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Definitions, and Comment:
Being a Description of the World
By Eli Siegel

205. Space and Time

40. Space

Space is a thing thought of as including or being included in another thing, and not being it, and not impeding motion.

The rhythm of the world is one of having and being had, or including and being included. Existence, as finite and infinite, is a moving rhythm of having and being had, including and included. This is a phase of whole and part, itself and other, situation and existence itself.

Everything has an “aroundness” to it, or an “aboutness” which is not it. The aboutness of a pear on a table, which does not impede motion, is the space the pear is in. There is also a withinness in the pear which likewise can be seen as not impeding motion. This is the space in the pear. All space is, as space, about a thing or in a thing; which means that either the space has or includes the thing, or the thing has or includes the space.

41. Time

Time is a thing thought of as including or being included in motion as such, and as not being the motion.

All motion implies time. Time can be considered the environment, as form, of motion.

We say that the 19th century had this event: here the time seems to include the event or motion. We say, “This happening took that long,” where it seems the happening did something to time. We talk of the time of an occurrence, where the time seems to be of the event, to belong to it, to be included by it. All the ways I have presented of time’s being seen are valid, true.

Time is the form of motion as such; space is the form of being as such, or rest; therefore, if motion is being, time is that much space. This is also true.

Time also is including and included, having and had. Time, as a form of existence, is like existence: itself, more than itself, and less than itself, at once. All existence is a rhythm of what it is, what more it can be, and what less it can be.

Time thought of as always including, is infinity or eternity. Infinity is here time as going on or being included, and time at rest, or as such, at once. This aspect of time is a basis of reality as aesthetics: existence resting and changing at once.

Time can be thought of as giving motion, but also as being given motion. It is motion as form.

© 1945 by Eli Siegel, founder of Aesthetic Realism
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