Canticles 3:2-5, 6, 7
I will rise and will go about the city: in the streets and the broad ways I will seek Him Whom my soul loveth: I sought Him, and I found Him not. The watchmen who keep the city found me. Have you seen Him Whom my soul loveth? When I had a little passed by them, I found Him Whom my soul loveth; I held Him, and I will not let Him go till I bring Him into my mother’s house, and into the chamber of her that bore me. I adjure you, O daughters of Jerusalem, by the roes and harts of the fields, that you stir not up, nor wake my beloved till she please. Put me as a seal upon Thy heart, as a seal upon Thy arm; for love is strong as death, jealousy is hard as hell; the lamps thereof are lamps of fire and flames. Many waters cannot quench charity, neither can the floods drown it; if a man shall give all the substance of his house for love, he shall despise it as nothing.
Haydock
Verse 3. City. To prevent fires, &c. God will require the souls of the flock at the hands of his pastors.
Verse 4. Me. She was perhaps dead. Women had separate apartments, to which none but the husband could have access. Gen. xxiv. 28. At the end of the marriage-feast, the bride was conducted to her husband’s house. Matt. xxv. 1. C. — The Jews shall in the end acknowledge Christ, (W.) as the Church desires. M.
Verse 5. I. The bridegroom (C.) speaks as c. ii. 7. (W.) and c. viii. 4. He retires early.
Verse 6. Who. The female companions of the spouse, (C.) or the bridegroom’s friends, (M.) admire her at a distance. C. vi. 9. and viii. 5. C. — The converted Gentiles change the desert of the world into a paradise, by their good works, which ascend like a perfume. S. Greg. They admire their own conversion, and proclaim that we must fight for heaven, (W.) and adore Christ, the God-man; imitating all his virtues, (H.) and preaching his gospel. M.
Verse 7. Bed. Being stationed at the door to prevent any alarm, v. 8. C. — In the Church Christ finds his repose, and daily produces the only heirs of heaven. Ven. Bede. — The angels, saints and pastors watch to defend it against the spirits of darkness. M.