SAME VERSE. — 'And over the nation, and over all men.' God provides for the least as for the greatest, and for individuals as for the universe. — As if we were openly admonished to attend to this: that this judgment, which is described over one nation, is also celebrated over all men by an invisible examination, so that one is chosen, another rejected, secretly, but no one unjustly. This, therefore, which we discern to be done in the greatest matters, let us carefully fear also in each of us as individuals. For the divine judgments are extended over one soul just as over one city; over one city just as over one nation; over one nation just as over the whole multitude of the human race; because the Lord both so attends to individuals as if He were free from all,
and so at the same time attends to all, as if He were free from individuals. For He who fills all things by administering, rules by filling; He is neither wanting to the universe when He disposes one, nor wanting to one when He disposes the universe—working all things, that is, at rest by the power of His nature. What wonder, then, that He who works at rest is not straitened when He is intent? Let it therefore be said that He exercises this subtle judgment both over the nation and over all men. [Rec. XIV.] Because therefore He has passed from the species to the genus, now from the genus He turns Himself to the species, and shows what Judea in particular deserves, saying: