All that up to here has been said serves to declare the motives that the philosophers had to recognize and confess a first cause, a first principle and a first mover and governor of all this universe, which we call God. It also serves so that we may know the providence that this sovereign Lord has of all things, considering the abilities with which he provided all the animals for their conservation, which is to maintain themselves and defend themselves from their contraries, and cure themselves in their illnesses, and raise their children. In none of this did the philosophers of more grave and settled judgment place doubt. But just as monstrous bodies are at times found, which are born either with excess or with lack of the accustomed members, so also (and even much more) there are monstrous spirits and wits that say things not only against all reason, but against all the common consent of the human race, such as were those who, confessing the providence that God had of the brute animals (for the aforesaid reasons), dared to say that he did not have it of men, because of the confusion and disorder that they saw in human things, not considering that since the brutes are not capable either of virtue or of vice, there is no reason why the Creator should alter the providence that he has of them. But since man is capable of the one and of the other, God treats him according to his works, doing good to the good man and punishing the evil one. Which that distinguished moral philosopher Seneca came to understand, saying in one word a great part of what our religion teaches. For speaking of God, he says that he treats us in the manner that we treat him, giving to understand that those who revere and honor God as true lord and father, he treats as faithful servants and sons. What more would this philosopher have said, if he were a Christian? How great and
how universal a doctrine is comprehended in these so brief words! But here it is to be noted that, when we say that God does good to the good and punishes the evil, we do not here understand by good temporal goods (which not even the philosophers called goods) nor by evil poverty or lack of them, since this does not deserve the name of true evil, since all the saints voluntarily loved and procured it. Thus the providence that the Creator has of animals is always of one manner, but that of men is diverse, according to the diversity of their works. But against these wandering philosophers the true and grave philosophers armed themselves, especially those who were called Stoics, who were very devoted to virtue, proving with very grave reasons the providence that that sovereign Lord generally has of human things, of which we shall place some here.
For first, what ears are not scandalized, hearing it said that God has care of beasts and not of men, the beasts and all these lower things having been created for the service of man, as is already declared? Who will say that a father has care of the slaves and servants of his son, and does not have it of the son? If it belongs to prudence and good government to have greater care of the greater things than of the lesser, man being without comparison more noble than all the brute animals, as a creature made to the image and likeness of God, in what reason does it fit to say that he has providence of things so low, and despises the high, as are men whom he calls sons by the likeness that they have with him? And if he has care of the brutes, who neither recognize the benefit, nor give him thanks for it, how much more will he have it of man, who recognizes and adores and praises him for it?
We also see that love is the cause of the providence that creatures have of their own things, and that, the more they love them, so much the greater is the care that they have of them, as we see in the providence and care that the brutes have of the children that they love. Then if God has greater love for man than for the brutes (which is seen by the advantages that he has over the brutes and by the more excellent nature that he gave him), how is it possible that, having care of what he loves less, he should not have it of what he loves more? We see by experience that if a man plants or grafts a little tree, he afterward rejoices when he sees it grown and advanced and loaded with fruit, and it pains him if he sees it maltreated, and he delights to cultivate and water it. Then if man has this love and care of a little tree that he planted, how much greater will the Creator have it of the man whom he formed?
But not only love, but goodness also is cause of providence. And thus we see that men of singular and excellent goodness have great respect for the common good, and thus desire and procure it, although it be at their cost. Then if this is proper to excellent goodness, how much more will it be proper to that highest and infinite Goodness, to have care of man, especially knowing that, man being well ordered, all this world that serves him is well ordered, but on the contrary, he being disordered, the world is also so, since it serves one who does not serve the common Lord of all?
And all the perfections of creatures that are called absolutely perfections are in God in a very eminent manner, and to have care of the common good is one of them; who
will dare to deny that it is not in God, he being an abyss of all perfections and the author of them?
We also see that all causes have special care of their effects, as parents have of their children, kings of their vassals, fathers of family of their family. Then how much greater will that King of kings, that sovereign Father and that Cause of causes have it of the most noble effect that in this lower world he produced, which is man?
I add more to what has been said: that if God does not have providence of human things, either it is because he cannot, or does not wish, or does not know what passes in this world. To say that he does not know is to take wisdom from him, and to say that he knows, but does not wish, is to take from him goodness, and justice, and charity, and mercy, and finally all his perfections and virtues, which is horrible blasphemy. But to say that he cannot is against the greatness of his power, which is infinite. For he who could create this world so great, so beautiful, so well ordered, so constant in the variety of times and in the movement of the heavens, and populated with so many things for the use of human life, how will he not be able to govern what he could make? And if he by his own will wished to create this world, not by necessity that he had of it, nor because anyone forced him, but by his sole goodness, by which he wished to give being to the things that did not have it, why must he not wish to conserve and govern what he wished to create?
At the end of what has been said I increase a very principal and very experienced consideration. We see generally that all men, of whatever nation they may be, when they see themselves in some distress and anguish, suddenly, without any discourse of reason, but by the sole instinct of nature, lift the eyes and the hands to heaven, where that Lord principally resides, asking him for succor. Then since this inclination is impressed by the Creator in the very nature of man, and this cannot be idle and vain by that common sentence of philosophers, who say that God and nature do not make a superfluous thing, it follows that he has providence of the things of men, since he created this natural inclination in their hearts. Nor is the common consent of all peoples a lesser testimony, however barbarous and bestial they may be, in whom there is always found some manner of worship of divinity, although false and erroneous, this with presupposition that they do not honor this divinity for nothing, but because they hope for favor from it. For if they hoped for nothing, they would not honor it, nor would they take account of its temples and sacrifices. And this is to confess divine providence, which is God taking account of whoever venerates and honors him. And as this is a universal thing in all peoples, it follows that this affection and knowledge is born with man himself, and is impressed in his heart by the author of nature itself, who, just as he grafted into the hearts of children a natural inclination to respect and revere their parents, so he also impressed another to honor God, who in a much more excellent manner is universal father of all men. And this is so notorious in the light of nature, that Aristotle said that we ought not put into dispute whether snow was white, nor also whether parents and gods were to be honored, but give eyes to him who denies snow to be white, and lashes and punishment to him who should deny the honor due to parents and to the gods.
These and other similar reasons moved the gravest and wisest philosophers, as were Plato and Socrates, his teacher, and especially the Stoics, one of whom (who was Seneca) wrote an entire book On Divine Providence, of which he also makes mention in other places of his letters. And thus in one that he writes to his friend Lucilius he says these singular and notable words: “Near you is God, with you he is, within you he is, a sacred spirit dwells within us, which guards and notes our good works, which treats us in the manner that we treat him. And hold it as certain that no man can be good without him. For how will anyone be able to despise the things of fortune without his help? He is the one who gives us magnificent counsels. It is certain that God dwells in the souls of the good, although we do not know which God this is that dwells in them. An excellent and moderated spirit, and one that passes over all things as over vile and low things, and laughs at all that we fear or desire, only God can make it. So great a thing cannot be made without favor from him. And thus the greater part of this spirit is in the place whence it descended. So that, just as the rays of the sun reach the earth, but they are in the same sun whence they descend, so the great and sacred spirit, sent into the world so that by it we may know divine things, converses here with us, but it is together with its principle whence it is born.” And in another letter he says thus: “You marveled that men go to the gods: a greater marvel is that God comes to men, and (what is still nearer) God comes to dwell in them. For there is no good soul without the favor and presence of God.” All these are words of Seneca, who without having read the Gospel confesses the necessity of grace, without understanding what grace is, and the care of divine providence. Wherefore there is reason for us to be frightened at the blindness and madness of the Pelagian heretics, who, receiving the Sacred Scriptures, dogmatized that a man could with the forces of free will alone, without the succor of grace, keep perfectly all the divine commandments and merit the kingdom of heaven.
To this so illustrious testimony of Seneca I shall add that of Tully, who confesses the same, saying that “the immortal gods not only provide for all the lineage of men, but also for each one in particular, because if they have providence of all the world, they also have it of the principal parts of it, which are Asia, Africa, and Europe, and if they have it of these, they also have it of the cities of them, as are Rome, Athens, Sparta, Rhodes, with the rest, and thus it follows that they must have special care of each one of the dwellers of these. And in this account we place Curius, Fabricius, Metellus, Marcellus, Cato, Scipio, Laelius, and many other singular men that there were in Rome and in Greece, none of whom was such without the help of God, which reason convinced the poets, and particularly Homer, that they should assign certain gods as companions, helpers, and defenders from dangers to heroic men, as were Ulysses, Diomedes, Agamemnon, and Achilles.” Whereby it is concluded that never in the world was there any signal man who was not helped with a breath and favor of God. The aforesaid is from Tully, who also, like Seneca, confesses the necessity of divine favor and the care of divine providence.
Of How All The Things Of This World Were Fabricated For Man
I
This same providence the same Tully proves by declaring very particularly how all these things that we see were fabricated by divine providence for man, and thus he says: “If someone should ask for whose cause such great things have been fabricated, perhaps for love of the trees and of the herbs, which although they lack sense, are works of nature? This would be very contrary to all reason. But perhaps were they formed for the sake of the beasts? Nor can it be said that the gods have fabricated this for the sake of mute beasts, which have no intelligence. Then for whose cause shall we say this world was made? To this we respond that for the sake of the animals that use reason, which are men, because they alone use reason and live by law.” “So that, just as we say that Athens and Lacedaemon and all that there is in these cities serve the dwellers of them, so all the things that there are in this great city of the world are for the service of men. Then already the course of the sun, and of the moon, and of the stars, although they serve for the order and government of the world, are also a most beautiful spectacle for men. For there is nothing whose sight is for our eyes more insatiable, more beautiful, more artful for our understanding, for by the order and course of these planets we know the quality of the times and the variety and changes of them. And if men alone know these, for them alone must we judge that they were made. Then the earth full of crops and of diverse species of legumes that it produces with great abundance, does it serve for the use of men, or of beasts? Then what shall I say of the vineyards and of the olive groves, whose fruits so copious and so savory do not belong to the beasts? For they have no science either of sowing the fields, nor of cultivating them, nor of reaping and gathering the fruit of them at their times, nor of keeping it for later, because the use and care of all these things is of men alone, and not of them. Whereby just as the strings of a vihuela, and the other musical instruments, were made for those alone who know how to use them, so all these aforesaid things serve for those alone who know how to use them. Nor is it reason to say that they have been made because of them, because at times they snatch and steal something of these fruits, just as we do not say that men gather and keep wheat in their granaries for the sake of the mice and of the ants that steal it, but for provision of their women and children and family. Thus the beasts enjoy something of this by theft, but men freely and openly. For who will have doubt that so great a variety and abundance of fruits so savory to the taste, and so suave to the smell, and so beautiful to sight, nature has given for men? And how can it be said that these things were made for the beasts, since it is clear to us that those beasts were made for the sake of men? For what other thing do sheep serve, except so that from their wool cloths may be made with which we may dress ourselves? Which could neither maintain themselves, nor sustain themselves, nor give any fruit, if men did not have care of them. Then already the guard so faithful of dogs, and the love with which they love and flatter their lords, and the fury and hatred against strangers, and such incredible sagacity and smell to seek the hunt, and so much lightness and joy to pursue it, what other thing does it represent to us except that they were engendered for the profit and service of men? Then what shall I say of oxen, whose backs declare that they were not fabricated to carry and bring loads, but the necks so accommodated to receive the yoke, and the forces and breadth of the breasts to draw the plough, we see how much they serve the use of men? For which reason
anciently in that golden age, as the poets call it, it was held as a great crime to kill oxen, and eat of their flesh. It would be a prolix thing if I wished now to declare the profit that comes to us from mules and from the other horse-like beasts, which we see serve men. But the pig, for what does it serve except to maintain us with its flesh? And so that this should not be corrupted, they gave it the soul in place of salt. And because this animal is so profitable for our maintenance, we see that no other gives birth to and raises as many children as it. Then what shall I say of the multitude and suavity of fish? What of the birds, from which we receive so great delight, that it seems that this so favored providence was ordered by Epicurus? Which we could not have in hand, except with the artifice and industry of men. Then already the fierce beasts we attain by hunting, partly to maintain ourselves from them, and partly to exercise ourselves in military discipline, which we also tame and domesticate, as we do with elephants, and many things from them serve to cure wounds and illnesses, as the herbs also do, whose virtue and efficacy we know by long times and experiences. And if we circle with our spirits as with our eyes all the earth and all the seas, we shall see such great spaces of fertile and fruitful fields, we shall see the mountains clothed with green herbs, and the pasture of the livestock, and the incredible lightness with which ships run through the sea. And not only the things that are upon the earth, but also those hidden in its entrails serve us, which, just as they are for the service of men, so they alone bring them to light and discover them.” The aforesaid is from Tully, who by the aforesaid examples manifestly proves all the things of this lower world together with the heaven to have been fabricated and ordered for the use and provision of our life. All which is a manifest argument of the providence that God has of men, since he created so many things so appropriate for the use and provision and delight of men, of which the beasts are not capable.
And besides this discourse and argument with which this divine providence is proved, he also confesses it in the book On Laws by these words: “Before all things let men hold as ascertained that the gods are lords and governors of all things, and what passes in human life happens by their will and empire, and that they attend to doing good to the lineage of men, and look at what each one of them does, and in what he sins, and with what devotion and spirit he treats the things that belong to religion, and finally they take account and reckoning with the life of the good and of the evil.” Then what more would this philosopher have said, if he had had light of faith?
Then I hold the testimony of Plutarch as more illustrious, who confesses together with divine providence the immortality of the soul by these words: “One is the reason that confirms and proves divine providence and the immortality of the soul, nor can we embrace the one and reject the other. For the soul remaining alive after the death of the body, it is fitting, and even necessary, that it receive the punishment or reward of its works. For the time that it lives in this world it fights like a wrestler and, the fight finished, it must receive what it deserved. But in what manner the soul has to be rewarded or punished after this life, we who live do not know of this any certain thing that we can affirm, because this secret is hidden from us.” Thus far are words of this great philosopher, which declare to us how great is the force and the light of truth, since in the midst of the darkness of gentility they saw its rays and splendors.
Let us come to Aristotle, who, as we already saw, does not consent that there be dispute of the honor that is owed to parents and to God, because it is a thing so clear and so peremptory. The same, in his Politics, after having said that four things were necessary for a well ordered republic, which are provisions, arms, arts, and money, says that the first that is necessary to it is the worship of the gods, which they call religion. And in the tenth book of the Ethics he says thus: “He who is ruled by reason and understanding, and seeks to perfect this principal part of his soul, and is affected to the good, it appears that this such one will be most acceptable to God, because if the gods have care of human things, as it appears, it is a thing according to reason that they be pleased by a thing so good and so similar to them (which is our understanding) and those who love this part of their soul, and seek to adorn it with the virtues, it is just that they be loved by the gods as people who live virtuously and who have care to perfect what they received.” All these are words of Aristotle, which favor divine providence, since they make God a lover of the good as of people similar to him in the nobility of the understanding and in the purity of life. And no less does it make to this purpose that this philosopher attributes to religion and worship of God the first place in the well ordered republic, as we have just said. For to what end must men honor God, if he has no care nor account with them? Knowing now by faith that there is eternal punishment and glory for good and evil, there are so many men who have very little account with God; what would it be if neither in this life nor in the other they hoped for anything from him? And what would the world be populated with such men as those who believed this would be, except a cave of thieves and robbers, and a mire of pigs or, to speak better, a piece of hell? And the world being such, how unworthy a thing it would be of that infinite Goodness and Wisdom to have created those so great heavens, and those so resplendent lights, and to govern this so great machine of the world, sending its rains at their times to fructify the earth, and deputing the fish of the sea, and the birds of the air, and the animals of the earth, and all this for the use of men, they being much worse than beasts? What thing more unworthy of such knowledge and of such goodness? Thus, since Aristotle so much wishes that we honor God, he wishes that we hope something from him, because, as the Comic said, no one wishes to be good for nothing.
But the same philosopher, in the compendium of philosophy that he wrote to Alexander, although some doubt that this book is his, speaks more clearly of providence, where he relates a memorable thing, because he recounts that once Mount Etna overflowed with so great a mouthful of fire that it extended through all the fields and neighboring lands, and all the young men fleeing with great haste, as the old men could not flee, there were some sons so loyal to their parents that, taking them upon their shoulders, they fled with them. But not being able to make so much haste because of the load that they carried, finally the hurrying flame had to reach them. Then God, being pleased by that faith and loyalty of the good sons toward their old parents, made the flame divide and part into two parts, so that it should give place and safe passage to the virtuous youths with their parents. This history Aristotle relates in the aforesaid book, in which he not only confesses divine providence, but also miracles, which surpass all the faculty of nature.
II
With this example we shall join others referred not by Christian authors, to whom the infidels do not give credit, but by others of another religion. And because to this providence it belongs not only to reward the good, but also to punish the evil, we shall refer here some punishments so great and so extraordinary, executed against most perverse men, whose greatness declares them to be manifest work of divine providence and justice. Among which the disastrous end of that Herod who, by the sole ambition of reigning, used the greatest cruelty that ever was seen, which was to shed the blood of so many innocent children, and together with them that of his own son, with other cruelties and tyrannies that he used during the time that he lived, will have the first place. For the cries and voices, both of that innocent blood shed and of the fathers and mothers of these children, who asked vengeance, it was just that they should reach the ears of that sovereign judge, who, besides the pains of the other life, should punish so extraordinary a wickedness with new and extraordinary punishment. Which Josephus, noble historian among the Jews, relates by these words: “The terrible illness of Herod each day became greater, until it entirely avenged the wickedness committed. For outside in the skin and surface he burned with a tempered fire, but within he was scorched as an enkindled oven. He always suffered very great hunger, and with no food that he ate could he calm the most cruel rage. His entrails within he had full of sores, and from his body there came out a thin and yellow humor that bathed him down to the feet, and from the feet to the beard. All his members he had swollen, and his shameful parts rotten and full of worms, and swollen, and abominable, and with terrible pains. And over all the evils there afflicted him the stench that came out from the rottenness of the members, or from the breath of the poisoned mouth. And he was so surrounded by pains that already the natural forces did not suffice him to suffer them. The diviners said that the sovereign emperor God had given him this pain for his great and many wickednesses. But given that he was wounded with such incurable sores, not for that did he lose the hope of living. For which he procured those arts and remedies that he could. Having crossed the Jordan, he bathed sometimes in the baths that are called of Callirhoe, whose waters are also healthful to drink. And it appeared to the physicians that he should bathe the whole body in hot oil, but, placed in this bath, his members were disjointed, and his eyes leaped out of their proper places. From there they brought him to Jericho, where, moved by the weepings of his servants, and already despairing of life, he commanded that to his knights should be distributed to each one fifty pesos of money, and afterward for some days he distributed among his friends a great sum of money. But afterward, full of fury and fierceness and as if threatening death, he ended with an incredible wickedness and cruelty. For he commanded all the noble and principal men of all the cities and towns of Judea to be called, and to be enclosed in a certain place, and calling his sister Salome with her husband Alexander, he said to them: ‘I know that the Jews are to rejoice at my death, but if you wish to fulfill my commandment, I shall have my burial and obsequies very honored with a multitude of men and women who weep. Have armed people ready because, at the hour when I expire, they may kill all these principal men of Judea whom I have enclosed, so that all the province, although it grieve them, may make lamentation at my death.’ And a little afterward, already feeling death near by the force of the pains, he asked for a knife to pare an apple (as he was wont) with his hand, and they gave it to him. Soon after, understanding that there was no one who was at hand for him, he raised the knife and thrust it into his body. But the little time that lasted before he expired, he did not wish to pass without cruelty, and he had the third son beheaded,
after two who by his commandment had before been beheaded. In this manner he went out of life full of no fewer pains than wickednesses.” The aforesaid is from Josephus. In which we see verified that sentence of the Psalm: “God is just, and a lover of justice, and his eyes look upon equity.” We also see here the beauty and greatness of divine justice, which permitted that this tyrant should pardon neither himself nor his own sons, he who did not pardon those of others, and that he should pay this debt not only with the hastened death that he rabidly took with his hands, but also with that terrible and prolonged illness that he wished to redeem with his own death. Which illness was of such a quality that the very physicians who cured him understood that that ailment came to him from heaven for his great sins. For this rule we must hold as general and true: that when extraordinary calamities come upon a tyrant, extraordinary wickednesses or cruelties having preceded, we must understand by this punishment the severity of divine justice and providence, which by this means declares itself and gives motive to men who are scandalized to preach the divine praises. Conformably to which the Prophet says: “The just man shall rejoice when he shall see the vengeance, and he shall wash his hands in the blood of the sinner.” He means to say that, with the example of this punishment and with the fear of divine justice, he will labor to justify and purify his soul.
The same Josephus relates another extraordinary punishment of another Herod, who is the one who beheaded James, and seized Saint Peter to do as much to him. This one, then, being indignant against the dwellers of Tyre and of Sidon, and they coming with all humility to ask him pardon because of the necessity that they had of him, went out to a platform richly dressed in royal garments to make an oration to these peoples who were present. Then they, raising their voices, began to flatter him, saying: “These are words of God, and not of man.” With this the unfortunate and mad king in such manner swelled with pride and became vain with this flattery, that in place of giving glory to God, he took it for himself, judging that that so great praise fit in him. At this point Josephus says that an angel of God struck him, and thus, eaten and consumed by worms, he disastrously ended his life. Where it is much to consider that, this wicked man having beheaded one Apostle and imprisoned another, he did not receive any punishment, but now he received this so great one for having stolen the glory from God and attributed it to himself: so that by this may be understood the danger that there can be in vainglory and in presumption and esteem of oneself.
With these aforesaid examples we shall join those of the emperors who persecuted the Church, beginning from Nero, who for the greater part had disastrous ends, as in the second part of this writing we declare. And among these very notable is the terrible punishment of Maximinus, and the miserable illness that he suffered, which the very physicians confessed to be punishment from God because of the greatness of his wickednesses and cruelties, as in its proper place we declare.
These examples are from gentile writers, for those who do not give faith to Christians. But with all that I shall refer here another example that in Sacred Scripture is written of King Antiochus, whose wickednesses and cruelties toward the people of God were such that they cannot be explained except by saying that almost all the things that Antichrist has to do against the honor of Christ this man did to destroy the worship of God. This is the one who martyred those happy and blessed seven Maccabean brothers with their most holy mother, and the one who
filled the holy temple with ruffians and bad women, and commanded it to be entitled by the name of Jupiter, and placed the statue of this idol where the ark of the Testament was. And among other slaughters that are written of him, one was that in the space of three days there were killed eighty thousand men and forty thousand captives, and as many others sold. But divine providence, which never sleeps, after having punished the sins of his people by the hand of this tyrant, took from him the vengeance that his wickednesses deserved, because he did not do this as minister of God, but as cruel tyrant. And thus he was punished with such illness that he himself understood that it was not natural nor ordinary, but that it came from on high. For coming on the road, suddenly God struck him with an incredible pain and torment of the entrails. And the evil did not stop here, but all the body was covered with sores so horrible that from them flowed streams of worms that gnawed his flesh day and night, and from them came out so pestilential a stench that all the army that came with him was oppressed by it, and he himself could not bear it. The miserable man, then, knowing the scourge of God upon himself, began, although late, to humble himself and recognize the power of God and the wickedness of his sins. And thus he said: “It is a just thing to subject oneself to God, and that mortal man should not wish to put himself on equality with him.” And repentant with this knowledge, he promised to make the city of Jerusalem equal with that of Athens, which he was coming to lay waste, and to privilege all the Jews as Athenian citizens, and that he would adorn the temple with precious and rich gifts, and would multiply the sacred vessels, and would command that from the rents of his public granaries the cost of all the sacrifices should be paid. And over all this, that he would convert himself to the faith of the Jews, and would go about preaching everywhere the greatness of the power and glory of God.
All these are words of Sacred Scripture, which, although they serve for many other purposes, yet I have brought them here so that both this example and all the others that we have said, together with the reasons alleged, may declare to us how that sovereign Judge has special providence, not only of the brute animals, but much more of man, as of the more principal creature, giving to each one his deserved thing according to his works, to all generally in the other life, and to many also in this one, as the past examples testify. This is one of the greatest consolations that the good have in all their labors, flattering themselves with the hope of the reward, and this same is the greatest bridle that the lukewarm and negligent have, knowing that there is punishment and pain for them, who, as much as is on the part of their malice, would not wish that God knew the evils that they do, nor that he could punish them, so that they might more without remorse of conscience wallow in the mire of their vices. And with this they make God blind so as not to see, and weak so as not to be able to punish, and unjust so as not to do justice. And this, as much as is on the part of their desire, is to wish that there be no God, because such a God as they desire, without wisdom, without power, and without justice, cannot be God. But Solomon undeceives these and all of us, who concludes all the dispute of his Ecclesiastes saying: “Let us hear the end to which all this dispute is ordered. Fear God and keep his commandments, because this is the whole being of man. And all the things that in this life are done, God will bring to judgment, whether they be good or whether evil, to give to each one his deserved thing, which is the proper office of divine providence.”