The Garden State

               I know many perceive the garden state to be the "perfect" society, but I really don't see it that way. To me the garden state is one that requires constant aid and maintenance to ensure success. One needs to work in order to have a functional garden. If a garden is left neglected, the plants die. However even with maintenance and attention, sometimes the crop is just bad, and things in the garden will go wrong.

              Where am I going with this? It seems to me that this is the summary of Voltaire's response to Leibniz's philosophy. It's a perfect metaphor of society, both modern and ancient. In society not everything happens is for the best. Like a garden, a society can fail and die, and sometimes it's beyond human control. Sometimes it's via natural disasters, and sometimes it's because us humans screw it up. The best we humans can do to prevent our "garden" from failing is to not screw it up, and eliminate the chance of us causing our own demise. If we were to do that, then the only thing that could end us would be things beyond human control, like a garden.

                If a gardener does everything right, but a volcano explodes and the ash covers up the sun and the plants die then it's not his fault. Yet if he were to forget to water the garden then that's on him. This is what us humans have to acknowledge and focus on: just not screwing up.

              I also think Candide's garden state can also be interpreted on a smaller, more personal level; a level resembling the average human worker. In order to be happy and successful, one should have a good work ethic, and put in effort to have a "large crop yield". Some people may get lucky and not really try but have a big ass garden, others may be unlucky and try hard yet not get anything. It's kinda the way things work it seems.