For with what judgment ye judge, ye shall be judged: and with what measure ye mete, it shall be measured to you again.
Ver. 2. For with what judgment ye judge, &c.] Our Saviour sets forth what he had said before by these two proverbial sentences, as well known among them as those among us: "Ye shall sow as ye reap, drink as ye brew, be served with the same sauce," &c. a Compare herewith those divine proverbs,Isaiah 33:1; Proverbs 12:14; Proverbs 13:2; Proverbs 13:21; Proverbs 14:14; Proverbs 14:22; Proverbs 22:8; Job 6:8; Mark 6:24. God delights to give men their own, as good as they brought, to pay them home in their own coin, or, as the text here and the Hebrew proverb hath it, to remit to them in their own measure, b Isaiah 3:10,11; with the merciful to show himself merciful, and with the froward to wrestle. He will be as froward as they for the hearts of them, beat them with their own weapons, overshoot them in their own bows, shape their estates according to their own patterns, and cause others to write after their copies, as it fared with Pharaoh, Adonibezek, Agag, &c. Sodom sinned in fulness of bread, and it is expressly noted that their victuals were taken from them by the four kings, Genesis 14:11. Their eyes were full of uncleanness, and they were smitten with blindness; they burned with lust, and were burned with fire; they sinned against nature, and against the course of nature, fire descends and consumes them. Eglon, stabbed into the guts, finds his bane the same way with his sin. Sisera annoys God's people with his iron chariots, and is slain by a nail of iron. Jezebel's brains, that devised mischief against the innocent, are strewed upon the stones; by a letter to Jezreel she shed the blood of Naboth, and by a letter from Jezreel the blood of her sons is shed. Nebuchadnezzar destroyed Solomen's temple (that seven years' work of so many thousands), therefore let him be turned a grazing, and seven seasons pass over him, saith the oracle,Daniel 4:16. The blasphemers in the Revelation "gnaw their tongues" through pain, and Dives (for like cause) was tormented in that part chiefly. c Apion scoffing at religion, and especially at circumcision, had an ulcer at the same time and in the same place. Phocas, a wild, drunken, bloody, adulterous tyrant, was worthily slaughtered by Heraclius, who cut off his hands and feet, and then his genitals by piecemeal. The Donatists, that cast the holy elements in the Lord's supper to dogs, were themselves afterward devoured of dogs. John Martin of Briqueras, a mile from Angrogne, vaunted everywhere that he would slit the minister's nose of Angrogne, but was himself assaulted by a wolf, which bit off his nose, whereof he died mad. Sir Ralph Elerker, Knight Marshal of Calais, in Queen Mary's reign, being present at the death of Adam Damlip, martyr, bid the executioner despatch, saying that he would not away till he saw the traitor's heart out. Shortly after this Sir Ralph was slain, among others, in a skirmish at Bullein, and his heart cut out of his body by the enemies, -a terrible example to all merciless and bloody men, &c.; for no cause was known why they should use such indignation against him more than the rest, but that it is written, "With what measure ye mete, it shall be measured to you again." Bishop Ridley told Stephen Winchester that it was the hand of God that he was now in prison, because he had so troubled others in his time. And as he had inflamed so many good martyrs, so he died miserably of an inflammation, that caused him to thrust out his tongue all swollen and black, as Archbishop Arundel had died before him. The Archbishop of Tours made suit for the erection of a court, called Chambre Ardent, wherein to condenm the Protestants to the fire. He was afterwards stricken with a disease called "the fire of God," which began at his feet, and so ascended upward, that he caused one member after another to be cut off, and so died miserably. And there is mention made of one Christopher, an unmerciful courtier, who suffering a poor lazar d to die in a ditch by him, did afterwards perish himself in a ditch. To return to the present purpose: Laurentius Valla censured all that wrote before him; Erasmus comes after, and censures him as much; Beza finds as many faults with Erasmus, and not without cause, as appeareth by that one passage among many in his annotations on Romans 7:21; "I find then a law, that when I would do good, evil is present with me;" Erasmus Originem secutus, scripsit Paulum hoc Sermone balbutire, quum ipse potius ineptiat. Scaliger the hypercritic gives this absurd and unmannerly censure: Gothi belluae, Scoti non minus. Angli perfidi, inflati, feri, contemptores, stolidi, amentes, inertes, inhospitales, immanes. The Goths are beasts, so are the Scots. Englishmen are perfidious, proud, fierce, foolish, mad men, slow bellies, inhospitable, barbarous. Another comes after him, and saith, His bolt, you see, is soon shot, and so you may happily guess at the quality of the archer. Tacitus speaks reproachfully of both Jews and Christians; and is paid his own as well, both by Tertullian and Lipsius. e If men suffer in their good names, they may thank themselves, mostly. Contempt is a thing that man's nature is most impatient of. Those that are given to slight and censure others, are punished with the common hatred of all. Imitation and retaliation are in all men naturally, as we may see in every child. And that of Solomon is in this sense found most rule, "As in water face answereth to face; so doth the heart of a man to a man." None are so shunned and censured as those that are most censorious. The places they live in groan for a vomit to spew them out.
a κριματος μετρον, Matthew 7:2, est rigor iuris moderationi et mitigationi oppositus. Aret.
b See also Revelation 13:10; Revelation 18:6; Middah cenegedh middah. Psalms 18:26 .
c Quia lingua plus peccaverat.
d A poor and diseased person, usually one afflicted with a loathsome disease; esp. a leper. ŒD
e Taciturn Lipsius immemorem, secumque pugnantem; Tertullianus mendaciorum loquacissimum appellat.