nly used for pleading the cause of a man accused before his
judge. But he has not remembered that in the tribunals of men, which cannot
always penetrate to the truth, one is often compelled to be guided by signs
and probabilities, and above all by presumptions or prejudices; whereas it
is agreed, as we have already observed, that Mysteries are not probable.
For instance, M. Bayle will not have it that one can justify the goodness
of God in the permission of sin, because probability would be against a man
that should happen to be in circumstances comparable in our eyes to [93]
this permission. God foresees that Eve will be deceived by the serpent if
he places her in the circumstances wherein she later found herself; and
nevertheless he placed her there. Now if a father or a guardian did the
same in regard to his child or his ward, if a friend did so in regard to a
young person whose behaviour was his concern, the judge would not be
satisfied by the excuses of an advocate who said that the man only
permitted the evil, without doing it or willing it: he would rather take
this permission as a sign of ill intention, and would regard it as a sin of
omission, which would render the one convicted thereof accessary in
another's sin of commission.

33. But it must be borne in mind that when one has foreseen the evil and
has not prevented it although it seems as if one could have done so with
ease, and one has even done things that have facilitated it, it does not
follow on that account _necessarily_ that one is accessary thereto. It is
only a very strong presumption, such as commonly replaces truth in human
affairs, but which would be destroyed by an exact consideration of the
facts, supposing we were capable of that in relation to God. For amongst
lawyers that is called 'presumption' which must provisionally pass for
truth in case the contrary is not proved; and it says more than
'conjecture', although the _Dictionary_ of the Academy has not sifted the
difference. Now there is every reason to conclude unquestionably that one
would find through this consideration, if only it were attainable, that
reasons most just, and stronger than those which appear contrary to them,
have compelled the All-Wise to permit the evil, and even to do things which
have facilitated it. Of this some instances will be given later.

34. It is none too easy, I confess, for a father, a guardian, a friend to
have such reasons in the case under considerati