body; and he expects the coming of Messiah.

We have traced the barest outlines of the religion of Job. The friends who come to him, if they share not his

piety, at least do not treat his views as something quite strange and previously unheard. This, then, is a

blessed picture of at least a certain class in that age. How far culture and civilization must have advanced in

those times we gather from various allusions in the book of Job. Job himself is a man of great wealth and

high rank. In the language of a recent writer:28

"The chieftain lives in considerable splendor and dignity. . . . Job visits the city frequently, and is there

received with high respect as a prince, judge, and distinguished warrior. (Job 29:7,9) There are allusions to

courts of justice, written indictments, and regular forms of procedure. (Job 13:26; 31:28) Men had begun to

observe and reason upon the phenomena of nature, and astronomical observations were connected with

curious speculations upon primeval traditions. We read of mining operations, great buildings, ruined

sepulchers. . . . Great revolutions had occurred within the time of the writer; nations, once independent, had

been overthrown, and whole races reduced to a state of misery and degradation."

Nor ought we to overlook the glimpses of social life given us in this history. While, indeed, there was

violence, robbery, and murder in the land, there is happily also another side to the picture. "When I went out

to the gate through the city, when I prepared my seat in the street, the young men saw me, and hid

themselves; and the aged arose and stood up." Along with such becoming tribute of respect paid to worth,

we find that the relationship between the pious rich and the poor is thus described: "When the ear heard me,

then it blessed me; and when the eye saw me, it gave witness to me: because I delivered the poor that cried,

and the fatherless, and him 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."

Assuredly there is nothing in all this which we could wish to see altered even in New Testament times! But

the more terrible in contrast must have been the idolatry and t he corruption of the vast majority of mankind;

an idolatry which they had probably inherited from before the flood, and which soon attained gigantic

proportions, and a corruption which went on ever increasing during the "times of this ignorance."