CINXE.COM

<!DOCTYPE html> <html lang="en"> <head> <title>CATHOLIC ENCYCLOPEDIA: Evil</title><script src="https://dtyry4ejybx0.cloudfront.net/js/cmp/cleanmediacmp.js?ver=0104" async="true"></script><script defer data-domain="newadvent.org" src="https://plausible.io/js/script.js"></script><link rel="canonical" href="https://www.newadvent.org/cathen/05649a.htm"> <meta name="viewport" content="width=device-width, initial-scale=1"> <meta name="description" content="In a large sense, described as the sum of the opposition, which experience shows to exist in the universe, to the desires and needs of individuals; whence arises, among human beings at least, the sufferings in which life abounds"> <meta http-equiv="Content-Type" content="text/html; charset=utf-8"><link rel="alternate" type="application/rss+xml" title="RSS" href="http://feeds.newadvent.org/bestoftheweb?format=xml"><link rel="icon" href="../images/icon1.ico" type="image/x-icon"><link rel="shortcut icon" href="../images/icon1.ico" type="image/x-icon"><meta name="robots" content="noodp"><link type="text/css" rel="stylesheet" href="../utility/screen6.css" media="screen"></head> <body class="cathen" id="05649a.htm">  <br/> <div id="capitalcity"><table summary="Logo" cellpadding=0 cellspacing=0 width="100%"><tr valign="bottom"><td align="left"><a href="../"><img height=36 width=153 border="0" alt="New Advent" src="../images/logo.gif"></a></td><td align="right"> <form id="searchbox_000299817191393086628:ifmbhlr-8x0" action="../utility/search.htm">  <input type="hidden" name="safe" value="active"> <input type="hidden" name="cx" value="000299817191393086628:ifmbhlr-8x0"/> <input type="hidden" name="cof" value="FORID:9"/>  <label for="searchQuery" id="searchQueryLabel">Search:</label> <input id="searchQuery" name="q" type="text" size="25" aria-labelledby="searchQueryLabel"/>  <label for="submitButton" id="submitButtonLabel" class="visually-hidden">Submit Search</label> <input id="submitButton" type="submit" name="sa" value="Search" aria-labelledby="submitButtonLabel"/> </form> <table summary="Spacer" cellpadding=0 cellspacing=0><tr><td height="2"></td></tr></table> <table summary="Tabs" cellpadding=0 cellspacing=0><tr> <td bgcolor="#ffffff"></td> <td class="tab"><a class="tab_color_on_beige" href="../"> Home </a></td> <td class="tab"><a class="tab_white_on_color" href="../cathen/index.html"> Encyclopedia </a></td> <td class="tab"><a class="tab_color_on_beige" href="../summa/index.html"> Summa </a></td> <td class="tab"><a class="tab_color_on_beige" href="../fathers/index.html"> Fathers </a></td> <td class="tab"><a class="tab_color_on_beige" href="../bible/gen001.htm"> Bible </a></td> <td class="tab"><a class="tab_color_on_beige" href="../library/index.html"> Library </a></td> </tr></table> </td> </tr></table><table summary="Alphabetical index" width="100%" cellpadding=0 cellspacing=0><tr><td class="bar_white_on_color"> <a href="../cathen/a.htm"> A </a><a href="../cathen/b.htm"> B </a><a href="../cathen/c.htm"> C </a><a href="../cathen/d.htm"> D </a><a href="../cathen/e.htm"> E </a><a href="../cathen/f.htm"> F </a><a href="../cathen/g.htm"> G </a><a href="../cathen/h.htm"> H </a><a href="../cathen/i.htm"> I </a><a href="../cathen/j.htm"> J </a><a href="../cathen/k.htm"> K </a><a href="../cathen/l.htm"> L </a><a href="../cathen/m.htm"> M </a><a href="../cathen/n.htm"> N </a><a href="../cathen/o.htm"> O </a><a href="../cathen/p.htm"> P </a><a href="../cathen/q.htm"> Q </a><a href="../cathen/r.htm"> R </a><a href="../cathen/s.htm"> S </a><a href="../cathen/t.htm"> T </a><a href="../cathen/u.htm"> U </a><a href="../cathen/v.htm"> V </a><a href="../cathen/w.htm"> W </a><a href="../cathen/x.htm"> X </a><a href="../cathen/y.htm"> Y </a><a href="../cathen/z.htm"> Z </a> </td></tr></table></div> <div id="mobilecity" style="text-align: center; "><a href="../"><img height=24 width=102 border="0" alt="New Advent" src="../images/logo.gif"></a></div>  <div id="mi5"><span class="breadcrumbs"><a href="../">Home</a> > <a href="../cathen">Catholic Encyclopedia</a> > <a href="../cathen/e.htm">E</a> > Evil</span></div> <div id="springfield2"> <div class='catholicadnet-728x90' id='cathen-728x90-top' style='display: flex; height: 100px; align-items: center; justify-content: center; '></div> <h1>Evil</h1> <p><em><a href="https://gumroad.com/l/na2"><strong>Please help support the mission of New Advent</strong> and get the full contents of this website as an instant download. Includes the Catholic Encyclopedia, Church Fathers, Summa, Bible and more  all for only $19.99...</a></em></p> <p>Evil, in a large sense, may be described as the sum of the opposition, which experience shows to exist in the <a href="../cathen/15183a.htm">universe</a>, to the desires and needs of <a href="../cathen/07762a.htm">individuals</a>; whence arises, among human beings at least, the sufferings in which life abounds. Thus evil, from the point of view of human welfare, is what ought not to exist. Nevertheless, there is no department of <a href="../cathen/09580c.htm">human</a> <a href="../cathen/09238c.htm">life</a> in which its presence is not felt; and the discrepancy between what is and what ought to be has always called for explanation in the account which <a href="../cathen/09580c.htm">mankind</a> has sought to give of itself and its surroundings. For this purpose it is <a href="../cathen/10733a.htm">necessary</a> (1) to define the precise nature of the principle that imparts the character of evil to so great a variety of circumstances, and (2) to ascertain, as far as may be possible, the source from which it arises.</p> <div class="CMtag_300x250" style="display: flex; height: 300px; align-items: center; justify-content: center; "></div> <p>With regard to the nature of evil, it should be observed that evil is of three kinds  physical, moral, and metaphysical. <em>Physical</em> evil includes all that causes harm to man, whether by bodily injury, by thwarting his natural desires, or by preventing the full development of his powers, either in the order of nature directly, or through the various social conditions under which <a href="../cathen/09580c.htm">mankind</a> naturally exists. Physical evils directly due to nature are sickness, accident, death, etc. Poverty, oppression, and some forms of disease are instances of evil arising from imperfect social organization. Mental suffering, such as anxiety, disappointment, and remorse, and the limitation of intelligence which prevents human beings from attaining to the full comprehension of their environment, are congenital forms of evil; each vary in character and degree according to natural disposition and social circumstances.</p> <p>By <em>moral</em> evil are understood the deviation of human volition from the prescriptions of the moral order and the action which results from that deviation. Such action, when it proceeds solely from <a href="../cathen/07648a.htm">ignorance</a>, is not to be classed as moral evil, which is properly restricted to the motions of will towards ends of which the <a href="../cathen/04268a.htm">conscience</a> disapproves. The extent of moral evil is not limited to the circumstances of life in the natural order, but includes also the sphere of religion, by which man's welfare is affected in the <a href="../cathen/14336b.htm">supernatural order</a>, and the <a href="../cathen/12372b.htm">precepts</a> of which, as depending ultimately upon the <a href="../cathen/06612a.htm#IID2">will of God</a>, are of the strictest possible <a href="../cathen/11189a.htm">obligation</a> (see <a href="../cathen/14004b.htm">SIN</a>). The <a href="../cathen/11189a.htm">obligation</a> to moral action in the natural order is, moreover, generally believed to depend on the motives supplied by religion; and it is at least <a href="../cathen/05141a.htm">doubtful</a> whether it is possible for moral <a href="../cathen/11189a.htm">obligation</a> to exist at all apart from a <a href="../cathen/14336b.htm">supernatural</a> sanction.</p> <p> <em>Metaphysical</em> evil is the limitation by one another of various component parts of the natural world. Through this mutual limitation natural objects are for the most part prevented from attaining to their full or ideal perfection, whether by the constant pressure of physical condition, or by sudden catastrophes. Thus, animal and vegetable organisms are variously influenced by climate and other natural causes; predatory animals depend for their existence on the destruction of life; nature is subject to storms and convulsions, and its order depends on a system of perpetual decay and renewal due to the interaction of its constituent parts. If animals suffering is excluded, no pain of any kind is caused by the inevitable limitations of nature; and they can only be called evil by analogy, and in a sense quite different from that in which the term is applied to human experience. Clarke, moreover, has aptly remarked (Correspondence with Leibniz, letter ii) that the apparent disorder of nature is really no disorder, since it is part of a definite scheme, and precisely fulfills the intention of the Creator; it may therefore be counted as a relative perfection rather than an imperfection. It is, in fact, only by a transference to irrational objects of the subjective ideals and aspirations of human intelligence, that the "evil of nature" can be called evil in any sense but a merely analogous one. The nature and degree of pain in lower animals is very obscure, and in the <a href="../cathen/10733a.htm">necessary</a> absence of data it is difficult to say whether it should rightly be classed with the merely formal evil which belongs to inanimate objects, or with the suffering of <a href="../cathen/09580c.htm">human beings</a>. The latter view was generally held in ancient times, and may perhaps be referred to the <a href="../cathen/01558c.htm">anthropomorphic</a> tendency of primitive minds which appears in the <a href="../cathen/05075b.htm">doctrine</a> of <a href="../cathen/10234d.htm">metempsychosis</a>. Thus it has often been supposed that animal suffering, together with many of the imperfections of inanimate nature, was due to the fall of man, with whose welfare, as the chief part of creation, were bound up the fortunes of the rest (see Theoph. Antioch., Ad Autolyc., II; cf. <a href="../bible/gen003.htm">Genesis 3</a> and <a href="../bible/1co009.htm">1 Corinthians 9</a>). The opposite view is taken by <a href="../cathen/14663b.htm">St. Thomas</a> (I, Q. xcvi, a. 1,2). <a href="../cathen/04744b.htm">Descartes</a> supposed that animals were merely machines, without sensation or consciousness; he was closely followed by <a href="../cathen/09568a.htm">Malebranche</a> and <a href="../cathen/04744b.htm">Cartesians</a> generally. <a href="../cathen/09134b.htm">Leibniz</a> grants sensation to animals, but considers that mere sense-perception, unaccompanied by reflexion, cannot cause either pain or pleasure; in any case he holds the pain and pleasure of animals to be <a href="../cathen/11460a.htm">parable</a> in degree to those resulting from reflex action in man (see also Maher, <a href="../cathen/12545b.htm">Psychology</a>, Supp't. A, London, 1903).</p> <div class="CMtag_300x250" style="display: flex; height: 300px; align-items: center; justify-content: center; "></div> <p>It is evident again that all evil is essentially negative and not positive; i.e. it consists not in the acquisition of anything, but in the loss or deprivation of something <a href="../cathen/10733a.htm">necessary</a> for perfection. Pain, which is the test or criterion of physical evil, has indeed a positive, though purely subjective existence as a sensation or emotion; but its evil quality lies in its disturbing effect on the sufferer. In like manner, the perverse action of the will, upon which moral evil depends, is more than a mere negation of right action, implying as it does the positive element of choice; but the morally evil character of wrong action is constituted not by the element of choice, but by its rejection of what right <a href="../cathen/12673b.htm">reason</a> requires. Thus <a href="../cathen/11306b.htm">Origen</a> (In Joh., ii, 7) defines evil as <em>stéresis;</em> the <a href="../cathen/05013a.htm">Pseudo-Dionysius</a> (De Div. Nom. iv) as the non-existent; <a href="../cathen/09540b.htm">Maimonides</a> (Dux perplex. iii, 10) as "privato boni alicujus"; <a href="../cathen/01264a.htm">Albertus Magnus</a> (adopting <a href="../cathen/02084a.htm">St. Augustine's</a> phrase) attributes evil to "aliqua causa <em>deficiens</em>" (Summa Theol., I, xi, 4); Schopenhauer, who held pain to be the positive and normal condition of life (pleasure being its partial and temporary absence), nevertheless made it depend upon the failure of human desire to obtain fulfillment--"the wish is in itself pain". Thus it will be seen that evil is not a real entity; it is relative. What is evil in some relations may be good in others; and probably there is no form of existence which is exclusively evil in all relations, Hence it has been thought that evil cannot truly be said to exist at all, and is really nothing but a "lesser good." But this opinion seems to leave out of account the reality of human experience. Though the same cause may give pain to one, and pleasure to another, pain and pleasure, as sensations or <a href="../cathen/07630a.htm">ideas</a>, cannot but be mutually exclusive. No one, however, has attempted to deny this very obvious fact; and the opinion in question may perhaps be understood as merely a paradoxical way of stating the relativity of evil.</p> <p>There is practically a general agreement of authorities as the nature of evil, some allowance being made for varying modes of expression depending on a corresponding variety of <a href="../cathen/12025c.htm">philosophical</a> presuppositions. But on the question of the origin of evil there has been, and is a considerable diversity of opinion. The problem is strictly a metaphysical one; i.e. it cannot be solved by a mere experimental analysis of the actual conditions from which evil results. The question, which Schopenhauer has called "the <em>punctum pruriens</em> of metaphysics", is concerned not so much with the various detailed manifestations of evil in nature, as with the hidden and underlying cause which has made these manifestations possible or <a href="../cathen/10733a.htm">necessary</a>; and it is at once evident that enquiry in a region so obscure must be attended with great difficulty, and that the conclusions reached must, for the most part be of a provisional and tentative character. No system of <a href="../cathen/12025c.htm">philosophy</a> has ever succeeded in escaping from the obscurity in which the subject is involved; but it is not too much to say that the <a href="../cathen/03712a.htm">Christian</a> solution offers, on the whole, fewer difficulties, and approaches more nearly to completeness than any other. The question may be stated thus. Admitting that evil consists in a certain relation of man to his environment, or that it arises in the relation of the component parts of the totality of existence to one another, how comes it that though all are alike the results of a universal cosmic process, this universal agency is perpetually at <a href="../cathen/15546c.htm">war</a> with itself, contradicting and thwarting its own efforts in the mutual hostility of its progeny? Further, admitting that metaphysical evil in itself may be merely nature's method, involving nothing more than a continual redistribution of the material elements of the <a href="../cathen/15183a.htm">universe</a>, human suffering and wrongdoing still and out as essentially opposed to the general scheme of natural development, and are scarcely to be reconciled in thought with any conception of unity or harmony in nature. To what, then, is the evil of <a href="../cathen/09580c.htm">human</a> <a href="../cathen/09238c.htm">life</a>, physical and moral, to be attributed as its cause? But when the <a href="../cathen/15183a.htm">universe</a> is considered as the work of an all-benevolent and all-powerful Creator, a fresh element is added to the problem. If <a href="../cathen/06608a.htm">God</a> is all-benevolent, why did He cause or permit suffering? If He is all-Powerful, He can be under no necessity of creating or permitting it; and on the other hand, if He is under any such necessity, He cannot be all-powerful. Again, if <a href="../cathen/06608a.htm">God</a> is absolutely good, and also <a href="../cathen/11251c.htm">omnipotent</a>, how can He permit the existence of moral evil? We have to enquire, that is to say, how evil has come to exist, and what is its special relation to the Creator of the <a href="../cathen/15183a.htm">universe</a>.</p> <p>The solution of the problem has been attempted by three different methods.</p> <p>I. It has been contended that existence is fundamentally evil; that evil is the active principle of the <a href="../cathen/15183a.htm">universe</a>, and good no more than an illusion, the pursuit of which serves to induce the <a href="../cathen/09580c.htm">human race</a> to perpetuate its own existence (see <a href="../cathen/11740b.htm">PESSIMISM</a>). This is the fundamental tenet of <a href="../cathen/03028b.htm">Buddhism</a>, which regards <a href="../cathen/07131b.htm">happiness</a> as unattainable, and holds that there is no way of escaping from misery but by ceasing to exist otherwise than in the impersonal state of Nirvana. The origin of suffering, according to <a href="../cathen/03028b.htm">Buddha</a>, is "the thirst for being". This was also, among Greek <a href="../cathen/12025c.htm">philosophers</a>, the view of Hegesias the Cyrenaic (called <em>peisithánatos,</em> the counsellor of death), who held life to be valueless, and pleasure, the only good, to be unattainable. But the Greek temper was naturally disinclined to a pessimistic view of nature and life; and while popular mythology embodied the darker aspects of existence in such conceptions as those of <a href="../cathen/05793a.htm">Fate</a>, the avenging Furies, and the <a href="../cathen/08326b.htm">envy</a> <em>(phthónos)</em> of the gods, Greek thinkers, as a rule, held that evil is universally supreme, but can be avoided or overcome by the wise and virtuous.</p> <p>Pessimism, as a metaphysical system, is the product of modern times. Its chief representatives are Schopenhauer and Von Hartmann, both of whom held the actual <a href="../cathen/15183a.htm">universe</a> to be fundamentally evil, and <a href="../cathen/07131b.htm">happiness</a> it to be impossible. The origin of the phenomenal <a href="../cathen/15183a.htm">universe</a> is attributed by Schopenhauer to a <a href="../cathen/15017a.htm">transcendental</a> Will, which he identifies with pure being; and by Hartmann to the unconscious, which includes both the Will and the Idea (<em>Vorstellung</em>) of Schopenhauer. According to both Schopenhauer and Hartmann, suffering has come into existence with self-consciousness, from which it is inseparable.</p> <p>II. Evil has been attributed to one of two mutually opposed principles, to which respectively the mingled <a href="../cathen/06636b.htm">good</a> and evil of the world are due. The relation between the two is variously represented, and ranges from the co-ordination imagined by <a href="../cathen/02151b.htm">Zoroastrianism</a> to the mere relative independence of the created will as held by <a href="../cathen/03712a.htm">Christian</a> <a href="../cathen/14580a.htm">theology</a>. Zoroaster attributed <a href="../cathen/06636b.htm">good</a> and evil respectively to two mutually hostile principles <em>(hrízai,</em> or <em>árchai)</em> called <a href="../cathen/01233a.htm">Ormuzd (Ahura Mazda)</a> and <a href="../cathen/01233a.htm">Ahriman (Angra Mainyu)</a>. Each was independent of the other; but eventually the good were to be victorious with <a href="../cathen/01233a.htm">Ormuzd</a>, and <a href="../cathen/01233a.htm">Ahriman</a> and his evil followers were to be expelled from the world. This mythological <a href="../cathen/05169a.htm">dualism</a> passed to the <a href="../cathen/09591a.htm">sect of the Manichees</a>, whose founder, Manes, added a third, but subordinate principle, emanating from the source of good (and perhaps corresponding, in some degree, to the <a href="../cathen/10402a.htm">Mithras</a> of <a href="../cathen/02151b.htm">Zoroastrianism</a>), in the "living spirit", by whom was formed the present material world of mingled <a href="../cathen/06636b.htm">good</a> and evil. Manes held that matter was essentially evil, and therefore could not be in direct contact with <a href="../cathen/06608a.htm">God</a>. He probably derived the notion from the <a href="../cathen/06592a.htm">Gnostic sects</a>, which, though they differed on many points from one another, were generally agreed in following the opinion of <a href="../cathen/12023a.htm">Philo</a>, and the <a href="../cathen/10742b.htm">neo-Platonist</a> Plotinus, as the evil of matter. They held the world to have been formed by an emanation, the <a href="../cathen/04707b.htm">Demiurge</a>, as a kind of intermediary between <a href="../cathen/06608a.htm">God</a> and impure matter. <a href="../cathen/02293a.htm">Bardesanes</a>, however, and his followers regarded evil as resulting from the misuse of created <a href="../cathen/06259a.htm">free will.</a></p> <p>The notion that evil is necessarily inherent in matter, independent of the Divine author of good, and in some sense opposed to Him, is common to the above <a href="../cathen/14626a.htm">theosophical</a> systems, to many of the purely rational conceptions of Greek philosophy, and to much that has been advanced on this subject in later times, In the Pythagorean <a href="../cathen/07630a.htm">idea</a> of a numerical harmony as the constitutive principle of the world, good is represented by unity and evil by multiplicity (Philolaus, Fragm.) Heraclitus set the "strife", which he held to be the essential condition of life, over against the action deity. "God is the author of all that is right and good and just; but men have sometimes chosen good and sometimes evil" (Fragm. 61). Empedocles, again, attributed evil to the principle of hate <em>(neîkos),</em> inherent together with its opposite, <a href="../cathen/09397a.htm">love</a> <em>(phília),</em> in the <a href="../cathen/15183a.htm">universe</a>. <a href="../cathen/12159a.htm">Plato</a> held <a href="../cathen/06608a.htm">God</a> to be "free from blame" <em>(anaítios)</em> for the evil of the world; its cause was partly the <a href="../cathen/10733a.htm">necessary</a> imperfection of material and created existence, and partly the action of the human will (Timeaus, xlii; cf. Phaedo. lx). With <a href="../cathen/01713a.htm">Aristotle</a>, evil is a <a href="../cathen/10733a.htm">necessary</a> aspect of the constant changes of matter, and has in itself no real existence (Metaph., ix, 9). The <a href="../cathen/14299a.htm">Stoics</a> conceived evil in a somewhat similar manner, as due to necessity; the immanent Divine power harmonizes the evil and good in a changing world. Moral evil proceeds from the folly of <a href="../cathen/09580c.htm">mankind</a>, not from the Divine will, and is overruled by it to a good end. In the <a href="../cathen/07595a.htm">hymn</a> of Cleanthes to Zeus (Ston. Ecl., 1, p. 30) may be perceived an approach to the <a href="../cathen/05075b.htm">doctrine</a> of Leibniz, as to the nature of evil and the <a href="../cathen/06636b.htm">goodness</a> of the world. "Nothing is done without thee in earth or sea or sky, save what evil men commit by their own folly; so thou hast fitted together all evil and good in one, that there might be one reasonable and everlasting scheme of all things." In the mystical system of <a href="../cathen/05274a.htm">Eckhart</a> (d. 1329), evil, <a href="../cathen/14004b.htm">sin</a> included, has its place in the evolutionary scheme by which all proceeds from and returns to <a href="../cathen/06608a.htm">God</a>, and contributes, both in the moral order and in the physical, to the accomplishment of the Divine purpose. <a href="../cathen/05274a.htm">Eckhart's</a> <a href="../cathen/10483a.htm">monistic</a> or <a href="../cathen/11447b.htm">pantheistic</a> tendencies seem to have obscured for him many of the difficulties of the subject, as has been the case with those by whom the same tendencies have since been carried to an extreme conclusion.</p> <div class="CMtag_300x250" style="display: flex; height: 300px; align-items: center; justify-content: center; "></div> <p><a href="../cathen/03712a.htm">Christian</a> philosophy has, like the Hebrew, uniformly attributed moral and physical evil to the action of created <a href="../cathen/06259a.htm">free will</a>. Man has himself brought about the evil from which he suffers by transgressing the <a href="../cathen/09071a.htm">law of God</a>, on obedience to which his <a href="../cathen/07131b.htm">happiness</a> depended. Evil is in created things under the aspect of mutability, and possibility of defect, not as existing <em>per se</em> : and the <a href="../cathen/05525a.htm">errors</a> of <a href="../cathen/09580c.htm">mankind</a>, mistaking the <a href="../cathen/15073a.htm">true</a> conditions of its own well-being, have been the cause of moral and physical evil (<a href="../cathen/05013a.htm">Dionysius the Pseudo-Areopagite</a>, De Div. Nom., iv, 31; <a href="../cathen/02084a.htm">St. Augustine</a>, <a href="../fathers/120112.htm"><em>City of God</em> XII</a>). The evil from which man suffers is, however, the condition of good, for the sake of which it is permitted. Thus, "God judged it better to bring good out of evil than to suffer no evil to exist" (St. Aug., Enchirid., xxvii). Evil contributes to the perfection of the <a href="../cathen/15183a.htm">universe</a>, as shadows to the perfection of a picture, or harmony to that of music (<a href="../fathers/120111.htm"><em>City of God</em> 11</a>). Again, the excellence of <a href="../cathen/06608a.htm">God's</a> works in nature is insisted on as evidence of the Divine wisdom, power, and <a href="../cathen/06636b.htm">goodness</a>, by which no evil can be directly caused. (Greg. Nyss., De. opif. hom.) Thus <a href="../cathen/02610b.htm">Boethius</a> asks (De Consol. Phil., I, iv) Who can be the author of good, if <a href="../cathen/06608a.htm">God</a> is the author of evil? As darkness is nothing but the absence of light, and is not produced by creation, so evil is merely the defect of <a href="../cathen/06636b.htm">goodness</a>. (St. Aug., In Gen. as lit.) <a href="../cathen/02330b.htm">St. Basil</a> (Hexaem., Hom. ii) points out the <a href="../cathen/05295b.htm">educative</a> purposes served by evil; and <a href="../cathen/02084a.htm">St. Augustine</a>, holding evil to be permitted for the punishment of the wicked and the trial of the good, shows that it has, under this aspect, the nature of good, and is pleasing to <a href="../cathen/06608a.htm">God</a>, not because of what it is, but because of where it is; i.e. as the penal and just consequence of <a href="../cathen/14004b.htm">sin</a> (<a href="../fathers/120111.htm"><em>City of God</em> XI.12</a>, De Vera Relig. xliv). Lactantius uses similar arguments to oppose the dilemma, as to the <a href="../cathen/11251c.htm">omnipotence</a> and <a href="../cathen/06636b.htm">goodness</a> of <a href="../cathen/06608a.htm">God</a>, which he puts into the mouth of <a href="../cathen/05500b.htm">Epicurus</a> (De Ira Dei, xiii). <a href="../cathen/01546a.htm">St. Anselm</a> (Monologium) connects evil with the partial manifestation of good by creation; its fullness being in <a href="../cathen/06608a.htm">God</a> alone.</p> <p>The features which stand out in the earlier <a href="../cathen/03712a.htm">Christian</a> explanation of evil, as compared with non-Christian <a href="../cathen/05169a.htm">dualistic</a> theories are thus</p> <div class="bulletlist"><ul><li>the definite attribution to <a href="../cathen/06608a.htm">God</a> of absolute <a href="../cathen/11251c.htm">omnipotence</a> and <a href="../cathen/06636b.htm">goodness</a>, notwithstanding His permission of the existence of evil;</li><li>the assignment of a moral and retributive cause for suffering in the <a href="../cathen/14004b.htm">sin</a> of <a href="../cathen/09580c.htm">mankind</a>; and</li><li>the unhesitating assertion of the beneficence of <a href="../cathen/06608a.htm">God's</a> purpose in permitting evil, together with the full admission that He could, had He so chosen, have prevented it (<a href="../fathers/120114.htm"><em>City of God</em> XIV</a>).</li></ul></div> <p>How <a href="../cathen/06608a.htm">God's</a> permission of the evil which He foreknew and could have prevented is to be reconciled with His <a href="../cathen/06636b.htm">goodness</a>, is not fully considered; <a href="../cathen/02084a.htm">St. Augustine</a> states the question in forcible terms, but is content by way of answer to follow <a href="../cathen/11567b.htm">St. Paul</a>, in his reference to the unsearchableness of the Divine judgments (Contra Julianum, I, 48).</p> <p>The same general lines have been followed by most of the modern attempts to account in terms of Theism for the existence of evil. <a href="../cathen/04744b.htm">Descartes</a> and <a href="../cathen/09568a.htm">Malebranche</a> held that the world is the best possible for the purpose for which it was created, i.e. for the manifestation of the <a href="../cathen/06612a.htm">attributes of God</a>. If it had been less fitted as a whole for the attainment of this object. The relation of evil to the will of a perfectly benevolent Creator was elaborately treated by Leibniz, in answer to Bayle, who had insisted on the arguments derived from the existence of evil against that of a good and <a href="../cathen/11251c.htm">omnipotent</a> <a href="../cathen/06608a.htm">God</a>. <a href="../cathen/09134b.htm">Leibniz</a> founded his views mainly on those of <a href="../cathen/02084a.htm">St. Augustine</a> and from <a href="../cathen/14663b.htm">St. Thomas</a>, and <a href="../cathen/04674a.htm">deduced</a> from them his theory of Optimism. According to it, the inverse is the best possible; but metaphysical evil, or perfection, is necessarily involved in the constitution, since it must be finite, and could not have been endowed with the <a href="../cathen/08004a.htm">infinite</a> perfection which belongs to <a href="../cathen/06608a.htm">God</a> alone. Moral and physical evil are due to the fall of man, but all evil is overruled by <a href="../cathen/06608a.htm">God</a> to a good purpose. Moreover, the world with which we are acquainted is only a very small factor in the whole of creation, and it may be supposed that the evil it contains is <a href="../cathen/10733a.htm">necessary</a> for the existence of other regions that are unknown to us. Voltaire in "Candide", undertook to throw ridicule at the <a href="../cathen/07630a.htm">idea</a> of "best possible world"; and it must be admitted that the theory is open to grave objections. On the one hand, it is scarcely consistent with the <a href="../cathen/02408b.htm">belief</a> in the Divine <a href="../cathen/11251c.htm">omnipotence</a>; and on the other, it fails to account for the permission (or indirect authorship) of evil by a good <a href="../cathen/06608a.htm">God</a>, to which Bayle had specially taken exception. We can not <a href="../cathen/08673a.htm">know</a> that this world is the best possible; and if it were, why, since it must include so much that is evil, should a perfectly good <a href="../cathen/06608a.htm">God</a> have created it? It may be urged, moreover, that there can be no degree of finite <a href="../cathen/06636b.htm">goodness</a> which is not susceptible of increase by <a href="../cathen/11251c.htm">omnipotence</a>, without ceasing to fall short of <a href="../cathen/08004a.htm">infinite</a> perfection.</p> <p>Leibniz has been more or less closely followed by many who have since treated the subject from the <a href="../cathen/03712a.htm">Christian</a> point of view. These have, for the most part, emphasized the evidence in creation of the wisdom and <a href="../cathen/06636b.htm">goodness</a> of its Author, after the manner of the Book of Job, and have been content to leave undiscovered the reason for the creation, by Him, of a <a href="../cathen/15183a.htm">universe</a> in which evil is unavoidable. Such was the view of King (Essay on the Origin of Evil, London, 1732), who insisted strongly on the <a href="../cathen/05075b.htm">doctrine</a> of the best possible world; of Cudworth, who held that evil, though inseparable from the nature of imperfect beings, is largely a matter of men's own fancy and opinions, rather than the reality of things, and therefore not to be made the ground of accusations against <a href="../cathen/12510a.htm">Divine Providence</a>. Derham (Physico-Theology, London, 1712) took occasion from an examination of the excellence of creation to commend an attitude of <a href="../cathen/07543b.htm">humility</a> and trust towards the creator of "this elegant, this well contrived, well formed world, in which we find everything <a href="../cathen/10733a.htm">necessary</a> for the sustenation, use and pleasure both of man and every other creature here below; as well as some whips, some rods, to scourge us for our <a href="../cathen/14004b.htm">sins</a>". Priestly held a <a href="../cathen/05075b.htm">doctrine</a> of absolute determinism, and consequently attributed evil solely to the divine will; which, however, he justified by the good ends which evil is providentially made to subserve (Doctrine of Philosophical Necessity, Birmingham, 1782). Clarke, again, called special attention to the evidence of method of design, which bear witness to the benevolence of the Creator, in the midst of apparent moral and physical disorder. <a href="../cathen/13194b.htm">Rosmini</a>, closely following <a href="../cathen/09568a.htm">Malebranche</a>, pointed out that the question of the possibility of a better world than this has really no meaning; any world created by <a href="../cathen/06608a.htm">God</a> must be the best possible in relation to its special purpose, apart from which neither <a href="../cathen/06636b.htm">goodness</a> or badness can be predicated of it. Mamiani also supposed that evil be inseparable from the finite, but it tended to disappear as the finite approached its final union with the <a href="../cathen/08004a.htm">infinite</a>.</p> <p>III. The third way of conceiving the place of evil in the general scheme of existence is that of those systems of Monism, by which evil is merely viewed as a mode in which certain aspects of moments of the development of nature are apprehended by human consciousness. In this view there is no distinctive principle to which evil can be assigned, and its origin is one with that of nature as a whole. These systems reject the specific <a href="../cathen/07630a.htm">idea</a> of creation; and the <a href="../cathen/07630a.htm">idea</a> of <a href="../cathen/06608a.htm">God</a> is either rigorously excluded, or identified with an impersonal principle, immanent in the <a href="../cathen/15183a.htm">universe</a>, or conceived as a mere abstraction from the methods of nature; which, whether viewed from the standpoint of materialism or that of <a href="../cathen/07634a.htm">idealism</a>, is the one ultimate reality. The problem of the origin of evil is thus merged in that of the origin of being. Moral evil, in particular, arises from <a href="../cathen/05525a.htm">error</a>, and is to be gradually eliminated, or at least minimized, by improved <a href="../cathen/08673a.htm">knowledge</a> of the conditions of human welfare (Meliorism). Of this kind, of the whole, were the doctrines of the <a href="../cathen/07594a.htm">Ionic Hylozoists</a>, whose fundamental notion was the essential unity of matter and life; and on the other hand, also, that of the <a href="../cathen/15756b.htm">Eleatics</a>, who founded the origin of all things in abstract being. The <a href="../cathen/02053a.htm">Atomists</a> Leucippus and Democritus, held what may be called a <a href="../cathen/05075b.htm">doctrine</a> of materialistic Monism. This <a href="../cathen/05075b.htm">doctrine</a>, however, found its first complete expression in the philosophy of <a href="../cathen/05500b.htm">Epicurus</a>, which explicitly rejected the notion of any external influence on nature, whether of "fate", or of Divine power. According to the Epicurean Lucretius (De Rerum Natura, II, line 180) the existence of evil was fatal to the supposition of the creation of the world by <a href="../cathen/06608a.htm">God</a>:</p> <blockquote><p>Nequaquam nobis divinitus esse creatum <br>Naturam mundi, quæ tanta est prædita culpa. </p></blockquote> <p><a href="../cathen/03016a.htm">Giordano Bruno</a> made <a href="../cathen/06608a.htm">God</a> the immanent cause of all things, acting by an internal necessity, and producing the relations considered evil by <a href="../cathen/09580c.htm">mankind</a>. Hobbes regarded <a href="../cathen/06608a.htm">God</a> as merely a corporeal first cause; and applying his theory of civil government to the <a href="../cathen/15183a.htm">universe</a>, defended the existence of evil by simple assertion of the absolute power to which it is due--a theory which is little else other than a statement of materialistic <a href="../cathen/04756c.htm">Determinism</a> in terms of social relations. <a href="../cathen/14217a.htm">Spinoza</a> united spirit and matter in the notion of a single substance, to which he attributed both thought and extension; <a href="../cathen/05525a.htm">error</a> and perfection were the <a href="../cathen/10733a.htm">necessary</a> consequence of the order of the <a href="../cathen/15183a.htm">universe</a>. The <a href="../cathen/07192a.htm">Hegelian</a> Monism, which reproduces many of the <a href="../cathen/07630a.htm">ideas</a> of <a href="../cathen/05274a.htm">Eckhart</a>, and is adopted in its main features by many different systems of recent origin, gives to evil a place in the unfolding of the Idea, in which both the origin and inner reality of the <a href="../cathen/15183a.htm">universe</a> are to be found. Evil is the temporary discord between what is and what ought to be. Huxley was content to believe the ultimate causes of things are at present unknown, and may be unknowable. Evil is to be known and combated in the concrete and in detail; but the <a href="../cathen/01215c.htm">Agnosticism</a> professed, and named, by Huxley refuses to entertain any question as to <a href="../cathen/15017a.htm">transcendental</a> causes, and confines itself to experimental facts. Haeckel advances a dogmatic materialism, in which substance (i.e. matter and force) appears as the eternal and <a href="../cathen/08004a.htm">infinite</a> basis of all things. Professor Metchnikoff, on similar principles, places the cause of evil in "disharmonies" which prevail in nature, and which he thinks may perhaps be ultimately removed, for the <a href="../cathen/09580c.htm">human race</a> at least, together with pessimistic temper arising from them, by the progress of <a href="../cathen/13598b.htm">science</a>. Bourdeau has asserted in express terms the futility of seeking a <a href="../cathen/15017a.htm">transcendental</a> or <a href="../cathen/14336b.htm">supernatural</a> origin for evil and the necessity of confining the view to natural accessible, and determinable causes (Revue Philosophique, I, 1900).</p> <p>The recently constructed system, or method, called Pragmatism, has this much in common with Pessimism, that it regards evil as an actually unavoidable part of that human experience which is in point of fact identical with <a href="../cathen/15073a.htm">truth</a> and reality. The world is what we make it; evil tends to diminish with the growth of experience, and may finally vanish; though on the other hand, there may always remain the irreducible minimum of evil. The origin of evil is, like the origin of all things, inexplicable; it cannot be fitted into any theory of the design of the <a href="../cathen/15183a.htm">universe</a>, simply because no such theory is possible. "We cannot by any possibility comprehend the character of the cosmic mind whose purpose are fully revealed by the strange mixture of <a href="../cathen/06636b.htm">good</a> and evil that we find in this actual worlds particulars--the mere word <em>design</em>, by itself has no consequences and explains nothing." (James, Pragmatism, London, 1907. Cf. Schiller, <a href="../cathen/07538b.htm">Humanism</a>, <a href="../cathen/09341a.htm">London</a> 1907.) Nietzsche holds evil to be purely relative, and its moral aspects at least, a transitory and non-fundamental concept. With him, <a href="../cathen/09580c.htm">mankind</a> in the present state, is "the animal not yet properly adapted to his environment". In this mode of thought the individual necessarily counts for very little, as being merely a transient manifestation of the cosmic force; and the social aspects of humanity are those under which its pains and shortcomings are mostly considered, with a view to their amelioration. Hence, the various forms of Socialism: the <a href="../cathen/07630a.htm">idea</a> conceived by Nietzsche of a totally new, though as yet undefined, form of social morality, and of the constitution and mutual relations of classes; and the so called <a href="../cathen/05556a.htm">ethical</a> and scientific <a href="../cathen/12738a.htm">religions</a> inculcating morality as tending to be generally good. The first example of such religion was that of Auguste Comte, who upon the materialistic basis of Positivism, founded the "religion of <a href="../cathen/09580c.htm">humanity</a>", and professed to substitute an enthusiasm for humanity as the motive for right action, for the motives of <a href="../cathen/14336b.htm">supernatural</a> religion.</p> <p>In the light of <a href="../cathen/05075b.htm">Catholic doctrine</a>, any theory that may be held concerning evil must include certain points bearing on the question that have been authoritatively defined. These points are</p> <div class="bulletlist"><ul><li>the <a href="../cathen/11251c.htm">omnipotence</a>, omniscience, and absolute <a href="../cathen/06636b.htm">goodness</a> of the Creator;</li><li>the freedom of the will; and</li><li>that suffering is the penal consequence of wilful disobedience to the <a href="../cathen/09071a.htm">law of God</a>.</li></ul></div> <p>A complete account may be gathered from the teaching of <a href="../cathen/14663b.htm">St. Thomas Aquinas</a>, by whom the principles of <a href="../cathen/02084a.htm">St. Augustine</a> are systematized, and to some extent supplemented. Evil, according to <a href="../cathen/14663b.htm">St. Thomas</a>, is a privation, or the absence of some good which belongs properly to the nature of the creature. (I,Q. xiv, a. 10; Q. xlix, a. 3; Contra Gentiles, III, ix, x). There is therefore no "summum malum", or positive source of evil, corresponding to the "summum bonum", which is <a href="../cathen/06608a.htm">God</a> (I, Q. xlix, a. 3; C. G., III, 15; De Malo, I, 1); evil being not "ens reale" but only "ens rationis"--i.e. it exists not as an objective fact, but as a subjective conception; things are evil not in themselves, but by reason of their relation to other things, or <a href="../cathen/11726a.htm">persons</a>. All realities <em>(entia)</em> are in themselves good; they produce bad results only incidentally; and consequently the ultimate cause of evil is fundamentally good, as well as the objects in which evil is found (I, Q. xlix; cf. I, Q. v, 3; De Malo, I, 3). Thus the <a href="../cathen/09591a.htm">Manichaean</a> <a href="../cathen/05169a.htm">dualism</a> has no foundation in reason.</p> <p>Evil is threefold, viz., <em>"malum naturæ"</em> (metaphysical evil), "<em>culpæ"</em> (moral), and "<em>paenæ</em>" (physical, the retributive consequence of "<em>malum culpæ</em>") (I, Q. xlviii, a. 5, 6; Q. lxiii, a. 9; De Malo, I, 4). Its existence subserves the perfection of the whole; the <a href="../cathen/15183a.htm">universe</a> would be less perfect if it contained no evil. Thus fire could not exist without the corruption of what it consumes; the lion must slay the ass in order to live, and if there were no wrong doing, there would be no sphere for patience and <a href="../cathen/08571c.htm">justice</a> (I, Q. xlviii, a. 2). <a href="../cathen/06608a.htm">God</a> is said (as in <a href="../bible/isa045.htm">Isaiah 45</a>) to be the author of evil in the sense that the corruption of material objects in nature is <a href="../cathen/11279a.htm">ordained</a> by Him, as a means for carrying out the design of the <a href="../cathen/15183a.htm">universe</a>; and on the other hand, the evil which exists as a consequence of the breach of Divine <a href="../cathen/09053a.htm">laws</a> is in the same sense due to Divine appointment; the <a href="../cathen/15183a.htm">universe</a> would be less perfect if its <a href="../cathen/09053a.htm">laws</a> could be broken with impunity. Thus evil, in one aspect, i.e. as counter-balancing the deordination of <a href="../cathen/14004b.htm">sin</a>, has the nature of good (II, Q. ii, a. 19). But the evil of <a href="../cathen/14004b.htm">sin</a> <em>(culpæ),</em> though permitted by <a href="../cathen/06608a.htm">God</a>, is in no sense due to him (I, Q. xlix, a. 2).; its cause is the abuse of <a href="../cathen/06259a.htm">free will</a> by <a href="../cathen/01476d.htm">angels</a> and men (I-II, Q. lxxiii, a. 6; II-II, Q. x, a. 2; I-II, Q. ix, a. 3). It should be observed that the universal perfection to which evil in some form is <a href="../cathen/10733a.htm">necessary</a>, is the perfection of <em>this</em> <a href="../cathen/15183a.htm">universe</a>, not of <em>any</em> <a href="../cathen/15183a.htm">universe</a>: metaphysical evil, that is to say, and indirectly, moral evil as well, is included in the design of the <a href="../cathen/15183a.htm">universe</a> which is partially known to us; but we cannot say without denying the Divine <a href="../cathen/11251c.htm">omnipotence</a>, that another equally perfect <a href="../cathen/15183a.htm">universe</a> could not be created in which evil would have no place.</p> <div class="CMtag_300x250" style="display: flex; height: 300px; align-items: center; justify-content: center; "></div> <p><a href="../cathen/14663b.htm">St. Thomas</a> also provides explanations of what are now generally considered to be the two main difficulties of the subject, viz., the Divine permission of foreseen moral evil, and the question finally arriving thence, why <a href="../cathen/06608a.htm">God</a> chose to create anything at all. First, it is asked why <a href="../cathen/06608a.htm">God</a>, foreseeing that his creatures would use the gift of <a href="../cathen/06259a.htm">free will</a> for their own injury, did not either abstain from creating them, or in some way safeguard their <a href="../cathen/06259a.htm">free will</a> from misuse, or else deny them the gift altogether? St. Thomas replies (C. G., II, xxviii) that <a href="../cathen/06608a.htm">God</a> cannot change His mind, since the Divine will is free from the defect of weakness or mutability. Such mutability would, it should be remarked, be a defect in the Divine nature (and therefore impossible), because if <a href="../cathen/06608a.htm">God's</a> purpose were made dependent on the foreseen <a href="../cathen/06259a.htm">free</a> <a href="../cathen/01115a.htm">act</a> of any creature, <a href="../cathen/06608a.htm">God</a> would thereby sacrifice His own freedom, and would submit Himself to His creatures, thus abdicating His essential supremacy--a thing which is, of course, utterly inconceivable. Secondly, to the question why <a href="../cathen/06608a.htm">God</a> should have chosen to create, when creation was in no way needful for His own perfection, St. Thomas answers that <a href="../cathen/06608a.htm">God's</a> object in creating is Himself; He creates in order to manifest his own <a href="../cathen/06636b.htm">goodness</a>, power, and wisdom, and is pleased with that reflection or similitude of Himself in which the <a href="../cathen/06636b.htm">goodness</a> of creation consists. <a href="../cathen/06608a.htm">God's</a> pleasure is the one supremely perfect motive for action, alike in <a href="../cathen/06608a.htm">God</a> Himself and in His creatures; not because of any need, or inherent necessity, in the Divine nature (C. G., I, xxviii; II, xxiii), but because <a href="../cathen/06608a.htm">God</a> is the source, centre, and object, of all existence. (I, Q. 65:a. 2; cf. <a href="../bible/pro026.htm">Proverbs 26</a> and Conc. Vat., can. 1:v; Const. Dogm., 1.) This is accordingly the sufficient reason for the existence of the <a href="../cathen/15183a.htm">universe</a>, and even for the suffering which moral evil has introduced into it. <a href="../cathen/06608a.htm">God</a> has not made the world primarily for man's good, but for His own pleasure; good for man lies in conforming himself to the supreme purpose of creation, and evil in departing from it (C.G., III, xvii, cxliv). It may further be understood from St. Thomas, that in the diversity of metaphysical evil, in which the perfection of the <a href="../cathen/15183a.htm">universe</a> as a whole is embodied, <a href="../cathen/06608a.htm">God</a> may see a certain similitude of His own threefold unity (cf. I, Q. xii); and again, that by permitting moral evil to exist He has provided a sphere for the manifestation of one aspect of His essential <a href="../cathen/08571c.htm">justice</a> (cf. I, Q. lxv, a. 2; and I, Q. xxi, a. 1, 3).</p> <p>It is obviously impossible to suggest a reason why this <a href="../cathen/15183a.htm">universe</a> in particular should have been created rather than another; since we are necessarily incapable of forming an <a href="../cathen/07630a.htm">idea</a> of any other <a href="../cathen/15183a.htm">universe</a> than this. Similarly, we are unable to imagine why <a href="../cathen/06608a.htm">God</a> chose to manifest Himself by the way of creation, instead of, or in addition to, the other ways, whatever they may be, by which He has, or may have, attained the same end. We reach here the utmost limit of speculation; and our inability to conceive the ultimate reason for creation (as distinct from its direct motive) is paralleled, at a much earlier stage of the enquire, by the inability of the non-creationist <a href="../cathen/13554b.htm">schools</a> of thought to assign any ultimate cause for the existence of the order of nature. It will be observed that <a href="../cathen/14663b.htm">St. Thomas's</a> account of evil is a <a href="../cathen/15073a.htm">true</a> <a href="../cathen/14569a.htm">Theodicy</a>, taking into consideration as it does every factor of the problem, and leaving unsolved only the mystery of creation, before which all <a href="../cathen/13554b.htm">schools</a> of thought are equally helpless. It is as impossible to <a href="../cathen/08673a.htm">know</a>, in the fullest sense, <em>why</em> this world was made as to <a href="../cathen/08673a.htm">know</a> <em>how</em> it was made; but <a href="../cathen/14663b.htm">St. Thomas</a> has at least shown that the acts of the Creator admit of complete <a href="../cathen/09324a.htm">logical</a> justification, notwithstanding the mystery in which, for human intelligence, they can never wholly cease to be involved. On <a href="../cathen/03449a.htm">Catholic</a> principles, the amelioration of moral evil and its consequent suffering can only take place by means of individual reformation, and not so much through increase of <a href="../cathen/08673a.htm">knowledge</a> as through stimulation or re-direction of the will. But since all methods of social improvement that have any value must necessarily represent a nearer approach to conformity with Divine <a href="../cathen/09053a.htm">laws</a> they are welcomed and furthered by the <a href="../cathen/03744a.htm">Church</a>, as tending, at least indirectly, to accomplish the purpose for which she exists.</p> <div class='catholicadnet-728x90' id='cathen-728x90-bottom' style='display: flex; height: 100px; align-items: center; justify-content: center; '></div> <div class="pub"><h2>About this page</h2><p id="apa"><strong>APA citation.</strong> <span id="apaauthor">Sharpe, A.</span> <span id="apayear">(1909).</span> <span id="apaarticle">Evil.</span> In <span id="apawork">The Catholic Encyclopedia.</span> <span id="apapublisher">New York: Robert Appleton Company.</span> <span id="apaurl">http://www.newadvent.org/cathen/05649a.htm</span></p><p id="mla"><strong>MLA citation.</strong> <span id="mlaauthor">Sharpe, Alfred.</span> <span id="mlaarticle">"Evil."</span> <span id="mlawork">The Catholic Encyclopedia.</span> <span id="mlavolume">Vol. 5.</span> <span id="mlapublisher">New York: Robert Appleton Company,</span> <span id="mlayear">1909.</span> <span id="mlaurl"><http://www.newadvent.org/cathen/05649a.htm>.</span></p><p id="transcription"><strong>Transcription.</strong> <span id="transcriber">This article was transcribed for New Advent by Patricia Massia-Kellog, H. Jason Krim, Jes Bahn, and Yaqoob Mohyuddin.</span> <span id="dedication"></span></p><p id="approbation"><strong>Ecclesiastical approbation.</strong> <span id="nihil"><em>Nihil Obstat.</em> May 1, 1909. Remy Lafort, Censor.</span> <span id="imprimatur"><em>Imprimatur.</em> +John M. Farley, Archbishop of New York.</span></p><p id="contactus"><strong>Contact information.</strong> The editor of New Advent is Kevin Knight. My email address is webmaster <em>at</em> newadvent.org. Regrettably, I can't reply to every letter, but I greatly appreciate your feedback — especially notifications about typographical errors and inappropriate ads.</p></div> </div> <div id="ogdenville"><table summary="Bottom bar" width="100%" cellpadding=0 cellspacing=0><tr><td class="bar_white_on_color"><center><strong>Copyright © 2023 by <a href="../utility/contactus.htm">New Advent LLC</a>. Dedicated to the Immaculate Heart of Mary.</strong></center></td></tr></table><p align="center"><a href="../utility/contactus.htm">CONTACT US</a> | <a href="https://cleanmedia.net/p/?psid=491-308-20180429T2217479770">ADVERTISE WITH NEW ADVENT</a></p></div> <ins class="CANBMDDisplayAD" data-bmd-ad-unit="30849120210203T1734389107AB67D35C03D4A318731A4F337F60B3E" style="display:block"></ins> <script src="https://secureaddisplay.com/au/bmd/"></script>  <ins class="CMAdExcludeArticles"></ins> </body> </html>