An exposition with practical observations continued upon the eighth, ninth and tenth chapters of…An exposition with practicall observations continued upon the eighth, ninth and tenth chapters of…

The Hebrew is, Is not fewness of days mine? Yes, That's my portion. Abstracts often increase, and sometimes they diminish the sense. Here the sense is diminutive; as if he had said, My days are so far from many, that they are fewness it self: Mine are not increasing and growing, but declining and abating days. My days are going down, they are brought into a lesser, and a narrower compass every day. The Chaldee renders, Are not my days ceasing? My days fade and wear out every day, Show me how short my life is (closer to the original) how soon ceasing I am, or as others, What, or of what quantity mine age is, how transitory, how temporary I am.

The Hebrew is, Is not fewnesse of daies mine? Yes, That's my portion. Abstracts often encrease, and sometimes they diminish the sense. Here the sense is diminutive; as if he had said, My daies are so farre from many, that they are fewnesse it self: Mine are not encreasing and growing, but declining and abating daies. My daies are going down, they are brought into a lesser, and a narrower compasse every day. The Chaldee renders, Are not my daies ceasing? My daies fade and wear out every day, Shew me how short my life is (closer to the originall) how soon ceasing I am, or as others, What, or of what quantity mine age is, how transitory, how temporary I am.

Cease then, and let me alone.

Some read it in the third person, Therefore let him cease from ⟨p. 577⟩me, and let me alone; we in the second, Cease then, ¹and let me alone. Job looks upon himself as one besieged and straitened with afflictions: Now (saith he) I beseech thee raise thy siege, and draw off thy force from me: or if thou wilt not make a final peace with me, yet grant me a cessation, let me have a truce for a limited time, let me not have such continual alarms, or be forced to stand armed continually; Let me rest, saith the Septuagint; Issachar stooped to burdens, because he desired rest. Some are so burdened that they cannot rest, how much soever they desire it. Job desires God to give him rest, because his days were few.