208 Chap. 5. An Expofition upon the Book of J B. Verf. .5. provoke them to anger with a foolifh Nation, , Deut. 32.,2 r. The Gentiles, as Paul expounds this place, Rom. 10. t 9. and , Peter, i Peter 2. r o.) whom the Jews flighted as a foolifh people as no people, came in and eat up the harvest of the Gofpel, and,were in- veiled withgreater privi ledges than they. This made the Jews mad with anger, as you may read in that famous record of it, Ails 22._verf. 2 I, 22. They could not bear it, that, Thofe men of the thornes, fhoatldpartake of thefatnefr of the Olive, As Potham fpalte in his Parable,(`judg, 9. i 5.).when the queflion was, which of the trees thould be King, theolive or the vine, -6-c, at Taft it féll to the brambles lot ,or to the therue. That parable gives force light to this expofation : For thofe feveraI fortsof trees fhadowed out the feveral forts of men ; and the bramble flaadowed out the meanefl fort of men ; .a man of thornes, or a man coming out of the thornes. And he adds '(which further anfwers this fenfe) Let fire come out of the bramble, anddevour the Cedars ofLebanon which in plainEnglifla is, let there come power from a powerlefs man, who is but as bryer, oras a thorne,.and confutne the.gre.atetá and the mightieft. And it may fupport us (while we fee fo many great Cedars and firong Okes, with whom we have to do) . that God can fend .a man out of the thornes to fubdue their pride , and can caufe a bramble to confume Cedars, when himfelf pleafèth, The Pro- phet Amos puts the ,quetlion, By whom (hall Jacob rife, for he is (mall? The only anfwer is,jacob bath a great God,a God that can do great things : Uwe fhould queftion, by whom(hall the wicked fall, for they are verygreat ? I anfwer,haply, they /hallfall by him, that is, veryfmall, A manout of the bushes, a man of thornes, Tome poor ,Ihrub, artr.ed with thepower ofGod, shall !hake and overthrow them in the height of all their wickednefs and worldly glory. Thirdly, Take it according to our reading : He 'hallfetch it out ofthe therues.Whick Tome interpret, tobe thornes growing na- turally in or among the corn ; according to that general curie up- on the earth, Gen, 3.. 18. Thorne:andthi/itles /hall it bring forth to thee, But rather Cif not alone) thofe are thornes platted toge- ther induftriouily, and wrought into a hedge, to fave corne fields or corn-flacks from fpoile. So the meaning is, that when the hun- gry man comes with a commiflion from God, to eat the harveft of the foolifh, he will have his eflate whatever it colts him, or
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