The Man of Uz, and Other Poems. L. H. Sigourney
sunbeam nears the west,
Soothing, perchance our self-esteem with proofs
That 'mid all faults the good have loved us still,
And quickening with redoubled energy
To do or suffer.
The three friends of Job
Who in the different regions where they dwelt
Teman, and Naamah and the Shuhite land,
Heard tidings of his dire calamity,
Moved by one impulse, journey'd to impart
Their sorrowing sympathy.
Yet when they saw
Him fallen so low, so chang'd that scarce a trace
Remained to herald his identity
Down by his side upon the earth, they sate
Uttering no language save the gushing tear—
Spontaneous homage to a grief so great.
Oh Silence, born of Wisdom! we have felt
Thy fitness, when beside the smitten friend
We took our place. The voiceless sympathy
The tear, the tender pressure of the hand
Interpreted more perfectly than words
The purpose of our soul.
We speak to err,
Waking to agony some broken chord
Or bleeding nerve that slumbered. Words are weak,
When God's strong discipline doth try the soul;
And that deep silence was more eloquent
Than all the pomp of speech.
Yet the long pause
Of days and nights, gave scope for troubled thought
And their bewildered minds unskillfully
Launching all helmless on a sea of doubt
Explored the cause for which such woes were sent,
Forgetful that this mystery of life
Yields not to man's solution. Passing on
From natural pity to philosophy
That deems Heaven's judgments penal, they inferr'd
Some secret sin unshrived by penitence,
That drew such awful visitations down.
While studying thus the wherefore, with vain toil
Of painful cogitation, lo! a voice
Hollow and hoarse, as from the mouldering tomb,
"Perish the day in which I saw the light!
The day when first my mother's nursing care
Sheltered my helplessness. Let it not come
Into the number of the joyful months,
Let blackness stain it and the shades of death
Forever terrify it.
For it cut
Not off as an untimely birth my span,
Nor let me sleep where the poor prisoners hear
No more the oppressor, where the wicked cease
From troubling and the weary are at rest.
Now as the roar of waves my sorrows swell,
And sighs like tides burst forth till I forget
To eat my bread. That which I greatly feared
Hath come upon me. Not in heedless pride
Nor wrapped in arrogance of full content
I dwelt amid the tide of prosperous days,
And yet this trouble came."
With mien unmoved
The Temanite reprovingly replied:
"Who can refrain longer from words, even though
To speak be grief? Thou hast the instructor been
Of many, and their model how to act.
When trial came upon them, if their knees
Bow'd down, thou saidst, "be strong," and they obey'd.
But now it toucheth thee and thou dost shrink,
And murmuring, faint. The monitor forgets
The precepts he hath taught. Is this thy faith,
Thy confidence, the uprightness of thy way?
Whoever perish'd being innocent?
And when were those who walk'd in righteous ways
Cut off? How oft I've seen that those who sow
The seeds of evil secretly, and plow
Under a veil of darkness, reap the same.
In visions of the night, when deepest sleep
Falls upon men, fear seiz'd me, all my bones
Trembled, and every stiffening hair rose up.
A spirit pass'd before me, but I saw
No form thereof. I knew that there it stood,
Even though my straining eyes discern'd it not.
Then from its moveless lips a voice burst forth,
"Is man more just than God? Is mortal man
More pure than He who made him?
Lo, he puts
No trust in those who serve him, and doth charge
Angels with folly. How much less in them
Dwellers in tents of clay, whose pride is crush'd
Before the moth. From morn to eve they die
And none regard it."
So despise thou not
The chastening of the Almighty, ever just,
For did thy spirit please him, it should rise
More glorious from the storm-cloud, all the earth
At peace with thee, new offspring like the grass
Cheering thy home, and when thy course was done
Even as a shock of corn comes fully ripe
Into the garner should thy burial be
Beldv'd and wept of all."
Mournful arose
The sorrowful response.
"Oh that my grief
Were in the balance laid by faithful hands
And feeling hearts. To the afflicted soul
Friends should be comforters. But mine have dealt
Deceitfully, as fails the shallow brook
When summer's need is sorest.
Did I say
Bring me a gift? or from your flowing wealth
Give solace to my desolate penury?
Or with your pitying influence neutralize
My cup of scorn poured out by abject hands?
That thus ye mock me with contemptuous words
And futile arguments, and dig a pit
In which to whelm the man you