Justine's virtue repeatedly rewarded with ruin
Two orphaned sisters take opposite paths. Each charitable act sets up her next punishment, and when Juliette finally rescues her, Justine is killed by a stray bolt of lightning.
Justine
4 ideas
Destruction is nature's work, not crime
The libertines argue that nature creates only through destruction. Killing therefore merely returns matter to circulation in another form, so it cannot offend nature and may even serve it. On this view, crime is a category invented by human law, not something found in the natural order.
Morality is a weapon of the weak
Laws, pity, and conscience are conventions the weak invented to restrain the strong, who owe them no natural obligation. The libertines treat each person's pleasure as the only real measure, dismissing others' suffering as a sensation that is not one's own. On this account, compassion is a learned weakness rather than a natural instinct.
Virtue only pays when others share it
Honesty and charity work like a cooperative strategy. They benefit you only in a society where most people practice them. Among predators, the virtuous person becomes the easiest target, because her trust, pity, and refusal to retaliate are exactly what others exploit.