§ 152. The vulnerable point in Spinoza's argument can thus be expressed: that which is important is questionable, and that which is unquestionable is of doubtful importance. Have I indeed a clear and distinct idea of an absolutely infinite being? The answer turns upon the meaning of the phrase "idea of." It is true I can add to such meaning as I apprehend the thought of possible other meaning, and suppose the whole to have a definiteness and systematic unity like that of the triangle. But such an idea is problematic. I am compelled to use the term "possible," and so to confess the failure of definite content to measure up to my idea. My idea of an absolutely infinite being is like my idea of a universal language: I can think _of_ it, but I cannot _think it out_, for lack of data or because of the conflicting testimony of other data. If I mean the infinity of my being to be a term of inclusiveness, and to insist that the all must be, and that there can be nothing not included in the all, I can scarcely be denied. But it is reasonable to doubt the importance of such a truth. If, on the other hand, I mean that my infinite being shall have the compactness and organic unity of a triangle, I must admit that such a being is indeed problematic. The degree to which the meaning of the part is dependent upon the meaning of the whole, or the degree to which the geometrical analogy is to be preferred to the analogy of aggregates, like the events within a year, is a problem that falls quite outside Spinoza's fundamental arguments. [Sidenote: Spinoza's Provision for the Finite.] § 153. But the advance of Spinoza over the Eleatics must not be lost sight of. The modern philosopher has so conceived being as to provide for parts within an individual unity. The geometrical analogy is a most illuminating one, for it enables us to understand how manyness may be indispensable to a being that is essentially unitary. The triangle as triangle is one. But it could not be such without sides and angles. The unity is equally necessary to the parts, for sides and angles of a triangle could not be such without an arrangement governed by the nature triangle. The whole of nature may be similarly conceived: as the reciprocal necessity of _natura naturans_, or nature defined in respect of its unity, and _natura naturata_, or nature specified in detail. There is some promise here of a reconciliation of the _Way of Opinion_ with the _Way of Truth_. Opinion would be a gathering of detail, truth a comprehension of the intelligible unity. Both would be provided for through the consideration that whatever is complete and necessary must be made up of incompletenesses that are necessary to it. [Sidenote: Transition to Teleological Conceptions.]