And when he saw a fig tree in the way, he came to it, and found nothing thereon, but leaves only, and said unto it, Let no fruit grow on thee henceforward for ever. And presently the fig tree withered away.
Ver. 19. He came to it and found nothing] He thought then to have found something; there was some kind of ignorance, we see, in Christ as man (but not that that was sinful). His soul desired the first ripe fruits, Micah 7:1; yea, though they had not been ripe and ready, hard hunger would have made them sweet and savoury, as the shepherd's bread and onions were to Hunniades, when he was put to flight by the Turks; so well can hunger season homely cares, saith the historian. Of this promising fig tree our Saviour might say, as Alciat of the cypress,
" Pulchra coma est, pulchro digestaeque ordine frondes,
Sed fructus nullos haec coma pulchra gerit. "