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Job is driven to retort. He affirms his own competency to speak. He claims equality with his would-be teachers, whose words are yet far from healing or comforting his sorely afflicted heart. "I have understanding as well as you." But to him belongs the contempt which is the lot of misfortune. Sad is the story told in a sentence here, but repeated in every day's history and in every land and every age. The selfish heart, rising to a higher level of prosperity, looks down, and looks contemptuously down, on him over whom Misfortune casts her dark shade. "The just upright man is laughed to scorn." Note the truth of this, its wrong and its remedy.

I. UNIVERSAL EXPERIENCE TESTIFIES TO THIS - THAT CONTEMPT IS THE LOT OF MISFORTUNE. The testimony comes up from a thousand sufferers towards whom fortune has shown no favour. The wounds may be deep, the pangs of sorrow keen; dark desolation may encompass; but the joyful, the well-to-do, on whom the smile of prosperity rests, become incompetent to descend to the lowly lot. On such the tale of woe makes little impression. There is a sad, if not even natural, revulsion from the mere sight of suffering, and the step is easy from this to the bitter, scathing complaint, "Ah! he brought it all upon himself!' From Job's days downward the same has been ever seen. Prosperity seems to blind the eyes, to harden the heart, to withdraw the sympathies even from the friend overtaken in misfortune. It is an interruption to ease and felicity, to quiet and comfort. And Well-to-do resists as impertinent the appeals of the victim of misfortune; or, as here, takes up an accusation against him, and treats him as an offender. Everywhere the truth of this is seen. "He that is ready to slip with his feet is as a lamp despised in the thoughts of him that is at ease;"

II. IT IS NOT MORE GENERAL THAN IT IS WRONG. It is unworthy, unbrotherly, unneighbourlike. The great Teacher hit the evil with his hard words, and exposed for ever to the gaze of men the self-sufficiency of the prosperous one and his carelessness as to the condition of the sufferer. He passes by on the other side, indisposed to help the poor wretch lying in his blood, stript and sore. Pride fills the heart to overflowing that is well-nigh full of treasure. There is little room in it for sympathy and pity, and the tender communion of sorrow. He who is lifted up does not feel that the lot of him who is trodden down is any affair of his. He cannot be hindered on his way. Shame upon the heart that is so far forgetful of the common interest that it leaves the needy and sad, and finds itself absorbed in its own comfort! The curl of contempt upon the lip and the hard word upon the tongue - Job fathomed this depth, and in the bitterness of his soul rebukes the wrong.

III. WE TURN TO OTHER WORDS FOR THE CORRECTION OF THIS ERROR. True, Job by his irony accuses his severe friends, who transport themselves into accusers. In their hard words he traces the contempt of which he complains, and takes his lot with others who suffer like himself. He is not unmindful of the true Source of help. He is one who "calleth upon God." lie retains his integrity, and the consciousness of it gives him support even under this trouble. "The just upright man is laughed to scorn." But the assurance of his uprightness is a deep consolation. Here, then, are the true sources of help. The tested faith in God will find its reward, and the testimony of a good conscience is of price untold. By these Job is upheld, and by that strength which is secretly imparted to all faithful ones who call upon God, though it may seem as though they were abandoned and forgotten. If the "neighbour" mocketh, the righteous Judge does not mock; and though the trial is permitted and continued, a Divine and gracious end is reserved which Job lived fully to prove. - R.G.

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KJV: And Job answered and said,

WEB: Then Job answered,