10

ESSAYS ON THE JUSTICE OF GOD AND THE FREEDOM OF MAN IN THE ORIGIN OF EVIL * * * * *

PART THREE

241. Now at last I have disposed of the cause of moral evil; _physical evil_, that is, sorrows, sufferings, miseries, will be less troublesome to explain, since these are results of moral evil. _Poena est malum passionis, quod infligitur ob malum actionis_, according to Grotius. One suffers because one has acted; one suffers evil because one does evil.

_Nostrorum causa malorum_

_Nos sumus_.

It is true that one often suffers through the evil actions of others; but when one has no part in the offence one must look upon it as a certainty that these sufferings prepare for us a greater happiness. The question of _physical evil_, that is, of the origin of sufferings, has difficulties in common with that of the origin of _metaphysical evil_, examples whereof are furnished by the monstrosities and other apparent irregularities of the universe. But one must believe that even sufferings and monstrosities are part of order; and it is well to bear in mind not only that it was better to admit these defects and these monstrosities than to violate general laws, as Father Malebranche sometimes argues, but also that these very monstrosities are in the rules, and are in conformity with general acts of will, though we be not capable of discerning this conformity. It is just as sometimes there are appearances of irregularity in mathematics which issue finally in a great order when one has finally got to the bottom of them: that is why I have already in this work observed that according to my principles all individual events, without exception, are consequences of general acts of will.

242. It should be no cause for astonishment that I endeavour to elucidate these things by comparisons taken from pure mathematics, where everything proceeds in order, and where it is possible to fathom them by a close contemplation which grants us an enjoyment, so to speak, of the vision of the ideas of God. One may propose a succession or series of numbers perfectly irregular to all appearance, where the numbers increase and diminish variably without the emergence of any order; and yet he who knows the key to the formula, and who understands the origin and the structure of this succession of numbers, will be able to give a rule which, being properly understood, will show that the series is perfectly regular, and that it even has excellent properties. One may make this still more evident in lines. A line may have twists and turns, ups and downs, points of reflexion and points of inflexion, interruptions and other variations, so that one sees neither rhyme nor reason therein, especially when taking into account only a portion of the line; and yet it may be that one can give its equation and construction, wherein a geometrician would find the reason and the fittingness of all these so-called irregularities. That is how we must look upon the irregularities constituted by monstrosities and other so-called defects in the universe.

243. In this sense one may apply that fine adage of St. Bernard (Ephesians 276, Ad Eugen., III): ’Ordinatissimum est, minus interdum ordinate fieri aliquid.’ It belongs to the great order that there should be some small disorder. One may even say that this small disorder is apparent only in the whole, and it is not even apparent when one considers the happiness of those who walk in the ways of order.

244. When I mention monstrosities I include numerous other apparent defects besides. We are acquainted with hardly anything but the surface of our globe; we scarce penetrate into its interior beyond a few hundred fathoms. That which we find in this crust of the globe appears to be the effect of some great upheavals. It seems that this globe was once on fire, and that the rocks forming the base of this crust of the earth are scoria remaining from a great fusion. In their entrails are found metal and mineral products, which closely resemble those emanating from our furnaces: and the entire sea may be a kind of _oleum per deliquium_, just as tartaric oil forms in a damp place. For when the earth’s surface cooled after the great conflagration the moisture that the fire had driven into the air fell back upon the earth, washed its surface and dissolved and absorbed the solid salt that was left in the cinders, finally filling up this great cavity in the surface of our globe, to form the ocean filled with salt water.

245. But, after the fire, one must conclude that earth and water made ravages no less. It may be that the crust formed by the cooling, having below it great cavities, fell in, so that we live only on ruins, as among others Thomas Burnet, Chaplain to the late King of Great Britain, aptly observed. Sundry deluges and inundations have left deposits, whereof traces and remains are found which show that the sea was in places that to-day are most remote from it. But these upheavals ceased at last, and the globe assumed the shape that we see. Moses hints at these changes in few words: the separation of light from darkness indicates the melting caused by the fire; and the separation of the moist from the dry marks the effects of inundations. But who does not see that these disorders have served to bring things to the point where they now are, that we owe to them our riches and our comforts, and that through their agency this globe became fit for cultivation by us. These disorders passed into order. The disorders, real or apparent, that we see from afar are sunspots and comets; but we do not know what uses they supply, nor the rules prevailing therein. Time was when the planets were held to be wandering stars: now their motion is found to be regular. Peradventure it is the same with the comets: posterity will know.

246. One does not include among the disorders inequality of conditions, and M. Jacquelot is justified in asking those who would have everything equally perfect, why rocks are not crowned with leaves and flowers? why ants are not peacocks? And if there must needs be equality everywhere, the poor man would serve notice of appeal against the rich, the servant against the master. The pipes of an organ must not be of equal size. M. Bayle will say that there is a difference between a privation of good and a disorder; between a disorder in inanimate things, which is purely metaphysical, and a disorder in rational creatures, which is composed of crime and sufferings. He is right in making a distinction between them, and I am right in combining them. God does not neglect inanimate things: they do not feel, but God feels for them. He does not neglect animals: they have not intelligence, but God has it for them. He would reproach himself for the slightest actual defect there were in the universe, even though it were perceived of none.

247. It seems M. Bayle does not approve any comparison between the disorders which may exist in inanimate things and those which trouble the peace and happiness of rational creatures; nor would he agree to our justifying the permission of vice on the pretext of the care that must be taken to avoid disturbing the laws of motion. One might thence conclude, according to him (posthumous Reply to M. Jacquelot, p. 183), ’that God created the world only to display his infinite skill in architecture and mechanics, whilst his property of goodness and love of virtue took no part in the construction of this great work. This God would pride himself only on skill; he would prefer to let the whole human kind perish rather than suffer some atoms to go faster or more slowly than general laws require.’ M. Bayle would not have made this antithesis if he had been informed on the system of general harmony which I assume, which states that the realm of efficient causes and that of final causes are parallel to each other; that God has no less the quality of the best monarch than that of the greatest architect; that matter is so disposed that the laws of motion serve as the best guidance for spirits; and that consequently it will prove that he has attained the utmost good possible, provided one reckon the metaphysical, physical and moral goods together.

248. But (M. Bayle will say) God having power to avert innumerable evils by one small miracle, why did he not employ it? He gives so much extraordinary help to fallen men; but slight help of such a kind given to Eve would have prevented her fall and rendered the temptation of the serpent ineffective. I have sufficiently met objections of this sort with this general answer, that God ought not to make choice of another universe since he has chosen the best, and has only made use of the miracles necessary thereto. I had answered M. Bayle that miracles change the natural order of the universe. He replies, that that is an illusion, and that the miracle of the wedding at Cana (for instance) made no change in the air of the room, except that instead of receiving into its pores some corpuscles of water, it received corpuscles of wine. But one must bear in mind that once the best plan of things has been chosen nothing can be changed therein.

249. As for miracles (concerning which I have already said something in this work), they are perhaps not all of one and the same kind: there are many, to all appearances, which God brings about through the ministry of invisible substances, such as the angels, as Father Malebranche also believes. These angels or these substances act according to the ordinary laws of their nature, being combined with bodies more rarefied and more vigorous than those we have at our command. And such miracles are only so by comparison, and in relation to us; just as our works would be considered miraculous amongst animals if they were capable of remarking upon them. The changing of water into wine might be a miracle of this kind. But the Creation, the Incarnation and some other actions of God exceed all the power of creatures and are truly miracles, or indeed Mysteries. If, nevertheless, the changing of water into wine at Cana was a miracle of the highest kind, God would have thereby changed the whole course of the universe, because of the connexion of bodies; or else he would have been bound to prevent this connexion miraculously also, and cause the bodies not concerned in the miracle to act as if no miracle had happened. After the miracle was over, it would have been necessary to restore all things in those very bodies concerned to the state they would have reached without the miracle: whereafter all would have returned to its original course. Thus this miracle demanded more than at first appears.

250. As for physical evil in creatures, to wit their sufferings, M. Bayle contends vigorously against those who endeavour to justify by means of particular reasons the course of action pursued by God in regard to this. Here I set aside the sufferings of animals, and I see that M. Bayle insists chiefly on those of men, perhaps because he thinks that brute beasts have no feeling. It is on account of the injustice there would be in the sufferings of beasts that divers Cartesians wished to prove that they are only machines, _quoniam sub Deo justo nemo innocens miser est_: it is impossible that an innocent creature should be unhappy under such a master as God. The principle is good, but I do not think it warrants the inference that beasts have no feeling, because I think that, properly speaking, perception is not sufficient to cause misery if it is not accompanied by reflexion. It is the same with happiness: without reflexion there is none.

_O fortunatos nimium, sua qui bona norint!_

One cannot reasonably doubt the existence of pain among animals; but it seems as if their pleasures and their pains are not so keen as they are in man: for animals, since they do not reflect, are susceptible neither to the grief that accompanies pain, nor to the joy that accompanies pleasure. Men are sometimes in a state approaching that of the beasts, when they act almost on instinct alone and simply on the impressions made by the experience of the senses: and, in this state, their pleasures and their pains are very slight.

251. But let us pass from the beasts and return to rational creatures. It is with regard to them that M. Bayle discusses this question: whether there is more physical evil than physical good in the world? (_Reply to the Questions of a Provincial_, vol. II, ch. 75.) To settle it aright, one must explain wherein these goods and evils lie. We are agreed that physical evil is simply displeasure and under that heading I include pain, grief, and every other kind of discomfort. But does physical good lie solely in pleasure? M. Bayle appears to be of this opinion; but I consider that it lies also in a middle state, such as that of health. One is well enough when one has no ill; it is a degree of wisdom to have no folly:

_Sapientia prima est,_ _Stultitia caruisse_. In the same way one is worthy of praise when one cannot with justice be blamed:

_Si non culpabor, sat mihi laudis erit_. That being the case, all the sensations not unpleasing to us, all the exercises of our powers that do not incommode us, and whose prevention would incommode us, are physical goods, even when they cause us no pleasure; for privation of them is a physical evil. Besides we only perceive the good of health, and other like goods, when we are deprived of them. On those terms I would dare to maintain that even in this life goods exceed evils, that our comforts exceed our discomforts, and that M. Descartes was justified in writing (vol. I, Letter 9) ’that natural reason teaches us that we have more goods than evils in this life’.

252. It must be added that pleasures enjoyed too often and to excess would be a very great evil. There are some which Hippocrates compared to the falling sickness, and Scioppius doubtless only made pretence of envying the sparrows in order to be agreeably playful in a learned and far from playful work. Highly seasoned foods are injurious to health and impair the niceness of a delicate sense; and in general bodily pleasures are a kind of expenditure of the spirit, though they be made good in some better than in others.

253. As proof, however, that the evil exceeds the good is quoted the instance of M. de la Motte le Vayer (Letter 134), who would not have been willing to return to the world, supposing he had had to play the same part as providence had already assigned to him. But I have already said that I think one would accept the proposal of him who could re-knot the thread of Fate if a new part were promised to us, even though it should not be better than the first. Thus from M. de la Motte le Vayer’s saying it does not follow that he would not have wished for the part he had already played, provided it had been new, as M. Bayle seems to take it.

254. The pleasures of the mind are the purest, and of greatest service in making joy endure. Cardan, when already an old man, was so content with his state that he protested solemnly that he would not exchange it for the state of the richest of young men who at the same time was ignorant. M. de la Motte le Vayer quotes the saying himself without criticizing it. nowledge has doubtless charms which cannot be conceived by those who have not tasted them. I do not mean a mere knowledge of facts without that of reasons, but knowledge like that of Cardan, who with all his faults was a great man, and would have been incomparable without those faults.

_Felix, qui potuit rerum cognoscere causas!_ _Ille metus omnes et inexorabile fatum_ _Subjecit pedibus._

It is no small thing to be content with God and with the universe, not to fear what destiny has in store for us, nor to complain of what befalls us. Acquaintance with true principles gives us this advantage, quite other than that the Stoics and the Epicureans derived from their philosophy. There is as much difference between true morality and theirs as there is between joy and patience: for their tranquillity was founded only on necessity, while ours must rest upon the perfection and beauty of things, upon our own happiness.

255. What, then, shall we say of bodily sufferings? May they not be sufficiently acute to disturb the sage’s tranquillity? Aristotle assents; the Stoics were of a different opinion, and even the Epicureans likewise. M. Descartes revived the doctrine of these philosophers; he says in the letter just quoted: ’that even amid the worst misfortunes and the most overwhelming sufferings one may always be content, if only one knows how to exercise reason’. M. Bayle says concerning this (_Reply to the Questions of a Provincial_, vol. III, ch. 157, p. 991) ’that it is saying nothing, that it is prescribing for us a remedy whose preparation hardly anyone understands’. I hold that the thing is not impossible, and that men could attain it by dint of meditation and practice. For apart from the true martyrs and those who have been aided in wonderful wise from on high, there have been counterfeits who imitated them. That Spanish slave who killed the Carthaginian governor in order to avenge his master and who evinced great joy in his deed, even in the greatest tortures, may shame the philosophers. Why should not one go as far as he? One may say of an advantage, as of a disadvantage:

_Cuivis potest accidere, quod cuiquam potest_.

256. But even to-day entire tribes, such as the Hurons, the Iroquois, the Galibis and other peoples of America teach us a great lesson on this matter: one cannot read without astonishment of the intrepidity and well-nigh insensibility wherewith they brave their enemies, who roast them over a slow fire and eat them by slices. If such people could retain their physical superiority and their courage, and combine them with our acquirements, they would surpass us in every way, _Extat ut in mediis turris aprica casis_.

They would be, in comparison with us, as a giant to a dwarf, a mountain to a hill:

_Quantus Eryx, et quantus Athos, gaudetque nivali_ _Vertice se attollens pater Apenninus ad auras._

257. All that which is effected by a wonderful vigour of body and mind in these savages, who persist obstinately in the strangest point of honour, might be acquired in our case by training, by well-seasoned mortifications, by an overmastering joy founded on reason, by great practice in preserving a certain presence of mind in the midst of the distractions and impressions most liable to disturb it. Something of this kind is related of the ancient Assassins, subjects and pupils of the Old Man or rather the Seigneur (_Senior_) of the Mountain. Such a school (for a better purpose) would be good for missionaries who would wish to return to Japan. The Gymnosophists of the ancient Indians had perhaps something resembling this, and that Calanus, who provided for Alexander the Great the spectacle of his burning alive, had doubtless been encouraged by the great examples of his masters and trained by great sufferings not to fear pain. The wives of these same

Indians, who even to-day ask to be burned with the bodies of their husbands, seem still to keep something of the courage of those ancient philosophers of their country. I do not expect that there should straightway be founded a religious order whose purpose would be to exalt man to that high pitch of perfection: such people would be too much above the rest, and too formidable for the authorities. As it rarely happens that people are exposed to extremes where such great strength of mind would be needed, one will scarce think of providing for it at the expense of our usual comforts, albeit incomparably more would be gained than lost thereby.

258. Nevertheless the very fact that one has no need of that great remedy is a proof that the good already exceeds the evil. Euripides also said:

[Greek: pleiô ta chrêsta tôn kakôn einai brotois].

_Mala nostra longe judico vinci a bonis._

Homer and divers other poets were of another mind, and men in general agree with them. The reason for this is that the evil arouses our attention rather than the good: but this same reason proves that the evil is more rare. One must therefore not credit the petulant expressions of Pliny, who would have it that Nature is a stepmother, and who maintains that man is the most unhappy and most vain of all creatures. These two epithets do not agree: one is not so very unhappy, when one is full of oneself. It is true that men hold human nature only too much in contempt, apparently because they see no other creatures capable of arousing their emulation; but they have all too much self-esteem, and individually are but too easily satisfied. I therefore agree with Meric Casaubon, who in his notes on the Xenophanes of Diogenes Laertius praises exceedingly the admirable sentiments of Euripides, going so far as to credit him with having said things _quae spirant_ [Greek: theopneuston] _pectus_. Seneca (Lib. 4, c. 5, _De Benefic._) speaks eloquently of the blessings Nature has heaped upon us. M. Bayle in his _Dictionary_, article ’Xenophanes’, brings up sundry authorities against this, and among others that of the poet Diphilus in the Collections of Stobaeus, whose Greek might be thus expressed in Latin:

_Fortuna cyathis bibere nos datis jubens,_ _Infundit uno terna pro bono mala._

259. M. Bayle believes that if it were a question only of the evil of guilt, or of moral evil among men, the case would soon be terminated to the advantage of Pliny, and Euripides would lose his action. To that I am not opposed; our vices doubtless exceed our virtues, and this is the effect of original sin. It is nevertheless true that also on that point men in general exaggerate things, and that even some theologians disparage man so much that they wrong the providence of the Author of mankind. That is why I am not in favour of those who thought to do great honour to our religion by saying that the virtues of the pagans were only _splendida peccata_, splendid vices. It is a sally of St. Augustine’s which has no foundation in holy Scripture, and which offends reason. But here we are only discussing a physical good and evil, and one must compare in detail the prosperities and the adversities of this life. M. Bayle would wish almost to set aside the consideration of health; he likens it to the rarefied bodies, which are scarcely felt, like air, for example; but he likens pain to the bodies that have much density and much weight in slight volume. But pain itself makes us aware of the importance of health when we are bereft of it. I have already observed that excess of physical pleasures would be a real evil, and the matter ought not to be otherwise; it is too important for the spirit to be free. Lactantius (_Divin. Instit._, lib. 3, cap. 18) had said that men are so squeamish that they complain of the slightest ill, as if it swallowed up all the goods they have enjoyed. M. Bayle says, concerning this, that the very fact that men have this feeling warrants the judgement that they are in evil case, since it is feeling which measures the extent of good or evil. But I answer that present feeling is anything rather than the true measure of good and evil past and future. I grant that one is in evil case while one makes these peevish reflexions; but that does not exclude a previous state of well-being, nor imply that, everything reckoned in and all allowance made, the good does not exceed the evil.

260. I do not wonder that the pagans, dissatisfied with their gods, made complaints against Prometheus and Epimetheus for having forged so weak an animal as man. Nor do I wonder that they acclaimed the fable of old Silenus, foster-father of Bacchus, who was seized by King Midas, and as the price of his deliverance taught him that ostensibly fine maxim that the first and the greatest of goods was not to be born, and the second, to depart from this life with dispatch (Cic., _Tuscul._, lib. 1). Plato believed that souls had been in a happier state, and many of the ancients, amongst others Cicero in his Consolation (according to the account of Lactantius), believed that for their sins they were confined in bodies as in a prison. They rendered thus a reason for our ills, and asserted their prejudices against human life: for there is no such thing as a beautiful prison. But quite apart from the consideration that, even according to these same pagans, the evils of this life would be counterbalanced and exceeded by the goods of past and future lives, I make bold to say that we shall find, upon unbiassed scrutiny of the facts, that taking all in all human life is in general tolerable. And adding thereto the motives of religion, we shall be content with the order God has set therein. Moreover, for a better judgement of our goods and our evils, it will be well to read Cardan, _De Utilitate ex Adversis Capienda_, and Novarini, _De Occultis Dei Beneficiis_.

261. M. Bayle dilates upon the misfortunes of the great, who are thought to be the most fortunate: the constant experience of the fair aspect of their condition renders them unaware of good, but greatly aware of evil. Someone will say: so much the worse for them; if they know not how to enjoy the advantages of nature and fortune, is that the fault of either? There are nevertheless great men possessed of more wisdom, who know how to profit by the favours God has shown them, who are easily consoled for their misfortunes, and who even turn their own faults to account. M. Bayle pays no heed to that: he prefers to listen to Pliny, who thinks that Augustus, one of the princes most favoured by fortune, experienced at least as much evil as good. I admit that he found great causes of trouble in his family and that remorse for having crushed the Republic may have tormented him; but I think that he was too wise to grieve over the former, and that Maecenas apparently made him understand that Rome had need of a master. Had not Augustus been converted on this point, Vergil would never have said of a lost soul:

_Vendidit hic auro patriam Dominumque potentem_ _Imposuit, fixit leges pretio atque refixit._

Augustus would have thought that he and Caesar were alluded to in these lines, which speak of a master given to a free state. But there is every indication that he applied it just as little to his dominion, which he regarded as compatible with liberty and as a necessary remedy for public evils, as the princes of to-day apply to themselves the words used of the kings censured in M. de Cambray’s _Telemachus_. Each one considers himself within his rights. Tacitus, an unbiassed writer, justifies Augustus in two words, at the beginning of his _Annals_. But Augustus was better able than anyone to judge of his good fortune. He appears to have died content, as may be inferred from a proof he gave of contentedness with his life: for in dying he repeated to his friends a line in Greek, which has the signification of that _Plaudite_ that was wont to be spoken at the conclusion of a well-acted play. Suetonius quotes it:

[Greek: Dote kroton kai pantes hymeis meta charas ktypêsate.]

262. But even though there should have fallen to the lot of the human kind more evil than good, it is enough where God is concerned that there is incomparably more good than evil in the universe. Rabbi Maimonides (whose merit is not sufficiently recognized in the statement that he is the first of the Rabbis to have ceased talking nonsense) also gave wise judgement on this question of the predominance of good over evil in the world. Here is what he says in his _Doctor Perplexorum_ (cap. 12, p. 3): ’There arise often in the hearts of ill-instructed persons thoughts which persuade them there is more evil than good in the world: and one often finds in the poems and songs of the pagans that it is as it were a miracle when something good comes to pass, whereas evils are usual and constant. This error has taken hold not of the common herd only, those very persons who wish to be considered wise have been beguiled thereby. A celebrated writer named Alrasi, in his _Sepher Elohuth_, or Theosophy, amongst other absurdities has stated that there are more evils than goods, and that upon comparison of the recreations and the pleasures man enjoys in times of tranquillity with the pains, the torments, the troubles, faults, cares, griefs and afflictions whereby he is overwhelmed our life would prove to be a great evil, and an actual penalty inflicted upon us to punish us.’ Maimonides adds that the cause of their extravagant error is their supposition that Nature was made for them only, and that they hold of no account what is separate from their person; whence they infer that when something unpleasing to them occurs all goes ill in the universe.

263. M. Bayle says that this observation of Maimonides is not to the point, because the question is whether among men evil exceeds good. But, upon consideration of the Rabbi’s words, I find that the question he formulates is general, and that he wished to refute those who decide it on one particular motive derived from the evils of the human race, as if all had been made for man; and it seems as though the author whom he refutes spoke also of good and evil in general. Maimonides is right in saying that if one took into account the littleness of man in relation to the universe one would comprehend clearly that the predominance of evil, even though it prevailed among men, need not on that account occur among the angels, nor among the heavenly bodies, nor among the elements and inanimate compounds, nor among many kinds of animals. I have shown elsewhere that in supposing that the number of the damned exceeds that of the saved (a supposition which is nevertheless not altogether certain) one might admit that there is more evil than good in respect of the human kind known to us. But I pointed out that that neither precludes the existence of incomparably more good than evil, both moral and physical, in rational creatures in general, nor prevents the city of God, which contains all creatures, from being the most perfect state. So also on consideration of the metaphysical good and evil which is in all substances, whether endowed with or devoid of intelligence, and which taken in such scope would include physical good and moral good, one must say that the universe, such as it actually is, must be the best of all systems.

264. Moreover, M. Bayle will not have it that our transgression should have anything to do with the consideration of our sufferings. He is right when it is simply a matter of appraising these sufferings; but the case is not the same when one asks whether they should be ascribed to God, this indeed being the principal cause of M. Bayle’s difficulties when he places reason or experience in opposition to religion. I know that he is wont to say that it is of no avail to resort to our free will, since his objections tend also to prove that the misuse of free will must no less be laid to the account of God, who has permitted it and who has co-operated therein. He states it as a maxim that for one difficulty more or less one must not abandon a system. This he advances especially in favour of the methods of the strict and the dogma of the Supralapsarians. For he supposes that one can subscribe to their opinion, although he leaves all the difficulties in their entirety, because the other systems, albeit they put an end to some of the difficulties, cannot meet them all. I hold that the true system I have expounded satisfies all. Nevertheless, even were that not so, I confess that I cannot relish this maxim of M. Bayle’s, and I should prefer a system which would remove a great portion of the difficulties, to one which would meet none of them. And the consideration of the wickedness of men, which brings upon them well-nigh all their misfortunes, shows at least that they have no right to complain. No justice need trouble itself over the origin of a scoundrel’s wickedness when it is only a question of punishing him: it is quite another matter when it is a question of prevention. One knows well that disposition, upbringing, conversation, and often chance itself, have much share in that origin: is the man any the less deserving of punishment?

265. I confess that there still remains another difficulty. If God is not bound to account to the wicked for their wickedness, it seems as if he owes to himself, and to those who honour him and love him, justification for his course of action with regard to the permission of vice and crime. But God has already given that satisfaction, as far as it is needed here on earth: by granting us the light of reason he has bestowed upon us the means whereby we may meet all difficulties. I hope that I have made it plain in this discourse, and have elucidated the matter in the preceding portion of these Essays, almost as far as it can be done through general arguments. Thereafter, the permission of sin being justified, the other evils that are a consequence thereof present no further difficulty. Thus also I am justified in restricting myself here to the evil of guilt to account for the evil of punishment, as Holy Scripture does, and likewise well-nigh all the Fathers of the Church and the Preachers. And, to the end that none may say that is only good _per la predica_, it is enough to consider that, after the solutions I have given, nothing must seem more right or more exact than this method. For God, having found already among things possible, before his actual decrees, man misusing his freedom and bringing upon himself his misfortune, yet could not avoid admitting him into existence, because the general plan required this. Wherefore it will no longer be necessary to say with M. Jurieu that one must dogmatize like St. Augustine and preach like Pelagius.

266. This method, deriving the evil of punishment from the evil of guilt, cannot be open to censure, and serves especially to account for the greatest physical evil, which is damnation. Ernst Sonner, sometime Professor of Philosophy at Altorf (a university established in the territory of the free city of Nuremberg), who was considered an excellent Aristotelian, but was finally recognized as being secretly a Socinian, had composed a little discourse entitled: _Demonstration against the Eternity of Punishment_. It was founded on this somewhat trite principle, that there is no proportion between an infinite punishment and a finite guilt. It was conveyed to me, printed (so it seemed) in Holland; and I replied that there was one thing to be considered which had escaped the late Herr Sonner: namely that it was enough to say that the duration of the guilt caused the duration of the penalty. Since the damned remained wicked they could not be withdrawn from their misery; and thus one need not, in order to justify the continuation of their sufferings, assume that sin has become of infinite weight through the infinite nature of the object offended, who is God. This thesis I had not explored enough to pass judgement thereon. I know that the general opinion of the Schoolmen, according to the Master of the Sentences, is that in the other life there is neither merit nor demerit; but I do not think that, taken literally, it can pass for an article of faith. Herr Fecht, a famous theologian at Rostock, well refuted that in his book on _The State of the Damned_. It is quite wrong, he says (§ 59); God cannot change his nature; justice is essential to him; death has closed the door of grace, but not that of justice.

267. I have observed that sundry able theologians have accounted for the duration of the pains of the damned as I have just done. Johann Gerhard, a famous theologian of the Augsburg Confession (in _Locis Theol._, loco de Inferno, § 60), brings forward amongst other arguments that the damned have still an evil will and lack the grace that could render it good. Zacharias Ursinus, a theologian of Heidelberg, who follows Calvin, having formulated this question (in his treatise _De Fide_) why sin merits an eternal punishment, advances first the common reason, that the person offended is infinite, and then also this second reason, _quod non cessante peccato non potest cessare poena_. And the Jesuit Father Drexler says in his book entitled _Nicetas, or Incontinence Overcome_ (book 2, ch. 11, § 9): ’Nec mirum damnatos semper torqueri, continue blasphemant, et sic quasi semper peccant, semper ergo plectuntur.’ He declares and approves the same reason in his work on _Eternity_ (book 2, ch. 15) saying: ’Sunt qui dicant, nec displicet responsum: scelerati in locis infernis semper peccant, ideo semper puniuntur.’ And he indicates thereby that this opinion is very common among learned men in the Roman Church. He alleges, it is true, another more subtle reason, derived from Pope Gregory the Great (lib. 4, Dial. c. 44), that the damned are punished eternally because God foresaw by a kind of _mediate knowledge_ that they would always have sinned if they had always lived upon earth. But it is a hypothesis very much open to question. Herr Fecht quotes also various eminent Protestant theologians for Herr Gerhard’s opinion, although he mentions also some who think differently.

268. M. Bayle himself in various places has supplied me with passages from two able theologians of his party, which have some reference to these statements of mine. M. Jurieu in his book on the _Unity of the Church_, in opposition to that written by M. Nicole on the same subject, gives the opinion (p. 379) ’that reason tells us that a creature which cannot cease to be criminal can also not cease to be miserable’. M. Jacquelot in his book on _The Conformity of Faith with Reason_ (p. 220) is of opinion ’that the damned must remain eternally deprived of the glory of the blessed, and that this deprivation might well be the origin and the cause of all their pains, through the reflexions these unhappy creatures make upon their crimes which have deprived them of an eternal bliss. One knows what burning regrets, what pain envy causes to those who see themselves deprived of a good, of a notable honour which had been offered to them, and which they rejected, especially when they see others invested with it.’ This position is a little different from that of M. Jurieu, but both agree in this sentiment, that the damned are themselves the cause of the continuation of their torments. M. le Clerc’s Origenist does not entirely differ from this opinion when he says in the _Select Library_ (vol. 7, p. 341): ’God, who foresaw that man would fall, does not condemn him on that account, but only because, although he has the power to recover himself, he yet does not do so, that is, he freely retains his evil ways to the end of his life.’ If he carries this reasoning on beyond this life, he will ascribe the continuation of the pains of the wicked to the continuation of their guilt.

269. M. Bayle says (_Reply to the Questions of a Provincial_, ch. 175, p. 1188) ’that this dogma of the Origenist is heretical, in that it teaches that damnation is not founded simply on sin, but on voluntary impenitence’: but is not this voluntary impenitence a continuation of sin? I would not simply say, however, that it is because man, having the power to recover himself, does not; and would wish to add that it is because man does not take advantage of the succour of grace to aid him to recover himself. But after this life, though one assume that the succour ceases, there is always in the man who sins, even when he is damned, a freedom which renders him culpable, and a power, albeit remote, of recovering himself, even though it should never pass into action. And there is no reason why one may not say that this degree of freedom, exempt from necessity, but not exempt from certainty, remains in the damned as well as in the blessed. Moreover, the damned have no need of a succour that is needed in this life, for they know only too well what one must believe here.

270. The illustrious prelate of the Anglican Church who published recently a book on the origin of evil, concerning which M. Bayle made some observations in the second volume of his _Reply_, speaks with much subtlety about the pains of the damned. This prelate’s opinion is presented (according to the author of the _Nouvelles de la République des Lettres_, June 1703) as if he made ’of the damned just so many madmen who will feel their miseries acutely, but who will nevertheless congratulate themselves on their own behaviour, and who will rather choose to be, and to be that which they are, than not to be at all. They will love their state, unhappy as it will be, even as angry people, lovers, the ambitious, the envious take pleasure in the very things that only augment their misery. Furthermore the ungodly will have so accustomed their mind to wrong judgements that they will henceforth never make any other kind, and will perpetually pass from one error into another. They will not be able to refrain from desiring perpetually things whose enjoyment will be denied them, and, being deprived of which, they will fall into inconceivable despair, while experience can never make them wiser for the future. For by their own fault they will have altogether corrupted their understanding, and will have rendered it incapable of passing a sound judgement on any matter.’

271. The ancients already imagined that the Devil dwells remote from God voluntarily, in the midst of his torments, and that he is unwilling to redeem himself by an act of submission. They invented a tale that an anchorite in a vision received a promise from God that he would receive into grace the Prince of the bad angels if he would acknowledge his fault; but that the devil rebuffed this mediator in a strange manner. At the least, the theologians usually agree that the devils and the damned hate

God and blaspheme him; and such a state cannot but be followed by continuation of misery. Concerning that, one may read the learned treatise of Herr Fecht on the _State of the Damned_.

272. There were times when the belief was held that it was not impossible for a lost soul to be delivered. The story told of Pope Gregory the Great is well known, how by his prayers he had withdrawn from hell the soul of the Emperor Trajan, whose goodness was so renowned that to new emperors the wish was offered that they should surpass Augustus in good fortune and Trajan in goodness. It was this that won for the latter the pity of the Holy Father. God acceded to his prayers (it is said), but he forbade him to make the like prayers in future. According to this fable, the prayers of St. Gregory had the force of the remedies of Aesculapius, who recalled Hippolytus from Hades; and, if he had continued to make such prayers, God would have waxed wroth, like Jupiter in Vergil:

_At pater omnipotens aliquem indignatus ab umbris_ _Mortalem infernis ad lumina surgere vitae,_ _Ipse repertorem medicinae talis et artis_ _Fulmine Phoebigenam Stygias detrusit ad undas._

Godescalc, a monk of the ninth century, who set at variance the theologians of his day, and even those of our day, maintained that the reprobate should pray God to render their pains more bearable; but one is never justified in believing oneself reprobate so long as one is alive. The passage in the Mass for the dead is more reasonable: it asks for the abatement of the torments of the damned, and, according to the hypothesis that I have just stated, one must wish for them _meliorem mentem_. Origen having applied the passage from Psalm lxxvii, verse 10: God will not forget to be gracious, neither will he shut up his loving-kindness in displeasure, St. Augustine replies _(Enchirid._, c. 112) that it is possible that the pains of the damned last eternally, and that they may nevertheless be mitigated. If the text implied that, the abatement would, as regards its duration, go on to infinity; and yet that abatement would, as regards its extent, have a _non plus ultra_. Even so there are asymptote figures in geometry where an infinite length makes only a finite progress in breadth. If the parable of the wicked rich man represented the state of a definitely lost soul, the hypothesis which makes these souls so mad and so wicked would be groundless. But the charity towards his brothers attributed to him in the parable does not seem to be consistent with that degree of wickedness which is ascribed to the damned. St. Gregory the Great (IX _Mor._, 39) thinks that the rich man was afraid lest their damnation should increase his: but it seems as though this fear is not sufficiently consistent with the disposition of a perfectly wicked will. Bonaventura, on the Master of the Sentences, says that the wicked rich man would have desired to see everyone damned; but since that was not to be, he desired the salvation of his brothers rather than that of the rest. This reply is by no means sound. On the contrary, the mission of Lazarus that he desired would have served to save many people; and he who takes so much pleasure in the damnation of others that he desires it for everyone will perhaps desire that damnation for some more than others; but, generally speaking, he will have no inclination to gain salvation for anyone. However that may be, one must admit that all this detail is problematical, God having revealed to us all that is needed to put us in fear of the greatest of misfortunes, and not what is needed for our understanding thereof.

273. Now since it is henceforth permitted to have recourse to the misuse of free will, and to evil will, in order to account for other evils, since the divine permission of this misuse is plainly enough justified, the ordinary system of the theologians meets with justification at the same time. Now we can seek with confidence _the origin of evil in the freedom of creatures_. The first wickedness is well known to us, it is that of the Devil and his angels: the Devil sinneth from the beginning, and for this purpose the Son of God was manifested, that he might destroy the works of the Devil (1 John 3:8). The Devil is the father of wickedness, he was a murderer from the beginning, and abode not in the truth (John 8:44). And therefore God spared not the angels that sinned, but cast them down to Hell, and delivered them into chains of darkness, to be reserved unto judgement (2 Peter 2:4). And the angels which kept not their own habitation, he hath reserved in _eternal_ (that is to say everlasting) chains under darkness unto the judgement of the great day (Jude 1:6). Whence it is easy to observe that one of these two letters must have been seen by the author of the other.

274. It seems as if the author of the Apocalypse wished to throw light upon what the other canonical writers had left obscure: he gives us an account of a battle that took place in Heaven. Michael and his angels fought against the Dragon, and the Dragon fought and his angels. ’But they prevailed not, neither was their place found any more in heaven. And the great Dragon was cast out, that old serpent, called the Devil, and Satan, which deceiveth the whole world: and he was cast out into the earth, and his angels were cast out with him’ (Revelation 12:7-9). For although this account is placed after the flight of the woman into the wilderness, and it may have been intended to indicate thereby some revulsion favourable to the Church, it appears as though the author’s design was to show simultaneously the old fall of the first enemy and a new fall of a new enemy.

275. Lying or wickedness springs from the Devil’s own nature, [Greek: ek tôn idiôn] from his will, because it was written in the book of the eternal verities, which contains the things possible before any decree of God, that this creature would freely turn toward evil if it were created. It is the same with Eve and Adam; they sinned freely, albeit the Devil tempted them. God gives the wicked over to a reprobate mind (Romans 1:28), abandoning them to themselves and denying them a grace which he owes them not, and indeed ought to deny to them.

276. It is said in the Scriptures that God hardeneth (Exodus 4:21 and Exodus 7:3; Isaiah 63:17); that God sendeth a lying spirit (1 Kings 22:23); strong delusion that they should believe a lie (2 Thessalonians 2:11); that he deceived the prophet (Ezekiel 14:9); that he commanded Shimei to curse (2 Samuel 16:10); that the children of Eli hearkened not unto the voice of their father, because the Lord would slay them (1 Samuel 2:25); that the Lord took away Job’s substance, even although that was done through the malice of brigands (Job 1:21); that he raised up Pharaoh, to show his power in him (Exodus 9:19; Romans 9:17) that he is like a potter who maketh a vessel unto dishonour (Romans 9:21); that he hideth the truth from the wise and prudent (Matthew 11:25); that he speaketh in parables unto them that are without, that seeing they may see and not perceive, and hearing they may hear and not understand, lest at any time they might be converted, and their sins might be forgiven them (Mark 4:12; Luke 8:10); that Jesus was delivered by the determinate counsel and foreknowledge of God (Acts 2:23); that Pontius Pilate and Herod with the Gentiles and the people of Israel did that which the hand and the counsel of God had determined before to be done (Acts 4:27-28); that it was of the Lord to harden the hearts of the enemy, that they should come against Israel in battle, that he might destroy them utterly, and that they might have no favour (Joshua 11:20); that the Lord mingled a perverse spirit in the midst of Egypt, and caused it to err in all its works, like a drunken man (Isaiah 19:14); that Rehoboam hearkened not unto the word of the people, for the cause was from the Lord (1 Kings 12:15); that he turned the hearts of the Egyptians to hate his people (Psalms 105:25). But all these and other like expressions suggest only that the things God has done are used as occasion for ignorance, error, malice and evil deeds, and contribute thereto, God indeed foreseeing this, and intending to use it for his ends, since superior reasons of perfect wisdom have determined him to permit these evils, and even to co-operate therein. ’Sed non sineret bonus fieri male, nisi omnipotens etiam de malo posset facere bene’, in St. Augustine’s words. But this has been expounded more fully in the preceding part.

277. God made man in his image (Genesis 1:26); he made him upright (Ecclesiastes 7:29). But also he made him free. Man has behaved badly, he has fallen; but there remains still a certain freedom after the fall. Moses said as from God: ’I call heaven and earth to record this day against you, that I have set before you life and death, blessing and cursing; therefore choose life’ (Deuteronomy 30:19). ’Thus saith the Lord: Behold, I set before you the way of life, and the way of death’ (Jeremiah 21:8). He has left man in the power of his counsel, giving him his ordinances and his commandments. ’If thou wilt, thou shalt keep the commandments’ (or they shall keep thee). ’He hath set before thee fire and water, to stretch forth thine hand to whichever thou wilt’ (Sir 15:14-16). Fallen and unregenerate man is under the domination of sin and of Satan, because it pleases him so to be; he is a voluntary slave through his evil lust. Thus it is that free will and will in bondage are one and the same thing.

278. ’Let no man say, I am tempted of God’; ’but every man is tempted, when he is drawn away of his own lust and enticed’ (James 1:13-14). And Satan contributes thereto. He ’blindeth the minds of them which believe not’ (2 Corinthians 4:4). But man is delivered up to the Devil by his covetous desire: the pleasure he finds in evil is the bait that hooks him. Plato has said so already, and Cicero repeats it: ’Plato voluptatem dicebat escam malorum.’ Grace sets over against it a greater pleasure, as St. Augustine observed. All _pleasure_ is a feeling of some perfection; one _loves_ an object in proportion as one feels its perfections; nothing surpasses the divine perfections. Whence it follows that charity and love of God give the greatest pleasure that can be conceived, in that proportion in which one is penetrated by these feelings, which are not common among men, busied and taken up as men are with the objects that are concerned with their passions.

279. Now as our corruption is not altogether invincible and as we do not necessarily sin even when we are under the bondage of sin, it must likewise be said that we are not aided invincibly; and, however efficacious divine grace may be, there is justification for saying that one can resist it. But when it indeed proves victorious, it is certain and infallible beforehand that one will yield to its allurements, whether it have its strength of itself or whether it find a way to triumph through the congruity of circumstances. Thus one must always distinguish between the infallible and the necessary.

280. The system of those who call themselves Disciples of St. Augustine is not far removed from this, provided one exclude certain obnoxious things, whether in the expressions or in the dogmas themselves. In the _expressions_ I find that it is principally the use of terms like ’necessary’ or ’contingent’, ’possible’ or ’impossible’, which sometimes gives a handle and causes much ado. That is why, as Herr Löscher the younger aptly observed in a learned dissertation on the _Paroxysms of the Absolute Decree_, Luther desired, in his book _On the Will in Bondage_, to find a word more fitting for that which he wished to express than the word necessity. Speaking generally, it appears more reasonable and more fitting to say that obedience to God’s precepts is always _possible_, even for the unregenerate; that the grace of God is always _resistible_, even in those most holy, and that _freedom_ is exempt not only from _constraint_ but also from _necessity_, although it be never without infallible _certainty_ or without inclining _determination_.

281. Nevertheless there is on the other hand a sense wherein it would be permitted to say, in certain conjunctures, that the _power_ to do good is often lacking, even in the just; that sins are often _necessary_, even in the regenerate; that it is _impossible_ sometimes for one not to sin; that grace is _irresistible_; that freedom is not exempt from _necessity_. But these expressions are less exact and less pleasing in the circumstances that prevail about us to-day. They are also in general more open to misuse; and moreover they savour somewhat of the speech of the people, where terms are employed with great latitude. There are, however, circumstances which render them acceptable and even serviceable. It is the case that sacred and orthodox writers, and even the holy Scriptures, have made use of expressions on both sides, and no real contradiction has arisen, any more than between St. Paul and St. James, or any error on either side that might be attributable to the ambiguity of the terms. One is so well accustomed to these various ways of speaking that often one is put to it to say precisely which sense is the more ordinary and the more natural, and even that more intended by the author (_quis sensus magis naturalis, obvius, intentus_). For the same writer has different aims in different passages, and the same ways of speaking are more or less accepted or acceptable before or after the decision of some great man or of some authority that one respects and follows. As a result of this one may well authorize or ban, as opportunity arises and at certain times, certain expressions; but it makes no difference to the sense, or to the content of faith, if sufficient explanations of the terms are not added.

282. It is therefore only necessary to understand fully some distinctions, such as that I have very often urged between the necessary and the certain, and between metaphysical necessity and moral necessity. It is the same with possibility and impossibility, since the event whose opposite is possible is contingent, even as that whose opposite is impossible is necessary. A distinction is rightly drawn also between a proximate potency and a remote potency; and, according to these different senses, one says now that a thing may be and now that it may not be. It may be said in a certain sense that it is necessary that the blessed should not sin; that the devils and the damned should sin; that God himself should choose the best; that man should follow the course which after all attracts him most. But this necessity is not opposed to contingency; it is not of the kind called logical, geometrical or metaphysical, whose opposite implies contradiction. M. Nicole has made use somewhere of a comparison which is not amiss. It is considered impossible that a wise and serious magistrate, who has not taken leave of his senses, should publicly commit some outrageous action, as it would be, for instance, to run about the streets naked in order to make people laugh. It is the same, in a sense, with the blessed; they are still less capable of sinning, and the necessity that forbids them to sin is of the same kind. Finally I also hold that ’will’ is a term as equivocal as potency and necessity. For I have already observed that those who employ this axiom, that one does not fail to do what one wills when one can, and who thence infer that God therefore does not will the salvation of all, imply a _decretory will_. Only in that sense can one support this proposition, that wisdom never wills what it knows to be among the things that shall not happen. On the other hand, one may say, taking will in a sense more general and more in conformity with customary use, that the wise will is _inclined_ antecedently to all good, although it _decrees_ finally to do that which is most fitting. Thus one would be very wrong to deny to God the serious and strong inclination to save all men, which Holy Scripture attributes to him; or even to attribute to him an original distaste which diverts him from the salvation of a number of persons, _odium antecedaneum_. One should rather maintain that the wise mind tends towards all good, as good, in proportion to his knowledge and his power, but that he only produces the best that can be achieved. Those who admit that, and yet deny to God the antecedent will to save all men, are wrong only in their misuse of the term, provided that they acknowledge, besides, that God gives to all help sufficient to enable them to win salvation if only they have the will to avail themselves thereof.

283. In the _dogmas_ themselves held by the Disciples of St. Augustine I cannot approve the damnation of unregenerate children, nor in general damnation resulting from original sin alone. Nor can I believe that God condemns those who are without the necessary light. One may believe, with many theologians, that men receive more aid than we are aware of, were it only when they are at the point of death. It does not appear necessary either that all those who are saved should always be saved through a grace efficacious of itself, independently of circumstances. Also I consider it unnecessary to say that all the virtues of the pagans were false or that all their actions were sins; though it be true that what does not spring from faith, or from the uprightness of the soul before God, is infected with sin, at least virtually. Finally I hold that God cannot act as if at random by an absolutely absolute decree, or by a will independent of reasonable motives. And I am persuaded that he is always actuated, in the dispensation of his grace, by reasons wherein the nature of the objects participates. Otherwise he would not act in accordance with wisdom. I grant nevertheless that these reasons are not of necessity bound up with the good or the less evil natural qualities of men, as if God gave his grace only according to these good qualities. Yet I hold, as I have explained already here, that these qualities are taken into consideration like all the other circumstances, since nothing can be neglected in the designs of supreme wisdom.

284. Save for these points, and some few others, where St. Augustine appears obscure or even repellent, it seems as though one can conform to his system. He states that from the substance of God only a God can proceed, and that thus the creature is derived from nothingness (Augustine _De Lib. Arb._, lib. 1, c. 2). That is what makes the creature imperfect, faulty and corruptible (_De Genesi ad Lit._, c. 15, _Contra Epistolam Manichaei_, c. 36). Evil comes not from nature, but from evil will (Augustine, in the whole book _On the Nature of Good_). God can command nothing that would be impossible. ’Firmissime creditur Deum justum et bonum impossibilia non potuisse praecipere’ (_Lib. de Nat. et Grat._, c. 43, p. 69). Nemo peccat in eo, quod caveri non potest (lib. 3, _De Lib. Arb._, c. 16, 17, _lib._ 1 _Retract._ c. 11, 13, 15). Under a just God, none can be unhappy who deserves not so to be, ’neque sub Deo justo miser esse quisquam, nisi mereatur, potest’ (lib. 1, c. 39). Free will cannot carry out God’s commands without the aid of grace (_Ep. ad Hilar. Caesaraugustan._). We know that grace is not given according to deserts (Ephesians 106, 107, 120). Man in the state of innocence had the aid necessary to enable him to do good if he wished; but the wish depended on free will, ’habebat adjutorium, per quod posset, et sine quo non vellet, sed non adjutorium quo vellet’ (_Lib. de Corrept._, c. 11 et c. 10, 12). God let angels and men try what they could do by their free will, and after that what his grace and his justice could achieve (ibid., c. 10, 11, 12). Sin turned man away from God, to turn him towards creatures (lib. 1, qu. 2, _Ad Simplicium_). To take pleasure in sinning is the freedom of a slave (_Enchirid._, c. 103). ’Liberum arbitrium usque adeo in peccatore non periit, ut per illud peccent maxime omnes, qui cum delectatione peccant’ (lib. 1, _Ad Bonifac._, c. 2, 3).

285. God said to Moses: ’I will be gracious to whom I will be gracious, and will shew mercy on whom I will shew mercy’ (Exodus 33:19). ’So then it is not of him that willeth, nor of him that runneth, but of God that sheweth mercy’ (Romans 9:15-16). That does not prevent all those who have good will, and who persevere therein, from being saved. But God gives them the willing and the doing. ’Therefore hath he mercy on whom he will have mercy, and whom he will he hardeneth’ (Romans 9:18). And yet the same Apostle says that God willeth that all men should be saved, and come to the knowledge of the truth; which I would not interpret in accordance with some passages of St. Augustine, as if it signified that no men are saved except those whose salvation he wills, or as if he would save _non singulos generum, sed genera singulorum_. But I would rather say that there is none whose salvation he willeth not, in so far as this is permitted by greater reasons. For these bring it about that God only saves those who accept the faith he has offered to them and who surrender themselves thereto by the grace he has given them, in accordance with what was consistent with the plan of his works in its entirety, than which none can be better conceived.

286. As for predestination to salvation, it includes also, according to St. Augustine, the ordinance of the means that shall lead to salvation. ’Praedestinatio sanctorum nihil aliud est, quam praescientia et praeparatio beneficiorum Dei, quibus certissime liberantur quicunque liberantur’ (_Lib. de Persev._, c. 14). He does not then understand it there as an absolute decree; he maintains that there is a grace which is not rejected by any hardened heart, because it is given in order to remove especially the hardness of hearts (_Lib. de Praedest._, c. 8; _Lib. de Grat._, c. 13, 14). I do not find, however, that St. Augustine conveys sufficiently that this grace, which subdues the heart, is always efficacious of itself. And one might perhaps have asserted without offence to him that the same degree of inward grace is victorious in the one, where it is aided by outward circumstances, but not in the other.

287. Will is proportionate to the sense we have of the good, and follows the sense which prevails. ’Si utrumque tantundem diligimus, nihil horum dabimus. Item: Quod amplius nos delectat, secundum id operemur necesse est’ (in c. 5, _Ad Gal._). I have explained already how, despite all that, we have indeed a great power over our will. St. Augustine takes it somewhat differently, and in a way that does not go far, when he says that nothing is so much within our power as the action of our will. And he gives a reason which is almost tautological: for (he says) this action is ready at the moment when we will. ’Nihil tam in nostra potestate est, quam ipsa voluntas, ea enim mox ut volumus praesto est’ (lib. 3, _De Lib. Arb._, c. 3; lib. 5, _De Civ. Dei_, c. 10). But that only means that we will when we will, and not that we will that which we wish to will. There is more reason for saying with him: ’_aut voluntas non est, aut libera dicenda est_’ (d. 1, 3, c. 3); and that what inclines the will towards good infallibly, or certainly, does not prevent it from being free. ’Perquam absurdum est, ut ideo dicamus non pertinere ad voluntatem [libertatem] nostram, quod beati esse volumus, quia id omnino nolle non possumus, nescio qua bona constrictione naturae. Nec dicere audemus ideo Deum non voluntatem [libertatem], sed necessitatem habere justitiae, quia non potest velle peccare. Certe Deus ipse numquid quia peccare non potest, ideo liberum arbitrium habere negandus est?’ (_De Nat. et Grat._, c. 46, 47, 48, 49). He also says aptly, that God gives the first good impulse, but that afterwards man acts also. ’Aguntur ut agant, non ut ipsi nihil agant’ (_De Corrept._, c. 2).

288. I have proved that free will is the proximate cause of the evil of guilt, and consequently of the evil of punishment; although it is true that the original imperfection of creatures, which is already presented in the eternal ideas, is the first and most remote cause. M. Bayle nevertheless always disputes this use of the notion of free will; he will not have the cause of evil ascribed to it. One must listen to his objections, but first it will be well to throw further light on the nature of freedom. I have shown that freedom, according to the definition required in the schools of theology, consists in intelligence, which involves a clear knowledge of the object of deliberation, in spontaneity, whereby we determine, and in contingency, that is, in the exclusion of logical or metaphysical necessity. Intelligence is, as it were, the soul of freedom, and the rest is as its body and foundation. The free substance is self-determining and that according to the motive of good perceived by the understanding, which inclines it without compelling it: and all the conditions of freedom are comprised in these few words. It is nevertheless well to point out that the imperfection present in our knowledge and our spontaneity, and the infallible determination that is involved in our contingency, destroy neither freedom nor contingency.

289. Our knowledge is of two kinds, distinct or confused. Distinct knowledge, or _intelligence_, occurs in the actual use of reason; but the senses supply us with confused thoughts. And we may say that we are immune from bondage in so far as we act with a distinct knowledge, but that we are the slaves of passion in so far as our perceptions are confused. In this sense we have not all the freedom of spirit that were to be desired, and we may say with St. Augustine that being subject to sin we have the freedom of a slave. Yet a slave, slave as he is, nevertheless has freedom to choose according to the state wherein he is, although more often than not he is under the stern necessity of choosing between two evils, because a superior force prevents him from attaining the goods whereto he aspires. That which in a slave is effected by bonds and constraint in us is effected by passions, whose violence is sweet, but none the less pernicious. In truth we will only that which pleases us: but unhappily what pleases us now is often a real evil, which would displease us if we had the eyes of the understanding open. Nevertheless that evil state of the slave, which is also our own, does not prevent us, any more than him, from making a free choice of that which pleases us most, in the state to which we are reduced, in proportion to our present strength and knowledge.

290. As for spontaneity, it belongs to us in so far as we have within us the source of our actions, as Aristotle rightly conceived. The impressions of external things often, indeed, divert us from our path, and it was commonly believed that, at least in this respect, some of the sources of our actions were outside ourselves. I admit that one is bound to speak thus, adapting oneself to the popular mode of expression, as one may, in a certain sense, without doing violence to truth. But when it is a question of expressing oneself accurately I maintain that our spontaneity suffers no exception and that external things have no physical influence upon us, I mean in the strictly philosophical sense.

291. For better understanding of this point, one must know that true spontaneity is common to us and all simple substances, and that in the intelligent or free substance this becomes a mastery over its actions. That cannot be better explained than by the System of Pre-established Harmony, which I indeed propounded some years ago. There I pointed out that by nature every simple substance has perception, and that its individuality consists in the perpetual law which brings about the sequence of perceptions that are assigned to it, springing naturally from one another, to represent the body that is allotted to it, and through its instrumentality the entire universe, in accordance with the point of view proper to this simple substance and without its needing to receive any physical influence from the body. Even so the body also for its part adapts itself to the wishes of the soul by its own laws, and consequently only obeys it according to the promptings of these laws. Whence it follows that the soul has in itself a perfect spontaneity, so that it depends only upon God and upon itself in its actions.

292. As this system was not known formerly, other ways were sought for emerging from this labyrinth, and the Cartesians themselves were in difficulties over the subject of free will. They were no longer satisfied by the ’faculties’ of the Schoolmen, and they considered that all the actions of the soul appear to be determined by what comes from without, according to the impressions of the senses, and that, ultimately, all is controlled in the universe by the providence of God. Thence arose naturally the objection that there is therefore no freedom. To that M. Descartes replied that we are assured of God’s providence by reason; but that we are likewise assured of our freedom by experience thereof within ourselves; and that we must believe in both, even though we see not how it is possible to reconcile them.

293. That was cutting the Gordian knot, and answering the conclusion of an argument not by refuting it but by opposing thereto a contrary argument. Which procedure does not conform to the laws for philosophical disputes. Notwithstanding, most of the Cartesians contented themselves with this, albeit the inward experience they adduce does not prove their assertion, as M. Bayle has clearly shown. M. Regis (_Philos._, vol. 1, Metaph., book 2, part 2, c. 22) thus paraphrases M. Descartes’ doctrine: ’Most philosophers’, he says, ’have fallen into error. Some, not being able to understand the relation existing between free actions and the providence of God, have denied that God was the first efficient cause of free will: but that is sacrilegious. The others, not being able to apprehend the relation between God’s efficacy and free actions, have denied that man was endowed with freedom: and that is a blasphemy. The mean to be found between these two extremes is to say’ (id. ibid., p. 485) ’that, even though we were not able to understand all the relations existing between freedom and God’s providence, we should nevertheless be bound to acknowledge that we are free and dependent upon God. For both these truths are equally known, the one through experience, and the other through reason; and prudence forbids one to abandon truths whereof one is assured, under the pretext that one cannot apprehend all the relations existing between them and other truths well known.’

294. M. Bayle here remarks pertinently in the margin, ’that these expressions of M. Regis fail to point out that we are aware of relations between man’s actions and God’s providence, such as appear to us to be incompatible with our freedom.’ He adds that these expressions are over-circumspect, weakening the statement of the problem. ’Authors assume’, he says, ’that the difficulty arises solely from our lack of enlightenment; whereas they ought to say that it arises in the main from the enlightenment which we have, and cannot reconcile’ (in M. Bayle’s opinion) ’with our Mysteries.’ That is exactly what I said at the beginning of this work, that if the Mysteries were irreconcilable with reason, and if there were unanswerable objections, far from finding the mystery incomprehensible, we should comprehend that it was false. It is true that here there is no question of a mystery, but only of natural religion.

295. This is how M. Bayle combats those inward experiences, whereon the Cartesians make freedom rest: but he begins by reflexions with which I cannot agree. ’Those who do not make profound examination’, he says (_Dictionary_, art. ’Helen.’, lit. [Greek: TD]), ’of that which passes within them easily persuade themselves that they are free, and that, if their will prompts them to evil, it is their fault, it is through a choice whereof they are the masters. Those who judge otherwise are persons who have studied with care the springs and the circumstances of their actions, and who have thought over the progress of their soul’s impulses. Those persons usually have doubts about their free will, and even come to persuade themselves that their reason and mind are slaves, without power to resist the force that carries them along where they would not go. It was principally persons of this kind who ascribed to the gods the cause of their evil deeds.’

296. These words remind me of those of Chancellor Bacon, who says that a little philosophy inclineth us away from God, but that depth in philosophy bringeth men’s minds about to him. It is the same with those who reflect upon their actions: it appears to them at first that all we do is only impulsion from others, and that all we apprehend comes from without through the senses, and is traced upon the void of our mind _tanquam in tabula rasa_. But more profound meditation shows us that all (even perceptions and passions) comes to us from our own inner being, with complete spontaneity.

297. Yet M. Bayle cites poets who pretend to exonerate men by laying the blame upon the gods. Medea in Ovid speaks thus:

_Frustra, Medea, repugnas,_ _Nescio quid Deus obstat, ait._ And a little later Ovid makes her add:

_Sed trahit invitam nova vis, aliudque Cupido,_ _Mens aliud suadet; video meliora proboque,_ _Deteriora sequor_. But one could set against that a passage from Vergil, who makes Nisus say with far more reason:

_Di ne hunc ardorem mentibus addunt,_ _Euryale, an sua cuique Deus fit dira cupido?_

298. Herr Wittich seems to have thought that in reality our independence is only apparent. For in his _Diss. de providentia Dei actuali_ (n. 61) he makes free will consist in our being inclined towards the objects that present themselves to our soul for affirmation or denial, love or hate, in such a way that we _do not feel_ we are being determined by any outward force. He adds that it is when God himself causes our volitions that we act with most freedom; and that the more efficacious and powerful God’s action is upon us, the more we are masters of our actions. ’Quia enim Deus operatur ipsum velle, quo efficacius operatur, eo magis volumus; quod autem, cum volumus, facimus, id maxime habemus in nostra potestate.’ It is true that when God causes a volition in us he causes a free action. But it seems to me that the question here is not of the universal cause or of that production of our will which is proper to it in so far as it is a created effect, whose positive elements are actually created continually through God’s co-operation, like all other absolute reality of things. We are concerned here with the reasons for willing, and the means God uses when he gives us a good will or permits us to have an evil will. It is always we who produce it, good or evil, for it is our action: but there are always reasons that make us act, without impairing either our spontaneity or our freedom. Grace does no more than give impressions which are conducive to making will operate through fitting motives, such as would be an attention, _a dic cur hic_, a prevenient pleasure. And it is quite evident that that does not interfere with freedom, any more than could a friend who gives counsel and furnishes motives. Thus Herr Wittich has not supplied an answer to the question, any more than M. Bayle, and recourse to God is of no avail here.

299. But let me give another much more reasonable passage from the same M. Bayle, where he disputes with greater force the so-called lively sense of freedom, which according to the Cartesians is a proof of freedom. His words are indeed full of wit, and worthy of consideration, and occur in the _Reply to the Questions of a Provincial_ (vol. III, ch. 140, p. 761 _seqq._). Here they are: ’By the clear and distinct sense we have of our existence we do not discern whether we exist through ourselves or derive our being from another. We discern that only by reflexion, that is, through meditation upon our powerlessness in the matter of conserving ourselves as much as we would, and of freeing ourselves from dependence upon the beings that surround us, etc. It is indeed certain that the pagans (the same must be said of the Socinians, since they deny the creation) never attained to the knowledge of that true dogma that we were created from nothing, and that we are derived from nothingness at every moment of our continuance. They therefore thought erroneously that all substances in the universe exist of themselves and can never be reduced to nothing, and that thus they depend upon no other thing save in respect of their modifications, which are liable to be destroyed by the action of an external cause. Does not this error spring from the fact that we are unconscious of the creative action which conserves us, and that we are only conscious of our existence? That we are conscious of it, I say, in such a way that we should for ever remain ignorant of the cause of our being if other knowledge did not aid us? Let us say also, that the clear and distinct sense we have of the acts of our will cannot make us discern whether we give them ourselves to ourselves or receive them from that same cause which gives us existence. We must have recourse to reflexion or to meditation in order to effect this discrimination. Now I assert that one can never by purely philosophical meditations arrive at an established certainty that we are the efficient cause of our volitions: for every person who makes due investigation will recognize clearly, that if we were only passive subjects with regard to will we should have the same sensations of experience as we have when we think that we are free. Assume, for the sake of argument, that God so ordered the laws of the union between soul and body that all the modalities of the soul, without a single exception, are of necessity linked together with the interposition of the modalities of the brain. You will then understand that nothing will happen to us except that of which we are conscious: there will be in our soul the same sequence of thoughts from the perception of objects of the senses, which is its first step, up to the most definite volitions, which are its final step. There will be in this sequence the consciousness of ideas, that of affirmations, that of irresolutions, that of velleities and that of volitions. For whether the act of willing be impressed upon us by an external cause or we bring it about ourselves, it will be equally true that we will, and that we feel that we will. Moreover, as this external cause can blend as much pleasure as it will with the volition which it impresses upon us, we shall be able to feel at times that the acts of our will please us infinitely, and that they lead us according to the bent of our strongest inclinations. We shall feel no constraint; you know the maxim: _voluntas non potest cogi_. Do you not clearly understand that a weather-vane, always having communicated to it simultaneously (in such a way, however, that priority of nature or, if one will, a real momentary priority, should attach to the desire for motion) movement towards a certain point on the horizon, and the wish to turn in that direction, would be persuaded that it moved of itself to fulfil the desires which it conceived? I assume that it would not know that there were winds, or that an external cause changed everything simultaneously, both its situation and its desires. That is the state we are in by our nature: we know not whether an invisible cause makes us pass sufficiently from one thought to another. It is therefore natural that men are persuaded that they determine their own acts. But it remains to be discovered whether they are mistaken in that, as in countless other things they affirm by a kind of instinct and without having made use of philosophic meditation. Since therefore there are two hypotheses as to what takes place in man: the one that he is only a passive subject, the other that he has active virtues, one cannot in reason prefer the second to the first, so long as one can only adduce proofs of feeling. For we should feel with an equal force that we wish this or that, whether all our volitions were imprinted upon our soul by an exterior and invisible cause, or we formed them ourselves.’