P10: We are affected more intensely toward a future thing which we imagine will quickly be present, than if we imagined the time when it will exist to be further from the present. We are also affected more intensely by the memory of a thing we imagine to be not long past, than if we imagined it to be long past.

Dem.: Insofar as we imagine that a thing will quickly be present, or is not long past, we thereby imagine something that excludes the presence of the thing less than if we imagined that the time when it will exist were further from the present, or that it were far in the past (as is known through itself). And so (by P9), to that extent we will be affected more intensely toward it, q.e.d.

Schol.: From what we noted at D6, it follows that we are still affected equally mildly toward objects separated from the present by an interval of time longer than that we can determine by imagining, even though we may understand that they are separated from one another by a long interval of time.