Paul et Virginie, or the Enigma of Evil: The Double Theodicy of Bernardin de Saint-Pierre

This article aims to show how Bernardin de Saint-Pierre—whose philosophical and theological thought is generally overlooked by scholars—provides an original solution to the problem of the existence of evil. A comparative reading of the systematic discussion of Providence that animates The Studies of Nature, his major theoretical work, and Paul and Virginia, a true Romanesque application of the philosophical treatise, brings out a double theodicy. In fact, Saint-Pierre establishes a fruitful synergy between Rousseau's anthropodicy, which provides a social and historical justification of evil, and Leibniz's eschatology, aimed at its metaphysical and otherworldly justification.