en they condemn wretches according to the measure of their
crimes.

But enough concerning evil rightly so called. Sickness, poverty,
obscurity, death, finally all human afflictions, ought not to be ranked
as evils, since we do not count among the greatest boons things which
are their opposites. Among these afflictions some are the effect of
nature, others have obviously been for many a source of advantage. Let
us be silent for the moment about these metaphors and allegories, and,
simply following without vain curiosity the words of Holy Scripture, let
us take from darkness the idea which it gives us.

But reason asks, Was darkness created with the world? Is it older than
light? Why, in spite of its inferiority, has it preceded it? Darkness,
we reply, did not exist in essence; it is a condition produced in the
air by the withdrawal of light. What, then, is that light which
disappeared suddenly from the world so that darkness should cover the
face of the deep? If anything had existed before the formation of this
sensible and perishable world, no doubt we conclude it would have been
in the light. The orders of angels, the heavenly hosts, all intellectual
natures named or unnamed, all the ministering spirits, did not live in
darkness, but enjoyed a condition fitted for them in light and spiritual
joy.

No one will contradict this, least of all he who looks for celestial
light as one of the rewards promised to virtue--the light which, as
Solomon says, is always a light to the righteous, the light which made
the apostle say, "Giving thanks unto the Father, which hath made us meet
to be partakers of the inheritance of the saints in light." Finally, if
the condemned are sent into outer darkness, evidently those who are made
worthy of God's approval are at rest in heavenly light. When, then,
according to the order of God, the heaven appeared, enveloping all that
its circumference included, a vast and unbroken body separating outer
things from those which it enclosed, it necessarily kept the space
inside in darkness for want of communication with the outer light.

Three things are, indeed, needed to form a shadow: light, a body, a dark
place. The shadow of heaven forms the darkness of the world. Understand,
I pray you, what I mean, by a simple example--by raising for yourself at
midday a tent of some compact and impenetrable material, you shut
yourself up in sudden darkness. Suppose that original darkness was like
this, not s