And shall receive the reward of unrighteousness, as they that count it pleasure to riot in the day time. Spots they are and blemishes, sporting themselves with their own deceivings while they feast with you;
Ver. 13. To riot in the day time] See Trapp on " 1Th 5:7 " The word here rendered riot, comes of a root that signifies to break, for there is nothing that doth so break and emasculate the minds of men as rioting and revelling; luxury draws out a man's spirits, and dissolves him. (τρυφη, a θρυπτω, frango.) Hence Venus is called λυσιμελης by the ancients, and harlots are called cruces, crosses, by the young man in Terence. Solomon's prodigal found them no better,Proverbs 5:11, after he had paid for his learning.
Spots they are] σπιλοι, blots of goodness, botches of Christian society. Such are the Jesuits, who tell us they can daily be with the fairest women and yet not lust after them. Such was that profligate priest, who persuaded many maids and matrons to lie with him under a pretence of religion; asserens impietatis et hypocriseos plenam esse fiduciam, qua castitate et pudicitia sua potius quam Christi gratia niterentur, telling them that that faith of theirs was naught and counterfeit, whereby they were drawn to rest more upon their chastity and modesty than upon Christ's grace and merits. (Theatr. Histor. Horndorf.) I much doubt we have many such merchants, such marcidi bibauldi, rascal ribalds a (as Math. Paris calls them), now abroad among us, in these last and loosest times.
a One of an irregular class of retainers who performed the lowest offices in royal or baronial households, especially in France during the 14th and 15th centuries, and were employed in warfare as irregular troops; hence, a menial or dependent of low birth. Obs. ŒD