claimed St. Paul, "we live, and we move, and we are." (Acts xvii. 28.) Hence St. Augustine thus expressed his gratitude: "You place me under obligations to you, O Lord, every moment, because every moment you bestow great benefits on me."
III. God does not merely preserve your life, but guards it from innumerable evils and miseries which others suffer. Thus the miseries of others constitute your benefit. Ask yourself why you are not, like many others, blind, deaf, dumb, lame, or oppressed with a thousand diseases and infirmities? Why have you not, like so many others, been slain or met with accidental death? God has hitherto delivered you from all these misfortunes, in order that you, being grateful for so many favors, "might serve Him without fear, in holiness and justice before Him, all your days." (Luke i. 74.)
THURSDAY.
The Benefit of Preservation.— II.
I. As your preserver, God has not only removed evils from you, as we have already seen, but, acting the part of a most indulgent parent, He has provided you most abundantly with every necessary and convenience. His hands have furnished this lower world for you as a temporary habitation; He has enlightened it with the sun, moon, and stars for your benefit and delight, and has stored it with living animals for your use. In fine, whatever you admire on the surface of the earth or below it, whatever ranges on it or swims in the sea, or inhabits the regions of the air, are all yours. "What is man, that Thou art mindful of him? Thou hast subjected all things under his feet, all sheep and oxen; moreover, the beasts also of the fields, the birds of the air and the
