If Cain shall be avenged sevenfold, truly Lamech seventy and sevenfold.
Ver. 24. If Cain shall be avenged sevenfold, &c.] Boastful Lamech brags, and goes on to outdare God himself. For it is as if he should say, If God will take vengeance on them that condemn him, why may not I on those that condemn me, wives or other? Nay, though God will forgive evils against him, yet will not I evils against me. I'll have the odds of him, seventy to seven; so Junius interprets it. A desperate expression, and somewhat like that of Pope Julius III., above mentioned, in the last note upon the former chapter; whereunto may here be added, a that the same Pope being forbidden by his physician to eat swine's flesh, as being harmful and bad for his gout, he called for his steward in a great rage, and said, Bring me my pork flesh, al despito di Dio, in despite of God. O wretch!
a Act. and Mon ., fol. 1417.