I only desire to call attention
to one point. To those who maintain that the planets are not
inhabited one may reply: You might be perfectly in the right,
if you could only show that the earth is the best possible
world, in spite of what Voltaire has said. She has but one
satellite, while Jupiter, Uranus, Saturn, Neptune have each
several, an advantage by no means to be despised. But that
which renders our own globe so uncomfortable is the inclination
of its axis to the plane of its orbit. Hence the inequality of
days and nights; hence the disagreeable diversity of the seasons.
On the surface of our unhappy spheroid we are always either too
hot or too cold; we are frozen in winter, broiled in summer;
it is the planet of rheumatism, coughs, bronchitis; while on the
surface of Jupiter, for example, where the axis is but slightly
inclined, the inhabitants may enjoy uniform temperatures.
It possesses zones of perpetual springs, summers, autumns, and
winters; every Jovian may choose for himself what climate he
likes, and there spend the whole of his life in security from
all variations of temperature. You will, I am sure, readily
admit this superiority of Jupiter over our own planet, to say
nothing of his years, which each equal twelve of ours!
Under such auspices and such marvelous conditions of existence,
it appears to me that the inhabitants of so fortunate a world
must be in every respect superior to ourselves.
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