idens nemo illis (hoc est, nemo est qui illis dividat, id est, porrigat.)
JEREMIAH AND LAMENTATIONS help or to succor them in their miseries. He, then, does not accuse the people of cruelty, that they did not nourish their children, but on the contrary he means that they were given up to cruel enemies. 569
As the ostriches, or the owls, he says, in the wilderness. If we understand the ostrich to be intended, we know that bird to be very stupid; for as soon as she lays an egg, she forgets and leaves it. The comparison, then, would be suitable, were the daughter of the people said to be cruel, because she neglected her children; but the
Prophet, as I think, means, on the contrary, that the Jews were so destitute of every help, as though they were banished into solitary places beyond the sight of men; for birds in solitude in vain seek the help of others. As, then, the ostrich Or the owl has in the desert no one to bring it help, and is without its own mother, so the Prophet intimates that there was no one to stretch forth a hand to the distressed people to relieve their extreme miseries. It follows, ---
Lamentations 4:4
4. The tongue of the sucking child cleaveth to the roof of his mouth for thirst: the young children ask bread, and no man breaketh it unto them.
4. Adhaesit lingua lactantis ad palatum ejus in siti; parvuli petierunt panem, dividens nemo illis (hoc est, nemo est qui illis dividat, id est, porrigat.)
He says that sucking children were so thirsty, that the tongue was as it were fixed to the palate; and it was a dreadful thing; for mothers would willingly pour forth their own blood to feed their infants. When, therefore, the tongue of a child clave to his mouth, it seemed to be in a manner beyond nature. Among other calamities, then, the Prophet names this, that infants pined away with thirst, and also that children sought bread in vain. He speaks not in the latter instance of sucklings, but. of children three or four years old. Then he says that they sought or asked for bread, but that there was no one to give. 570
He describes here the famine of the city, of which he had predicted, when he declared that it would be better with the slain than with the people remaining alive, for a harder conflict with famine and want would await the living. But this was not believed. Now, then, the Prophet upbraids the Jews with their former perverseness.
He afterwards adds, ---
Lamentations 4:5
5. They that did feed delicately are desolate in the streets: they that were brought up in scarlet embrace dunghills.
5. Qui comedebant ad delicias (hoc est, in deliciis, ad verbum, {),}למעדנים perierunt in plateis; qui educati fuerant in coccino (ad coccinum,) amplexi sunt stercora.
Here he goes on farther, and says, that they had perished with famine who had
569The reference here is to the conduct of mothers, called here "the daughter of my people," as it appears evident from the following verse, — Even dragons have drawn out the breast, They have suckled their young ones: The daughter of my people has been for cruelty Like the ostriches in the desert. It is said that the ostrich lays her eggs and forsakes them. See Job 39:15. The verb, to be, is understood, as the case often is, but it must ever be in the same tense as the verb or verbs connected with the sentence. — Ed.
570The verbs here are in the past tense, and not in the present, as in our version, — Cleave did the tongue of the suckling To his palate through thirst; Children asked bread, A breaker, none was to them. — Ed