also, when you shal see these things, know ye that it is nigh even at the doores. 34Amen I say to you, that this Generation shal not passe, til al these things be done. 35Heaven and earth shal passe, but my words shal not passe.✠
36But of that day and houre no body knoweth, neither the Angels of Heaven, but the Father alone. 37And as Gen. 7, 5.* in the dayes of Noe, so shal also the comming of the Sonne of man be. 38For as they were in the dayes before the floud, eating and drinking, marying and giving to mariage, even unto that day in which Noe entred into the arke, 39and knew not til the floud came, and tooke them al: so also shal the comming of the Sonne of man be. 40Then two shal be in the field: one shal be taken, and one shal be left. 41Two women grinding in the mill: one shal be taken, and one shal be left. The Gospel upon S. Clement martyr his day Novemb. 23. And for some Confessours Bishops.42Watch therfore because you know not what houre your Lord wil come. 43But this know ye, that 1. Thes. 5. 1.* if the Good-man of the house did know what houre the theefe would come, he would surely watch, and would not suffer his house to be broken up. 44Therfore be you also ready, because at what houre you know not, the Sonne of man wil come.
45Who, thinkest thou, is a faithful and wise servant, whom his Lord hath appointed over his familie, to give them meate in season? 46Blessed is that servant, whom when his Lord commeth, he shal finde so doing. 47Amen I say to you, that over al his goods shal he appoint him.✠ 48But if that naughtie servant shal say in his hart: My Lord is long a comming: 49and shal begin to strike his felow-servants, and eateth, and drinketh with drunkards: 50the Lord of that servant shal come in a day that he hopeth not, and an houre that he knoweth not, 51and shal devide him, and appoint his portion with the Hypocrites: there shal be weeping and gnashing of teeth.
ANNOTATIONS.
Chap. XXIV.
2. Not left.) This was fulfilled 40. yeares after Christes Ascension by Vespasian the Emperour and his sonne Titus. Euseb. li. 3. c. 6. & seq. ex Josepho. Upon which words, There shal not be left &c, which threaten the destruction of the Jewes Temple; and those words, Mat. 16.upon this Rock I wil build my Church, The Church can never faile.which promise the building of the Catholike Church of al Nations; Li. adv. Gentes quod Christus sit Deus, prope finem.S. Chrysostome making a long comparison of these two Prophecies of Christ, saith thus: Thou seest in both, his great and unspeakable power, in that he increased and built up them that worshipped him, and those that stumbled at him, he abased, destroyed, and plucked them up by the root. Doest thou see how whatsoever he hath built, no man shal destroy: and whatsoever he hath destroyed, no man shal build? He builded the Church, and no man shal be able to destroy it; he destroyed the Temple, and no man is able to build it, and that in so long time: For they have endeavoured both to destroy that, and could not: and they have attempted to build up this, and they could not doe that neither, &c.
3. The signe.) Our Maister knowing that it was not profitable nor seemly for them to know these secrets, gave them by way of Prophecie warning of divers miseries, signes, and tokens, that should fal, some further off, and some neerer the later day: by which the Faithful might alwayes prepare them selves, but never be certaine of the houre, day,
