world? Assuredly he could not now change it, without derogation to his
wisdom, since he has foreseen the existence of this world and of what it
contains, and since, likewise, he has formed this resolution to bring it
into existence: for he cannot be mistaken nor repent, and it did not behove
him to from an imperfect resolution applying to one part and not the [152]
whole. Thus, all being ordered from the beginning, it is only because of
this hypothetical necessity, recognized by everyone, that after God's
prevision or after his resolution nothing can be changed: and yet the
events in themselves remain contingent. For (setting aside this supposition
of the futurition of the thing and of the prevision or of the resolution of
God, a supposition which already lays it down as a fact that the thing will
happen, and in accordance with which one must say, 'Unumquodque, quando
est, oportet esse, aut unumquodque, siquidem erit, oportet futurum esse'),
the event has nothing in it to render it necessary and to suggest that no
other thing might have happened in its stead. And as for the connexion
between causes and effects, it only inclined, without necessitating, the
free agency, as I have just explained; thus it does not produce even a
hypothetical necessity, save in conjunction with something from outside, to
wit, this very maxim, that the prevailing inclination always triumphs.
54. It will be said also that, if all is ordered, God cannot then perform
miracles. But one must bear in mind that the miracles which happen in the
world were also enfolded and represented as possible in this same world
considered in the state of mere possibility; and God, who has since
performed them, when he chose this world had even then decreed to perform
them. Again the objection will be made that vows and prayers, merits and
demerits, good and bad actions avail nothing, since nothing can be changed.
This objection causes most perplexity to people in general, and yet it is
purely a sophism. These prayers, these vows, these good or bad actions that
occur to-day were already before God when he formed the resolution to order
things. Those things which happen in this existing world were represented,
with their effects and their consequences, in the idea of this same world,
while it was still possible only; they were represented therein, attracting
God's grace whether natural or supernatural, requiring punishments or
rewards, just as it has happened actually in this world since God chose it.
The prayer or the good action were even then an _ideal cause_ or
_condition_, that is, an inclining reason able to contribute to the grace
of God, or to the reward, as it now does in reality. Since, moreover, all
is wisely connected together in the world, it is clear that God, foreseeing
that which would happen freely, ordered all other things on that basis
beforehand, or (what is the same) he chose that possible world in [153]
which everything was ordered in this fashion.
55. This consideration demolishes at the same time what the ancients called
the 'Lazy Sophism' ([Greek: logos argos]) which ended in a decision to do
nothing: for (people would say) if what I ask is to happen it will happen
even though I should do nothing; and if it is not to happen it will never
happen, no matter what trouble I take to achieve it. This necessity,
supposedly existent in events, and detached from their causes, might be
termed _Fatum Mahometanum_, as I have already observed above, because a
similar line of reasoning, so it is said, causes the Turks not to shun
places ravaged by plague. But the answer is quite ready: the effect being
certain, the cause that shall produce it is certain also; and if the effect
comes about it will be by virtue of a proportionate cause. Thus your
laziness perchance will bring it about that you will obtain naught of what
you desire, and that you will fall into those misfortunes which you would
by acting with care have avoided. We see, therefore, that the _connexion of
causes with effects_, far from causing an unendurable fatality, provides
rather a means of obviating it. There is a German proverb which says that
death will ever have a cause; and nothing is so true. You will die on that
day (let us presume it is so, and that God foresees it): yes, without
doubt; but it will be because you will do what shall lead you thither. It
is likewise with the chastisements of God, which also depend upon their
causes. And it will be apposite in this connexion to quote this famous
passage from St. Ambrose (in cap. I _Lucae_), 'Novit Dominus mutare
sententiam, si tu noveris mutare delictum', which is not to be understood
as of reprobation, but of denunciation, such as that which Jonah dealt out
for God to the Ninevites. This common saying: 'Si non es praedestinatus,
fac ut praedestineris', must not be taken literally, its true sense being
that he who has doubts of his predestination need only do what is required
for him to obtain it by the grace of God. The sophism which ends in a
decision to trouble oneself over nothing will haply be useful sometimes to
induce certain people to face danger fearlessly. It has been applied in
particular to Turkish soldiers: but it seems that hashish is a more
important factor than this sophism, not to mention the fact that this
resolute spirit in the Turks has greatly belied itself in our days.
56. A learned physician of Holland named Johan van Beverwyck took the
trouble to write _De Termino Vitae_ and to collect sundry answers, [154]
letters and discourses of some learned men of his time on this subject.
This collection has been printed, and it is astonishing to see there how
often people are misled, and how they have confused a problem which,
properly speaking, is the easiest in the world. After that it is no wonder
that there are very many doubts which the human race cannot abandon. The
truth is that people love to lose themselves, and this is a kind of ramble
of the mind, which is unwilling to subject itself to attention, to order,
to rules. It seems as though we are so accustomed to games and jesting that
we play the fool even in the most serious occupations, and when we least
think to do so.
57. I fear that in the recent dispute between the theologians of the
Augsburg Confession, _De Termino Paenitentiae Peremptorio_, which has
called forth so many treatises in Germany, some misunderstanding, though of
a different nature, has slipped in. The terms prescribed by the laws are
amongst lawyers known as _fatalia_. It may be said, in a sense, that the
_peremptory term_, prescribed to man for his repentance and amendment, is
certain in the sight of God, with whom all is certain. God knows when a
sinner will be so hardened that thereafter nothing can be done for him: not
indeed that it would be impossible for him to do penance or that sufficient
grace needs must be refused to him after a certain term, a grace that never
fails; but because there will be a time whereafter he will no more approach
the ways of salvation. But we never have certain marks for recognizing this
term, and we are never justified in considering a man utterly abandoned:
that would be to pass a rash judgement. It were better always to have room
for hope; and this is an occasion, with a thousand others, where our
ignorance is beneficial.
_Prudens futuri temporis exitum_
_Caliginosa nocte premit Deus_.
58. The whole future is doubtless determined: but since we know not what it
is, nor what is foreseen or resolved, we must do our duty, according to the
reason that God has given us and according to the rules that he has
prescribed for us; and thereafter we must have a quiet mind, and leave to
God himself the care for the outcome. For he will never fail to do that
which shall be the best, not only in general but also in particular, for
those who have true confidence in him, that is, a confidence composed [155]
of true piety, a lively faith and fervent charity, by virtue of which we
will, as far as in us lies, neglect nothing appertaining to our duty and
his service. It is true that we cannot 'render service' to him, for he has
need of nothing: but it is 'serving him', in our parlance, when we strive
to carry out his presumptive will, co-operating in the good as it is known
to us, wherever we can contribute thereto. For we must always presume that
God is prompted towards the good we know, until the event shows us that he
had stronger reasons, although perhaps unknown to us, which have made him
subordinate this good that we sought to some other greater good of his own
designing, which he has not failed or will not fail to effect.
59. I have just shown how the action of the will depends upon its causes;
that there is nothing so appropriate to human nature as this dependence of
our actions; and that otherwise one would slip into a preposterous and
unendurable fatality, namely into the _Fatum Mahometanum_, which is the
worst of all because it overthrows foresight and good counsel. It is well
to show, notwithstanding, how this dependence of voluntary actions does not
fundamentally preclude the existence within us of a wonderful
_spontaneity_, which in a certain sense makes the soul in its resolves
independent of the physical influence of all other creatures. This
spontaneity, hitherto little recognized, which exalts our command over our
actions to the highest pitch, is a consequence of the System of
Pre-established Harmony, of which I must give some explanation here. The
Scholastic philosophers believed that there was a reciprocal physical
influence between body and soul: but since it has been recognized that
thought and dimensional mass have no mutual connexion, and that they are
creatures differing _toto genere_, many moderns have acknowledged that
there is no _physical communication_ between soul and body, despite the
_metaphysical communication_ always subsisting, which causes soul and body
to compose one and the same _suppositum_, or what is called a person. This
physical communication, if there were such, would cause the soul to change
the degree of speed and the directional line of some motions that are in
the body, and _vice versa_ the body to change the sequence of the thoughts
that are in the soul. But this effect cannot be inferred from any notion
conceived in the body and in the soul; though nothing be better known to us
than the soul, since it is inmost to us, that is to say inmost to itself.
[156]
60. M. Descartes wished to compromise and to make a part of the body's
action dependent upon the soul. He believed in the existence of a rule of
Nature to the effect, according to him, that the same quantity of movement
is conserved in bodies. He deemed it not possible that the influence of the
soul should violate this law of bodies, but he believed that the soul
notwithstanding might have power to change the direction of the movements
that are made in the body; much as a rider, though giving no force to the
horse he mounts, nevertheless controls it by guiding that force in any
direction he pleases. But as that is done by means of the bridle, the bit,
the spurs and other material aids, it is conceivable how that can be; there
are, however, no instruments such as the soul may employ for this result,
nothing indeed either in the soul or in the body, that is, either in
thought or in the mass, which may serve to explain this change of the one
by the other. In a word, that the soul should change the quantity of force
and that it should change the line of direction, both these things are
equally inexplicable.
61. Moreover, two important truths on this subject have been discovered
since M. Descartes' day. The first is that the quantity of absolute force
which is in fact conserved is different from the quantity of movement, as I
have demonstrated elsewhere. The second discovery is that the same
direction is still conserved in all bodies together that are assumed as
interacting, in whatever way they come into collision. If this rule had
been known to M. Descartes, he would have taken the direction of bodies to
be as independent of the soul as their force; and I believe that that would
have led direct to the Hypothesis of Pre-established Harmony, whither these
same rules have led me. For apart from the fact that the physical influence
of one of these substances on the other is inexplicable, I recognized that
without a complete derangement of the laws of Nature the soul could not act
physically upon the body. And I did not believe that one could here listen
to philosophers, competent in other respects, who produce a God, as it
were, _ex machina_, to bring about the final solution of the piece,
maintaining that God exerts himself deliberately to move bodies as the soul
pleases, and to give perceptions to the soul as the body requires. For this
system, which is called that of _occasional causes_ (because it teaches
that God acts on the body at the instance of the soul, and _vice versa_),
besides introducing perpetual miracles to establish communication [157]
between these two substances, does not obviate the derangement of the
natural laws obtaining in each of these same substances, which, in the
general opinion, their mutual influence would cause.
62. Being on other considerations already convinced of the principle of
Harmony in general, I was in consequence convinced likewise of the
_preformation_ and the Pre-established Harmony of all things amongst
themselves, of that between nature and grace, between the decrees of God
and our actions foreseen, between all parts of matter, and even between the
future and the past, the whole in conformity with the sovereign wisdom of
God, whose works are the most harmonious it is possible to conceive. Thus I
could not fail to arrive at the system which declares that God created the
soul in the beginning in such a fashion that it must produce and represent
to itself successively that which takes place within the body, and the body
also in such a fashion that it must do of itself that which the soul
ordains. Consequently the laws that connect the thoughts of the soul in the
order of final causes and in accordance with the evolution of perceptions
must produce pictures that meet and harmonize with the impressions of
bodies on our organs; and likewise the laws of movements in the body, which
follow one another in the order of efficient causes, meet and so harmonize
with the thoughts of the soul that the body is induced to act at the time
when the soul wills it.
63. Far from its being prejudicial, nothing can be more favourable to
freedom than that system. And M. Jacquelot has demonstrated well in his
book on the _Conformity of Faith with Reason_, that it is just as if he who
knows all that I shall order a servant to do the whole day long on the
morrow made an automaton entirely resembling this servant, to carry out
to-morrow at the right moment all that I should order; and yet that would
not prevent me from ordering freely all that I should please, although the
action of the automaton that would serve me would not be in the least free.
64. Moreover, since all that passes in the soul depends, according to this
system, only upon the soul, and its subsequent state is derived only from
it and from its present state, how can one give it a greater
_independence_? It is true that there still remains some imperfection in
the constitution of the soul. All that happens to the soul depends upon it,
but depends not always upon its will; that were too much. Nor are such[158]
happenings even recognized always by its understanding or perceived with
distinctness. For there is in the soul not only an order of distinct
perceptions, forming its dominion, but also a series of confused
perceptions or passions, forming its bondage: and there is no need for
astonishment at that; the soul would be a Divinity if it had none but
distinct perceptions. It has nevertheless some power over these confused
perceptions also, even if in an indirect manner. For although it cannot
change its passions forthwith, it can work from afar towards that end with
enough success, and endue itself with new passions and even habits. It even
has a like power over the more distinct perceptions, being able to endue
itself indirectly with opinions and intentions, and to hinder itself from
having this one or that, and stay or hasten its judgement. For we can seek
means beforehand to arrest ourselves, when occasion arises, on the sliding
step of a rash judgement; we can find some incident to justify postponement
of our resolution even at the moment when the matter appears ready to be
judged. Although our opinion and our act of willing be not directly objects
of our will (as I have already observed), one sometimes, takes measures
nevertheless, to will and even to believe in due time, that which one does
not will, or believe, now. So great is the profundity of the spirit of man.
65. And now, to bring to a conclusion this question of _spontaneity_, it
must be said that, on a rigorous definition, the soul has within it the
principle of all its actions, and even of all its passions, and that the
same is true in all the simple substances scattered throughout Nature,
although there be freedom only in those that are intelligent. In the
popular sense notwithstanding, speaking in accordance with appearances, we
must say that the soul depends in some way upon the body and upon the
impressions of the senses: much as we speak with Ptolemy and Tycho in
everyday converse, and think with Copernicus, when it is a question of the
rising and the setting of the sun.
66. One may however give a true and philosophic sense to this _mutual
dependence_ which we suppose between the soul and the body. It is that the
one of these two substances depends upon the other ideally, in so far as
the reason of that which is done in the one can be furnished by that which
is in the other. This had already happened when God ordered beforehand the
harmony that there would be between them. Even so would that [159]
automaton, that should fulfil the servant's function, depend upon me
_ideally_, in virtue of the knowledge of him who, foreseeing my future
orders, would have rendered it capable of serving me at the right moment
all through the morrow. The knowledge of my future intentions would have
actuated this great craftsman, who would accordingly have fashioned the
automaton: my influence would be objective, and his physical. For in so far
as the soul has perfection and distinct thoughts, God has accommodated the
body to the soul, and has arranged beforehand that the body is impelled to
execute its orders. And in so far as the soul is imperfect and as its
perceptions are confused, God has accommodated the soul to the body, in
such sort that the soul is swayed by the passions arising out of corporeal
representations. This produces the same effect and the same appearance as
if the one depended immediately upon the other, and by the agency of a
physical influence. Properly speaking, it is by its confused thoughts that
the soul represents the bodies which encompass it. The same thing must
apply to all that we understand by the actions of simple substances one
upon another. For each one is assumed to act upon the other in proportion
to its perfection, although this be only ideally, and in the reasons of
things, as God in the beginning ordered one substance to accord with
another in proportion to the perfection or imperfection that there is in
each. (Withal action and passion are always reciprocal in creatures,
because one part of the reasons which serve to explain clearly what is
done, and which have served to bring it into existence, is in the one of
these substances, and another part of these reasons is in the other,
perfections and imperfections being always mingled and shared.) Thus it is
we attribute _action_ to the one, and _passion_ to the other.
67. But after all, whatsoever dependence be conceived in voluntary actions,
and even though there were an absolute and mathematical necessity (which
there is not) it would not follow that there would not be a sufficient
degree of freedom to render rewards and punishments just and reasonable. It
is true that generally we speak as though the necessity of the action put
an end to all merit and all demerit, all justification for praise and
blame, for reward and punishment: but it must be admitted that this
conclusion is not entirely correct. I am very far from sharing the opinions
of Bradwardine, Wyclif, Hobbes and Spinoza, who advocate, so it seems,[160]
this entirely mathematical necessity, which I think I have adequately
refuted, and perhaps more clearly than is customary. Yet one must always
bear testimony to the truth and not impute to a dogma anything that does
not result from it. Moreover, these arguments prove too much, since they
would prove just as much against hypothetical necessity, and would justify
the lazy sophism. For the absolute necessity of the sequence of causes
would in this matter add nothing to the infallible certainty of a
hypothetical necessity.
68. In the first place, therefore, it must be agreed that it is permitted
to kill a madman when one cannot by other means defend oneself. It will be
granted also that it is permitted, and often even necessary, to destroy
venomous or very noxious animals, although they be not so by their own
fault.
69. Secondly, one inflicts punishments upon a beast, despite its lack of
reason and freedom, when one deems that this may serve to correct it: thus
one punishes dogs and horses, and indeed with much success. Rewards serve
us no less in the managing of animals: when an animal is hungry, the food
that is given to him causes him to do what otherwise would never be
obtained from him.
70. Thirdly, one would inflict even on beasts capital punishments (where it
is no longer a question of correcting the beast that is punished) if this
punishment could serve as an example, or inspire terror in others, to make
them cease from evil doing. Rorarius, in his book on reason in beasts, says
that in Africa they crucified lions, in order to drive away other lions
from the towns and frequented places, and that he had observed in passing
through the province of Jülich that they hanged wolves there in order to
ensure greater safety for the sheepfolds. There are people in the villages
also who nail birds of prey to the doors of houses, with the idea that
other birds of the same kind will then not so readily appear. These
measures would always be justified if they were of any avail.
71. Then, in the fourth place, since experience proves that the fear of
chastisements and the hope of rewards serves to make men abstain from evil
and strive to do good, one would have good reason to avail oneself of such,
even though men were acting under necessity, whatever the necessity might
be. The objection will be raised that if good or evil is necessary it is
useless to avail oneself of means to obtain it or to hinder it: but the
answer has already been given above in the passage combating the lazy [161]
sophism. If good or evil were a necessity without these means, then such
means would be unavailing; but it is not so. These goods and evils come
only with the aid of these means, and if these results were necessary the
means would be a part of the causes rendering them necessary, since
experience teaches us that often fear or hope hinders evil or advances
good. This objection, then, differs hardly at all from the lazy sophism,
which we raise against the certainty as well as the necessity of future
events. Thus one may say that these objections are directed equally against
hypothetical necessity and absolute necessity, and that they prove as much
against the one as against the other, that is to say, nothing at all.
72. There was a great dispute between Bishop Bramhall and Mr. Hobbes, which
began when they were both in Paris, and which was continued after their
return to England; all the parts of it are to be found collected in a
quarto volume published in London in the year 1656. They are all in
English, and have not been translated as far as I know, nor inserted in the
Collection of Works in Latin by Mr. Hobbes. I had already read these
writings, and have obtained them again since. And I had observed at the
outset that he had not at all proved the absolute necessity of all things,
but had shown sufficiently that necessity would not overthrow all the rules
of divine or human justice, and would not prevent altogether the exercise
of this virtue.
73. There is, however, a kind of justice and a certain sort of rewards and
of punishments which appear not so applicable to those who should act by an
absolute necessity, supposing such necessity existed. It is that kind of
justice which has for its goal neither improvement nor example, nor even
redress of the evil. This justice has its foundation only in the fitness of
things, which demands a certain satisfaction for the expiation of an evil
action. The Socinians, Hobbes and some others do not admit this punitive
justice, which properly speaking is avenging justice. God reserves it for
himself in many cases; but he does not fail to grant it to those who are
entitled to govern others, and he exercises it through their agency,
provided that they act under the influence of reason and not of passion.
The Socinians believe it to be without foundation, but it always has some
foundation in that fitness of things which gives satisfaction not only to
the injured but also to the wise who see it; even as a beautiful piece of
music, or again a good piece of architecture, satisfies cultivated [162]
minds. And the wise lawgiver having threatened, and having, so to speak,
promised a chastisement, it befits his consistency not to leave the action
completely unpunished, even though the punishment would no longer avail to
correct anyone. But even though he should have promised nothing, it is
enough that there is a fitness of things which could have prompted him to
make this promise, since the wise man likewise promises only that which is
fitting. And one may even say that there is here a certain compensation of
the mind, which would be scandalized by disorder if the chastisement did
not contribute towards restoring order. One can also consult what Grotius
wrote against the Socinians, of the satisfaction of Jesus Christ, and the
answer of Crellius thereto.
74. Thus it is that the pains of the damned continue, even when they no
longer serve to turn them away from evil, and that likewise the rewards of
the blessed continue, even when they no longer serve for strengthening them
in good. One may say nevertheless that the damned ever bring upon
themselves new pains through new sins, and that the blessed ever bring upon
themselves new joys by new progress in goodness: for both are founded on
the _principle of the fitness of things_, which has seen to it that affairs
were so ordered that the evil action must bring upon itself a chastisement.
There is good reason to believe, following the parallelism of the two
realms, that of final causes and that of efficient causes, that God has
established in the universe a connexion between punishment or reward and
bad or good action, in accordance wherewith the first should always be
attracted by the second, and virtue and vice obtain their reward and their
punishment in consequence of the natural sequence of things, which contains
still another kind of pre-established harmony than that which appears in
the communication between the soul and the body. For, in a word, all that
God does, as I have said already, is harmonious to perfection. Perhaps then
this principle of the fitness of things would no longer apply to beings
acting without true freedom or exemption from absolute necessity; and in
that case corrective justice alone would be administered, and not punitive
justice. That is the opinion of the famous Conringius, in a dissertation he
published on what is just. And indeed, the reasons Pomponazzi employed in
his book on fate, to prove the usefulness of chastisements and rewards,
even though all should come about in our actions by a fatal necessity,[163]
concern only amendment and not satisfaction, [Greek: kolasin ou timôrian].
Moreover, it is only for the sake of outward appearances that one destroys
animals accessary to certain crimes, as one razes the houses of rebels,
that is, to inspire terror. Thus it is an act of corrective justice,
wherein punitive justice has no part at all.
75. But we will not amuse ourselves now by discussing a question more
curious than necessary, since we have shown sufficiently that there is no
such necessity in voluntary actions. Nevertheless it was well to show that
_imperfect freedom_ alone, that is, freedom which is exempt only from
constraint, would suffice as foundation for chastisements and rewards of
the kind conducive to the avoidance of evil, and to amendment. One sees
also from this that some persons of intelligence, who persuade themselves
that everything is necessary, are wrong in saying that none must be praised
or blamed, rewarded or punished. Apparently they say so only to exercise
their wit: the pretext is that all being necessary nothing would be in our
power. But this pretext is ill founded: necessary actions would be still in
our power, at least in so far as we could perform them or omit them, when
the hope or the fear of praise or blame, of pleasure or pain prompted our
will thereto, whether they prompted it of necessity, or in prompting it
they left spontaneity, contingency and freedom all alike unimpaired. Thus
praise and blame, rewards and punishments would preserve always a large
part of their use, even though there were a true necessity in our actions.
We can praise and blame also natural good and bad qualities, where the will
has no part--in a horse, in a diamond, in a man; and he who said of Cato of
Utica that he acted virtuously through the goodness of his nature, and that
it was impossible for him to behave otherwise, thought to praise him the
more.
76. The difficulties which I have endeavoured up to now to remove have been
almost all common to natural and revealed theology. Now it will be
necessary to come to a question of revealed theology, concerning the
election or the reprobation of men, with the dispensation or use of divine
grace in connexion with these acts of the mercy or the justice of God. But
when I answered the preceding objections, I opened up a way to meet those
that remain. This confirms the observation I made thereon (_Preliminary
Dissertation,_ 43) that there is rather a conflict between the true [164]
reasons of natural theology and the false reasons of human appearances,
than between revealed faith and reason. For on this subject scarcely any
difficulty arises that is new, and not deriving its origin from those which
can be placed in the way of the truths discerned by reason.
77. Now as theologians of all parties are divided among themselves on this
subject of predestination and grace, and often give different answers to
the same objections, according to their various principles, one cannot
avoid touching on the differences which prevail among them. One may say in
general that some look upon God more metaphysically and others more
morally: and it has already been stated on other occasions that the
Counter-Remonstrants took the first course and the Remonstrants the second.
But to act rightly we must affirm alike on one side the independence of God
and the dependence of creatures, and on the other side the justice and
goodness of God, which makes him dependent upon himself, his will upon his
understanding or his wisdom.
78. Some gifted and well-intentioned authors, desiring to show the force of
the reasons advocated by the two principal parties, in order to persuade
them to a mutual tolerance, deem that the whole controversy is reduced to
this essential point, namely: What was God's principal aim in making his
decrees with regard to man? Did he make them solely in order to show forth
his glory by manifesting his attributes, and forming, to that end, the
great plan of creation and providence? Or has he had regard rather to the
voluntary movements of intelligent substances which he designed to create,
considering what they would will and do in the different circumstances and
situations wherein he might place them, so as to form a fitting resolve
thereupon? It appears to me that the two answers to this great question
thus given as opposites to one another are easy to reconcile, and that in
consequence the two parties would be agreed in principle, without any need
of tolerance, if all were reduced to this point. In truth God, in designing
to create the world, purposed solely to manifest and communicate his
perfections in the way that was most efficacious, and most worthy of his
greatness, his wisdom and his goodness. But that very purpose pledged him
to consider all the actions of creatures while still in the state of pure
possibility, that he might form the most fitting plan. He is like a great
architect whose aim in view is the satisfaction or the glory of having[165]
built a beautiful palace, and who considers all that is to enter into this
construction: the form and the materials, the place, the situation, the
means, the workmen, the expense, before he forms a complete resolve. For a
wise person in laying his plans cannot separate the end from the means; he
does not contemplate any end without knowing if there are means of
attaining thereto.
79. I know not whether there are also perchance persons who imagine that,
God being the absolute master of all things, one can thence infer that
everything outside him is indifferent to him, that he considers himself
alone, without concern for others, and that thus he has made some happy and
others unhappy without any cause, without choice, without reason. But to
teach so about God were to deprive him of wisdom and of goodness. We need
only observe that he considers himself and neglects nothing of what he owes
to himself, to conclude that he considers his creatures also, and that he
uses them in the manner most consistent with order. For the more a great
and good prince is mindful of his glory, the more he will think of making
his subjects happy, even though he were the most absolute of all monarchs,
and though his subjects were slaves from birth, bondsmen (in lawyers'
parlance), people entirely in subjection to arbitrary power. Calvin himself
and some others of the greatest defenders of the absolute decree rightly
maintained that God had _great and just reasons_ for his election and the
dispensation of his grace, although these reasons be unknown to us in
detail: and we must judge charitably that the most rigid predestinators
have too much reason and too much piety to depart from this opinion.
80. There will therefore be no argument for debate on that point (as I
hope) with people who are at all reasonable. But there will always be
argument among those who are called Universalists and Particularists,
according to what they teach of the grace and the will of God. Yet I am
somewhat inclined to believe that the heated dispute between them on the
will of God to save all men, and on that which depends upon it (when one
keeps separate the doctrine _de Auxiliis_, or of the assistance of grace),
rests rather in expressions than in things. For it is sufficient to
consider that God, as well as every wise and beneficent mind, is inclined
towards all possible good, and that this inclination is proportionate to
the excellence of the good. Moreover, this results (if we take the [166]
matter precisely and in itself) from an 'antecedent will', as it is termed,
which, however, is not always followed by its complete effect, because this
wise mind must have many other inclinations besides. Thus it is the result
of all the inclinations together that makes his will complete and
decretory, as I have already explained. One may therefore very well say
with ancient writers that God wills to save all men according to his
antecedent will, but not according to his consequent will, which never
fails to be followed by its effect. And if those who deny this universal
will do not allow that the antecedent inclination be called a will, they
are only troubling themselves about a question of name.
81. But there is a question more serious in regard to predestination to
eternal life and to all other destination by God, to wit, whether this
destination is absolute or respective. There is destination to good and
destination to evil; and as evil is moral or physical, theologians of all
parties agree that there is no destination to moral evil, that is to say,
that none is destined to sin. As for the greatest physical evil, which is
damnation, one can distinguish between destination and predestination: for
predestination appears to contain within itself an absolute destination,
which is anterior to the consideration of the good or evil actions of those
whom it concerns. Thus one may say that the reprobate are _destined_ to be
condemned, because they are known to be impenitent. But it cannot so well
be said that the reprobate are _predestined_ to damnation: for there is no
_absolute_ reprobation, its foundation being final foreseen impenitence.
82. It is true that there are writers who maintain that God, wishing to
manifest his mercy and his justice in accordance with reasons worthy of
him, but unknown to us, chose the elect, and in consequence rejected the
damned, prior to all thought of sin, even of Adam, that after this resolve
he thought fit to permit sin in order to be able to exercise these two
virtues, and that he has bestowed grace in Jesus Christ to some in order to
save them, while he has refused it to others in order to be able to punish
them. Hence these writers are named 'Supralapsarians', because the decree
to punish precedes, according to them, the knowledge of the future
existence of sin. But the opinion most common to-day amongst those who are
called Reformed, and one that is favoured by the Synod of Dordrecht, is
that of the 'Infralapsarians', corresponding somewhat to the conception of
St. Augustine. For he asserts that God having resolved to permit the [167]
sin of Adam and the corruption of the human race, for reasons just but
hidden, his mercy made him choose some of the corrupt mass to be freely
saved by the merit of Jesus Christ, and his justice made him resolve to
punish the others by the damnation that they deserved. That is why, with
the Schoolmen, only the saved were called _Praedestinati_ and the damned
were called _Praesciti_. It must be admitted that some Infralapsarians and
others speak sometimes of predestination to damnation, following the
example of Fulgentius and of St. Augustine himself: but that signifies the
same as destination to them, and it avails nothing to wrangle about words.
That pretext, notwithstanding, was in time past used for maltreating that
Godescalc who caused a stir about the middle of the ninth century, and who
took the name of Fulgentius to indicate that he followed that author.
83. As for the destination of the elect to eternal life, the Protestants,
as well as those of the Roman Church, dispute much among themselves as to
whether election is absolute or is founded on the prevision of final living
faith. Those who are called Evangelicals, that is, those of the Augsburg
Confession, hold the latter opinion: they believe that one need not go into
the hidden causes of election while one may find a manifest cause of it
shown in Holy Scripture, which is faith in Jesus Christ; and it appears to
them that the prevision of the cause is also the cause of the prevision of
the effect. Those who are called Reformed are of a different opinion: they
admit that salvation comes from faith in Jesus Christ, but they observe
that often the cause anterior to the effect in execution is posterior in
intention, as when the cause is the means and the effect is the end. Thus
the question is, whether faith or salvation is anterior in the intention of
God, that is, whether God's design is rather to save man than to make him a
believer.
84. Hence we see that the question between the Supralapsarians and the
Infralapsarians in part, and again between them and the Evangelicals, comes
back to a right conception of the order that is in God's decrees. Perhaps
one might put an end to this dispute at once by saying that, properly
speaking, all the decrees of God that are here concerned are simultaneous,
not only in respect of time, as everyone agrees, but also _in signo
rationis_, or in the order of nature. And indeed, the Formula of Concord,
building upon some passages of St. Augustine, comprised in the same [168]
Decree of Election salvation and the means that conduce to it. To
demonstrate this synchronism of destinations or of decrees with which we
are concerned, we must revert to the expedient that I have employed more
than once, which states that God, before decreeing anything, considered
among other possible sequences of things that one which he afterwards
approved. In the idea of this is represented how the first parents sin and
corrupt their posterity; how Jesus Christ redeems the human race; how some,
aided by such and such graces, attain to final faith and to salvation; and
how others, with or without such or other graces, do not attain thereto,
continue in sin, and are damned. God grants his sanction to this sequence
only after having entered into all its detail, and thus pronounces nothing
final as to those who shall be saved or damned without having pondered upon
everything and compared it with other possible sequences. Thus God's
pronouncement concerns the whole sequence at the same time; he simply
decrees its existence. In order to save other men, or in a different way,
he must needs choose an altogether different sequence, seeing that all is
connected in each sequence. In this conception of the matter, which is that
most worthy of the All-wise, all whose actions are connected together to
the highest possible degree, there would be only one total decree, which is
to create such a world. This total decree comprises equally all the
particular decrees, without setting one of them before or after another.
Yet one may say also that each particular act of antecedent will entering
into the total result has its value and order, in proportion to the good
whereto this act inclines. But these acts of antecedent will are not called
decrees, since they are not yet inevitable, the outcome depending upon the
total result. According to this conception of things, all the difficulties
that can here be made amount to the same as those I have already stated and
removed in my inquiry concerning the origin of evil.
85. There remains only one important matter of discussion, which has its
peculiar difficulties. It is that of the dispensation of the means and
circumstances contributing to salvation and to damnation. This comprises
amongst others the subject of the Aids of Grace (_de auxiliis gratiae_), on
which Rome (since the Congregation _de Auxiliis_ under Clement VIII, when a
debate took place between the Dominicans and the Jesuits) does not readily
permit books to be published. Everyone must agree that God is [169]
altogether good and just, that his goodness makes him contribute the least
possible to that which can render men guilty, and the most possible to that
which serves to save them (possible, I say, subject to the general order of
things); that his justice prevents him from condemning innocent men, and
from leaving good actions without reward; and that he even keeps an exact
proportion in punishments and rewards. Nevertheless, this idea that one
should have of the goodness and the justice of God does not appear enough
in what we know of his actions with regard to the salvation and the
damnation of men: and it is that which makes difficulties concerning sin
and its remedies.
86. The first difficulty is how the soul could be infected with original
sin, which is the root of actual sins, without injustice on God's part in
exposing the soul thereto. This difficulty has given rise to three opinions
on the origin of the soul itself. The first is that of the _pre-existence
of human souls_ in another world or in another life, where they had sinned
and on that account had been condemned to this prison of the human body, an
opinion of the Platonists which is attributed to Origen and which even
to-day finds adherents. Henry More, an English scholar, advocated something
like this dogma in a book written with that express purpose. Some of those
who affirm this pre-existence have gone as far as metempsychosis. The
younger van Helmont held this opinion, and the ingenious author of some
metaphysical _Meditations_, published in 1678 under the name of William
Wander, appears to have some leaning towards it. The second opinion is that
of _Traduction_, as if the soul of children were engendered (_per
traducem_) from the soul or souls of those from whom the body is
engendered. St. Augustine inclined to this judgement the better to explain
original sin. This doctrine is taught also by most of the theologians of
the Augsburg Confession. Nevertheless it is not completely established
among them, since the Universities of Jena and Helmstedt, and others
besides, have long been opposed to it. The third opinion, and that most
widely accepted to-day, is that of _Creation_: it is taught in the majority
of the Christian Schools, but it is fraught with the greatest difficulty in
respect of original sin.
87. Into this controversy of theologians on the origin of the human soul
has entered the philosophic dispute on _the origin of forms._ Aristotle and
scholastic philosophy after him called _Form_ that which is a [170]
principle of action and is found in that which acts. This inward principle
is either substantial, being then termed 'Soul', when it is in an organic
body, or accidental, and customarily termed 'Quality'. The same philosopher
gave to the soul the generic name of 'Entelechy' or _Act_. This word
'Entelechy' apparently takes its origin from the Greek word signifying
'perfect', and hence the celebrated Ermolao Barbaro expressed it literally
in Latin by _perfectihabia_: for Act is a realization of potency. And he
had no need to consult the Devil, as men say he did, in order to learn
that. Now the Philosopher of Stagira supposes that there are two kinds of
Act, the permanent act and the successive act. The permanent or lasting act
is nothing but the Substantial or Accidental Form: the substantial form (as
for example the soul) is altogether permanent, at least according to my
judgement, and the accidental is only so for a time. But the altogether
momentary act, whose nature is transitory, consists in action itself. I
have shown elsewhere that the notion of Entelechy is not altogether to be
scorned, and that, being permanent, it carries with it not only a mere
faculty for action, but also that which is called 'force', 'effort',
'conatus', from which action itself must follow if nothing prevents it.
Faculty is only an _attribute_, or rather sometimes a mode; but force, when
it is not an ingredient of substance itself (that is, force which is not
primitive but derivative), is a _quality_, which is distinct and separable
from substance. I have shown also how one may suppose that the soul is a
primitive force which is modified and varied by derivative forces or
qualities, and exercised in actions.
88. Now philosophers have troubled themselves exceedingly on the question
of the origin of substantial forms. For to say that the compound of form
and matter is produced and that the form is only _comproduced_ means
nothing. The common opinion was that forms were derived from the potency of
matter, this being called _Eduction_. That also meant in fact nothing, but
it was explained in a sense by a comparison with shapes: for that of a
statue is produced only by removal of the superfluous marble. This
comparison might be valid if form consisted in a mere limitation, as in the
case of shape. Some have thought that forms were sent from heaven, and even
created expressly, when bodies were produced. Julius Scaliger hinted that
it was possible that forms were rather derived from the active potency of
the efficient cause (that is to say, either from that of God in the [171]
case of Creation or from that of other forms in the case of generation),
than from the passive potency of matter. And that, in the case of
generation, meant a return to traduction. Daniel Sennert, a famous doctor
and physicist at Wittenberg, cherished this opinion, particularly in
relation to animate bodies which are multiplied through seed. A certain
Julius Caesar della Galla, an Italian living in the Low Countries, and a
doctor of Groningen named Johan Freitag wrote with much vehemence in
opposition to Sennert. Johann Sperling, a professor at Wittenberg, made a
defence of his master, and finally came into conflict with Johann Zeisold,
a professor at Jena, who upheld the belief that the human soul is created.
89. But traduction and eduction are equally inexplicable when it is a
question of finding the origin of the soul. It is not the same with
accidental forms, since they are only modifications of the substance, and
their origin may be explained by eduction, that is, by variation of
limitations, in the same way as the origin of shapes. But it is quite
another matter when we are concerned with the origin of a substance, whose
beginning and destruction are equally difficult to explain. Sennert and
Sperling did not venture to admit the subsistence and the indestructibility
of the souls of beasts or of other primitive forms, although they allowed
that they were indivisible and immaterial. But the fact is that they
confused indestructibility with immortality, whereby is understood in the
case of man that not only the soul but also the personality subsists. In
saying that the soul of man is immortal one implies the subsistence of what
makes the identity of the person, something which retains its moral
qualities, conserving the _consciousness_, or the reflective inward
feeling, of what it is: thus it is rendered susceptible to chastisement or
reward. But this conservation of personality does not occur in the souls of
beasts: that is why I prefer to say that they are imperishable rather than
to call them immortal. Yet this misapprehension appears to have been the
cause of a great inconsistency in the doctrine of the Thomists and of other
good philosophers: they recognized the immateriality or indivisibility of
all souls, without being willing to admit their indestructibility, greatly
to the prejudice of the immortality of the human soul. John Scot, that is,
the Scotsman (which formerly signified Hibernian or Erigena), a famous
writer of the time of Louis the Debonair and of his sons, was for the
conservation of all souls: and I see not why there should be less [172]
objection to making the atoms of Epicurus or of Gassendi endure, than to
affirming the subsistence of all truly simple and indivisible substances,
which are the sole and true atoms of Nature. And Pythagoras was right in
saying generally, as Ovid makes him say:
_Morte carent animae_.
90. Now as I like maxims which hold good and admit of the fewest exceptions
possible, here is what has appeared to me most reasonable in every sense on
this important question. I consider that souls and simple substances
altogether cannot begin except by creation, or end except by annihilation.
Moreover, as the formation of organic animate bodies appears explicable in
the order of nature only when one assumes a _preformation_ already organic,
I have thence inferred that what we call generation of an animal is only a
transformation and augmentation. Thus, since the same body was already
furnished with organs, it is to be supposed that it was already animate,
and that it had the same soul: so I assume _vice versa_, from the
conservation of the soul when once it is created, that the animal is also
conserved, and that apparent death is only an envelopment, there being no
likelihood that in the order of nature souls exist entirely separated from
all body, or that what does not begin naturally can cease through natural
forces.
91. Considering that so admirable an order and rules so general are
established in regard to animals, it does not appear reasonable that man
should be completely excluded from that order, and that everything in
relation to his soul should come about in him by miracle. Besides I have
pointed out repeatedly that it is of the essence of God's wisdom that all
should be harmonious in his works, and that nature should be parallel with
grace. It is thus my belief that those souls which one day shall be human
souls, like those of other species, have been in the seed, and in the
progenitors as far back as Adam, and have consequently existed since the
beginning of things, always in a kind of organic body. On this point it
seems that M. Swammerdam, Father Malebranche, M. Bayle, Mr. Pitcairne, M.
Hartsoeker and numerous other very able persons share my opinion. This
doctrine is also sufficiently confirmed by the microscope observations of
M. Leeuwenhoek and other good observers. But it also for divers reasons
appears likely to me that they existed then as sentient or animal [173]
souls only, endowed with perception and feeling, and devoid of reason.
Further I believe that they remained in this state up to the time of the
generation of the man to whom they were to belong, but that then they
received reason, whether there be a natural means of raising a sentient
soul to the degree of a reasoning soul (a thing I find it difficult to
imagine) or whether God may have given reason to this soul through some
special operation, or (if you will) by a kind of _transcreation_. This
latter is easier to admit, inasmuch as revelation teaches much about other
forms of immediate operation by God upon our souls. This explanation
appears to remove the obstacles that beset this matter in philosophy or
theology. For the difficulty of the origin of forms thus disappears
completely; and besides it is much more appropriate to divine justice to
give the soul, already corrupted _physically_ or on the animal side by the
sin of Adam, a new perfection which is reason, than to put a reasoning
soul, by creation or otherwise, in a body wherein it is to be corrupted
_morally_.
92. Now the soul being once under the domination of sin, and ready to
commit sin in actual fact as soon as the man is fit to exercise reason, a
new question arises, to wit: whether this tendency in a man who has not
been regenerated by baptism suffices to damn him, even though he should
never come to commit sin, as may happen, and happens often, whether he die
before reaching years of discretion or he become dull of sense before he
has made use of his reason. St. Gregory of Nazianzos is supposed to have
denied this (_Orat. de Baptismo_); but St. Augustine is for the
affirmative, and maintains that original sin of itself is sufficient to
earn the flames of hell, although this opinion is, to say the least, very
harsh. When I speak here of damnation or of hell, I mean pains, and not
mere deprivation of supreme felicity; I mean _poenam sensus, non damni_.
Gregory of Rimini, General of the Augustinians, with a few others followed
St. Augustine in opposition to the accepted opinion of the Schools of his
time, and for that reason he was called the torturer of children, _tortor
infantum_. The Schoolmen, instead of sending them into the flames of hell,
have assigned to them a special Limbo, where they do not suffer, and are
only punished by privation of the beatific vision. The Revelations of St.
Birgitta (as they are called), much esteemed in Rome, also uphold this
dogma. Salmeron and Molina, and before them Ambrose Catharin and [174]
others, grant them a certain natural bliss; and Cardinal Sfondrati, a man
of learning and piety, who approves this, latterly went so far as to prefer
in a sense their state, which is the state of happy innocence, to that of a
sinner saved, as we may see in his _Nodus Praedestinationis Solutus_. That,
however, seems to go too far. Certainly a soul truly enlightened would not
wish to sin, even though it could by this means obtain all imaginable
pleasures. But the case of choosing between sin and true bliss is simply
chimerical, and it is better to obtain bliss (even after repentance) than
to be deprived of it for ever.
93. Many prelates and theologians of France who are well pleased to differ
from Molina, and to join with St. Augustine, seem to incline towards the
opinion of this great doctor, who condemns to eternal flames children that
die in the age of innocence before having received baptism. This is what
appears from the letter mentioned above, written by five distinguished
prelates of France to Pope Innocent XII, against that posthumous book by
Cardinal Sfondrati. But therein they did not venture to condemn the
doctrine of the purely privative punishment of children dying without
baptism, seeing it approved by the venerable Thomas Aquinas, and by other
great men. I do not speak of those who are called on one side Jansenists
and on the other disciples of St. Augustine, for they declare themselves
entirely and firmly for the opinion of this Father. But it must be
confessed that this opinion has not sufficient foundation either in reason
or in Scripture, and that it is outrageously harsh. M. Nicole makes rather
a poor apology for it in his book on the _Unity of the Church_, written to
oppose M. Jurieu, although M. Bayle takes his side in chapter 178 of the
_Reply to the Questions of a Provincial_, vol. III. M. Nicole makes use of
this pretext, that there are also other dogmas in the Christian religion
which appear harsh. On the one hand, however, that does not lead to the
conclusion that these instances of harshness may be multiplied without
proof; and on the other we must take into account that the other dogmas
mentioned by M. Nicole, namely original sin and eternity of punishment, are
only harsh and unjust to outward appearance, while the damnation of
children dying without actual sin and without regeneration would in truth
be harsh, since it would be in effect the damning of innocents. For that
reason I believe that the party which advocates this opinion will never
altogether have the upper hand in the Roman Church itself. Evangelical[175]
theologians are accustomed to speak with fair moderation on this question,
and to surrender these souls to the judgement and the clemency of their
Creator. Nor do we know all the wonderful ways that God may choose to
employ for the illumination of souls.
94. One may say that those who condemn for original sin alone, and who
consequently condemn children dying unbaptized or outside the Covenant,
fall, in a sense, without being aware of it, into a certain attitude to
man's inclination and God's foreknowledge which they disapprove in others.
They will not have it that God should refuse his grace to those whose
resistance to it he foresees, nor that this expectation and this tendency
should cause the damnation of these persons: and yet they claim that the
tendency which constitutes original sin, and in which God foresees that the
child will sin as soon as he shall reach years of discretion, suffices to
damn this child beforehand. Those who maintain the one and reject the other
do not preserve enough uniformity and connexion in their dogmas.
95. There is scarcely less difficulty in the matter of those who reach
years of discretion and plunge into sin, following the inclination of
corrupt nature, if they receive not the succour of the grace necessary for
them to stop on the edge of the precipice, or to drag themselves from the
abyss wherein they have fallen. For it seems hard to damn them eternally
for having done that which they had no power to prevent themselves from
doing. Those that damn even children, who are without discretion, trouble
themselves even less about adults, and one would say that they have become
callous through the very expectation of seeing people suffer. But it is not
the same with other theologians, and I would be rather on the side of those
who grant to all men a grace sufficient to draw them away from evil,
provided they have a sufficient tendency to profit by this succour, and not
to reject it voluntarily. The objection is made that there has been and
still is a countless multitude of men, among civilized peoples and among
barbarians, who have never had this knowledge of God and of Jesus Christ
which is necessary for those who would tread the wonted paths to salvation.
But without excusing them on the plea of a sin purely philosophical, and
without stopping at a mere penalty of privation, things for which there is
no opportunity of discussion here, one may doubt the fact: for how do we
know whether they do not receive ordinary or extraordinary succour of [176]
kinds unknown to us? This maxim, _Quod facienti, quod in se est, non
denegatur gratia necessaria_, appears to me to have eternal truth. Thomas
Aquinas, Archbishop Bradwardine and others have hinted that, in regard to
this, something comes to pass of which we are not aware. (Thom. quest. XIV,
_De Veritate_, artic. XI, ad I et alibi. Bradwardine, _De Causa Dei_, non
procul ab initio.) And sundry theologians of great authority in the Roman
Church itself have taught that a sincere act of the love of God above all
things, when the grace of Jesus Christ arouses it, suffices for salvation.
Father Francis Xavier answered the Japanese that if their ancestors had
used well their natural light God would have given them the grace necessary
for salvation; and the Bishop of Geneva, Francis of Sales, gives full
approval to this answer (Book 4, _On the Love of God,_ ch. 5).
96. This I pointed out some time ago to the excellent M Pélisson, to show
him that the Roman Church, going further than the Protestants, does not
damn utterly those who are outside its communion, and even outside
Christianity, by using as its only criterion explicit faith. Nor did he
refute it, properly speaking, in the very kind answer he gave me, and which
he published in the fourth part of his _Reflexions_, also doing me the
honour of adding to it my letter. I offered him then for consideration what
a famous Portuguese theologian, by name Jacques Payva Andradius, envoy to
the Council of Trent, wrote concerning this, in opposition to Chemnitz,
during this same Council. And now, without citing many other authors of
eminence, I will content myself with naming Father Friedrich Spee, the
Jesuit, one of the most excellent in his Society, who also held this common
opinion upon the efficacy of the love of God, as is apparent in the preface
to the admirable book which he wrote in Germany on the Christian virtues.
He speaks of this observation as of a highly important secret of piety, and
expatiates with great clearness upon the power of divine love to blot out
sin, even without the intervention of the Sacraments of the Catholic
Church, provided one scorn them not, for that would not at all be
compatible with this love. And a very great personage, whose character was
one of the most lofty to be found in the Roman Church, was the first to
make me acquainted with it. Father Spee was of a noble family of Westphalia
(it may be said in passing) and he died in the odour of sanctity, according
to the testimony of him who published this book in Cologne with the [177]
approval of the Superiors.
97. The memory of this excellent man ought to be still precious to persons
of knowledge and good sense, because he is the author of the book entitled:
_Cautio Criminalis circa Processus contra Sagas_, which has caused much
stir, and has been translated into several languages. I learnt from the
Grand Elector of Mainz, Johann Philipp von Schonborn, uncle of His Highness
the present Elector, who walks gloriously in the footsteps of that worthy
predecessor, the story that follows. That Father was in Franconia when
there was a frenzy there for burning alleged sorcerers. He accompanied even
to the pyre many of them, all of whom he recognized as being innocent, from
their confessions and the researches that he had made thereon. Therefore in
spite of the danger incurred at that time by one telling the truth in this
matter, he resolved to compile this work, without however naming himself.
It bore great fruit and on this matter converted that Elector, at that time
still a simple canon and afterwards Bishop of Würzburg, finally also
Archbishop of Mainz, who, as soon as he came to power, put an end to these
burnings. Therein he was followed by the Dukes of Brunswick, and finally by
the majority of the other princes and states of Germany.
98. This digression appeared to me to be seasonable, because that writer
deserves to be more widely known. Returning now to the subject I make a
further observation. Supposing that to-day a knowledge of Jesus Christ
according to the flesh is absolutely necessary to salvation, as indeed it
is safest to teach, it will be possible to say that God will give that
knowledge to all those who do, humanly speaking, that which in them lies,
even though God must needs give it by a miracle. Moreover, we cannot know
what passes in souls at the point of death; and if sundry learned and
serious theologians claim that children receive in baptism a kind of faith,
although they do not remember it afterwards when they are questioned about
it, why should one maintain that nothing of a like nature, or even more
definite, could come about in the dying, whom we cannot interrogate after
their death? Thus there are countless paths open to God, giving him means
of satisfying his justice and his goodness: and the only thing one may
allege against this is that we know not what way he employs; which is far
from being a valid objection.
[178]
99. Let us pass on to those who lack not power to amend, but good will.
They are doubtless not to be excused; but there always remains a great
difficulty concerning God, since it rested with him to give them this same
good will. He is the master of wills, the hearts of kings and those of all
other men are in his hand. Holy Scripture goes so far as to say that God at
times hardened the wicked in order to display his power by punishing them.
This hardening is not to be taken as meaning that God inspires men with a
kind of anti-grace, that is, a kind of repugnance to good, or even an
inclination towards evil, just as the grace that he gives is an inclination
towards good. It is rather that God, having considered the sequence of
things that he established, found it fitting, for superior reasons, to
permit that Pharaoh, for example, should be in such _circumstances_ as
should increase his wickedness, and divine wisdom willed to derive a good
from this evil.
100. Thus it all often comes down to _circumstances_, which form a part of
the combination of things. There are countless examples of small
circumstances serving to convert or to pervert. Nothing is more widely
known than the _Tolle, lege_ (Take and read) cry which St. Augustine heard
in a neighbouring house, when he was pondering on what side he should take
among the Christians divided into sects, and saying to himself,
_Quod vitae sectabor iter?_
This brought him to open at random the book of the Holy Scriptures which he
had before him, and to read what came before his eyes: and these were words
which finally induced him to give up Manichaeism. The good Steno, a Dane,
who was titular Bishop of Titianopolis, Vicar Apostolic (as they say) of
Hanover and the region around, when there was a Duke Regent of his
religion, told us that something of that kind had happened to him. He was a
great anatomist and deeply versed in natural science; but he unfortunately
gave up research therein, and from being a great physicist he became a
mediocre theologian. He would almost listen to nothing more about the
marvels of Nature, and an express order from the Pope _in virtute sanctae
obedientiae_ was needed to extract from him the observations M. Thévenot
asked of him. He told us then that what had greatly helped towards inducing
him to place himself on the side of the Roman Church had been the voice of
a lady in Florence, who had cried out to him from a window: 'Go not on[179]
the side where you are about to go, sir, go on the other side.' 'That voice
struck me,' he told us, 'because I was just meditating upon religion.' This
lady knew that he was seeking a man in the house where she was, and, when
she saw him making his way to the other house, wished to point out where
his friend's room was.
101. Father John Davidius, the Jesuit, wrote a book entitled _Veridicus
Christianus_, which is like a kind of _Bibliomancy_, where one takes
passages at random, after the pattern of the _Tolle, lege_ of St.
Augustine, and it is like a devotional game. But the chances to which, in
spite of ourselves, we are subject, play only too large a part in what
brings salvation to men, or removes it from them. Let us imagine twin
Polish children, the one taken by the Tartars, sold to the Turks, brought
to apostasy, plunged in impiety, dying in despair; the other saved by some
chance, falling then into good hands to be educated properly, permeated by
the soundest truths of religion, exercised in the virtues that it commends
to us, dying with all the feelings of a good Christian. One will lament the
misfortune of the former, prevented perhaps by a slight circumstance from
being saved like his brother, and one will marvel that this slight chance
should have decided his fate for eternity.
102. Someone will perchance say that God foresaw by mediate knowledge that
the former would have been wicked and damned even if he had remained in
Poland. There are perhaps conjunctures wherein something of the kind takes
place. But will it therefore be said that this is a general rule, and that
not one of those who were damned amongst the pagans would have been saved
if he had been amongst Christians? Would that not be to contradict our
Lord, who said that Tyre and Sidon would have profited better by his
preaching, if they had had the good fortune to hear it, than Capernaum?
103. But were one to admit even here this use of mediate knowledge against
all appearances, this knowledge still implies that God considers what a man
would do in such and such circumstances; and it always remains true that
God could have placed him in other circumstances more favourable, and given
him inward or outward succour capable of vanquishing the most abysmal
wickedness existing in any soul. I shall be told that God is not bound to
do so, but that is not enough; it must be added that greater reasons
prevent him from making all his goodness felt by all. Thus there must [180]
needs be choice; but I do not think one must seek the reason altogether in
the good or bad nature of men. For if with some people one assume that God,
choosing the plan which produces the most good, but which involves sin and
damnation, has been prompted by his wisdom to choose the best natures in
order to make them objects of his grace, this grace would not sufficiently
appear to be a free gift. Accordingly man will be distinguishable by a kind
of inborn merit, and this assumption seems remote from the principles of
St. Paul, and even from those of Supreme Reason.
104. It is true that there are reasons for God's choice, and the
consideration of the object, that is, the nature of man, must needs enter
therein; but it does not seem that this choice can be subjected to a rule
such as we are capable of conceiving, and such as may flatter the pride of
men. Some famous theologians believe that God offers more grace, and in a
more favourable way, to those whose resistance he foresees will be less,
and that he abandons the rest to their self-will. We may readily suppose
that this is often the case, and this expedient, among those which make man
distinguishable by anything favourable in his nature, is the farthest
removed from Pelagianism. But I would not venture, notwithstanding, to make
of it a universal rule. Moreover, that we may not have cause to vaunt
ourselves, it is necessary that we be ignorant of the reasons for God's
choice. Those reasons are too diverse to become known to us; and it may be
that God at times shows the power of his grace by overcoming the most
obstinate resistance, to the end that none may have cause either to despair
or to be puffed up. St. Paul, as it would seem, had this in mind when he
offered himself as an example. God, he said, has had mercy upon me, to give
a great example of his patience.
105. It may be that fundamentally all men are equally bad, and consequently
incapable of being distinguished the one from the other through their good
or less bad natural qualities; but they are not bad all in the same way:
for there is an inherent individual difference between souls, as the
Pre-established Harmony proves. Some are more or less inclined towards a
particular good or a particular evil, or towards their opposites, all in
accordance with their natural dispositions. But since the general plan of
the universe, chosen by God for superior reasons, causes men to be in
different circumstances, those who meet with such as are more [181]
favourable to their nature will become more readily the least wicked, the
most virtuous, the most happy; yet it will be always by aid of the
influence of that inward grace which God unites with the circumstances.
Sometimes it even comes to pass, in the progress of human life, that a more
excellent nature succeeds less, for lack of cultivation or opportunities.
One may say that men are chosen and ranged not so much according to their
excellence as according to their conformity with God's plan. Even so it may
occur that a stone of lesser quality is made use of in a building or in a
group because it proves to be the particular one for filling a certain gap.
106. But, in fine, all these attempts to find reasons, where there is no
need to adhere altogether to certain hypotheses, serve only to make clear
to us that there are a thousand ways of justifying the conduct of God. All
the disadvantages we see, all the obstacles we meet with, all the
difficulties one may raise for oneself, are no hindrance to a belief
founded on reason, even when it cannot stand on conclusive proof, as has
been shown and will later become more apparent, that there is nothing so
exalted as the wisdom of God, nothing so just as his judgements, nothing so
pure as his holiness, and nothing more vast than his goodness.
[182]
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