e
them by nourishing them and making them grow. To beasts she has given
sense and motion, and a faculty which directs them to what is
wholesome, and prompts them to shun what is noxious to them. On man she
has conferred a greater portion of her favor; inasmuch as she has added
reason, by which he is enabled to command his passions, to moderate
some, and to subdue others.

XIII. In the fourth and highest degree are those beings which are
naturally wise and good, who from the first moment of their existence
are possessed of right and consistent reason, which we must consider
superior to man and deserving to be attributed to a God; that is to
say, to the world, in which it is inevitable that that perfect and
complete reason should be inherent. Nor is it possible that it should
be said with justice that there is any arrangement of things in which
there cannot be something entire and perfect. For as in a vine or in
beasts we see that nature, if not prevented by some superior violence,
proceeds by her own appropriate path to her destined end; and as in
painting, architecture, and the other arts there is a point of
perfection which is attainable, and occasionally attained, so it is
even much more necessary that in universal nature there must be some
complete and perfect result arrived at. Many external accidents may
happen to all other natures which may impede their progress to
perfection, but nothing can hinder universal nature, because she is
herself the ruler and governor of all other natures. That, therefore,
must be the fourth and most elevated degree to which no other power can
approach.

But this degree is that on which the nature of all things is placed;
and since she is possessed of this, and she presides over all things,
and is subject to no possible impediment, the world must necessarily be
an intelligent and even a wise being. But how marvellously great is the
ignorance of those men who dispute the perfection of that nature which
encircles all things; or who, allowing it to be infinitely perfect, yet
deny it to be, in the first place, animated, then reasonable, and,
lastly, prudent and wise! For how without these qualities could it be
infinitely perfect? If it were like vegetables, or even like beasts,
there would be no more reason for thinking it extremely good than
extremely bad; and if it were possessed of reason, and had not wisdom
from the beginning, the world would be in a worse condition than man;
for man