De Lubac traces the searchings of ancient thinkers whose restless questioning revealed a sense of divine calling but without the means of interpreting the signs pointing to it. (faith.org.uk)
Many ancient thinkers conceived of the supreme God as far removed from the material world and too pure to have anything directly to do with it. (religion-online.org)
Supernatural intervention was much less a problem for ancient thinkers than it has become for us, with our conception of the orderly processes of nature; for the race, as for the individual, «heaven lies about us in our infancy.» (religion-online.org)