Since then mankind has a certain end, and since there is a certain means necessary for the universal end of nature, it necessarily follows that nature aims at obtaining that means. And therefore the Philosopher, in the second book of _Natural Learning_,[241] well shows that nature always acts for the end. And since nature cannot reach this end through one man, because that there are many actions necessary to it, which need many to act, therefore nature must produce many men and set them to act. And besides the higher influence,[242] the powers and properties of inferior spheres contribute much to this. And therefore we see not only that individual men, but also that certain races are born to govern, and certain others to be governed and to serve, as the Philosopher argues in the _Politics_;[243] and for the latter, as he himself says, subjection is not only expedient, but just, even though they be forced into subjection. [Footnote 241: Arist. _Phys. Ausc._ ii. 1.--(W.)] [Footnote 242: _I.e._ of the heavens. Witte quotes _Parad._ viii. 97, _Purg._ xiv. 38.] [Footnote 243: I. 5, 11; 6, 9.--(W.)] And if this is so, it cannot be doubted that nature ordained in the world a country and a nation for universal sovereignty; if this were not so, she would have been untrue to herself, which is impossible. But as to where that country is, and which is that nation, it is sufficiently manifest, both from what we have said and from what we shall say, that it was Rome and her citizens or people; and this our poet very skilfully touches on in the sixth _Æneid_, where he introduces Anchises prophesying to Æneas, the ancestor of the Romans: "Others may mould the breathing bronze more delicately--I doubt it not; they may chisel from marble the living countenance; they may surpass thee in pleading causes; they may track the course of the heavens with the rod, and tell when the stars will rise; but thou, Roman, remember to rule the nations with thy sway. These shall be thy endowments--to make peace to be the custom of the world; to spare thy foes when they submit, and to crush the proud."[244] And again, Virgil skilfully notes the appointment of the _place_, in the fourth _Æneid_, when he brings in Jupiter speaking to Mercury concerning Æneas: "His fair mother did not promise him to us to be such as this: it was not for this that twice she rescues him from Grecian arms; but that there should be one to rule over Italy, teeming with empires, tempestuous with wars." It has, therefore, sufficiently been shown that the Roman people was by nature ordained to empire. Therefore it was of right that they gained empire, by subduing to themselves the world. [Footnote 244: _Æn._ vi. 848, iv. 227.--(W.)] VIII.--But in order properly to discover the truth in our inquiry, we must recognise that the judgment of God is sometimes made manifest to men, and sometimes hidden from them. It may be made manifest in two ways, namely, by reason and by faith.