and conscience, free-will and
law, eternally antagonistic. Man is at war with himself: why?

"Man," say the theologians, "transgressed in the beginning; our race
is guilty of an ancient offence. For this transgression humanity has
fallen; error and ignorance have become its sustenance. Read history,
you will find universal proof of this necessity for evil in the
permanent misery of nations. Man suffers and always will suffer; his
disease is hereditary and constitutional. Use palliatives, employ
emollients; there is no remedy."

Nor is this argument peculiar to the theologians; we find it
expressed in equivalent language in the philosophical writings of the
materialists, believers in infinite perfectibility. Destutt de Tracy
teaches formally that poverty, crime, and war are the inevitable
conditions of our social state; necessary evils, against which it would
be folly to revolt. So, call it NECESSITY OF EVIL or ORIGINAL DEPRAVITY,
it is at bottom the same philosophy.

"The first man transgressed." If the votaries of the Bible interpreted
it faithfully, they would say: MAN ORIGINALLY TRANSGRESSED, that is,
made a mistake; for TO TRANSGRESS, TO FAIL, TO MAKE A MISTAKE, all mean
the same thing.

"The consequences of Adam's transgression are inherited by the race;
the first is ignorance." Truly, the race, like the individual, is born
ignorant; but, in regard to a multitude of questions, even in the moral
and political spheres, this ignorance of the race has been dispelled:
who says that it will not depart altogether? Mankind makes continual
progress toward truth, and light ever triumphs over darkness. Our
disease is not, then, absolutely incurable, and the theory of the
theologians is worse than inadequate; it is ridiculous, since it is
reducible to this tautology: "Man errs, because he errs." While the true
statement is this: "Man errs, because he learns."

Now, if man arrives at a knowledge of all that he needs to know, it is
reasonable to believe that, ceasing to err, he will cease to suffer.

But if we question the doctors as to this law, said to be engraved upon
the heart of man, we shall immediately see that they dispute about a
matter of which they know nothing; that, concerning the most important
questions, there are almost as many opinions as authors; that we find
no two agreeing as to the best form of government, the principle of
authority, and the nature of right; that all sail hap-hazard upon a
shoreless