Chapter 3.—If Evil is Defined as that Which is Hurtful, This Implies Another Refutation
of the Manichæans.
5. Let us then inquire more carefully, and, if possible, more plainly. I ask you again,
What is evil? If you say it is that which is hurtful, here, too, you will not answer amiss. But
consider, I pray you; be on your guard, I beg of you; be so good as to lay aside party spirit,
and make the inquiry for the sake of finding the truth, not of getting the better of it. Whatever
is hurtful takes away some good from that to which it is hurtful; for without the loss of good
there can be no hurt. What, I appeal to you, can be plainer than this? what more intelligible?
What else is required for complete demonstration to one of average understanding, if he is
not perverse? But, if this is granted, the consequence seems plain. In that race which you
take for the chief evil, nothing can be liable to be hurt, since there is no good in it. But if,
as you assert, there are two natures,—the kingdom of light and the kingdom of darkness;
since you make the kingdom of light to be God, attributing to it an uncompounded nature,162
so that it has no part inferior to another, you must grant, however decidedly in opposition
to yourselves, you must grant, nevertheless, that this nature, which you not only do not deny
to be the chief good, but spend all your strength in trying to show that it is so, is immutable,
incorruptible, impenetrable, inviolable, for otherwise it would not be the chief good; for the
chief good is that than which there is nothing better, and for such a nature to be hurt is
impossible. Again, if, as has been shown, to hurt is to deprive of good, there can be no hurt
to the kingdom of darkness, for there is no good in it. And as the kingdom of light cannot
be hurt, as it is inviolable, what can the evil you speak of be hurtful to?
162 [It is probable that Mani thought of the Kingdom of Light pantheistically, and that the principles person-
ified in his mythological system were the result of efforts on his part to connect the infinite with the fi-
nite.—A.H.N.]
If Evil is Defined as that Which is Hurtful, This Implies Another Refutation of the Manichæans.
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If Evil is Defined as that Which is Hurtful, This Implies Another Refutation…