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“Theodicy” by Czesław Miłosz 🇵🇱🇺🇸 (30 Jun 191114 Aug 2004)
Translated from the Polish by Robert Hass
No, it won’t do, my sweet theologians.
Desire will not save the morality of God.
If he created beings able to choose between good and evil,
And they chose, and the world lies in iniquity,
Nevertheless, there is pain, and the undeserved torture of creatures,
Which would find its explanation only by assuming
The existence of an archetypal Paradise
And a pre-human downfall so grave
That the world of matter received its shape from diabolic power.