\\INTRODUCTION TO JOB 20\\

Zophar and his friends, not satisfied with Job's confession of faith,
he in his turn replies, and in his preface gives his reasons why he
made any answer at all, and was so quick in it, \\#Job 20:1-3\\; and
appeals to Job for the truth of an old established maxim, that the
prosperity of wicked men and hypocrites is very short lived,
\\#Job 20:4,5\\; and the short enjoyment of their happiness is described
by several elegant figures and similes, \\#Job 20:6-9\\; such a wicked
man being obliged, in his lifetime, to restore his ill gotten goods,
and at death to lie down with the sins of his youth, \\#Job 20:10,11\\;
his sin in getting riches, the disquietude of his mind in retaining
them, and his being forced to make restitution, are very beautifully
expressed by the simile of a sweet morsel kept in the mouth, and turned
to the gall of asps in the bowels, and then vomited up, \\#Job 20:12-16\\;
the disappointment he shall have, the indigent and strait circumstances
he shall be brought into, and the restitution he shall be obliged to
make for the oppression of the poor, and the uneasiness he shall feel
in his own breast, are set forth in a very strong light,
\\#Job 20:17-22\\; and it is suggested, that not only the hand of wicked
men should be upon him, but the wrath of God also, which should seize
on him suddenly and secretly, and would be inevitable, he not being
able to make his escape from it, and which would issue in the utter
destruction of him and his in this world, and that to come,
\\#Job 20:23-28\\. And the chapter is, concluded with this observation,
that such as before described is the appointed portion and heritage of
a wicked man from God, \\#Job 20:29\\.