 Let us now consider a second objection, related to the first. A good general source of objections to Vision in God is Malebranche’s own Elucidations, which was first appended to the Search in 1678, only four years after the original edition. There he faces objections that had already been raised against the doctrine, but also anticipates criticisms that were to be developed later, such as Arnauld’s worry that Vision in God reduces to Vision of God, which we have already discussed. One of the objections canvassed there raises a cluster of difficulties. Malebranche claims that God is the locus of intelligibility, but why couldn’t this ‘intelligible world’ (monde intelligible) reside in our own mind? God supposedly sees all possible creatures in his own perfections, but why couldn’t the mind see extension at least in its own being? Malebranche subscribes to what might be called a ‘cognitive resemblance thesis,’ which holds that the immediate object of cognition must have the same nature as the mind, which is immaterial or spiritual. According to this principle, in order for the mind to see material things in themselves, it would have to be material. But how is God any better off here, as he too is immaterial? ‘The soul is not material, admitted. But God, though he is a pure spirit, sees bodies in himself; why could not the soul, then, see them by considering itself, even though it itself is spiritual?’ (OC 3:147, LO 624).