The nature of body does not, therefore, consist in hardness.
In the same way, it may be shown that weight, colour, and all the
other qualities of this sort, which are perceived in corporeal
matter, may be taken from it, itself meanwhile remaining entire: it
thus follows that the nature of body depends on none of these.
V. That the truth regarding the nature of body is obscured by the
opinions respecting rarefaction and a vacuum with which we are pre-
occupied.
There still remain two causes to prevent its being fully admitted
that the true nature of body consists in extension alone. The first
is the prevalent opinion, that most bodies admit of being so
rarefied and condensed that, when rarefied, they have greater
extension than when condensed; and some even have subtilized to such
a degree as to make a distinction between the substance of body and
its quantity, and between quantity itself and extension. The second
cause is this, that where we conceive only extension in length,
breadth, and depth, we are not in the habit of saying that body is
there, but only space and further void space, which the generality
believe to be a mere negation.
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