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29:1  And Job again took up his discourse, and said:
29:2  “Oh, that I were as in the months of old, as in the days when God watched over me,
29:3  when his lamp shone upon my head, and by his light I walked through darkness,
29:4  as I was in my prime, when the friendship of God was upon my tent,
29:5  when the Almighty was yet with me, when my children were all round me,
29:6  when my steps were washed with butter, and the rock poured out for me streams of oil!
29:7  When I went out to the gate of the city, when I prepared my seat in the square,
29:8  the young men saw me and withdrew, and the aged rose and stood;
29:9  the princes refrained from talking and laid their hand on their mouth;
29:10  the voice of the nobles was hushed, and their tongue stuck to the roof of their mouth.
29:11  When the ear heard, it called me blessed, and when the eye saw, it approved,
29:12  because I delivered the poor who cried for help, and the fatherless who had none to help him.
29:13  The blessing of him who was about to perish came upon me, and I caused the widow's heart to sing for joy.
29:14  I put on righteousness, and it clothed me; my justice was like a robe and a turban.
29:15  I was eyes to the blind and feet to the lame.
29:16  I was a father to the needy, and I searched out the cause of him whom I did not know.
29:17  I broke the fangs of the unrighteous and made him drop his prey from his teeth.
29:18  Then I thought, ‘I shall die in my nest, and I shall multiply my days as the sand,
29:19  my roots spread out to the waters, with the dew all night on my branches,
29:20  my glory fresh with me, and my bow ever new in my hand.’
29:21  “Men listened to me and waited and kept silence for my counsel.
29:22  After I spoke they did not speak again, and my word dropped upon them.
29:23  They waited for me as for the rain, and they opened their mouths as for the spring rain.
29:24  I smiled on them when they had no confidence, and the light of my face they did not cast down.
29:25  I chose their way and sat as chief, and I lived like a king among his troops, like one who comforts mourners.