VERSE XX. XXI. XXII.

WHEREFORE IS LIGHT GIVEN TO HIM THAT IS IN MISERY, AND LIFE UNTO THE BITTER IN SOUL? WHICH LONG FOR DEATH, BUT IT COMETH NOT, AND DIG FOR IT MORE THAN FOR HID TREASURES? WHICH REJOICE EXCEEDINGLY, AND ARE GLAD WHEN THEY CAN FIND THE GRAVE.

IT is customary with our modern poets, as well as with the ancients, to make their heroes, when overwhelmed with misfortunes like our Job, not only curse their impropitious stars, but devoutly wish for the day of their diffolution, in order to put an end at once to all their forrows.-There is no author, however, as I know of, that has fucceeded fo well, nor expreffed this ardent defire, this longing after death, with that art and elegance as our inimitable Shakespear, in the third scene of the first act of his Hamlet; where he represents that young prince almost distracted with the abhorrence of his mother's incestuous marriage with his uncle, and fo apprehenfive of the enfuing troubles in which his family would be inevitably involved through that detefted match, that life itself becomes a perfect burden to him, and death alone can give him patience.

HAMLET folus..

Oh! that this too too folid flesh would melt,.

Thaw, and refolve itself into a dew!

Or that the everlasting had not fix'd

His canon 'gainst felf-flaughter!-Oh God! O God!
How weary, ftale, flat, and unprofitable,

Seem to me all the ufes of the world?

Fie on't! oh fie !-'tis an unweeded garden

That grows to feed; things rank, and grofs in nature

Poffefs it meerly.

Not much unlike the above-cited paffage is that other celebrated foliloquy, in the second scene of the third act of the fame play, which by the generality of readers has been accounted a very powerful perfuafive from the unnatural fin of self-murder; and fo, indeed, it might juftly be thought, had he omitted the concluding lines, which, in my humble opinion, feem to take off, in a great measure at least, the edge and energy of what he before advanced. The paffage, however, is too interefting to need apology for its infertion.

HAMLET folus.

To be, or not to be?-That's the question,-
Whether 'tis nobler in the mind, to fuffer
The flings and arrows of outrageous fortune;
Or to take arms against a fea of troubles,
And by oppofing end them ?—To die,—to fleep

No.

No more; and by a fleep to fay, we end
The heart-ache, and the thousand natural fhocks
That flesh is heir to;-'tis a confummation.
Devoutly to be wifh'd. To die-to fleep-

To fleep?-perchance to dream, ay, there's the rub ;--
For in that fleep of death what dreams may come,
When we have fhuffled off this mortal coil,
Muft give us pause. There's the respect
That makes calamity of fo long life.

For who would bear the whips and scorns of time,
Th' oppreffors wrong, the proud man's contumely,
The pang of defpis'd love, the laws delay,
The infolence of office, and the spurns
That patient merit of th' unworthy takes,
When he himself might his quietus make
With a bare bodkin? Who would fardles bear,
To groan and sweat under a weary life,
But that the dread of fomething after death,
That undiscover'd country from whose bourne
No traveller returns, puzzles the will;

And makes us rather bear thofe ills we have,
Than fly to others that we know not of:
"Thus confcience doth make cowards of us all,
"And thus the native hue of refolution
"Is ficklied o'er with the pale caft of thought;
And enterprises of great pith and moment,
"With this regard their currents turn awry,

"And lofe the name of action

We fhall close these Remarks with a poetical epitome of the whole chapter, by

Dr. YOUNG.

Then Job, contain'd no more, but curs'd his fate :

His day of birth, its inaufpicious light,

He wishes funk in endless shades of night,

And blotted from the year; nor fears to crave
Death, inftant death, impatient for the grave;
That feat of peace, that manfion of repose,
Where reft, and mortals are no longer foes;
Where counsellors are hufh'd, and mighty kings,

happy turn no more are wretched things.

CHAP.

CHAP. IV.

ELIPHAZ, ONE OF THE THREE FRIENDS THAT CAME TO VISIT AND CONDOLE WITH JOB, UPON HEARING HIS IMPATIENT EXECRATIONS, INSTEAD OF ADMINISTRING ANY CONSOLATION, REPROVES HIM VERY SEVERELY FOR ACTING INCONSISTENT WITH HIS CHARACTER, AND VENTING HIS SORROWS IN SUCH INDECENT AND UNWARRANTABLE TERMS. HE REPRESENTS TO HIM, IN THE FIRST PLACE, THAT IT IS THE WICKED, AND NOT THE RIGHTEOUS, THAT GOD ALMIGHTY CORRECTS WITH HIS AFFLICTING ROD: AFTER THAT, HE GIVES AN AWFUL DESCRIPTION OF AN UNCOMMON VISION THAT HAD TERRIFIED HIM IN THE NIGHT; WHEREIN GOD HAD DISCOVERED TO HIM, IN SOME MEASURE, WHAT HIS JUSTICE WAS; AND THAT MAN WAS LESS THAN NOTHING IN COMPARISON OF HIS MAKER. BY WHICH DISCOURSE, ELIPHAZ INTIMATED TO JOB, THAT HIS COMPLICATED WOES WERE THE JUST RESULT OF HIS SECRET SINS; AND THAT, NOTWITHSTANDING HIS OUTWARD SHEW OF SANCTITY, IN A STATE OF AFFLUENCE AND EASE, IT WAS EVIDENT, FROM HIS PRESENT DEPORTMENT IN THE DAY OF HIS ADVERSITY, THAT HE HAD PLAYED THE HYPOCRITE; AND THAT HIS FORMER UPRIGHTNESS WAS FORMAL AND INSINCERE.

E

LIPHAZ the Temanite, having liftned with no small concern to Job's impatient, and, as he thought, almost blafphemous execrations, could refrain from speaking no longer, and faid :-We came, friend Job, to alleviate your forrows, if poffible, by condoling with you in the fofteft terms; but you have, contrary to our expectations, shewed your impatience and inquietude to such a shameful degree, and caft fuch audacious reflec

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tions on the Almighty, of whom you have always spoken till now with the most profound and reverential awe, that instead of pouring balm into your wounds, my language perhaps may, like the probe, only aggravate your pains for the prefent. But who can refrain from vindicating the divine juftice, and ufing his best endeavours to fet an erring friend in the right way? We readily acknowledge, that your wise instructions have given great relief to the afflicted, and made the feeble ftrong; that fuch as have mourned, and been overwhelmed with forrows, have found your friendly advice, like an healing balfam, mitigate their griefs; that your pious exhortations have confirmed many in their conftancy and refignation to the divine will; but now, fince it is your turn to undergo the the fufferers part, it visibly appears, by your unjustifiable murmurs and complaints, that it is much more easy to give good counsel, than to receive it; to recommend the afflicting rod, than to bear it; you have now almoft convinced us, that your views were mean and mercenary; and that you ferved God in hope only of fome recompence or reward. Give but yourself the leaft time for reflection, and you will find, that the innocent and virtuous were never plunged in fuch an abyfs of woes, as were beyond all hope of cure: they never bear the marks of the divine vengeance to fo fevere a degree. They are oftentimes chaftifed, indeed, and kindly corrected by the hand of providence, but never totally deftroyed: a truly upright perfon was never known to be undone, beyond recovery, as you seem to be. He that delights to fow iniquity, fhall inevitable see a rueful harvest of deftruction. The breath of the Supreme Being shall blast him, like a peftilential air, and leave him in his drooping despondency to be consumed. Just so, the lion, that, inured to blood and rapin, fhall roar, when once fecured within the hunter's toils, or otherwife, fhall be devoured by famine, when grown impotent and old; fo fhall his ravenous whelps range over the mountains, and die for want of food within the barren defert. Though

I would

I would not boast of having any celeftial intelligence, yet to convince you still further of your error, liften with patience to what I was fecretly informed by an heavenly meffenger.

One night, as I was mufing in my bed, I faw a vision, which ftruck me with a reverential horror; my hair stiffened, as it were, at the unusual apparition, and my joints trembled with a fear which was irresistible: and notwithstanding I saw plainly a corporeal glory stand before me, yet I cannot describe the form or shape diftinctly which it affumed, through the confufion, and the flutter which my fpirits then were in. There was a profound filence, however, and I heard a voice utter, with all the deliberation imaginable, the purport of what follows. "Shall any finite creature, faid he, affect "to be more righteous than the fovereign Lord of heaven and "earth? Shall any mortal man presume to vie with his Maker in regard to his purity and perfection? Since the Almighty cannot put any full confidence in the pureft of his seraphims; and fince "the arch-angels themfelves bow, down and blush before him, "when he charges them with folly; fhall a meer man contend "with his Maker, and be fo audacious as to justify his innocence " and conduct before him? Shall a meer man, I say, act with such "a confummate affurance, whofe habitation is nothing more than "a house of clay, and whofe foundation is in the duft, and liable to be destroyed by the meanest infect: thousands of them perish

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every day, and their fall excites no manner of wonder or regard. "In vain they fly for fuccour to their immenfe riches, and their "extenfive power; for as they lived, fo they die in folly.”

Correct therefore, friend Job, thy rafh difcourfe, and never more prefume to reflect on, or arraign the justice of thy Maker.

MISCELLANEOUS REMARKS on CHA P. IV.

NOTWITHSTANDING in the argument of this hiftory, we gave our readers fome general hints, indeed, in regard to the fubject-matter of the grand debate between

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Job