"Well do the best we know. Well build our house and chop our wood And make our garden grow." -Final Chorus from the Broadway musical Candide

Probably the best known of Voltaires works today is his satiric novel, Candide. The story follows the adventuresmore often misadventuresof Candide, the optimist. The book lampooned so many individuals and institutions, that Voltaire, who had already spent a disproportionate part of his life in either exile or jail, published it under the pseudonym, Mr. Dr. Ralph (or Monsieur le docteur Ralph, for you Francophiles). More than anything, Candide skewers the philosophic argument of Gottfried Leibniz who argued that since the world was created by a perfect God, it must therefore be the best of all possible worlds. As our hero, Candide, experiences ever more horrendous misfortune, his teacher, Dr. Pangloss (A.K.A. Leibniz) incredibly argues that things couldnt be better!

The history of the musical is nearly as complicated as Voltaires plot. Despite a brilliant musical score by Leonard Bernstein, incisive lyrics by poet Richard Wilbur and writer Dorothy Parker, and a book by playwright Lillian Hellman, the show was an immediate flop when it opened on December 1, 1956. Fortunately, interest in Candide was kept alive by the brilliant (and still definitive) original cast recording released by Columbia Records. In the early 70s, legendary producer and director Hal Prince introduced a completely revamped and highly comedic one act version that enjoy popular success. In the 1980s, a two act iteration appeared with the renewed help of Bernstein and input from none other than Stephen Sondheim. Its been a hit ever since.

Both the book and the show end with Candides enlightenment. From a Dervish he learns that a life spent theorizing, rationalizing, speculating and debating is basically a life wasted. From a simple farmer he learns that deep contentment and satisfaction require neither wealth nor power. Rather, its a matter of developing your own innate gifts and applying them wherever you happen to be, that will create your own best of all possible worlds.

A lot of us spend our time fretting, worrying and grumbling about our situation. We dont know exactly what we want beyond the certainty that its not what weve got. We just know that the perfect job awaits us just out of sightthe one thats challenging, pays well and gives us plenty of free time. We just know that the perfect relationship is out therethe one that involves an extraordinarily good looking mate, wholl meet our every need while cheerfully enduring our personality quirks. And of course every parent just knows (and this is true) that there are better behaved kids somewhere out there!

But the truth is in the chorus! Lets do the best we can with what weve got. We can build our house by nurturing the relationships that give meaning to our lives and by prudently using our resources. We can chop our wood by earnestly applying heart and mind to each responsibility weve accepted along the way. Most of all, we can make our garden grow by unselfishly applying every gift with which weve been endowed toward the betterment of the place in which we find ourselves. Home, work and in betweenlets make our garden grow.