34 The Rev. J. Hamilton on the Funic Passage in Plautus, 



The Punic Phraseology of the Part respecting the Recovery collated with 



Scripture. 



The word rite, Punic cun, is one of great significance. It is a term of tute- 

 lary worship, and, though not formally included in the invocation, forms the link 

 awA. junctura between it and the body of Hanno's prayer; which, in this respect, 

 reminds us of the invocation of the tutelary deities, in the 2nd Book of the 

 iEneid, " Ut rite secundarent," &c. ; and the still more solemn address to them 

 in the Carmen Seculare, what may be considered the subject of Hanno's prayer 

 family increase, and restauration. Rite* — tuere matres — prodiicas sobolem — 

 prosperes decreta super jugandis — Romul(S genti date remque prolemque, Sfc. 



In praying for this reparation and family increase and prosperity, and 

 expressing hope in, and only in, the divine tutelary favour conciliated by pious 

 worship, the language of the 127th Psalm has a remarkable agreement with 

 that of the Carmen ; but particularly in an expression which seems to be 

 in sense, and in the Chaldee version in sound, the same with the word cun, the 

 Punic equivalent of rite. An expression which, however, from mistake as to the 

 sense, has occasioned much obscurity to readers and trouble to commentators on 

 the Psalms. 



" It is but lost labour that ye rise up early and so late take rest, (/or) so he 

 giveth his beloved sleep." The illative particle yor implies, that the conclusion 

 follows from the premises, whereas the apparent inconclusiveness is felt by the 

 generality of readers as a non sequitur. The truth is, the illative for is not in 

 the original, and the right way of dividing and reading the passage is, in 

 place of including that clause in the same verse with the preceding, to make 

 it the beginning of the following verse : — " Duly, fitly, he giveth to his 

 beloved" the desiderated blessing. (As a gift that cometh from the tutelary God, 

 and conferred on his faithful people as a reward.) This is the rendering of the 

 Chaldee version for the word which other versions render so, the Hebrew p = 

 recte, bene = rite ; but, according to the Chaldee rendering, convenienter, and 

 .in phonetic power, (according to the dialect of that version) cun,f pronounced 



* Rile joined v/ith prosperes and with secundarent, as the Punic, cun ^-VS, with ffoiy ythmu. 

 ■f The drift of the lesson inculcated in the Psalm is that human industry ' ' may plant," and human 



