416 PRINCIPLES OF NATURE AND GRACE 



9. This primary simple substance must include emi- 

 nently 41 the perfections contained in the derivative sub- 

 stances which are its effects. Thus it will have power, 

 knowledge and will in perfection, that is to say, it will 

 have supreme [souveraine] omnipotence, omniscience and 

 goodness. And as justice, taken very 42 generally, is 

 nothing but goodness in conformity with wisdom, there 

 must also be in God supreme justice^ 3 . The reason 

 which has led to the existence of things through Him 

 makes them also depend upon Him for their continued 

 existence and working ; and they continually receive 

 from Him that which makes them have any perfection ; 

 but any imperfection that remains in them comes from 

 the essential and original limitation of the created 

 thing 44 . 



41 i. e. in a higher degree. See Monadology, note 61. 



42 E. omits fort [very]. 



* 3 * There is a great difference between the way in which men 

 are just and the way in which God is just ; but it is merely 

 a difference in degree. For God is perfectly and entirely just, and 

 the justice of men is mingled with injustice, faults, and sins 

 because of the imperfection of human nature. The perfections of 

 Gcd are infinite and ours are limited. . . . Justice is nothing but 

 that which is in conformity with wisdom and goodness taken 

 together ; the end of goodness is the greatest good, but in order to 

 recognize this there is need of wisdom, which is nothing but the 

 knowledge of the good. In the same way, goodness is nothing but 

 the inclination to do good to all and to prevent evil, unless it be 

 necessary in order to secure a greater good or to prevent a greater 

 evil. Thus wisdom is in the understanding and goodness in the 

 will. And consequently justice is in both. Power is another 

 thing ; b\it if it comes into play, it makes the right become 

 actual and causes what ought to be really to exist, so far as the 

 nature of things allows. This is what God does in the world.' 

 Meditation sur la notion commune de la justice (Mollat, pp. 60, 62 \ 

 Cf. On the Notions of Right and Justice (1693), p. 283. 



** Cf. Monadology, 42. This is a brief statement of the main 

 contention of the Theodicee, in so far as it endeavours to vindicate 

 the goodness of God in face of the evil in the world. God is the 

 source of the perfections of each Monad, because it is through His 

 choice of the best of all possible worlds that each Monad actually 

 exists and continues in existence. But every Monad has some 



