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They probably felt, as the full vision of his sufferings burst upon them, that the ordinary consolations would not suit the case. In this state of mind they were peculiarly open to the suggestions of the malevolent being into whose hands God had permitted Job to fall. Satan therefore easily induced them to adopt his own ideas, and shook their confidence in the piety of their friend. They seem unanimously to have adopted the opinion, that these great calamities were proofs of great criminality, and, therefore, that Job could not be the real friend of God. In accordance with this idea, instead of seeking to console, and making their real sympathy a comfort, they regard him as a hypocrite, and administer rebuke and reproof, trying to convince him that God, on whom he relied, was displeased with him. Oh! it required an intellect of the highest order, as well as exalted piety, to resist all these influences! How trying must it have been to the bowed sufferer to feel that his own friends, aged and dear friends, friends who had known him long and familiarly, did not understand him, had lost confidence in him, could not be persuaded of his sincerity and truthfulness! What a sense of isolation and injustice must have weighed down his spirit! and if, in his efforts to vindicate himself under all these circumstances, an impatient word dropped from his lips, or his self-vindication was carried too far, which of us will dare to do more than to pity him? or while we do acknowledge the sin, must we not still admire the piety and patience of the man? How far superior to the great mass of men does he show himself, even while he sins! Yes, Job did sin! but even in the midst of his sin he presents a spectacle of sublime moral greatness, such as our world has never seen in any other mere man. He did sin! but we all feel that it was the sin of a great and good man. Jesus Christ is the only perfect model.

Endeavour to bring up before your mind this noble sufferer as here presented, to realize the powerful and terrible forces by which he was at the same time assailed, all urging to one single

point-to induce him to curse God, to renounce Him, as the only object of love and worship.

You must bear in mind throughout the whole of his trials, who was the real adversary that had arrayed all his forces against the solitary man. You must not forget that it was that mighty and powerful being, who once stood near the throne of God-that noble creature, who had mind and power enough to dare, even in heaven, to think of seizing the throne of the Almighty; who had power and might and hardihood enough to imagine that it was possible to be successful in a contest even with Jehovahthat being, who was able to overcome our first parents in all their glory as they came from the hands of their Creator-that fearful one, who dared to meet in hostile array the Son of God when he was here on earth, and to measure his power with Omnipotence. It was this mighty foe, let loose and unrestrained by God, who stands before the solitary stripped sufferer, driving upon him all his forces, assailing him with the memory of joys and comforts torn away by violence, assailing him with the vivid picture of his scattered fortune swept away in an hour-urging on his throbbing heart the memory of the cruel death- pangs of his loved children -setting before him the vision of their mangled bodies, and urging him by all these to renounce his piety-pleading with him by the pains of his body, by the anguish of his soul under obloquy and contempt, pleading by the solici tation and sympathy of his wife-assailing him with the injustice of his friends, and by their strong arguments to prove to him that God was not his God. And yet that solitary, lon e sufferer stands firm, clinging to his God with an unbroken and un relaxing grasp, exclaiming in his darkest hour, "Though He slay me, yet will I trust in him: I know that my Redeemer liveth;" and if in his anguish both of body and soul he do exclaim, "Cursed be the day of my birth, I am weary of life ;" and if in his self-justification he do sin, must we not still admire and adore the grace of God, by which a creature

so weak in himself was enabled to stand so firmly and so long without sin, and to swerve so little from the pathway of duty?

The trial of faith, resignation, and integrity now draws to an end. The arch-demon who had directed it is completely baffled. God himself in some way visibly appears, to pronounce judgment; shows that he has been no uninterested spectator of his servant's trials, and speaks to Job out of the whirlwind. The address ascribed to Him bears innate evidence that God alone is its author. As a combination of diguity, sublimity, grandeur, and condescension, it is far beyond anything delivered in human language. It asserts the supremacy of the Most High, and that he must be adored the incomprehensibility of his wisdom, and therefore that it is vain to arraign it-the omnipotence of his power, and therefore that it is absurd to resist it-the universality of his greatness, and therefore that it is blindness and ingratitude to deny it.

The awful and sublime address is listened to with conviction. The humiliated sufferer confesses the folly of his arrogance and presumption, abhors himself for his conduct, and exclaims in lowliness of soul, "I have heard of Thee by the hearing of the ear, but now mine eye seeth Thee; therefore I abhor myself, and repent in dust and ashes. Behold, I am vile."

The departure of Satan immediately succeeds. The self-abasement of Job is accepted his friends are severely reprimanded for their judgment concerning him, and for their false and dishonourable views of the providence of God, in contending that he never does or can permit trouble but in cases of wickedness. A sacrifice is demanded of them, and Job is appointed to be their intercessor. Upon the accomplishment of this the severely tried patriarch is restored to his former state of enjoyment, and his prosperity is in every respect doubled.

IX.

THE FAMILY OF ELKANAH.

AMIDST the scenes of war and violence, of alternate struggle and servitude, unfolded in the Book of Judges, the picture of the pious Levite of Ramathaim-zophim and his family, is one of peculiar beauty. The wonderful deeds of the most extraordinary among the Jewish heroes, Samson, were ringing in the ears of the people; the feeble and irresolute Eli was judge and high-priest of Israel, and the sons whom he so criminally indulged were bringing destruction upon themselves and wrath upon the nation, when within the sacred precincts of the tabernacle was growing up the devoted child, the chosen prophet, the pious governor, whose administration was to restore dignity and peace to his country. Elkanah was a peaceable citizen of a town in Mount Ephraim, and a devout servant of Jehovah, as appears from the regularity with which he went up, at stated times, to worship and offer sacrifices. The ark and tabernacle were at Shiloh in the territory of Ephraim, the most powerful and least exposed of the provinces; and thither, to the one place and the one altar consecrated by the presence of Divinity, was the true Israelite bound to repair, whatever disorder might prevail in the ceremonies, or however unworthy might be the priests who ministered in the holy ordiThe character of this exemplary citizen is finely drawn by a few touches in the Bible. He was devotedly attached to Hannah, who seems to have been his first wife. For Peninnah, the mother of his children, he had due respect, and showed it in giving to her and the children the customary portions at the appointed peace-offerings, on which it was usual for the offerer to

nances.

feast with his family. To Hannah, the beloved, he rendered more than the wonted attention; a circumstance which did not escape the jealous observation of her rival. The patience and kindness with which Elkanah bears the arrogance and malevolence of Peninnah, exhibited in a way which must have wounded him most severely, since it imbittered the life of one dearer than himself the tenderness with which he remonstrates with Hannah upon her indulgence of a grief that disturbed their proper performance of religious ceremonies, assuring her of the unchangeable affection which ought to have consoled her for all disappointments—and the fidelity with which he aids her to fulfil her pledge to the Lord, mark him as a faithful husband and father, as well as a true-hearted Hebrew. We know not the motives with which he had married Peninnah; probably the desire of offspring, as in Abraham's case, had influenced him; but like him, he had reason to repent a step involving injury to his own peace, and rendering his house, when his family was assembled, the scene of discord and suffering. On every occasion, and particularly when they went up to Shiloh, to join in the solemn acts enjoined by their religious law-the fortunate mother of sons and daughters, proud of her fertility, and rejoicing that her rival was denied the blessing of children, taunted and provoked Hannah. Peninnah is emphatically called "her adversary," for her conduct was prompted by the most cruel malevolence, and might have generated not only discontent, but envy and vindictive resentment in the mind of the gentle being so wantonly insulted. But Hannah's nature, it seems, was not one ready to apprehend and resent injury. She gave no reply to the taunts hurled against her, even at times when respect for the ordinances of the sanctuary should have checked a vaunting or insolent spirit; she uttered no murmur against the Providence which seemed to have cut her off from the hope of being a mother in Israel; but she felt the reproach intensely and keenly, and poured out her sorrow in

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