Can it be applied to him ‘figuratively’ in virtue of the indefinite number of His acts? 139. In regard to any other attributes of God than those of his duration and expansion, [1] Locke admits that the term ‘infinite’ is applied ‘figuratively’ (Book II. chap. xvii. sec. 1). ‘When we call them (_e.g._ His power, wisdom, and goodness) infinite, we have no other idea of this infinity but what carries with it some reflection on, or intimation of, that number or extent of the acts or objects of God’s wisdom, &c., which can never be supposed so great or so many which these attributes will not always surmount, let us multiply them in our thoughts as far as we can with all the infinity of endless number.’ What determination, then, according to this passage, of our conception of God’s goodness is represented by calling it infinite? Simply its relation to a number of acts and objects of which the sum can always be increased, and which, just for that reason, cannot represent the perfect God. Is it then, it may be asked, of mere perversity that when thinking of God under attributes that are not quantitative, and therefore do not carry with them the necessity of incompleteness, we yet go out of our way by this epithet ‘infinite’ to subject them to the conditions of quantity and its ‘progressus ad infinitum?’ [1] In the passages referred to, Locke speaks of ‘duration and _ubiquity_.’ The proper counterpart, however, of ‘duration’ according to him is ‘expansion’--this being to space what duration is to time. Under the embarrassment, however, which necessarily attends the ascription of expansion to God, he tacitly substitutes for it ‘ubiquity,’ a term which does not match ‘duration,’ and can only mean presence throughout the _whole_ of expansion, presence throughout the whole of that which does not admit of a whole. An act, finite in its nature, remains so, however often repeated.