Augustine of Hippo — as excerpted in the Catena Aurea on Mark 13:14-20

“(ubi sup.) But some persons more fitly understand that the calamities themselves are signified by days, as evil days are spoken of in other parts of holy Scripture; for the days themselves are not evil, but what is done in them. The woes themselves therefore are said to be abridged, because through the patience which God gave they felt them less, and then what was great in itself was abridged.”