The Methodist Zions Herald placed in display type in its issue of December 31, 1941, under the title, "He [Napoleon] Embarrassed God," the following impressive statement from Victor Hugo:
Was it possible that Napoleon should have won that battle? We answer no. Why? Because of Wellington? Because of Bliicher? No. Because of God.
Bonaparte victor at Waterloo ; that does not come within the law of the nineteenth century. Another series of facts was in preparation, in which there was no longer any room for Napoleon. The ill will of events had declared itself long before. It was time that this vast man should fall.
The excessive weight of this man in human destiny disturbed the balance. This individual alone counted for more than a universal group. These plethoras of all human vitality concentrated in a single head ; the world mounting to the brain of one man—this would be mortal to civilization were it to last. The moment had arrived for the incorruptible and supreme equity to alter its plan. Probably the principles and the elements on which the regular gravitations of the moral, as of the material, world depend had complained. Smoking blood, overfilled cemeteries, mothers in tears—these are formidable pleaders. When the earth is suffering from too heavy a burden, there are mysterious groanings of the shades, to which the abyss lends an ear.
Napoleon had been denounced in the infinite, and his fall had been decided on. He embarrassed God.
Waterloo is not a battle; it is a change of front on the part of the Universe.—"Les Miserables, Cosette, Book First—Waterloo."
Hugo is right when he says that Napoleon "embarrassed God." When men controlled by wicked motives attempt with inordinate pride to shape the destinies of this world to suit their own minds, they do embarrass God, and He must remove them and defeat their purposes.
Writes the prophet Isaiah:
"Woe unto them that hide deep their counsel from Jehovah, and whose works are in the dark, and that say, Who seeth us? and who knoweth us? Ye turn things upside down! Shall the potter be esteemed as clay ; that the thing made should say of him that made it, He made me not ; or the thing formed say of him that formed it, He hath no understanding?" Isa. 2915, 16. (See also Isa. 45 :9 ; 64:8; jer. 18: 7-10.)
Hugo is wrong when he hints it is possible for men to think they can work out the destinies of this world, and by so doing cause perplexity to the Divine Sovereign. He who knows the "end from the beginning" is carrying out His program in the history of this world. Daniel assures us that:
"He [God] changeth the times and the seasons ; He removeth kings, and setteth up kings ; He giveth wisdom unto the wise, and knowledge to them that have understanding; He revealeth the deep and secret things ; He knoweth what is in the darkness, and the light dwelleth with Him." Dan. 2 :21, 22: (See also Dan. 4 :25 ; 5:21.)
Indeed, is not this the very purpose of prophecy, to establish in the hearts of men the knowledge that God is supreme, and that His will shall be carried out in the history of the world in spite of all human opposition? Daniel affirmed this when he told King Nebuchadnezzar: "There is a God in heaven that revealeth secrets, and maketh known . . . what shall be in the latter days ;" and when he added farther on : "God hath made known to the king what shall come to pass."
