that can be discovered when any part of evil is examined. The other objects, when they participate in the evil and resemble it, become evil without however being absolute Evil. Ancient and medieval Christian thought Neoplatonism was influential on St. Augustine of Hippo, with whom the doctrine is most associated. Augustine, in his Enchiridion, wrote: Also, in his City of God, he wrote: Through the influence of Augustine, this doctrine influenced much of Catholic thought on the subject of evil. For instance, Boethius famously proved, in Book III of his Consolation of Philosophy, that "evil is nothing". The theologian Pseudo-Dionysius the Areopagite also states that all being is good, in Chapter 4 of his work The Divine Names. Thomas Aquinas concluded, in article 1 of question 5 of the First Part of his Summa Theologiae, that "goodness and being are really the same, and differ only in idea". Early modern philosophy The philosopher Baruch Spinoza also agreed with the doctrine, when he said: "By reality and perfection I mean the same thing" (Ethics, part II, definition VI). He clarified this definition in the preface to part IV of the same work:Perfection and imperfection, then, are in reality merely modes of thinking, or notions which we form from a comparison among one another of individuals of the same species; hence I said above (II. Def. vi.), that by reality and perfection I mean the same thing. For we are wont to refer all the individual things in nature to one genus, which is called the highest genus, namely, to the category of Being, whereto absolutely all individuals in nature belong. Thus, in so far as we refer the individuals in nature to this category, and comparing them one with another, find that some possess more of being or reality than others, we, to this extent, say that some are more perfect than others. [...] As for the terms good and bad, they indicate no positive quality in things regarded in themselves, but are merely modes of thinking, or notions which we form from the comparison of things one with another. Thus one and the same thing can be at the same time good, bad, and indifferent. For instance, music is good for him that is melancholy, bad for him that mourns; for him that is deaf, it is neither good nor bad. Nevertheless, though this be so, the terms should still