Thus when it is said,[208] _If ye had Faith as a grain of Mustard-seed, ye might say unto this Sycamine Tree, Be thou plucked up by the roots, and be thou placed in the Sea, and it should obey you_: it might be more significantly spoken of this Sycamore; this being described to be _Arbor vasta_, a large and well rooted Tree, whose removal was more difficult than many others. And so the instance in that Text, is very properly made in the Sycamore Tree, one of the largest and less removable Trees among them. A Tree so lasting and well rooted, that the Sycamore which _Zacheus_ ascended, is still shewn in _Judæa_ unto Travellers; as also the hollow Sycamore at _Maturæa_ in _Ægypt_, where the blessed Virgin is said to have remained: which though it relisheth of the Legend, yet it plainly declareth what opinion they had of the lasting condition of that Tree, to countenance the Tradition; for which they might not be without some experience, since the learned describer of the _Pyramides_[209] observeth, that the old Ægyptians made Coffins of this Wood, which he found yet fresh and undecayed among divers of their Mummies.
And thus, also, when _Zacheus_ climbed up into a Sycamore above any other Tree, this being a large and fair one, it cannot be denied that he made choice of a proper and advantageous Tree to look down upon our Saviour.
[Sidenote: _Increase of Seed 100. fold in_ Matt. 13. 23.]
31. Whether the expression of our Saviour in the Parable of the Sower, and the increase of the Seed _unto thirty, sixty and a hundred fold_, had any reference unto the ages of Believers, and measures of their Faith, as Children, Young and Old Persons, as to beginners, well advanced and strongly confirmed Christians, as learned men have hinted; or whether in this progressional assent there were any latent Mysteries, as the mystical Interpreters of Numbers may apprehend, I pretend not to determine.
But, how this multiplication may well be conceived, and in what way apprehended, and that this centesimal increase is not naturally strange, you that are no stranger in Agriculture, old and new, are not like to make great doubt.
That every Grain should produce an Ear affording an hundred Grains, is not like to be their conjecture who behold the growth of Corn in our Fields, wherein a common Grain doth produce far less in number. For barley consisting but of two _Versus_ or Rows, seldom exceedeth twenty Grains, that is, ten upon each Στοῖχος, or Row; Rye, of a square figure, is very fruitfull at forty: Wheat, besides the _Frit_ and _Uruncus_, or imperfect Grains of the small Husks at the top and bottom of the Ear, is fruitfull at ten treble _Glumæ_ or Husks in a Row, each containing but three Grains in breadth, if the middle Grain arriveth at all to perfection; and so maketh up threescore Grains in both sides.