The first of the realities with which we will deal is Time.
It is the fashion with some metaphysical writers to assert
that there is no time; but the arguments advanced in support
of this claim are superficial. Time is not an entity having
substance, but it is an existing reality, nevertheless. Time
is not an idea; a fiction by which we measure and record the
motions of the heavenly bodies; time would go on just the
same and at exactly the same rate if the heavenly bodies
were motionless. Do not misunderstand me in my use of the
word "time." Many people suppose that time began when man
began, and must end when man ends as a mortal and physical
being, and that the periods before and after the earth life
of the human race are to be called eternities; in other
words that there can be no time except so long as there is a
mortal man to measure it; but this is erroneous.
Days,
weeks, months and years must have gone on before man came on
earth, just as they do now; and if man disappeared from the
earth, they would still go on. If the earth ceased to
revolve around the sun, and to turn on its axis, the
succession of the seasons and of day and night would cease;
day would be continuous on one side of the earth, and night
upon the other, but hours and minutes would go on just the
same, and if the sun, moon, planets, stars and all else were
to disappear and be succeeded by black, silent, formless
chaos, hours and minutes would go on forever. Clocks do not
make time; an hour would have the same duration if there
were no clocks. In eternity there must still be time; time
is duration in eternity. Eternity is endless time.