was so much admired for his wisdom, that unto him men gave ear, and kept silence at his counsel, and after his words they spake not again? ch. xxix. 21, 22. Surely his wisdom failed him, (1.) When he took so much pains to express his desire that he had never been born, which, at the best, was a vain wish, for it is impossible to make that which has been, not to have been. (2.) When he was so liberal of his curses upon a day and a night, that could not be hurt, or made ever the worse for his curses. (3.) When he wished a thing so very barbarous to his own mother, as that she might not have brought him forth, when her full time was come; which must inevitably have been her death, and a miserable death. (4.) When he despised the goodness of God to him, (in giving him a being, such a being, so noble and excellent a life, such a life, so far above that of any other creature in this lower world,) and undervalued the gift, as not worth the acceptance, only because transit cum onere—it was clogged with a proviso of trouble, which now, at length, came upon him, after many years' enjoyment of its pleasures. What a foolish thing it was to wish that his eyes had never seen the light, that so they might not have seen sorrow, which yet he might hope to see through, and beyond which he might see joy! Did Job believe and hope that he should in his flesh see God at the latter day; (ch. xix. 26.) and yet would he wish he never had had a being capable of such a bliss, only because, for the present, he had sorrow in the flesh? God, by his grace, arm us against this foolish and hurtful lust of impatience!
11. Why died I not from the womb? why did I not give up the ghost when I came out of the belly? 12. Why did the knees prevent me? or why the breasts that I should suck? 13. For now should I have lain still and been quiet, I should have slept: then had I been at rest, 14. With kings and counsellors of the earth, which built desolate places for themselves; 15. Or with princes that had gold, who filled their houses with silver: 16. Or as a hidden untimely birth I had not been; as infants which never saw light. 17. There the wicked cease from troubling; and there the weary be at rest. 18. There the prisoners rest together; they hear not the voice of the oppressor. 19. The small and great are there; and the servant is free from his master.
Job, perhaps reflecting upon himself for his folly in wishing he had never been born, follows it, and thinks to mend it, with another, little better, that he had died as soon as he was born, which he enlarges upon in these verses. When our Saviour would set forth a very calamitous state of things, he seems to allow such a saying as this, Blessed are the barren, and the wombs that never bare, and the paps which never gave suck; (Luke xxiii. 29.) but blessing the barren womb is one thing, and cursing the fruitful womb is another! It is good to make the best of afflictions, but it is not good to make the worst of mercies. Our rule is, Bless, and curse not.
Life is often put for all good, and death for all evil; yet Job here very absurdly complains of life and its supports, as a curse and plague to him, and covets death and the grave, as the greatest and most desirable bliss. Surely Satan was deceived in Job, when he applied that maxim to him, All that a man hath will he give for his life; for never any man valued life at a lower rate than he did.
I. He ungratefully quarrels with life, and is angry that it was not taken from him as soon as it was given him; (v. 11, 12.) Why died not I from the womb? See here, 1. What a weak and helpless creature man is when he comes into the world, and how slender the thread of life is, when it is first drawn. We are ready to die from the womb, and to breathe our last, as soon as we begin to breathe at all. We can do nothing for ourselves, as other creatures can, but should drop into the grave, if the knees did not prevent us; and the lamp of life, when first lighted, would go out of itself, if the breasts given us, that we should suck, did not supply it with fresh oil. 2. What a merciful and tender care Divine Providence took of us, at our entrance into the world. It was owing to this, that we died not from the womb, and did not give up the ghost when we came out of the belly. Why were we not cut off as soon as we were born? Not because we did not deserve it; justly might such weeds have been plucked up as soon as they appeared, justly might such cockatrices have been crushed in the egg: not because we did, or could, take any care of ourselves and our own safety; no creature comes into the world so shiftless as man. It was not our might, or the power of our hand, that preserved us these beings; but God's power and providence up held our frail lives, and his pity and patience spared our forfeited lives. It was owing to this that the knees prevented us. Natural affection is put into parents' hearts by the hand of the God of nature: and hence it was, that the blessings of the breast attended those of the womb. 3. What a great deal of vanity and vexation of spirit attends human life. If we had not a God to serve in this world, and better things to hope for in another world, considering the faculties we are endued with, and the troubles we are surrounded with, we should be strongly tempted to wish that we had died from the womb, which had prevented a great deal both of sin and misery.
He that is born to-day, and dies to-morrow,
Loses some hours of joy, but months of sorrow.
4. The evil of impatience, fretfulness, and discontent; when they thus prevail, they are unreasonable and absurd, impious and ungrateful; they are a slighting and undervaluing of God's favour. How much soever life is imbittered, we must say, "It was of the Lord's mercies that we died not from the womb, that we were not consumed." Hatred of life is a contradiction to the common sense and sentiments of mankind, and our own at another time. Let discontented people declaim ever so much against life, they will be loath to part with it when it comes to the point. When the old man in the fable, being tired with his burthen, threw it down with discontent, and called for death, and death came to him, and asked him what he would have with him, he then answered, "Nothing, but help me up with my burthen."
II. He passionately applauds death and the grave, and seems quite in love with them. To desire to die, that we may be with Christ, that we may be free from sin, and that we may be clothed upon with our house which is from heaven, is the effect and evidence of grace; but to desire to die, only that we may be quiet in the grave, and delivered from the troubles of this life, savours of corruption. Job's considerations here may be of good use to reconcile us to death when it comes, and to make us easy under the arrest of it; but they ought not to be made use of as a pretence to quarrel with life while it is continued, or to make us uneasy under the burthens of it. It is our wisdom and duty to make the
Vol. III—D
