Finally, the distinction of reason is that between a substance and some one of its attributes, without which it is impossible for us to distinctly conceive the substance itself; or between two such attributes of a common substance, the one of which we try to think without the other. This distinction is manifest from our inability to form a clear and distinct idea of such a substance, if we separate from it such attribute; or to have a clear perception of the one of two such attributes if we separate it from the other. For example, because any substance which ceases to endure ceases also to exist, duration is not distinct from substance except in thought (ratione); and in general all the modes of thinking which we consider as in objects differ only in thought, as well from the objects of which they are thought as from each other in a common object. …
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