Hosea 12:10

I have also spoken - I have used every means, and employed every method, to instruct and save you. I have sent prophets, who spake plainly, exhorting, warning, and beseeching you to return to me. They have had Divine visions, which they have declared and interpreted. They have used similitudes, symbols, metaphors, allegories, etc., in order to fix your attention, and bring you back to your duty and interest. And, alas! all is in vain; you have not profited by my condescension.

WHEN THE LORD would win his people Israel from their iniquities, he did not leave a stone unturned, but gave them precept upon precept, line upon line, here a little and there a little. He taught them sometimes with a rod in his hand, when he smote them with sore famine and pestilence, and invasion; at other times he sought to win them with bounties, for he multiplied their corn and their wine and their oil, and he laid no famine upon them.

by . . . the prophets--literally, "upon," that is, My spirit resting on them. I deposited with them My instructions which ought to have brought you to the right way. An aggravation of your guilt, that it was not through ignorance you erred, but in defiance of God and His prophets [CALVIN].

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WHEN THE LORD would win his people Israel from their iniquities, he did not leave a stone unturned, but gave them precept upon precept, line upon line, here a little and there a little. He taught them sometimes with a rod in his hand, when he smote them with sore famine and pestilence, and invasion; at other times he sought to win them with bounties, for he multiplied their corn and their wine and their oil, and he laid no famine upon them. But all the teachings of his providence were unavailing, and whilst his hand was stretched out, still they continued to rebel against the Most High. He hewed them by the prophets. He sent them first one, and then another: the golden mouthed Isaiah was followed by the plaintive Jeremy; while at his heels in quick succession, there followed many far-seeing, thunder-speaking seers. But though prophet followed prophet in quick succession, each of them uttering the burning words of the Most High, yet they would have none of his rebukes, but they hardened their hearts, and went on still in their iniquities. Among the rest of God’s agencies for striking their attention and their conscience, was the use of similitudes. The prophets were accustomed not only to preach, but to be themselves as signs and wonders to the people. For instance, Isaiah named his child, Maher-shalal-hash-baz, that they might know that the judgment of the Lord was hastening upon them; and this child was ordained to be a sign, “for before the child shall have knowledge to cry, my father and my mother, the riches of Damascus and the spoil of Samaria shall be taken away before the king of Assyria.” On another occasion, the lord said unto Isaiah, “Go and loose the sackcloth from off thy loins, and put off thy shoe from thy foot. And he did so, walking naked and barefoot.

I have also spoken by the prophets - Literally, “upon the prophets,” the revelation coming down from heaven upon them. Somewhat like this, is what Ezekiel says, “the hand of the Lord was strong upon me” (Eze 3:14, ...). God declares, in what way He had been their God “from the land of Egypt.” Their ignorance of Him was without excuse, for He had always taught them, although they ever sought the false prophets, and persecuted the true. He taught them continually and in divers ways, if so be any impression might be made upon them. He taught them, either in plain words, or in the “visions” which He “multiplied” to the prophets; or in the “similitudes” or parables, which He taught through their ministry. In the “vision,” God is understood to have represented the things to come, as a picture, to the prophet’s mind, , “whether the picture were presented to his bodily eyes, or impressed on his imagination, and that, either in a dream, or without a dream.” The “similitude,” which God says that He repeatedly, continually, used, seems to have been the parable, as when God compared His people to a vine, Himself to the Lord of the vineyard, or when He directed His prophets to do acts which should shadow forth some truth, as in the marriage of Hosea himself. God had said to Aaron, that He would thus make Himself known by the prophets. “If there be a prophet among you, I, the Lord, will make Myself known unto him in a vision, and will speak unto him in a dream. My servant Moses is not so, who is faithful in all My house. With him will I speak mouth to mouth, even apparently, and not in dark speeches” Num 12:6-8. “The dark speech” in Moses answers to the “similitude” of Hosea; the “vision” and “dream” in Moses are comprehended in “visions,” as used by Hosea. The prophet Joel also says, “your old men shall dream dreams, your young men shall see visions” Joe 2:28. […]