7. It might be objected that it is inconsistent to consider the present
only, exclusive of the past (as in the case of happiness), when we
do not do so in respect of time. For the addition of past to present
unquestionably lengthens time. If then we may properly say that time
becomes longer, why may we not say the same of happiness?--Were we to
do so, we would be applying happiness to divisions of time, while it
is precisely to bring out the indivisibility of happiness that it is
considered to be measured by the present exclusively. While considering
time, in respect of things that have vanished, such as, for instance,
the dead, it is perfectly reasonable to reckon the past; but it would
be unreasonable to compare past happiness with present happiness
in respect to duration, because it would be treating happiness as
something accidental and temporary. Whatever might be the length of
time that preceded the present, all that can be said of it is, that
it is no more. To regard duration while considering happiness is to
try to disperse and fraction something that is one and indivisible,
something that exists only in the present. That is why time is called
an image of eternity, inasmuch as it tends to destroy eternity's
permanence through its own dispersion.[57] By abstracting permanence
from eternity, and appropriating it, time destroys eternity; for a
short period, permanence may survive in association with time; but as
soon as it becomes fused with it, eternity perishes. Now as happiness
consists in the enjoyment of a life that is good, namely in that which
is proper to Essence (in itself), because none better exists, it must,
instead of time, have, as a measure, eternity itself, a principle
which admits neither increase nor diminution, which cannot be compared
to any length, whose nature it is to be indivisible, and superior to
time. No comparison, therefore, should be instituted between essence
and non-essence, eternity and time, the perpetual and the eternal;
nor should extension be predicated of the indivisible. If we regard
existence of Essence in itself, it will be necessary to regard it
entire; to consider it, not as the perpetuity of time, but as the very
life of eternity, a life which instead of consisting of a series of
centuries, exists entire since all centuries.