And saying, We have piped unto you, and ye have not danced; we have mourned unto you, and ye have not lamented.
Ver. 17. We have piped unto you, &c.] It is probable that children in those days were wont to solace themselves with songs in this sort: and thence our Saviour seeks to repress the pride and set forth the sin of his untoward hearers. Fit similes do excellently illustrate: and he is the best preacher, saith Luther, that delivereth himself vernacularly, plainly, trivially: not speaking in a Roman, English, or other lofty language, that the hearers are nothing the wiser for; nor yet puzzling them with scholastic craggy disquisitions, that breed wind, and not nourishment. But so attempering their discourses to the hearers' capacities, that their desires and endeavours may answer his: as it was between St Paul and the elders of Ephesus, Acts 20:31,37. He tells them of his tears, and they answer him with tears: O happy compliance! But most of our hearers are like these in the text, which whether piped to or mourned to, are nothing at all affected.