by Coverdale, Let them that curse the daye give it their curse also, even those that be ready to rapse up lebiathan, By leviathan some understand the greatest and most imminent dangers; and others, the deri, whom the enchanters are desperate enough to attempt to raise by their incantations.

Calmet understands the whole to be spoken of the Atlantes, a people of Ethiopia, who curse the sun because it parches their fields and their bodies; and who fearlessly attack, kill, and eat the crocodile. This seems a good sense.

Verse 9. Let the stars of the twilight thereof] The stars of the twilight may here refer to the planets Venus, Jupiter, Mars, and Mercury, as well as to the brighter fixed stars.

Let it look for light] Here the prosopopia or personification is still carried on. The darkness is represented as waiting for the lustre of the evening atar, but is disappointed; and then for the Aurora or down, but equally in vain. He had prayed that its light, the sun, should not shine upon it, ver. 4; and here he prays that its evening star may be totally obscured, and that it might never see the dawning of the day. Thus his execration comprehends every thing that might irradiate or enliven it.

Verse 10. Because it shut not up the doors] Here is the reason why he curses the day and the night in which he was conceived and born; because, had he never been brought into existence, he would never have seen trouble. It seems, however, very harsh that he should have wished the destruction of his mother, in order that his birth might have been prevented; and I rather think Job's execration did not extend thus far. The Targum understands the passage as speaking of the umbilical cord, by which the fetus is nourished in its mother's womb: had this been shut up, there must have been a miscarriage, or be must have been dead born; and thus sorrow would have been hidden from his eyes. This seeming gloss is mach nearer the letter and spirit of the Hebrew than is generally imagined. I shall quote the words:

ki lo sagar dalthey bitni, because it כי לא סגר דלתי ב

did not shut up the doors of my belly. This is much nce consistent with the feelings of humanity, than to wish his mother's womb to have been his grave.

Verse 11. Why died I not from the womb?] As the other circumstance did not take place, why was I not still-born, without the possibility of reviviscence?

day of his birth.

why the breasts that I should suck?

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13 For now should I have lain still and been quiet, I should have slept: then had I been at rest, 14 With kings and counsellors of the earth, which built desolate places for themselves; 15 Or with princes that had gold, who filled their houses with silver.

16 Or as an hidden untimely birth I had Gen. xxx. 3. Isai. lxvi. 12.- d Ch. xv. 28. —e Ps.

lviii. 8.

or, as this did not occur, why did I not die as soon as born? These three things appear to me to be clearly intended here:-1. Dying in the womb, or never coming to maturity, as in the case of an abortion. 2. Being still-born, without ever being able to breathe. 3. Or, if born alive, dying within a short time after. And to these states, he seems to refer in the following verses.

Verse 12. Why did the knees prevent me?] Why was I dandled on the knees? Why was I nourished by the breasts? In either of the above cases I had neither been received into a mother's lap, nor hung upon a mother's breasts.

Verse 13. For now should I have lain still] In that case I had been insensible; quiet-without these overwhelming agitations; slept-unconscious of evil; been at rest-been out of the reach of calamity and sorrow.

Verse 14. With kings and counsellors of the earth] I believe this translation to be perfectly correct. The counsellors, y yoatsey, I suppose to mean the privy council, or advisers of kings; those without whose advice kings seldom undertake wars, expeditions, &c. These mighty agitators of the world are at rest in their graves, after the lives of commotion which they have led among men: most of whom indeed have been the troublers of the peace of the globe.

Which built desolate places] Who erect mausoleums, funeral monuments, sepulchral pyramids, &c., to keep their names from perishing, while their bodies are turned to corruption. I cannot think, with some learned men, that Job is here referring to those patriotic princes who employed themselves in repairing the ruins and desolations which others had occasioned. His simple idea is that, had he died from the womb, he would have been equally at rest, neither troubling nor troubled, as those defunct kings and planners of wars and great designs are, who have nothing to keep even their names from perishing, but the monuments which they have raised to contain their corrupting flesh, mouldering bones, and dust.

Verse 15. Or with princes that had gold] Chief or mighty men, lords of the soil, or fortunate adventurers in merchandise, who got gold in abundance, filled their houses with silver, left all behind, and had nothing reserved for themselves but the empty places which they had made for their last dwelling, and where their dust now sleeps, devoid of care, painful

Job complains of the grievous

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a

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never saw light.

17 There the wicked cease

from troubling; and there the

weary be at rest.

b

and are glad, when they can find the grave?

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man whose way is hid, and whom God hat

k

journies, and anxious expectations, He alludes here to the case of the covetous, whom nothing can satisfy, as an Asiatic writer has observed, but the dust that fills his mouth when laid in the grave.—SAADY.

Verse 16. Or as an hidden untimely birth] An early miscarriage, which was scarcely perceptible by the parent herself; and in this case he had not beenhe had never had the distinguishable form of a human being, whether male or female.

As infants] Little ones; those further advanced in maturity, but miscarried long before the time of birth.

Verse 17. There the wicked cease] In the grave the oppressors of men cease from irritating, harassing, and distressing their fellow-creatures and dependants. And there the weary be at rest.] Those who were worn out with the cruelties and tyrannies of the above. The troublers and the troubled, the restless and the submissive, the toils of the great and the labours of the slave, are here put in opposition.

Verse 18. The prisoners rest together] Those who were slaves, feeling all the troubles, and scarcely tasting any of the pleasures, of life, are quiet in the grave together; and the voice of the oppressor, the hard unrelenting task-master, which was more terrible than death, is heard no more. They are free from his exactions, and his mouth is silent in the dust. This may be a reference to the Egyptian bondage. The children of Israel cried by reason of their oppressors or task-masters.

Verse 19. The small and great are there] All sorts and conditions of men are equally blended in the grave, and ultimately reduced to one common dust; and between the bond and free there is no difference. The grave is

"The appointed place of rendezvous, where all These travellers meet."

Equality is absolute among the sons of men in their entrance into and exit from the world: all the intermediate state is disparity. All men begin and end life alike; and there is no difference between the king and the cottager. A contemplation of this should equally humble the great and the small. The saying is trite, but it is true,

come upon me, and that which I was afrai of is come unto me.

26 I was not in safety, neither had I rest neither was I quiet; yet trouble came.

Lam. iii. 7. i Ch. i. 10. k Heb. before my meas Heb. I feared a fear, and it came upon me.

Pallida mors æquo pulsat pede pauperum tabernas, Regumque turres. HOR. Odar. lib. i., Odiv., ver. 12 "With equal pace impartial Fate Knocks at the palace as the cottage gate."

Death is that state,

"Where they an equal honour share
Who buried or unburied are.
Where Agamemnon knows no more
Than Irus he contemned before.
Where fair Achilles and Thersites lie,
Equally naked, poor, and dry."

And why do not the living lay these things to heart

There is a fine saying in Seneca ad Marciam, cap 20, on this subject, which may serve as a commen on this place: MORS-servitutem invito domino re mittit; hæc captivorum catenas levat; hæc e carcer eduxit, quos exire imperium impotens vetuerat. Hæ est in quo nemo humilitatem suam sensit; hæc que nulli paruit; hæc quæ nihil quicquam alieno feci arbitrio. Hæc, ubi res communes fortuna male divisi et æquo jure genitos alium alii donavit, exæqua omnia.-" Death, in spite of the master, manuinit the slave. It loosens the chains of the prisoners. brings out of the dungeon those whom impoter authority had forbidden to go at large. This is th state in which none is sensible of his humiliation Death obeys no man. It does nothing according t the will of another. It reduces, by a just law, to state of equality, all who in their families and ci cumstances had unequal lots in life."

Verse 20. Wherefore is light given] Why is li granted to him who is incapable of enjoying it, of performing its functions?

Verse 21. Which long for death] They look to as the end of all their miseries; and long more for separation from life, than those who love gold do f a rich mine.

Verse 22. Which rejoice exceedingly] Literall They rejoice with joy, and exult when they find the gra There is a various reading here in one of Kenn cott's MSS., which gives a different sense. Inste of who rejoice, ba “8 eley gil, with Joy, it has ba tbx el

Observations on

the preceding chapter.

Verse 23. To a man whose way is hid] Who knows not what is before him in either world, but is fall of fears and trembling concerning both.

God hath hedged in?] Leaving him no way to escape; and not permitting him to see one step before him. There is an exact parallel to this passage in Lam. 7, 9: He hath hedged me about that I cannot get out. He hath inclosed my ways with hewn stone. Mr. Good translates the verse thus: To the man whose path is broken up, and whose futurity God hath overwhelmed. But I cannot see any necessity for departing from the common text, which gives both an easy and a natural sense.

Verse 24. For my sighing cometh] Some think that this refers to the ulcerated state of Job's body, mouth, hands, &c. He longed for food, but was not able to lift it to his mouth with his hands, nor masticate it when brought thither. This is the sense in which Origen has taken the words. But perhaps it is most natural to suppose that he means his sighing took away all appetite, and served him in place of meat. There is the same thought in Ps. xlii. 3: My tears have been my meat day and night; which place is not an imitation of Job, but more likely Job an imitation of it, or, rather, both an imitation of nature. My roarings are poured out] My lamentations are like the noise of the murmuring stream, or the dashings of the overswollen torrent.

Verse 25. For the thing which I greatly feared] Literally, the fear that I feared; or, I feared a fear, as in the margin. While I was in prosperity I thought adversity might come, and I had a dread of it. I feared the loss of my family and my property; and both Lave occurred. I was not lifted up: I knew that what I possessed I had from Divine Providence, and that he who gave might take away. I am not stripped of my all as a punishment for my self-confidence. Verse 26. I was not in safety] If this verse be read interrogatively, it will give a good and easy sease: Was I not in safety? Had I not rest? Was I not in comfort? Yet trouble came. It is well known that, previously to this attack of Satan, Job was in great prosperity and peace. Mr. Good translites, I had no peace; yea, I had no rest. Yea, I had no respite, as the trouble came on; and refers the whole to the quick succession of the series of heavy evils by which he was tried. There is a similar thought in the Psalmist: Deep crieth unto deep at the voise of thy water-spouts; all thy waves and thy Lakers have gone over me; Ps. xlii. 7. One evil treads

in the heels of another.

In this chapter Job's conflict begins. Now, and not before, Satan appears to have access to his mind. We he deprived him of his property, and, what was still dearer, of his sons and his daughters, the Lage of his family, he bore all with the most exemF patience, and the deepest resignation to the divine will. When his adversary was permitted to truck is body, and afflict it in the most grievous and stres-lug manner, rendered still more intolerable by his being previously deprived of all the comforts and

complaint, no murmur was heard. From the Lord's hand he received his temporal good; and from that hand he received his temporal evil, the privation of that good. Satan was, therefore, baffled in all his attempts; Job continued to be a perfect and upright man, fearing God, and avoiding evil. This was Job's triumph, or rather the triumph of divine grace; and Satan's defeat and confusion.

It is indeed very seldom that God permits Satan to waste the substance or afflict the body of any man; but at all times this malevolent spirit may have access to the mind of any man, and inject doubts, fears, diffidence, perplexities, and even unbelief. And here is the spiritual conflict. Now, their wrestling is not with flesh and blood-with men like themselves, nor about secular affairs; but they have to contend with angels, principalities, and powers, and the rulers of the darkness of this world, and spiritual wickednesses in heavenly places. In such cases Satan is often permitted to diffuse darkness into the understanding, and envelope the heavens with clouds. Hence are engendered false views of God and his providence, of men, of the spiritual world, and particularly of the person's own state and circumstances. Every thing is distorted, and all seen through a false medium. Indescribable distractions and uneasiness are hereby induced; the mind is like a troubled sea, tossed by a tempest that seems to confound both heaven and earth. Strong temptations to things which the soul contemplates with abhorrence are injected; and which are followed by immediate accusations, as if the injections were the offspring of the heart itself; and the trouble and dismay produced are represented as the sense of guilt, from a consciousness of having, in heart, committed these evils. Thus Satan tempts, accuses, and upbraids, in order to perplex the soul, induce scepticism, and destroy the empire of faith. Behold here the permission of God, and behold also his sovereign control: all this time the grand tempter is not permitted to touch the heart, the seat of the affections, nor offer even the slightest violence to the will. The soul is cast down, but not destroyed; perplexed, but not in despair. It is on all sides harassed; without are fightings, within are fears: but the will is inflexible on the side of God and truth, and the heart, with all its train of affections and passions, follows it. The man does not wickedly depart from his God; the outworks are violently assailed, but not taken; the city is still safe, and the citadel impregnable. Heaviness may endure for the night, but joy cometh in the morning. Jesus is soon seen walking upon the waters. He speaks peace to the winds and the sea: immediately there is a calm. Satan is bruised down under the feet of the sufferer; the clouds are dispersed, the heavens re-appear, and the soul, to its surprise, finds that the storm, instead of hindering, has driven it nearer to the haven whither it would be.

The reader who closely examines the subject will find that this was the case of Job. The following chapters show the conflict of the soul; the end of the book, God's victory and his exaltation. Satan sifted Job as wheat, but his faith failed not.

The uncertain and miserable

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9 By the blast of God they perish, and by the breath of

his nostrils are they consumed.

10 The roaring of the lion, and the voice of the fierce lion, and the teeth of the young lions, are broken.

11 The old lion perisheth for lack of prey, and the stout lion's whelps are scattered abroad.

d

12 Now a thing was secretly brought to

* That is, by his anger: as Isai. xxx. 33. See Exod. xv. 8. C. i. 19. xv. 30. Isai. xi. 4. 2 Thess. ii. 8. b Ps. lviii. 6. 4 Heb. by stealth.―e Ch. xxxiii.

Ps. xxxiv. 10.forth good fruit, but a corrupt tree bringeth forth evil fruit. So the Greeks:

Ατης αρουρα θανατον εκκαρπιζεται.

ÆscH. Επτα επι Θηβαις, ver. 607. *The field of iniquity produces the fruit of death." Ύβρις γαρ εξανθουσ' εκαρπωσε σταχυν Ατης, όθεν παγκλαυτον εξαμα θερος.

IB. IIεpoα, ver. 823.

"For oppression, when it springs, Puts forth the blade of vengeance; and its fruit Yields a ripe harvest of repentant woe.”—Potter. The image is common every where, because it is a Universal law of nature.

Verse 9. By the blast of God they perish] As the noxious and parching east wind blasts and destroys vegetation, so the wicked perish under the indignation of the Almighty.

Verse 10. The roaring of the lion] By the roaring ho, fierce lion, old lion, stout lion, and lion's whelps, tyranous rulers of all kinds are intended. The design of Eliphaz in using these figures is to show that even those who are possessed of the greatest suthority and power—the kings, rulers, and princes of the earth-when they become wicked and oppressive to their subjects, are cast down, broken to pieces, and destroyed, by the incensed justice of the Lord; and their helps-their children and intended successors, scattered without possessions over the face of the earth. Verse 11. The old lion perisheth] In this and the preceding verse the word lion occurs five times; and in the original the words are all different:

1.arych, from arah, to tear off. 2. nw shachal, which as it appears to signify black or dark, may mean the black lion, which is said to be found in Ethiopia and India. 3. kephir, a young lion, from caphar, to cover, because he is said to hide himself in order to surprise his prey, which the old ene does not. 4. layish, from w lash, to knead, trample upon; because of his method of seizing his prey. 6. xa labi, from x25 laba, to suckle with the first milk; a lioness giving suck; at which time they are peculiarly fierce. All these words may point out some quality of the lion; and this was probably the cause why they were originally given: but it is likely

little thereof.

13

In thoughts from the visions of the night, when deep sleep falleth on men,

f

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14 Fear came upon me, and trembling, which made all my bones to shake.

h

15 Then a spirit passed before my face; the hair of my flesh stood up:

16 It stood still, but I could not discern the form thereof: an image was before mine eyes, 'there was silence, and I heard a voice, saying,

15. f Heb. met me. titude of my bones.

- Hab. iii. 16. —— Heb. the mul Or, I heard a still voice.

that, in process of time, they served only to designate the beast, without any particular reference to any of his properties. We have one and the same idea when we say the lion, the king of beasts, the monarch of the forest, the most noble of quadrupeds, &c.

Verse 12. Now a thing was secretly brought to me] To give himself the more authority, he professes to have received a vision from God, by which he was taught the secret of the divine dispensations in providence; and a confirmation of the doctrine which he was now stating to Job; and which he applied in a different way to what was designed in the divine communication.

Mine ear received a little thereof.] Mr. Good translates, "And mine ear received a whisper along with it." The apparition was the general subject; and the words related ver. 17, &c., were the whispers which he heard when the apparition stood still.

Verse 13. From the visions of the night] "It is in vain," says Mr. Good, "to search through ancient or modern poetry for a description that has any pretensions to rival that upon which we are now entering. Midnight-solitude-the deep sleep of all around— the dreadful chill and horripilation or erection of the hair over the whole body-the shivering, not of the muscles only, but of the bones themselves--the gliding approach of the spectre—the abruptness of his pause— his undefined and indescribable form-are all powerful and original characters, which have never been given with equal effect by any other writer."

Mr. Hervey's illustration is also striking and natural. ""Twas in the dead of night; all nature lay shrouded in darkness; every creature was buried in sleep. The most profound silence reigned through the universe. In these solemn moments Eliphaz, alone, all wakeful and solitary, was musing on sublime subjects. When, lo! an awful being burst into his apartment. A spirit passed before his face. Astonishment seized the beholder. His bones shivered within him; his flesh trembled all over him; and the hair of his head stood erect with horror. Sudden and unexpected was its appearance; not such its departure. It stood still, to present itself more fully to his view. It made a solemn pause, to prepare his mind for some momentous message. After which a voice was heard. A