touch his life. For God knew that Satan's attempts would but end with the greater honour of His servant, and with his own confusion. Satan therefore struck Job with a very grievous ulcer from the sole of his foot even to the top of his head. This we must suppose was a kind of leprosy, which rendered him unfit for the society of men. He left his house, and seating himself upon a dunghill, he scraped the corruption and filth from his afflicted body with a potsherd. Nothing now remained to him on earth but his wife, who, instead of comforting him under his misery, upbraided him for his simplicity and trust in God, urging him to bless God and die. But Job replied to her words with patience and piety, "Thou hast spoken," said he," like one of the foolish women: if we have received good things from the hands of God, why should we not receive evil?" Thus perfectly did Job act in God's sight under the heaviest trials and afflictions which can befall human nature.

JOB'S COMFORTERS.

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THEN three of Job's friends came to visit him, condole with him in his misfortunes; they were men ofrank and state, who are called in the book of Tobias kings. No doubt they were, like Job, men of great possessions, and sort of princes over the territories in which they lived.

When they first saw Job in the miserable state to which he was reduced, they failed to recognise him; and when they did so, they wept, tore their garments, and sprinkled ashes on their heads, to show their grief and dismay. But instead of looking upon Job as a holy man suffering under the hand of God for his greater perfection, they took a low, worldly,

and uncharitable view of their friend's case, and believed that he had been committing some enormous crimes, for which God was now punishing him.

Upon this supposition, they reproached him with being the cause of his own miseries, asking him, "Who ever perished being innocent?" or when were the just destroyed?

And Job in reply acknowledged his sinfulness, being filled with the knowledge of that, as all good men are; and he said, "Indeed I know that man cannot be justified compared with God; yet," said he, "if I be judged, I know that I shall be found just." And then he expressed his perfect faith and trust in God: "although He should kill me, yet will I trust in Him," he said.

His three friends, however, still insisted on their arguments, and in their pride and self-will would not believe that what Job had urged in his defence could have any force. They loaded him with harsh speeches and severe accusations, and carried them to such an extent towards him whom they had affected to come to console and support under his afflictions, that the expression "Job's comforters" has become a proverb to express persons who say unkind or disheartening words to those in trouble or sorrow.

But Job's real comfort under all his trials was in the certainty of God's love for him, and that all He did to him was done in His mercy for his greater good; and in the knowledge of his own sincerity of heart towards God, in Whose sight he had ever endeavoured to lead a holy life. Job knew too, and expressed his belief in that Redeemer promised by God to the patriarchs; "for I know," he said, "that my Redeemer liveth, and in the last day I shall rise again out of the earth; and I shall be clothed again with my skin, and in my flesh I shall see my God, Whom I myself shall see and my eyes shall behold,

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and not another; this my hope is laid up in my bosom."

God, however, at last had pity on His servant, and restored him to health. He spoke Himself to Job, consoling him for all his sufferings, and expressed His wrath against those false friends who had so spoken against and accused His servant, nor would He pardon them until Job had prayed for them. And God blessed the end of Job's life more than the beginning; for He gave him greater possessions than he had at first, and as many sons and daughters as he had before. And Job lived to be a hundred and forty years old, and saw his children's children to the fourth generation.

THE MACHABEES.

AFTER the captivity of the Jews in Babylon, &c. had ended, and they had been permitted by Artaxerxes, king of Persia (who was the grandson of Assuerus), to repair their city of Jerusalem, they set to work and rebuilt the walls of Jerusalem, and endeavoured to restore it to something of its ancient beauty and splendour. After this the Jews had a long and prosperous peace; but then Alexander the Great, king of Macedon, conquered the king of Persia, and divided the great empire of that monarch into four kingdoms, leaving them at his death among his four generals; and the one of these called the kingdom of Asia fell to the share of one of Alexander's captains or generals named Seleucus, who favoured the Jews, and permitted them to have their full liberty. But on his death, his brother Antiochus Epiphanes took possession of the throne, and he was very wicked. He took the holy vessels from the Jew

ish temple and sold them, and got his wicked brother Jason made high-priest, who of course committed all sorts of profanations, and taught the Jewish youths to be as wicked as the heathen, and to practise all their manners and games. Jerusalem was thus rendered a scene of irreligion and bloodshed, and dreadful signs were seen in the heavens, foreboding the wrath of God.

There was on one occasion an appearance of soldiers glittering in golden armour; on another men in helmets with drawn swords, and troops of horsemen moving to and fro through the air, shaking their shields and encountering each other.

It was not long ere these dreadful omens were realised in a frightful massacre of the Jewish people, 80,000 of whom were slain by the wicked Antiochus, with a view to reducing the unhappy Jews to obedience; the city having been filled with the factions of his brother Jason.

As soon as Antiochus had made himself complete master of Jerusalem, he began to consider how he could entirely destroy the whole race of the Jews, and extirpate their religion; and after selling many of them for slaves, he set up a statue of the idol Jupiter Olympius, and the Jews were ordered to sacrifice to it under pain of death. This brought many Jewish martyrs to confess their faith, and seal it with their blood; and amongst the rest were seven brothers, commonly known by the name of Machabees. These seven brave youths, with their mother, firmly refused to offer sacrifice to any but the true God; neither would they eat of the meats forbidden by their religion, or in any way break the Jewish laws.

At first King Antiochus had them tormented with whips and scourges; but then the eldest of the brethren spoke thus to their tyrant: "What

wouldst thou ask or learn of us? We are ready to die rather than transgress the laws of God received from our fathers." Then Antiochus, filled with rage at the constancy of these youths, ordered fryingpans and brazen caldrons to be made hot, which being done, the king ordered his executioners to cut out the tongue, and cut off the extremities of the hands and feet, and pull off the skin of the head of this eldest Machabee, and then fry him in the frying-pan. This was all done according to the command of the tyrant; and during all his sufferings his mother and brothers stood by him, and instead of giving way to the anguish and grief which must have filled their hearts at so sad and dreadful a sight, they took courage in God, for whose sake they stood ready themselves for martyrdom, and exhorted their son and brother to stand firm to his faith, saying, "The Lord God will look upon the truth, and will take pleasure in us," as Moses declared in the profession of the Canticle (or Psalm): "and in His servants He will take pleasure." Then the next brother was seized and tortured in the same manner, and acted with the same heroic resolution. And when he was at the last gasp, and his soul was on the eve of departure from his tortured body, he turned to the tyrant and said: "Thou indeed, O most wicked man, destroyest us out of this present life, but the King of the world will raise us up who die for His laws in the resurrection of eternal life." The wretch Antiochus, whose great object, instigated as he was by the devil, was to force these young men to deny God's religion, then proceeded to torment the other brothers, and kill them; but with no better success. At last he came to the seventh brother, and looking at him, and considering his extreme youth, he resolved to make one desperate trial to overcome his constancy.