286Chapter VII.—“Let Both Grow Together Till the Harvest.”

“But it will be said that the worshippers themselves ought to be taken away by the true God, that others may not do it.  But you are not wiser than God, that you should give Him counsel as one more prudent than He.  He knows what He does; for He is long-suffering to all who are in impiety, as a merciful and philanthropic father, knowing that impious men become pious.  And of those very worshippers of base and senseless things, many becoming sober have ceased to worship these things and to sin, and many Greeks have been saved so as to pray to the true God.