Job's Complaint
Dublin Core
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To comfort or deplore me;
Pain wakes a pulse in every bone,And death is closing o'er me.
Still doth his lifter stroke delay,Protracted tortures dooming,
I feel, ere life has pass'd away,His very worm consuming.
And all around are sleeping,
While I, in tears of agony,My restless couch am steeping.
I sigh for morn - the rising dayAwakes the earth to gladness;
I turn, with sickening soul, away -It smiles upon my sadness.
That trembles o'er the river,
A moment sheds its quivering gleam,Then shuns the sight for ever;
So soft a ray can pleasure shed,While secret snares surround it,
So swift the faithless hope is fled,Which wins the heart to wound it!
Whole nations bent before me:
Princes and hoary siress would bow,To flatter and adore me.
To me the widow turn'd for aid,And ne'er in vain address'd me;
For me the grateful orphan pray'd -The soul of misery bless'd me.
In lonely anguish lying;
Was balm unto the wounded mind,And solace to the dying.
Till one stern stroke, of all my state,Of all my bliss bereft me;
And I was worse than desolate,For God himself had left me.
When all conspired to bless me,
I deem'd you friends - but ye have proved,The foes who most oppress me.
I could have borne the slave's rude scorn,The wreck of all I cherish'd;
Had one, but one, remain'd to mournO'er me, when I, too, perish'd.
And nought can now divide them:
O! would the same wild storm had laid,Their wretched sire beside them -
I had not then been doom'd to seeThe loss of all who love me;
Unbroken would my slumbers be,Though none had wept above me.
A higher hope remaineth;
E'en while his wrath is o'er me shed,I know my Saviour reigneth.
The worm may waste this withering clay,When flesh and spirit sever;
My soul shall see eternal day,And dwell with God for ever!
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