nts change; and I
think one ought still to abide by this ancient doctrine, for the arguments
I remember having read do not prove the contrary, and prove more than is
needed.

394. 'One of the absurdities', says M. Bayle (p. 779), 'that arise from the
so-called distinction which is alleged to exist between substances and
their accidents is that creatures, if they produce the accidents, would
possess a power of creation and annihilation. Accordingly one could not
perform the slightest action without creating an innumerable number of real
beings, and without reducing to nothingness an endless multitude of them.
Merely by moving the tongue to cry out or to eat, one creates as many
accidents as there are movements of the parts of the tongue, and one
destroys as many accidents as there are parts of that which one eats, which
lose their form, which become chyle, blood, etc.' This argument is only a
kind of bugbear. What harm would be done, supposing that an infinity of
movements, an infinity of figures spring up and disappear at every moment
in the universe, and even in each part of the universe? It can be
demonstrated, moreover, that that must be so.

395. As for the so-called creation of the accidents, who does not see that
one needs no creative power in order to change place or shape, to form a
square or a column, or some other parade-ground figure, by the movement of
the soldiers who are drilling; or again to fashion a statue by removing a
few pieces from a block of marble; or to make some figure in relief, by
changing, decreasing or increasing a piece of wax? The production of
modifications has never been called _creation_, and it is an abuse of terms
to scare the world thus. God produces substances from nothing, and the
substances produce accidents by the changes of their limits.

396. As for the souls or substantial forms, M. Bayle is right in adding:
'that there is nothing more inconvenient for those who admit substantial
forms than the objection which is made that they could not be produced save
by an actual creation, and that the Schoolmen are pitiable in their
endeavours to answer this.' But there is nothing more convenient for me and
for my system than this same objection. For I maintain that all the Souls,
Entelechies or primitive forces, substantial forms, simple substances, or
Monads, whatever name one may apply to them, can neither spring up [361]
naturally nor perish. And the qualities or derivative forces