In the next place, when we carefully analyze the nature of this conception itself, we find that it arises immediately out of our conception of Being as Being. This is shown by the idea of _equivalency_ between cause and effect, which is an essential feature of the conception of causality as such. In other words, the statement of any causal relation is merely a statement of the fact that both the matter and the energy concerned in the event were of a permanent nature and unalterable amount. Therefore, _if_ the ultimate Reality is mental, Causation _must_ be ontologically identical with Volition. And that the ultimate Reality is either mental, or something greater, seems to be proved by the consideration that if it be supposed anything _less_, there must be an end of the conception of equivalency as between cause and effect, and so of the conception of causality itself; for, clearly, if my mind has been caused by anything less than itself, there is an end of any possible equivalency between the activity of that thing as a cause, and the occurrence of my mind as an effect[13]. Lastly, the conception of causality essentially involves the idea of finality as existing somewhere. Here I cannot do better than quote some extracts from Canon Mozley's essay on 'The Principle of Causation,' as he manages very tersely to convey the gist of previous philosophizing upon this subject. 'He (Clarke) brings out simply at bottom the meaning and significance of an idea in the human mind, that there is implied in the very idea itself of cause, firstly, that it causes something else; and secondly, that it is uncaused itself.... An infinite series of causes does not make a cause; ... an infinite succession of causes rests, by the very hypothesis, upon no cause; each particular one rests on the one which follows it, but the whole rests upon nothing.... If from one cause we have to go back to another, that which we go back from is not the cause, but that which we go back to is. The very idea of cause, as I have said, implies a stop; and wherever we stop is the cause.... A true cause is a First Cause.... The atheistic idea thus does not correspond to the idea of reason. The atheist appears to acknowledge the necessity of a cause, and appears to provide for it; but when we come to his scheme it fails exactly in that part of the idea which clenches it, and which is essential to its integrity; it fails in providing a stop; ... One might say to him, Why do you give yourself the trouble to supply causation at all? You do so because you consider yourself obliged in reason to do it, but if you supply causation at all, why not furnish such a cause as reason has impressed upon you, and which is inherent in your mind--a cause which stands still, an original cause? If you never intended to supply this, it must have been because you thought a real cause was