How did saxophones get on that list? Julie Krueger who loves a good jazz sax riff ========Original Message======== Subj: [lit-ideas] Re: The Problem of Evil Date: 3/9/06 11:11:15 P.M. Central Standard Time From: _eyost1132@xxxxxxxxxxxxxx (mailto:eyost1132@xxxxxxxxxxxxx) To: _lit-ideas@xxxxxxxxxxxxxx (mailto:lit-ideas@xxxxxxxxxxxxx) Sent on: A little research gave me this. In _Dialogues Concerning Natural Religion_, David Hume maintains that we cannot say for sure that the world was created by perfect good or by perfect evil. As far as theology goes, he seems to be saying that the Devil, God's Prosecutor in Job, may have had a hand in the design. There may "four" hypotheses be framed concerning the first causes of the universe: that they are endowed with perfect goodness, that they are endowed with perfect malice, that they are opposite and have both goodness and malice, that they have neither goodness nor malice. Mixed phenomena can never prove the two former unmixed principles. And the uniformity and steadiness of general laws seems to oppose the third. The fourth, therefore, seems be far the most probable. (Part XI) The Devil has some obvious contributions, to be sure: my chili, saxophones, collapsible push-scooters for adults, chocolate egg cream, flavored rum, bathroom scales, door-close buttons in elevators, TBS, musical birthday cards, films by M. Night Shyamalan, the Comet Cursor, and so on. ------------------------------------------------------------------ To change your Lit-Ideas settings (subscribe/unsub, vacation on/off, digest on/off), visit www.andreas.com/faq-lit-ideas.html