If thou canst answer me, set [thy words] in order before me, stand up.
Ver. 5. If thou canst answer me] Or, If thou canst, do thou answer me. This bold challenge, and the like confident expressions, not unlike in appearance to that of Campian, with his ten unanswerable reasons (as he accounted them), or that of Sanders, with his forty not probable reasons, but most solid demonstrations (if men would believe him) to prove, that the pope is not Antichrist, hath caused one interpreter, following Gregory, to censure Elihu, for a palpable braggadocian, full of pride and vain-glory (De visib. Monarch. libri 8). This is a hard saying, and at the best reverenter glossanda, as he said of the Pontifician laws. I think this good man is hereby no less mistaken and wronged than John Baptist was by Tertullian, who falls foul upon him in three different places, for that harmless question of his sent to our Saviour by two of his disciples (whom he sought to settle), "Art thou he that should come?" &c., Matthew 11:3, as if he himself had doubted who the person of the Messiah was.
Set thy words in order before me, stand up] A metaphor from military matters; muster up and marshal thine arguments in good array, and then stand to it; make good thy ground like a valiant soldier, who will rather die for it than stir an inch. An expression not unlike this is that of David, Psalms 5:3. In the morning will I direct (or marshal up) my prayers, and then look up; be as a spy upon a watch tower, to see what speed, and whether I get the day: military terms they are both.