And Hamor communed with them, saying, The soul of my son Shechem longeth for your daughter: I pray you give her him to wife.
Ver. 8. And Hamor communed with them.] A fond father seeks to satisfy the lust of a loose son, whom he should severely have punished; such parents are peremptores potius quam parentes, saith Bernard; like apes, that kill their young with culling them. They show their love as little, as if, by clapping their hands on their children's mouths, to keep the cold wind from them, they should strangle them to death. A fair hand, here, maketh a foul wound; when correction would be a kind of cure. Severitas tamen non sit tetra, sed tetrica, saith Sidonius. a For, as a cur by trying waxeth fiercer, and as new wine breaketh weak vessels; so too much severity overthroweth, and quite spilleth a tender mind.
a Sidonius, lib, iv. epist. 9.