Matthew Poole and continuators on Mark 13:8

8 For nation shall rise against nation, and kingdom against kingdom, and there shall be earthquakes in divers places, and there shall be famines, and troubles: These are the beginnings of sorrows.

Matthew adds Pestilences. Luke saith▪ Pestilences, and fearfull sights, and great Signs from Heaven. See the Notes on Matth. 24.6.7.8. Here are two or three more Signs put together! Wars and rumours of Wars, great commotions in Nations, which tho they may be at other times, yet probably may be more extraordinary before the Day of Judgment. 2. Famines, Pestilences and Earthquakes. 3. Fearful Sights and Apparitions in the Air, and the Heavens. Such there were (as Iosephus tells us) before the Destruction of Ierusalem; and tho these things be seen before the last day, yet it is most probable they will be greater before the day of Judgment, than at any time before; and for fearful sights, and great Signs from Heaven, they ordinarily go before some great Judgment of God upon places, and therefore the observation of them by the Heathen, (as we learn by Livy and others) seems but to be a piece of natural Religion, and Christ giving these things as Signs of the approaching ruine, first of Jerusalem, then of the World, will make thinking Christians behold the[illegible: 1 letter] with a Relig[illegible: 1 letter]ous fear, tho not to undertake to expound them particularly or Prophecy upon them. Certainly we ought to look upon them, as prognosticating some great work of God, and usually of Judgment upon Sinners.

Marginal references: Or▪ pains of a woman in travel.