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.

Ver. 2.

Here ye this O Elders, and hearken ye all inhabitants of the land, whether such a thing hath bin in your daies, or yet in the daies of your fathers.

* 1.1THe Proposition or priucipall poynt by way of amplification. And this amplification was needefull because of mockers and scorners of God. For when as the Prophet was to speake of locusts, palmer wormes, grashoppers & caterpillers (which are filly creatures, and of the kinde which they call insecta) and of their power against men, and the kingdome of Iudah, he should by & by moue laugh∣ter vnto these scoffers, in that he should thunder and so greatly, go about to fray men so exceedingly with so smal and light matters. He doth therefore by the effects describe the matter it selfe, both as in part it was euery where felt already, and was more to be per∣ceiued yet hereafter, & sheweth that it is a most grieuous & feare∣full iudgement of God, the which they otherwise peraduenture would haue contemned or despised. So Exod. it appeareth that God by locusts ouercame the Egyptians. And this plague a∣mong the rest is reckoned vp Psal. 105. ver. 34 in these wordes, He spake and the grashoppers came, and caterpillers innumerable. So 1. Kinng 8. ver. 37 such kind of creatures & beasts are reckoned vp among the most bitter scourges & whippes of God. And elswhere they are called the great army or host of God. For nothing is light or weake the which God armeth against vs.

* 1.2This verse hath two things to be noted. For we must marke both whom he stirreth vp to heare, and why he stirreth them vp. And first of all he stirreth vp those, who among that people are Elders in age,* 1.3 and might haue noted and marked both more and greater iudgements of God by reason of the length of their yeares. Se∣condly, al the rest of the inhabitants of the land of Iudah, [unspec 1] as namely all vnto which this speech is directed. And all these doth God wil to heare these things which follow, not only with the eares of their body: but also earnestly to applie their minde thereunto, to weigh and thinke vpon them with themselues, and diligently to hearken vnto them: [unspec 2] But why the Prophet thus dilignetly warneth them to heare, both the regard of the mttaer, and also the greatnes of the daunger (wherein they either already are, or presently are like to be) doth perswade. For, as it is here sayd, in that kinde, there yet had neuer bin any daunger, or hurt like or equall vnto it, either in

the memory or remembrance of those which were aliue, or else in the times of their elders. For where as it is sayd of the grashop∣pers which God in his anger sent vpon Pharao and his land, that they were such, as neither their fathers, nor their fathers fathers had euer seene vpon the earth vnto that day, that maketh nothing against this which is here spoken. For there he speaketh not of the multi∣tude of those kinde of creatures but of the greatnes of them, that there should neuer after be the like of them, that is, so big, & great in the quantity of their bodies, as those then in Egypt seemed and were. Exod. 10. ver. 6.14.

Notes

• * 1.1

  The proposition by way of am∣plification. Insect a, are a kind of small vermin deui∣ded in the body betweene the head and the taile hauing no flesh, bloud, sinnues, &c. as are flies, gnats, bees, antes, waspes, hor∣nets, and such like.
• * 1.2

  1 Who are stir∣red vp to heare.
• * 1.3

  2 Why they are stirred vp.