15. The definition of extension explains it not.
If any one ask me what this space I speak of is, I will tell him when
he tells me what his extension is. For to say, as is usually done, that extension is to have partes extra partes, is to
say only, that extension is extension. For what am I the better informed in the nature of extension, when I am told
that extension is to have parts that are extended, exterior to parts that are extended, i.e., extension consists of
extended parts? As if one, asking what a fibre was, I should answer him,--that it was a thing made up of several
fibres. Would he thereby be enabled to understand what a fibre was better than he did before? Or rather, would he
not have reason to think that my design was to make sport with him, rather than seriously to instruct him?
