Everywhere we see a chain of effects and causes, of ends and means, regularity in coming to be and perishing, and because nothing has entered by itselfb into the state in which it finds itself, this state always refers further to another thing as its cause, which makes necessary just the same further inquiry, so that in such a way the entire wholec would have to sink into the abyss of nothingness if one did not assume something subsisting for itself originally and in dependently outside this infinite contingency, which supports it and at the same time, as the cause of its existence, secures its continuation.