when he has found it he will have still more trouble in demonstrating an opposition between the principle and the Mystery:  for, if it happened that the Mystery was evidently contrary to an evident principle, it would not be an obscure Mystery, it would be a manifest absurdity.) ’or what is the same thing, answer will be made with some distinction as obscure as the very thesis that will have been attacked.’  (One can do without distinctions, if need be, by denying either some premiss or some conclusion; and when one is doubtful of the meaning of some term used by the opposer one may demand of him its definition.  Thus the defender has no need to incommode himself when it is a question of answering an adversary who claims that he is offering us an invincible proof.  But even supposing that the defender, perchance being kindly disposed, or for the sake of brevity, or because he feels himself strong enough, should himself vouchsafe to show the ambiguity concealed in the objection, and to remove it by making some distinction, this distinction need not of necessity lead to anything clearer than the first thesis, since the defender is not obliged to elucidate the Mystery itself.)

74.  ‘Now it is certain’, so M. Bayle continues, ’that an objection which is founded on distinct notions remains equally victorious, whether you give to it no answer, or you make an answer where none can comprehend anything.  Can the contest be equal between a man who alleges in objection to you that which you and he very clearly conceive, and you, who can only defend yourself by answers wherein neither of you understands anything?’ (It is not enough that the objection be founded on quite distinct notions, it is necessary also that one apply it in contradiction of the thesis.  And when I answer someone by denying some premiss, in order to compel him to prove it, or some conclusion, to compel him to put it in good form, it cannot be said that I answer nothing or that I answer nothing intelligible.  For as it is the doubtful premiss of the adversary that I deny, my denial will be [116] as intelligible as his affirmation.  Finally, when I am so obliging as to explain myself by means of some distinction, it suffices that the terms I employ have some meaning, as in the Mystery itself.  Thus something in my answer will be comprehended:  but one need not of necessity comprehend all that it involves; otherwise one would comprehend the Mystery also.)

75.  M. Bayle continues thus:  ’Every philosophical dispute assumes that the disputant parties agree on certain definitions’ (This would be desirable, but usually it is only in the dispute itself that one reaches such a point, if the necessity arises.) ’and that they admit the rules of Syllogisms, and the signs for the recognition of bad arguments.  After that everything lies in the investigation as to whether a thesis conforms mediately or immediately to the principles one is agreed upon’ (which is done by means of the syllogisms of him who makes