"And when Felix heard these things, having more perfect knowledge of that way, he deferred them, and said, When Lysias the chief captain shall come down, I will know the uttermost of your matter. And he commanded a centurion to keep Paul, and to let him have liberty, and that he should forbid none of his acquaintance to minister or come unto him." Felix, living at Cæsarea, where Cornelius, a Roman centurion, had been so wonderfully converted, and where Philip the deacon, and many other Christians resided, must have heard a good deal about the doctrines of "that way" of worshipping the Lord; and he had certainly found, that the Christians were better subjects, and altogether better men, than the Jews. He would not therefore be inclined to condemn St. Paul _because_ he was a Christian; and, listening carefully to the accusations and defence just made before him, he saw at once that the prisoner had not committed any crime whatever, and that the whole affair arose from the hatred, which the Jews bore to the followers of Jesus Christ. Instead, however, of boldly pronouncing sentence one way or the other, he tried to pacify the Jews by putting off the trial till Claudius Lysias, whom they had accused of illegal violence, could come down; and mean time he entrusted St. Paul to the care of a centurion, with orders not to treat him as a prisoner. It must have been a bitter disappointment to the Jews, to see the man whom they persecuted thus kindly treated. We may also see the protecting hand of God overruling these events. Had St. Paul been set at liberty, the Jews would doubtless have tried to take his life; but under the watchful care of the centurion, he was safe from their malice. Whether Claudius Lysias ever did come down to Cæsarea, we are not told; but it is quite clear that St. Paul was neither declared guilty of any offence deserving punishment, nor set at liberty, which, as an innocent man, he ought to have been.