31. See Lk 12:28.6.
298 The Literal Meaning ofGenesis subjection of these things as well to the regulation of the divine command, while it does indeed escape our notice, is not absent from the nature of the universe.
But why turn to the psalm? We have it from the mouth of the Savior himself that not a single sparrow falls to the ground without the will of God, and that he is the one who clothes the grass of the field, so soon to be thrown onto the bonfire.31 Does this not confirm our confidence that it is notjust the whole of this part of the cosmos allotted to things mortal and perishable, but even the most insignificant and disregarded particles of it, that are governed by divine Providence?
Further arguments in support of God's providential control of the world
22, 43. Now these people who deny this and do not agree with holy words of such weighty authority, but assume that this part of the cosmos is just tossed about by fortuitous upheavals rather than being regulated by the Wisdom of the divine Majesty, set about "proving" their point by a double argument: the one I have just mentioned about the unpredictable irregularity of storms; and another from the good and bad fortunes of human beings, which happen to them in total disregard of their deserts. But if they would only observe in this same part of the cosmos the marvelous ordering of the bodily organs of any living creature you like, which is apparent to any person of average intelligence and sense, not just to members of the medical profession who have dissected and examined them sedulously in performance of their art, then surely they would exclaim, would they not, that not for a single moment of time does this same part of the world cease to be governed by God, from whom comes every standard of measures, every balance of numbers, every system of weights.32
So can there be any idea, then, more absurd, more insipidly irrational than to assert that this whole part of the cosmos is void of the beck and call of Provi dence, when you can see how the least, the meanest things in it are formed with such regular precision, that if you reflect upon them a little more attentively, the inexpressible wonder of it will almost make your hair stand on end? And since the nature of the soul excels the nature of the body, what could be more mindless than to suppose that there is no judgment of providence upon the morals of human beings, when so many indications of its ingenuity can be brilliantly demonstrated in their flesh? But because these trifles are readily available to our senses, and we can easily investigate them, the ordered regularity of things is limpidly evident in them, while matters in which the order is not apparent to us are reckoned to lack any order by people who assume that anything they cannot see does not exist, or else if they allow its existence assume that it is just like whatever they are used to seeing.
31. See Lk 12:28.6. 32. See Wis 11:20.