{"author":null,"backreferences":[{"context_html":"<p>That, therefore, which the whole Church of the true God\r\nholds and professes as its creed, that Christ shall come from\r\nheaven to judge quick and dead, this we call the last day, or\r\nlast time, of the divine judgment. For we do not know how\r\nmany days this judgment may occupy; but no one who reads\r\nthe Scriptures, however negligently, need be told that in them\r\n\"day\" is customarily used for \"time.\" And when we speak\r\nof the day of God's judgment, we add the word last or final\r\nfor this reason, because even now God judges, and has judged\r\nfrom the beginning of human history, banishing from paradise,\r\nand excluding from the tree of life, those first men who perpetrated\r\nso great a sin. Yea, He was certainly exercising<span class=\"pagenum\"><a id=\"Page_346\">[Pg 346]</a></span>\r\njudgment also when He did not spare the angels who sinned,\r\nwhose prince, overcome by envy, seduced men after being\r\nhimself seduced. Neither is it without God's profound and\r\njust judgment that the life of demons and men, the one in\r\nthe air, the other on earth, is filled with misery, calamities,\r\nand mistakes. And even though no one had sinned, it could\r\nonly have been by the good and right judgment of God that\r\nthe whole rational creation could have been maintained in\r\neternal blessedness by a persevering adherence to its Lord.\r\nHe judges, too, not only in the mass, condemning the race of\r\ndevils and the race of men to be miserable on account of the\r\noriginal sin of these races, but He also judges the voluntary\r\nand personal acts of individuals. For even the devils pray\r\nthat they may not be tormented,<a id=\"FNanchor_673_673\"></a><a class=\"fnanchor pginternal\" href=\"#Footnote_673_673\">[673]</a> which proves that without\r\ninjustice they might either be spared or tormented according\r\nto their deserts. And men are punished by God for their\r\nsins often visibly, always secretly, either in this life or after\r\ndeath, although no man acts rightly save by the assistance of\r\ndivine aid; and no man or devil acts unrighteously save by\r\nthe permission of the divine and most just judgment. For, as\r\nthe apostle says, \"There is no unrighteousness with God;\"<a id=\"FNanchor_674_674\"></a><a class=\"fnanchor pginternal\" href=\"#Footnote_674_674\">[674]</a>\r\nand as he elsewhere says, \"His judgments are inscrutable,\r\nand His ways past finding out.\"<a id=\"FNanchor_675_675\"></a><a class=\"fnanchor pginternal\" href=\"#Footnote_675_675\">[675]</a> In this book, then, I shall\r\nspeak, as God permits, not of those first judgments, nor of\r\nthese intervening judgments of God, but of the last judgment,\r\nwhen Christ is to come from heaven to judge the quick and\r\nthe dead. For that day is properly called the day of judgment,\r\nbecause in it there shall be no room left for the ignorant\r\nquestioning why this wicked person is happy and that\r\nrighteous man unhappy. In that day true and full happiness\r\nshall be the lot of none but the good, while deserved and\r\nsupreme misery shall be the portion of the wicked, and of\r\nthem only.</p>","headings":["THE CITY OF GOD.","BOOK TWENTIETH.","ARGUMENT."],"marker_anchor":null,"paragraph_id":"pg45305-paragraph-559"}],"canonical_references":[],"date_end":null,"date_start":null,"deduplication_fingerprint":"a4f8c71dc0b6cb5b945df77a8240888bb44c97f3f14c44584e7aa2db03e0a36c","edition_title":"The City of God, Volume II","edition_translators":["Marcus Dods","George Wilson (Books XVII-XVIII)"],"edition_year":1871,"explicit_reference_candidates":[{"book":"ROM","chapter":9,"kind":"unreviewed","source_notation":"Rom. ix. 14","verse":14,"verse_end":14}],"headings":[],"id":"pg45305-Footnote_674_674","license_url":"https://www.gutenberg.org/policy/license.html","public_import_allowed":false,"record_kind":"original-editor-translator-note","review_required":["work and recension attribution","original-work chronology","Bible reference numbering and citation kind","English edition rights and attribution"],"review_status":"needs_review","rights_evidence":"Provider catalog reports public domain in the USA. Original transcription title leaves state T. & T. Clark, Edinburgh, 1871; printed translator allocation retained. Gutenberg credits Internet Archive/Canadian Libraries without an exact scan identifier. Full provider license preserved with acquired original; republication and per-work metadata remain unreviewed.","source_anchor":"Footnote_674_674","source_ebook":45305,"source_html":"<div class=\"footnote\">\n<p><a id=\"Footnote_674_674\"></a><a class=\"pginternal\" href=\"#FNanchor_674_674\"><span class=\"label\">[674]</span></a> Rom. ix. 14.</p></div>","source_sha256":"7e0ced9e70512f3cf050b53c9d548e36b70d468d875153869f95d8aff5bbb530","source_url":"https://www.gutenberg.org/cache/epub/45305/pg45305-images.html#Footnote_674_674","text_sha256":"f9c7ec88be9e3ab228a544bbbc796c0dbad1b7098db4eac691883aecb9ba64dc","verified":false,"work_id":null}