want to know what I do not know?

THE PHILOSOPHER:

We are curious. I want to know how being so crude in your mountains, in
your deserts, in your seas, you appear nevertheless so industrious in
your animals, in your vegetables?

NATURE:

My poor child do you want me to tell you the truth? It is that I have
been given a name which does not suit me; my name is "Nature", and I am
all art.

THE PHILOSOPHER:

That word upsets all my ideas. What! nature is only art?

NATURE:

Yes, without any doubt. Do you not know that there is an infinite art in
those seas and those mountains that you find so crude? do you not know
that all those waters gravitate towards the centre of the earth, and
mount only by immutable laws; that those mountains which crown the
earth are the immense reservoirs of the eternal snows which produce
unceasingly those fountains, lakes and rivers without which my animal
species and my vegetable species would perish? And as for what are
called my animal kingdom, my vegetable kingdom and my mineral kingdom,
you see here only three; learn that I have millions of kingdoms. But if
you consider only the formation of an insect, of an ear of corn, of
gold, of copper, everything will appear as marvels of art.

THE PHILOSOPHER:

It is true. The more I think about it, the more I see that you are only
the art of I know not what most potent and industrious great being, who
hides himself and who makes you appear. All reasoners since Thales, and
probably long before him, have played at blind man's buff with you; they
have said: "I have you!" and they had nothing. We all resemble Ixion; he
thought he was kissing Juno, and all that he possessed was a cloud.

NATURE:

Since I am all that is, how can a being such as you, so small a part of
myself, seize me? Be content, atoms my children, with seeing a few atoms
that surround you, with drinking a few drops of my milk, with vegetating
for a few moments on my breast, and with dying without having known your
mother and your nurse.

THE PHILOSOPHER:

My dear mother, tell me something of why you exist, of why there is
anything.

NATURE:

I will answer you as I have answered for so many centuries all those who
have interrogated me about first principles: I KNOW NOTHING ABOUT THEM.

THE PHILOSOPHER:

Would not non-existence be better than this multitude of existences made
in order to be continually dissolved, this crowd of animals born and
reproduced in order t