The patriarch Job experienced the darkness and mystery of sorrow
when he thus spoke:--"Know now that God hath overthrown me, and hath
compassed me with his net. Behold, I cry out of wrong, but I am not
heard: I cry aloud, but there is no judgment. He hath fenced up my
way that I cannot pass, and he hath set darkness in my paths. He hath
stripped me of my glory, and taken the crown from my head. He hath
destroyed me on every side, and I am gone; and mine hope hath he
removed like a tree." "Even to-day is my complaint bitter; my stroke
is heavier than my groaning. O that I knew where I might find him!
that I might come even to his seat!" "Behold, I go forward, but he is
not there; and backward, but I cannot perceive him: on the left hand,
where he doth work, but I cannot behold him: he hideth himself on the
right hand, that I cannot see him. But he knoweth the way that I take:
when he hath tried me, I shall come forth as gold."

The sweet singer of Israel sung in darkness when he said:--"My heart
is sore pained within me; and the terrors of death are fallen upon
me. Fearfulness and trembling are come upon me, and horror hath
overwhelmed me. And I said, O that I had wings like a dove! for then
would I fly away, and be at rest." "Thou hast laid me in the lowest
pit, in darkness, in the deeps. Thy wrath lieth hard upon me, and
thou hast afflicted me with all thy waves. Thou hast put away mine
acquaintance far from me; thou hast made me an abomination unto them:
I am shut up, and I cannot come forth."

The prophet Jeremiah cried out of the depths of mysterious sorrow when
he poured forth these lamentations:--"I am the man that hath seen
affliction by the rod of his wrath. He hath led me, and brought me
into darkness, but not into light. Surely against me is he turned;