Job 3:16

Like a runt escaped from his mother's womb; And that was not noticed. Or like children who have not seen the light; Who have not reached any distinguished rank.

"Or like a stillborn child that never sees the light," he says. Notice how, in order that he may not appear to be arrogant, he even compares himself with a stillborn child, so absolutely wretched and pitiful is he.

MORAL INTERPRETATION. Or as an hidden untimely birth I had not been; as infants which never saw light. An abortive child, because it is born before the full period, being dead is forthwith put out of sight. Whom then does the holy man term 'abortives,' with whom he might 'have been at rest,' he reflects, saving all the Elect, who from the beginning of the world lived before the time of the Redemption, and yet studied to mortify themselves to this world. Those who had not the tables of the Law, 'died' as it were 'from the womb,' in that it was by the natural law that they fear their Creator, and believing the Mediator would come, they strove to the best of their power, by mortifying their pleasures, to keep even those very precepts, which they had not received in writing. And so that period, which at the beginning of the world produced our fathers dead to this life, was in a certain sense the 'womb of an abortive birth.' For there we have Abel, of whom we read not that he resisted his brother when he slew him. There Enoch, who approved himself such that he was carried up to walk with the Lord. There Noah, who hereby, that he was acceptable to the searching judgment of God, was, in the world, the world's survivor. There Abraham, who, while a pilgrim in the world, became the friend of God. There Isaac, who, by reason of his fleshly eyes waxing dim, by his age had no sight of things present, but by the efficacy of the prophetic Spirit lighted up future ages even with his extraordinary luminousness of sight. There Jacob, who in humility fled his brother's indignation, and by kindness overcame the same; who was fruitful indeed in his offspring, but yet being more fruitful in richness of the Spirit, bound that offspring with the chains of prophecy. And this untimely birth is well described as hidden, in that from the beginning of the world, while there are some few, whom we are informed of by Moses' mention of them, by far the largest portion of mankind is hidden from our sight. For we are not to imagine that during all the period up to the receiving of the Law, only just so many righteous men came forth, as Moses has run through in the most summary notice. And thus, forasmuch as the multitude of the righteous born from the beginning of the world is in great measure withdrawn from our knowledge, this untimely birth is called hidden. And it is also said, not to…