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| Chapter LXIX
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Chapter
LXIX.
He continues to say that “neither have
visible things3973
been given to man
(by God), but each individual thing comes into existence and perishes
for the sake of the safety of the whole passing agreeably to the
change, which I have already mentioned, from one thing to
another.” It is unnecessary, however, to linger over the
refutation of these statements, which have been already refuted to the
best of my ability. And the following, too, has been answered,
viz., that “there will neither be more nor less good and evil
among mortals.” This point also has been referred to, viz.,
that “God does not need to amend His work afresh.”3974
| 3974 οὔτε τῷ Θεῷ
καινοτέρας
δεῖ
διορθώσεως. | But it is not as a man who has
imperfectly designed some piece of workmanship, and executed it
unskilfully, that God administers correction to the world, in purifying
it by a flood or by a conflagration, but in order to prevent the tide
of evil from rising to a greater height; and, moreover, I am of opinion
that it is at periods which are precisely determined beforehand that He
sweeps wickedness away, so as to contribute to the good of the whole
world.3975
| 3975 ὅτι
καὶ πάντη
τεταγμένως
αὐτὴν
ἀφανίζων
συμφερόντως
τῷ παντί. | If, however,
he should assert that, after the disappearance of evil, it again comes
into existence, such questions will have to be examined in a special
treatise.3976
| 3976 [See note
supra, p. 524. S.] | It is, then,
always in order to repair what has become faulty3977
| 3977 τὰ σφάλματα
ἀναλαμβάνειν. | that God desires to amend His work
afresh. For although, in the creation of the world, all things
had been arranged by Him in the most beautiful and stable manner, He
nevertheless needed to exercise some healing power upon those who were
labouring under the disease of wickedness, and upon a whole world,
which was polluted as it were thereby. But nothing has been
neglected by God, or will be neglected by Him; for He does at each
particular juncture what it becomes Him to do in a perverted and
changed world. And as a husbandman performs different acts of
husbandry upon the soil and its productions, according to the varying
seasons of the year, so God administers entire ages of time, as if they
were, so to speak, so many individual years, performing during each one
of them what is requisite with a reasonable regard to the care of the
world; and this, as it is truly understood by God alone, so also is it
accomplished by Him.E.C.F. INDEX & SEARCH
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