or hearts of men, as hatred of the people of God and desire of their ruin.—Where this prevails, as it did in these persecuting Egyptians, it deprives men of all wisdom and understanding, that they shall do things against all rules of reason and policy, (which commonly they pretend unto,) brutishly and obstinately, though apparently tending unto their own ruin and destruction. So it was with these Egyptians; for although they designed the utter extirpation of the people, that they should be no more