 Physical and increasingly moral evil were topics much discussed in the 18th century, and pessimism over the condition of the world, especially its violence and suffering, was understood to be a tempting yet in some ways deplorable option.. As befit a celebrated optimist, Leibniz had a sanguine view of human beings. Most of us, he appeared to think, are morally decent people, and evil men are best dealt with by good laws and effective legal institutions. A good education and some degree of censorship are also helpful. Posthumous divine retribution will take care of what human institutions cannot. Leibniz explained the appearance of evil in the world as consistent with God’s goodness in various ways. He claimed that evil derives from the portion of inertia or nullity present in all non-divine creation; that it is a necessary accompaniment of good, or a stimulus to action, that it is an illusion based on narrow or temporally limited experience (G 4: 120f, 196, 231). Moreover, the world has not declined since the Fall, but, on the contrary, the entire universe “takes part in a perpetual and most free progress, so that it is always advancing toward greater culture (cultivation)” (G 7: 308).