the Tigris and Euphrates, were possessed of any notion that such a city had ever been; and if now for the first time the idea arose through some accident laying bare its long-hidden monuments, we could determine the substantial history and condition of the people whose residences are disclosed to us by the labours of Mr. Layard. There might be the profoundest ignorance of the very name of the people whose former existence is thus revealed, yet still we could ascertain what they were and how they lived, though not who they were. And we should say of them, on the evidence of sculptures and other remains-This people was not a rude and barbarous tribe, but a refined and civilized nation. They were not confined to a small and insignificant territory, but possessed an extensive and mighty empire. Their land was not a land of peace and brotherhood, for they were ambitious of conquest and practised war. Their living was not spare, moderate, and hardy, but self-indulgent and luxurious. They were no worshippers of an invisible and holy God, but embodied their fancies of the Godhead in foolish and unworthy forms, and then bowed themselves before the work of their own hands. These are essential characteristics of a people's condition, and were we unable to decipher the name of Nineveh, or the tale of any of its deeds, we gather all this from its now unburied bricks and bas-reliefs. The disinterring of an ancient book might lead to similar discoveries and conclusions. It Even were its actual contents fictitious, let us but have evidence of its age, and of the scene of its tales, and we may know much of the condition and character of the people among whom it originated. Let its contents bear the indubitable impress of history, and our conclusions will be still more certain and valuable. may contain but a fragment of history, and its facts may be isolated from the annals of the land in which they occurred, and the reader may be unable to assign to them their general place in its history-its value as a revealer of the general condition and character of the people to which it relates will remain unimpaired. We have a book of this order, which assists us to determine the early condition of the mountains of Edom. The service which the now uncovered mounds of Khorsabad and Nimroud render to our knowledge of Nineveh, the book of Job renders to our knowledge of Idumæa. This book is probably the oldest in existence. It is strictly historical, or rather biographical. Though the age of its events cannot be determined with minute certainty, it was between the days of Jacob and the Exodus of the Israelites from Egypt. The scene of its events was Idumæa. "There was a man in the land of Uz, whose name was Job," are the first words of the book. In the book of Lamentations the words occur, "Rejoice and be glad, O daughter of Edom, that dwellest in the land of Uz," chap. iv. 21. So that the land of Uz comprehended, or was contained in, or was identical with the country which was ultimately occupied by Esau and his descendants, and called from them the land of Edom. This conclusion is fortified by the description which is given of Job's friends. They were Eliphaz the Temanite, and Bildad the Shuhite, and Zophar the Naamathite. The Teman, from whom the first of these men took his denomination, was the son of another Eliphaz, who was the son of Esau. (Gen. xxxvi. 11.) The remarkable connexion of the names of Esau's son and grandson in the designation, "Eliphaz the Temanite," renders it one of the most satisfactory evidences that Job's friend was a son or grandson of Teman, the grandson of Esau, and took his name from the ancestral Eliphaz, and resided in the hereditary land of Esau's descendants. The grandson of Esau gave his name to a town or city in Edom, which was famous for its wisdom, probably as early as the days of Job, and certainly in a later age. (Job xii. 2; Jer. xlix. 7.) The only person to whom we can trace the designation of Bildad is Shuah, a son of Abraham by Keturah. Zophar the Naamathite was probably from Naamah, a town mentioned (in Josh. xv. 41) in a list of the uttermost cities of the lot of Judah, "towards the coast of Edom southwards;" it is, further, among that portion of those towns that lay "in the valley," (ver. 33,) which valley is the same that contained Joktheel, (ver. 38,) the well-known Petra. Naamah was probably in or near the Arabah. The conclusion is inevitable, that the scene of the book of Job is laid in the land of Edom. It is not in the magnificent ruins of Petra, which belong to a later age, but in the allusions and descriptions of the book of Job, that we find our proof and illustration of the early civilization of Idumæa. We are met at the outset with nomade and lawless habits, in the case of the neighbouring Sabeans and Chaldeans, such as still prevail among the Arabs. In Idumæa Proper we have patriarchal simplicity in the condition of Job himself, whose wealth is reckoned by the number of his sheep, and camels, and oxen, though he was "the greatest of all the men of the east." But patriarchal simplicity is compatible with a state of advanced civilization. One of the most important evidences of Idumæan civilization is the familiar reference to the art of writing, which we find in the book of Job: "Oh! that my words were now written! "Oh! that he would hear me ! Ch. xix. 23, 24. (Barnes.) Behold my defence! May the Almighty answer me! Would that he who contends with me would write down his charge! Truly upon my shoulders would I bear it; I would bind it upon me as a diadem," Ch. xxxi. 35, 36. (Barnes.) "Thou writest bitter things against me," Ch. xiii. 26. In reference to the first of these quotations, it is immaterial whether the lead be regarded as that on which the writing was to be engraved, or as used to fill up the sculptured characters on the face of the rock. The point of interest in the passage is the reference to engraving or sculpturing sayings of importance with pens of iron, or with graving tools, on those tablets which were already provided by nature. And Job's allusion to this mode of writing becomes the more significant, now that we are aware of the existence of rocks so engraven in the very region which is supposed to have been the scene of the poem. It is not necessary to argue that either the Sinaitic or the Himyaritic inscriptions are as old as the time of Job, but the patriarch's words, preserved throughout many generations more safely than if they had been " engraven on a rock," show that the custom which is evinced by the rocks of the peninsula of Sinai existed in his time. Apart from the material by which, or on which writing was effected in the time of Job, the simple fact of the existence of this art is itself most interesting. We know how destitute savages are of all knowledge of the art of writing, and how mysterious it appears when it is first introduced among them. The origin of the art of writing is involved in much obscurity. Whether hieroglyphical or alphabetic writing is the more ancient cannot now be determined. But there can be no doubt that the existence and prevalence of this art among a people are proofs of an advanced |