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THE CORONATION 279
ernments, bringing to naught the counsels of hell for
the destruction of Christianity in our times. We do not
merit this protection of the infinite power, because all
are united in rousing the divine wrath and the whole
world has joined hands with the infernal fiends, into
whose power it has fallen on account of the blind and
insane pursuit of evil rampant among men.
297. In the conversion of saint Paul this assistance
of the Most High is openly manifest; for He had set
him apart even in the womb of his mother, and chosen
him as an Apostle and as a vase of election. Although
his life before the persecution of the Church was a series
of events, which deceived the demons just as he is de
ceived in many other souls, yet God watched him from
the moment of his conception and regulated his natural
character and the care of the angels in his defense and
protection. Hence the hatred of the devil and their de
sire of causing his death in the first years of his life
increased. As they failed in this, and as they later saw
him become a persecutor of the Church, they were solici
tous to preserve his life. When the holy angels found
themselves powerless to withdraw Paul from the error,
to which he had entirely dedicated himself, the powerful
Queen entered the combat and made his cause her own.
Through Her, Christ and the eternal Father interposed
his divine assistance and snatched him from the grasp of
the dragon.
all
In one instant at the apparition of the Lord,
the demons that accompanied saint Paul on the way
to Damascus, were hurled to the abyss.
298. On that occasion Lucifer and his cohorts felt
the lash of the divine Omnipotence filled with fear and
;
consternation they for some days lay lifeless in the
depths of the infernal caverns. But as soon as the Lord
took away from their minds the remembrance of the
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