Certain philosophers once asked the elders at Rome, " If your God has no pleasure in idolatry, why does He not destroy the objects of it?® "And so He would,® was the reply, *if only such objects were worshiped as the world does not stand in need of; but you idolators will worship the sun and moon, the stars and the constellations. Should He destroy the world because of the fools there are in it? No! The world goes on as it has done all the same, but they who abuse it will have to answer for their conduct. On your philosophy, when one steals a measure of wheat and sows it in his field it should by rights produce no crop; nevertheless the world goes on as if no wrong had been done, and they who abuse it will one day smart for it.®