gogues. The doctrine of a special or equal providence would have been effectually banished: and the Jews would have been satisfied, that their commonwealth was governed by the same general laws as any other commonwealth. But was this actually the case? Quite the reverse. When our Lord's disciples saw a man that had been blind from his birth, they immediately, in the very spirit of that Law which by a special providence ordained that temporal blessings or troubles should always follow piety or impiety, proceeded to inquire, whether the man was born blind by reason of his own sins in a preëxistent state or by reason of the sins of his parents'. And, in a similar manner, when the tower of Siloam crushed by its fall eighteen individuals; it was forthwith concluded, as a thing of course, that their death was to be esteemed punitive, and that they were more wicked than all their other countrymen'.

Now I contend, that, if Ezra wrote the book of Job by way of teaching the Jews that they were to expect a special providence no longer; and if they knew that such was its drift, which they must have known had Ezra meant it to be really useful to them: then they would, no more

1 John ix. 1, 2. The Jews seem to have imbibed the pagan notion of a preëxisting state, with its inseparable concomitant the doctrine of the Metempsychosis, during the Babylonian captivity.

2 Luke xiii. 1—5.

than ourselves, have pronounced every accidental death or corporeal infirmity a plain judgment upon some concealed wickedness; then the doctrine would have been entirely given up from the time of Ezra, its erroneousness subsequent to that period having been determined by the express voice of revelation; and then, consequently, it could not have been in existence during the ministry of Christ.

This argument alone seems to me fully conclusive against the theory of Bishop Warburton.

2. The hypothesis of a late production of the book of Job being thus rejected in the theory of its principal advocate, we have next to consider the hypothesis of an early production of that poem.

This second theory, I conceive, must at once recommend itself by its much greater abstract probability. For, if Job were contemporary with Amram and Moses, and if his character were such as to deserve being adduced by Ezekiel conjointly with Noah and Daniel; it is incredible, that his history should have been left for so many centuries to the chance of mere tradition. Other circumstances, which were of importance to the chosen people of God, were not left thus neglected: they were duly committed to writing by persons, who were made fully competent to the task, about the time when the circumstances themselves actually occurred. Matters indeed, which preceded the existence of

the Hebrew commonwealth, whether handed down in writing or by tradition, were left to be regularly and accurately detailed by an inspired writer of the house of Israel; agreeably to what seems to have been the plan of divine wisdom, that the descendants of Jacob should specially be the vehicles of heavenly instruction to mankind: but the whole of their own history, from the time of Moses down to the time of Nehemiah, appears to have been either written by persons who were contemporary with the facts related, or to have been faithfully compiled from the regularly kept and well authenticated chronicles of the kings. The important moral history of Job on the contrary, if we adopt the hypothesis of its late production, was floating only in the stream of vague tradition, at the very time when Ezekiel adduces him as an eminent and well known example of righteousness. Hence the abstract probability most undoubtedly is, that the book of Job was written at a very early period; that it was written, in short, soon after the occurrence of the events which it details.

With this opinion, the internal evidence, afforded by the book itself, perfectly agrees. Its language, as some of our first critics have re marked, is that of very high antiquity: and, notwithstanding the efforts of Warburton and others to prove the contrary, the complete absence of any clear allusions to events in the Israelitish his tory subsequent to the days of Moses makes it

scarcely possible for the work to have been written by a more modern Jewish author. From the failure of various attempts even in our own days, we all know the extreme difficulty of composing at a laté period a poem which shall be exhibited ás the production of an early period. After the greatest care, something or other will always escape which too plainly betrays the hand of a modern writer. But, after âttentively weighing every allusion to recent events by which Warburton would prove the comparative newness of the book, I can discover no reason, why all such passages might not have been written quite as well before the events to which they have been thought to refer, as after them'.

1 To give a single instance: let the reader first turn to his Bible, and peruse Job xxxiii. 17—26. Let him then ponder, what modern event in the Jewish history this passage can possibly be thought to refer to. After a reasonable time spent in such an exercise, let him consult the Divine Legation book vi. sect. 2. § II. 1. p. 315, 316. for its supposed key. Then let him read the passage again, and consider whether it might not have been written just as well in the days of Job as in the days of Ezra. I doubt, whether by the laws of evidence any pas sage can be positively established as an allusion to a given circumstance, unless it can be at the same time shewn, that the passage could not have been written before the circumstance itself occurred. Thus, if some ancient chronicle of the gestes of William the Norman were produced as the work of a contemporary prelate, and if the conqueror were described as using cannon at the battle of Hastings, we should be sure that it was the production of a more recent age.

II. If then the book of Job be an inspired production, it must have been written by an inspired author. The next question therefore is, to what author we must ascribe it. Now, with respect to this point, when we consider its high antiquity, we shall forthwith perceive, that the only probable claimants of the work must assuredly be either Moses or Job.

1. Archbishop Magee, who, like myself, decidedly contends for the remote antiquity of the work, supposes either Job himself, or some Idumèan contemporary of his, to have been its author; conceives, that it fell into the hands of Moses while sojourning in Midian; and imagines, that in the transcription the Hebrew Lawgiver might have made some small and unimportant alterations, which will sufficiently account for occasional and partial resemblances of expression between it and the Pentateuch, if any such there be1.

From this opinion he afterward in some measure departs; urging a reason why Job must be the author of the book, which, if valid, would effectually exclude any Idumèan contemporary of his, just as much as Moses or indeed as any other person.

Job, says he, appears to have enjoyed the divine vision'. In what manner, whether, as the Seventy think, by some appearance of a glorious cloud, or

Disc. on the Atonem. vol. ii. numb. LIX. p. 127, 128. *Job xxxviii. 1. xlii. 5.