goodness must exceed infinitely that which the natural appetites seek in objects, these appetites and objects being limited while this power is independent or at the least this goodness, given by the will to the chosen object, must be arbitrary and of such a kind as the will desires.  For whence would one derive the reason for limits if the object is possible, if it is within reach of him who wills, and if the will can give it the goodness it desires to give, independently of reality and of appearances?  It seems to me that may suffice to overthrow a hypothesis so precarious, which contains something of a fairy-tale kind, optantis ista sunt, non invenientis.  It therefore remains only too true that this handsome fiction cannot render us more immune from evils.  And we shall see presently that when men place themselves above certain desires or certain aversions they do so through other desires, which always have their foundation in the representation of good and evil.  I said also ’that one might grant the conclusion of the argument’, which states that our happiness does not depend absolutely upon ourselves, at least in the present state of human life:  for who would question the fact that we are liable to meet a thousand accidents which human prudence cannot evade?  How, for example, can I [425] avoid being swallowed up, together with a town where I take up my abode, by an earthquake, if such is the order of things?  But finally I can also deny the inference in the argument, which states that if the will is only actuated by the representation of good and evil our happiness does not depend upon ourselves.  The inference would be valid if there were no God, if everything were ruled by brute causes; but God’s ordinance is that for the attainment of happiness it suffices that one be virtuous.  Thus, if the soul follows reason and the orders that God has given it, it is assured of its happiness, even though one may not find a sufficiency thereof in this life.

19.  Having thus endeavoured to point out the disadvantages of my hypothesis, our gifted author sets forth the advantages of his own.  He believes that it alone is capable of saving our freedom, that all our felicity rests therein, that it increases our goods and lessens our evils, and that an agent possessing this power is so much the more complete.  These advantages have almost all been already disproved.  We have shown that for the securing of our freedom it is enough that the representations of goods and of evils, and other inward or outward dispositions, should incline us without constraining us.  Moreover one does not see how pure indifference can contribute to felicity; on the contrary, the more indifferent one is, the more insensitive and the less capable of enjoying what is good will one prove to be.  Besides the hypothesis proves too much.  For if an indifferent power could give itself the consciousness of good it could also give itself the most perfect happiness, as has been already shown.  And it is