John Trapp on Amos 4:6

Verſe 6. And I have alſo given you cleanneſſe of teeth,] ſo that you need not ſpend time in picking them, as thoſe that are full-fed: for I have cut you ſhort enough, and held you to hard allowance: as thoſe that would tame wild creatures, keep them empty and waking: but you have been, and ſo continue, untamed and untractable, incorrigibly flagitious, uncapable of repentance. Your diſeaſes are complicate, yea they are ſo ingrained, that they are not eaſily ſtirred, much leſſe deſtroyed by any potion I have yet given you. In vain have I ſmitten your children: they received no correction, Jer. 2.30

In all your cities,] One as well as other, leſt you ſhould ſay as thoſe Philiſtines, It was a chance [illegible: 1 word] and as the Rabbines tell us, that the idolatrous prieſts told Jeroboam, 1 Sam. 6.9. that the drying up of his hand fell out meerely by accident.

and want of bread in all your places,] Thus the Scripture oft interpreteth it ſelf, and is ever its own beſt gloſſe. Some think that by want of bread here, is meant dearth of corn; as by cleanneſſe of teeth, ſcarcity of fleſh: and that by all your places, we are to underſtand, all your houſes. This fell out in the times of Elias and Eliſha, 1 King. 17. and 2 King. 6.21. and 8.1. and God would not have it to bee forgotten, but is juſtly angry that they remained ſo irreformable. That dearth in Elias his dayes, laſted above three yeers: and might (likely) be as extreme, as that here in England, (about the yeer 700.) of three yeers continuance: and ſo violent it was, that not onely many died daily for hunger, but great numbers joyning hand in hand, fourty or fifty in a company,Godw. Catal. p. 465. threw themſelves headlong into the Sea. A like three-yeers famine alſo wee read to have been in Bohemia and Polonia, Anno 1312. ſo great, that children devoured their parents, and parents their children: ſome fed upon the dead carcaſſes that hang'd in gibbets,Balth. Exner. Val. Max. 135 &c. Wolves alſo were ſo famiſhed, that they fell upon all they met, and fed upon them.

yet have ye not returned unto me, ſaith the Lord.] Ye have loſt the fruit of your afflictions, and all mine hammers hitherto have but beat cold iron.Perdidiſtis ſructum afflictionis. Aug. The bellows are burnt, the lead is conſumed, the Founder melteth in vain, for the wicked are not plucke away, ſc. from their wickedneſſe: his droſſe is yet with him, his great ſcum ſtill in him. Ezek. 24.6, 12, 13. it is woven into the very texture of his heart, and cannot be ſeparated. Reprobate ſilver ſhall men call him, becauſe he returneth not to God that ſmiteth him, Jer. 6.29, 30. Eſay 9.12, 13.