Methodist Magazine and Review

W. H. WITHROW, D.D., EDITOR.

GEO. A.

E. R. WOOD,

MANAGING DIRECTOR

G. A. MORROW

ASSISTANT MANAGER

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Job iv. 13-21.

BY MARGARET G. CURRIE.

'Twas in the far-off Patriarchal Age,

At midnight-haply of the solstice bland,
To Teman's palmy land of chief and sage
There came a spirit from the spirit-land,
To couch of strong Eliphaz grave and grand,
A poet seer, an olden king uncrowned,

A princely trafficker of stainless hand
His camels, treasures on their bunches bound,
Fared India-ward o'er sandy solitudes profound.

Safe were his asses in their nightly stalls,

His flocks in fold, his herds on pasture-sward
And he at rest amid his divaned halls,
Feared not Sabean or Chaldean horde,
Nor starry deities whom they adored;
His home-born servitors, a valiant band,

Profoundly slept, with ready spear and sword
To guard from prowlers of nigh desert land

The horned and fleecy droves that passed beneath the hand.

The prophet-chieftain knew before he waked

A pure, ethereal visitant was near,

His flesh crawled white, his bones and sinews quaked,

His hair stood up, instinct with that wild fear

That thrills the hearts of men when ghosts appear.
Eliphaz shuddering owned how weak his race,

The spirit's insight how divinely clear-
The draped form luminous but veiled the face,
A silent voice was heard that filled the eery place.

"Give ear to me awhile, thou Temanite,

I know the mysteries I may not disclose,
My phantom feet have trod the land of light
Beyond death's swelling stream that darkling flows,
I come commissioned thy secure repose

To break, that I man's nothingness may show.
And might of God who doth all fates dispose—
Even as the seraphs that before Him glow

I at His mandate stand, or at His bidding go

"Shall man be purer, juster than the Lord,
Who when archangels thought to wrest His crown
Rebuked their arrant folly, His strong word

From glittering thrones supernal cast them down.
Then why will feeble man provoke His frown?"
The voice was tender though with touch of scorn,
The spirit, mortal birth's weak hour had known,
Had entered life with wailing, and forlorn,
Tho' now exalted high among the sons of morn.

CHAPULTEPEC, MEXICO.