It is precisely here, as I suppose, that Mr. Spencer's "symbolizing process" and his "symbolized product" come in. We have taken as the elements of thought the idea of successive measurements of space; and the law of thought permits us to have as a definite product whatever extent of space can be marked off by such successive measurements. But when we undertake to have, as the product of thought, a consciousness, or conception, of endless space, we have merely used the idea of a definite space as a "symbol," or _simulacrum_, of that which is without form, and is only a "formless consciousness of the inscrutable"--whatever that means. Let us see what has happened. The power of measuring, or describing in form, a definite extent of space, has given us an idea of space. The product of our thought is extension between two given points. Such extensions must be capable of indefinite multiplication, although we can not express in figures an indefinite multiplicand. The product is then something beyond what we can express in a definite form; but is it beyond the sphere of thought? What is it? It is an idea which we deduce by a strict process of reasoning, and to which we do not need to give and can not give expression in figures. The process of reasoning is this: Measurement has given us an idea of space; our faculty of applying measurement is limited; but our faculty of conceiving of space through which we could go on forever multiplying such measurements, if we had the means, is certainly a faculty of which all men are conscious who are accustomed to analyze the processes of thought. In this process we may reach that which in one sense is "inscrutable." It is inscrutable, inasmuch as we can not understand how eternity of space or time came to exist. Our experience of phenomena enables us to have an idea of space and time, and from the fact that we have measured off portions of space or time, we deduce the fact that there must be an eternity of both. It is immaterial whether we call this a "symbolizing" process, or call it something else. The product is an idea at which we arrive by a strict process of reasoning. Eternity of space or time is an inscrutable idea, when we attempt to inquire how it came to be. That it exists, is an idea from which the human mind can not escape, and which it reaches by a perfectly sound deduction. We are all the while thinking of space or time, whether we are thinking of that which is measurable, or of that which is immeasurable. I now come to a passage in Mr. Spencer's recent article which it is necessary to attempt to explain to the unlearned reader, and to bring it, if possible, within the reach of ordinary minds. This passage, which follows in his recent article immediately after his quotation from his "Essays," is the following: