...
Esse praeterea in hac Naturae universitate quiddam quod maneat et
intelligible sit, rerum genitarum, quae quidem in perpetuo quodam
mutationum fluxu versantur, exemplar, Ideam dici et mente comprehendi....
Permanet igitur mundus constanter talis qualis est creatus a Deo ...
proponente sibi non exemplaria quaedam manuum opificio edita, sed
illam Ideam intelligibilemque essentiam."--So taught the
half-inspired pagan philosopher whom Plato took as his guide in his
contemplations of Nature.
We trace the thought again in Dante, amidst the various fragments of
ancient wisdom which he has embodied in the "Divina Commedia":
Cio che non muore e cio che puo morire
Non e se non splendor cli quella idea
Che partorisco, amando, il nosfro Sire.
----_Paradiso_, XIII. 52-54.
Two thousand years after the old Greek had written, the Christian
philosopher, Sir Thomas Browne, repeats the same doctrine in a new
phraseology:--"_Before Abraham was, I am_, is the saying of Christ;
yet it is true in some sense, if I say it of myself; for I was not
only before myself, but _Adam_, that is, in the idea of God, and the
decree of that Synod held from all eternity. And in this sense, I say,
the World was before the Creation, and at an end before it had a
beginning; and thus was I dead before I was alive; though my grave be
_England_, my dying place was Paradise; and Eve miscarried of me
before she conceived of Cain.
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