John Calvin on 1 Corinthians 4:12

12. When he says that while persecuted he suffers it, and that he prays for his revilers, he intimates that he is not merely afflicted and abased by God, by means of the cross, but is also endowed with a disposition to abase himself willingly. In this, perhaps, he gives a stroke to the false apostles, who were so effeminate and tender, that they could not bear to be touched even with your little finger. In speaking of their laboring he adds — with our own hands, to express more fully the meanness of his employments “Que c’estoit vn mestier ville, et mechanique;” — “That it was a mean and mechanical occupation.” — “I do not merely gain a livelihood for myself by my own labor, but by mean labor, working with my own hands.”