Theodicy Part 24

OBJECTION IV

Whoever can prevent the sin of others and does not so, but rather contributes to it, although he be fully apprised of it, is accessary thereto.

G.o.d can prevent the sin of intelligent creatures; but he does not so, and he rather contributes to it by his co-operation and by the opportunities he causes, although he is fully cognizant of it.

Therefore, etc.

ANSWER

I deny the major of this syllogism. It may be that one can prevent the sin, but that one ought not to do so, because one could not do so without committing a sin oneself, or (when G.o.d is concerned) without acting unreasonably. I have given instances of that, and have applied them to[383]

G.o.d himself. It may be also that one contributes to the evil, and that one even opens the way to it sometimes, in doing things one is bound to do. And when one does one's duty, or (speaking of G.o.d) when, after full consideration, one does that which reason demands, one is not responsible for events, even when one foresees them. One does not will these evils; but one is willing to permit them for a greater good, which one cannot in reason help preferring to other considerations. This is a _consequent_ will, resulting from acts of _antecedent_ will, in which one wills the good. I know that some persons, in speaking of the antecedent and consequent will of G.o.d, have meant by the antecedent that which wills that all men be saved, and by the consequent that which wills, in consequence of persistent sin, that there be some d.a.m.ned, d.a.m.nation being a result of sin.

But these are only examples of a more general notion, and one may say with the same reason, that G.o.d wills by his antecedent will that men sin not, and that by his consequent or final and decretory will (which is always followed by its effect) he wills to permit that they sin, this permission being a result of superior reasons. One has indeed justification for saying, in general, that the antecedent will of G.o.d tends towards the production of good and the prevention of evil, each taken in itself, and as it were detached (_particulariter et secundum quid_: Thom., I, qu. 19, art.

6) according to the measure of the degree of each good or of each evil.

Likewise one may say that the consequent, or final and total, divine will tends towards the production of as many goods as can be put together, whose combination thereby becomes determined, and involves also the permission of some evils and the exclusion of some goods, as the best possible plan of the universe demands. Arminius, in his _Antiperkinsus,_ explained very well that the will of G.o.d can be called consequent not only in relation to the action of the creature considered beforehand in the divine understanding, but also in relation to other anterior acts of divine will. But it is enough to consider the pa.s.sage cited from Thomas Aquinas, and that from Scotus (I, dist. 46, qu. 11), to see that they make this distinction as I have made it here. Nevertheless if anyone will not suffer this use of the terms, let him put 'previous' in place of 'antecedent' will, and 'final' or 'decretory' in place of 'consequent' will. For I do not wish to wrangle about words.

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OBJECTION V

Whoever produces all that is real in a thing is its cause.

G.o.d produces all that is real in sin.

Therefore G.o.d is the cause of sin.

ANSWER

I might content myself with denying the major or the minor, because the term 'real' admits of interpretations capable of rendering these propositions false. But in order to give a better explanation I will make a distinction. 'Real' either signifies that which is positive only, or else it includes also privative beings: in the first case, I deny the major and I admit the minor; in the second case, I do the opposite. I might have confined myself to that; but I was willing to go further, in order to account for this distinction. I have therefore been well pleased to point out that every purely positive or absolute reality is a perfection, and that every imperfection comes from limitation, that is, from the privative: for to limit is to withhold extension, or the more beyond. Now G.o.d is the cause of all perfections, and consequently of all realities, when they are regarded as purely positive. But limitations or privations result from the original imperfection of creatures which restricts their receptivity. It is as with a laden boat, which the river carries along more slowly or less slowly in proportion to the weight that it bears: thus the speed comes from the river, but the r.e.t.a.r.dation which restricts this speed comes from the load. Also I have shown in the present work how the creature, in causing sin, is a deficient cause; how errors and evil inclinations spring from privation; and how privation is efficacious accidentally. And I have justified the opinion of St. Augustine (lib. I, _Ad. Simpl._, qu. 2) who explains (for example) how G.o.d hardens the soul, not in giving it something evil, but because the effect of the good he imprints is restricted by the resistance of the soul, and by the circ.u.mstances contributing to this resistance, so that he does not give it all the good that would overcome its evil. 'Nec _(inquit)_ ab illo erogatur aliquid quo h.o.m.o fit deterior, sed tantum quo fit melior non erogatur.' But if G.o.d had willed to do more here he must needs have produced either fresh natures in his creatures or fresh miracles to change their natures, and this the best plan did not allow. It is just as if the current of the river must needs be more rapid than its slope permits or the boats themselves be less laden, if they [385]

had to be impelled at a greater speed. So the limitation or original imperfection of creatures brings it about that even the best plan of the universe cannot admit more good, and cannot be exempted from certain evils, these, however, being only of such a kind as may tend towards a greater good. There are some disorders in the parts which wonderfully enhance the beauty of the whole, just as certain dissonances, appropriately used, render harmony more beautiful. But that depends upon the answer which I have already given to the first objection.

OBJECTION VI

Whoever punishes those who have done as well as it was in their power to do is unjust.

G.o.d does so.

Therefore, etc.

ANSWER

I deny the minor of this argument. And I believe that G.o.d always gives sufficient aid and grace to those who have good will, that is to say, who do not reject this grace by a fresh sin. Thus I do not admit the d.a.m.nation of children dying unbaptized or outside the Church, or the d.a.m.nation of adult persons who have acted according to the light that G.o.d has given them. And I believe that, _if anyone has followed the light he had_, he will undoubtedly receive thereof in greater measure as he has need, even as the late Herr Hulsemann, who was celebrated as a profound theologian at Leipzig, has somewhere observed; and if such a man had failed to receive light during his life, he would receive it at least in the hour of death.

OBJECTION VII

Whoever gives only to some, and not to all, the means of producing effectively in them good will and final saving faith has not enough goodness.

G.o.d does so.

Therefore, etc.

ANSWER

I deny the major. It is true that G.o.d could overcome the greatest resistance of the human heart, and indeed he sometimes does so, [386]

whether by an inward grace or by the outward circ.u.mstances that can greatly influence souls; but he does not always do so. Whence comes this distinction, someone will say, and wherefore does his goodness appear to be restricted? The truth is that it would not have been in order always to act in an extraordinary way and to derange the connexion of things, as I have observed already in answering the first objection. The reasons for this connexion, whereby the one is placed in more favourable circ.u.mstances than the other, are hidden in the depths of G.o.d's wisdom: they depend upon the universal harmony. The best plan of the universe, which G.o.d could not fail to choose, required this. One concludes thus from the event itself; since G.o.d made the universe, it was not possible to do better. Such management, far from being contrary to goodness, has rather been prompted by supreme goodness itself. This objection with its solution might have been inferred from what was said with regard to the first objection; but it seemed advisable to touch upon it separately.

OBJECTION VIII

Whoever cannot fail to choose the best is not free.

G.o.d cannot fail to choose the best.

Therefore G.o.d is not free.

ANSWER

I deny the major of this argument. Rather is it true freedom, and the most perfect, to be able to make the best use of one's free will, and always to exercise this power, without being turned aside either by outward force or by inward pa.s.sions, whereof the one enslaves our bodies and the other our souls. There is nothing less servile and more befitting the highest degree of freedom than to be always led towards the good, and always by one's own inclination, without any constraint and without any displeasure. And to object that G.o.d therefore had need of external things is only a sophism. He creates them freely: but when he had set before him an end, that of exercising his goodness, his wisdom determined him to choose the means most appropriate for obtaining this end. To call that a _need_ is to take the term in a sense not usual, which clears it of all imperfection, somewhat as one does when speaking of the wrath of G.o.d.

Seneca says somewhere, that G.o.d commanded only once, but that he obeys[387]

always, because he obeys the laws that he willed to ordain for himself: _semel jussit, semper paret_. But he had better have said, that G.o.d always commands and that he is always obeyed: for in willing he always follows the tendency of his own nature, and all other things always follow his will.

And as this will is always the same one cannot say that he obeys that will only which he formerly had. Nevertheless, although his will is always indefectible and always tends towards the best, the evil or the lesser good which he rejects will still be possible in itself. Otherwise the necessity of good would be geometrical (so to speak) or metaphysical, and altogether absolute; the contingency of things would be destroyed, and there would be no choice. But necessity of this kind, which does not destroy the possibility of the contrary, has the name by a.n.a.logy only: it becomes effective not through the mere essence of things, but through that which is outside them and above them, that is, through the will of G.o.d. This necessity is called moral, because for the wise what is necessary and what is owing are equivalent things; and when it is always followed by its effect, as it indeed is in the perfectly wise, that is, in G.o.d, one can say that it is a happy necessity. The more nearly creatures approach this, the closer do they come to perfect felicity. Moreover, necessity of this kind is not the necessity one endeavours to avoid, and which destroys morality, reward and commendation. For that which it brings to pa.s.s does not happen whatever one may do and whatever one may will, but because one desires it.

A will to which it is natural to choose well deserves most to be commended; and it carries with it its own reward, which is supreme happiness. And as this const.i.tution of the divine nature gives an entire satisfaction to him who possesses it, it is also the best and the most desirable from the point of view of the creatures who are all dependent upon G.o.d. If the will of G.o.d had not as its rule the principle of the best, it would tend towards evil, which would be worst of all; or else it would be indifferent somehow to good and to evil, and guided by chance. But a will that would always drift along at random would scarcely be any better for the government of the universe than the fortuitous concourse of corpuscles, without the existence of divinity. And even though G.o.d should abandon himself to chance only in some cases, and in a certain way (as he would if he did not always tend entirely towards the best, and if he were capable of preferring a lesser good to a greater good, that is, an evil to a good, since that which [388]

prevents a greater good is an evil) he would be no less imperfect than the object of his choice. Then he would not deserve absolute trust; he would act without reason in such a case, and the government of the universe would be like certain games equally divided between reason and luck. This all proves that this objection which is made against the choice of the best perverts the notions of free and necessary, and represents the best to us actually as evil: but that is either malicious or absurd.

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EXCURSUS ON THEODICY

392

published by the author in Memoires de Trevoux

July 1712

_February_ 1712

I said in my essays, 392, that I wished to see the demonstrations mentioned by M. Bayle and contained in the sixth letter printed at Trevoux in 1703.

Father des Bosses has shown me this letter, in which the writer essays to demonstrate by the geometrical method that G.o.d is the sole true cause of all that is real. My perusal of it has confirmed me in the opinion which I indicated in the same pa.s.sage, namely, that this proposition can be true in a very good sense, G.o.d being the only cause of pure and absolute realities, or perfections; but when one includes limitations or privations under the name of realities one can say that second causes co-operate in the production of what is limited, and that otherwise G.o.d would be the cause of sin, and even its sole cause. And I am somewhat inclined to think that the gifted author of the letter does not greatly differ in opinion from me, although he seems to include all modalities among the realities of which he declares G.o.d to be the sole cause. For in actual fact I think he will not admit that G.o.d is the cause and the author of sin. Indeed, he explains himself in a manner which seems to overthrow his thesis and to grant real action to creatures. For in the proof of the eighth corollary of his second proposition these words occur: 'The natural motion of the soul, although determinate in itself, is indeterminate in respect of its objects. For it is love of good in general. It is through the ideas of good appearing [390]

in individual objects that this motion becomes individual and determinate in relation to those objects. And thus as the mind has the power of varying its own ideas it can also change the determinations of its love. And for that purpose it is not necessary that it overcome the power of G.o.d or oppose his action. These determinations of motion towards individual objects are not invincible. It is this noninvincibility which causes the mind to be free and capable of changing them; but after all the mind makes these changes only through the motion which G.o.d gives to it and conserves for it.' In my own style I would have said that the perfection which is in the action of the creature comes from G.o.d, but that the limitations to be found there are a consequence of the original limitation and the preceding limitations that occurred in the creature. Further, this is so not only in minds but also in all other substances, which thereby are causes co-operating in the change which comes to pa.s.s in themselves; for this determination of which the author speaks is nothing but a limitation.

Now if after that one reviews all the demonstrations or corollaries of the letter, one will be able to admit or reject the majority of its a.s.sertions, in accordance with the interpretation one may make of them. If by 'reality'

one means only perfections or positive realities, G.o.d is the only true cause; but if that which involves limitations is included under the realities, one will deny a considerable portion of the theses, and the author himself will have shown us the example. It is in order to render the matter more comprehensible that I used in the Essays the example of a laden boat, which, the more laden it is, is the more slowly carried along by the stream. There one sees clearly that the stream is the cause of what is positive in this motion, of the perfection, the force, the speed of the boat, but that the load is the cause of the restriction of this force, and that it brings about the r.e.t.a.r.dation.

It is praiseworthy in anyone to attempt to apply the geometrical method to metaphysical matters. But it must be admitted that hitherto success has seldom been attained: and M. Descartes himself, with all that very great skill which one cannot deny in him, never perhaps had less success than when he essayed to do this in one of his answers to objections. For in mathematics it is easier to succeed, because numbers, figures and calculations make good the defects concealed in words; but in metaphysics, where one is deprived of this aid (at least in ordinary [391]

argumentation), the strictness employed in the form of the argument and in the exact definitions of the terms must needs supply this lack. But in neither argument nor definition is that strictness here to be seen.

The author of the letter, who undoubtedly displays much ardour and penetration, sometimes goes a little too far, as when he claims to prove that there is as much reality and force in rest as in motion, according to the fifth corollary of the second proposition. He a.s.serts that the will of G.o.d is no less positive in rest than in motion, and that it is not less invincible. Be it so, but does it follow that there is as much reality and force in each of the two? I do not see this conclusion, and with the same argument one would prove that there is as much force in a strong motion as in a weak motion. G.o.d in willing rest wills that the body be at the place A, where it was immediately before, and for that it suffices that there be no reason to prompt G.o.d to the change. But when G.o.d wills that afterwards the body be at the place B, there must needs be a new reason, of such a kind as to determine G.o.d to will that it be in B and not in C or in any other place, and that it be there more or less promptly. It is upon these reasons, the volitions of G.o.d, that we must a.s.sess the force and the reality existent in things. The author speaks much of the will of G.o.d, but he does not speak much in this letter of the reasons which prompt G.o.d to will, and upon which all depends. And these reasons are taken from the objects.