9. Let there more work be laid upon the men. Although Pharaoh knew that he was cruelly entreating the unhappy Israelites, who ought, as strangers, to be hospitably and kindly received, yet he says that they were abusing their idleness, and were revolting because he indulged them too much. Thus, when tyranny has lost all regard for justice, there are no bounds to its harshness; and so far from being moved to pity by complaints, they only aggravate its cruelty. And these are the means by which its flatterers inflame it more, viz., that its subjects will never be quiet unless they faint under the weight of their burdens; that this is the best receipt for governing them, so to oppress them that they dare not open their mouths; if they cry, or murmur, that they should be oppressed the more, (69) till they grow hardened, and, as it were, callous to their bondage. They, therefore, relax not their contumelies and cruelties until the wretched people have altogether succumbed. Pharaoh insults them still more wantonly, when he says that he imposes heavier burdens upon them, that “they may not regard vain words.” But what are these, except that they ask permission to worship God? His impiety, therefore, bursts forth in the midst of his tyrannical insolence; nor does he only mean to utter a blasphemy against God, but he is instigated by the wiles of Satan to undermine the faith of the Church. By a similar impulse, Rabshakeh proclaimed that Hezekiah deceived the people by “vain words,” when he bade them trust in the living God. (Isaiah 36:5.) Nor does Satan cease to employ the same machination against the faithful, as if all that God promises was deceit and vanity.
(69) The original here is, “ut obdurescant ad servitutem, quasi contracto collo;” which the French translates “pour l’endurcir a servitude, comme si on le trainoit par le col.” The Geneva edition of 1617, as well as that of Amsterdam of 1671, however, have substituted “callo,” which certainly seems to make the sense clearer.