Verse 30
Ask them not again - Or, Do not beg them off. This probably refers to the way in which the tax-gatherers and Roman soldiers used to spoil the people. "When such harpies as these come upon your goods, suffer the injury quietly, leaving yourselves in the hand of God, rather than attempt even to beg off what belongs to you, lest on their part they be provoked to seize or spoil more, and lest you be irritated to sue them at law, which is totally opposite to the spirit and letter of the Gospel; or to speak bad words, or indulge wrong tempers, which would wound the spirit of love and mercy." Of such as these, and of all merciless creditors, who even sell the tools and bed of a poor man, it may be very truly said: -
Tristius haud illis monstrum, nec saevior ulla
Pestis et ira deum Stygiis sese extulit undis: -
Diripiunt dapes, contactaque omnia faedant Immundo
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