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God, then, Theotimus, needs not many acts, because
one only divine act of his all-powerful will, by
reason of its infinite perfection, is sufficient to
produce all the variety of his works. But we mortals
must treat them after the method and manner of
understanding which our small minds can attain to;
according to which, to speak of divine providence,
let us consider, I pray you, the reign of the great
Solomon, as a perfect model of the art of good
government.
This great king then, knowing by divine
inspiration that the commonwealth is to religion as
the body to the soul, and religion to the
commonwealth as the soul to the body, disposed with
himself all the parts requisite as well for the
establishment of religion as of the commonwealth. As
to religion, he determined that a temple must be
erected of such and such length, breadth, and height,
so many porches and courts, so many windows and thus
of all the rest which belonged to the temple; then so
many sacrificers, so many singers and other officers
of the temple.
And as for the commonwealth he determined to make
a royal palace and court for his majesty, and in this
so many stewards, so many gentlemen and other
courtiers; and, for the people, judges, and other
magistrates who were to execute justice further, for
the assurance of the kingdom, and securing of the
public peace which it enjoyed, he arranged to have in
time of peace a powerful preparation for war, and to
this effect two hundred and fifty commanders in
various charges, forty thousand horses, and all that
great equipage which the Scripture and historians
record.
Now having disposed and arranged in his mind all the
principal things requisite for his kingdom, he came
to the act of providing them, and thought out all
that was necessary to construct the temple, to
maintain the sacred officers, the royal ministers and
magistrates, and the soldiers whom he intended to
appoint, and resolved to send to Hiram for fit
timber, to begin commerce with Peru(1) and Ophir, and
to take all convenient means to procure all things
requisite for the fulfilment and success of his
undertaking.
Neither stayed he there, Theotimus, for having
made his project and deliberated with himself about
the proper means to accomplish it, coming to the
practice, he actually created officers as he had
disposed, and by a good government caused provision
to be made of all things requisite to carry out and
to accomplish their charges. So that having the
knowledge of the art of reigning well, he put it into
practice, executed that disposition which he had made
in his mind for the creation of officers of every
sort, and provided in effect what he had seen it
necessary to provide; and so his art of government
which consisted in disposition, and in providence or
foresight, was put into practice by the creation of
officers and by actual government and good
management.
But inasmuch as the disposing is useless without
the creation of officers, and creation also vain
without that provident foresight which looks after
what is needed to maintain the officers created or
appointed; and since this maintaining by good
government is nothing more than a providence put into
effect, therefore not only the disposition but also
the creation and good government of Solomon were
called by the name of providence, nor do we indeed
say that a man is provident unless he govern well.
Now, Theotimus, speaking of heavenly things
according to the impression we have gained by the
consideration of human things, we affirm that God,
having had an eternal and most perfect knowledge of
the art of making the world for his glory, disposed
before all things in his divine understanding all the
principal parts of the universe which might render
him honour; to wit, angelic and human nature, and in
the angelic nature the variety of hierarchies and
orders, as the sacred Scripture and holy doctors
teach us; as also among men he ordained that there
should be that great diversity which we see.
Further, in this same eternity he provided and
determined in his mind all the means requisite for
men and angels to come to the end for which he had
ordained them, and so made the act of his providence;
and not stopping there, he, in order to effect what
he had disposed, really created angels and men, and
to effect his providence he did and does by his
government furnish reasonable creatures with all
things necessary to attain glory, so that, to say it
in a word, sovereign providence is no other thing
than the act whereby God furnishes men or angels with
the means necessary or useful for the obtaining of
their end.
But because these means are of different kinds we
also diversify the name of providence, and say that
there is one providence natural, another
supernatural, and that the latter again is general,
or special, or particular.
And because hereafter, Theotimus, I shall exhort you
to unite your will to God's providence, I would,
while on this part of my subject, say a word about
natural providence.
God then, willing to provide men with the natural
means necessary for them to render glory to the
divine goodness, produced in their behalf all the
other animals and the plants, and to provide for the
other animals and the plants, he has produced a
variety of lands, seasons, waters, winds, rains; and,
as well for man as for the other things appertaining
to him, he created the elements, the sky, the stars,
ordaining in an admirable manner that almost all
creatures should mutually serve one another. Horses
carry us, and we care for them; sheep feed and clothe
us, and we feed them; the earth sends vapours to the
air; and the air rain to the earth; the hand serves
the foot, and the foot the hand.
O! he who should consider this general commerce
and traffic which creatures have together, in so
perfect a correspondence - with how strong an amorous
passion for this sovereign wisdom would he be moved,
crying out: Thy providence O great and eternal Father
governs all things!(2) S. Basil and S. Ambrose in
their Hexaemerons, the good Louis of Granada in his
introduction to the Creed, and Louis Richeome in many
of his beautiful works, will furnish ample motives to
loving souls profitably to employ this consideration.
Thus, dear Theotimus, this providence reaches all,
reigns over all, and reduces all to its glory. There
are indeed fortuitous cases and unexpected accidents,
but they are only fortuitous or unexpected to us, and
are of course most certain to the divine providence,
which foresees them, and directs them to the general
good of the universe. These accidents happen by the
concurrence of various causes, which having no
natural alliance one with the other, produce each of
them its particular effect, but in such a way that
from their concourse there issues another effect of a
different nature, to which though one could not
foresee it, all these different causes contributed.
For example, it was reasonable to chastise the
curiosity of the poet Aeschylus, who being told by a
diviner that he would perish by the fall of some
house, kept himself all that day in the open country,
to escape his fate, and as he was standing up
bareheaded, a falcon which held in its claws a
tortoise, seeing this bald head, and thinking it to
he the point of a rock, let the tortoise fall upon
it, and behold Aeschylus dies immediately, crushed by
the house and shell of a tortoise. This was doubtless
a fortuitous accident, for this man did not go into
the country to die, but to escape death, nor did the
falcon dream of crushing a poet's head, but the head
and shell of a tortoise to make itself master of the
meat within: yet it chanced to the contrary, for the
tortoise remained safe and poor Aeschylus was killed.
According to us this chance was unexpected, but in
respect of the Divine providence which looked from
above and saw the concurrence of causes, it was an
act of justice punishing the superstition of the man.
The adventures of Joseph of old were admirable in
their variety and the way they passed from one
extreme to the other. His brethren who to ruin him
had sold him were amazed to see that he had become
viceroy, and were mightily apprehensive that he
remained sensible of the wrong they had done him: but
no said he: Not by your counsel was I sent hither,
but by the will of God. You thought evil against me,
but God turned it into good.(3)
You see, Theotimus, the world would have termed
this a chance, or fortuitous event, which Joseph
called a design of the sovereign providence, which
turns and reduces all to its service. It is the same
with all things that happen in the world yea, even
with monstrosities, whose birth makes complete and
perfect works more esteemed, begets admiration,
provokes discussion, and many good thoughts; in a
word they are in the world as the shades in pictures,
which give grace and seem to bring out the colours.
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