18. But what does this mean: “Until the day on which the Lord shall send rain on the earth”? except that He, too, “shall come down like rain upon a fleece, and like the drops that water the earth.” In which passage is disclosed the mystery of the old history where Gideon, the warrior of the mystic conflict, receiving the pledge of future victory, recognized the spiritual sacrament in the vision of his mind, that that rain was the dew of the Divine Word, which first came down on the fleece, when all the earth was parched with continual drought, and by a second true sign, moistened the floor of all the earth with a shower, whilst dryness was upon the fleece.