That the
operations of uses from the Lord by spheres proceeding from him, are the
divine providence, was said above, n. 386; this divine providence
therefore is meant by the sphere of protection and support of those who
cannot protect and support themselves: for it is a law of creation that
the things created are to be preserved, guarded, protected, and
supported; otherwise the universe would fall to decay: but as this
cannot be done immediately from the Lord with living creatures, who are
left to their own choice, it is done mediately by his love implanted in
fathers, mothers, and nurses. That their love is from the Lord
influencing them, is not known to themselves, because they do not
perceive the influx, and still less the Lord's omnipresence: but who
does not see, that this principle is not of nature, but of the divine
providence operating in and by nature; and that such a universal
principle cannot exist except from God, by a certain spiritual sun,
which is in the centre of the universe, and whose operation, being
without space and time, is instant and present from first principles in
last? But in what manner that divine operation, which is the Lord's
divine providence, is received by animate subjects, will be shewn in
what follows.
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