Take as another illustration a purely moral idea. We know that there is a moral quality which we call goodness; an attribute of human character of which we have a clear conception, and which we can describe because it is manifested to us in human lives. When we speak of the moral phenomena to which we give the name of goodness, or virtue, all mankind know what is meant. But human virtue is imperfect, limited, measurable. It may be idealized into something approaching to perfection, but the ideal character thus drawn must fall short of perfection if it is made consistent with human nature. But from human character we derive the idea of goodness or virtue as a thinkable idea. Is the idea of absolute perfection of this quality any less thinkable? Absolute perfection of moral character can not be described by a definition; but, as we know that a measurable goodness which we can describe exists, wherein consists the failure or lapse of a thinkable relation, when we reason from that which exists in a measurable degree to that which transcends all degree? We are all the while thinking of goodness or virtue, whether we think of it as limited and imperfect, or as unlimited and perfect. Take another quality--power. We know that there is such a quality as power, wielded by human beings, and guided by their will. But human power is limited, measurable, and therefore finite. When we reason from the finite power of man to the idea of an infinite and immeasurable power held and wielded by another being, do we strive to conceive of something that is unthinkable because we can only say that the power of that other being is without limit? We are all the while thinking of power, of the quality of power, whether we think of it as measurable or immeasurable. All qualities and all faculties which are manifested to us in a limited degree, when we conceive of them as unlimited and without degree, become proofs that what exists in a measurable and limited degree may exist without limitation and without degree. Although we can only define the finite, the infinite is not the less a subject of true thinking, because, whether we think of the finite or the infinite, what we are all the time thinking about is the quality of power, and nothing else. In the one case it is limited, in the other it is unlimited, but it is all the time the quality itself of which we are thinking.[94]