and wounding him through the creatures. Then he feels a weight which is too heavy for the strongest saint to bear; and when this is accompanied with a fear that his sins are not pardoned, it adds an intolerable weight to all his other burdens. Job seems to point to this with the last words of this answer, as he earnestly begs for pardon.

"Verse 21. And why dost thou not pardon my transgression, and take away mine iniquity?' &c.

"Job, having confessed his sin, and inquired of the Lord a reason of his continued sorrows, now applies for pardon of his sins, and of course for the removal of his afflictions, and he desires an answer to his suit speedily, lest help come too late for he cannot hold out long, he must soon make his bed in the grave, and then being sought for he shall not be found.

:

"The Septuagint reads it, Why dost thou not forget my transgressions? but it generally imports the lifting up that which lies heavy upon us, and because pardon is the lifting off of sin, therefore it is often put for the act of pardoning.

"The word for take away, signifies to pass away, or to pass by; and transgression notes a violation of the commands of God with a high hand, or a rebellion of the mind, when pride of spirit shows itself.

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Iniquity denotes sin when committed from a crooked purpose.

"God only can pardon sin. When the name of the Lord is proclaimed, Exod. xxxiv.-for

giving iniquity and transgression; and sin is mentioned last, to show that none can pardon, but he who is invested with all those glorious titles; and, therefore, God only can forgive

sin.

"The greatest sins fall within the compass of God's pardoning mercy, and when sin is pardoned, the punishment is remitted.

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Though corruption is mortified, and the actings of it abated in pardoned persons; yet, properly speaking, pardon only takes away guilt, which is the obligation to punishment, and thereby punishment is taken away too.

"The pardoned sinner in God's account, is as if he had never sinned; yet he must continue praying for pardon. Nathan told David, that God hath put away thy sin, yet David, Psal. li. prays, (O how earnestly!) for pardon again and again. Christ knew that his sheep should continue for ever, &c. yet how abundantly doth he pray that they may be kept from evil, John xvii. 15. I pray not that thou shouldest take them out of the world, but that thou shouldest keep them from the evil.'

"For now shall I sleep in the dust.' Only he who hath his treasure and his heart in heaven, can comfortably think of laying down his head in the dust.

"Job complains of restless nights; yet he could think of a time when he should lie quietly in his bed, and not have so much as a waking moment or distracting dream, till the morning of the resurrection.

Thou shalt seek me in the morning, but

I shall not be.' This is a reinforcement of what he said, verses 7, 8; here he speaks the same thing in a variety of words. The severity of my sickness threatens to prevent thy earliest preparations for my relief."

"Lord, pardon my sins, and give me the comfort of that pardon, and then I will easily bear my afflictions. Matt. ix. 2, Son, be of good cheer, thy sins be forgiven thee;' Isa. xxxiii. 24, The inhabitant shall not say, I am sick; the people that dwell therein shall be forgiven their iniquity.

"Whenever God removes the guilt of sin, it breaks the power of sin.

"If my sins be not pardoned while I live, I am lost and undone for ever.

"The consideration that we must shortly die, and may die suddenly, should make us very desirous, not only for our sins pardoned and our iniquities taken away, but for the comfortable sense of it.

"Verse 1.

CHAPTER VIII.

Then answered Bildad the Shuhite, and said,' &c.

"Job having endeavoured to vindicate himself from Eliphaz's rash charge of hypocrisy, is next attacked by Bildad for having impugned the justice of God; and, by threatenings and promises, excites him to repentance.

"He 1st censures all that Job had spoken, verse 2. 2dly, He proposes a question concerning the justice of God, verse 3. 3dly, By the example of Job's children, and his own present condition, and the probability of his deliverance, he asserts the equity of God, verse 4-8; and, from the testimony of antiquity, he draws another argument, verse 8-10; and a third argument from similitudes, first, of a rush, verse 11-13; 2d, of a spider's web, verses 14, 15; 3d, of a flourishing tree, but soon plucked up.

He then sets forth the favour of God to the faithful and sincere, and proclaims the goodness of God to sinners, and even hypocrites, when they truly humble themselves and repent before him.

"Verse 2. How long wilt thou speak these things? and how long shall the words of thy mouth be like a strong wind?'

"Thus Bildad undervalues what Job had said, as if it was so contemptible as to be a trouble to hear it, and perhaps in allusion to what Job had said, chap. vi. 26. He speaks of his words as a strong wind, a tempestuous dangerous wind.

"The wind of words blows both good and evil to the world.

"Observe, That reproofs are often founded upon mistakes. Bildad clothes Job's speech in a sense that he abhorred, and then censures accordingly.

"Bildad prefers a special charge against

Job; and to give it the greater emphasis, and a strong negation, he turns it into a question. "Verse 3. Doth God pervert judgment? or doth the Almighty pervert justice?'

"Far be it from him that he should, and from us that we should suspect him.

"The Lord God is most exact in judgment; he is righteous in all his ways, though his ways are past finding out. He proceeds by the evidence of the law as well as by the fact, and is as ready to acquit the innocent as to condemn the guilty.*

"Verse 4. If thy children have sinned against him, and he hath cast them away for their transgression.'

"Job would acknowledge that God could not pervert judgment, but he would not admit that therefore his children were cast away and perished, on account of some great transgression. As both parents and children are transgressors, they should justify God under every affliction.

"For although every sin cries for vengeance till either God put the sinner into the hands of sin, that he may at once receive pay for and from his own folly, or he receives forgiveness through the blood of Christ; yet extraordinary suffering is not always on account of hei

It

* Men sometimes pervert justice for fear of the power of others, but God stands in awe of none. is often through man's weakness and impotency that he is unjust. It is God's omnipotency that he cannot

be so.