Note 1090 — AN ESSAY ON MAN, IN FOUR EPISTLES (continued 3)

The chief problem which Pope undertook to solve was the existence of moral evil. Yet, if man, in obedience to God's commands, became morally perfect, none of the disastrous effects the poet describes would ensue. Angels would not be hurled from their spheres; worlds would not be wrecked; nor would heaven's foundations nod to their centre. Reason and revelation unite in the conclusion that moral perfection would, on the contrary, be an unmitigated blessing. Consequently Pope's hypothesis explains nothing unless he had shown how it is that a system which rendered evil impossible would be inferior to our own.