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produce them. The best system of things will therefore not contain Gods; it
will always be a system of bodies (that is, things arranged according to
time and place) and of souls which represent and are aware of bodies, and
in accordance with which bodies are in great measure directed. So, as the
design of a building may be the best of all in respect of its purpose, of
expense and of circumstances; and as an arrangement of some figured
representations of bodies which is given to you may be the best that one
can find, it is easy to imagine likewise that a structure of the universe
may be the best of all, without becoming a god. The connexion and order of
things brings it about that the body of every animal and of every plant is
composed of other animals and of other plants, or of other living and
organic beings; consequently there is subordination, and one body, one
substance serves the other: thus their perfection cannot be equal.

201. M. Bayle thinks (p. 1063) that M. Diroys has confused two different
propositions. According to the one, God must do all things as wise and
virtuous persons would wish that they should be done, by the rules of
wisdom and of goodness that God has imprinted in them, and as they would be
obliged themselves to do them if those things depended upon them. The other
is that it is not consistent with supreme wisdom and goodness to fail to do
what is best and most perfect. M. Diroys (in M. Bayle's opinion) sets up
the first proposition as an objection for himself, and replies to the
second. But therein he is justified, as it seems to me. For these two
propositions are connected, the second is a result of the first: to do less
good than one could is to be lacking in wisdom or in goodness. To be the
best, and to be desired by those who are most virtuous and wise, comes to
the same thing. And it may be said that, if we could understand the
structure and the economy of the universe, we should find that it is made
and directed as the wisest and most virtuous could wish it, since God
cannot fail to do thus. This necessity nevertheless is only of a moral
nature: and I admit that if God were forced by a metaphysical necessity to
produce that which he makes, he would produce all the possibles, or
nothing; and in this sense M. Bayle's conclusion would be fully correct.
But as all the possibles are not compatible together in one and the same
world-sequence, for that very reason all the possibles cannot be