III. When Patrocleas had done, Olympicus spoke next: ‘Take another point, Patrocleas; what a grave absurdity these delays and hesitations on the part of Heaven involve! The slowness takes away all assurance of a Providence; and when misfortune comes to bad men, not on the heels of each wicked [Sidenote: C] deed, but later on, they set it down to mischance, and call it a calamity, not a punishment; they do not profit by it, they are annoyed at the things which befall them, but do not repent of the things which they have done. It is so with a horse; the touch of whip or spur which follows immediately on a stumble or blunder sets him up and brings him to his duty; whereas tugs and checks and ratings later on, after an interval, seem to him to have some purpose which is not education, they irritate, but do not school him. And so with vice; if punishment [Sidenote: D] from switch or rein follow every trip and tumble, vice will have the best chance of becoming thoughtful and lowly, and getting the fear of God, as of a Judge who stands over men in their acts and their passions, and does not wait till the day after to-morrow. Whereas, the Justice which moves calmly, “with a slow foot”, as Euripides put it, and falls upon the wicked “when the day comes”, resembles an automaton rather than a Providence, in her vague, procrastinating, unmethodical procedure. Thus I do not see what use there is in those “mills of the Gods” which [Sidenote: E] “grind slowly”, we are told,[206] for they make the form of Justice dim, and the fears of the wicked evanescent.’