Habakkuk 2:19

Woe unto him that saith to the wood, Awake; to the dumb stone, Arise, it shall teach! Behold, it [is] laid over with gold and silver, and [there is] no breath at all in the midst of it.

Ver. 19. Woe unto him that saith to the wood, Awake] It is wood still, and yet he saith to it, Awake, Arise, &c., as if he would deny his own reason, and unman himself. When Hezekiah saw that such was the venom of the Israelitish idolatry, that the brazen serpent stung worse than the fiery, he pulled it down, and in contempt called it Nehushtan, that is, a piece of brass, 2 Kings 18:4. Pagnine rendereth it, aenusum. Marinus, aeniculum, that is, parum quid aeris, a little piece of sorry brass (Thes. Ling. Sanct.). The Jews to this day say that as long as they see the preacher direct his speech and prayer to that little wooden crucifix, that standeth in the pulpit by him, to call it his Lord and Saviour, to kneel to it, to embrace it, to kiss it, to weep upon it (as is the fashion of Italy), this is preaching sufficient for them; and persuadeth them more with the very sight of it to hate Christian religion, than any reason that the world can allege to love it. Woe, therefore, to those Popish idolaters, because of offences; destruction to them, that thus say to the wood, Awake, and

to the dumb stone, Arise] A prayer, fit to be preferred to God only, as Psa 35:23 who giveth not his glory to any other, nor his honour to graven images, Isaiah 42:8. He that is the right object of men's prayers must be omnipotent, omnipresent, omniscient, a God also in covenant with us, &c. Is any wood or stone so? Is it not inutile lignum, useless wood, a dead stock? Eben dumam, a dumb stone? Our English seems to come of the Hebrew.

It shall teach] Dumb, and yet teach? Others read it as a question, Ipse doceat? Can it teach? What better lesson can ye learn from it than a lie? as Habakkuk 2:18. Bid adieu to it, therefore, as King Henry VIII did to the Pope (if he had done so to Popery too, it had been better for him) in his protestation against him. England is no more a babe, to be led and fed with lies -. Surely, except God take away our right wits, not only the Pope's authority shall be driven out for ever, but his name also shortly shall be forgotten in England. We will from henceforth ask counsel of him and his when we wish to be deceived, when we covet to be in error, when we desire to offend God, truth, and honesty.

Behold, it is laid over with gold and silver] q.d. Come and see, believe your own eyes at least, behold the matter, form, workmanship of this newly made god, and grow wiser. The rood of grace with all its trinkets, the blood of Hales (that notable impostor) was laid open at Paul's Cross by Cromwell, and there viewed and torn in pieces by the people.

There is no breath at all in the midst of it] No soul, not so much as that of a beast. O pulchrum caput, sed cerebrum non inest, said the ape in the fable, coming once into a carver's shop. The best thing that an image can teach a man is, that itself is dumb and dead; and that the maker thereof cannot give life and breath to it, much less a deity.