“Not in the case before us,” rejoined Mr. Merton, “because your objection concedes the existence of evil, and only denies it as the work of a particular agent. But let that pass. I can answer the question only in the light of Christian theology. According to that theology, there is no real evil but sin; and sin is always voluntary on the part of the sinner. God chose to create men and angels free moral agents, that they might be capable of virtue, and of meriting the rewards of obedience. He could not so create us without making us capable of abusing our freedom, for obedience is not and cannot be meritorious where there is no power of disobedience, as disobedience is not culpable where there is no power of obedience. Hence the saints in heaven, having no longer the power of disobedience, do not merit by their obedience, and simply enjoy the rewards of their obedience in their state of probation on earth. If any do not obtain the rewards of obedience, the fault is their own, and they have no one to blame but themselves. Their failure is voluntary; they fail only because they choose to fail. “In regard to the Satanic vexations,” continued Mr. Merton, ”we must bear in mind that Satan has no power to harm us—not even a hair of our head—against our free will or deliberate assent. It is always in our power to resist him, and even to turn his machinations and vexations against him, and to make them occasions of merit. ‘Count it all joy, my brethren,’ says the blessed Apostle St. James, ‘when ye fall into divers temptations,’ that is, trials and afflictions. The evil is not in the temptation even to sin, but in the free, voluntary assent; it is not in the vexations and afflictions, obsessions and possessions, but in our voluntary abuse of them, or failure to turn them to a good account. God suffers no one to be tempted or tried or harassed beyond what he can bear. Always is his grace sufficient for all straits. Always stands firm his promise, ‘My grace is sufficient for thee;’ and this sustains and consoles us in the midst of our greatest distress, our severest trials, and our most perfect abandonment. We may always, if we will, come forth from the furnace of affliction purified as gold tried in the fire. It depends on our own free will whether the vexations of Satan shall do us good or harm. If we choose, we can always prevent his wiles from doing us evil, and derive profit from his malice. This is a sufficient answer to the objection drawn from the perfection of God. It is no impeachment of Divine Love to let loose an enemy against us for our good, or to give us an opportunity to acquire merit, any more than it is to Divine Justice to permit an enemy to harass us as a punishment for our sins. Satanic temptations and invasions are sometimes permitted for the one purpose, and sometimes for the other, and in either case are perfectly compatible with the attributes of God.”