Leah [was] tender eyed; but Rachel was beautiful and well favoured.
Ver. 17. Leah was tender-eyed.] Purblind or squint, as one a interprets it. Now, a froward look and squint eyes, saith the historian, b are the certain notes of a nature to be suspected. The Jerusalem Targum tells us, that her eyes were tender with weeping and praying. Mary Magdalene is famous for her tears; and Christ was never so near her as when she could not see him for weeping. After which she spent (as some report) thirty years in Gallia Narbonensi, in weeping for her sins.
But Rachel was beautiful, &c.] Plato calls beauty the principality of nature; Aristotle, a greater commendation than all epistles. See Trapp on " Gen 24:16 "
a Mercer.
b Turk. Hist ., fol. 483.
c Heidfeld.