359. I suppose that the gifted author of this extract, when he thought the

difficulty could be solved, had in mind something akin to my principles on

this matter. If he had vouchsafed to declare himself in this passage, he

would to all appearance have replied, like M. Regis, that the laws God

established were the most excellent that could be established. He would

have acknowledged, at the same time, that God could not have refrained[341]

from establishing laws and following rules, because laws and rules are what

makes order and beauty; that to act without rules would be to act without

reason; and that because God _called into action all his goodness_ the

exercise of his omnipotence was consistent with the laws of wisdom, to

secure as much good as was possible of attainment. Finally, he would have

said, the existence of certain particular disadvantages which strike us is

a sure indication that the best plan did not permit of their avoidance, and

that they assist in the achievement of the total good, an argument

wherewith M. Bayle in more than one place expresses agreement.

360. Now that I have proved sufficiently that everything comes to pass

according to determinate reasons, there cannot be any more difficulty over

these principles of God's foreknowledge. Although these determinations do

not compel, they cannot but be certain, and they foreshadow what shall

happen. It is true that God sees all at once the whole sequence of this

universe, when he chooses it, and that thus he has no need of the connexion

of effects and causes in order to foresee these effects. But since his

wisdom causes him to choose a sequence in perfect connexion, he cannot but

see one part of the sequence in the other. It is one of the rules of my

system of general harmony, _that the present is big with the future_, and

that he who sees all sees in that which is that which shall be. What is

more, I have proved conclusively that God sees in each portion of the

universe the whole universe, owing to the perfect connexion of things. He

is infinitely more discerning than Pythagoras, who judged the height of

Hercules by the size of his footprint. There must therefore be no doubt

that effects follow their causes determinately, in spite of contingency and

even of freedom, which nevertheless exist together with certainty or

determination.

361. Durand de Saint-Pourçain, among others, has indicated this clearly in

saying that contingent futurities are seen determinately in their causes,

and that God, who knows all, seeing all that shall have power to tempt or

repel the will, will see therein the course it shall take. I could cite

many other authors who have said the same thing, and reason does not allow

the possibility of thinking otherwise. M. Jacquelot implies also

(_Conformity of Faith with Reason_, p. 318 _et seqq._), as M. Bayle

observes (_Reply to the Questions of a Provincial_, vol. III, ch. 142, p.

796), that the dispositions of the human heart and those of circumstances

acquaint God unerringly with the choice that man shall make. M. Bayle [342]

adds that some Molinists say the same, and refers us to those who are

quoted in the _Suavis Concordia_ of Pierre de S. Joseph, the Feuillant (pp.

579, 580).

362. Those who have confused this determination with necessity have

fabricated monsters in order to fight them. To avoid a reasonable thing

which they had disguised under a hideous shape, they have fallen into great

absurdities. For fear of being obliged to admit an imaginary necessity, or

at least one different from that in question, they have admitted something

which happens without the existence of any cause or reason for it. This

amounts to the same as the absurd deviation of atoms, which according to

Epicurus happened without any cause. Cicero, in his book on Divination, saw

clearly that if the cause could produce an effect towards which it was

entirely indifferent there would be a true chance, a genuine luck, an

actual fortuitous case, that is, one which would be so not merely in

relation to us and our ignorance, according to which one may say:

_Sed Te_

_Nos facimus, Fortuna, Deam, caeloque locamus,_

but even in relation to God and to the nature of things. Consequently it

would be impossible to foresee events by judging of the future by the past.

He adds fittingly in the same passage: 'Qui potest provideri, quicquam

futurum esse, quod neque causam habet ullam, neque notam cur futurum sit?'

and soon after: 'Nihil est tam contrarium rationi et constantiae, quam

fortuna; ut mihi ne in Deum quidem cadere videatur, ut sciat quid casu et

fortuito futurum sit. Si enim scit, certe illud eveniet: sin certe eveniet,

nulla fortuna est.' If the future is certain, there is no such thing as

luck. But he wrongly adds: 'Est autum fortuna; rerum igitur fortuitarum

nulla praesensio est.' There is luck, therefore future events cannot be

foreseen. He ought rather to have concluded that, events being

predetermined and foreseen, there is no luck. But he was then speaking

against the Stoics, in the character of an Academician.

363. The Stoics already derived from the decrees of God the prevision of

events. For, as Cicero says in the same book: 'Sequitur porro nihil Deos

ignorare, quod omnia ab iis sint constituta.' And, according to my system,

God, having seen the possible world that he desired to create, foresaw[343]

everything therein. Thus one may say that the _divine knowledge of vision

differs from the knowledge of simple intelligence_ only in that it adds to

the latter the acquaintance with the actual decree to choose this sequence

of things which simple intelligence had already presented, but only as

possible; and this decree now makes the present universe.

364. Thus the Socinians cannot be excused for denying to God the certain

knowledge of future events, and above all of the future resolves of a free

creature. For even though they had supposed that there is a freedom of

complete indifference, so that the will can choose without cause, and that

thus this effect could not be seen in its cause (which is a great

absurdity), they ought always to take into account that God was able to

foresee this event in the idea of the possible world that he resolved to

create. But the idea which they have of God is unworthy of the Author of

things, and is not commensurate with the skill and wit which the writers of

this party often display in certain particular discussions. The author of

the _Reflexion on the Picture of Socinianism_ was not altogether mistaken

in saying that the God of the Socinians would be ignorant and powerless,

like the God of Epicurus, every day confounded by events and living from

one day to the next, if he only knows by conjecture what the will of men is

to be.

365. The whole difficulty here has therefore only come from a wrong idea of

contingency and of freedom, which was thought to have need of a complete

indifference or equipoise, an imaginary thing, of which neither a notion

nor an example exists, nor ever can exist. Apparently M. Descartes had been

imbued with the idea in his youth, at the College of la Flèche. That caused

him to say (part I of his _Principles_, art. 41): 'Our thought is finite,

and the knowledge and omnipotence of God, whereby he has not only known

from all eternity everything that is, or that can be, but also has willed

it, is infinite. Thus we have enough intelligence to recognize clearly and

distinctly that this power and this knowledge are in God; but we have not

enough so to comprehend their extent that we can know how they leave the

actions of men entirely free and indeterminate.' The continuation has

already been quoted above. 'Entirely free', that is right; but one spoils

everything by adding 'entirely indeterminate'. One has no need of infinite

knowledge in order to see that the foreknowledge and the providence of God

allow freedom to our actions, since God has foreseen those actions in [344]

his ideas, just as they are, that is, free. Laurentius Valla indeed, in his

_Dialogue against Boethius_ (which I will presently quote in epitome) ably

undertakes to reconcile freedom with foreknowledge, but does not venture to

hope that he can reconcile it with providence. Yet there is no more

difficulty in the one than the other, because the decree to give existence

to this action no more changes its nature than does one's mere

consciousness thereof. But there is no knowledge, however infinite it be,

which can reconcile the knowledge and providence of God with actions of an

indeterminate cause, that is to say, with a chimerical and impossible

being. The actions of the will are determined in two ways, by the

foreknowledge or providence of God, and also by the dispositions of the

particular immediate cause, which lie in the inclinations of the soul. M.

Descartes followed the Thomists on this point; but he wrote with his usual

circumspection, so as not to come into conflict with some other

theologians.

366. M. Bayle relates (_Reply to the Questions of a Provincial_, vol. III,

ch. 142, p. 804) that Father Gibieuf of the Oratory published a Latin

treatise on the freedom of God and of the creature, in the year 1639; that

he was met with protests, and was shown a collection of seventy

contradictions taken from the first book of his work; and that, twenty

years after, Father Annat, Confessor to the King of France, reproached him

in his book _De Incoacta Libertate_ (ed. Rome, 1654, in 4to.), for the

silence he still maintained. Who would not think (adds M. Bayle), after the

uproar of the _de Auxiliis_ Congregations, that the Thomists taught things

touching the nature of free will which were entirely opposed to the opinion

of the Jesuits? When, however, one considers the passages that Father Annat

quoted from the works of the Thomists (in a pamphlet entitled: _Jansenius a

Thomistis, gratiae per se ipsam efficacis defensoribus, condemnatus_,

printed in Paris in the year 1654 in 4to.) one can in reality only see

verbal controversies between the two sects. The grace efficacious of

itself, according to the one side, leaves to free will quite as much power

of resistance as the congruent grace of the others. M. Bayle thinks one can

say almost as much of Jansenius himself. He was (so he says) an able man,

of a methodical mind and of great assiduity. He worked for twenty-two years

at his _Augustinus_. One of his aims was to refute the Jesuits on the dogma

of free will; yet no decision has yet been reached as to whether he rejects

or adopts freedom of indifference. From his work innumerable passages [345]

are quoted for and against this opinion, as Father Annat has himself shown

in the work that has just been mentioned, _De Incoacta Libertate_. So easy

is it to render this subject obscure, as M. Bayle says at the conclusion of

this discourse. As for Father Gibieuf, it must be admitted that he often

alters the meaning of his terms, and that consequently he does not answer

the question in the main, albeit he often writes with good sense.

367. Indeed, confusion springs, more often than not, from ambiguity in

terms, and from one's failure to take trouble over gaining clear ideas

about them. That gives rise to these eternal, and usually mistaken,

contentions on necessity and contingency, on the possible and the

impossible. But provided that it is understood that necessity and

possibility, taken metaphysically and strictly, depend solely upon this

question, whether the object in itself or that which is opposed to it

implies contradiction or not; and that one takes into account that

contingency is consistent with the inclinations, or reasons which

contribute towards causing determination by the will; provided also that

one knows how to distinguish clearly between necessity and determination or

certainty, between metaphysical necessity, which admits of no choice,

presenting only one single object as possible, and moral necessity, which

constrains the wisest to choose the best; finally, provided that one is rid

of the chimera of complete indifference, which can only be found in the

books of philosophers, and on paper (for they cannot even conceive the

notion in their heads, or prove its reality by an example in things) one

will easily escape from a labyrinth whose unhappy Daedalus was the human

mind. That labyrinth has caused infinite confusion, as much with the

ancients as with those of later times, even so far as to lead men into the

absurd error of the Lazy Sophism, which closely resembles fate after the

Turkish fashion. I do not wonder if in reality the Thomists and the

Jesuits, and even the Molinists and the Jansenists, agree together on this

matter more than is supposed. A Thomist and even a wise Jansenist will

content himself with certain determination, without going on to necessity:

and if someone goes so far, the error mayhap will lie only in the word. A

wise Molinist will be content with an indifference opposed to necessity,

but such as shall not exclude prevalent inclinations.

368. These difficulties, however, have greatly impressed M. Bayle, who[346]

was more inclined to dwell on them than to solve them, although he might

perhaps have had better success than anyone if he had thought fit to turn

his mind in that direction. Here is what he says of them in his

_Dictionary_, art. 'Jansenius', lit. G, p. 1626: 'Someone has said that the

subject of Grace is an ocean which has neither shore nor bottom. Perhaps he

would have spoken more correctly if he had compared it to the Strait of

Messina, where one is always in danger of striking one reef while

endeavouring to avoid another.

_Dextrum Scylla latus, laevum implacata Charybdis_

_Obsidet._

Everything comes back in the end to this: Did Adam sin freely? If you

answer yes, then you will be told, his fall was not foreseen. If you answer

no, then you will be told, he is not guilty. You may write a hundred

volumes against the one or the other of these conclusions, and yet you will

confess, either that the infallible prevision of a contingent event is a

mystery impossible to conceive, or that the way in which a creature which

acts without freedom sins nevertheless is altogether incomprehensible.'

369. Either I am greatly mistaken or these two alleged

incomprehensibilities are ended altogether by my solutions. Would to God it

were as easy to answer the question how to cure fevers, and how to avoid

the perils of two chronic sicknesses that may originate, the one from not

curing the fever, the other from curing it wrongly. When one asserts that a

free event cannot be foreseen, one is confusing freedom with

indetermination, or with indifference that is complete and in equipoise;

and when one maintains that the lack of freedom would prevent man from

being guilty, one means a freedom exempt, not from determination or from

certainty, but from necessity and from constraint. This shows that the

dilemma is not well expressed, and that there is a wide passage between the

two perilous reefs. One will reply, therefore, that Adam sinned freely, and

that God saw him sinning in the possible state of Adam, which became actual

in accordance with the decree of the divine permission. It is true that

Adam was determined to sin in consequence of certain prevailing

inclinations: but this determination destroys neither contingency nor

freedom. Moreover, the certain determination to sin which exists in man

does not deprive him of the power to avoid sinning (speaking generally) or,

since he does sin, prevent him from being guilty and deserving [347]

punishment. This is more especially so since the punishment may be of

service to him or others, to contribute towards determining them another

time not to sin. There is besides punitive justice, which goes beyond

compensation and amendment, and wherein also there is nothing liable to be

shaken by the certain determination of the contingent resolutions of the

will. It may be said, on the contrary, that the penalties and rewards would

be to some extent unavailing, and would fail in one of their aims, that of

amendment, if they could not contribute towards determining the will to do

better another time.

370. M. Bayle continues: 'Where freedom is concerned there are only two

courses to take: one is to say that all the causes distinct from the soul,

and co-operating with it, leave it the power to act or not to act; the

other is to say that they so determine it to act that it cannot forbear to

do so. The first course is that taken by the Molinists, the other is that

of the Thomists and Jansenists and the Protestants of the Geneva

Confession. Yet the Thomists have clamorously maintained that they were not

Jansenists; and the latter have maintained with equal warmth that where

freedom was concerned they were not Calvinists. On the other hand, the

Molinists have maintained that St. Augustine did not teach Jansenism. Thus

the one side not wishing to admit that they were in conformity with people

who were considered heretics, and the other side not wishing to admit that

they were in opposition to a learned saint whose opinions were always

considered orthodox, have both performed a hundred feats of contortion,

etc.'

371. The two courses which M. Bayle distinguishes here do not exclude a

third course, according to which the determination of the soul does not

come solely from the co-operation of all the causes distinct from the soul,

but also from the state of the soul itself and its inclinations which

mingle with the impressions of the senses, strengthening or weakening them.

Now all the internal and external causes taken together bring it about that

the soul is determined certainly, but not of necessity: for no

contradiction would be implied if the soul were to be determined

differently, it being possible for the will to be inclined, but not

possible for it to be compelled by necessity. I will not venture upon a

discussion of the difference existing between the Jansenists and the

Reformed on this matter. They are not perhaps always fully in accord [348]

with themselves as regards things, or as regards expressions, on a matter

where one often loses one's way in bewildering subtleties. Father Theophile

Raynaud, in his book entitled _Calvinismus Religio Bestiarum_, wished to

strike at the Dominicans, without naming them. On the other hand, those who

professed to be followers of St. Augustine reproached the Molinists with

Pelagianism or at the least semi-Pelagianism. Things were carried to excess

at times by both sides, whether in their defence of a vague indifference

and the granting of too much to man, or in their teaching _determinationem

ad unum secundum qualitatem actus licet non quoad ejus substantiam_, that

is to say, a determination to evil in the non-regenerate, as if they did

nothing but sin. After all, I think one must not reproach any but the

adherents of Hobbes and Spinoza with destroying freedom and contingency;

for they think that that which happens is alone possible, and must happen

by a brute geometrical necessity. Hobbes made everything material and

subjected it to mathematical laws alone; Spinoza also divested God of

intelligence and choice, leaving him a blind power, whence all emanates of

necessity. The theologians of the two Protestant parties are equally

zealous in refuting an unendurable necessity. Although those who follow the

Synod of Dordrecht teach sometimes that it suffices for freedom to be

exempt from constraint, it seems that the necessity they leave in it is

only hypothetical, or rather that which is more appropriately termed

certainty and infallibility. Thus it results that very often the

difficulties only lie in the terms. I say as much with regard to the

Jansenists, although I do not wish to make excuse for those people in

everything.

372. With the Hebrew Cabalists, _Malcuth_ or the Kingdom, the last of the

Sephiroth, signified that God controls everything irresistibly, but gently

and without violence, so that man thinks he is following his own will while

he carries out God's. They said that Adam's sin had been _truncatio Malcuth

a caeteris plantis_, that is to say, that Adam had cut back the last of the

Sephiroth, by making a dominion for himself within God's dominion, and by

assuming for himself a freedom independent of God, but that his fall had

taught him that he could not subsist of himself, and that men must needs be

redeemed by the Messiah. This doctrine may receive a good interpretation.

But Spinoza, who was versed in the Cabala of the writers of his race, and

who says (_Tractatus Politicus_, c. 2, n. 6) that men, conceiving of

freedom as they do, establish a dominion within God's dominion, has [349]

gone too far. The dominion of God is with Spinoza nothing but the dominion

of necessity, and of a blind necessity (as with Strato), whereby everything

emanates from the divine nature, while no choice is left to God, and man's

choice does not exempt him from necessity. He adds that men, in order to

establish what is termed _Imperium in Imperio_, supposed that their soul

was a direct creation of God, something which could not be produced by

natural causes, furthermore that it had an absolute power of determination,

a state of things contrary to experience. Spinoza is right in opposing an

absolute power of determination, that is, one without any grounds; it does

not belong even to God. But he is wrong in thinking that a soul, that a

simple substance, can be produced naturally. It seems, indeed, that the

soul to him was only a transient modification; and when he pretends to make

it lasting, and even perpetual, he substitutes for it the idea of the body,

which is purely a notion and not a real and actual thing.

373. The story M. Bayle relates of Johan Bredenburg, a citizen of Rotterdam

(_Dictionary_, art. 'Spinoza', lit. H, p. 2774) is curious. He published a

book against Spinoza, entitled: _Enervatio Tractatus Theologico-politici,

una cum demonstratione geometrico ordine disposita, Naturam non esse Deum,

cujus effati contrario praedictus Tractatus unice innititur_. One was

surprised to see that a man who did not follow the profession of letters,

and who had but slight education (having written his book in Flemish, and

had it translated into Latin), had been able to penetrate with such

subtlety all the principles of Spinoza, and succeed in overthrowing them,

after having reduced them by a candid analysis to a state wherein they

could appear in their full force. I have been told (adds M. Bayle) that

this writer after copious reflexion upon his answer, and upon the principle

of his opponent, finally found that this principle could be reduced to the

form of a demonstration. He undertook therefore to prove that there is no

cause of all things other than a nature which exists necessarily, and which

acts according to an immutable, inevitable and irrevocable necessity. He

examined the whole system of the geometricians, and after having

constructed his demonstration he scrutinized it from every imaginable

angle, he endeavoured to find its weak spot and was never able to discover

any means of destroying it, or even of weakening it. That caused him real

distress: he groaned over it and begged the most talented of his [350]

friends to help him in searching out the defects of this demonstration. For

all that, he was not well pleased that copies of the book were made. Franz

Cuper, a Socinian (who had written _Arcana Atheismi Revelata_ against

Spinoza, Rotterdam, 1676, in 4to.), having obtained a copy, published it

just as it was, that is, in Flemish, with some reflexions, and accused the

author of being an atheist. The accused made his defence in the same

tongue. Orobio, a very able Jewish physician (that one who was refuted by

M. Limbourg, and who replied, so I have heard say, in a work posthumously

circulated, but unpublished), brought out a book opposing Bredenburg's

demonstration, entitled: _Certamen Philosophicum Propugnatae Veritatis

Divinae ac Naturalis, adversus J.B. principia, Amsterdam_, 1684. M. Aubert

de Versé also wrote in opposition to him the same year under the name of

Latinus Serbattus Sartensis. Bredenburg protested that he was convinced of

free will and of religion, and that he wished he might be shown a

possibility of refuting his own demonstration.

374. I would desire to see this alleged demonstration, and to know whether

it tended to prove that primitive Nature, which produces all, acts without

choice and without knowledge. In this case, I admit that his proof was

Spinozistic and dangerous. But if he meant perhaps that the divine nature

is determined toward that which it produces, by its choice and through the

motive of the best, there was no need for him to grieve about this

so-called immutable, inevitable, irrevocable necessity. It is only moral,

it is a happy necessity; and instead of destroying religion it shows divine

perfection to the best advantage.

375. I take this opportunity to add that M. Bayle quotes (p. 2773) the

opinion of those who believe that the book entitled _Lucii Antistii

Constantis de Jure Ecclesiasticorum Liber Singularis_, published in 1665,

is by Spinoza. But I have reason for doubting this, despite that M.

Colerus, who has passed on to me an account he wrote of the life of that

famous Jew, is also of that opinion. The initial letters L.A.C. lead me to

believe that the author of this book was M. de la Cour or Van den Hoof,

famous for works on the _Interest of Holland, Political Equipoise_, and

numerous other books that he published (some of them under the signature

V.D.H.) attacking the power of the Governor of Holland, which was at that

time considered a danger to the Republic; for the memory of Prince William

the Second's attempt upon the city of Amsterdam was still quite fresh.[351]

Most of the ecclesiastics of Holland were on the side of this prince's son,

who was then a minor, and they suspected M. de Witt and what was called the

Lowenstein faction of favouring the Arminians, the Cartesians, and other

sects that were feared still more, endeavouring to rouse the populace

against them, and not without success, as the event proved. It was thus

very natural that M. de la Cour should publish this book. It is true that

people seldom keep to the happy mean in works published to further party

interests. I will say in passing that a French version of the _Interest of

Holland_ by M. de la Cour has just been published, under the deceptive

title of _Mémoires de M. le Grand-Pensionnaire de Witt_; as if the thoughts

of a private individual, who was, to be sure, of de Witt's party, and a man

of talent, but who had not enough acquaintance with public affairs or

enough ability to write as that great Minister of State might have written,

could pass for the production of one of the first men of his time.

376. I saw M. de la Cour as well as Spinoza on my return from France by way

of England and Holland, and I learnt from them a few good anecdotes on the

affairs of that time. M. Bayle says, p. 2770, that Spinoza studied Latin

under a physician named Franz van den Ende. He tells at the same time, on

the authority of Sebastian Kortholt (who refers to it in the preface to the

second edition of the book by his late father, _De Tribus Impostoribus,

Herberto L. B. de Cherbury, Hobbio et Spinoza_) that a girl instructed

Spinoza in Latin, and that she afterwards married M. Kerkering, who was her

pupil at the same time as Spinoza. In connexion with that I note that this

young lady was a daughter of M. van den Ende, and that she assisted her

father in the work of teaching. Van den Ende, who was also called A.

Finibus, later went to Paris, and there kept a boarding-school in the

Faubourg St. Antoine. He was considered excellent as an instructor, and he

told me, when I called upon him there, that he would wager that his

audiences would always pay attention to his words. He had with him as well

at that time a young girl who also spoke Latin, and worked upon geometrical

demonstrations. He had insinuated himself into M. Arnauld's good graces,

and the Jesuits began to be jealous of his reputation. But he disappeared

shortly afterwards, having been mixed up in the Chevalier de Rohan's

conspiracy.

377. I think I have sufficiently proved that neither the foreknowledge nor

the providence of God can impair either his justice or his goodness, [352]

or our freedom. There remains only the difficulty arising from God's

co-operation with the actions of the creature, which seems to concern more

closely both his goodness, in relation to our evil actions, and our

freedom, in relation to good actions as well as to others. M. Bayle has

brought out this also with his usual acuteness. I will endeavour to throw

light upon the difficulties he puts forward, and then I shall be in a

position to conclude this work. I have already proved that the co-operation

of God consists in giving us continually all that is real in us and in our

actions, in so far as it involves perfection; but that all that is limited

and imperfect therein is a consequence of the previous limitations which

are originally in the creature. Since, moreover, every action of the

creature is a change of its modifications, it is obvious that action arises

in the creature in relation to the limitations or negations which it has

within itself, and which are diversified by this change.

378. I have already pointed out more than once in this work that evil is a

consequence of privation, and I think that I have explained that

intelligibly enough. St. Augustine has already put forward this idea, and

St. Basil said something of the same kind in his _Hexaëmeron_, Homil. 2,

'that vice is not a living and animate substance, but an affection of the

soul contrary to virtue, which arises from one's abandoning the good; and

there is therefore no need to look for an original evil'. M. Bayle, quoting

this passage in his _Dictionary_ (art. 'Paulicians', lit. D, p. 2325)

commends a remark by Herr Pfanner (whom he calls a German theologian, but

he is a jurist by profession, Counsellor to the Dukes of Saxony), who

censures St. Basil for not being willing to admit that God is the author of

physical evil. Doubtless God is its author, when the moral evil is assumed

to be already in existence; but speaking generally, one might assert that

God permitted physical evil by implication, in permitting moral evil which

is its source. It appears that the Stoics knew also how slender is the

entity of evil. These words of Epictetus are an indication: 'Sicut

aberrandi causa meta non ponitur, sic nec natura mali in mundo existit.'

379. There was therefore no need to have recourse to a principle of evil,

as St. Basil aptly observes. Nor is it necessary either to seek the origin

of evil in matter. Those who believed that there was a chaos before God

laid his hand upon it sought therein the source of disorder. It was an

opinion which Plato introduced into his _Timaeus_. Aristotle found fault

with him for that (in his third book on Heaven, ch. 2) because, [353]

according to this doctrine, disorder would be original and natural, and

order would have been introduced against nature. This Anaxagoras avoided by

making matter remain at rest until it was stirred by God; and Aristotle in

the same passage commends him for it. According to Plutarch (_De Iside et

Osiride_, and _Tr. de Animae Procreatione ex Timaeo_) Plato recognized in

matter a certain maleficent soul or force, rebellious against God: it was

an actual blemish, an obstacle to God's plans. The Stoics also believed

that matter was the source of defects, as Justus Lipsius showed in the

first book of the Physiology of the Stoics.

380. Aristotle was right in rejecting chaos: but it is not always easy to

disentangle the conceptions of Plato, and such a task would be still less

easy in respect of some ancient authors whose works are lost. Kepler, one

of the most excellent of modern mathematicians, recognized a species of

imperfection in matter, even when there is no irregular motion: he calls it

its 'natural inertia', which gives it a resistance to motion, whereby a

greater mass receives less speed from one and the same force. There is

soundness in this observation, and I have used it to advantage in this

work, in order to have a comparison such as should illustrate how the

original imperfection of the creatures sets bounds to the action of the

Creator, which tends towards good. But as matter is itself of God's

creation, it only furnishes a comparison and an example, and cannot be the

very source of evil and of imperfection. I have already shown that this

source lies in the forms or ideas of the possibles, for it must be eternal,

and matter is not so. Now since God made all positive reality that is not

eternal, he would have made the source of evil, if that did not rather lie

in the possibility of things or forms, that which alone God did not make,

since he is not the author of his own understanding.

381. Yet even though the source of evil lies in the possible forms,

anterior to the acts of God's will, it is nevertheless true that God

co-operates in evil in the actual performance of introducing these forms

into matter: and this is what causes the difficulty in question here.

Durand de Saint-Pourçain, Cardinal Aureolus, Nicolas Taurel, Father Louis

de Dole, M. Bernier and some others, speaking of this co-operation, would

have it only general, for fear of impairing the freedom of man and the

holiness of God. They seem to maintain that God, having given to creatures

the power to act, contents himself with conserving this power. On the [354]

other hand, M. Bayle, according to some modern writers, carries the

cooperation of God too far: he seems to fear lest the creature be not

sufficiently dependent upon God. He goes so far as to deny action to

creatures; he does not even acknowledge any real distinction between

accident and substance.

382. He places great reliance especially on that doctrine accepted of the

Schoolmen, that conservation is a continued creation. The conclusion to be

drawn from this doctrine would seem to be that the creature never exists,

that it is ever newborn and ever dying, like time, movement and other

transient beings. Plato believed this of material and tangible things,

saying that they are in a perpetual flux, _semper fluunt, nunquam sunt_.

But of immaterial substances he judged quite differently, regarding them

alone as real: nor was he in that altogether mistaken. Yet continued

creation applies to all creatures without distinction. Sundry good

philosophers have been opposed to this dogma, and M. Bayle tells that David

de Rodon, a philosopher renowned among those of the French who have adhered

to Geneva, deliberately refuted it. The Arminians also do not approve of

it; they are not much in favour of these metaphysical subtleties. I will

say nothing of the Socinians, who relish them even less.

383. For a proper enquiry as to _whether conservation is a continued

creation,_ it would be necessary to consider the reasons whereon this dogma

is founded. The Cartesians, after the example of their master, employ in

order to prove it a principle which is not conclusive enough. They say that

'the moments of time having no necessary connexion with one another, it

does not follow that because I am at this moment I shall exist at the

moment which shall follow, if the same cause which gives me being for this

moment does not also give it to me for the instant following.' The author

of the _Reflexion on the Picture of Socinianism_ has made use of this

argument, and M. Bayle (perhaps the author of this same _Reflexion_) quotes

it (_Reply to the Questions of a Provincial_, vol. III, ch. 141, p. 771).

One may answer that in fact it does not follow _of necessity_ that, because

I am, I shall be; but this follows _naturally_, nevertheless, that is, of

itself, _per se_, if nothing prevents it. It is the distinction that can be

drawn between the essential and the natural. For the same movement endures

naturally unless some new cause prevents it or changes it, because the

reason which makes it cease at this instant, if it is no new reason, [355]

would have already made it cease sooner.

384. The late Herr Erhard Weigel, a celebrated mathematician and

philosopher at Jena, well known for his _Analysis Euclidea_, his

mathematical philosophy, some neat mechanical inventions, and finally the

trouble he took to induce the Protestant princes of the Empire to undertake

the last reform of the Almanac, whose success, notwithstanding, he did not

witness; Herr Weigel, I say, communicated to his friends a certain

demonstration of the existence of God, which indeed amounted to this idea

of continued creation. As he was wont to draw parallels between reckoning

and reasoning--witness his Arithmetical Ethics (_rechenschaftliche

Sittenlehre_)--he said that the foundation of the demonstration was this

beginning of the Pythagorean Table, _once one is one_. These repeated

unities were the moments of the existence of things, each one of them

depending upon God, who resuscitates, as it were, all things outside

himself at each moment: falling away as they do at each moment, they must

ever have one who shall resuscitate them, and that cannot be any other than

God. But there would be need of a more exact proof if that is to be called

a demonstration. It would be necessary to prove that the creature always

emerges from nothingness and relapses thither forthwith. In particular it

must be shown that the privilege of enduring more than a moment by its

nature belongs to the necessary being alone. The difficulties on the

composition of the _continuum_ enter also into this matter. This dogma

appears to resolve time into moments, whereas others regard moments and

points as mere modalities of the _continuum_, that is, as extremities of

the parts that can be assigned to it, and not as constituent parts. But

this is not the place for entering into that labyrinth.

385. What can be said for certain on the present subject is that the

creature depends continually upon divine operation, and that it depends

upon that no less after the time of its beginning than when it first

begins. This dependence implies that it would not continue to exist if God

did not continue to act; in short, that this action of God is free. For if

it were a necessary emanation, like that of the properties of the circle,

which issue from its essence, it must then be said that God in the

beginning produced the creature by necessity; or else it must be shown how,

in creating it once, he imposed upon himself the necessity of conserving

it. Now there is no reason why this conserving action should not be [356]

called production, and even creation, if one will: for the dependence being

as great afterwards as at the beginning, the extrinsic designation of being

new or not does not change the nature of that action.

386. Let us then admit in such a sense that conservation is a continued

creation, and let us see what M. Bayle seems to infer thence (p. 771) after

the author of the _Reflexion on the Picture of Socinianism_, in opposition

to M. Jurieu. 'It seems to me', this writer says, 'that one must conclude

that God does all, and that in all creation there are no first or second or

even occasional causes, as can be easily proved. At this moment when I

speak, I am such as I am, with all my circumstances, with such thought,

such action, whether I sit or stand, that if God creates me in this moment

such as I am, as one must of necessity say in this system, he creates me

with such thought, such action, such movement and such determination. One

cannot say that God creates me in the first place, and that once I am

created he produces with me my movements and my determinations. That is

indefensible for two reasons. The first is, that when God creates me or

conserves me at this instant, he does not conserve me as a being without

form, like a species, or another of the Universals of Logic. I am an

individual; he creates me and conserves me as such, and as being all that I

am in this instant, with all my attendant circumstances. The second reason

is that if God creates me in this instant, and one says that afterwards he

produces with me my actions, it will be necessary to imagine another

instant for action: for before acting one must exist. Now that would be two

instants where we only assume one. It is therefore certain in this

hypothesis that creatures have neither more connexion nor more relation

with their actions than they had with their production at the first moment

of the first creation.' The author of this _Reflexion_ draws thence very

harsh conclusions which one can picture to oneself; and he testifies at the

end that one would be deeply indebted to any man that should teach those

who approve this system how to extricate themselves from these frightful

absurdities.

387. M. Bayle carries this still further. 'You know', he says (p. 775),

'that it is demonstrated in the Scholastic writings' (he cites Arriaga,

_Disp_. 9, Phys., sect. 6 et praesertim, sub-sect. 3) 'that the creature

cannot be either the total cause or the partial cause of its conservation:

for if it were, it would exist before existing, which is [357]

contradictory. You know that the argument proceeds like this: that which

conserves itself acts; now that which acts exists, and nothing can act

before it has attained complete existence; therefore, if a creature

conserved itself, it would act before being. This argument is not founded

upon probabilities, but upon the first principles of Metaphysics, _non

entis nulla sunt accidentia, operari sequitur esse_, axioms as clear as

daylight. Let us go further. If creatures co-operated with God (here is

meant an active cooperation, and not co-operation by a passive instrument)

to conserve themselves they would act before being: that has been

demonstrated. Now if they co-operated with God for the production of any

other thing, they would also act before being; it is therefore as

impossible for them to co-operate with God for the production of any other

thing (such as local movement, an affirmation, volition, entities actually

distinct from their substance, so it is asserted) as for their own

conservation. Since their conservation is a continued creation, and since

all human creatures in the world must confess that they cannot co-operate

with God at the first moment of their existence, either to produce

themselves or to give themselves any modality, since that would be to act

before being (observe that Thomas Aquinas and sundry other Schoolmen teach

that if the angels had sinned at the first moment of their creation God

would be the author of the sin: see the Feuillant Pierre de St. Joseph, p.

318, _et seqq_., of the _Suavis Concordia Humanae Libertatis_; it is a sign

that they acknowledge that at the first instant the creature cannot act in

anything whatsoever), it follows manifestly that they cannot co-operate

with God in any one of the subsequent moments, either to produce themselves

or to produce any other thing. If they could co-operate therein at the

second moment of their existence, nothing would prevent their being able to

cooperate at the first moment.'

388. This is the way it will be necessary to answer these arguments. Let us

assume that the creature is produced anew at each instant; let us grant

also that the instant excludes all priority of time, being indivisible; but

let us point out that it does not exclude priority of nature, or what is

called anteriority _in signo rationis,_ and that this is sufficient. The

production, or action whereby God produces, is anterior by nature to the

existence of the creature that is produced; the creature taken in itself,

with its nature and its necessary properties, is anterior to its accidental

affections and to its actions; and yet all these things are in being [358]

in the same moment. God produces the creature in conformity with the

exigency of the preceding instants, according to the laws of his wisdom;

and the creature operates in conformity with that nature which God conveys

to it in creating it always. The limitations and imperfections arise

therein through the nature of the subject, which sets bounds to God's

production; this is the consequence of the original imperfection of

creatures. Vice and crime, on the other hand, arise there through the free

inward operation of the creature, in so far as this can occur within the

instant, repetition afterwards rendering it discernible.

389. This anteriority of nature is a commonplace in philosophy: thus one

says that the decrees of God have an order among themselves. When one

ascribes to God (and rightly so) understanding of the arguments and

conclusions of creatures, in such sort that all their demonstrations and

syllogisms are known to him, and are found in him in a transcendent way,

one sees that there is in the propositions or truths a natural order; but

there is no order of time or interval, to cause him to advance in knowledge

and pass from the premisses to the conclusion.

390. I find in the arguments that have just been quoted nothing which these

reflexions fail to satisfy. When God produces the thing he produces it as

an individual and not as a universal of logic (I admit); but he produces

its essence before its accidents, its nature before its operations,

following the priority of their nature, and _in signo anteriore rationis_.

Thus one sees how the creature can be the true cause of the sin, while

conservation by God does not prevent the sin; God disposes in accordance

with the preceding state of the same creature, in order to follow the laws

of his wisdom notwithstanding the sin, which in the first place will be

produced by the creature. But it is true that God would not in the

beginning have created the soul in a state wherein it would have sinned

from the first moment, as the Schoolmen have justly observed: for there is

nothing in the laws of his wisdom that could have induced him so to do.

391. This law of wisdom brings it about also that God reproduces the same

substance, the same soul. Such was the answer that could have been given by

the Abbé whom M. Bayle introduces in his _Dictionary_ (art. 'Pyrrhon.' lit.

B, p. 2432). This wisdom effects the connexion of things. I concede

therefore that the creature does not co-operate with God to conserve [359]

himself (in the sense in which I have just explained conservation). But I

see nothing to prevent the creature's co-operation with God for the

production of any other thing: and especially might this concern its inward

operation, as in the case of a thought or a volition, things really

distinct from the substance.

392. But there I am once more at grips with M. Bayle. He maintains that

there are no such accidents distinct from the substance. 'The reasons', he

says, 'which our modern philosophers have employed to demonstrate that the

accidents are not beings in reality distinct from the substance are not

mere difficulties; they are arguments which overwhelm one, and which cannot

be refuted. Take the trouble', he adds, 'to look for them in the writings

of Father Maignan, or Father Malebranche or M. Calli' (Professor of

Philosophy at Caen) 'or in the _Accidentia profligata_ of Father Saguens,

disciple of Father Maignan, the extract from which is to be found in the

_Nouvelles de la République des Lettres_, June 1702. Or if you wish one

author only to suffice you, choose Dom François Lami, a Benedictine monk,

and one of the strongest Cartesians to be found in France. You will find

among his _Philosophical Letters_, printed at Trévoux in 1703, that one

wherein by the geometricians' method he demonstrates "that God is the sole

true cause of all that which is real." I would wish to see all these books;

and as for this last proposition, it may be true in a very good sense: God

is the one principal cause of pure and absolute realities, or of

perfections. _Causae secundae agunt in virtute primae._ But when one

comprises limitations and privations under the term realities one may say

that the second causes co-operate in the production of that which is

limited; otherwise God would be the cause of sin, and even the sole cause.

393. It is well to beware, moreover, lest in confusing substances with

accidents, in depriving created substances of action, one fall into

Spinozism, which is an exaggerated Cartesianism. That which does not act

does not merit the name of substance. If the accidents are not distinct

from the substances; if the created substance is a successive being, like

movement; if it does not endure beyond a moment, and does not remain the

same (during some stated portion of time) any more than its accidents; if

it does not operate any more than a mathematical figure or a number: why

shall one not say, with Spinoza, that God is the only substance, and [360]

that creatures are only accidents or modifications? Hitherto it has been

supposed that the substance remains, and that the accidents change; and I

think one ought still to abide by this ancient doctrine, for the arguments

I remember having read do not prove the contrary, and prove more than is

needed.

394. 'One of the absurdities', says M. Bayle (p. 779), 'that arise from the

so-called distinction which is alleged to exist between substances and

their accidents is that creatures, if they produce the accidents, would

possess a power of creation and annihilation. Accordingly one could not

perform the slightest action without creating an innumerable number of real

beings, and without reducing to nothingness an endless multitude of them.

Merely by moving the tongue to cry out or to eat, one creates as many

accidents as there are movements of the parts of the tongue, and one

destroys as many accidents as there are parts of that which one eats, which

lose their form, which become chyle, blood, etc.' This argument is only a

kind of bugbear. What harm would be done, supposing that an infinity of

movements, an infinity of figures spring up and disappear at every moment

in the universe, and even in each part of the universe? It can be

demonstrated, moreover, that that must be so.

395. As for the so-called creation of the accidents, who does not see that

one needs no creative power in order to change place or shape, to form a

square or a column, or some other parade-ground figure, by the movement of

the soldiers who are drilling; or again to fashion a statue by removing a

few pieces from a block of marble; or to make some figure in relief, by

changing, decreasing or increasing a piece of wax? The production of

modifications has never been called _creation_, and it is an abuse of terms

to scare the world thus. God produces substances from nothing, and the

substances produce accidents by the changes of their limits.

396. As for the souls or substantial forms, M. Bayle is right in adding:

'that there is nothing more inconvenient for those who admit substantial

forms than the objection which is made that they could not be produced save

by an actual creation, and that the Schoolmen are pitiable in their

endeavours to answer this.' But there is nothing more convenient for me and

for my system than this same objection. For I maintain that all the Souls,

Entelechies or primitive forces, substantial forms, simple substances, or

Monads, whatever name one may apply to them, can neither spring up [361]

naturally nor perish. And the qualities or derivative forces, or what are

called accidental forms, I take to be modifications of the primitive

Entelechy, even as shapes are modifications of matter. That is why these

modifications are perpetually changing, while the simple substance remains.

397. I have shown already (part I, 86 _seqq._) that souls cannot spring up

naturally, or be derived from one another, and that it is necessary that

ours either be created or be pre-existent. I have even pointed out a

certain middle way between a creation and an entire pre-existence. I find

it appropriate to say that the soul preexisting in the seeds from the

beginning of things was only sentient, but that it was elevated to the

superior degree, which is that of reason, when the man to whom this soul

should belong was conceived, and when the organic body, always accompanying

this soul from the beginning, but under many changes, was determined for

forming the human body. I considered also that one might attribute this

elevation of the sentient soul (which makes it reach a more sublime degree

of being, namely reason) to the extraordinary operation of God.

Nevertheless it will be well to add that I would dispense with miracles in

the generating of man, as in that of the other animals. It will be possible

to explain that, if one imagines that in this great number of souls and of

animals, or at least of living organic bodies which are in the seeds, those

souls alone which are destined to attain one day to human nature contain

the reason that shall appear therein one day, and the organic bodies of

these souls alone are preformed and predisposed to assume one day the human

shape, while the other small animals or seminal living beings, in which no

such thing is pre-established, are essentially different from them and

possessed only of an inferior nature. This production is a kind of

_traduction_, but more manageable than that kind which is commonly taught:

it does not derive the soul from a soul, but only the animate from an

animate, and it avoids the repeated miracles of a new creation, which would

cause a new and pure soul to enter a body that must corrupt it.

398. I am, however, of the same opinion as Father Malebranche, that, in

general, creation properly understood is not so difficult to admit as might

be supposed, and that it is in a sense involved in the notion of the

dependence of creatures. 'How stupid and ridiculous are the Philosophers!'

(he exclaims, in his _Christian Meditations_, 9, No. 3). 'They assume that

Creation is impossible, because they cannot conceive how God's power [362]

is great enough to make something from nothing. But can they any better

conceive how the power of God is capable of stirring a straw?' He adds,

again with great truth (No. 5), 'If matter were uncreate, God could not

move it or form anything from it. For God cannot move matter, or arrange it

wisely, if he does not know it. Now God cannot know it, if he does not give

it being: he can derive his knowledge only from himself. Nothing can act on

him or enlighten him.'

399. M. Bayle, not content with saying that we are created continually,

insists also on this other doctrine which he would fain derive thence: that

our soul cannot act. This is the way he speaks on that matter (ch. 141, p.

765): 'He has too much acquaintance with Cartesianism' (it is of an able

opponent he is speaking) 'not to know with what force it has been

maintained in our day that there is no creature capable of producing

motion, and that our soul is a purely passive subject in relation to

sensations and ideas, and feelings of pain and of pleasure, etc. If this

has not been carried as far as the volitions, that is on account of the

existence of revealed truths; otherwise the acts of the will would have

been found as passive as those of the understanding. The same reasons which

prove that our soul does not form our ideas, and does not stir our organs,

would prove also that it cannot form our acts of love and our volitions,

etc' He might add: our vicious actions, our crimes.

400. The force of these proofs, which he praises, must not be so great as

he thinks, for if it were they would prove too much. They would make God

the author of sin. I admit that the soul cannot stir the organs by a

physical influence; for I think that the body must have been so formed

beforehand that it would do in time and place that which responds to the

volitions of the soul, although it be true nevertheless that the soul is

the principle of the operation. But if it be said that the soul does not

produce its thoughts, its sensations, its feelings of pain and of pleasure,

that is something for which I see no reason. In my system every simple

substance (that is, every true substance) must be the true immediate cause

of all its actions and inward passions; and, speaking strictly in a

metaphysical sense, it has none other than those which it produces. Those

who hold a different opinion, and who make God the sole agent, are

needlessly becoming involved in expressions whence they will only with

difficulty extricate themselves without offence against religion; [363]

moreover, they unquestionably offend against reason.

401. Here is, however, the foundation of M. Bayle's argument. He says that

we do not do that of which we know not the way it is done. But it is a

principle which I do not concede to him. Let us listen to his dissertation

(p. 767 seqq.): 'It is an astonishing thing that almost all philosophers

(with the exception of those who expounded Aristotle, and who admitted a

universal intelligence distinct from our soul, and cause of our

perceptions: see in the _Historical and Critical Dictionary_, Note E of the

article "Averroes") have shared the popular belief that we form our ideas

actively. Yet where is the man who knows not on the one hand that he is in

absolute ignorance as to how ideas are made, and on the other hand, that he

could not sew two stitches if he were ignorant of how to sew? Is the sewing

of two stitches in itself a work more difficult than the painting in one's

mind of a rose, the very first time one's eyes rest upon it, and although

one has never learnt this kind of painting? Does it not appear on the

contrary that this mental portrait is in itself a work more difficult than

tracing on canvas the shape of a flower, a thing we cannot do without

having learnt it? We are all convinced that a key would be of no use to us

for opening a chest if we were ignorant as to how to use the key, and yet

we imagine that our soul is the efficient cause of the movement of our

arms, despite that it knows neither where the nerves are which must be used

for this movement, nor whence to obtain the animal spirits that are to flow

into these nerves. We have the experience every day that the ideas we would

fain recall do not come, and that they appear of themselves when we are no

longer thinking of them. If that does not prevent us from thinking that we

are their efficient cause, what reliance shall one place on the proof of

feeling, which to M. Jacquelot appears so conclusive? Does our authority

over our ideas more often fall short than our authority over our volitions?

If we were to count up carefully, we should find in the course of our life

more velleities than volitions, that is, more evidences of the servitude of

our will than of its dominion. How many times does one and the same man not

experience an inability to do a certain act of will (for example, an act of

love for a man who had just injured him; an act of scorn for a fine sonnet

that he had composed; an act of hatred for a mistress; an act of approval

of an absurd epigram. Take note that I speak only of inward acts, [364]

expressed by an "I will", such as "I will scorn", "approve", etc.) even if

there were a hundred pistoles to be gained forthwith, and he ardently

desired to gain these hundred pistoles, and he were fired with the ambition

to convince himself by an experimental proof that he is master in his own

domain?

402. 'To put together in few words the whole force of what I have just said

to you, I will observe that it is evident to all those who go deeply into

things, that the true efficient cause of an effect must know the effect,

and be aware also of the way in which it must be produced. That is not

necessary when one is only the instrument of the cause, or only the passive

subject of its action; but one cannot conceive of it as not necessary to a

true agent. Now if we examine ourselves well we shall be strongly

convinced, (1) that, independently of experience, our soul is just as

little aware of what a volition is as of what an idea is; (2) that after a

long experience it is no more fully aware of how volitions are formed than

it was before having willed anything. What is one to conclude from that,

save that the soul cannot be the efficient cause of its volitions, any more

than of its ideas, and of the motion of the spirits which cause our arms to

move? (Take note that no pretence is made of deciding the point here

absolutely, it is only being considered in relation to the principles of

the objection.)'

403. That is indeed a strange way of reasoning! What necessity is there for

one always to be aware how that which is done is done? Are salts, metals,

plants, animals and a thousand other animate or inanimate bodies aware how

that which they do is done, and need they be aware? Must a drop of oil or

of fat understand geometry in order to become round on the surface of

water? Sewing stitches is another matter: one acts for an end, one must be

aware of the means. But we do not form our ideas because we will to do so,

they form themselves within us, they form themselves through us, not in

consequence of our will, but in accordance with our nature and that of

things. The foetus forms itself in the animal, and a thousand other wonders

of nature are produced by a certain _instinct_ that God has placed there,

that is by virtue of _divine preformation_, which has made these admirable

automata, adapted to produce mechanically such beautiful effects. Even so

it is easy to believe that the soul is a spiritual automaton still more

admirable, and that it is through divine preformation that it produces

these beautiful ideas, wherein our will has no part and to which our [365]

art cannot attain. The operation of spiritual automata, that is of souls,

is not mechanical, but it contains in the highest degree all that is

beautiful in mechanism. The movements which are developed in bodies are

concentrated in the soul by representation as in an ideal world, which

expresses the laws of the actual world and their consequences, but with

this difference from the perfect ideal world which is in God, that most of

the perceptions in the other substances are only confused. For it is plain

that every simple substance embraces the whole universe in its confused

perceptions or sensations, and that the succession of these perceptions is

regulated by the particular nature of this substance, but in a manner which

always expresses all the nature in the universe; and every present

perception leads to a new perception, just as every movement that it

represents leads to another movement. But it is impossible that the soul

can know clearly its whole nature, and perceive how this innumerable number

of small perceptions, piled up or rather concentrated together, shapes

itself there: to that end it must needs know completely the whole universe

which is embraced by them, that is, it must needs be a God.

404. As regards _velleities_, they are only a very imperfect kind of

conditional will. I would, if I could: _liberet si liceret_; and in the

case of a velleity, we do not will, properly speaking, to will, but to be

able. That explains why there are none in God; and they must not be

confused with antecedent will. I have explained sufficiently elsewhere that

our control over volitions can be exercised only indirectly, and that one

would be unhappy if one were sufficiently master in one's own domain to be

able to will without cause, without rhyme or reason. To complain of not

having such a control would be to argue like Pliny, who carps at the power

of God because God cannot destroy himself.

405. I intended to finish here after having met (as it seems to me) all the

objections of M. Bayle on this matter that I could find in his works. But

remembering Laurentius Valla's _Dialogue on Free Will,_ in opposition to

Boethius, which I have already mentioned, I thought it would be opportune

to quote it in abstract, retaining the dialogue form, and then to continue

from where it ends, keeping up the fiction it initiated; and that less with

the purpose of enlivening the subject, than in order to explain myself

towards the end of my dissertation as clearly as I can, and in a way [366]

most likely to be generally understood. This Dialogue of Valla and his

books on Pleasure and the True Good make it plain that he was no less a

philosopher than a humanist. These four books were opposed to the four

books on the _Consolation of Philosophy_ by Boethius, and the Dialogue to

the fifth book. A certain Spaniard named Antonio Glarea requests of him

elucidation on the difficulty of free will, whereof little is known as it

is worthy to be known, for upon it depend justice and injustice, punishment

and reward in this life and in the life to come. Laurentius Valla answers

him that we must console ourselves for an ignorance which we share with the

whole world, just as one consoles oneself for not having the wings of

birds.

406. ANTONIO--I know that you can give me those wings, like another

Daedalus, so that I may emerge from the prison of ignorance, and rise to

the very region of truth, which is the homeland of souls. The books that I

have seen have not satisfied me, not even the famous Boethius, who meets

with general approval. I know not whether he fully understood himself what

he says of God's understanding, and of eternity superior to time; and I ask

for your opinion on his way of reconciling foreknowledge with freedom.

LAURENT--I am fearful of giving offence to many people, if I confute this

great man; yet I will give preference over this fear to the consideration I

have for the entreaties of a friend, provided that you make me a promise.

ANT.--What? LAUR.--It is, that when you have dined with me you do not ask

me to give you supper, that is to say, I desire that you be content with

the answer to the question you have put to me, and do not put a further

question.

407. ANT.--I promise you. Here is the heart of the difficulty. If God

foresaw the treason of Judas, it was necessary that he should betray, it

was impossible for him not to betray. There is no obligation to do the

impossible. He therefore did not sin, he did not deserve to be punished.

That destroys justice and religion, and the fear of God. LAUR.--God foresaw

sin; but he did not compel man to commit it; sin is voluntary. ANT.--That

will was necessary, since it was foreseen. LAUR.--If my knowledge does not

cause things past or present to exist, neither will my foreknowledge cause

future things to exist.

408. ANT.--That comparison is deceptive: neither the present nor the past

can be changed, they are already necessary; but the future, movable in

itself, becomes fixed and necessary through foreknowledge. Let us [367]

pretend that a god of the heathen boasts of knowing the future: I will ask

him if he knows which foot I shall put foremost, then I will do the

opposite of that which he shall have foretold. LAUR.--This God knows what

you are about to do. ANT.--How does he know it, since I will do the

opposite of what he shall have said, and I suppose that he will say what he

thinks? LAUR.--Your supposition is false: God will not answer you; or

again, if he were to answer you, the veneration you would have for him

would make you hasten to do what he had said; his prediction would be to

you an order. But we have changed the question. We are not concerned with

what God will foretell but with what he foresees. Let us therefore return

to foreknowledge, and distinguish between the necessary and the certain. It

is not impossible for what is foreseen not to happen; but it is infallibly

sure that it will happen. I can become a Soldier or Priest, but I shall not

become one.

409. ANT.--Here I have you firmly held. The philosophers' rule maintains

that all that which is possible can be considered as existing. But if that

which you affirm to be possible, namely an event different from what has

been foreseen, actually happened, God would have been mistaken. LAUR.--The

rules of the philosophers are not oracles for me. This one in particular is

not correct. Two contradictories are often both possible. Can they also

both exist? But, for your further enlightenment, let us pretend that Sextus

Tarquinius, coming to Delphi to consult the Oracle of Apollo, receives the

answer:

_Exul inopsque cades irata pulsus ab urbe._

A beggared outcast of the city's rage,

Beside a foreign shore cut short thy age.

The young man will complain: I have brought you a royal gift, O Apollo, and

you proclaim for me a lot so unhappy? Apollo will say to him: Your gift is

pleasing to me, and I will do that which you ask of me, I will tell you

what will happen. I know the future, but I do not bring it about. Go make

your complaint to Jupiter and the Parcae. Sextus would be ridiculous if he

continued thereafter to complain about Apollo. Is not that true? ANT.--He

will say: I thank you, O holy Apollo, for not having repaid me with

silence, for having revealed to me the Truth. But whence comes it that

Jupiter is so cruel towards me, that he prepares so hard a fate for an[368]

innocent man, for a devout worshipper of the Gods? LAUR.--You innocent?

Apollo will say. Know that you will be proud, that you will commit

adulteries, that you will be a traitor to your country. Could Sextus reply:

It is you who are the cause, O Apollo; you compel me to do it, by

foreseeing it? ANT.--I admit that he would have taken leave of his senses

if he were to make this reply. LAUR.--Therefore neither can the traitor

Judas complain of God's foreknowledge. And there is the answer to your

question.

410. ANT.--You have satisfied me beyond my hopes, you have done what

Boethius was not able to do: I shall be beholden to you all my life long.

LAUR.--Yet let us carry our tale a little further. Sextus will say: No,

Apollo, I will not do what you say. ANT.--What! the God will say, do you

mean then that I am a liar? I repeat to you once more, you will do all that

I have just said. LAUR.--Sextus, mayhap, would pray the Gods to alter fate,

to give him a better heart. ANT.--He would receive the answer:

_Desine fata Deum flecti sperare precando_.

He cannot cause divine foreknowledge to lie. But what then will Sextus say?

Will he not break forth into complaints against the Gods? Will he not say?

What? I am then not free? It is not in my power to follow virtue?

LAUR.--Apollo will say to him perhaps: Know, my poor Sextus, that the Gods

make each one as he is. Jupiter made the wolf ravening, the hare timid, the

ass stupid, and the lion courageous. He gave you a soul that is wicked and

irreclaimable; you will act in conformity with your natural disposition,

and Jupiter will treat you as your actions shall deserve; he has sworn it

by the Styx.

411. ANT.--I confess to you, it seems to me that Apollo in excusing himself

accuses Jupiter more than he accuses Sextus, and Sextus would answer him:

Jupiter therefore condemns in me his own crime; it is he who is the only

guilty one. He could have made me altogether different: but, made as I am,

I must act as he has willed. Why then does he punish me? Could I have

resisted his will? LAUR.--I confess that I am brought to a pause here as

you are. I have made the Gods appear on the scene, Apollo and Jupiter, to

make you distinguish between divine foreknowledge and providence. I have

shown that Apollo and foreknowledge do not impair freedom; but I cannot

satisfy you on the decrees of Jupiter's will, that is to say, on the orders

of providence. ANT.--You have dragged me out of one abyss, and you [369]

plunge me back into another and greater abyss. LAUR.--Remember our

contract: I have given you dinner, and you ask me to give you supper also.

412. ANT.--Now I discover your cunning: You have caught me, this is not an

honest contract. LAUR.--What would you have me do? I have given you wine

and meats from my home produce, such as my small estate can provide; as for

nectar and ambrosia, you will ask the Gods for them: that divine nurture is

not found among men. Let us hearken to St. Paul, that chosen vessel who was

carried even to the third heaven, who heard there unutterable words: he

will answer you with the comparison of the potter, with the

incomprehensibility of the ways of God, and wonder at the depth of his

wisdom. Nevertheless it is well to observe that one does not ask why God

foresees the thing, for that is understood, it is because it will be: but

one asks why he ordains thus, why he hardens such an one, why he has

compassion on another. We do not know the reasons which he may have for

this; but _since he is very good and very wise that is enough to make us

deem that his reasons are good_. As he is just also, it follows that his

decrees and his operation do not destroy our freedom. Some men have sought

some reason therein. They have said that we are made from a corrupt and

impure mass, indeed of mud. But Adam and the Angels were made of silver and

gold, and they sinned notwithstanding. One sometimes becomes hardened again

after regeneration. We must therefore seek another cause for evil, and I

doubt whether even the Angels are aware of it; yet they cease not to be

happy and to praise God. Boethius hearkened more to the answer of

philosophy than to that of St. Paul; that was the cause of his failure. Let

us believe in Jesus Christ, he is the virtue and the wisdom of God: he

teaches us that God willeth the salvation of all, that he willeth not the

death of the sinner. Let us therefore put our trust in the divine mercy,

and let us not by our vanity and our malice disqualify ourselves to receive

it.

413. This dialogue of Valla's is excellent, even though one must take

exception to some points in it: but its chief defect is that it cuts the

knot and that it seems to condemn providence under the name of Jupiter,

making him almost the author of sin. Let us therefore carry the little

fable still further. Sextus, quitting Apollo and Delphi, seeks out Jupiter

at Dodona. He makes sacrifices and then he exhibits his complaints. Why

have you condemned me, O great God, to be wicked and unhappy? Change [370]

my lot and my heart, or acknowledge your error. Jupiter answers him: If you

will renounce Rome, the Parcae shall spin for you different fates, you

shall become wise, you shall be happy. SEXTUS--Why must I renounce the hope

of a crown? Can I not come to be a good king? JUPITER--No, Sextus; I know

better what is needful for you. If you go to Rome, you are lost. Sextus,

not being able to resolve upon so great a sacrifice, went forth from the

temple, and abandoned himself to his fate. Theodorus, the High Priest, who

had been present at the dialogue between God and Sextus, addressed these

words to Jupiter: Your wisdom is to be revered, O great Ruler of the Gods.

You have convinced this man of his error; he must henceforth impute his

unhappiness to his evil will; he has not a word to say. But your faithful

worshippers are astonished; they would fain wonder at your goodness as well

as at your greatness: it rested with you to give him a different will.

JUPITER--Go to my daughter Pallas, she will inform you what I was bound to

do.

414. Theodorus journeyed to Athens: he was bidden to lie down to sleep in

the temple of the Goddess. Dreaming, he found himself transported into an

unknown country. There stood a palace of unimaginable splendour and

prodigious size. The Goddess Pallas appeared at the gate, surrounded by

rays of dazzling majesty.

_Qualisque videri_

_Coelicolis et quanta solet._

She touched the face of Theodorus with an olive-branch, which she was

holding in her hand. And lo! he had become able to confront the divine

radiancy of the daughter of Jupiter, and of all that she should show him.

Jupiter who loves you (she said to him) has commended you to me to be

instructed. You see here the palace of the fates, where I keep watch and

ward. Here are representations not only of that which happens but also of

all that which is possible. Jupiter, having surveyed them before the

beginning of the existing world, classified the possibilities into worlds,

and chose the best of all. He comes sometimes to visit these places, to

enjoy the pleasure of recapitulating things and of renewing his own choice,

which cannot fail to please him. I have only to speak, and we shall see a

whole world that my father might have produced, wherein will be represented

anything that can be asked of him; and in this way one may know also what

would happen if any particular possibility should attain unto [371]

existence. And whenever the conditions are not determinate enough, there

will be as many such worlds differing from one another as one shall wish,

which will answer differently the same question, in as many ways as

possible. You learnt geometry in your youth, like all well-instructed

Greeks. You know therefore that when the conditions of a required point do

not sufficiently determine it, and there is an infinite number of them,

they all fall into what the geometricians call a locus, and this locus at

least (which is often a line) will be determinate. Thus you can picture to

yourself an ordered succession of worlds, which shall contain each and

every one the case that is in question, and shall vary its circumstances

and its consequences. But if you put a case that differs from the actual

world only in one single definite thing and in its results, a certain one

of those determinate worlds will answer you. These worlds are all here,

that is, in ideas. I will show you some, wherein shall be found, not

absolutely the same Sextus as you have seen (that is not possible, he

carries with him always that which he shall be) but several Sextuses

resembling him, possessing all that you know already of the true Sextus,

but not all that is already in him imperceptibly, nor in consequence all

that shall yet happen to him. You will find in one world a very happy and

noble Sextus, in another a Sextus content with a mediocre state, a Sextus,

indeed, of every kind and endless diversity of forms.

415. Thereupon the Goddess led Theodorus into one of the halls of the

palace: when he was within, it was no longer a hall, it was a world,

_Solemque suum, sua sidera norat_.

At the command of Pallas there came within view Dodona with the temple of

Jupiter, and Sextus issuing thence; he could be heard saying that he would

obey the God. And lo! he goes to a city lying between two seas, resembling

Corinth. He buys there a small garden; cultivating it, he finds a treasure;

he becomes a rich man, enjoying affection and esteem; he dies at a great

age, beloved of the whole city. Theodorus saw the whole life of Sextus as

at one glance, and as in a stage presentation. There was a great volume of

writings in this hall: Theodorus could not refrain from asking what that

meant. It is the history of this world which we are now visiting, the

Goddess told him; it is the book of its fates. You have seen a number [372]

on the forehead of Sextus. Look in this book for the place which it

indicates. Theodorus looked for it, and found there the history of Sextus

in a form more ample than the outline he had seen. Put your finger on any

line you please, Pallas said to him, and you will see represented actually

in all its detail that which the line broadly indicates. He obeyed, and he

saw coming into view all the characteristics of a portion of the life of

that Sextus. They passed into another hall, and lo! another world, another

Sextus. who, issuing from the temple, and having resolved to obey Jupiter,

goes to Thrace. There he marries the daughter of the king, who had no other

children; he succeeds him, and he is adored by his subjects. They went into

other rooms, and always they saw new scenes.

416. The halls rose in a pyramid, becoming even more beautiful as one

mounted towards the apex, and representing more beautiful worlds. Finally

they reached the highest one which completed the pyramid, and which was the

most beautiful of all: for the pyramid had a beginning, but one could not

see its end; it had an apex, but no base; it went on increasing to

infinity. That is (as the Goddess explained) because amongst an endless

number of possible worlds there is the best of all, else would God not have

determined to create any; but there is not any one which has not also less

perfect worlds below it: that is why the pyramid goes on descending to

infinity. Theodorus, entering this highest hall, became entranced in

ecstasy; he had to receive succour from the Goddess, a drop of a divine

liquid placed on his tongue restored him; he was beside himself for joy. We

are in the real true world (said the Goddess) and you are at the source of

happiness. Behold what Jupiter makes ready for you, if you continue to

serve him faithfully. Here is Sextus as he is, and as he will be in

reality. He issues from the temple in a rage, he scorns the counsel of the

Gods. You see him going to Rome, bringing confusion everywhere, violating

the wife of his friend. There he is driven out with his father, beaten,

unhappy. If Jupiter had placed here a Sextus happy at Corinth or King in

Thrace, it would be no longer this world. And nevertheless he could not

have failed to choose this world, which surpasses in perfection all the

others, and which forms the apex of the pyramid. Else would Jupiter have

renounced his wisdom, he would have banished me, me his daughter. You see

that my father did not make Sextus wicked; he was so from all [373]

eternity, he was so always and freely. My father only granted him the

existence which his wisdom could not refuse to the world where he is

included: he made him pass from the region of the possible to that of the

actual beings. The crime of Sextus serves for great things: it renders Rome

free; thence will arise a great empire, which will show noble examples to

mankind. But that is nothing in comparison with the worth of this whole

world, at whose beauty you will marvel, when, after a happy passage from

this mortal state to another and better one, the Gods shall have fitted you

to know it.

417. At this moment Theodorus wakes up, he gives thanks to the Goddess, he

owns the justice of Jupiter. His spirit pervaded by what he has seen and

heard, he carries on the office of High Priest, with all the zeal of a true

servant of his God, and with all the joy whereof a mortal is capable. It

seems to me that this continuation of the tale may elucidate the difficulty

which Valla did not wish to treat. If Apollo has represented aright God's

knowledge of vision (that which concerns beings in existence), I hope that

Pallas will have not discreditably filled the role of what is called

knowledge of simple intelligence (that which embraces all that is

possible), wherein at last the source of things must be sought.

[377]

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