as I live.

ZOPHAR.

This is the portion of a wicked man with God,
And the heritage of oppressors, which they receive from the Almighty.
Though he heap up silver as the dust,
And prepare raiment as the clay;
He may prepare it, but the just shall put it on,
And the innocent shall divide the silver.
He openeth his eyes, and he is not.
Terrors overtake him like waters;
A tempest stealeth him away in the night.
The east wind carrieth him away, and he departeth;
And it sweepeth him out of his place.

{210}

JOB.

Oh that I were as in the months of old,
As in the days when God watched over me;
When his lamp shined upon my head,
And by his light I walked through darkness;
As I was in the ripeness of my days,
When the secret of God was upon my tent;
When the Almighty was yet with me,
And my children were about me;
When I went forth to the gate unto the city,
When I prepared my seat in the street,
The young men saw me and hid themselves,
And the aged rose up and stood;
The princes refrained talking,
And laid their hand on their mouth;
The voice of the nobles was hushed,
And their tongue cleaved to the roof of their mouth.

For when the ear heard me, then it blessed me;
And when the eye saw me, it gave witness unto me:
Because I delivered the poor that cried,
The fatherless also, that had none to help him.
The blessing of him that was ready to perish came upon me:
And I caused the widow's heart to sing for joy.
I put on righteousness, and it clothed me:
My justice was as a robe and a diadem.
I was eyes to the blind,
And feet was I to the lame.
I was a father to the needy:
And the cause of him that I knew not I searched out. {211}
But now they that are younger than I have me in derision,
Upon my right hand rise the rabble;
They thrust aside my feet,
And they cast up against me their ways of destruction.

And now my soul is poured out within me;
Days of affliction have taken hold upon me.
In the night season my bones are pierced in me,
And the pains that gnaw me take no rest.
He hath cast me into the mire,
And I am become like dust and ashes.
I cry unto thee, and thou dost not answer me:
I stand up, and thou lookest at me.
Thou liftest me up to the wind, thou causest me to ride upon it;
And thou dissolvest me in the storm.

If I did despise the cause of my manservant or of my maidservant,
W