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48 of life, as illustrated in the history of Ruth.

Ruth. About eleven hundred years before the Christian era, Elimeleck and his wife Naomi, with their two sons, were driven by famine from Bethlehem to the land of Moab. The sons married women of Moab, named Ruth and Orphah. After a few years, Elimeleck and his sons died, leaving Naomi, Ruth and Orphah in mourning. Naomi, aged and dependent, resolved to return to the land of her nativity. She urged Ruth and Orphah to remain with their kindred and friends rather than follow her in poverty to a land of strangers. But Ruth believed it to be her duty to remain with Naomi and assist in her maintenance, saying: "Entreat me not to leave thee, nor to return from following after thee; for whither thou goest, I will go and where thou lodgest I will lodge; thy people shall be my people and thy God my God."

They arrived in Bethlehem, destitute, weary and worn and Ruth was compelled to seek through menial labor the means of support for herself and the aged Naomi. Faithful to the duties which adverse fortune had thrown upon her, she became a gleaner in the fields of Boaz, who said to his servant that as set over his reapers : "Whose