Wisdom 16:3-5

New Catholic Bible

³ Thus, the idolaters, repulsed by the sight of loathsome creatures^[a] sent to plague them,
    lost their appetite even though suffering from hunger,
while your own people, after a short period of privation,
    partook with pleasure of rare delicacies.
⁴ For these idolaters necessarily had to be afflicted with inexorable want,
    sufficient to indicate to your people how their enemies were being tormented.

⁵ Even when the venomous rage of wild animals terrorized your people
    and they were perishing from the bites of wriggling serpents,
    your anger did not continue to the uttermost.