Blake was troubled by no modern criticism of the Book of Job, which by post-dating it several hundred years has robbed it of much of its literary interest. To him it was the porch of the Sanctuary, the oldest book in the Bible, at once the most ancient and most modern of books. Job, after his dark night of testing and judgment, emerged simple and guileless, a Patriarch who served God solely because that was the supremely right thing to do. Who was Job? The Book gives no hint of his parentage. Who wrote the wonderful prologue? Who could write it? Again the Book is silent. Tradition says Moses; and if tradition speak truly, then several very interesting things follow. Job was probably the son of Issachar,[6] and as such went down with his father into Egypt when Joseph had been advanced in that land. He would then remove to Uz in Chaldæa, carrying within treasures of Egyptian learning. In later years, Moses, fleeing from Egypt into the desert of Midian, would become his neighbour. Moses is admittedly one of the world's greatest initiates. As such he could certainly have written the prologue and the epilogue. And how lofty a level the drama maintains throughout! Even Job's friends, who pour out pithy things in rich poetical language surpassing that attained by all laureates, are rebuked for uttering only what everybody knows. Yet so universal is the Book in its symbolism that it can afford, if need be, to dispense with picturesque details of its authorship and date, and stand simply on its merits as an inspired dramatic epic of Man's passage from his consciousness of degradation as a worm, and his stubbornness as a wild ass's colt, to the dignity and power of a son of God. Blake had already traced the course of man's day of judgment in Night IX of _The Four Zoas_, and had painted a fresco of the subject in 1820. In the poem he had used his own peculiar mythology, and closed his poem to nearly all readers. The Book of Job obliged him to drop his own symbolism and use the simple and universal symbols that the drama itself supplies. A brief reference to each design in order will make his purpose clear. [Illustration: Then went Satan forth from the presence of the Lord] _Design I._--Job and his wife and family, like true Israelites, are at prayer under a spreading fig-tree. The shepherd sons have for the time left their flocks at rest and hanged their musical instruments on the tree. At first sight the picture presents a scene of idyllic peace. But there are ominous signs. The sun is setting, night is fast coming, and the fig-tree suggests the immemorial symbol of Israel's wrestling during the dark night. _Design II._--An illustration of the prologue of the Book. It is a marvellous representation of what an initiate only--a Moses, a Blake--could have imagined of the cosmos, with its heavenly portion peopled with the angelic sons of God in the middle, the earth and its inhabitants below, and above and beyond all God in His Heaven.