8 When Pilate therefore heard that saying, he was the more afraid;



Ver. 8. He was the more afraid] Christ’s innocence did before triumph in Pilate’s conscience. But now, that he hears that he made himself the Son of God, he was in a mighty maze, "he was afraid," saith the text, of lifting up his hand against God. The greatest men, if not utterly debauched and satanized, cannot but quake at the apprehension of God: and as the worms, when it thunders, wriggle into the corners of the earth; Caligula (that dared his Jove to a duel with that hemistich in Homer, ç ì áíáåéñ ç åãù óå , Either kill me, or I will kill thee), when it thundered, covered his eyes with his cap, running under the bed or any bench hole. (Sueton. in Calig.)