I was reading Camus' The Plague this week and among the many things I highlighted, I highlighted the following passage. Said by Paneloux the priest after having witnessed months of plague and specifically the suffering of the prefect's son as he died. In his subsequent sermon to his congregation in what seems to be a monologue of shattering faith he says this.

"For who would dare to assert that eternal happiness can compensate for a single moment of human suffering?"

This is a question that, growing up religious, I never would have thought. What think you all?

I disagree. I think eternal happiness could compensate for a single moment of human suffering. But in the case of certain deeper and more protracted forms of suffering, I'm not sure.

I seem to remember Dostoevsky making a similar point in the Brothers Karamazov.