THE SIX ENNEADS [147]
that numerical value by which the magnitude accompanying the Movement is estimated. But that number can be only the abstract figure which represents the magnitude, and it is difficult to see how an abstract figure can perform the act of measuring. And, supposing that we discover a way in which it can, we still have not Time, the measure, but a particular quantity of Time, not at all the same thing: Time means something very different from any definite period: before all question as to quantity is the question as to the thing of which a certain quantity is present. Time, we are told, is the number outside Movement and measuring it, like the tens applied to the reckoning of the horses and cows but not inherent in them: we are not told what this Number is; yet, applied or not, it must, like that decade, have some nature of its own. Or "it is that which accompanies a Movement and measures it by its successive stages"; but we are still left asking what this thing recording the stages may be. In any case, once a thing- whether by point or standard or any other means- measures succession, it must measure according to time: this number appraising movement degree by degree must, therefore, if it is to serve as a measure at all, be something dependent upon time and in contact with it: for, either, degree is spatial, merely- the beginning and end of the Stadium, for example- or in the only alternative, it is a pure matter of Time: the succession of early and late is stage of Time, Time ending upon a certain Now or Time beginning from a Now. Time, therefore, is something other than the mere number measuring Movement, whether Movement in general or any particular tract of Movement. Further: Why should the mere presence of a number give us Time- a number measuring or measured; for the same number may be either- if Time is not given us by the fact of Movement itself, the Movement which inevitably contains in itself a succession of stages? To make the number essential to Time is like saying that magnitude has not its full quantity unless we can estimate that quantity. Again, if Time is, admittedly, endless, how can number apply to it? Are we to take some portion of Time and find its numerical statement? That simply means that Time existed before number was applied to it. We may, therefore, very well think that it existed before the Soul or Mind that estimates it- if, indeed, it is not to be thought to take its origin from the Soul- for no measurement by anything is necessary to its existence; measured or not, it has the full extent of its being. And suppose it to be true that the Soul is the appraiser, using Magnitude as the measuring standard, how does this help us to the conception of Time? 10. Time, again, has been described as some sort of a sequence upon Movement, but we learn nothing from this, nothing is said, until we know what it is that produces this sequential thing: probably the cause and not the result would turn out to be Time. And, admitting such a thing, there would still remain the question whether it came into being before the movement, with it, or after it; and, whether we say before or with or after, we are speaking of order in Time: and thus our definition is "Time is a sequence upon movement in Time!" Enough: Our main purpose is to show what Time is, not to refute false definition. To traverse point by point the many opinions of our many predecessors would mean a history rather than an identification; we have treated the various theories as fully as is possible in a cursory review: and, notice, that which makes Time the Measure of the All-Movement is refuted by our entire discussion and, especially, by the observations upon the Measurement of Movement in general, for all the argument- except, of course, that from irregularity- applies to the All as much as to particular Movement. We are, thus, at the stage where we are to state what Time really is. 11. To this end we must go back to the state we affirmed of Eternity, unwavering Life, undivided totality, limitless,