494 REMNANTS OF TIME. This was the case ofthat holy man whose sorrows and com- plaints have furnished out almost a whole book of scripture, and supplied the saints in all succeeding ages with the forms and speeches of pious mourning. It is the voice of a sacred impatience that Job here utters, " O that I knew where I might find him !" and by a plain paraphrase we may learn both the meaning and the reason of such language, and be taught by his example to la- ment after an absent God. Let us suppose the saint therefore pouring out his soul in such sort of expressions as these, in which I shall not entirely confine myself to the darkness of the patriarchal dispensation under which Job lived, but indulge in the languagebf the New Testament and personating a mourning christian. Time was when I had a God near me, and upon every new distress and difficulty I made him my present refuge ; I was ' wont to call upon him in an hourof darkness, and he shone upon my path with divine. light. He has often taught me to read my duty in his providences, or in his word, or by souse secret hints of his own Spirit, even while I have been kneeling at the throne of grace but now I find not my usual signs and tokens. My Guide and my Counsellor is withdrawn; " O that I knew where I might find him !" He was once my kind Assistant in every duty, and my support under every burden : I have found the grace of my Lord sufficient for me in my sharpest conflicts, his strength has appeared in my weakness: When my spiritual enemies have beset me round, he has scattered them before me, or subdued them under me; and being held up by his everlasting arms, I have stood my ground, and borne up head under the weight of heavy sorrows ; but now I am attacked on all sides, my soul wrestles hard with sins andtemptations, and I find no assistance, no victory : I sink under my present sorrows : for my God, my strength, and my Comforter is absent, and afar off; " O that I knew where I might find him !" . My God was wont to deal with me as a compassionate friend ; when Satan accused, he . has justified. He has shown me the all - sufficient sacrifice of his Son, and that spotless righte- ousness of his, which has answered all the demands of his osvn holy law, and cancelled all the charges ofguilt that the devil or my own conscience could bring against me. He has taught me by faith to put my soul under the sprinklings of this sacred blood, and to wrap around me the robe of this divine righteousness; he himself has arrayed me in garments of salvation. But now the army of my sins rises up before me and overwhelms my spirit with many terrors ; Satan the accuser urges on the charge, and my Saviour and his righteousness are as it were hidden from me. " O that I knew where I might find him !"
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