A fruitfull commentarie vpon the twelue small prophets briefe, plaine, and easie, going ouer the same verse by verse, and shewing every where the method, points of doctrine, and figures of rhetoricke, to the no small profit of all godly and well disposed readers, with very necessarie fore-notes for the vnderstanding of both of these, and also all other the prophets. The text of these prophets together with that of the quotations omitted by the author, faithfully supplied by the translatour, and purged of faults in the Latine coppie almost innumerable, with a table of all the chiefe matters herein handled, and marginall notes very plentifull and profitable; so that it may in manner be counted a new booke in regard of these additions. VVritten in Latin by Lambertus Danæus, and newly turned into English by Iohn Stockwood minister and preacher at Tunbridge.

Vers. 14.

Sanctifie you a fast: call a solemne assemblie: gather the Elders, and all the inhabitants of the land into the house of the Lord your God, and crye vnto the Lord.

* 1.1THe dutie of the Priests so far forth as it cōcerneth themselues, hath been shewed before: now is declared what their dutie is concerning the residue of the Church, and the other partes and

tokens that remain of publik and extraordinarie repentance are described. Now this was the dutie of the Priestes concerning others, to exhort & stirre them vp vnto repentance, and therefore that they should sāctifie a fast, that is, that they should pronounce some day to be holy, and appoynted vnto God extraordinarilie, in the which the people should fast extraordinarily & publikely, and in the same day they should ordeine and commaund those things to be obserued or kept, the which the Iewes were com∣manded by God to keepe on the Holy-daye, that is, on the Sab∣both daye. By this and the like places appeareth that the appoyn∣ting of a fast appertayneth not onely vnto the godly magi∣strate, no though it be the chiefe magistrate: but also vnto the pastours of the Church: for they ought to be called vnto councell in this matter, because it is an ecclesiastical or Church matter, & the which ought to be established and appoynted according vnto the word of God. Wherefore those magistrates take too much vpon them, who themselues of their owne authoritie do appoynt publik fasts without the knowledge of their pastors, nay do not so much as call them and aske their aduise at all.

Secondly, it is the office of the pastors of the Church to call the congregation extraordinarily called. First to gather to gather the elders or old men, afterward the rest into the temple or holy place, & not into the Tauerne, or Ale house: that the old men may be an example of godlines vnto others, and that the rest may follow them. The companie of the Church being called and ga∣thered together, To crie vnto God for themselues, and for the rest of the people, is the dutie of the same Ministers of God, or Pastors of the Church, as it here appeareth.

Notes

• * 1.1

  The dutie of the Priests con∣cerning the Church in this matter of pub∣like repentance.