245.  But, after the fire, one must conclude that earth and water made ravages no less.  It may be that the crust formed by the cooling, having below it great cavities, fell in, so that we live only on ruins, as among others Thomas Burnet, Chaplain to the late King of Great Britain, aptly observed.  Sundry deluges and inundations have left deposits, whereof traces and remains are found which show that the sea was in places that to-day are most remote from it.  But these upheavals ceased at last, and the globe assumed the shape that we see.  Moses hints at these changes in few words:  the separation of light from darkness indicates the melting caused by the fire; and the separation of the moist from the dry marks the effects of inundations.  But who does not see that these disorders have served to bring things to the point where they now are, that we owe to them our riches and our comforts, and that through their agency this globe became fit for cultivation by us.  These disorders passed into order.  The disorders, real or apparent, that we see from afar are sunspots and comets; but we do not know what uses they supply, nor the rules prevailing therein.  Time was when the planets were held to be wandering stars:  now their motion is found to be regular.  Peradventure it is the same with the comets:  posterity will know.

246.  One does not include among the disorders inequality of conditions, and M. Jacquelot is justified in asking those who would have everything equally perfect, why rocks are not crowned with leaves and flowers? why ants are not peacocks?  And if there must needs be equality everywhere, the poor man would serve notice of appeal against the rich, the servant against the master.  The pipes of an organ must not be of equal size.  M. Bayle will say that there is a difference between a privation of good and a disorder; between a disorder in inanimate things, which is purely metaphysical, and a disorder in rational creatures, which is composed of crime and [279] sufferings.  He is right in making a distinction between them, and I am right in combining them.  God does not neglect inanimate things:  they do not feel, but God feels for them.  He does not neglect animals:  they have not intelligence, but God has it for them.  He would reproach himself for the slightest actual defect there were in the universe, even though it were perceived of none.

247.  It seems M. Bayle does not approve any comparison between the disorders which may exist in inanimate things and those which trouble the peace and happiness of rational creatures; nor would he agree to our justifying the permission of vice on the pretext of the care that must be taken to avoid disturbing the laws of motion.  One might thence conclude, according to him (posthumous Reply to M. Jacquelot, p. 183), ’that God created the world only to display his infinite skill in architecture and mechanics, whilst his property of goodness and love of virtue took no part in the construction of