the single good principle produce no evil, ask too much; for by the same reason, according to M. Diroys, they ought also to ask that he should produce the greatest good, the less good being a kind of evil.  I hold that the Dualists are wrong in respect of the first point, and that they would be right in respect of the second, where M. Diroys blames them without cause; or rather that one can reconcile the evil, or the less good, in some parts with the best in the whole.  If the Dualists demanded that God should do the best, they would not be demanding too much.  They are mistaken rather in claiming that the best in the whole should be free from evil in the parts, and that therefore what God has made is not the best.

200.  But M. Diroys maintains that if God always produces the best he will produce other Gods; otherwise each substance that he produced would not be the best nor the most perfect.  But he is mistaken, through not taking into account the order and connexion of things.  If each substance taken separately were perfect, all would be alike; which is neither fitting nor possible.  If they were Gods, it would not have been possible to [252] produce them.  The best system of things will therefore not contain Gods; it will always be a system of bodies (that is, things arranged according to time and place) and of souls which represent and are aware of bodies, and in accordance with which bodies are in great measure directed.  So, as the design of a building may be the best of all in respect of its purpose, of expense and of circumstances; and as an arrangement of some figured representations of bodies which is given to you may be the best that one can find, it is easy to imagine likewise that a structure of the universe may be the best of all, without becoming a god.  The connexion and order of things brings it about that the body of every animal and of every plant is composed of other animals and of other plants, or of other living and organic beings; consequently there is subordination, and one body, one substance serves the other:  thus their perfection cannot be equal.

201.  M. Bayle thinks (p. 1063) that M. Diroys has confused two different propositions.  According to the one, God must do all things as wise and virtuous persons would wish that they should be done, by the rules of wisdom and of goodness that God has imprinted in them, and as they would be obliged themselves to do them if those things depended upon them.  The other is that it is not consistent with supreme wisdom and goodness to fail to do what is best and most perfect.  M. Diroys (in M. Bayle’s opinion) sets up the first proposition as an objection for himself, and replies to the second.  But therein he is justified, as it seems to me.  For these two propositions are connected, the second is a result of the first:  to do less good than one could is to be lacking in wisdom or in goodness.  To be the best, and to be desired by those who are most virtuous and wise,