A time to love, and a time to hate; a time of war, and a time of peace.
Ver. 8. A time to love, and a time to hate.] Yet I like not his counsel that said, Ama tanquam osurus, odi tanquam amaturus, a Let a man choose whom he may love, and then love whom he hath chosen. "Let love be without dissimulation; abhor the evil, cleave to the good." Rom 12:9 Hate we may, but then it must be, non virum, sed vitium, not the man, but his evil qualities; whereof also we must seek to bereave him, that he may be totus desiderabilis, "altogether lovely." Son 5:16
A time of war, and a time of peace.] Time, saith an interpreter, is a circle; and the Preacher shutteth up this passage of time in a circle. For having begun with "a time to be born," and "a time to die," he endeth with "a time of war," which is a time of dying, and with "a time of peace," which is a time wherein people, by bringing forth, are multiplied.
a Cicero De Amicit.