Hence there remains only the idea of God, concerning
which we must consider whether it is something which cannot
have proceeded from me myself. By the name God I understand a
substance that is infinite [eternal, immutable], independent,
all-knowing, all-powerful, and by which I myself and
everything else, if anything else does exist, have been
created. Now all these characteristics are such that the more
diligently I attend to them, the less do they appear capable
of proceeding from me alone; hence, from what has been already
said, we must conclude that God necessarily exists.
For although the idea of substance is within me owing to
the fact that I am substance, nevertheless I should not have
the idea of an infinite substance?since I am finite?if it had
not proceeded from some substance which was veritably
infinite.
Nor should I imagine that I do not perceive the infinite
by a true idea, but only by the negation of the finite, just
as I perceive repose and darkness by the negation of movement
and of light; for, on the contrary, I see that there is
manifestly more reality in infinite substance than in finite,
and therefore that in some way I have in me the notion of the
infinite earlier then the finite?to wit, the notion of God
before that of myself.
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