arer to its
Creator than a single thinking and feeling being, yet the system of the
universe which produces, preserves, and perpetuates all thinking and
feeling beings, ought to be dearer to him than any one of them, and he
may, notwithstanding his goodness, or rather by reason of his goodness,
sacrifice something of the happiness of individuals to the preservation
of the whole. "That the dead body of a man should feed worms or wolves
or plants is not, I admit, a compensation for the death of such a man;
but if in the system of this universe, it is necessary for the
preservation of the human race that there should be a circulation of
substance between men, animals, vegetables, then the particular mishap
of an individual contributes to the general good. I die, I am eaten by
worms; but my children, my brothers, will live as I have lived; my body
enriches the earth of which they will consume the fruits; and so I do,
by the order of nature and for all men, what Codrus, Curtius, the Decii,
and a thousand others, did of their own free will for a small part of
men." (p. 305.)

All this is no doubt very well said, and we are bound to accept it as
true doctrine. Although, however, it may make resignation easier by
explaining the nature of evil, it does not touch the point of Voltaire's
outburst, which is that evil exists, and exists in shapes which it is a
mere mockery to associate with the omnipotence of a benevolent
controller of the world's forces. According to Rousseau, if we go to the
root of what he means, there is no such thing as evil, though much that
to our narrow and impatient sight has the look of it. This may be true
if we use that fatal word in an arbitrary and unreal sense, for the
avoidable, the consequent without antecedent, or antecedent without
consequent. If we consent to talk in this way, and only are careful to
define terms so that there is no doubt as to their meaning, it is hardly
deniable that evil is a mere word and not a reality, and whatever is is
indeed right and best, because no better is within our reach. Voltaire,
however, like the man of sense that he was, exclaimed that at any rate
relatively to us poor creatures the existence of pain, suffering, waste,
whether caused or uncaused, whether in accordance with stern immutable
law or mere divine caprice, is a most indisputable reality: from our
point of view it is a cruel puerility to cry out at every calamity and
every iniquity that all is well in