604 GOTTFRIEDLEIBNIZ
towards the apparent good, and so express or imitate God’s will in certain particular
respects in respect of which this apparent good always has something of the true, He
determines our will to choose what seems the best without nonetheless necessitating it.
For, absolutely speaking, in so far as it may be opposed to necessity, our will is indif-
ferent and has the power to do otherwise or to suspend its action altogether, since both
are and remain possible.
Hence it falls to the soul to take precautions against the appearances taking it by
surprise by means of a firm resolve to reflect and to refuse to act or judge on particular
occasions without thorough deliberation. Nevertheless it is true and even certain from
all eternity that a particular soul will not use this power on one such occasion. But who
could do anything about it or do other than complain about himself? For all complaints
after the fact are unjust when they would have been unjust before. Now would this soul,
shortly before sinning, be in the right to complain of God, who has not determined him
to flee from the sin as if He had determined him to sin? Since God’s determinations in
these matters are unforeseeable, how does he know himself to be determined to sin,
unless in fact he is already actually sinning? It is only a matter of not willing, and God
could propose no easier or juster condition. Moreover, any judge stops only to consider
how far a man’s will is bad without searching for the reasons disposing him to have a
bad will. But perhaps it is certain from all eternity that I will sin? Answer yourself: per-
haps not. Do not think about what you cannot know and cannot enlighten you, but act in
accordance with the duty you know.
But, someone else will ask, whence comes it that that man will certainly do this
sin? The answer is easy: otherwise he would not be that man. For God sees for all time
that there will be a certain Judas whose notion, or idea God has of him, contains this
future free action. Hence the only question that remains is why such a Judas, the traitor,
who is merely a possible in the idea of God actually exists. But to that question there is
no answer to be expected here below, unless that in general we must say that since God
thought it good for him to exist, despite the sin he foresaw this evil must be repaid with
interest in the universe, that God will obtain a greater good from it; and that in all He
will find this sequence of things including the existence of this sinner the most perfect
of all the other possible ones. But to explain in all cases the admirable economy of this
choice is not possible while we are travellers in this vale of tears in this world. It is
enough to know without understanding it. It is time here to recognise “the height of the
riches,” the width and depth of the divine wisdom, without seeking a detail involving
these infinite considerations.
Nevertheless, it is clear that God is not the cause of evil. For not only did original
sin take hold of the soul after the loss of innocence but before then there was a limitation
or original imperfection common to the natures of all creatures making them capable of
sin or liable to fail. Thus there is no more difficulty with regard to the supralapsarians*
than with the others. In my opinion, it is to this that the opinion of St. Augustine and
other authors that the root of evil is in nothingness should be reduced, i.e. in the privation
or the limitation of creatures that God graciously remedies by giving them the degree of
perfection it pleases Him to give. Whether ordinary or extraordinary, this grace of God
has its degrees and measures, always in itself efficacious in producing a proportionate
effect. Moreover it is always sufficient, not only to guarantee us against sin, but to
produce salvation, if the man joins himself to it with his will, though it is not always
sufficient to surmount human inclinations, otherwise it would depend on nothing more,
*Calvinists who believe that election to heaven or hell was a part of God’s original plan.