And Jeremiah lamented for Josiah: and all the singing men and the singing women spake of Josiah in their lamentations to this day, and made them an ordinance in Israel: and, behold, they [are] written in the lamentations.
Ver. 25. And Jeremiah lamented for Josiah.] Whose worth he had fully known; and to whom himself was better known than Daniel was afterwards to Belshazzar; who knew not till he was told by his mother that there was any such man in his kingdom. Whereas had he been a Tricongiustospot, he would sooner have taken knowledge of him.
And behold they are written in the lamentations.] Whether he meant the Lamentations of Jeremiah Lamentations 4:1,22, or some other mournful ditty extant in those time, and known by the name of the Lamentations, a is uncertain. The Roman senate bitterly bewailed the death of Titus, heaping more praise upon him dead than ever they had done whilst he was alive. b Cardanus's epitaph upon our King Edward VI is well known -
“ Flete nefas magnum, sed toto flebitis orbe
Mortales: rester corruit omnis honos.
Nam regum decus et iuvenum flos, spesque bonorum,
Deliciae saecli et gloria gentis erat.
Dignus Apollineis lachrymis, doctaeque Minervae
Flosculus (heu misero) concidit ante diem.
Te tumulo dabimus Musae supremaque flentes
Munera, Melpomene tristia fata canet. ”
a θρηνωδιας
b Sueton.