Precisely _how_ this is effected, we, from our finite standpoint, cannot presume to say. It is natural to draw illustrations from the “specious present” of perception, in which we appear to have a succession that is also simultaneous; or again, from the timeless and purely logical character science seeks to ascribe to its “laws of nature.” But in the “specious present” we seem obliged to attend to _one_ aspect, succession or simultaneity, to the exclusion of the other; probably we never succeed in equally fixing both aspects at once. It thus presents us rather with the problem than with its solution. And again, after our discussion of the meaning of law, we cannot affirm that Nature is, for the absolute experience, a system of general laws. Hence it seems well not to take these illustrations for more than they are actually worth as indications of the merely phenomenal character of time. Metaphysics, like the old scholastic theology, needs sometimes to be reminded that God’s thoughts are not as ours, and His ways, in a very real sense when Philosophy has done its best, still past finding out.[155] _Consult further_:—F. H. Bradley, _Appearance and Reality_, chaps. 4 (Space and Time), 18 (Temporal and Spatial Appearance); L. Couturat, _L’Infini Mathématique_, pt. 2, bk. iv. chap. 4 (against the Kantian antinomies); H. Poincaré, _La Science et L’Hypothèse_, pp. 68-109; H. Lotze, _Metaphysic_, bk. ii. chaps. 1-3; W. Ostwald, _Vorlesungen über Naturphilosophie_, lects. 5, 8; J. Royce, _The World and the Individual_, Second Series, lect. 3; B. Russell, _Foundations of Geometry: Is Position in Space and Time Absolute or Relative_ (_Mind_, July 1901), _Principles of Mathematics_, pt. 6, vol. i.; H. Spencer, _First Principles_, pt. 2, chap. 3. ----- Footnote 141: The student who desires to think out the problems for himself would probably do well to take the discussions of Locke (_Essay_, bk. ii. chaps. 13-15) and Hume (_Treatise of Human Nature_, bk. i. pt. 2) rather than that of Kant as his starting-point, as they are less vitiated by psychological superstitions. In recent metaphysical work the chapters on the subject in Mr. Bradley’s _Appearance and Reality_ will probably be found most useful. Much may be learned from Mr. Russell’s work, _Foundations of Geometry_, with which should, however, be compared the largely discrepant results of his later article, “Is Position in Space and Time Relative or Absolute?” (_Mind_, July 1901). Footnote 142: We are not called upon to enter into such specially psychological questions as, _e.g._, whether both directions, past and future, can be detected within the “specious present” of direct perception, or whether the specious present only contains the elements “now” and “no longer,” the “not yet” being a subsequent intellectual construction, as is held, _e.g._, by Mr. Bradley and Mr. Shadworth Hodgson. Footnote 143: