you,” says He, “whom if his son ask bread, will he give him a stone? Or if he ask a fish, will he give him a serpent? If ye then, being evil, know how to give good gifts unto your children, how much more shall your Father which is in heaven give good things to them that ask Him?” How do the evil give good things? Now, He has called those evil450 who are as yet the lovers of this world and sinners. And, in fact, the good things are to be called good ac- cording to their feeling, because they reckon these to be good things. Although in the nature of things also such things are good, but temporal, and pertaining to this feeble life: and whoever that is evil gives them, does not give of his own; for the earth is the Lord’s, and the fulness thereof,451 who made heaven, and earth, the sea, and all that therein is.452 How much reason, therefore, there is for the hope that God will give us good things when we ask Him, and that we cannot be deceived, so that we should get one thing instead of another, when we ask Him; since we even, although we are evil, know how to give that for which we are asked? For we do not deceive our children; and whatever good things we give are not given of our own, but of what is His. 450 This has been regarded as a strong proof-text for the doctrine of original sin. Bengel calls it “a shining testimony for original sin.” Stier says it is “the strongest proof-text for original sin in the whole of the Holy Scriptures.” Meyer says the reference is to actual sin; while Plumptre declares that “the words at once recognise the fact of man’s depravity, and assert that it is not total.” 451 Ps. xxiv. 1. 452 Ps. cxlvi. 6. 142 Chapter XXI