ination, independent of the representation of the object; this
bishop, I say, in other passages nevertheless says things which seem more
in favour of my doctrine than of what appears contrary thereto in his own.
He says that what an infinitely wise and free cause has chosen is better
than what it has not chosen. Is not that recognizing that goodness is the
object and the reason of his choice? In this sense one will here aptly say:

_Sic placuit superis; quaerere plura, nefas_.

[276]
* * * * *

ESSAYS ON THE JUSTICE OF GOD AND THE FREEDOM OF MAN IN THE ORIGIN OF EVIL

* * * * *

PART THREE

241. Now at last I have disposed of the cause of moral evil; _physical
evil_, that is, sorrows, sufferings, miseries, will be less troublesome to
explain, since these are results of moral evil. _Poena est malum passionis,
quod infligitur ob malum actionis_, according to Grotius. One suffers
because one has acted; one suffers evil because one does evil.

_Nostrorum causa malorum_
_Nos sumus_.

It is true that one often suffers through the evil actions of others; but
when one has no part in the offence one must look upon it as a certainty
that these sufferings prepare for us a greater happiness. The question of
_physical evil_, that is, of the origin of sufferings, has difficulties in
common with that of the origin of _metaphysical evil_, examples whereof are
furnished by the monstrosities and other apparent irregularities of the
universe. But one must believe that even sufferings and monstrosities are
part of order; and it is well to bear in mind not only that it was better
to admit these defects and these monstrosities than to violate general
laws, as Father Malebranche sometimes argues, but also that these very
monstrosities are in the rules, and are in conformity with general acts of
will, though we be not capable of discerning this conformity. It is [277]
just as sometimes there are appearances of irregularity in mathematics
which issue finally in a great order when one has finally got to the bottom
of them: that is why I have already in this work observed that according to
my principles all individual events, without exception, are consequences of
general acts of will.

242. It should be no cause for astonishment that I endeavour to elucidate
these things by comparisons taken from