Ver. 1. That they may serve me.] Eventus platarum est alius per accidens, ut simulata emendatio Pharaonis; alius per se, ut dimissio populi. Alsted.
Ver. 2. Behold, I will smite.] God usually, not always, warns before he wounds. Ideoque minatur, ut non puniat; and therefore threateneth, that he may not punish his creature.
Ver. 3. And the river shall bring forth frogs.] Instead of fishes. Thus the first and this second plague are about the water; the third and fourth about the earth; the five next about the air; and the last about man.
Ver. 4. And the frogs shall come up.] Neither walls nor weapons could keep off the frogs from Pharaoh and his people. As neither could Hatto, archbishop of Mentz, be possibly rid of that army of mice that God sent out against him for his cruelty to some of his poor subjects till they had devoured him. A muribus in Rheno confectus periit (anno 923).
Ver. 5. And the Lord spake unto Moses.] By secret inspiration; for it was in Pharaoh’s presence.
Ver. 6. And the frogs came up.] With their hateful hearing of “Brekekekex coax, coax.” Aristoph., in Ranis.
Ver. 7. And the magicians did so.] [See Trapp on “Ex 7:22”]
Ver. 8. Intreat the Lord.] In extremity a hypocrite will cry for help, as a pig under the knife, as a prisoner at the bar, as a drowning man will catch at that twig which erst standing on the bank he despised. Joab in distress runs to the horns of the altar. “Lord, in trouble have they visited thee, they poured forth a charm when thy chastening was upon them,” saith the prophet of those hypocrites that yet “brought forth” no better than “wind.” (Isaiah 26:16,18) But “will the hypocrite pray always?.” (Job 27:10) “Did they at all fast unto me, even to me?.” (Zechariah 7:5) I will let the people.] For the present, it may be, he purposed so to do. Good thoughts make but a thoroughfare of carnal hearts: they cannot settle there. “Thy goodness is as the morning dew,” &c. (Hosea 6:4)
Ver. 9. Glory over me.] Or, Jeer me, andreject me, as thou hast done heretofore: but when thou hast so done, thou must be beholden to me for my prayers, or thou art like to lie under the plague, for aught that thy wizards can do to relieve and release thee. In the river only.] For a memento, that thou flinch not, nor forget thy promise. Quo teneam vultus, &c. Horat.
Ver. 10. To morrow.] Cras vat corvina. “Today, if ye will hear his voice.” Now is the day of grace, & c.; procrastination is perilous. Hannibal, when he could have taken Rome, would not: when he would, could not. So, εις αυριον τα σπουδαια, said that fool. Let serious matters alone till tomorrow; but he was slain that night. “ Nemo tam divos habuit faventes, Crastinum ut possit sibi policeri.” Plutarch.
Ver. 11. In the river only.] [See Trapp on “Ex 8:9”]
Ver. 12. And Moses cried unto the Lord.] Not for Pharaoh’s conversion; for he knew he was past cure; but for his deliverance from the present plague, that the power of God might be the more manifested, and the tyrant’s conscience the more convinced.
Ver. 13. According to the word.] Iste vir potuit apud Deum quod voluit. Moses might do what he would with God, as one said of Luther.
Ver. 14. And the land stank.] As once this land also did by those unclean frogs that came out of the Pope’s mouth. (Revelation 16:3) But England is now no more a babe, said King Henry VIII, in his protestation against the Pope: there is no man here but now he knows that they do foolishly that give gold for lead, &c. Surely, except God take away our right wits, not only the Pope’s authority shall be driven out for ever, but his name also shall shortly be forgotten in England, &c. Thus he, and much more to like purpose. God hath promised to take away the unclean spirit out of the land. (Zechariah 13:2) Fiat, fiat. Surely the society of ungodly men, whether Papists or atheists, is unsavoury and tedious, like the slime and filth that is congealed, when frogs and toads and other vermin join together. Act. and Mon., fol. 990.
Ver. 15. But when Pharaoh saw that there was respite.] Heb., A breathing, or respiration. So fulfilling that of the prophet Isaiah, Isaiah 26:10. In like sort William Rufus, being dangerously sick at Gloucester, in the sixth year of his reign, vowed, upon his recovery, to see all vacancies in the Church furnished: which he did, but with so much ado, as showed, that having escaped the danger, he would gladly have deceived the saint; like the man in Erasmus’s Naufragium, who in a storm promised the Virgin a picture of wax as big as St Christotpher: but when he came to shore would not give a tallow candle! Thus, in the sweating sickness ministers were sent for, and large promises made of amendment: but no sooner were they recovered, but they returned to their old courses, as Mr Bradford complaineth: whence Pliny, in one of his epistles to one who desired rules from him how to order his life aright, I will, saith he, give you one rule, that shall be instead of a thousand, Ut tales esse perseveremus sani, quales nos futuros esse profitemur infirmi: That we go on to be such when well, as we promised to be when sick. Men roar when upon the rack: but once got off, they think they may do as they wish. Daniel’s Hist, fol. 58. Sciaputo il morbo, fraudato il santo.
Ver. 16. Stretch out thy rod.] Here is no warning given; which shows great wrath. Impenitency makes God “weary of repenting.” (Jeremiah 15:6) Absolute in his threatenings, if any; resolute in his executions, as Deuteronomy 29:19,20.
Ver. 17. All the dust of the land became lice.] Or, gnats. Quid cniphe villus? saith Philo; what so base and vile a creature as a louse, a gnat? And yet by this poor vermin God so plagued all Egypt, that fainting under it, they were forced to cry out, “This is the very finger of God.” Ciniphes sunt muscae minutisslmae, aculeis permolestae, saith Rupert. Others say, that here are meant pediculi inguinales, crab lice; Honos set auribus.
Ver. 18. But they could not.] Though they endeavoured it, as did the juggler of Antwerp, who, being required by the English merchants there to play his feats and show his cunning, after much sweating and toil, when he saw that nothing could go forward, but that all his enchantments were void, was compelled openly to confess that there was some man there at supper which disturbed and hindered all his doings. This was Mr Tindal the martyr, who, hearing of this juggler, had desired certain of the merchants that he might be present to see him play, &c. Act. and Mon., fol. 985.
Ver. 19. This is the finger of God.] An act of omnipotency, as Luke 11:20 Ps 8:3. “The heavens are the work of God’s fingers.” Deus disponit membra pulicis et culicis, saith Augustine. And he hearkened not to them.] Neither to Moses, nor to his own magicians, being akin to the catadupes that dwell at the fall of his river Nile, and are deaf.
Ver. 20. Rise up early in the morning.] Sanctificat, sanat, ditat quoque surgere mane. Early rising is good for health, wealth, and godliness. David “prevented the dawning of the morning,” &c. (Psalms 119:147) Christ “rose up a great while before day.” (Mark 1:35) [See Trapp on “Mr 1:35”]
Ver. 21. Shall be full of swarms of flies.] Of all the ten plagues this was the most troublesome; for that they never suffered men to rest: so worldly cares; nocte ac die non dabunt requiem, as those tyrants in Jeremiah 16.
Ver. 22. And I will sever.] Heb., Marvellously separate, by setting upon them my signum salutare. (Ezekiel 9:4) So that the worst that are “shall return and discern betwixt the righteous and the wicked.” (Malachi 3:18) See Exodus 33:16. In the midst of the earth.] Not in heaven only, whereunto Aristotle and other atheists would confine his providence. Lysippus made Alexander’s picture with this poesy:— “ Iupiter asserui terram mihi, tu assere coelum. ” Docuit Aristoteles Providentiam Dei ad coelum Lunae usque protendi, non ultra.
Ver. 23. And I will put a division.] Heb., A redemption; so Luke 1:68. Aristotle reporteth that, when from the hill Etna there ran down a torrent of fire that consumed all the houses thereabouts, in the midst of those fearful flames the river of fire parted itself, and made a kind of lane for those who ventured to rescue their aged parents. This extorted from him an acknowledgment of God’s good providence for the godly here on earth. Ενθα το των ευσεβων μενος εξοχως ετιμησε το δαιμονιον. Arist., De Mundo., cap. 6.
Ver. 24. A grievous swarm of flies,] i.e., Numerous and pernicious; yet not so bad as those many noisome thoughts that swarm daily in men’s hearts. There is that Leviathan; there are also creeping things innumerable. And these many times mar and corrupt our prayers, so as that they stink in the nostrils of God.
Ver. 25. Sacrifice to your God in the land.] Persecutors, when they cannot conquer, would compound.
Ver. 26. Will they not stone us?] Superstition is cruel; witness the Popish Inquisition to Lithgow, who, in ten hours, received seventy various torments. And the massacre of Paris, wherein they poisoned the Queen of Navarre, murdered the most part of the peerless nobility in France, their wives and children, with a great sort of the common people, a hundred thousand in one year in various parts of the realm; some say three hundred thousand! The bloody and barbarous persecutions of the religious abroad in Bohemia, the Valtoline, Piedmont, and Netherlands; the Marian dog-days here at home; are better known than I need to mention them.
Ver. 27. As he shall command us.] Manner as well as matter, circumstance as well as substance, to be heeded in God’s service; else there may be malum opus in bona materia, as one saith, -an evil work in a good matter.
Ver. 28. Only ye shall not go very far.] So loath was he to lose his hold. So is the devil. The Pope made large offers to Queen Elizabeth, as also to our king, when in Spain. Intreat for me.] So Simon Magus, in a fright, begs Peter’s prayers. So Maximinus, the persecuting emperor, sent to the Church for prayers, when God had laid upon him a grievous disease. So Ezra 6:10, “Pray for the king’s life, and for his sons.” Euseb.
Ver. 29. Deal deceitfully any more.] Some are so slippery, there is no believing of them. Egesippus saith of Pilate, that he was vir nequam, et parvifaciens mendacium, a naughty man, and one that made no conscience of a lie. No more did Pharaoh.
Ver. 30. Intreated the Lord.] [See Trapp on “Ex 8:12”]
Ver. 31. There remained not one.] Prayer makes clean work; it can do wonders in heaven and earth. Say thou with David, “Cleanse thou me from secret faults,” (Psalms 19:12) those that are of daily and hourly incursion. Prayer will scour the coast, clear the conscience of dead works. (Acts 8:22)
Ver. 32. And Pharaoh hardened.] All blows and pressures were so far from mollifying him, that he hardened and emmarbled more and more.