"It is clear that Jesus Christ, completing what Moses had begun, wished that the Divinity should be the object not only of our fear and veneration but also of our love and devotion....Love is that mental state which makes us take pleasure in the perfections of the object of our love, and there is not"
"the one kind is of those called the 'Eternal Verities', which are altogether necessary, so that the opposite implies contradiction. Such are the truths whose necessity is logical, metaphysical or geometrical, which one cannot deny without being led into absurdities. There are others which may be cal"
"For what is contrary to reason is contrary to the absolutely certain and inevitable truths; and what is above reason is in opposition only to what one is wont to experience or to understand... A truth is above reason when our mind (or even every created mind) cannot comprehend it. Such is, as it see"
"Now we have no need of revealed faith to know that there is such a sole Principle of all things, entirely good and wise. Reason teaches us this by infallible proofs; and in consequence all the objections taken from the course of things, in which we observe imperfections, are only based on false appe"
巴洛克风格凌乱得每读三分钟就出戏,仍然是古老的伊壁鸠鲁式诘难,Leibniz表述为:“Si Deus est,unde malum?Si non est,unde bonum?(既然有上帝,何以有恶?若无上帝,何以有善?);上帝从无限多个可能的世界中选择了这个最好的世界;对恶的解释诉诸一种“道德的必然性”,认为斯宾诺莎的必然性过于僵化;以充足理由原则来推出上帝的存在。
“上帝创造的世界犹如一朵花之绽放,其一切都在神意中被预定,但这种预定又不是逻辑必然的,因为不同的境况并非自相矛盾的。这种预定也兼容于自由,因为预定的理由'只是推动而不加强迫(incline without necessitate)',为自由留有余地。”