27. The supposed pressure brought to explain cohesion is unintelligible.
For, to extend our thoughts a little
further, that pressure which is brought to explain the cohesion of bodies is as unintelligible as the cohesion itself.
For if matter be considered, as no doubt it is, finite, let any one send his contemplation to the extremities of the
universe, and there see what conceivable hoops, what bond he can imagine to hold this mass of matter in so close
a pressure together; from whence steel has its firmness, and the parts of a diamond their hardness and
indissolubility. If matter be finite, it must have its extremes; and there must be something to hinder it from
scattering asunder. If, to avoid this difficulty, any one will throw himself into the supposition and abyss of infinite
matter, let him consider what light he thereby brings to the cohesion of body, and whether he be ever the nearer
making it intelligible, by resolving it into a supposition the most absurd and most incomprehensible of all other:
so far is our extension of body (which is nothing but the cohesion of solid parts) from being clearer, or more
distinct, when we would inquire into the nature, cause, or manner of it, than the idea of thinking.
