Job’s Plea to God

1it greueth my soule to lyue. Neuerthelesse, now will I put forth my wordes: I wil speake out of the very heuynesse off my soule,

2and will saye vnto God: O do not condemne me, but shewe me the cause, wherfore thou iudgest me on this maner.

3Thinkest thou it well done, to oppresse me, to cast me of (beinge a worke of thy hondes) and to manteyne the councell of the vngodly?

4Hast thou flesshy eyes then, or doest thou loke as man loketh?

5Are thy dayes as the dayes of man, and thy yeares as mans yeares?

6that thou makest soch inquisicion for my wickednesse, and searchest out my synne?

7where as (notwithstondinge) thou knowest that I am no wicked person, & that there is no man able to delyuer me out of thine honde.

8Thy hondes haue made me, & fashioned me alltogether rounde aboute, wilt thou then destroye me sodely?

9O remembre (I beseke the) how that thou madest me of the moulde of the earth, and shalt brynge me to earth agayne.

10Hast thou not milked me, as it were mylck: and turned me to cruddes like chese?

11Thou hast couered me with skynne and flesh, and ioyned me together with bones & synowes.

12Thou hast graunted me life, and done me good: and the diligent hede that thou tokest vpon me, hath preserued my sprete.

13Though thou hydest these thinges in thine hert, yet am I sure, that thou remembrest the all.

14Wherfore didest thou kepe me, when I synned, and hast not clensed me fro myne offence?

15Yf I do wickedly, wo is me therfore: Yf I be rightuous, yet darre I not lift vp my heade: so full am I of confucion, and se myne owne misery.

16Thou huntest me out (beynge in heuynesse) as it were a Lyon, and troublest me out of measure.

17Thou bringest fresh witnesses agaynst me, thy wrath increasest thou vpon me, very many are the plages that I am in.

18Wherfore hast thou brought me out of my mothers wombe? O that I had perished, & that no eye had sene me.

19Yf they had caried me to my graue, as soone as I was borne, then shulde I be now, as though I had neuer bene.

20Shall not my short life come soone to an ende? O holde the fro me, let me alone, that I maye ease myself a litle:

21afore I go thyther, from whence I shal not turne agayne: Namely, to that londe of darcknesse & shadowe of death:

22yee into that darck clowdy londe & deadly shadowe, where as is no ordre, but terrible feare as in the darcknesse.