" Here is somebody else who has not the means to educate her
child, perhaps whose character and intelligence are a good deal below
the average level. Her child is spared, spared for what? Spared for a
career for which it will be entirely unfitted; and the question is, Why
does God do such things, why is the universe governed in this fashion?
And I have had persons say to me: "I have been ill all my life, I have
suffered no end of pain and trouble: I wonder why? What have I done
that I must be burdened and afflicted after this fashion?" So these
questions are coming up perpetually, showing that underlying the
ordinary surface of our common daily life is still this theory that God
arbitrarily governs the world, and rewards people for being good with
health and with money and with children and with all sorts of
prosperity. There is no end of talk in regard to judgments, as they are
called. I remember when I was living in the West I take this as an
illustration as good as any a neighboring small city was badly
devastated by fire. All the ministers around me in my city began to
preach about it as a judgment of God for the supposed wickedness of
this city. One peculiar thing about this particular judgment, which I
noticed as reported in the papers, was that the last thing which the
fire burned was a church; and it left standing next door, and
untouched, a liquor saloon. It seemed to me a very peculiar kind of
divine judgment, if that is what it really was.
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