Only bad men continue to live.

The nations of India had been demoralised by that doctrine for centuries.

But it did not satisfy wise men.
Balthasar thought: If a man starves through a few dozen lives, then something good must come out of it.

Or is evil good enough to continue, and good evil enough to cease?
Balthasar sought better counsel.

He sought throughout the universe for a peg on which to hang a new, more beneficial philosophy of life.