more from Gottfried Leibniz

Single Idea 2101

[catalogued under 27. Natural Reality / D. Time / 2. Passage of Time / a. Experience of time]

Full Idea

To ask why God did not make everything a year sooner would be reasonable if time were something apart from temporal things, but time is just the succession of things, which remains the same if the universe is created a year sooner.

Gist of Idea

If everything in the universe happened a year earlier, there would be no discernible difference

Source

Gottfried Leibniz (Letters to Samuel Clarke [1716], 3.6)

Book Reference

Leibniz,Gottfried: 'Philosophical Writings', ed/tr. Parkinson,G.H.R. [Dent 1973], p.212