11. Would you venture to say
that, in this universe, this thing or the other thing is an evil, whose
origin and cause you are unable to explain and to analyze?32593259 And
because it interferes with your lawful, perhaps even your unlawful
pleasures, would you say that it is pernicious and adverse? What,
then, because cold is disagreeable to your members, and is wont to
chill32603260 the warmth of
your blood, ought not winter on that account to exist in the
world? And because you are unable32613261 to endure the hottest rays of the sun,
is summer to be removed from the year, and a different course of nature
to be instituted under different laws? Hellebore is poison to
men; should it therefore not grow? The wolf lies in wait by the
sheepfolds; is nature at all in fault, because she has produced a beast
most dangerous to sheep? The serpent by his bite takes away life;
a reproach, forsooth, to creation, because it has added to animals
monsters so cruel.