hing _less_,
there must be an end of the conception of equivalency as between cause
and effect, and so of the conception of causality itself; for, clearly,
if my mind has been caused by anything less than itself, there is an end
of any possible equivalency between the activity of that thing as a
cause, and the occurrence of my mind as an effect[13].

Lastly, the conception of causality essentially involves the idea of
finality as existing somewhere. Here I cannot do better than quote some
extracts from Canon Mozley's essay on 'The Principle of Causation,' as
he manages very tersely to convey the gist of previous philosophizing
upon this subject.

'He (Clarke) brings out simply at bottom the meaning and
significance of an idea in the human mind, that there is implied in
the very idea itself of cause, firstly, that it causes something
else; and secondly, that it is uncaused itself.... An infinite
series of causes does not make a cause; ... an infinite succession
of causes rests, by the very hypothesis, upon no cause; each
particular one rests on the one which follows it, but the whole
rests upon nothing.... If from one cause we have to go back to
another, that which we go back from is not the cause, but that
which we go back to is. The very idea of cause, as I have said,
implies a stop; and wherever we stop is the cause.... A true cause
is a First Cause.... The atheistic idea thus does not correspond to
the idea of reason. The atheist appears to acknowledge the
necessity of a cause, and appears to provide for it; but when we
come to his scheme it fails exactly in that part of the idea which
clenches it, and which is essential to its integrity; it fails in
providing a stop; ... One might say to him, Why do you give
yourself the trouble to supply causation at all? You do so because
you consider yourself obliged in reason to do it, but if you supply
causation at all, why not furnish such a cause as reason has
impressed upon you, and which is inherent in your mind--a cause
which stands still, an original cause? If you never intended to
supply this, it must have been because you thought a real cause was
not wanted; but if you thought a cause not wanted, why not have
said from the first that causes were not wanted, and said from the
first that events could take place without causes?'

Or, to quote