William Burkitt on Revelation 9:5

That is, God would bring such dreadful judgments and calamities upon the wicked world, that men should be an affliction beyond all other afflictions, that they could not die: to flee death is a great misery, but to have death flee from us, or flee before us, and not be able to find it, is a far greater misery; God can so embitter life by afflictions and sufferings, that those who dread death may yet desire to die; not for any good that they see in death, but only to get rid of the troubles of this life: In those days men shall seek death, and shall not find it.