of the cross, to bear up the weight of the body, and also a place for the feet to rest on. Jeremy Taylor thinks, in support of this view, that the body of a crucified person could not rest only on the four wounds of hands and feet. Bishop Pearson also quotes a passage from Seneca, which seems to favor the idea. — As tD the nails, Nonnus and Gregory Nazianzen say there were only three, and that one was driven through both feet at once. Cy- prian says there were four. — But these are matters about which we really know nothing, and it is useless to guess and speculate about them. Of one thing however we may be very sure. The feet of a crucified person were much nearer the ground than is commonly supposed, and very likely not more than a foot or two from the earth. In this, as in other points, most pictures of the crucifixion are grossly incorrect, and the cross is made out to be a piece of timber so long and so thick that no one mortal man could ever have carried it.
Concerning the precise amount of physical suffering, and the precise effect on the human body in a crucifixion, the following medical account by a German physician, named Richter, quoted in Smith's Dictionary of the Bible, can hardly fail to interest a Bible reader. He says, "(1) The unnatural position and violent tension of the body caused a painful sensation from the least motion. (2) The nails being driven through parts of the hands and feet which are full of nerves and tendons, and yet at a dis- tance from the heart, created the most exquisite anguish. (3) The exposure of so many wounds and lacerations brought on inflammation, which tended to become gangrene, and every mo- ment increased the poignancy of suffering. (4) In the dis- tended parts of the body more blood flowed through the arte- ries than could be carried back into the veins : and hence too much blood found its way from the aorta into the head and stomach, and the blood vessels of the head became pressed and swollen. The general obstruction of circulation caused an in- ternal excitement, exertion, and anxiety, more intolerable than death itself. (5) There was the inexpressible misery of gradu- ally increasing and lingering anguish. (6) To all this we may add burning and raging thirst." (Smith's Dictionary of the Bible : article. Crucifixion.) On the whole subject of the cross, and the sufferings connected with crucifixion, " Lipsius de Cruce " (published in 1595) is a most exhaustive book.
When we remember, beside all this, that our Lord's head was crowned with thorns. His back torn with savage scourging, and His whole system weighed down by the mental and bodily agony of the sleepless night following the Lord's Supper, we may have some faint idea of the intensity of His sufferings.
When we read " they " crucified, we are left to conjecture who it can refer to. It cannot be the Jews, because they could only stand by, and superintend at the most, as the Roman soldiers would certainly not let the punishment be inflicted by any other