Then I returned, and I saw vanity under the sun.
Ver. 7. Then I returned, and saw vanity, &c., ] i.e., Another extreme of vanity, visible wherever the sun is seen. Dum vitant stulti vitium in contraria currant: Fools while they shun the sands rush upon the rocks, - as Herod would needs prevent perjury by murder. The sluggard here, seeing those that do best to be envied of others, resolves to do just nothing. Again, the covetous miser, seeing the sluggard lie under so much infamy for doing nothing, se laboribus conficit, undoes himself with over doing. Sed nemo ita perplexus tenetur inter duo vitia, quin exitus pateat absque tertio, saith an ancient; but no man is so held hampered between two vices but that he may well get off without falling into a third. What need Eutyches fall into the other extreme of Nestorius? or Stancarus, of Osiander? or Illyricus, of Strigelius? but that they were for their pride justly given up to a spirit of giddiness.