 Philo maintains that we can’t evade the facts of disease, famine, and pestilence, except by “apologies, which still farther aggravate the charge” (DCNR 10.16/72). These apologies are theodicies—systematic attempts to reconcile God’s goodness with the existence of evil. Demea is also scornful of theodicies, blissfully unaware that all too soon he will be offering his own.