ts upon the ground." That is, they
were true hearted, truly loving, devout, religious men,
and yet they with their religion, were to become the
instruments of the most poignant sufferings, and the
sharpest temptations, which he had to endure. So it
was, and is, and will be,--of such materials is this human
life of ours composed.

And now, remembering the double action of the
drama, the actual trial of Job, the result of which is
uncertain, and the delusion of these men which is, at
the outset, certain, let us go rapidly through the dialogue.
Satan's share in the temptation had already been overcome.
Lying sick in the loathsome disease which had
been sent upon him, his wife, in Satan's own words, had
tempted Job, to say, "Farewell to God," think no more
of God or goodness, since this was all which came of it;
and Job had told her, that she spoke as one of the
foolish women. He "had received good at the hand of
the Lord, and should he not receive evil?" But now,
when real love and real affection appear, his heart melts
in him; he loses his forced self-composure, and bursts
into a passionate regret that he had ever been born.
In the agony of his sufferings, hope of better things had
died away. He does not complain of injustice; as yet,
and before his friends have stung and wounded him, he
makes no questioning of Providence,--but why was life
given to him at all, if only for this? And sick in mind
and sick in body, but one wish remains to him, that
death will come quickly and end all. It is a cry from
the very depths of a single and simple heart. But for
such simplicity and singleness his friends could not give
him credit; possessed beforehand with their idea, they
see in his misery only a fatal witness against him; such
calamities could not have befallen a man, the justice of
God would not have permitted it, unless they had been
deserved. Job had sinned and he had suffered, and
this wild passion was but impenitence and rebellion.

Being as certain that they were right in this opinion
as they were that God Himself existed, that they should
speak what they felt was only natural and necessary;
and their language at the outset is all which would be
dictated by the tenderest sympathy. Eliphaz opens,
the oldest and most important of the three, in a soft,
subdued, suggestive strain, contriving in every way to
spare the feelings of the sufferer, to the extreme, to
which his real love will allow him. All is general,
impe