Job 8:11

It and the flag, or bulrush, grow only in marshy places (such as are along the Nile). So the godless thrives only in external prosperity; there is in the hypocrite no inward stability; his prosperity is like the rapid growth of water plants.

ISAAC walked in the fields at eventide to meditate. I commend him for his occupation. Meditation is exceedingly profitable to the mind. If we talked less, read less, and meditated more we should be wiser men. I commend him for the season which he chose for that occupation—at eventide—when the business of the day was over and the general stillness of nature was in harmony with the quiet of his soul. I also commend him for the place which he selected—the wide expanse of nature—the field. Wise men can readily find a thousand subjects for contemplation abroad in the open country. Our four-square room is not very suggestive. But when a man walks in the fields, having the Lord in his heart and his whole mental faculties directed towards heavenly things, all things aid him in his pleasing occupation. If we look above to the sun, moon and stars, all these remind us of the grandeur of God and make us ask ourselves, "What is man, that the Lord should be mindful of him, or the son of man, that Jehovah should visit him?" If we look below, the green meadows, or golden cornfields all proclaim Divine care and bounty. There is not a bird that sings, nor a grasshopper that chirps in the grass which does not urge us to praise and magnify the name of the Most High—while the plants, from the hyssop on the wall to the cedar which spreads its boughs so gloriously on Lebanon— exhibit to observant eyes the wisdom of the great Creator of all things. The murmuring brook talks to the listening ear in hallowed whispers of Him whose cloudy Throne supplies its stream. And the air, as it sighs amid the trees, tells in mysterious accents of the great unseen but ever-active Spirit of the living God. The great book of Nature only needs to be turned over by a reverent hand and to be read by an attentive eye to be found to be only second in teaching to the Book of Revelation.

ISAAC walked in the fields at eventide to meditate. I commend him for his occupation. Meditation is exceedingly profitable to the mind. If we talked less, read less, and meditated more we should be wiser men. I commend him for the season which he chose for that occupation—at eventide—when the business of the day was over and the general stillness of nature was in harmony with the quiet of his soul. I also commend him for the place which he selected—the wide expanse of nature—the field.

Can the rush grow - The word גמא gome, which we translate rush, is, without doubt, the Egyptian flag papyrus, on which the ancients wrote, and from which our paper derives its name. The Septuagint, who made their Greek translation in Egypt, (if this book made a part of it), and knew well the import of each word in both languages, render גמא gome by παπυρος papyrus, thus: Μη θαλλει παπυρος ανευ ὑδατος; Can the Papyrus flourish without water? Their translation leaves no doubt concerning the meaning of the original. They were probably writing on the very substance in question, while making their translation. The technical language of no science is so thoroughly barbarous as that of botany: the description of this plant by Linnaeus, shall be a proof. The plant he calls “Cyperus Papyrus; Class Triandria; Order Monogynia; Culm three-sided, naked; umbel longer than the involucres; involucels three-leaved, setaceous, longer; spikelets in threes - Egypt, etc. Involucre eight-leaved; general umbel copious, the rays sheathing at the base; partial on very short peduncles; spikelets alternate, sessile; culm leafy at the base; leaves hollow, ensiform.” Hear our plain countryman John Gerarde, who describes the same plant: “Papyrus Nilotica, Paper Reed, hath many large flaggie leaves, somewhat triangular and smooth, not much unlike those of cats-taile, rising immediately from a tuft of roots, compact of many strings; amongst the which it shooteth up two or three naked stalkes, square, and rising some six or seven cubits high above the water; at the top whereof there stands a tuft or bundle off chaffie threds, set in comely order, resembling a tuft of floures, but barren and void of seed;” Gerarde’s Herbal, p. 40. Which of the two descriptions is easiest to be understood by common sense, either with or without a knowledge of the Latin language? […]