And they cast dust on their heads, and cried, weeping and wailing, saying, Alas, alas, that great city, wherein were made rich all that had ships in the sea by reason of her costliness! for in one hour is she made desolate.
Ver. 19. And they cast dust] As men willing to be as far underground as now they were above ground. Having lost their livelihood, they had little joy of their lives.
All that had ships in the sea] All churchmen, i.e. all, for the most part; some of them have little enough. Sanders was starved. Stapleton was made a professor of a petty university, scarcely as good as one of our free schools. On Harding his Holiness bestowed a prebend a of Gaunt, or (to speak more properly) a Gaunt prebend. Allin was commonly called the starveling cardinal.
a The portion of the revenues of a cathedral or collegiate church granted to a canon or member of the chapter as his stipend. ŒD