ing:' and in Job such equanimity would have been
but Stoicism, or the affectation of it, and unreal as the others'
theories. Possessed with the certainty that he had not deserved what had
befallen him, harassed with doubt, and worn out with pain and
unkindness, he had assumed (and how natural that he should assume it)
that those who loved him should not have been hasty to believe evil of
him; he had spoken to them as he really felt, and he thought that he
might have looked to them for something warmer and more sympathising
than such dreary eloquence. So when the revelation comes upon him of
what was passing in them, he attributes it (and now he is unjust to
them) to a falsehood of heart, and not to a blindness of understanding.
Their sermons, so kindly intended, roll past him as a dismal mockery.
They had been shocked (and how true again is this to nature) at his
passionate cry for death. 'Do ye reprove words?' he says, 'and the
speeches of one that is desperate, which are as wind?' It was but poor
friendship and narrow wisdom. He had looked to them for pity, for
comfort, and love. He had longed for it as the parched caravans in the
desert for the water-streams, and 'his brethren had dealt deceitfully
with him.' The brooks, in the cool winter, roll in a full turbid
torrent; 'what time it waxes warm they vanish, when it is hot they are
consumed out of their place; the caravans of Tema looked for them, the
companies of Sheba waited for them; they were confounded because they
had hoped; they came thither, and there was nothing.' If for once these
poor men could have trusted their hearts, if for once they could have
believed that there might be 'more things in heaven and earth' than were
dreamt of in their philosophy--but this is the one thing which they
could not do, which the theologian proper never has done or will do. And
thus whatever of calmness or endurance Job alone, on his ash-heap, might
have conquered for himself, is all scattered away; and as the strong
gusts of passion sweep to and fro across his heart, he pours himself out
in wild fitful music, so beautiful because so true, not answering them
or their speeches, but now flinging them from him in scorn, now
appealing to their mercy, or turning indignantly to God; now praying for
death; now in perplexity doubting whether, in some mystic way which he
cannot understand, he may not, perhaps, after all, really have sinned,
and praying to be shown his fault; and then st