or through another; thus, when something is known to be eternal and necessary in itself or through another, *) (1) the knowledge that it cannot fail to exist becomes all the more certain.

If any part of the world were eternal and beginningless, with no temporal event occurring within it, and then a temporal event occurred within it, that event would have changed it from its eternal, beginningless state—which was necessary in itself or through another—to a different and contrary state. This is already impossible; if, in addition, it occurred without a temporal cause, it would be impossible on both counts.

Moreover, it is inconceivable that the world should be devoid of accompanying temporal events. Bodies are never without temporal events accompanying them, such as motion and the like. As all rational people agree, the world contains nothing except what subsists in itself or in another. Those entities are never unaccompanied by temporal events; for had they first been devoid of them and then become accompanied by them, temporal events would necessarily have arisen without a cause, and that is false. If it were not false, temporal events could arise without a cause, and the doctrine of the world’s eternity would thereby be invalidated.

Furthermore, many speculative thinkers say that nothing exists in the world except bodies and accidents. Among them are those who define a body as that which can be pointed to and deny (2) that every body is composed of indivisible atoms (3) or of matter and form. They therefore do not face the difficulty that confronts others.

And even if it is assumed that the world contains something outside these categories, as maintained by those who posit the intellects