resided chiefly at Jerusalem, and they appear to have seldom preached beyond the bounds of Judea before the destruction of that city. But Paul was specially chosen to propagate Christianity among the heathen. Considering himself as "the minister of Jesus Christ to the Gentiles," he, with the approbation of his brethren, went into all the world, preaching the word every where, and seeking out those places, in preference to others, which had not heard the gospel. "I will not dare to speak of any but those things which Christ hath wrought by me to make the Gentiles obedient by word and deed, through mighty signs and wonders, by the power of the Spirit of God; so that, from Jerusalem and round about unto Illyricum, I have fully preached the gospel of Christ: yea, so have I strived to preach the gospel, not where Christ was named, lest I should build on another man's foundation." *

In the midst of these great labours he composed the letters which have instructed and made wise to salvation so many thousands besides those to whom they were immediately addressed, which have diffused the knowledge of the Gospel far beyond the sphere of his personal exertions, and will continue, along with the other Scriptures, to diffuse it more and more, until, having accomplished all their purposes, they shall be burnt up with the earth and all that is in it.

2. Consider him as a sufferer for the gospel. It behoved him to submit to more than toil and fatigue, privations and hardships, in pursuing the course which he had chosen. At the very commencement of it he "suffered the loss of all things," of every thing which he had formerly coveted and laboured to acquire, and valued at the highest rate, and gloried most in, the love of his friends, the high reputation which he had acquired among his countrymen, the prospects which he had of worldly advancement; and, what was still dearer to his proud and pharisaical heart, that goodly and rich garb of personal righteousness which he had woven and embroidered with infinite care, in which he had so often looked on himself with inward gratulation and complacency, and trusted

Rom. xv. 18-20.

for the approbation of God and men-all, all this he sacrificed cheerfully, threw it at his feet, and trampled on it as so much dirt and refuse, that he might "win Christ and be found in him," clothed with his righteousness; and that he might discharge that high ministry to which he was called of heaven. "I will show him" (said Jesus to Ananias, when he sent him to baptize his new convert), "how great things he must suffer for my name's sake;" as if the only thing to which he had been called was to suffer! And he gave him an early proof of the treatment which he might expect from men in his service for scarcely had he avowed himself a believer in Christianity, and begun to "preach the faith which once he destroyed," when the Jews sought to kill him; and so keen was their search after him, that it was necessary for his new friends to let him down by a basket over the wall of Damascus. From this time forward he was continually exposed to the deadly hatred of his unbelieving countrymen, along with the contempt and rage of the heathen world. Luke has given us some account of the sufferings he endured, and the hairbreadth escapes he made by sea and land, during the period that he accompanied him. They are frequently adverted to by the apostle himself in his writings. But we could have had no idea of their number, variety, and greatness, if he had not been led to specify them in one of his epistles, in answer to certain false teachers who aimed at marring his usefulness by derogating from the proofs of his apostleship. "Are they ministers of Christ? (I speak as a fool) I am more; in labours more abundant, in stripes above measure, in prisons more frequent, in deaths oft. Of the Jews five times received I forty stripes save one. Thrice was I beaten with rods, once was I stoned, thrice I suffered shipwreck, a night and a day have I been in the deep; in journeyings often, in perils of waters, in perils of robbers, in perils by mine own countrymen, in perils by the heathen, in perils in the city, in perils in the wilderness, in perils in the sea, in perils among false brethren; in weariness and painfulness, in watchings often, in hunger and thirst, in fastings often, in cold and nakedness. Besides those things that are without, that which cometh upon me daily, the

care of all the churches." (2 Cor. xi. 23-28.) You will observe, my brethren, that this was written ten years before his death, and that it is but a bare catalogue of the kinds of suffering to which he had been subjected, without mentioning particulars or detailing instances. What a fine opportunity would this have afforded to some persons to gratify, what is called, an innocent vanity, cover their detractors with shame, and awaken the slumbering sympathies of their friends, by entering into a minute detail of some of the most interesting and affecting of the tales of danger and death, by which it would have been easy to fill a letter larger than any in the New Testament! But the apostle hurries rapidly over them. So far from boasting of them, he apologizes for mentioning them, and declares that he "will glory in the things which concern his infirmities." The only one of which he gives any particulars was the most inglorious of his escapes (Verses 32, 33). And he states as the crowning and heaviest article of his distress, the burden which daily pressed upon his mind from (what many would have contrived to make light enough) "the care of all the churches."

3. Consider him as an advanced and experienced Christian. Deeply impressed as he was with the importance of his apostolical office, and assiduous in the discharge of its duties, he did not forget that he had a soul to be saved or lost, as well as the meanest of those to whom he preached. He found time to attend to and watch over this amidst the multiplicity of his public cares and watchings; and hereby left an example to all who should afterwards be intrusted with the gospel. He knew that persons might possess the most splendid and even edifying gifts; and that they might perform the most specious acts of charity and piety, and after all be destitute of saving grace, and strangers to the power of godliness. And he did not neglect to apply this test to his own character: "Though I speak with the tongues of men and of angels, and have not charity, I am become as sounding brass, or a tinkling cymbal. And though I bestow all my goods to feed the poor, and though I give my body to be burned, and have not charity, it profiteth me nothing." (1 Cor. xiii. 1-3.) He

had heard of Judas, and of Ananias and Sapphira, and he did not look upon their attainments as the ne plus ultra of hypocrisy and professional religion. He knew that persons might open the door to others, and usher them into the kingdom of heaven, and yet be themselves shut out; that they might be employed as heralds to proclaim peace to others, and as ambassadors might reconcile them to God, and yet continue to be themselves enemies to him. And knowing these things, he was anxious to prevent such a dreadful issue, and therefore laboured not only that he " might by all means save some" by the gospel, but also that he "might be partaker thereof with them." "I keep under my body," adds he, “and bring it into subjection; lest that by any means, when I have preached to others, I myself should be a castaway."

Though favoured with an immediate revelation from heaven to qualify him for his office, this did not hinder him from searching the scriptures daily, and comparing spiritual things with spiritual, that he might be the more fit for teaching the way of salvation to others; nor did it prevent him from meditating upon these things that he might save himself, applying them to his own soul in the exercise of faith and love, and living under their reviving, purifying, and consolatory influence. What great progress had he made in the Christian life when he presents himself to our view in the first written of his epistles; and yet how dissatisfied with his attainments, and eager in pressing forward! What extensive and deep insight into the Divine law! How abiding his sense of the deceitfulness of sin, the remaining depravity of his own heart, the seductions of the world, the wiles of Satan! How pungent his grief at his non-conformity to the will of God! How ardent his desires to be delivered from it! At the same time, how forcibly did he feel the all-subduing, heart-constraining influence of the love of Christ, which he commended so warmly to others! How transporting his admiration of its incomprehensible dimensions! How firm his reliance on the mercy of God, and the merits of Christ! How triumphant his

* 1 Cor. ix. 23-27.

glorying in the cross of his Saviour! How unspeakably joyful and full of glory his hope of immortality! Ah! my brethren (whatever it may be with some of us), it was no cold notions that he delivered, when he discoursed of the exceeding sinfulness of sin, of the wrath of God which is revealed against it, of the curse of the broken law, of the sting of death, and of the fearful looking for of judgment; of the blindness of the natural man to the things of God, and his aversion to the righteousness of God; of the law in the members, the besetting sin, and the battle between the flesh and the spirit. It was no empty speculation with him when he descanted on the mysteries of redeeming love, on the blessedness of the man who has been pardoned and justified by the faith of Christ, on the life of faith, on the mortification of sin, on crucifixion to the world, on spirituality of mind and heavenliness of conversation, on rejoicing in tribulation and desiring to depart and be with Christ. You must have observed that it is his almost ordinary style to write in the first person, and that he frequently changes from the plural to the singular number. Other writers have had recourse to this method; but how different the effect produced on us by it! pleased with it as a figure, in Paul it strikes in them it is painting, in him it is life. This is the great charm in the style of Paul. I repeat what I said before, he is the most practical and experimental of writers. The truths of the gospel come forth warm from a heart that burned with love to them; the dictates of inspiration are pronounced by one who had previously made them his own, and fed upon them. Who does not perceive the difference between the constrained declarations of the son of Peor, and the productions of those holy men who spake as they were moved by the Holy Ghost," when they discourse of the "sufferings of Christ and the glory that should follow?" The exclamation of Balaam is beautiful, and it would have been pathetic too, did we not perceive the eyes of the wretched prophet riveted, even when he was uttering it, on the wages of unrighteousness: "Let me die the death of the righteous, and let my latter end be as his!" But of the exclamation of Paul on the same subject,

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In them we are us as a reality;