It is proved by the testimony of illustrious authors that God stretched forth His hand to work miracles on behalf of the Roman Empire. For Livy, in the first part of his work, testifies that a shield fell from heaven into the city chosen of God in the time of Numa Pompilius, the second king of Rome, whilst he was sacrificing after the manner of the Gentiles. Lucan mentions this miracle in the ninth book of his Pharsalia, when he is describing the incredible force of the South wind. He says: "Surely it was thus, while Numa was offering sacrifices, that the shield fell with which the chosen patrician youth moves along. The South wind, or the North wind, had spoiled the people that bore our shields."[217] And when the Gauls had taken all the city, and, under cover of the darkness, were stealing on to attack the Capitol itself, the capture of which was all that remained to destroy the very name of Rome, then as Livy, and many other illustrious writers agree in testifying, a goose, which none had seen before, gave a warning note of the approach of the Gauls, and aroused the guards to defend the Capitol.[218] And our poet commemorates the event in his description of the shield of Æneas in the eighth book. "Higher, and in front of the temple stood Manlius, the watchman of the Tarpeian keep, guarding the rock of the Capitol. The palace stood out clear, rough with the thatch which Romulus had laid; here the goose, inlaid in silver, fluttered on the portico of gold, as it warned the Romans that the Gauls were even now on the threshold."[219] [Footnote 217: Luc. ix. 477.--(W.)] [Footnote 218: V. Liv. v. 47, and the _Convito_, iv. 5.--(W.)] [Footnote 219: _Æn._ viii. 652.--(W.)] And when the nobility of Rome had so fallen under the onset of Hannibal, that nothing remained for the final destruction of the Roman commonwealth, but the Carthaginian assault on the city, Livy tells us in the course of his history of the Punic war, that a sudden dreadful storm of hail fell upon them, so that the victors could not follow up their victory.[220] [Footnote 220: Liv. xxvi. 11; Oros. iv. 17.--(W.)] Was not the escape of Cloelia wonderful, a woman, and captive in the power of Porsenna, when she burst her bonds, and, by the marvellous help of God, swam across the Tiber, as almost all the historians of Rome tell us, to the glory of that city?[221] [Footnote 221: Liv. ii. 13; Oros. ii. 5.--(W.)] Thus was it fitting that He should work who foresaw all things from the beginning, and ordained them in the beauty of His order; so that He, who when made visible was to show forth miracles for the sake of things invisible, should, whilst invisible, also show forth miracles for the sake of things visible.