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and boasting in all the lawless things they do. They have humbled Your people, O Lord, and afflicted Your inheritance. They killed the widow and the sojourner, and they murdered the orphans. And they said, The Lord will not see, nor will the God of Jacob understand. It was not enough, he says, for the sinners to sin against themselves, but now they also rose up against Your people and Your Church, humbling some, afflicting others, and completely destroying others. And they have dared these things against Your people, O Lord, and against Your inheritance, all but thinking impious and blasphemous things about You. For they said in themselves, reasoning impiously: The Lord will not see, nor will the God of Jacob understand. Therefore, as if You do not see or understand, they attempt to do such great things against Your people, and against Your inheritance, and against widows and sojourners and orphans, those who according to man are unprotected and helpless. They did not do these things so much against them as against You, O Lord; for the oppressed were Your people and Your inheritance; and those oppressing them, blaspheming and acting impiously against You, reasoned these things, as if You did not exist, nor see, nor understand, nor avenge the things being done. Wherefore I rightly said in prayer, How long, O Lord, will sinners, how long will they persist in doing these things? One must understand the people and inheritance of God to be of old the nation of the Jews, since Jacob his people became the Lord's portion, Israel the lot of his inheritance. But after their rejection, which a certain prophetic word presents, saying: I have forsaken my house, I have left my inheritance; it introduces a new people from the nations in their place, according to another prophecy speaking in the person of Christ: Ask of me, and I will give you the nations for your inheritance, and the ends of the earth for your possession. Understand then, you senseless among the people, and you fools, at some time be wise. Shall he who planted the ear not hear? Or he who formed the eye not perceive? Shall he who instructs nations not rebuke, he who teaches man knowledge? The Lord knows the thoughts of men, that they are vain. The Prophet, having despaired and humanly lamented about the things dared by the impious, and having prayed and said: Be exalted, O judge of the earth, render a recompense to the proud; but also as having roused God, and stirred him up by saying: They have afflicted and humbled your people and your inheritance, and they said, the Lord will not see, nor will the God of Jacob understand; he is filled with the power of the Holy Spirit, and as if to those who have said: 23.1200 The Lord will not see, nor will the God of Jacob understand, he answers, saying: And how, O you who are truly blind in understanding, can he who provided these things to those who do not have them not see or hear? For surely he who imparts to others first possesses these things which he imparts. And the argument is stated in the form of a syllogism and is constructive of the dogma concerning providence. And it is especially fitting to apply the mind to such places of the divine Scriptures, for the proof that an irrational faith is not put forward to us by them, but that they provide the testimonies of the dogmas with clear reasonings and logical proofs; And countless such things would be scattered throughout the sacred books. Therefore he reasons with the impious and atheists who assert that God does not watch over human affairs. For which is it, he says, O you men, did the nature of living beings come into existence automatically, or did it come from some cause? Therefore, to claim that inanimate and soulless and unintelligent matter rashly and randomly, irrationally and automatically, produced so many living creatures and such a construction for each kind of living thing, and the forms and species in them, and such an arrangement of parts and limbs, and the variety of beauty, and so many differences, is extremely foolish and