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Updated: June 11, 2025
As to the 'pillar of salt' which has excited cavils on the one hand and foolish legends on the other, probably we are to think rather of a heap than of a pillar.
In the Indian court there was no question of his birth one adventurer was equal with the rest. But in Paris, a man attempting to rise provoked all the sarcasm of wit, all the cavils of party; and in polished and civil life, what valour has weapons against a jest? Thus, in civilisation, all the passions that spring from humiliated self-love and baffled aspiration again preyed upon his breast.
These are the petty cavils of petty minds; a poet overlooks the casual distinction of country and condition, as a painter, satisfied with the figure, neglects the drapery. The censure which he has incurred by mixing comick and tragick scenes, as it extends to all his works, deserves more consideration. Let the fact be first stated, and then examined.
There is a great many turnings and windings about suits and trials at law; the enemy, also, with his supersedeas15 cavils, and motions, often defers a speedy issue; wherefore, the man whose is the concern must wait; as the prophet said, "I will look," said he, "unto the Lord; I will wait for the God of my salvation." But how long, prophet, wilt thou wait?
Observe, that among all the objections and cavils that are made and will be made by the ungodly in the day of the Lord Jesus, they have not one about election, and reprobation: they murmur not at all that they were not predestinated to eternal life; and the reason is, because then they shall see, though now they are blind, that God could in his prerogative royal, without prejudice to them that are damned, choose and refuse at pleasure; and besides, they at this day shall be convinced that there was so much reality, and downright willingness in God, in every tender of grace and mercy to the worst of men, and also so much goodness, justness, and reasonableness in every command of the gospel of grace, which they were so often entreated and beseeched to embrace, that they will be drowned in the conviction of this, that they did refuse love, grace, and reason love, I say, for hatred, grace for sin, and things reasonable for things unreasonable and vain.
Having made three successful voyages to America, the Great Eastern, after all her troubles, was beginning to establish her reputation, to confirm the hopes of her friends and silence the cavils of her enemies, when the bad fortune that has been her portion from the cradle once more overwhelmed her, and shook, if it did not altogether destroy, the confidence in her capabilities which the public had been beginning tardily to entertain.
Furthermore, if any sophist cavils that righteousness is in the will, and therefore it cannot be ascribed to faith, which is in the intellect, the reply is easy, because in the schools even such persons acknowledge that the will commands the intellect to assent to the Word of God.
Whenever thou dost meditate upon the cavils uttered by all the people, be they divines, learned or ignorant, the firmer and the more steadfast wilt thou grow in the Faith. For whatsoever hath come to pass, hath been prophesied by them who are the Mines of divine knowledge, and Recipients of God’s eternal law.
But let him beware how he cavils at his own handiwork. 'Tis not for the untrained man under thirty-five to complain of us, when now he knows why we are so. "I'm not denyin' that women are foolish," says George Eliot. "God Almighty made 'em to match the men." "Last night in blue my little love was dressed; And as she walked the room in maiden grace, I looked into her fair and smiling face.
It would simplify and deepen our motives, and thus evolve from them nobler deeds and purer sacrifices. To all objections from so-called prudence, to all calculations from sparse results, to all cavils of onlookers who may carp and seek to hinder, we should have one all-sufficient answer. It is not for us to bandy arguments on such points as these.
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