Then the king's countenance was changed, and his thoughts troubled him, so that the joints of his loins were loosed, and his knees smote one against another.
Ver. 6. Then the king's countenance was changed.] How soon is carnal joy extinct, the gallantry of it checked with troubles and terrors! how suddenly is it put out as the fire of thorns! Psa 118:12 Ecc 7:6 Surely as lightning is followed with rending and roaring; and as comets, when their exhaled matter is wasted, vanish and fill the air with pestilent vapours; so is it here.
So that the joints of his loins were loosed.] If a bare citation to judgment were so terrible to this jolly prince, what shall the judgment itself be "Knowing therefore the terror of the Lord," &c.
And his knees smote one against another.] The writing on the wall he could neither read nor understand; but his conscience had written bitter things against him, which being now held to the fire of God's wrath become legible, as things written with the juice of an onion are visible when brought to the fire. The wounds also of an accusing conscience pierce the members of the body. Pro 17:22 The mark that God set upon Cain was, in likelihood the perpetual trembling of his hands and whole body. Tullus Hostilius, who profanely derided the devotions of his predecessor Numa, had deservedly for his gods Pavorem fear, and Pallorem. wanness, a Caracalla, after the murder of his brother Geta, was so haunted with the furies of his own evil conscience, that he forbade any so much as to name him on pain of death, and was well nigh mad; so was Theodoricus the tyrant upon the sight of the fish's head set before him, wherein he thought he saw the face of Symmachus whom he had wrongfully slain. The like befell our Richard III after the murder of his two innocent nephews; and Charles IX of France after the massacre at Paris.
a Lactant