Wherefore didst thou flee away secretly, and steal away from me; and didst not tell me, that I might have sent thee away with mirth, and with songs, with tabret, and with harp?
Ver. 27. That I might have sent thee away with mirth.] A likely matter! but it is the hypocrite's best now, to say the best. He durst do no other; for God had overawed him, and put his hook into his nostrils. Hypocrites are likened to "bulrushes," Isa 58:5 which are green and smooth; and he is curious to a miracle, that can find a knot in them; but within is nothing but a useless and spongy pith. Compared they are also to "vipers," Mat 3:7 that are painted, as it were, without, but poisonful within: they have their teeth also buried in their gums, saith Pliny, so that one would think them to be harmless beasts, and that they could not bite. So hypocrites seem most innocent. Who would have thought otherwise of Laban, that had not known him, considering his dispute here with Jacob, his protests, afterwards, of deep and dear love to his daughters, and lastly, his attestation and taking God to witness for their good usage, and his heap of stones to witness (together with his heap of words to small purpose), calling it first Jegar-sahadutha, as a witness betwixt man and man; and then Mizpeh, as a watch-tower or witness between God and man? Who could take Laban for less now, than a loving father, yea, and an honest man? But, as the historian a saith of another, so may we of him; Palam compositus pudor, intus summa adipiscendi libido. All this was but blanched hypocrisy, and coloured covetousness, as St Paul calls it. 1Th 2:5
“ Astutam vapido servat sub pectore vulpem .” - Pers.
a Tacit., De Sejano.