WISDOM 19

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¹But upon the ungodly there came unto the end indignation without mercy; For their future also God foreknew,

²How that, having changed their minds to let thy people go, And having speeded them eagerly on their way, They would repent themselves and pursue them.

³For while they were yet in the midst of their mourning, And making lamentation at the graves of the dead, They drew upon themselves another counsel of folly, And pursued as fugitives those whom with intreaties they had cast out.

⁴For the doom which they deserved was drawing them unto this end, And it made them forget the things that had befallen them, That they might fill up the punishment which was yet wanting to their torments,

⁵And that thy people might journey on by a marvellous road, But they themselves might find a strange death.

⁶For the whole creation, each part in its several kind, was fashioned again anew, Ministering to thy several commandments, That thy servants might be guarded free from hurt.

⁷Then was beheld the cloud that shadowed the camp, And dry land rising up out of what before was water, Out of the Red sea an unhindered highway, And a grassy plain out of the violent surge;

⁸By which they passed over with all their hosts, These that were covered with thy hand, Having beheld strange marvels.

⁹For like horses they roamed at large, And they skipped about like lambs, Praising thee, O Lord, who wast their deliverer.

¹⁰For they still remembered the things that came to pass in the time of their sojourning, How that instead of bearing cattle the land brought forth lice, And instead of fish the river cast up a multitude of frogs.

¹¹But afterwards they saw also a new race of birds, When, led on by desire, they asked for luxurious dainties;

¹²For, to solace them, there came up for them quails from the sea.

¹³And upon the sinners came the punishments Not without the tokens that were given beforehand by the force of the thunders; For justly did they suffer through their own wickednesses, For grievous indeed was the hatred which they practised toward guests.

¹⁴For whereas the men of Sodom received not the strangers when they came among them; The Egyptians made slaves of guests who were their benefactors.

¹⁵And not only so, but God shall visit the men of Sodom after another sort, Since they received as enemies them that were aliens;

¹⁶Whereas these first welcomed with feastings, And then afflicted with dreadful toils, Them that had already shared with them in the same rights.

¹⁷And moreover they were stricken with loss of sight (Even as were those others at the righteous man’s doors), When, being compassed about with yawning darkness, They sought every one the passage through his own door.

¹⁸For as the notes of a psaltery vary the character of the rhythm, Even so did the elements, changing their order one with another, Continuing always the same, each in its several sound; As may clearly be divined from the sight of the things that are come to pass.

¹⁹For creatures of the dry land were turned into creatures of the waters, And creatures that swim trode now upon the earth:

²⁰Fire kept the mastery of its own power in the midst of water, And water forgat its quenching nature:

²¹Contrariwise, flames wasted not the flesh of perishable creatures that walked among them; Neither melted they the ice-like grains of ambrosial food, that were of nature apt to melt.

²²For in all things, O Lord, thou didst magnify thy people, And thou didst glorify them and not lightly regard them; Standing by their side in every time and place.