136 HORiE PAULm^E. 



of tlift Acts, we are informed that Paul, after liis arrival ai 

 Rome, was suffered to dwell by himself with a soldier that 

 kept him. Dr. Lardner has shown that this mode of custody 

 was in use among the Romans, and that whenever it was 

 adopted, the prisoner was bound to the soldier by a single 

 chain : in reference to which St. Paul, in the twentieth 

 verse of this chapter, tells the Jews whom he had assem 

 bled, " For this cSuse therefore have I called for you, to see 

 you, and to speak with you, because that for the hope oi 

 Israel I am bound icithtlds cliaiji^' rijv a7a}Giv TavTrjvnepliianai. 

 It is in exact conformity therefore with the truth of St. Paul's 

 Eituation at the time, that he declares of himself in the epis- 

 tle, Ttpec^evu h akvoEc. And the exactness is the more remark- 

 able, as ulvcLg — a chain — is nowhere used in the singulai 

 number to express any other kind of custody. When the 

 prisoner's hands or feet were bound together, the word was 

 <5ea/zdi, bonds, as in the twenty-sixth chapter of the Acts, 

 where Paul replies to Agrippa, " I would to God that not 

 only thou, but also all that hear me this day, were both 

 almost, and altogether such as I am, except these bonds,'' 

 napEKToc ro)v deofiuv tovtuv. "When the prisoner was confined 

 oetween two soldiers, as in the case of Peter, Acts 12:6, 

 two chains were employed ; and it is said upon his miracu- 

 lous deliverance, that the " chains" — &?iVGeLg, in the plural — 

 *' fell from his hands." Aecfibg the noun, and didenat the verb, 

 being general terms, were applicable to this in common with 

 any other species of personal coercion ; but alvacg, in the sin- 

 gular number, to none but this. 



If it can be suspected that the Avriter of the present 

 epistle, who in no other particular appears to have availed 

 himself of the information concerning St. Paul delivered in 

 the Acts, had in this verse borrowed the word which he 

 read in that book, and had adapted his expression to what 

 he found there recorded of St. Paul's treatment at Rome ; 

 m short, that the coincidence here noted was effected by 

 craft and design — I think it a strong reply to remark, that 



