Page:Essays on Catholicism, Liberalism, and Socialism.djvu/123

is a dualism of three parts, constituting an absolute unity; by which we see that it is rather a mathematical than a religious absurdity. The manichean dualism asserts that in God is the principle of evil, and in man that of good; but in man, wherein exists the principle of good, there are two powers: a faculty essentially instinctive, and another faculty essentially logical; by the first he is God, by the second he is man; from which it follows that the two unities are divided into three, and this without their ceasing to be two; because, outside of man and of God, there exists neither substantial evil nor substantial good, no antagonism-there is nothing. We will now see how the two unities, which are three unities, are converted into one without ceasing to be two unities and three unities. Unity is in God; for besides that he is God, through the instinctive faculty, which is also in man, he is man. Unity is also in man, because he is man by his logical faculty, and he is God by his instinctive faculty; and consequently, man is both man and God. It results from all this, that dualism, without ceasing to be dualism, is threefold; that trinity, without ceasing to be threefold, is dualism; and that dualism and trinity, without ceasing to be what they are respectively, are unity; and that unity, which is unity without ceasing to be dualism and trinity, is in two parts.

If the citizen Proudhon were to proclaim that he has a mission, which he does not; and if he were able to prove that his mission is divine, which he cannot; yet his theory, which we have just exposed, ought to be rejected as absurd and impossible. The personal union of evil and good, considered as substantially existing, is impossible and absurd, because it involves an evident