CHAPTER 12
1 Lord, how good, and how sweet is thy Spirit in all things [or in us];
2 and therefore thou chastisest by parts these men that err; and thou admonishest [or thou warnest], of which things they sin, and thou speakest to them, that when they have forsaken malice, they believe in thee, Lord.
3 For thou wouldest lose those eld [or old] dwellers of thine holy land, which thou loathest;
4 for they did works hateful to thee, by medicines, that is, by witchcrafts, and false divinings, and sacrifices offered to fiends, and unjust [or unrightwise] sacrifices;
5 and the slayers of their sons, without mercy, and eaters of entrails [or the bowels] of men, and devourers of blood;
6 and by the hands of our fathers thou wouldest lose from thy middle sacrament, that is, from Judea, fathers and mothers, authors of souls, that is, of their children, unhelped;
7 that our fathers should take the worthy pilgrimage of God’s children, which is to thee the dearworthiest land of all.
8 But also thou sparedest these as men, and thou sentest wasps, the before-goers of thine host, that those [or they] should destroy them little and little.
9 Not for thou were unmighty to make wicked [or unpious] men subject to just [or rightwise] men in battle, either to destroy at once, by cruel beasts, either by an hard word;
10 but thou deemedest by parts, and gavest place to penance, and knewest, that the nation of them was wayward [or shrewd], and their malice was kindly, that is, made hard by long custom, and that their thought might not be changed without end.
11 For it was a cursed seed at [or from] the beginning. And thou not dreading any man, gavest forgiveness to the sins of them.
12 For why who shall say to thee, What hast thou done? either who shall stand against thy doom? either who shall come in thy sight, to be avenger of wicked men? either who shall areckon to thee [or who shall reckon to thee], if nations perish, which thou madest?
13 For why none other than thou is God, to whom is charge of all things, that thou show, that thou deemest doom not unjustly. [Forsooth there is none other God than thou, to whom is care of all, that thou show, for not unrightwisely thou deemest doom.]
14 Neither king neither tyrant in thy sight shall inquire of these men, which thou hast lost [or destroyed].
15 Therefore since thou art just, thou disposest justly all things, [or Since then thou art rightwise, all things rightwisely thou disposest]; also Father, thou condemnest him, that oweth not to be punished*, and thou guessest him a stranger from thy virtue.
16 For why thy virtue is the beginning of rightfulness [or of rightwiseness]; and for this, that thou art lord of all men, thou makest thee to spare all men.
17 For thou, that art not believed to be perfect [or full ended] in virtue, thou showest virtue; and thou leadest over these men, that know not thee, in hardiness.
18 But thou, lord [or lordshipper] of virtue, deemest with peaceableness, and disposest us with great reverence; for it is subject to thee to be able to, when thou wilt.
19 Forsooth thou hast taught thy people by such works, that it behooveth a judge to be just, and benign, either merciful; and thou madest thy sons of good hope, for thou deemest, and givest place to penance in sins.
20 For if thou tormentedest the enemies of thy servants, and men due to death with so great perceiving, either attentiveness, and deliveredest, and gavest time and place [or giving time and place], by which they might be changed from malice;
21 with how great diligence deemest thou thy sons, to whose fathers thou gavest oaths and covenants of good promises?
22 Therefore when thou givest chastising [or discipline] to us, thou beatest [or scourgest] manyfold our enemies, that we, deeming, think thy goodness; and when it is deemed of us, that we hope thy mercy.
23 Wherefore and to them, that lived unwisely, and unjustly in their life, thou gavest sovereign torments, by these things which they worshipped.
24 For they erred full long in the way of error, and guessed to be gods these things that be superfluous in beasts, and lived by custom of young children unwittingly [or living by manner of unwise young children].
25 For this thing thou gavest doom, into scorn, as to children unwitting [or unwise];
26 but they, that were not amended by scornings and blamings, feeled the worthy doom of God.
27 For they bare heavily in these things, which they suffered, in which things they suffering had indignation [or disdained]; they seeing him, whom they denied sometime them to know, knew him very God, by these things which they guessed gods among them, when those were destroyed; for which thing and the end of their condemnation shall come on them.
* CHAPTER 12:15 That is, punishest sometime, to proving of his patience, it is openly of saint Job.