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(3) The earth and sea include the two great material factors before man's eyes. Jehovah passes next to the great recurring features of nature, as seen in the day and night. Has Job ever, since the beginning of his life, commanded a single morning to appear, or caused the dawn to know the place of its appearing ? With all his supposed knowledge and power, man cannot command the forces of nature to do his bidding. Day by day the light appears in its appointed place, flooding the earth with light from which the guilty flee. Evening falls, and no word of man can arrest or quicken this constant action. Only One gave His command at the beginning, " Let there be light," and since that time evening and morning have known their appointed time and place. Joshua, speaking in the word of the Lord, can arrest the course of the day, and the prophet gives Hezekiah a divine sign, in turning back the shadow upon the sun-dial; but these only emphasize the fact that none but God can command the light." I form the light, and create darkness" (Isa. 45:7).Let us gaze with rapture at the glorious sunset, or watch with awe the dawning of a new day, and say from the depths of our hearts, " The day is thine, the night also is thine :Thou hast prepared the light and the sun " (Ps. 74 :16). The dawn knows its place-in the east, and yet varying daily as the year progresses. Astronomy marks these varying changes of place, and of time as well. All is perfect, and all sings His praise who commanded and maintains it."Thou makest the outgoings of the morning and evening to sing" (Ps. 65 :8, marg.) Our wisdom is to see and own it all as divine, to say with the poet:

" On the glimmering limit, far withdrawn,
God made Himself an awful rose of dawn."

With the dawning of the light evil men hide themselves. Literally as well as figuratively is this true of "the unfruitful works of darkness." As the mark of the signet-ring upon the formless clay, so the light stamps upon the face of the earth the varied forms and colors of all things. They stand out like a lovely garment-or the reverse, a scene of ruin-under the light. The light shows all things as they are:"Whatsoever doth make manifest is light" (Eph. 5:13). The night is the light of the wicked; they hate the light, and will not come to it lest their deeds should be reproved. The entrance of the light arrests their deeds. Their uplifted arm is broken.

Thus the light of God's presence detects evil. When He causes the dawning of a new day-"The day of the Lord"-evil doers shall be shaken out of the earth. For this cause, His people who are " children of the light and of the day," order their life by the light. For this cause, in that fair land where there is no night, nothing that defileth can enter. It is the home of the light. None could remain there but the sons of light. " The Lamb is the light thereof."

This appeal to day and night is most effectual. Shall Job accuse One who is Light, who sees all things as they are ? Shall he doubt One who knows the secrets of his heart, and the reason for these chastenings ? Do not these questions give a hint that God will cause Job's night to end, and at the appointed time cause His dayspring to visit the poor sufferer ?

(4) In intimate connection with the all-manifesting power of the light, God probes Job further. Does he know secret things ?-"which belong unto God." The hidden depths of the sea with its countless dead; the gates of death and what lies beyond. Has Job searched this out ? Has he fully known the breadth of the earth-all that it contains ? Does modern science know it really ? What is the "home," or origin of light, or of darkness? Men have been inquiring into "the origin of evil;" what do they know apart from divine revelation ? Modern science sees more clearly of late years that the sun is not the origin of light, which exists independently of that, or any other visible source. These questions of Jehovah are addressed not merely to Job, with his knowledge limited to that time, but to men of the present day. Whether we regard verse 21 as a question, as in our version, or as a statement in divine irony-" Thou knowest it for then thou wast born," etc.-the meaning is obvious.

(5) Jehovah speaks next of the phenomena of snow and rain, of frost and dew, with their effects upon the earth and man. Here again man's ignorance and helplessness are displayed in the presence of the wisdom, power and beneficence of God, as well as His chastening hand.

The snow and hail are laid up in storehouses- where ? Not in some hidden locality, in vast masses, not merely in the viewless vapor filling the firmament, as science now would say, but back of all that, those storehouses of mercy and of judgment are in the hand of God. It is by His word they are produced-the snow, for protection of the grass in winter, and for cooling and refreshing in summer; the hail, in smiting plagues and sweeping judgments (Isa. 28:17). Snow, we are told, is produced by the action of cold upon vapor, turning its molecules into crystals of lovely and varied form. Those forms are planned-by whom? Whose laws are fulfilled by these tiny crystals ? The working of whose mind do they display ?

Next to its coldness, perhaps more striking than that, snow is the standard for absolute whiteness, of purity. Perhaps Job did not know that this whiteness was caused by the pure white light reflected from the countless faces of its crystals. But what "treasures" of whiteness are reserved by God? He is light, and the snow reflecting the sunlight, suggests how completely His essential righteousness is displayed in that work of redemption which enables Him to say:"Though your sins be as scarlet, they shall be as white as snow" (Isa. i :18). Sins that once cried for vengeance, now, through the precious blood of Christ, reflect the glory of God's character! " To declare His righteousness, that He might be just, and the justifier of him which believeth in Jesus" (Rom. 3 :26). In the " redemption that is in Christ Jesus," He has exhaustless stores of whiteness and protection for the sins of the world. What fearful judgments will follow the rejection of that grace! "The wrath of the Lamb ! " The "snow" now falling in a pitiless storm of destruction.

This thought is emphasized in the hail, the frozen drops of rain. Those gentle showers which water the earth that it may bring forth its fruits, turned into death-dealing wrath ! For a Christ-rejecting world there is laid up " wrath against the day of wrath," of which the hail is a figure (Ex. 9:22; Hag. 2:17; Ps. 18 :12; Rev. 16 :21).

And yet these fearful judgments-God's "strange work "-will tell forth the glory of a righteousness, inflexible as well as full of love. " Praise Him . . . fire and hail; snow and vapors; stormy wind fulfilling His word " (Ps. 148:8).

Let Science tell us all it can discover of the laws and effects of the snow crystals, of the varied temperature of the air currents, of electric discharges and equalizations; let us penetrate as deeply as we may into these second causes, and we shall find them to be the outer court of His tabernacle, the display of His attributes, leading us on into the holiest of His revealed Person, as seen in Christ Jesus.

Passing from these phenomena of winter and of storm, the Lord asks as to the method of distribution of the light (for this seems the thought of ver. 24). How amazing are the "partings" of the light-permeating every part of the earth where its rays fall. How unthinkably swift are "the wings of the morning," flashing from sun to earth in a few moments. How beautiful are those "partings," as seen in the spectrum, the rainbow painting in living colors the whole landscape. Why and how is one object green, another blue, another red? Is it sufficient to say that each substance reflects certain rays? That these, in turn, are produced by varied vibrations of inconceivable rapidity ? We ask about the "X-rays," with their penetrating power; about the ultra-violet and red rays, of chemical and heating power. Science has much to tell us that might well fill us with wonder and amazement, and with awe and worship-of whom ? The more we know of His displays, the less we know, save as He makes Himself known in Christ, of Himself.* *It would lead us far into this field, if we were but able, to search into the endless details of the laws, manifestations and effects of the light, and their spiritual significance. It is a field in which comparatively little has been done, and yet what has been told us might well make us hunger for more. The white undivided light is composed of three main rays-blue, green, red. God is Light! Three is manifestation. God fully manifested is seen as three persons. Blue, the heavenly color, tells of the Father in heaven ; green, the color of life upon earth, tells of the Spirit, the giver and maintainer of life ; red, the color of heat, speaks of the Son, the expression of the love of God, whose precious blood is the measure of that love.

The three kinds of rays-the light ray, the heat ray, and the actinic, or chemical ray, may also tell us of the Trinity. The first, of the Father, who "hath shined in our hearts ; " the second, of the Son, healing, warming, sustaining ; the third, of the Spirit's most needed but inscrutable working. All are inter-related and complementary in their work. What would light be without heat? It could only show the wreckage of creation; spiritually, it manifests the hideous ruin of man's fallen nature. And what would both light and heat effect, save to warm, and ultimately consume the ruin ? So all waits on the actinic rays in which life is sustained ; the Spirit must accompany and make good all the brightness of divine revelation, all the warmth of the love of Christ.*

From the east, the apparent source of the light, comes also the sweeping east wind, distributed over the land in the storm-a picture of wrath-His wrath-who in the light had spoken so silently. But even the east wind is held in His fists, controlled by His will.

But storms and storm-clouds are but the prelude to the rain. Here, too, God is seen, bringing refreshing after the storm. So with Job, his chastening will be followed by the showers. Who knows how to "divide," to distribute, these refreshing showers ? Man would distribute them unevenly, or out of due time. God knows when and how to send the welcome relief. Nay, the very lightning and thunder are but the vehicles upon which the showers come, as Science now declares.

How widely distributed is this rain, reaching out beyond the abodes of man, to the waste places of the earth. Where the tiniest blade of grass grows, there is seen the truth that, " His tender mercies are over all His works."
Nor are these things merely acts; they are, so to speak, the offspring of God's love and care. Rain and dew, ice and frost, are all the children of the great and good God.

" These are Thy works, Thou Parent of all good! "

Can we doubt Him ? Shall we misjudge Him ? How our unbelief and discontent witness against us, as Job's complainings did against him. S. R.

(To be continued.)