John 9:2-3 as the refusal of the question. Neither this man nor his parents sinned, but that the works of God be made manifest in him. Neville puts it against his own vision of the sea of human imperfection and says he felt no human compassion and did not care who had sinned: the question simply dissolves in the presence of the power that remakes them. It belongs with his standing rejection of retribution - affliction is not payment owed but the occasion of a work - and he extends it to history, quoting Proverbs: he has made everything for its purpose, even the wicked for the day of trouble.