w they could avoid falling into an opinion so strange, unless they
acknowledged that there are reasons for God's choice, and that these
reasons are derived from his goodness: whence it follows of necessity that
what was chosen had the advantage of goodness over what was not chosen, and
consequently that it is the best of all the possibles. The best cannot be
surpassed in goodness, and it is no restriction of the power of God to say
that he cannot do the impossible. Is it possible, said M. Bayle, that there
is no better plan than that one which God carried out? One answers that it
is very possible and indeed necessary, namely that there is none: otherwise
God would have preferred it.

227. It seems to me that I have proved sufficiently that among all the
possible plans of the universe there is one better than all the rest, and
that God has not failed to choose it. But M. Bayle claims to infer thence
that God is therefore not free. This is how he speaks on that question
(_ubi supra_, ch. 151, p. 899): 'I thought to argue with a man who assumed
as I do that the goodness and the power of God are infinite, as well as his
wisdom; and now I see that in reality this man assumes that God's goodness
and power are enclosed within rather narrow bounds.' As to that, the
objection has already been met: I set no bounds to God's power, since I
recognize that it extends _ad maximum, ad omnia_, to all that implies no
contradiction; and I set none to his goodness, since it attains to the
best, _ad optimum_. But M. Bayle goes on: 'There is therefore no freedom in
God; he is compelled by his wisdom to create, and then to create precisely
such a work, and finally to create it precisely in such ways. These are
three servitudes which form a more than Stoic _fatum_, and which render
impossible all that is not within their sphere. It seems that, according to
this system, God could have said, even before shaping his decrees: I [269]
cannot save such and such a man, nor condemn such and such another, _quippe
vetor fatis_, my wisdom permits it not.'

228. I answer that it is goodness which prompts God to create with the
purpose of communicating himself; and this same goodness combined with
wisdom prompts him to create the best: a best that includes the whole
sequence, the effect and the process. It prompts him thereto without
compelling him, for it does not render impossible that which it does not
cause him to choose. To call that _fatum_ is taking