Page:Popular Science Monthly Volume 1.djvu/170

160 And elsewhere:

And again:

The late catastrophes on the Continent are similarly explained by a French writer who, like the English writer just quoted, professes to have looked behind the veil of things; and who tells us what have been the intentions of God in castigating his chosen people, the French. For it is to be observed in passing that, just as the evangelicals among ourselves think we are divinely blessed because we have preserved the purity of the faith, so it is obvious to the author of "La Main de l'Homme et le Doigt de Dieu" as to other Frenchmen, that France is hereafter still to be, as it has hitherto been, the leader of the world. This writer, in chapters entitled "Causes providentielles de nos malheurs," "Les Prussiens et les fléaux de Dieu," and "Justification de la Providence," carries out his interpretations in ways we need not here follow, and then closes his "Epilogue" with these sentences:

"If France could have known how to profit by the disasters she has suffered, God would have bestowed on her His chiefest favors. But she is stiff-necked in error and vice. Let us be assured that God will save her in spite of herself, regenerating her by water and by fire. When man is powerless, then it is that God's wisdom is displayed. But oh the tribulations, the anguish! Happy