as waters that pass away." "In the preceding verse, Zophar had assured his unfortunate friend he would lose all fear of fresh calamities; in the present one, he explains why he is so confident that this will be the case; it is because his friend will utterly forget his former miseries. As long as men continue to bear in mind sufferings they have had to undergo, they are apt to give way to a groundless dread of an impending renewal of them; but when they can once bring themselves to banish them altogether from their thoughts, they are freed from such ominous forebodings, and this Job is told will be his case. If a recollection of thy former sufferings should at any time rise up in thy mind, thou wilt be in no apprehension, but feel assured they can as little return as waters which have once passed by." Ver. 17.-" And thine age shall be clearer than the noonday; thou shalt shine forth, thou shalt be as the morning." The idea is that the remainder of his life would be as bright as the sun if he would only return to God. He would break forth as the sun which had been wrapped in clouds through many a day. Ver. 18.-" And thou shalt be secure, because there is hope; yea, thou hast looked about thee thou wilt lie down in security."— Bernard. "Wherever thou lookest about thee, in safety shalt thou lie down."Elzas. The idea is, that he would feel himself secure in every direction. Ver. 19.-" Also thou shalt lie down, and none shall make thee afraid; yea, many shall make suit unto thee." "And thou liest down without any one making thee afraid : and many shall caress thy cheeks." -Delitzsch. Ver. 20.-" But the eyes of the wicked shall fail, and they shall not escape, and their hope shall be as the giving up of the ghost." The eyes of the wicked shall be wearied out in the search for relief from the miseries of life. They shall not escape, or, as the margin has it, flight shall perish from them." Their deliverance is out of the question; their hope shall be as the giving up of the ghost, or, as the margin has it, as "a puff of breath"- -a mere exhalation. HOMILETICS. Here we have two subjects of thought,the life of the godly and the doom of the wicked. I. THE LIFE OF THE GODLY. These words of Zophar suggest to us the nature and blessedness of a godly life. First: The nature of a godly life. Here are two leading facts essentially connected with a godly life:-(1) The seeking for God. If thou prepare thine heart, and stretch out thine hands towards Him." (a) There must be the preparation of the heart. The heart in Scripture stands for the whole man, including the rational and moral parts. Man's great work is with his heart. It is a soil crusted by sin, covered with weeds, thorns, and thistles; its fallow ground must be broken up, its noxious productions uprooted, the incorruptible seed must be sown. It is a temple, but it is defiled by depravity and infested with demons. The fiends must be exorcised, and its precincts must be cleansed. It is a harp whose every string was made to vibrate with the praise of Jehovah, but it is unstrung and incapable of true moral music. "Prepare thine heart." Here is work for man! (6) There must be application to Heaven. "And stretch out thine hands toward Him." "Let my prayer be set forth before Thee as incense, and the lifting up of my hands as the evening sacrifice." The attitude expresses the very essence of religion, conscious dependence upon the eternal Father. The life of godliness is a life of prayer. (2) The abandonment of evil. "If iniquity be in thine hand, put it far away." The grand work of the godly man is the work that Christ came to accomplish, to "put away sin.' The words of Zophar suggest here Secondly: The blessedness of a godly life. What follows this godly life? (1) Cheerfulness of aspect. "Then shalt thou lift up thy face without spot." The face is the soul's dial-plate it notifies all the revolutions of the heart. Thoughts chisel their likeness on the brow, passions paint their hue upon the cheek. True godliness gives man a sunny face. (2) Steadfastness of mind. "Yea, thou shalt be stedfast." Instability is not only weakness but misery; mental distraction is feebleness and woe. Godliness brings firmness, it gives the soul a strong rooting in truth, and makes it as calm amidst the billows of life as the rock that breaks in pieces its surging assailants. (3) Fearlessness of soul. "And shalt not fear. Godliness is love, and "perfect love casteth out fear. Moses on the margin of the Red Sea, the three Hebrew youths entering the fiery furnace, Peter addressing the Sanhedrim, Paul standing before Agrippa, are a few of the sublimest instances of moral heroism on record. (4) Deliverance from all suffering. "Thou shalt forget thy misery, and remember it as waters that pass away. M The godly man's suffering will be one day only a thing of memory. Have you ever seen a river rolling backward, and retracing its march? Never! And never will the sorrows of a good man return; they are gone for ever. Flow on, then, thou stream of life, and bear away our trials! Thou wilt get clearer, deeper, and calmer, as thou nearest the blue, broad, boundless sea of eternity. It will be pleasant to remember them when they are gone; it will inspire us with the grateful and the devout. (5) Sunniness of being. "Thine age shall be clearer than the noon-day." Unto the upright there ariseth light in darkness. The righteous shall "shine forth as the sun in the kingdom of their Father." Here we have II. THE DOOM OF THE WICKED.. "But the eyes of the wicked shall fail, and they shall not escape, and their hope shall be as the giving up of the ghost." (1) Here is the loss of energy. "The eyes of the wicked shall fail." The soul's eyes gone, and the spiritual universe is midnight. (2) Here is the loss of safety. They shall not escape. All efforts directed to safety utterly fruitless. (3) Here is the loss of hope. "Their hope shall be as the giving up of the ghost." The idea is that the loss of hope is like death, the separation of the soul from the body. What the soul is to the body, the dominant hope is to the soul, the inspirer of its energies and the spring of its being. The loss of the dominant hope is like death in two respects. (a) In respect to its painfulness. How painful is death! it is the disruption of the mystic ties that connect the soul with the body, and the body with the loves, the pleasures, the beauties of the universe around it. Human nature recoils from it. But the pain of losing the dominant hope is in some respects greater than this. The loss of the dominant hope is like death, (b) In respect to its ruinousness. As the exit of the soul from the body ruins the body, the exit of hope from the soul ruins the soul. When hope takes her exit from the soul all beauty departs, all pleasures end, all usefulness is gone. A mind under despair is hideous, wretched, worthless.* For additional thoughts on this passage see Homilist, Second Series, vol. iii., p. 574. Also Third Series, vol x., p. 159. HOMILY No. XXXII. JOB'S ARGUMENT WITH HIS THREE FRIENDS. (1.) INDEPENDENCY OF THOUGHT IN RELIGION. "And Job answered and said," &c.-CHAP. xii. 1–5. EXEGETICAL REMARKS. Ver. 1. "And Job answered and said." This chapter begins Job's reply, not to any one of his friends, but to the three, and it extends to the close of the fourteenth chapter. It comprises two sections-his argument with men, and his appeal to Heaven. The first extends from chap. xii. 1 to xiii. 20; and the second from that verse to the end of chap. xiv. Zophar, who had spoken last, had commenced his speech by charging Job with the design of overwhelming his opponents with a multitude of words. Job now retorts, and says that it is they who seek to overwhelm him with their number and the display of their unanimity -for they are three to one, and all of the same opinion; that, namely, he must have been a great sinner: as if, forsooth, three men could not agree in their conclusions and yet err. In this and the two following chapters, Job sums up the result of the day's colloquy. Ver. 2.-" No doubt but ye are the people, and wisdom shall die with you." The reference is not to the one but to the three. Here is a strong irony, a withering sarcasm. He felt that his previous arguments had gone for nothing, and now in the bitter anguish of his soul he speaks in scathing sarcasm. His whole manhood seems to rise up against the twaddling sophistries of the dogmatists who came to comfort him. You monopolize wisdom; when you are gone all wisdom will be extinct. Ver. 3.-" But I have understanding as well as you; I am not inferior to you." "I also have a heart as well as you: I do not stand behind you."-Delitzsch. I have reason and conscience as well as you, and know as well as you the things of which you speak. "Who know eth not such things as these?" As if he had said, You consider your sentiments very original, but they are mere platitudes. Ver. 4.-"I am as one mocked of his neighbour." "A derision to his friend am I."-Elzas. I am as a laughing-stock. Mockery is not argument; to laugh a man down is a very easy matter, but it proves nothing. Even a perfectly righteous man may be made a laughingstock. "Who calleth upon God, and He answereth him: the just upright man is laughed to scorn." "A scorn to mine must I be, a man who calleth upon God, and He heareth him and scorn I the just and the upright."-Canon Cook. Ver. 5.-" He that is ready to slip with his feet is as a lamp despised in the thought of him that is at ease." The mind of one who is at ease hath contempt for calamity; it hath it quite ready for those who totter with their feet. It is not at all unusual to see people, whom success has rendered arrogant, laugh at those who are labourers under calamity, and are on the point of falling from their greatness. This sentiment is expressed also by the Psalmist (Ps. cxxiii. 4): "Our soul is exceedingly filled with the scorning of those that are at ease, and with the contempt of the proud." Critics have laboured much on this verse, and reached conflicting inter pretations. HOMILETICS.-Now in these verses Job asserts his moral manhood, he rises from the pressure of his sufferings and the loads of sophistry and implied calumny which his friends had laid upon his spirit, speaks out with the heart of a true man. In the sarcastic way in which he treats their arrogance, and in the reproof which he administers to them on account of their heartless insolence towards him, we have an illustration of independency of thought in religion, and this shall be our subject. A man though crushed in every respect, like Job, should not surrender this. That this is man's prerogative, which he is bound to vindicate and develop, appears from the following considerations: I. FROM THE CAPACITY OF THE SOUL. First: Man has a capacity to form conceptions of the cardinal principles of religion. He can think of God, the soul, duty, moral obligation, Christ, immortality, &c. This belongs to man not as a philosopher, a theologian, a religionist, but to him as man. Secondly: Man has a capacity to realize the practical force of these conceptions. He can turn them into emotions to fire his soul; he can embody them as principles in his life. He can incarnate his religious ideas, make the religious word flesh. That independency of thought in religion is man's prerogative appears— II. FROM THE DESPOTISM OF CORRUPT RELIGION. Corrupt religion, whether Pagan or Christian, Papal or Protestant, always seeks to crush this independency in the individual soul. It seeks to make men blind devotees, thoughtless limbs of its little sect. Dogmatists want to make a religion for you, as the builder your houses, the tailor your clothes; therefore, be on your guard, and say to these presumptuous mortals, as Job said, "I have understanding as well as you. |