(_b_) Providence is to be distinguished from preservation. While preservation is a maintenance of the existence and powers of created things, providence is an actual care and control of them. (_c_) Since the original plan of God is all-comprehending, the providence which executes the plan is all-comprehending also, embracing within its scope things small and great, and exercising care over individuals as well as over classes. (_d_) In respect to the good acts of men, providence embraces all those natural influences of birth and surroundings which prepare men for the operation of God’s word and Spirit, and which constitute motives to obedience. (_e_) In respect to the evil acts of men, providence is never the efficient cause of sin, but is by turns preventive, permissive, directive, and determinative. (_f_) Since Christ is the only revealer of God, and he is the medium of every divine activity, providence is to be regarded as the work of Christ; see 1 Cor. 8:6—“one Lord, Jesus Christ, through whom are all things”; _cf._ John 5:17—“My Father worketh even until now, and I work.” The Germans have the word _Fürsehung_, forseeing, looking out for, as well as the word _Vorsehung_, foreseeing, seeing beforehand. Our word “providence” embraces the meanings of both these words. On the general subject of providence, see Philippi, Glaubenslehre, 2:272-284; Calvin, Institutes, 1:182-219; Dick, Theology, 1:416-446; Hodge, Syst. Theol., 1:581-616; Bib. Sac., 12:179; 21:584; 26:315; 30:593; N. W. Taylor, Moral Government, 2:294-326. Providence is God’s attention concentrated everywhere. His care is microscopic as well as telescopic. Robert Browning, Pippa Passes, _ad finem_: “All service is the same with God—With God, whose puppets, best and worst, Are we: there is no last nor first.” Canon Farrar: “In one chapter of the Koran is the story how Gabriel, as he waited by the gates of gold, was sent by God to earth to do two things. One was to prevent king Solomon from the sin of forgetting the hour of prayer in exultation over his royal steeds; the other to help a little yellow ant on the slope of Ararat, which had grown weary in getting food for its nest, and which would otherwise perish in the rain. To Gabriel the one behest seemed just as kingly as the other, since God had ordered it. ‘Silently he left The Presence, and prevented the king’s sin, And holp the little ant at entering in.’ ‘Nothing is too high or low, Too mean or mighty, if God wills it so.’ ” Yet a preacher began his sermon on Mat. 10:30—“The very hairs of your head are are all numbered”—by saying: “Why, some of you, my hearers, do not believe that even your heads are all numbered!”