by virtue of which they act diversely on the bodies who find themselves
within the sphere of their action; that some have an aptitude to
attraction, whilst it is of the essence of others to repel; that even
those bodies that attract at one distance, repel at another; that the
peculiar attractions and repulsions of the particles of bodies
perpetually oppose, invariably counteract the general ones of the masses
of matter: he does not perceive that these beings, as destitute of
goodness, as devoid of malice, act only according to their respective
essences; follow the laws their properties impose upon them; without
being in capacity to act otherwise than they do. It is, therefore, for
want of being acquainted with these things, that he looks upon the great
Author of nature, the great _Cause of causes_, as the immediate cause of
those evils to which he is submitted; that he judges erroneously when he
imagines that the Divinity is exasperated against him.

The fact is, man believes that his welfare is a debt due to him from
nature; that when he suffers evil she does him an injustice; fully
persuaded that this nature was made solely for himself, he cannot
conceive she would make him, who is her lord paramount, suffer, if she
was not moved thereto by a power who is inimical to his happiness; who
has reasons with which he is unacquainted for afflicting, who has
motives which he wishes to discover, for punishing him. From hence it
will be obvious, that evil, much more than good, is the true motive of
those researches which man has made concerning the Divinity--of those
ideas which he has formed to himself--of the conduct he has held towards
him. The admiration of the works of nature, or the acknowledgement of
its goodness, seem never alone to have determined the human species to
recur painfully by thought to the source of these things; familiarized
at once with all those effects which are favourable to his existence, he
does not by any means give himself the same trouble to seek the causes,