Moff JOB Chapter 10

I am sick of life, sick of it;

I will give rein to my complaint of him.

‘Do not condemn me,’ I will say to God,

‘but tell me what thou hast against me.

Does it befit thee to be hard on men,

to disdain what thou hast made?

Are thine eyes only mortal,

is thy sight no more than man’s,

are thy days short as a man’s days,

are thy years like a man’s life,

that thou huntest out my guilt

and searchest thus for sin in me,

all the while knowing I am innocent,

knowing there is no perfidy in me?

Thy hands shaped and moulded me;

and wilt thou turn round to destroy me?

Remember how thou madest me like clay;

and wilt thou grind me into dust again?

Didst thou not pour me out like milk

and curdle me like cheese,

clothe me with skin and flesh,

knit me with bones and sinews?

Thou didst bestow upon me life and love,

my spirit was in thy charge and care.

And all the while this was thy dark design!--

plotting this, well I know it, against me!

If I do wrong, thou markest me,

and never wilt acquit me of iniquity.

If I am guilty, woe betide me!

If I am guiltless, I must hang my head!

For, if I dare to raise it, thou art after me like a lion,

so marvellously fresh in thine attacks,

so keen to put me in the wrong,

eager in thy rising wrath!

Why didst thou ever take me from the womb?

Why could I not have died there in the dark?

Then I would be as though I had not been,

borne from the womb straight to the tomb.

My days are few! let me alone awhile,

that I may have life bright with a brief smile,

before I leave it to return no more,

before I pass to darkness and deep gloom,

to a land dark as midnight, utter chaos,

with no light but the shades of death.’ ”