Have the goodness to explain how all is for the best. Plato, the dialectician, condescended6 to allow to God the liberty of making five worlds; because, said he, there are five regular solids in geometry, the tetrahedron, the cube, the hexahedron, the dodecahedron, and the icosahedron. But why thus restrict divine power? Why not permit the sphere, which is still more regular, and even the cone7, the pyramid of many sides, the cylinder8, etc.?
God, according to Plato, necessarily chose the best of all possible worlds; and this system has been embraced by many Christian9 philosophers, although it appears repugnant to the doctrine of original sin. After this transgression10, our globe was no more the best of all possible worlds. If it was ever so, it might be so still; but many people believe it to be the worst of worlds instead of the best.
Leibnitz takes the part of Plato; more readers than one complain of their inability to understand either the one or the other; and for ourselves, having read both of them more than once, we avow11 our ignorance according to custom; and since the gospel has revealed nothing on the subject, we remain in darkness without remorse12.
Leibnitz, who speaks of everything, has treated of original sin; and as every man of systems introduces into his plan something contradictory13, he imagined that the disobedience towards God, with the frightful14 misfortunes which followed it, were integral parts of the best of worlds, and necessary ingredients of all possible felicity: “Calla, calla, senor don Carlos; todo che se haze15 es por su ben.”
What! to be chased from a delicious place, where we might have lived for ever only for the eating of an apple? What! to produce in misery16 wretched children, who will suffer everything, and in return produce others to suffer after them? What! to experience all maladies, feel all vexations, die in the midst of grief, and by way of recompense be burned to all eternity17 — is this lot the best possible? It certainly is not good for us, and in what manner can it be so for God? Leibnitz felt that nothing could be said to these objections, but nevertheless made great books, in which he did not even understand himself.
Lucullus, in good health, partaking of a good dinner with his friends and his mistress in the hall of Apollo, may jocosely18 deny the existence of evil; but let him put his head out of the window and he will behold19 wretches20 in abundance; let him be seized with a fever, and he will be one himself.
I do not like to quote; it is ordinarily a thorny21 proceeding22. What precedes and what follows the passage quoted is too frequently neglected; and thus a thousand objections may rise. I must, notwithstanding, quote Lactantius, one of the fathers, who, in the thirteenth chapter on the anger of God, makes Epicurus speak as follows: “God can either take away evil from the world and will not; or being willing to do so, cannot; or He neither can nor will; or, lastly, He is both able and willing. If He is willing to remove evil and cannot, then is He not omnipotent24. If He can, but will not remove it, then is He not benevolent25; if He is neither able nor willing, then is He neither powerful nor benevolent; lastly, if both able and willing to annihilate26 evil, how does it exist?”
The argument is weighty, and Lactantius replies to it very poorly by saying that God wills evil, but has given us wisdom to secure the good. It must be confessed that this answer is very weak in comparison with the objection; for it implies that God could bestow27 wisdom only by allowing evil — a pleasant wisdom truly! The origin of evil has always been an abyss, the depth of which no one has been able to sound. It was this difficulty which reduced so many ancient philosophers and legislators to have recourse to two principles — the one good, the other wicked. Typhon was the evil principle among the Egyptians, Arimanes among the Persians. The Manich?ans, it is said, adopted this theory; but as these people have never spoken either of a good or of a bad principle, we have nothing to prove it but the assertion.
Among the absurdities28 abounding29 in this world, and which may be placed among the number of our evils, that is not the least which presumes the existence of two all-powerful beings, combating which shall prevail most in this world, and making a treaty like the two physicians in Molière: “Allow me the emetic30, and I resign to you the lancet.”
Basilides pretended, with the platonists of the first century of the church, that God gave the making of our world to His inferior angels, and these, being inexpert, have constructed it as we perceive. This theological fable31 is laid prostrate32 by the overwhelming objection that it is not in the nature of a deity33 all-powerful and all-wise to intrust the construction of a world to incompetent34 architects.
Simon, who felt the force of this objection, obviates35 it by saying that the angel who presided over the workmen is damned for having done his business so slovenly36, but the roasting of this angel amends37 nothing. The adventure of Pandora among the Greeks scarcely meets the objection better. The box in which every evil is enclosed, and at the bottom of which remains38 Hope, is indeed a charming allegory; but this Pandora was made by Vulcan, only to avenge39 himself on Prometheus, who had stolen fire to inform a man of clay.
The Indians have succeeded no better. God having created man, gave him a drug which would insure him permanent health of body. The man loaded his ass23 with the drug, and the ass being thirsty, the serpent directed him to a fountain, and while the ass was drinking, purloined40 the drug.
The Syrians pretended that man and woman having been created in the fourth heaven, they resolved to eat a cake in lieu of ambrosia41, their natural food. Ambrosia exhaled42 by the pores; but after eating cake, they were obliged to relieve themselves in the usual manner. The man and the woman requested an angel to direct them to a water-closet. Behold, said the angel, that petty globe which is almost of no size at all; it is situated43 about sixty millions of leagues from this place, and is the privy44 of the universe — go there as quickly as you can. The man and woman obeyed the angel and came here, where they have ever since remained; since which time the world has been what we now find it. The Syrians will eternally be asked why God allowed man to eat the cake and experience such a crowd of formidable ills?
I pass with speed from the fourth heaven to Lord Bolingbroke. This writer, who doubtless was a great genius, gave to the celebrated45 Pope his plan of “all for the best,” as it is found word for word in the posthumous46 works of Lord Bolingbroke, and recorded by Lord Shaftesbury in his “Characteristics.” Read in Shaftesbury’s chapter of the “Moralists” the following passage:
“Much may be replied to these complaints of the defects of nature — How came it so powerless and defective47 from the hands of a perfect Being? — But I deny that it is defective. Beauty is the result of contrast, and universal concord48 springs out of a perpetual conflict. . . . . It is necessary that everything be sacrificed to other things — vegetables to animals, and animals to the earth . . . . The laws of the central power of gravitation, which give to the celestial49 bodies their weight and motion, are not to be deranged50 in consideration of a pitiful animal, who, protected as he is by the same laws, will soon be reduced to dust.”
Bolingbroke, Shaftesbury, and Pope, their working artisan, resolve their general question no better than the rest. Their “all for the best” says no more than that all is governed by immutable52 laws; and who did not know that? We learn nothing when we remark, after the manner of little children, that flies are created to be eaten by spiders, spiders by swallows, swallows by hawks53, hawks by eagles, eagles by men, men by one another, to afford food for worms; and at last, at the rate of about a thousand to one, to be the prey54 of devils everlastingly55.
There is a constant and regular order established among animals of all kinds — a universal order. When a stone is formed in my bladder, the mechanical process is admirable; sandy particles pass by small degrees into my blood; they are filtered by the veins56; and passing the urethra, deposit themselves in my bladder; where, uniting agreeably to the Newtonian attraction, a stone is formed, which gradually increases, and I suffer pains a thousand times worse than death by the finest arrangement in the world. A surgeon, perfect in the art of Tubal-Cain, thrusts into me a sharp instrument; and cutting into the perineum, seizes the stone with his pincers, which breaks during the endeavors, by the necessary laws of mechanism57; and owing to the same mechanism, I die in frightful torments58. All this is “for the best,” being the evident result of unalterable physical principles, agreeably to which I know as well as you that I perish.
If we were insensitive, there would be nothing to say against this system of physics; but this is not the point on which we treat. We ask if there are not physical evils, and whence do they originate? There is no absolute evil, says Pope in his “Essay on Man”; or if there are particular evils, they compose a general good. It is a singular general good which is composed of the stone and the gout — of all sorts of crime and sufferings, and of death and damnation.
The fall of man is our plaister for all these particular maladies of body and soul, which you call “the general health”; but Shaftesbury and Bolingbroke have attacked original sin. Pope says nothing about it; but it is clear that their system saps the foundations of the Christian religion, and explains nothing at all.
In the meantime, this system has been since approved by many theologians, who willingly embrace contradictions. Be it so; we ought to leave to everybody the privilege of reasoning in their own way upon the deluge59 of ills which overwhelm us. It would be as reasonable to prevent incurable60 patients from eating what they please. “God,” says Pope, “beholds, with an equal eye, a hero perish or a sparrow fall; the destruction of an atom, or the ruin of a thousand planets; the bursting of a bubble, or the dissolution of a world.”
This, I must confess, is a pleasant consolation61. Who does not find a comfort in the declaration of Lord Shaftesbury, who asserts, “that God will not derange51 His general system for so miserable62 an animal as man?” It must be confessed at least that this pitiful creature has a right to cry out humbly63, and to endeavor, while bemoaning64 himself, to understand why these eternal laws do not comprehend the good of every individual.
This system of “all for the best” represents the Author of Nature as a powerful and malevolent65 monarch66, who cares not for the destruction of four or five hundred thousand men, nor of the many more who in consequence spend the rest of their days in penury67 and tears, provided He succeeds in His designs.
Far therefore from the doctrine — that this is the best of all possible worlds — being consolatory68, it is a hopeless one to the philosophers who embrace it. The question of good and evil remains in irremediable chaos69 for those who seek to fathom70 it in reality. It is a mere71 mental sport to the disputants, who are captives that play with their chains. As to unreasoning people, they resemble the fish which are transported from a river to a reservoir, with no more suspicion that they are to be eaten during the approaching Lent, than we have ourselves of the facts which originate our destiny.
Let us place at the end of every chapter of metaphysics the two letters used by the Roman judges when they did not understand a pleading. N. L. non liquet — it is not clear. Let us, above all, silence the knaves72 who, overloaded73 like ourselves with the weight of human calamities, add the mischief74 of their calumny75; let us refute their execrable imposture76 by having recourse to faith and Providence77.
Some reasoners are of opinion that it agrees not with the nature of the Great Being of Beings for things to be otherwise than they are. It is a rough system, and I am too ignorant to venture to examine it.
点击
收听单词发音
收听单词发音 |
1
impelling
|
|
| adj.迫使性的，强有力的v.推动、推进或敦促某人做某事( impel的现在分词 ) | |
参考例句： |
|
|
|
|
2
lamentable
|
|
| adj.令人惋惜的，悔恨的 | |
参考例句： |
|
|
|
|
3
calamities
|
|
| n.灾祸，灾难( calamity的名词复数 )；不幸之事 | |
参考例句： |
|
|
|
|
4
afflict
|
|
| vt.使身体或精神受痛苦，折磨 | |
参考例句： |
|
|
|
|
5
doctrine
|
|
| n.教义；主义；学说 | |
参考例句： |
|
|
|
|
6
condescended
|
|
| 屈尊，俯就( condescend的过去式和过去分词 )； 故意表示和蔼可亲 | |
参考例句： |
|
|
|
|
7
cone
|
|
| n.圆锥体，圆锥形东西，球果 | |
参考例句： |
|
|
|
|
8
cylinder
|
|
| n.圆筒，柱(面)，汽缸 | |
参考例句： |
|
|
|
|
9
Christian
|
|
| adj.基督教徒的；n.基督教徒 | |
参考例句： |
|
|
|
|
10
transgression
|
|
| n.违背；犯规；罪过 | |
参考例句： |
|
|
|
|
11
avow
|
|
| v.承认，公开宣称 | |
参考例句： |
|
|
|
|
12
remorse
|
|
| n.痛恨，悔恨，自责 | |
参考例句： |
|
|
|
|
13
contradictory
|
|
| adj.反驳的，反对的，抗辩的；n.正反对，矛盾对立 | |
参考例句： |
|
|
|
|
14
frightful
|
|
| adj.可怕的；讨厌的 | |
参考例句： |
|
|
|
|
15
haze
|
|
| n.霾，烟雾；懵懂，迷糊；vi.(over)变模糊 | |
参考例句： |
|
|
|
|
16
misery
|
|
| n.痛苦，苦恼，苦难；悲惨的境遇，贫苦 | |
参考例句： |
|
|
|
|
17
eternity
|
|
| n.不朽，来世；永恒，无穷 | |
参考例句： |
|
|
|
|
18
jocosely
|
|
| adv.说玩笑地，诙谐地 | |
参考例句： |
|
|
|
|
|
19
behold
|
|
| v.看，注视，看到 | |
参考例句： |
|
|
|
|
20
wretches
|
|
| n.不幸的人( wretch的名词复数 )；可怜的人；恶棍；坏蛋 | |
参考例句： |
|
|
|
|
21
thorny
|
|
| adj.多刺的，棘手的 | |
参考例句： |
|
|
|
|
22
proceeding
|
|
| n.行动，进行，(pl.)会议录，学报 | |
参考例句： |
|
|
|
|
23
ass
|
|
| n.驴；傻瓜，蠢笨的人 | |
参考例句： |
|
|
|
|
24
omnipotent
|
|
| adj.全能的，万能的 | |
参考例句： |
|
|
|
|
25
benevolent
|
|
| adj.仁慈的，乐善好施的 | |
参考例句： |
|
|
|
|
26
annihilate
|
|
| v.使无效；毁灭；取消 | |
参考例句： |
|
|
|
|
27
bestow
|
|
| v.把…赠与，把…授予；花费 | |
参考例句： |
|
|
|
|
28
absurdities
|
|
| n.极端无理性( absurdity的名词复数 )；荒谬；谬论；荒谬的行为 | |
参考例句： |
|
|
|
|
29
abounding
|
|
| adj.丰富的，大量的v.大量存在，充满，富于( abound的现在分词 ) | |
参考例句： |
|
|
|
|
30
emetic
|
|
| n.催吐剂；adj.催吐的 | |
参考例句： |
|
|
|
|
31
fable
|
|
| n.寓言；童话；神话 | |
参考例句： |
|
|
|
|
32
prostrate
|
|
| v.拜倒，平卧，衰竭；adj.拜倒的，平卧的，衰竭的 | |
参考例句： |
|
|
|
|
33
deity
|
|
| n.神，神性；被奉若神明的人(或物) | |
参考例句： |
|
|
|
|
34
incompetent
|
|
| adj.无能力的，不能胜任的 | |
参考例句： |
|
|
|
|
35
obviates
|
|
| v.避免，消除（贫困、不方便等）( obviate的第三人称单数 ) | |
参考例句： |
|
|
|
|
36
slovenly
|
|
| adj.懒散的，不整齐的，邋遢的 | |
参考例句： |
|
|
|
|
37
amends
|
|
| n. 赔偿 | |
参考例句： |
|
|
|
|
38
remains
|
|
| n.剩余物，残留物；遗体，遗迹 | |
参考例句： |
|
|
|
|
39
avenge
|
|
| v.为...复仇，为...报仇 | |
参考例句： |
|
|
|
|
40
purloined
|
|
| v.偷窃( purloin的过去式和过去分词 ) | |
参考例句： |
|
|
|
|
41
ambrosia
|
|
| n.神的食物；蜂食 | |
参考例句： |
|
|
|
|
42
exhaled
|
|
| v.呼出，发散出( exhale的过去式和过去分词 )；吐出（肺中的空气、烟等），呼气 | |
参考例句： |
|
|
|
|
43
situated
|
|
| adj.坐落在...的，处于某种境地的 | |
参考例句： |
|
|
|
|
44
privy
|
|
| adj.私用的；隐密的 | |
参考例句： |
|
|
|
|
45
celebrated
|
|
| adj.有名的，声誉卓著的 | |
参考例句： |
|
|
|
|
46
posthumous
|
|
| adj.遗腹的；父亡后出生的；死后的，身后的 | |
参考例句： |
|
|
|
|
47
defective
|
|
| adj.有毛病的，有问题的，有瑕疵的 | |
参考例句： |
|
|
|
|
48
concord
|
|
| n.和谐；协调 | |
参考例句： |
|
|
|
|
49
celestial
|
|
| adj.天体的；天上的 | |
参考例句： |
|
|
|
|
50
deranged
|
|
| adj.疯狂的 | |
参考例句： |
|
|
|
|
51
derange
|
|
| v.使精神错乱 | |
参考例句： |
|
|
|
|
52
immutable
|
|
| adj.不可改变的，永恒的 | |
参考例句： |
|
|
|
|
53
hawks
|
|
| 鹰( hawk的名词复数 )； 鹰派人物，主战派人物 | |
参考例句： |
|
|
|
|
54
prey
|
|
| n.被掠食者，牺牲者，掠食；v.捕食，掠夺，折磨 | |
参考例句： |
|
|
|
|
55
everlastingly
|
|
| 永久地，持久地 | |
参考例句： |
|
|
|
|
56
veins
|
|
| n.纹理；矿脉( vein的名词复数 )；静脉；叶脉；纹理 | |
参考例句： |
|
|
|
|
57
mechanism
|
|
| n.机械装置；机构，结构 | |
参考例句： |
|
|
|
|
58
torments
|
|
| （肉体或精神上的）折磨，痛苦( torment的名词复数 )； 造成痛苦的事物[人] | |
参考例句： |
|
|
|
|
59
deluge
|
|
| n./vt.洪水，暴雨，使泛滥 | |
参考例句： |
|
|
|
|
60
incurable
|
|
| adj.不能医治的，不能矫正的，无救的；n.不治的病人，无救的人 | |
参考例句： |
|
|
|
|
61
consolation
|
|
| n.安慰，慰问 | |
参考例句： |
|
|
|
|
62
miserable
|
|
| adj.悲惨的，痛苦的；可怜的，糟糕的 | |
参考例句： |
|
|
|
|
63
humbly
|
|
| adv. 恭顺地，谦卑地 | |
参考例句： |
|
|
|
|
64
bemoaning
|
|
| v.为（某人或某事）抱怨( bemoan的现在分词 )；悲悼；为…恸哭；哀叹 | |
参考例句： |
|
|
|
|
65
malevolent
|
|
| adj.有恶意的，恶毒的 | |
参考例句： |
|
|
|
|
66
monarch
|
|
| n.帝王，君主，最高统治者 | |
参考例句： |
|
|
|
|
67
penury
|
|
| n.贫穷，拮据 | |
参考例句： |
|
|
|
|
68
consolatory
|
|
| adj.慰问的，可藉慰的 | |
参考例句： |
|
|
|
|
69
chaos
|
|
| n.混乱，无秩序 | |
参考例句： |
|
|
|
|
70
fathom
|
|
| v.领悟，彻底了解 | |
参考例句： |
|
|
|
|
71
mere
|
|
| adj.纯粹的；仅仅，只不过 | |
参考例句： |
|
|
|
|
72
knaves
|
|
| n.恶棍，无赖( knave的名词复数 )；（纸牌中的）杰克 | |
参考例句： |
|
|
|
|
73
overloaded
|
|
| a.超载的，超负荷的 | |
参考例句： |
|
|
|
|
74
mischief
|
|
| n.损害，伤害，危害；恶作剧，捣蛋，胡闹 | |
参考例句： |
|
|
|
|
75
calumny
|
|
| n.诽谤，污蔑，中伤 | |
参考例句： |
|
|
|
|
76
imposture
|
|
| n.冒名顶替，欺骗 | |
参考例句： |
|
|
|
|
77
providence
|
|
| n.深谋远虑，天道，天意；远见；节约；上帝 | |
参考例句： |
|
|
|
| 欢迎访问英文小说网 |