When thou goest out to battle against thine enemies, and seest horses, and chariots, [and] a people more than thou, be not afraid of them: for the LORD thy God [is] with thee, which brought thee up out of the land of Egypt.
Ver. 1. When thou goest out to battle.] It is not unlawful, therefore, to go to war, as Lactantius and some others held; whether it be pro religione vel pro regione: only because it is easier to stir strife than to stop and stint it, - non enim in eiusdem potestate est initium belli, eiusque finis, a - war is not rashly to be undertaken, lest it befall men as in the battle between the dragon and the elephant. The dragon sucketh out the blood of the elephant, and the weight of the falling elephant oppresseth the dragon, and so both perish. b St Augustine would never pray for such as had willfully and voluntarily thrust themselves into unnecessary wars. c
For the Lord thy God is with thee.] And how many reckonest thou him for? - as Antigonus said to his discouraged soldiers. "The Lord is a man of war"; Exo 15:3 or, as the Chaldee there expresseth it, "a victor of wars." 2Ch 32:8 Si Deus pro nobis, &c. Rom 8:31
a Salust., in Jugurth.
b Plin., lib. viii. cap. 12.
c Possid., in Vit. Aug.