Commentary upon the Prophecy of Isaiah

IT was not the Prophets meaning to reckon up all the sins here which then reigned, but he only toucheth some particulars unto the which they were most addicted: and having handled the general doctrine, it was necessary to come to application; yea and to touch those things which were chiefest, because there would have been no end if he should have prosecuted them all, one after another. After that he hath reproved the vice of covetousness, he speaks against gourmandizing, which was then a very common sin among them; for he makes choice not only of such particular vices which were in one or two personages, but of such as reigned commonly every where. And the truth is, that these vices are so contagious that they infect the whole body. To rise betimes, signifies as much as to do some thing carefully, as it is said in Solomon, Woe to the people whose Princes eat in the morning, that is to say, who place their chief care in feeding their belly, and in enjoying their voluptuousness, Eccle. 10.16. now this is nothing else but to overturn the whole order of nature. For as David saith, Man ought to rise in the morning to go to his work, and to wait upon his business till the evening, Psal. 104.23.¹ But if he rise to do nothing but to take his pleasures, and to give himself to follow drunkenness, it is monstrous. He adds, that they continue till the evening. As if he should say, from morning to night, they continued in their drinkings, and were never weary in guzzling in of wine. Now abundance and excess are joined together, because where all things abound, there men abuse them to excess and intemperance.