nature of other, which is therefore
neither one nor being; and whether we take being and other, or being and
one, or one and other, in any case we have two things which separately are
called either, and together both. And both are two and either of two is
severally one, and if one be added to any of the pairs, the sum is three;
and two is an even number, three an odd; and two units exist twice, and
therefore there are twice two; and three units exist thrice, and therefore
there are thrice three, and taken together they give twice three and thrice
two: we have even numbers multiplied into even, and odd into even, and
even into odd numbers. But if one is, and both odd and even numbers are
implied in one, must not every number exist? And number is infinite, and
therefore existence must be infinite, for all and every number partakes of
being; therefore being has the greatest number of parts, and every part,
however great or however small, is equally one. But can one be in many
places and yet be a whole? If not a whole it must be divided into parts
and represented by a number corresponding to the number of the parts. And
if so, we were wrong in saying that being has the greatest number of parts;
for being is coequal and coextensive with one, and has no more parts than
one; and so the abstract one broken up into parts by being is many and
infinite. But the parts are parts of a whole, and the whole is their