Annotations on Job Psalms Proverbs Ecclesiastes and Song of Solomon, Title page – To the reader
ANNOTATIONS ON Five Poetical Books OF THE Old Testament: (viz.) IOB, PSALMES, PROVERBS, ECCLESIASTES, and CANTICLES.
By EDWARD LEIGH Master of Arts of Magdalen-Hall in Oxford.
LONDON, Printed by A. M. for T. Pierpoint at the Sunne; E. Brewster at the Crane; and M. Keinton at the Fountain in Pauls Church-yard, 1657.
TO THE RIGHT HONOURABLE EDVVARD Earl of MANCHESTER, Vicount Mandeville, Baron of Kimbolton.
My Lord,
IT was an elegant Passage of a Reverend*Mr Vines his Sermon preached at the Funeral of the Earl of Essex. Divine, now with God, spoken to your self, and other Lords and Gentlemen of this Nation, in a great Assembly, That Antiquity of Race is but a Moss of time growing upon the back of Virtue, and that Nobility is often-times the creature of a Princes fancy; which when there is no intrinsecal worth to be the supporter of it, is but Nobility by Parchment. A Heathen could say, Nobilitas sola est atque unica Virtus, Virtue is the only true Nobility; a Christian should say, Grace is the greatest Nobility, Acts 17. 11. Your Lordship hath a good name amongst the good Ministers and people of this Land for adhering to the Truth.
Malice it self cannot but acknowledge (saith worthy Mr Burroughes in his Epistle Dedicatory to you before that excellent Book of the Excellency of a Gracious Spirit) that Goodness in the strictness of it, and natural Excellencies in the eminency of them, have a blessed conjunction in your Honor.
I would commend the second Epistle of John to our great Ladies in these staggering dayes, especially the 1, 2, 4, 9, 10, and 11. verses. In times of general contagion it will be our wisdom to have our Antidotes ready.
I have had the honour formerly to be a little known unto your Lordship, which makes me take the boldness to make you the Patron of the first-fruits of my labours upon the Old-Testament.
I was the last who dedicated a Book to that great Light of all the Reformed Churches, my Lord of Armagh▪ The Subject of that Book was of Religion and Learning, a work needfull for these times, when Learning is so much decried, and the true Religion in the power thereof so little imbraced. I have since the publication thereof received a Letter from a great Rabbi of one of our Universities, testifying his high esteem of it, and wish it may finde the like approbation with the religious and learned, who are best able to judge of it, and for whose sake it was principally intended▪ That work of mine was kindly accepted by him, to whose Patronage I had good reason in many respects to commend it. All the Books of Scripture should be diligently perused and studied by all Christians, these five Books are full fraught with many precious Truths, and if any benefit shall accrue to the Church of God by these my Labours, I shall greatly rejoyce. Thus craving your Lordships pardon for my presumption, and wishing you and yours true felicity, I subscribe my self,
Your Lordships humble Servant EDWARD LEIGH.
TO THE Christian and Candid READER.
Reader,
I Have now by way of Essay made some Annotations, though short, upon five Books of the Old-Testament, viz. Job, Psalms, Proverbs, Ecclesiastes, Canticles, being incouraged in the publicationM. John Trap in his Epistle to his Commentary upon Ezra, Nehemiah, Esther, Job and Psalms. thereof by the Epistle of a Grave and Reverend Divine, who hath honoured me with the Patronage of a late learned Work of his that way, though I fear my Labours will neither answer his own expectation, nor finde that intertainment which he imagineth. Job and the Canticles as they are written Dialogue-wise, so they are mystical and obscure. The Psalms are a portion of Scripture, very usefull for all sorts of Christians to be acquainted with. Singing of Psalmes is an Ordinance of God, and a duty very profitable and comfortable to a true Saint, being rightly performed: But as a man must pray, so must he sing with understanding, and have his heart affected answerably to the matter; therefore I should conceive it very requisite for any that would perform this excellent Duty to their spiritual advantage, to make use of some good Expositor on the Psalmes, that they may competently understand the Psalme before they sing, and so perform reasonable service. Psal. 101. 5. Who so privily slandereth his neighbour, the Chaldee Paraphrast hath, He that speaketh with a third tongue against his neighbour: And so Psal. 140. 11. An evil speaker, or a man of tongue shall not be established on the earth, the Chaldee there also hath, The man that speaketh with a third tongue. The slanderer is said to use a thirdLud. De Die… Praefat. ad Xaver. Hist. Christi. tongue, either because he hurts three at once, himself, the hearer, and him whom he slandereth; or, because his tongue comes in the third between two, as one writing, and another speaking, that he may hurt his name, or separate affections; or because, he calumniating the words of two friends, abuseth the tongue of both, and mingleth his third tongue.
Proverbs is short, but very pithy and sententious.
Ecclesiastes sets forth the vanity of every Creature. I like not the way that is used by some able Divines, as Bucer, and others, of inlarging Scriptural Interpretation with intermixing of Common-places: I have heard (as I remember) that Peter Martyr did therefore put forth his Commonplaces, before any Expository Work, that he might not runne out that way, when he interpreted Scripture. If these Observations have a favourable reception, it will excite me to a quicker dispatch of my Annotations upon the Greater and Lesser Prophets, which I suppose will be a fair Folio, and so I may, if incouraged, proceed after to Genesis, and all the other Books of the Old-Testament, even to Job.
I have little cause to mistrust the liking of these my Labours, God having been pleased formerly to make way so generally in the hearts of his people, for the approbation of what I have heretofore published; I shall commend them therefore to his blessing, and shall desire however, to submit to his dispensation, and rest
Thy faithfull Friend and well-willer Edward Leigh.