^ You cannot miss the ring of conviction in the man's speech. It resounds in every line, and fills the air with its thrilling music. He says what he knows. He believes, and therefore speaks. It is the grand outleap of his whole soul in emphatic declaration, defiant faith, and fearless appeal, " rising with the aspiration of a flame, the beneficence of a fountain," and the certainty of un- clouded midday sunshine. " / know." It is not desire or caprice, wish or will, faith or hope, but unwavering, absolute knowledge, whose voice arrests our listening ear, and directs our expectant thought.2
^ By Eeason the limits of the finite may be transcended in knowledge, as for the dying saint they are in practice, and men may be certain that, could they comprehend as God comprehends, they should see the Eternal made manifest through the fleeting shadows of time. For there is but one Single Subject within which all knowledge and all reality fall. With and in that Single Subject philosophy and faith alike assure us that we are one. And so when his simple creed, pictorial, it may be, but symbolical of the deeper meaning of reality, bids the humblest soul in his greatest and last extremity be assured that his Eedeemer liveth, it may be that there has come to him an insight in form only different from that of the profoundest thinker.^
Jesus my Eedeemer lives,
Christ my trust is dead no more;
In the strength this knowledge gives Shall not all my fears be o'er.
Though the night of Death be fraught
Still with many an anxious thought ?
' A. B. Davidson, Job, 293. 2 j. Clifford, Daily Strength for Daily Living, 812. ' Lord Haldane, The Pathway to Reality.
94 I KNOW THAT MY REDEEMER LIVETH
Jesus my Eedeemer lives,
And His life I once shall see; Bright the hope this promise gives,
Where He is I too shall be. Shall I fear then? Can the Head Else and leave the members dead ?
Close to Him my soul is bound
In the bonds of Hope euclasp'd ; Faith's strong hand this hold hath found,
And the Eock hath firmly grasp'd ; And no ban of death can part From our Lord the trusting heart.^
^ Starting with the existence of an all-strong, all-wise, and all-loving God, Browning endeavours to prove the doctrine of a future lite by pointing to the incompleteness of the present one. Infinite wisdom united with Omnipotence cannot make anything imperfect ; but man in his earthly life is imperfect ; therefore that life can only be a part of a scheme which is as yet unrevealed in its entirety :
^ I search but cannot see
What purpose serves the soul that strives, or world it tries Conclusions with, unless the fruit of victories Stay one and all stored-up and guaranteed its own For ever!
If it be answered that, for all we know, the life of humanity as a whole, in its gradual development towards an as yet uncon- ceived end, may be perfect in itself, without the need of a future life for individuals. Browning would rejoin that in the temple which God builds, not merely the edifice itself, but every separate stone composing it, must be without spot or blemish ; for He is not subject to human limitations, and need not sacrifice the part to the whole. Consequently, Browning believed that if the individual's earthly life can be shown to be incomplete, the exist- ence of Heaven is proved.^
2. Job reached his conviction by the painful path of suffering. As we look back upon the history, and as we read the book, we can see in what way Job was a gainer by his discipline. And we find it in these verses if we find it in any part of the book. It
^ Lyra Gennanica, 93.
- A. C. Pigou, Eohert Brouyniiig as a Eeligious Teacher, 56.
JOB XIX. 25-27 95
was just this, that he had learned a new view of God. He had learned a great new truth. He had not perhaps been able to grasp it as fully as he would afterwards, but it had dawned upon him, this thought of God as a Father and a God who would reveal Himself more fully in a future life; and the words that were wrung from him in that hour of his deepest trouble were put here for the admonition of all the ages ; and saints of God who came after him, and followed sympathetically his history and his words, saw there a new light, a light that was strange to them, as it was to him, a light upon the far-distant horizon that cheered their souls through those dark ages that were to elapse until the coming of Christ. The dim and uncertain light led them on till at last the Sun of Kighteousness came, bringing life and immortality to light.
^ On any morning of the year, how many pious supplications, do you suppose, are uttered throughout educated Europe for " light " ? How many lips at least pronounce the word, and, perhaps, in the plurality of instances, with some distinct idea attached to it ? It is true the speakers employ it only as a metaphor. But why is their language thus metaphorical ? If they mean merely to ask for spiritual knowledge or gmdance, why not say so plainly, instead of using this jaded figure of speech ? No boy goes to his father when he wants to be taught, or helped, and asks his father to give him " light." He asks what he wants — advice or protection. Why are not we also content to ask our Father for what we want, in plain English ?