may be made publicly to our God and Saviour. “The Lord alone shall be exalted in that day.” And at the same time He will publicly justify His admirable providence with which He governs the world. And this is the second reason for the general judgment on the part of God, as we shall see in the
Second Part.
The providence of God seems to us inconsistent. Nothing is more incomprehensible to us mortals than the manner in which God acts with us in this world; and again, there is nothing that gives rise to more complaints, doubts, murmuring, nay, even blasphemies, not merely amongst heathens and heretics, but Catholics too, than the wonderful inscrutability of the divine decrees. Nay, this very circumstance is the cause of there being so many atheists in the world, who think and say that there is no God, or that, if there be one, He takes no concern about the affairs of mortals; He allows things to go as they please; He permits the crooked to appear straight; everything in the world happens according to the free will of men; wind anci weather, heat and cold, rain and sunshine, peace and war, happiness and misery, health and sickness, a short or along life—all these things are the result of chance, or else of the action or wickedness of men. It is true, my dear brethren, that many things are ordained that seem quite irregular and unjust according to our ignorant views, so that it appears impossible that they should come from a God of infinite wisdom, justice, mercy, and love.
As it ordains such incomprehensible things in the world amongst men.
For we see, says St. Augustine, and learn by daily experience that, for instance, a young, clever, and learned man dies prematurely, although his life would have been useful and necessary; while on the other hand an old, worn-out man continues to live, although he is good for nothing, and only a burden to himself and others. We see a father in the bloom of age and health hurried off suddenly by death from his wife and children, the latter thus becoming poor orphans who have great difficulty in finding bread enough to keep off the pangs of hunger; but another remains alive who is like a roaring lion in his home, ill-treating wife and children, drinking all their earnings, and reducing them to beggary. The poor laborer is cast down on a bed of sickness for a long time, although his work is the only means he has of procuring a livelihood; while another who has no need to work is kept in good health, although he makes a bad use of it