luence to benefit the most unworthy, most
shameful and abandoned profligates. According to the apostle, this
subjection is truly painful, and were the sun a rational creature
obeying its own volition rather than the decree of the Lord God who
has subjected it to vanity against its will, it might deny every one
of these wicked wretches even the least ray of light; that it is
compelled to minister to them is its cross and pain, by reason of
which it sighs and groans.

Just as we Christians endure many kinds of injustice and consequently
sigh for and implore help and deliverance in the Lord's prayer, so do
the creatures sigh. Although they have not human utterance, yet they
have speech intelligible to God and the Holy Spirit, who mark the
creatures' sighs over their unjust abuse by the ungodly.

18. Nowhere else in the Holy Scriptures do we find anything like
Paul's declaration here concerning the earnest expectation and
waiting of the creatures for the revelation of the children of God;
which waiting the apostle characterizes as a sighing in eager desire
for man's redemption. A little later he compares the state of the
creature to a woman in travail, saying it cries out in its anguish.
The sun, moon and stars, the heavens and earth, the bread we eat, the
water or wine we drink, the cattle and sheep, in short, all things
that minister to our comfort, cry out in accusation against the world
because they are subjected to vanity and must suffer with Christ and
his brethren. This accusing cry is beyond human power to express, for
God's created things are innumerable. Rightly was it said from the
pulpit in former times that on the last day all creatures will utter
an accusing cry against the ungodly who have shown them abuse here on
earth, and will call them tyrants to whom they were unjustly
subjected.

19. Paul presents this example of the creatures for the comfort of
Christians. His meaning is: Be not sorrowful because of your
sufferings; they are small indeed when the ensuing transcendent glory
is considered. You are not alone in your tribulation and your
complaint at injustice; the whole creation suffers with you and cries
out against its subjection to the wicked world. Every bleat of the
flock, every low of the herd, is an outcry against the ungodly as
enemies of God and not worthy to enjoy the creatures' ministrations;
not even to receive a morsel of bread or a drink of water. Along this
line St. Augustine is eloquen