though he had determined the sin. Since the deter- minations of God in these matters cannot be fore- seen, how would the soul know that it was pre- ordained to sin unless it had already committed the sin? It is merely a question of wishing to or not wishing to, and God could not have set an easier or juster condition. Therefore all judges without asking the reasons which have disposed a’ man to have an evil will, consider only how far this will is wrong. But, you object, perhaps it is ordained from all eternity that I will sin. Find your own answer. Perhaps it has not been. Now then, without asking for what you are unable to know and in regard to which you can have no light, act accord- ing to your duty and your knowledge. But, some one will object; whence comes it then that this man will assuredly do this sin? The reply is easy. It is that otherwise he would not be aman. For God foresees from all time that there will be a certain Judas, and in the concept or idea of him which God has, is contained this future free act. The only question, therefore, which remains 1s why this certain Judas, the betrayer who is possible only because of the idea of God, actually exists. To this question, however, we can expect no answer here on earth excepting to say in general that it is because God has found it good that he should exist notwithstanding that sin which he foresaw. This evil will be more than overbalanced. God will derive a greater good from it, and it will finally turn out that this series of events in which is included the existence of this sinner, is the most perfect among all the possible series of events. An explanation in every case of the admirable econ- DISCOURSE ON METAPHYSICS, bs a!
omy of this choice cannot be given while we are sojourners on earth. It is enough to know the excellence without understanding it. It is here that must be recognized altitudinem divitiarum, the unfathomable depth of the divine wisdom, without hesitating at a detail which involves an infinite number of considerations. It is clear, however, that God is not the cause of ill. For not only after the loss of innocence by men, has original sin possessed the soul, but even before that there was an original limitation or imperfection in the very nature of all creatures, which rendered them open to sin and able to fall. There is, therefore, no more difficulty in the supralapsarian view than there is in the other views of sin. To this also, it seems to me can be reduced the opinion of Saint Augustine and of other authors: that the root of evil is in the negativity, that is to say, in the lack or limitation of creatures which God graciously remedies by what- ever degree of perfection it pleases him to give. This grace of God, whether ordinary or extraordi- nary has its degrees and its measures. It is always efficacious in itself to produce a certain proportion- ate effect and furthermore it is always sufficient not only to keep one from sin but even to effect his salvation, provided that the man co-operates with - that which is in him. It has not always, however, sufficient power to overcome the inclination, for, if it did, it would no longer be limited in any way, and this superiority to limitations is reserved to that unique grace which is absolutely efficacious. This grace is always victorious whether through its own self or through the congruity of circum- stances.
52 LEIBNIZ.
XXXI. Concerning the motives of election; concern- ing faith foreseen and the absolute decree and that it all reduces to the question why God has chosen and resolved to admit to existence just such a possible per- son, whose concept includes just such a sequence of free acts and of free gifts of grace. This at once puts an end to all difficulties.
Finally, the grace of God is wholly unprejudiced and creatures have no claim upon it. Just as it is not sufficient in accounting for God’s choice in his dispensations of grace to refer to his absolute or conditional prevision of men’s future actions, so it is also wrong to imagine his decrees as absolute with no reasonable motive. As concerns foreseen faith and good works, it is very true that God has elected none but those whose faith and charity he foresees, guos se fide donaturum praescivit. The same question, however, arises again as to why God gives to some rather than to others the grace of faith or of good works. As concerns God’s ability to foresee not only the faith and good deeds, but also their material and predisposition, or that which aman on his part contributes to them (since there are as truly diversities on the part of men as on the part of grace, and a man although he needs to be aroused to good and needs to become converted, yet acts in accordance with his temperament),—as regards his ability to foresee there are many who say that God, knowing what a particular man will do without grace, that is without his extraordinary assistance, or knowing at least what will be the human contribution, resolves to give grace to those whose natural dispositions are the best, or at any rate are the least imperfect and evil. But if this were the DISCOURSE ON METAPHYSICS, 53 case then the natural dispositions in so far as they were good would be like gifts of grace, since God. would have given advantages to some over others; and therefore, since he would well know that the natural advantages which he had given would serve as motives for his grace or for his extraordinary assistance, would not everything be reduced to his mercy? I think, therefore, that since we do not know how much and in what way God regards natural dispositions in the dispensations of his grace, it would be safest and most exact to say, in accord- ance with our principles and as I have already remarked, that there must needs be among possible beings the person Peter or John whose concept or idea contains all that particular sequence of ordi- nary and, extraordinary manifestations of: grace togéther with the rest of the accompanying events and circumstances, and that it has pleased God to choose him among an infinite number of persons equally possible for actual existence. When we have said this there seems nothing left to ask, and all difficulties vanish. For in regard to that great. and ultimate question why it has pleased God to choose him among so great a number of possible persons, it is surely unreasonable to demand more than the general reasons which we have given. The reasons in detail surpass our ken. Therefore, instead of postulating an absolute decree, which being without reason would be unreasonable, and. instead of postulating reasons which do not succeed in solving the difficulties and in turn have need themselves of reasons, it will be best to say with St. Paul that there are for God’s choice certain great reasons of wisdom and congruity which.he-.
54 LEIBNIZ.
follows, which reasons, however, are unknown to mortals and are founded upon the general order, whose goal is the greatest perfection of the world. This is what is meant when the motives of God’s glory and of the manifestation of his justice are spoken of, as well as when men speak of his mercy, and his perfection in general; that immense vastness of wealth, in fine, with which the soul of the same St. Paul was to thrilled.
XXXII. Usefulness of these principles in matters of piety and of religion.
In addition it seems that the thoughts which we have just explained and particularly the great prin- ciple of the perfection of God’s operations and the concept of substance which includes all its changes with all its accempanying circumstances, far from injuring, serve rather to confirm religion, serve to dissipate great difficulties, to inflame souls with a divine love and to raise the mind to a knowledge of incorporeal substances much more than the present-day hypotheses. For it appears clearly that all other substances depend upon God just as our thoughts emanate from our own substances; that God is all in all and that he is intimately united to all created things, in proportion however to their perfection; that it is he alone who determines them from without by his influence, and if to act ts to determine directly, it may be said in metaphysical language that God alone acts upon me and He alone causes me to do good or ill, other substances con- tributing only because of his determinations; because God, who takes all things into considera- DISCOURSE ON METAPHYSICS. 55 tion, distributes his bounties and compels created beings to accommodate themselves to one another. Thus God alone constitutes the relation or commu- nication between substances. It is through him that the phenomena of the one meet and accord with the phenomena of the others, so that there may be a reality in our perceptions. In common parlance, however, an action is attributed to particular causes in the sense that I have explained above because it is not necessary to make continual mention of the universal cause when speaking of particular cases. It can be seen also that every substance has a per- fect spontaneity (which becomes liberty with intel- ligent substances). Everything which happens to it is a consequence of its idea or its being and noth- ing determines it except God only. It is for this reason that a person of exalted mind and revered saintliness may say that the soul ought often to think as if there were only God and itself in the world. Nothing can make us hold to immortality more firmly than this independence and vastness of the soul which protects it completely against exte- rior things, since it alone constitutes our universe and together with God is sufficient for itself. It is as impossible for it to perish save through annthila- tion as it is impessible for the universe to destroy itself, the universe whose animate and perpetual expression it is. Furthermore, the changes in this extended mass which is called our body cannot possibly affect the soul nor can the dissipation of the body destroy that which is indivisible.
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XXXITI. Explanation of the relation between the soul and the body, a matter which has been regarded as inexplicable or else as miraculous; concerning the origin of confused perceptions.
We can also see the explanation of that great mystery ‘‘the union of the soul and the body,”’ that is to say how it comes about that the passions and actions of the one are accompanied by the actions and passions or else the appropriate phenomena of the other. For it is not possible to conceive how one can. have an influence upon the other and it Is unreasonable to have recourse at once to the extraor- dinary intervention of the universal cause in an ordinary and particular case. The following, how- ever, is the true explanation. We have said that everything which happens to a soul or to any sub- stance is a consequence of its concept; hence the idea itself or the essence of the soul brings it about that all of its appearances or perceptions should be born out of its nature and precisely in such a way that they correspond of themselves to that which happens in the universe at large, but more partic- ularly and more perfectly to that which happens in the body associated with it, because it is in a partic- ular way and only for a certain time according to the relation of other bodies to its own body that the soul expresses the state of the universe. This last fact enables us to see how our body belongs to us, without, however, being attached to our essence. I believe that those who are careful thinkers will decide favorably for our principles because of this single reason, viz., that they are able to see in what consists the relation between the soul and the body, a parallelism which appears inexplicable in any DISCOURSE ON METAPHYSICS, 57 other way. We can also see that the perceptions of our senses even when they are clear must necessarily contain certain confused elements, for as all the bodies in the universe are in sympathy, ours receives the impressions of all the others, and while® our senses respond to everything, our soul cannot pay attention to every particular. That is why our con- fused sensations are the result of a variety of per- ceptions This variety is infinite. It is almost like the confused murmuring which ts heard by those who approach the shore of asea. It comes from the continual beatings of innumerable waves. If now, out of many perceptions which do not at all fit together to make one, no particular one percep- tion surpasses the others, and if they make impres- sions about equally strong or equally capable of holding the attention of the soul, they can be per- ceived only confusedly.
XXXIV. Concerning the difference between spirits and other substances, souls or substantial forms; that the immortality which men desire includes memory.
Supposing that the bodies which constitute a unum per se, as human bodies, are substances, and have substantial forms, and supposing that animals have souls, we are obliged to grant that these souls and these substantial forms cannot entirely perish, any more than can the atoms or the ultimate ele- ments of matter, according to the position of other philosophers; for no substance perishes, although it may become very different. Such substances also express the whole universe, although more imperfectly than do spirits. The principle differ- 58 LEIBNIZ.
ence, however, is that they do not know that they are, nor what they are. Consequently, not being able to reason, they are unable to discover necessary and universal truths. It is also because they do not reflect regarding themselves that they have no moral qualities, whence it follows that undergoing a thousand transformations, as we see a caterpillar change into a butterfly, the result from a moral or practical standpoint is the same as if we said that they perished in each case, and we can indeed say it from the physical standpoint in the same way that we say bodies perish in their dissolution. But the intelligent soul, knowing that it is and having the ability to say that word ‘“‘I’’ so full of meaning, not only continues and exists, metaphysically far more certainly than do the others, but it remains the same from the moral standpoint, and constitutes the same personality, for it is its memory or knowl- edge of this ego which renders it open to punish- ment and reward. Also the immortality which ts required in morals and in religion does not consist merely in this perpetual existence, which pertains to all substances, for if in addition there were. no remembrance of what one had been, immortality would not be at all desirable. Suppose that some individual could suddenly become King of China on condition, however, of forgetting what he had been, as though being born again, would it not amount to the same practically, or as far as the effects could be perceived, as if the individual were annihilated, and a king of China were the same instant created in his place? The individual would have no reason to desire this.
DISCOURSE ON METAPHYSICS, 59 XXXV. The excellence of spirits; that God considers them preferable to other creatures; that the spirits ex- press God rather than the world, while other simple substances express the world rather than God.
In order, however, to prove by natural reasons that God will preserve forever not only our sub- stance, but also our personality, that is to say the recollection and knowledge of what we are (although the distinct knowledge is sometimes suspended during sleep and in swoons) it is necessary to join to metaphysics moral considerations. God must be considered not only as the principle and the cause of ail substances and of all existing things, but also as the chief of all persons or intelligent substances, as the absolute monarch of the most perfect city or republic, such as is constituted by all the spirits together in the universe, God being the most com- plete of all spirits at the same time that he is great- est of all beings. For assuredly the spirits are the most perfect of substances and best express the divinity. Since all the nature, purpose, virtue and function of substances is, as has been sufficiently explained, to express God and the universe, there is no room for doubting that those substances which give the expression, knowing what they are doing and which are able to understand the great truths about God and the universe, do express God and the universe incomparably better than do those natures which are either brutish and incapable of recogniz- ing truths, or are wholly destitute of sensation and knowledge. The difference between intelligent substances and those which are not intelligent is quite as great as between a mirror and one who sees.
As God is himself the greatest and wisest of spirits 60 ‘ LEIBNIZ.
it is easy to understand that the spirits with which he can, so to speak, enter into conversation and ‘even into social relations by communicating to them in particular ways his feelings and his will so that they are able to know and love their benefac- tor, must be much nearer to him than the rest of created things which may be regarded as the instru- ments of spirits. In the same way we see that all wise persons consider far more the condition of a man than of anything else however precious it may be; and it seems that the greatest satisfaction which a soul, satisfied in other respects, can have is to see itself loved by others. However, with respect to God there is this difference that his glory and our worship can add nothing to his satisfaction, the -recognition of creatures being nothing but a conse- quence of his sovereign and perfect felicity and being far from contributing to it or from causing it even in part. Nevertheless, that which is reason- able in finite spirits is found eminently in him and as we praise a king who prefers to preserve the life of a man before that of the most precious and rare of his animals, we should not doubt that the most enlightened and most just of all monarchs has the same preference.
XXXVI. God is the monarch of the most perfect re- public composed of all the spirits, and the happiness of this city of God is his principal purpose.
Spirits are of all substances the most capable of perfection and their perfections are different in this that they interfere with one another the least, or rather they aid one another the most, for only the “most virtuous can be the most perfect friends.
DISCOURSE ON METAPHYSICS, 61 Hence it follows that God who in all things has the . greatest perfeetion will have the greatest care for spirits and will give not only to all of them in general, but even to each one in particular the highest perfection which the universal harmony will permit. Wecan even say that it is because he is a spirit that. God is the originator of existences, for if he had lacked the power of wi!l to choose what is best, there would have been no reason why one possible being should exist rather than any other. Therefore God’s being a spirit himself dominates _all the consideration which he may have toward created things. Spirits alone are made in his image, being as it were of his blood or as children in the family, since they alone are able to serve him of free will, and to act consciously imitating the divine nature. A single spirit is worth a whole world, because it not only expresses the whole world, but it also knows it and governs itself as does God. In this way we may say that though every substance expresses the whole universe, yet the other substances express the world rather than God, while spirits express God rather than the world. This nature of spirits, so noble that it enables them to approach divinity as much as is possible for created things, has as a result that God derives infinitely more glory from them than from the other beings, or rather the other beings furnish to spirits the material for glorifying him. This moral quality of God which constitutes him Lord and Monarch of spirits influences him so to speak personally and in a unique way. It is through this that he humanizes himself, that he is willing to _suffer anthropologies, anj that he enters into social 62 LEIBNIZ.
relations with us and this consideration ts so dear to him that the happy and prosperous condition of his empire which consists in the greatest possible felicity of its inhabitants, becomes supreme among his laws. Happiness is to persons what perfection is to beings. And if the dominant principle in the existence of the physical world is the decree to give it the greatest possible perfection, the primary purpose in the moral world or in the city of God which constitutes the noblest part of the universe ought to be to extend the greatest happiness pos- sible. We must not therefore doubt that God has so ordained everything that spirits not only shall live forever, because this is unavoidable, but that they shall also. preserve forever their moral quality, so that his city may never lose a person, quite in the same way that the world never loses a substance. Consequently they will always be con- scious of their being, otherwise they would be open to neither reward nor punishment, a_ condition which is the essence of a republic, and above all of the most perfect republic where nothing can be neglected. In fine, God being at the same time the most just and the most debonnaire of monarchs, and requiring only a good will on the part of men, provided that it be sincere and intentional, his sub- jects cannot desire a better condition. To render them perfectly happy he desires only that they love him.
XXXVII. Jesus Christ has revealed to men the mys- tery and the admirable laws of the kingdom of heaven, and the greatness of the supreme happiness which God has prepared for those who love him.
The ancient philosophers knew very little of these DISCOURSE ON METAPHYSICS. 63 important truths. Jesus Christ alone has expressed them divinely well, and in a way so clear and sim- ple that the dullest minds have understood them. His gospel has entirely changed the face of human affairs. It has brought us to know the kingdom of heaven, or that perfect republic of spirits which deserves to be called the city of God. He it is who has discovered to us its wonderful laws. He alone has made us see how much God loves us and with what care everything that concerns us has been provided for; how God, inasmuch as he cares for the sparrows, will not neglect reasoning beings, who are infinitely more dear to him; how all the hairs of our heads are numbered; how heaven and earth may pass away but the word of God and that which belongs to the means of our salvation will not pass away; how God has more regard for the least one among intelligent souls than for the whole machin- ery of the world; how we ought not to fear those who are able to destroy the body but are unable to destroy the soul, since God alone can render the soul happy or unhappy; and how the souls of the right- eous are protected by his hand against all the upheavals of the universe, since God alone is able to act upon them; how none of our acts are forgot- ten; how everything is to be accounted for; even careless words and even a spoonful of water which is well. used; in fact how everything must result in the greatest welfare of the good, for then shall the