Chapter 24.-The Secondary Causes of Evil are Ignorance and Lust.
This is the first evil that befell the intelligent creation-that is, its first privation of good. Following upon this crept in, and now even in opposition to man's will, ignorance of duty, and lust after what is hurtful: and these brought in their train error and suffering , which, when they are felt to be imminent, produce that shrinking of the mind which is called fear . Further, when the mind attains the objects of its desire, however hurtful or empty they may be, error prevents it from perceiving their true nature, or its perceptions are overborne by a diseased appetite, and so it is puffed up with a foolish joy . From these fountains of evil, which spring out of defect rather than superfluity, flows every form of misery that besets a rational nature.