Matthew Poole and continuators on 1 Corinthians 4:9

9 For I think that God hath set forth us the apostles last , as it were appointed to death . For we are made a spectacle unto the world, and to angels, and to men .

The lot of us who are the Apostles of Christ is not so externally happy, but a lot of poverty and misery, as if we were the worst of men, men appointed to death.

To be a meer sight or gazing-stock to the world, Angels, or men. Some think that the Apostle here hath a reference to the barbarous practice of the Romans, who first exposed and carried about for a sight those persons that were condemned to fight with wild beasts, that by them they might be torn in pieces. You are happy men, saith the Apostle, if you can owne Christ, and profess Christianity, and yet be in such credit and favour with the world, so full, and so rich, and so like Princes, we are those whom God hath honoured to be his Apostles and the first Ministers of the Gospel, our lot and portion is far otherwise.

Marginal references: Or, [illegible: 1 letter]s the [illegible: 1 word] Apostles as; Psal. 44.2[illegible: 1 letter] Rom. 8.36. 2 Cor. 4.11.; Heb. 10.3[illegible: 1 letter]; Gr. Theatr[illegible: 1 letter].