Jeremiah 20:9

Then I said, I will not make mention of him, nor speak any more in his name. But [his word] was in mine heart as a burning fire shut up in my bones, and I was weary with forbearing, and I could not [stay].

Ver. 9. Then I said, I will not make mention of him, nor speak any more in his name,] a i.e., I will give over preaching. This, said Latimer in a like case, was a naughty, a very naughty, resolution.

But his word was in my heart as a burning fire.] b Ex sensu malae conscientiae propter illud propositum. And here was the work of the Spirit against that carnal resolution of his. God's people cannot do the things that they would, saith the apostle. Gal 5:17 As they cannot do the good they would, because of the flesh, so neither the evil that they would, because of the Spirit. There is a continual conflict, and as it were the company of two opposite armies. Son 6:13 True grace will as little be hid as fire: quis enim celaverit ignem?

And I was weary with forbearing, and could not stay.] c Jeremiah's service among the Jews was something like that of Mantius Torquatus among the Romans, who gave it over, saying, Neither can I bear their manners, nor they my government. He began to think, with that painful patriarch, that rest was good; Gen 49:15 and with the olive, vine, and fig tree in Jotham's parable, that it was best to enjoy a beloved privacy. He was ready to say, Bene qui latuit bene vixit; and Bene qui tacuit bene dixit, &c. But this could not hold with him, he saw well; for as the motion of the heart and lungs is ever beating, and it is a pain to restrain it, to hold the breath, so here,

“ Strangulat inclusus dolor atque exaestuat intus:

Cogitur et vires multiplicare suas. ” - Ovid., Trist.

a Ex humano motu et metu hoc in mentem incidit. - A Lapide; Pisc.

b Quoque magis tegitur, tanto magis aestuat ignis. - Ovid.

c Hanc legem ex hoc loco dat concionatori ne defatigetur nec ullo tempore sileat, sive sit qui auscultet, sive non. - Chrysost, de Lazaro.