Concerning the Nature of Good, Against the Manichæans 30
30 That Good Things, Even the Least, and Those that are Earthly, are by God PL 42, 560
But that God made even the least things, that is, earthly and mortal things, must undoubtedly be understood from that passage of the apostle, where, speaking of the members of our flesh: "For if one member is glorified, all the members rejoice with it, and if one member suffers, all the members suffer with it;" also this he then says: "God has placed the members each one of them in the body as he willed;" and "God has tempered the body, giving to that to which it was wanting greater honor, that there should be no schism in the body, but that the members should have the same care one for another." But what the apostle thus praises in the measure and form and order of the members of the flesh, you find in the flesh of all animals, alike the greatest and the least; for all flesh is among earthly goods, and consequently is esteemed among the least.
Bona etiam minima et terrena esse a Deo. Quia vero et minima bona, hoc est, terrena atque mortalia ipse fecit, illo Apostoli loco sine dubitatione intelligitur, ubi loquens de membris carnis nostrae, Quia si glorificatur unum membrum, congaudent omnia membra; et si patitur unum membrum, compatiuntur omnia membra; etiam hoc ibi ait, Deus posuit membra, singulum quodque eorum in corpore prout voluit: et, Deus temperavit corpus, ei cui deerat majorem honorem dans, ut non essent scissurae in corpore, sed idem ipsum ut pro invicem sollicita sint membra . Hoc autem quod sic in modo et specie et ordine membrorum carnis laudat Apostolus, in omnium animalium carne invenis, et maximorum et minimorum; cum omnis caro in bonis terrenis, ac per hoc minimis deputetur.