different places, then to equip one soldier there would have to be as many factories as there are soldiers in the entire army.

Just like these two examples, if the creation of all things in this well-ordered palace, this fine town, this advanced country, this magnificent world is attributed to a single being, it becomes infinitely easy and light and is the reason for the infinite abundance, availability, and munificence we see. Otherwise everything would become so expensive, so difficult, that even if the whole world were to be given to someone, they still could not obtain them.

Tenth Proof

TENTH PROOF

Come, my friend, who has come a little to his senses! We have been here fifteen days [^18] now. If we have not learnt the regulations of this world and do not recognize its king, we shall deserve punishment. We have no excuse, because for fifteen days, as though given a respite, they did not interfere with us. Of course we have not just been left to our own devices. We cannot wander around among these delicate, well-balanced, subtle, skilfully made and instructive creatures like an animal and spoil them; they would not permit us to harm them. The penalties of this country’s august king are bound to be awesome. You can understand how powerful and majestic he is from the way he orders this huge world as though it were a palace, and makes it revolve like a machine. He administers this large country like a house, missing nothing. See, like filling a container and emptying it, he continuously fills this palace, this country, this town, with perfect order, and empties it with perfect wisdom. Like spreading out a table then clearing it away, varieties of foods are brought in turn and given to eat in the form of a great variety of tables [^19] being laid out by an unseen hand in every part of his vast country, and then being cleared away. The unseen hand clears away one, then brings another in its place. You see this too, and if you use your head, you will understand that within that awesome majesty is an infinitely munificent liberality.

[^18]:Fifteen days indicates the age of fifteen, the age of discretion.

[^19]:The tables indicate the face of the earth in summer, during which hundreds of tables of the Most Merciful emerge fresh and various from the kitchens of mercy. Every garden is a cauldron, every tree, a tray-bearer.

And see, just as all these things testify to that unseen being’s sovereignty and unity, so too these revolutions and changes which pass on in succession like caravans and are opened and closed from behind that true veil, testify to his continuance and permanence. For the causes of things