1755 Lisbon earthquake a benevolent deity. The Lisbon disaster provided a counterexample. As Theodor Adorno wrote, "[t]he earthquake of Lisbon sufficed to cure Voltaire of the theodicy of Leibniz" ("Negative Dialectics" 361). In the later twentieth century, the 1755 earthquake has sometimes been compared to the Holocaust as a catastrophe that transformed European culture and philosophy. Jean-Jacques Rousseau was also influenced by the devastation following the earthquake, whose severity he believed was due to too many people living within the close quarters of the city. Rousseau used the earthquake as an argument against cities as part of his desire for a more naturalistic
1732 Montreal earthquake 1732 Montreal earthquake The 1732 Montreal earthquake was a 5.8 magnitude earthquake that struck New France at 11:00 a.m. on September 16. The shaking associated with this earthquake shook the city of Montreal with significant damage, including destroyed chimneys, cracked walls and 300 damaged houses, as well as 185 buildings destroyed by fire following the earthquake. A girl was reported killed from the seismic activity, although Gabriel Leblanc found present information could not substantiate the claim, especially since, if the death was true, it should have been but was not mentioned in the description of the natural disaster by Sister