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Job 39:3

They bow themselves, they bring forth their young ones, they cast out their sorrows.

They bow themselves,.... That they may bring forth their young with greater ease and more safety: for it seems the hinds bring forth their young with great difficulty; and there are provisions in nature made to lessen it; as thunder, before observed, which causes them to bring forth the sooner; and there is an herb called "seselis", which it is said {i} they feed upon before birth, to make it the easier; as well as they use that, and another called "aros", after the birth, to ease them of their later pains;

they bring forth their young ones; renting and cleaving asunder the membrane, as the word signifies, in which their young is wrapped;

they cast out their sorrows; either their young, which they bring forth in pains and which then cease; or the secundines, or afterbirth, in which the young is wrapped, and which the philosopher says {k} they eat, and is supposed to be medical to them. None but a woman seems to bring forth with more pain than this creature; and a wife is compared to it, Proverbs 5:19.


{i} Cicero de Natura Deoram, l. 2. Plin. Nat. Hist. c. 8. 32. Aristot. Hist. Animal. l. 9. c. 5.
{k} Aristot. ib.

 

 

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