Slay them not, lest my people forget: scatter them by thy power; and bring them down, O Lord our shield.
Ver. 11. Slay them not, lest my people forget] Marcet sine adversario virtus, the natural heat decayeth if it have not wherewith to wrestle. Carthage was not to be destroyed, that Rome might not want an adversary. The saints have the relics of corruption left in them for exercise of their graces. "Slay them not," saith David; and the Chaldee addeth, statim, forthwith, or outright, but by degrees rather; "lest my people," my followers and fellow soldiers, forget their skill in arms or thy judgments on the enemies.
Scatter them by thy power] That they may wander, as Cain did, and be restless. Or, shake them to and fro, as meal is shaken in a sieve; let them be dissipated, and by degrees wasted, that they may be as so many standing monuments of the divine justice, ut eo sint illustriora et testatiora tun iudicia, as the dejected people of the Jews are today.