2 Esdras 5:42-44

Revised Standard Version

⁴² He said to me, “I shall liken my judgment to a circle;^[a] just as for those who are last there is no slowness, so for those who are first there is no haste.”

⁴³ Then I answered and said, “Couldst thou not have created at one time those who have been and those who are and those who will be, that thou mightest show thy judgment the sooner?”

⁴⁴ He replied to me and said, “The creation cannot make more haste than the Creator, neither can the world hold at one time those who have been created in it.”