1 Timothy 6:10

Have—pierced themselves through, &c.— "Have felt long and incurable pains, by the numerous wounds they have given to their own consciences, as it were, on every side." The original word περιεπειραν is very emphatical, and properly signifies, "They have stabbed themselves, as it were, from head to feet, so as to be all covered with wounds." And this indeed happily expresses the innumerable outrages done to conscience by those madmen, who have taken up the fatal resolution, that they will at all adventures be rich.