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DEDICATION.

TO MRS. LYDIA ADAMS:

THE heart and life Christian, the good Samaritan, the faithful mother, and the unknown genius; whose broad, catholic religion knows no sectarianism; the long pencil of whose life has been pure and coruscant beneath a vail; whose domestic virtues have shed luster on a large family of sons and daughters; whose heart ever beats in warm sympathy with liberal ideas and the onward march of human development and progress; whose words of encouragement first seconded the purpose of my young heart to emerge from the wilderness, without friends or money, to tread the halls of college, through my own unaided efforts; whose tender sympathies and prayers. have ever been with me in adversity, not less than in prosperity; and whose lute-strings, in a green old age, though shattered and broken by care, infirmities, and trouble, are yet beautiful, tender, magical, and melodious: together with another precious Friend, of sacred memory, sent by kind angels in my time of need; whose transcendant virtues, rare wealth of mind and heart, expansive benevolence and generosity-unaffected by vanity, pride, or selfishness-in the midst of affluence and the fashions and pomp of social life; the patron of art and science, and every form of goodness; to whom nature has been prodigal of beauty and redundant in the bestowment of happy surroundings; whose gifts of music, poetry, and spiritual aspirations, kindled by divine love, betoken an immortality of ineffable bliss; and by whose kind words of cheer and pecuniary aid, in a time of despondency and almost despair, I was encouraged to undertake this publi

cation; this strain of pensive sadness, heart-felt, though poorly sung; born of the olden time, though true, and fresh, and touching in every age; written in the valley of grief, sitting in the ashes unknown and uncomforted like Job; sanctified by holy tears, and uttered from a broken harp-string, more as the melancholy song of my own soul, in the night of my experience, than that of Job; is affectionately dedicated;-to the one, as a long-absent but everloving son; and to the other as a sincere, grateful, and ever-appreciative friend, by the Author.

LIST OF PICTURES AND EXPLANATIONS.

THE following pictures were all taken from original engravings especially prepared for this work.

PICTURE NO. I. PAGE 57.

Job Offering Sacrifices for his Children.

And his sons went and feasted in their houses, every one his day, and sent and called for their three sisters to eat and to drink with them. And it was so when the days of their feasting were gone about, that Job sent and sanctified them, and rose up early in the morning, and offered burnt offerings_according to the number of them all; for Job said: "It may be that my sons have sinned, and cursed God in their hearts." Thus did Job continually. What a practical denial were these pious and daily rites of the cruel charges brought against Job by Eliphaz, Bildad, and Zophar, of irreligion and impiety!

PICTURE NO. II. PAGE 66.

Job, His Three Friends, and Elihu.

These three friends were Eliphaz, King of the Temanites; Bildad, King of Shuah; and Zophar, King of

Naamah. They were all older than Job. Elihu was a young man, the son of Barachel, the Buzite, of the kindred of Ram. He stood by silently and patiently, and listened to the speeches of Job and his three aged friends until they ceased speaking. He then, with many apologies for his youth, and with great vehemence, took up the controversy, and showed his opinions. Eliphaz, Bildad, and Zophar had hitherto believed Job to be perfect and upright. They appear to have been on terms of great intimacy with him; for when they heard of the great evil that came upon him, they made an appointment to come together, to mourn with him, and to comfort him. And when they lifted up their eyes eyes afar off, and knew him not, because of his changed and desolate appearance, they lifted up their voices, and wept, and rent every one his mantle, and sprinkled dust upon their heads towards heaven. So they sat down with him upon the ground, seven days and seven nights, and none spake a word unto him; for they saw that his grief was great. But when they saw how dreadfully afflicted Job was; and that he had lost all his property, and consequently his friends, they changed their opinions concerning him. Educated in a dark and monstrous view of the nature and design of God's moral government over the world, they believed that calamity implied sin and guilt, and especially such extraordinary afflictions as had fallen on Job could only be regarded as the measure of his great iniquities. Hence they all speak from this standpoint. As it was said of Christ that he was in the world, and the world knew him not; so Job was before these self-righteous and self-opinionated accusers; but they knew him not; neither the scope and end of his dreadful trials. In all ages pivotal men have, in their life-time, been misunderstood and undervalued. They have been tried, persecuted, forsaken, and crucified, in feelings and reputation, if not in body, that others, through them might be saved. No age of the world has ever been so conspicuous for such illustrious examples as the present, and many who are now sitting on the ground, and in the ashes, sorely smitten and afflicted, calumniated and forsaken, will yet become the martyrs and heroes of an age, whose heraldic gushes are

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