"6. Which _shaketh the earth out of her place_, and the _pillars thereof_ tremble. "7. Which commandeth the sun, _and it riseth not; and sealeth up the stars_. "8. Which alone spreadeth out the heavens and _treadeth upon the waves of the sea_." All this is most remarkable: here is the delineation of a great catastrophe--the mountains are removed and leveled; the earth shakes to its foundations; the sun _fails to appear_, and the stars are sealed up. How? In the dense masses of clouds? Surely this does not describe the ordinary manifestations of God's power. When has the sun refused to rise? It can not refer to the story of Joshua, for in that case the sun was in the heavens and refrained from setting; and Joshua's time was long subsequent to that of Job. But when we take this in connection with the fire {p. 291} falling from heaven, the great wind, the destruction of men and animals, the darkness that came at midday, the ice and snow and sands of the sea, and the stones of the field, and the fact that Job is shut up as in a prison, never to return to his home or to the light of day, we see that peering through the little-understood context of this most ancient poem are the disjointed reminiscences of the age of fire and gravel. It sounds like the cry not of a man but of a race, a great, religious, civilized race, who could not understand how God could so cruelly visit the world; and out of their misery and their terror sent up this pitiful yet sublime appeal for mercy. "13. If God will not withdraw his anger, the proud helpers do stoop under him." One commentator makes this read: "Under him the whales below heaven bend," (the crooked leviathan?) "17. For he shall crush me in a _whirlwind_, and multiplieth my wounds even without cause." (Douay ver.) And Job can not recognize the doctrine of a special providence; he says: "22. This is one thing" (therefore I said it). "He _destroyeth the perfect and the wicked_. "23. If the _scourge slay suddenly_, he will laugh at the trial of the innocent. "24. The earth _is given into the hands of the wicked:_ he covereth the faces of the judges thereof; if it be not him, who is it then?" (Douay ver.) That is to say, God has given up the earth to the power of Satan (as appears by chapter i); good and bad perish together; and the evil one laughs as the scourge (the comet) slays suddenly the innocent ones; the very judges who should have enforced justice are dead, and {p. 292} their faces covered with dust and ashes. And if God has not done this terrible deed, who has done it? And Job rebels against such a state of things "34. Let him take his _rod away from me_, and let not his fear terrify me. "35. Then I would speak to him and not fear him but it is not so with me."