212. Who does not talk of fortune? Who does not acknowledge it by speaking of it and know something of it by experience? Yet who knows what it is? One cannot deny that it is something, for it exists and occurs, and a thing cannot exist and occur without being caused; but the cause of this something, fortune, is not known. Lest fortune be denied merely because the cause is unknown, consider dice or playing cards and play yourself or ask the players; do any deny that fortune exists? For they play with it and it plays with them surprisingly. Who can repulse it if it opposes him? Does it not laugh then at prudence and wisdom? When you shake the dice or shuffle the cards, does fortune not seem to know and direct the turns and twists of the wrists in favor of one player rather than another for some cause? Can the cause have any other source than divine providence in outermost things where it works along with human prudence in a wonderful way, constant or changeful, concealing itself at the same time? [2] We know that pagans of old acknowledged Fortune and built a temple to her, as Italians did at Rome. It has been granted me to learn many things which I am not permitted to make public about this fortune, which, as was said, is divine providence in outmosts. These made it plain to me that fortune is not an illusion of the mind nor a sport of nature nor something without a cause, for this has no reality, but is visible evidence that divine providence is over the least things in human thought and action. As divine providence occurs in these least things which are insignificant and trifling, why should it not in the significant and important matters of peace and war in the world and of salvation and life in heaven? 213. I know, however, that human prudence bears the rational faculty its way more than divine providence does its way, for the latter does not show itself and the former does. It can be accepted more readily that there is only one life, namely God, and that all men are recipients of life from Him, as we have shown many times, yet this amounts to saying that prudence is from Him, for prudence is part of life. What man, speaking in favor of nature and of human prudence in his reasoning, is not speaking from the natural or external man? And what man, speaking in favor of divine providence and of God in his reasoning, is not speaking from the spiritual or internal man? But, "Pray, write two books," I say to the natural man, "and fill them with plausible, likely and lifelike reasons which in your judgment are solid ones, the one book in favor of one's own prudence, and the other in favor of nature. Then hand them to any angel. I know he will write down on them these few words: `All this is appearance and fallacy.'" XI. DIVINE PROVIDENCE LOOKS TO WHAT IS ETERNAL, AND TO THE TEMPORAL ONLY AS THIS ACCORDS WITH THE ETERNAL