All that I thus require here is that I should interrogate
myself, if I wish to know whether I possess a power which is
capable of bringing it to pass that I who now am shall still
be in the future; for since I am nothing but a thinking thing,
or at least since thus far it is only this portion of myself
which is precisely in question at present, if such a power did
reside in me, I should certainly be conscious of it. But I am
conscious of nothing of the kind, and by this I know clearly
that I depend on some being different from myself.
Possibly, however, this being on which I depend is not
that which I call God, and I am created either by my parents
or by some other cause less perfect than God. This cannot be,
because, as I have just said, it is perfectly evident that
there must be at least as much reality in the cause as in the
effect; and thus since I am a thinking thing, and possess an
idea of God within me, whatever in the end be the cause
assigned to my existence, it must be allowed that it is
likewise a thinking thing and that it possesses in itself the
idea of all the perfections which I attribute to God.
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