If thus we be permitted to speak, I see three times,
and I confess there are three. Let it be said too, "there be three
times, past, present, and to come": in our incorrect way. See, I
object not, nor gainsay, nor find fault, if what is so said be but
understood, that neither what is to be, now is, nor what is past.
For but few things are there, which we speak properly, most things
improperly; still the things intended are understood.
I said then even now, we measure times as they pass, in order to
be able to say, this time is twice so much as that one; or, this is
just so much as that; and so of any other parts of time, which be
measurable. Wherefore, as I said, we measure times as they pass. And
if any should ask me, "How knowest thou?" I might answer, "I know,
that we do measure, nor can we measure things that are not; and things
past and to come, are not." But time present how do we measure, seeing
it hath no space? It is measured while passing, but when it shall have
passed, it is not measured; for there will be nothing to be
measured.
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