And all they that heard it wondered at those things which were told them by the shepherds.
Ver. 18. Wondered at those things] Yet made little benefit of what they heard. "All the world wondered after the beast," Revelation 13:3. And it was a wonder there was no more wondering at the birth of our Saviour; if that were true especially, that (besides the wise men's star, Matthew 2:8,11, and the angelic music in the air, &c.) among the Gentiles a voice was heard, The great God is now about to be born; and that at Rome, the likeness of a woman carrying a child in her arms was seen about the sun, &c. These things are told. Polydore Virgil reports out of Orosius, that on the very day of Christ's nativity, Augustus Caesar caused proclamation that no man should style him Lord any longer, Manifesto praesagio maioris Dominatus, qui tum in terris ortus esset; as presaging a greater than himself then born.