Goed geregeld

Waar we in deze ontkerkelijkende tijden niet meer bij stilstaan: hoe goed de Allerhoogste zijn zaakjes wel heeft geregeld. Neem nu bijvoorbeeld de dierenwereld:

"Camels, observed a preacher in 1696, had been sensibly allotted to Arabia, where there was no water, and savage beasts 'sent to deserts, where they may do less harm'. It was a sign of God's providence that fierce animals were less prolific than domestic ones and that they lived in dens by day, usually coming out only at night, when we were in bed. Moreover, whereas members of wild species all looked alike, cows, horses and other domestic animals had been conveniently variegated in colour and shape, in order 'that mankind may the more readily distinguish and claim their respective property'. The physician George Cheyne in 1705 explained that the Creator made the horse's excrement smell sweet, because he knew that men would often be in its vicinity."

Keith Thomas, Man and the Natural World. Changing attitudes in England 1500-1800, Penguin, Harmondsworth, 1983.

Het prentje: Henri Rousseau, Le repas du lapin, 1908. Nog zoiets: als er geen konijnen waren, wie zou dan al die wortelen en sla eten? Goed geregeld!