Proverbs 31:29

Many daughters have done virtuously - This is undoubtedly the speech of the husband, giving testimony to the excellence of his wife: "Her husband also, and he praiseth her, saying, 'many daughters,' women, 'have done virtuously,' with due propriety as wives, mistresses, and mothers; 'but Thou,' my incomparable wife, 'excellent them all;' ואת עלית על כלנה veath alith al cullanah, but Thou hast ascended above the whole of them - thou hast carried every duty, every virtue, and every qualification and excellency, to a higher perfection, than any of whom we have ever read or heard." And let the reader seriously consider the above particulars, as specified under the different heads and subdivisions; and he will be probably of the same mind. But high as the character of this Jewish matron stands in the preceding description, I can say that I have met at least her equal, in a daughter of the Rev. Dr. Samuel Annesly, the wife of Samuel Wesley, sen., rector of Epworth in Lincolnshire, and mother of the late extraordinary brothers, John and Charles Wesley. I am constrained to add this testimony, after having traced her from her birth to her death, through all the relations that a woman can bear upon earth. Her Christianity gave to her virtues and excellences a heightening, which the Jewish matron could not possess. Besides, she was a woman of great learning and information, and of a depth of mind, and reach of thought, seldom to be found among the daughters of Eve, and not often among the sons of Adam.

The words of praise which the husband Proverbs 31:28 is supposed to have addressed to the ideal wife.

Virtuously - The Hebrew word has primarily (like "virtus") the idea of "strength," but is used with various shades of meaning. Here (as in Proverbs 12:4; Ruth 3:11) the strength is that of character stedfast in goodness. In other passages (e. g., Genesis 34:29; Psalm 49:10) it has the sense of "riches," and is so taken here by the Septuagint and Vulgate, see also the marginal rendering.