“It must needs be, that there is an opposition in all things. If not so, … righteousness could not be brought to pass, neither wickedness, neither holiness nor misery, neither good nor bad” ( 2 Nephi 2:11; see also verse 15 ). As a result, Lehi continued, “the Lord God gave unto man that he should act for himself.

Wherefore, the ends of the law which the Holy One hath given, unto the inflicting of the d punishment which is affixed, which punishment that is affixed is in opposition to that of the happiness which is affixed, to answer the ends of the e atonement — 11 For it must needs be, that there is an a opposition in all things.

The first level sets of opposites—an opposition in all things, all ethical opposites, and opposites that characterize human existence—are related to each other by their negative possibilities. These relations compose the logical form that Lehi’s reasoning takes in 2 Nephi 2:11.