Page 30 of  42

But now [they that are] younger than I have me in derision, whose fathers I would have disdained to have set with the dogs of my flock (30:1)

Yea, whereto [might] the strength of their hands [profit] me, in whom old age was perished? (30:2)

For want and famine [they were] solitary; fleeing into the wilderness in former time desolate and waste (30:3)

Who cut up mallows by the bushes, and juniper roots [for] their meat (30:4)

They were driven forth from among [men], (they cried after them as [after] a thief;) (30:5)

To dwell in the cliffs of the valleys, [in] caves of the earth, and [in] the rocks (30:6)

Among the bushes they brayed; under the nettles they were gathered together (30:7)

[They were] children of fools, yea, children of base men: they were viler than the earth (30:8)

And now am I their song, yea, I am their byword (30:9)

They abhor me, they flee far from me, and spare not to spit in my face (30:10)

Because he hath loosed my cord, and afflicted me, they have also let loose the bridle before me (30:11)

Upon [my] right [hand] rise the youth; they push away my feet, and they raise up against me the ways of their destruction (30:12)

They mar my path, they set forward my calamity, they have no helper (30:13)

They came [upon me] as a wide breaking in [of waters]: in the desolation they rolled themselves [upon me] (30:14)

Terrors are turned upon me: they pursue my soul as the wind: and my welfare passeth away as a cloud (30:15)

And now my soul is poured out upon me; the days of affliction have taken hold upon me (30:16)

My bones are pierced in me in the night season: and my sinews take no rest (30:17)

By the great force [of my disease] is my garment changed: it bindeth me about as the collar of my coat (30:18)

He hath cast me into the mire, and I am become like dust and ashes (30:19)

I cry unto thee, and thou dost not hear me: I stand up, and thou regardest me [not] (30:20)

Thou art become cruel to me: with thy strong hand thou opposest thyself against me (30:21)

Thou liftest me up to the wind; thou causest me to ride [upon it], and dissolvest my substance (30:22)

For I know [that] thou wilt bring me [to] death, and [to] the house appointed for all living (30:23)

Howbeit he will not stretch out [his] hand to the grave, though they cry in his destruction (30:24)

Did not I weep for him that was in trouble? was [not] my soul grieved for the poor? (30:25)

When I looked for good, then evil came [unto me]: and when I waited for light, there came darkness (30:26)

My bowels boiled, and rested not: the days of affliction prevented me (30:27)

I went mourning without the sun: I stood up, [and] I cried in the congregation (30:28)

I am a brother to dragons, and a companion to owls (30:29)

My skin is black upon me, and my bones are burned with heat (30:30)

My harp also is [turned] to mourning, and my organ into the voice of them that weep (30:31)

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