How

culous in whatever was presented to them. Hence their craving after "wisdom," that is, after intellectual speculation. They were unable to fight with swords any longer, and so their restless energies found vent in wars of words. unfavourable it all seemed for the lasting prosperity of the Word of Grace, seeing that it demands earnestness, simplicity, humility of mind!

There was also a Roman* element in the population. Julius Cæsar had colonized the city with freedmen of Rome, who had been either slaves or sons of slaves. The Roman element, therefore, was not aristocratic, but democratic, and this may partly account for the want of subordination reproved by St. Paul continually, and for the parties into which the Church was divided. Lastly, there were, as in every great city, multitudes of Jews. Throughout the Epistle the Apostle assumes his readers' acquaintance with the Old Testament.

According to his invariable custom, he began his preaching amongst his own countrymen the Jews (Acts xviii. 4). At first, apparently, he was cautious in his dealing, that he might avoid opposition at the outset, and gain time to establish his footing. But when he found himself strengthened by the arrival of his two friends, Silas and Timothy, he boldly proclaimed that Jesus was Christ. A fierce opposition immediately rose; but he stood his ground. He determined to remain in this great centre, and thereby send the rays of life and knowledge around. Merchants who were ever coming and going might hear the Word, and carry it far and wide. Nevertheless, the Apostle left the synagogue, and set up, as it were, a rival synagogue close by. The Jews made a violent attempt to crush him, which was defeated by the cool indifference of the proconsul Gallio, a brother of Seneca; and that the Apostle had by this time a strong following appears from the fact that the Greeks actually seized the ruler of the synagogue,† probably out of scorn for the Jews, and beat him with impunity before Gallio. The Apostle had triumphed; "he remained there yet a good while;" and when he departed, he left the largest and noblest Church which he had yet founded.

What had been the preaching which produced this blessed result? Not dazzling rhetoric, or subtle logic-the Greeks had heard plenty of such; but a plain statement of facts, brought home to men's hearts by the earnestness of the preacher, attesting his own belief in them. It was natural that the glad tidings should be first received, not by the wise and the wealthy, but by the simple and unlearned.‡

When St. Paul left Corinth he came to Ephesus, and remained three years. It would seem that here, as at Corinth, he had resolved not to go up and down, but to plant his foot firmly on one spot, and make it a centre of life. Towards the end of his stay he received disquieting reports concerning the moral and spiritual state of the Corinthian Church. Various disorders had sprung up, now that his eye was not upon it, nor his firm hand guiding it. First, divisions had shown themselves, and from one cause or another the Corinthian believers had become a good deal alienated from St. Paul. Apollos

*Stanley points out what a number of Roman names occur in the Epistle: Gaius, Quartus, Fortunatus, Achaicus, Crispus, Justus.

Whether the ruler is the same Sosthenes who is afterwards mentioned as a brother by St. Paul, is uncertain. If he was, he was probably converted during the six months which followed.

1 Cor. i. 26.

had been there; and although he had endeavoured in perfect good faith to carry on the Apostle's work, yet some of them, with that continual tendency towards party feeling which characterized them, had hastened to call themselves Apollos' party. Though no doubt very inferior to St. Paul, yet Apollos was a very" eloquent man" (Acts xviii. 24), whereas the Apostle had determined to speak with the greatest possible simplicity, and without any ornament of diction (1 Cor. ii. 1-4).

Again, there were Jewish Christians, probably not numerous, but very active, who had begun with lording it over the Gentiles, as having had the Gospel first preached in their synagogue; St. Paul, not having seen Christ in the flesh, was inferior to the twelve. They called themselves Cephas' party. Some had ostentatiously proclaimed themselves above party altogether: they were Christ's. The boast was made in the very spirit of schism; consequently they became a party of their own.* Secondly, moral evils had sprung up among the Gentile Christians, those probably who called themselves "Paul's party." They boasted of their Christian liberty, and turned it into an excuse for licentious life; they attended heathen temples, carried on Divine worship indecorously, and turned the Lord's Supper itself into a disorderly banquet. So far had licentiousness been carried, that one man, to the scandal even of the unbelievers, had married his father's widow (v. 1). Lastly, to complete the picture of disorders and confusions, their intellectual conceit had caused them to stumble at the doctrine of the resurrection of the dead. They had a Greek contempt for the body; it was a dungeon, a prison-house. They were too spiritual, forsooth! St. Paul treats it as a denial of immortality, showing them that their pseudospiritual notions had ended with depriving them of that hope which the heathens themselves cherished.

A letter which came from Corinth at this very time to the Apostle, to make inquiries concerning certain questions of teaching and discipline, gave him the opportunity which he desired. He gave a detailed answer, but, before doing so, strongly expressed his indignation and sorrow at the sins into which the Corinthian Church had fallen. There is no writing of St. Paul so carefully and systematically arranged; we are able to trace each step of the argument. Beginning with the usual salutation, he first, according to his custom (such is his courtesy and wisdom), notices the grounds which he has for thankfulness on their account. What he can praise he does cheerfully and fully. He then with gentle but firm hand touches each of their sores; their separatist spirit, and seeking of their own glory (i. 10-iv.), and the intercourse with heathens, resulting in law-disputes and vicious life (v., vi.). Whilst answering the questions contained in their letter concerning marriage (vii.), heathen festivals (viii.-x.), and public worship (xi.-xiv.), he takes the opportunity of setting up the true idea of the Church as the body of Christ, not an aggregation of units, each seeking its own, but one harmonious whole; each part helping every other, the lowest being as necessary as the highest, and attaining its true dignity when it knows itself as a member of that body which has Christ for its head. They had made much of gifts; he shows unto them" a more excellent way," and sings his noble hymn of love (xiii.). Then we have the sublime chapter which is read in our Service for the Burial of the Dead.

*It was something like the silly assumption of a small sect of our own day, who call themselves "Bible Christians," as if every good Christian were not a Bible Christian.

I have already said that the Epistle was written toward the end of the stay at Ephesus. May we conjecture that it was in hand when the riot of Demetrius broke out (Acts xix.), and that ch. xv. 32 is a reference to that outbreak? Whether the word "beasts" be literal or metaphorical of fierce men, there seems no period in the Apostle's stay in which the event is so likely to have occurred as during the riot.

SOON after St. Paul had sent Titus to Corinth with the First Epistle, he left Ephesus. The trouble which the riot occasioned him was increased tenfold by his sorrow and anxiety for his loved Corinthian Church. He describes, in his Second Epistle, the gloom and misery which surrounded him (i. 8, ii. 12, 13). He came to Troas in hopes of meeting Titus with news. Not finding him, and unable to work, because he "had no rest in his spirit," he determined to go into Macedonia, in hopes of meeting him the sooner (see 2 Cor. vii. 5). At last Titus came. The news was partly satisfactory, but not entirely. The most scandalous of the evils had been removed, and Titus had been well received. But the Jewish party had continued their work of division, and had now gone so far as openly to impugn St. Paul's authority and Apostleship.

The Second Epistle, in consequence, has two main objects in view. The one is to express his joy and thankfulness for the improvement which Titus reports; the other his indignation against those who had impugned his teaching, and even his honesty. It has already been said that the First Epistle is the most systematically arranged of all the great Apostle's writings-the present is the least so. It is written in a state of vehement emotion: love, indignation, thankfulness are all there, one colouring the other; sometimes all these emotions together seem striving for the mastery. Often sentences are left unfinished, and long parentheses occur, one within another. But these very characteristics make this Epistle one of the most precious portions of God's Word. The intense and unceasing love towards God and man, which made the great Apostle yearn after blessings for the whole human race, as ordinary men sometimes do for the few whom nature impels them to love; his tender sympathy for the weak and erring, which caused him to groan under their faults as if they were his own; his unsparing indignation against those who would lead them astray from Christ; the brave and noble spirit which, though he was the meekest and most humble of men, yet did not shrink from jealously and

strenuously asserting his authority and his unselfishness, because he was not fighting his own cause, but that of his dear Master, Christ, in comparison with Whom all things were absolutely nothing to him ;- all this is to be seen in the vehement outpourings of this impassioned Epistle.

It is impossible to make a systematic division of it, for one idea is continually running into the other. There are three subjects mainly dealt with:

I. The Apostle's account of the anxiety he felt with regard to them after his First Epistle was sent, and before he heard of the effect it had wrought

II. Directions about the collections for the poor at Jerusalem
III. Defence of his Apostolical authority

The Epistles from this Book are—

I.-VII. VIII., IX.

X.-End.

vi. 1-10

xi. 19-31

Twelfth Sunday after Trinity.
St. Matthew.

First Sunday in Lent.
Sexagesima.

The later history of the Church of Corinth shows that, by God's blessing, the Apostle's labours brought forth rich and abundant fruit. Clement of Rome wrote a letter to the Corinthians; and whilst he also reproves evils, he speaks of a flourishing Church. Later still, Quadratus, in the middle of the second century, presided over it, and found in the faith and love of his flock a proof that their fathers had not received the grace of God in vain.

THE EPISTLE TO THE ROMANS.

THIS Epistle is placed first in order, probably because of the imperial dignity of the city of Rome, at that time the capital of the world. But the Epistle also merits its place on account of the importance of the subjects handled in it. It is St. Paul's great statement of Christian doctrine.

It was written from Corinth, A.D. 58, during St. Paul's wintering there (Acts xx. 3). He had never yet visited Rome when he wrote. Many of those whom he salutes in ch. xvi. were probably persons of whose faith he had heard, though he had never seen them. Some, on the other hand, there may have been who were visitors to the metropolis, and not strangers to the Apostle.

The origin of the Church of Rome is wrapt in obscurity; but we are told that its faith was spoken of in all the world at the time when the Epistle was written (i. 8). That it was not founded by an Apostle appears from these two facts taken together: first, he desires to come to Rome (ch. xv. 20); secondly, he made it a rule to himself never to intrude into another Apostle's work (2 Cor. x. 16). Nowhere in the Acts is there any mention of an Apostle visiting Rome before St. Paul (xxvii.). It is most reasonable to suppose that some of those converted at Pentecost (see Acts ii. 10) carried back the glad

tidings to their brethren the Jews, from whom they passed to the heathen. There was a vast multitude of Jews at Rome (Jos. Ant. xviii. 11, §1). Pompey brought a great number there as slaves; but being almost useless as such, owing to their determined adherence to their old customs, they had obtained their freedom. They attracted much attention. There are repeated allusions to them in Roman writers (Juvenal, Horace, Ovid). By most they were treated with ridicule, but not by all; for many, weary of infidelity, and unable any longer to maintain their old mythologies, had become proselytes. These proselytes were always the best recipients of Christian preaching; they brought to the hearing of it deep reverence for God and the Old Testament, without that narrowness and pride which made the Jews so hostile. Thus it was in the cases of Cornelius and Sergius Paulus, and thus the good providence of God prepared the soil for the planting of the Roman Church. No person stands forward prominently as the founder of it; it grew up silently. How, then, are we to account for the fact that some years later, when St. Paul arrived at Rome, the Jews professed entire ignorance of the faith (Acts xxviii. 22)? Some have supposed that they were only pretending ignorance; but this is unsatisfactory. We know that Claudius had expelled all Jews from Rome, and that the Roman law as yet knew no distinction between Jews and Jewish Christians (Acts xviii. 2). But when the edict of Claudius came to be forgotten, or ceased to be enforced, and the Jews began to return one by one, there was no longer that bond of union between Jews and Christians which there had been, and they became ignorant of one another. (There are other cases of a like kind in early Church History). Henceforth, then, Christianity, though it had arisen among Jews, was now separate from them, and drew its converts from among the heathen. Thus it is that there are no warnings against Judaizing errors in the Epistle, as there are in those to the Galatians and Colossians. Indeed, the Epistle is not controversial at all. It is a calm treatise, a scientific exposition of Christian truth, fitly addressed to the Church of the chief city in the world. This Epistle has exerted a mighty influence in the Church in all ages. St. Paul, from his own experience, draws forth the relation of the Law to the Gospel. He had tried by the help of the one to establish a righteousness of his own; how it had fared with him in consequence he tells us here. But God had shown him a more excellent way, the way of Grace, of Righteousness: not through the works of the Law, but through faith in Christ Jesus. The experience of one who has tried St. Paul's method will always prove the best expositor of this Epistle.

The influence of this Epistle has been greatest in the Western Church; the Eastern has clung more to St. John. For it was in the East that the great doctrines concerning the Nature of God, and of Christ, were put into form; the first Creeds were drawn up there. It was in the Western Church that questions concerning Man arose, his free will, his fall, the means of his restoration, and of his acceptance before God. When these questions came before the Western Church, it was in this Epistle that the answers were found, the doctrine of man's sin and God's grace. Hither came Augustine again and again when disputing with Pelagius; here Luther found his weapons when he fought so earnestly for the doctrine of Justification by Faith.

The following very slight summary is offered in the hope that some may find it a guide to an intelligent study of this great Epistle :