nnacherib his son
reigned for him, and hated, and loved not, the children of Israel. And
Tobit went unto all his kindred and comforted them, and divided to every
each of them as he might of his faculties and goods.

He fed the hungry and gave to the naked clothes, and diligently he
buried the dead men and them that were slain. After this when
Sennacherib returned, fleeing the plague from the Jewry, that God had
sent him for his blasphemy, and he, being wroth, slew many of the
children of Israel, and Tobit always buried the bodies of them, which
was told to the king, which commanded to slay him, and took away all his
substance. Tobit then with his wife and his son hid him and fled away
all naked, for many loved him well. After this, forty-five days, the
sons of the king slew the king, and then returned Tobit unto his house,
and all his faculties and goods were restored to him again. After this
on a high festival day of our Lord when that Tobit had a good dinner in
his house, he said to his son: Go and fetch to us some of our tribe
dreading God, that they may come and eat with us. And he went forth and
anon he returned telling to his father that one of the children of
Israel was slain and lay dead in the street. And anon he leapt out of
his house, leaving his meat, and fasting came to the, body, took it and
bare it in to his house privily, that he might secretly bury it when the
sun went down. And when he had hid the corpse, he ate his meat with
wailing and dread, remembering that word that our Lord said by Amos the
prophet: The day of your feast shall be turned into lamentation and
wailing. And when the sun was gone down he went and buried him. All his
neighbors reproved and chid him, saying for this cause they were
commanded to be slain, and unnethe [hardly] thou escapedst the
commandment of death, and yet thou buriest dead men. But Tobit, more
dreading God than the king, took up the bodies of dead men and hid them
in his house, and at midnight he buried them.

It happed on a day after this that when he was weary of burying dead
men, he came home and laid him down by a wall and slept. And he became
blind. This temptation suffered God to fall to him, that it should be an
example to them that shall come after him of his patience, like as it
was of holy Job. For from his infancy he dreaded ever God and kept his
precepts and was not grudging against God for his blindness, but he
abode immovable in the dread of God, giving