X. LOST AND KEPT.

THIS seeming paradox will, on examination, prove a real truth, viz. that though Job lost his seven thousand sheep consumed by fire of God, Job i. 16, (understand it, by his permission, and Satan’s immission,) yet he still kept the wool of many of them.

For Job, in the vindication of his integrity, (not to praise but purge himself,) doth relate, how the loins of the poor blessed him, being warmed with the fleece of his sheep (Job xxxi. 20). So much of his wool (in the cloth made thereof) he secured in a safe hand, lending it to God (in poor people), Prov. xix. 17, as the best of debtors, being most able and willing to repay it.

Such as have been plundered of their estates in these wars may content and comfort themselves with this consideration, that so long as they enjoyed plenty they freely parted with a proportion thereof to the relief of the poor: what they gave, that they have; it still remaineth theirs, and is safely laid up for them in a place where rust and moth do not corrupt, nor thieves break through and steal.