. Bayle would perchance have perceived this origin of evil
in the form in which I demonstrate it here, if he had herein combined the
wisdom of God with his power, his goodness and his holiness. I will add, in
passing, that his _holiness_ is nothing other than the highest degree of
goodness, just as the crime which is its opposite is the worst of all evil.

152. M. Bayle places the Greek philosopher Melissus, champion of the
oneness of the first principle (and perhaps even of the oneness of
substance) in conflict with Zoroaster, as with the first originator of
duality. Zoroaster admits that the hypothesis of Melissus is more
consistent with order and _a priori_ reasons, but he denies its conformity
with experience and _a posteriori_ reasons. 'I surpass you', he said, 'in
the explanation of phenomena, which is the principal mark of a good
system.' But, in my opinion, it is not a very good explanation of a
phenomenon to assign to it an _ad hoc_ principle: to evil, a _principium
maleficum_, to cold, a _primum frigidum_; there is nothing so easy and
nothing so dull. It is well-nigh as if someone were to say that the [219]
Peripatetics surpass the new mathematicians in the explanation of the
phenomena of the stars, by giving them _ad hoc_ intelligences to guide
them. According to that, it is quite easy to conceive why the planets make
their way with such precision; whereas there is need of much geometry and
reflexion to understand how from the gravity of the planets, which bears
them towards the sun, combined with some whirlwind which carries them
along, or with their own motive force, can spring the elliptic movement of
Kepler, which satisfies appearances so well. A man incapable of relishing
deep speculations will at first applaud the Peripatetics and will treat our
mathematicians as dreamers. Some old Galenist will do the same with regard
to the faculties of the Schoolmen: he will admit a chylific, a chymific and
a sanguific, and he will assign one of these _ad hoc_ to each operation; he
will think he has worked wonders, and will laugh at what he will call the
chimeras of the moderns, who claim to explain through mechanical structure
what passes in the body of an animal.

153. The explanation of the cause of evil by a particular principle, _per
principium maleficum_, is of the same nature. Evil needs no such
explanation, any more than do cold and darkness: there is neither _primum
frigidum_ nor principle of darkness. Evil