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For this cause, they were deservedly punished through creatures like those which they worship,
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Instead of this punishment, you, giving benefits to your people,
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to the end that your enemies, desiring food,
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For it was necessary that inescapable lack should come upon those oppressors,
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For even when terrible raging of wild beasts came upon your people,
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but for admonition were they troubled for a short time,
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for he who turned towards it was not saved because of that which was seen,
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Yes, and in this you persuaded our enemies
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For the bites of locusts and flies truly killed them.
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But your children weren’t overcome by the very fangs of venomous dragons,
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For they were bitten to put them in remembrance of your oracles,
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For truly it was neither herb nor poultice that cured them,
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For you have authority over life and death,
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But though a man kills by his wickedness,
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But it is not possible to escape your hand;
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for ungodly men, refusing to know you, were scourged in the strength of your arm,
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For, what was most marvellous,
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For at one time the flame was restrained,
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At another time even in the midst of water it burns more intensely than fire,
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Instead of these things, you gave your people angels’ food to eat,
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For your nature showed your sweetness towards your children,
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But snow and ice endured fire, and didn’t melt,
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and that this fire, again, in order that righteous people may be nourished,
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For the creation, ministering to you, its maker,
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Therefore at that time also, converting itself into all forms,
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that your children, whom you loved, O Lord, might learn
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For that which was not destroyed by fire,
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that it might be known that we must rise before the sun to give you thanks,
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for the hope of the unthankful will melt as the winter’s hoar frost,