the only one who has perceived
the necessity of recognizing a superior and only cause, creator of the
order of the wonders of the world of life. By this he is led to raise
his thoughts to the _Supreme Author_ of all that exists.

"In the creation of his works, and especially those we can observe,
this omnipotent Being has undoubtedly been the ruling power in
pursuing the method which has pleased him, namely, his will has
been:

"Either to create instantaneously and separately every particular
living being observed by us, to personally care for and watch over
them in all their changes, their movements, or their actions, to
unremittingly care for each one separately, and by the exercise of
his supreme will to regulate all their life;

"Or to reduce his creations to a small number, and among these, to
institute an order of things general and continuous, pervaded by
ceaseless activity (_mouvement_), especially subject to laws by
means of which all the organisms of whatever nature, all the changes
they undergo, all the peculiarities they present, and all the
phenomena that many of them exhibit, may be produced.

"In regard to these two modes of execution, if observation taught us
nothing we could not form any opinion which would be well grounded.
But it is not so; we distinctly see that there exists an order of
things truly created (_veritablement cree_), as unchangeable as its
author allows, acting on matter alone, and which possesses the power
of producing all visible beings, of executing all the changes, all
the modifications, even the extinctions, so also the renewals or
recreations that we observe among them. It is to this order of
things that we have given the name of _nature_. The Supreme Author
of all that exists is, then, the immediate creator of matter as also
of nature, but he is only indirectly the creator of what nature can
produce.

"The end that God has proposed to himself in creating matter, which
forms the basis of all bodies, and nature, which divides (_divise_)
this matter, forms the bodies, makes them vary, modifies them,
changes them, and renews them in different ways, can be easily known
to us; for the Supreme Being cannot meet with any obstacle to his
will in the execution of his works; the general results of these
works are necessarily the object he had in view. Thus this end could
be no other than the existence of nature, of