eternal unless it were necessary in itself, or if(1) the agent necessarily entailed it by virtue of its very nature(2). If there were no agent that necessarily entailed it, it could not be eternal. Each of the arguments advanced by proponents of temporal origination and proponents of eternity would therefore refute this position.

As for(3) the proponents of eternity, their fundamental premise is that a complete cause necessarily entails(4) its effect. They therefore deem it impossible to posit an eternal effect without a complete, necessitating cause, for that would be an effect without a complete cause.

As for the proponents of temporal origination, their fundamental premise is that an agent who acts by choice(5)—indeed, any agent whatsoever—can produce only a temporally originated effect, and that an eternal effect is impossible(6).

Thus, the fundamental premises of both groups refute this position, which no one has maintained. It is advanced only by way of compelling each group to face the implications of its position if it accepts what is false(7) therein rather than what is sound(8). Thus, if (the proponents of eternity) accept that temporally originated events may arise without a cause, that an effect does not require a complete cause, and that one who possesses power may select one of two possible acts without any determining factor; and if (the proponents of temporal origination) accept that an effect as such—or an effect produced through power and choice—has always existed eternally alongside and concurrently with its agent, then these two commitments together entail the possibility of an agent possessing power and choice who selects without any determining factor, while its effect, notwithstanding this, is eternal—