THREE:Among the most interesting of Plutarchs religious writings is one entitled On the Delays in the Divine Vengeance. As might be expected from the name, it deals with a problem closely akin to that which ages before had been made the subject of such sublime imagery and such inconclusive reasoning by the author of the Book of Job. What troubled the Hebrew poet was the apparently undeserved suffering of the just. What the Greek moralist feels himself called on to explain is the apparent prosperity and impunity of the wicked. He will not for a moment admit that crime remains unavengeful; his object is to show why the retribution does not follow directly on the deed. And, in order to account for this, he adduces a number of very ingenious reasons. By acting deliberately rather than in blind anger, the gods wish to read us a useful lesson in patience and forbearance. Sometimes their object is to give the sinner an opportunity for repentance and amendment; or else they may be holding him in reserve for the performance of some beneficial work. At other times, their justice is delayed only that it may be manifested by some signal and striking form of retribution. In many cases, the final stroke has been preceded by long years of secret torment; and even where no suffering seems to be inflicted, the pangs of remorse may furnish a sufficient expiation. Or again, vengeance may be reserved for a future generation. Some persons hold that to267 visit the sins of the fathers on the children is unjust, but in this they are profoundly mistaken. Members of the same family and citizens of the same state are connected as parts of one organic whole; sharing in the benefits which accrue from the good deeds of their predecessors, it is right that they should also share in the responsibility for their crimes. Moreover, the posterity of the wicked inherit a sinful disposition which, as the gods can clearly foresee, would betray itself in overt acts were they not cut off in their youth. And it is equally an error to suppose that the original wrongdoers remain unaffected by the retribution which befalls their descendants. On the contrary, they witness it from the next world, where it adds poignancy to their remorse, and entails on them fresh penalties over and above those which they have already been doomed to suffer.
FORE:Landor went on with his dinner coolly enough. "There's quite likely to be that at any time," he said, "so long as a pious and humane Indian Bureau sends out special agents of the devil who burn down the Agency buildings of peaceful Apaches as a means of inducing them to seek illness and death in malarious river bottoms."
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FORE:But he pleaded entire ignorance, and the others were at considerable pains to enlighten him."Then they all have 'medicine' on," Cairness continued, "redbird and woodpecker feathers, in buckskin bags, or quail heads, or prairie-dog claws. One fellow was making an ornament out of an adobe dollar. Every buck and boy in the band has a couple of cartridge belts and any quantity of ammunition, likewise new shirts and zarapes. They have fitted themselves out one way or another since Crawford got at them in January. I don't think there are any of them particularly anxious to come in."
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FORE:TROOPS ESCORTING THE STAMPED PAPER TO THE CITY HALL, NEW YORK. (See p. 188.)
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FORE:With so powerful a protector, Alexander might safely bid his enemies defiance. The governor of Bithynia had to entreat Lucian, whose life had been threatened by the impostor, to keep out of harms way. Should anything happen to you, he said, I could not afford to offend Rutilianus by bringing his father-in-law to justice. Even the best and wisest man then living yielded to the prevalent delusion. Marcus Aurelius, who was at that time fighting with the Marcomanni, was induced to act on an oracle from Abonuteichus, promising that if two lions were thrown into the Danube a great victory would be the result. The animals made their way safely to the opposite bank; but were beaten to death with clubs by the barbarians, who mistook them for some outlandish kind of wolf or dog; and the imperial army was shortly afterwards defeated with a loss of 20,000 men.346 Alexander helped himself out of the difficulty with the stale excuse that he had only foretold a victory, without saying which side should win. He was not more successful in determining the duration of his own life, which came to an end before he had completed seventy years, instead of lasting, as he had prophesied, for a hundred and fifty. This miscalculation, however, seems not to have impaired his reputation, for even after his death it was believed that a statue of him in the market-place of Parium in Mysia had the power of giving oracles.347
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