form which it soon and naturally assumed, this injunction could have no place. Would a person who lived under a hierarchy, such as the Christian hierarchy became when it had settled into a regular establishment, have thought it necessary to prescribe concerning the qualification of a bishop," that he should be no striker ?" And this injunction would be equally alien from the imagination of the writer, whether he wrote in his own character, or personated that of an apostle.

No. IV.

Chap. v. 23. " Drink no longer water, but use a little wine for thy stomach's sake and thine often infirmities."

Imagine an impostor sitting down to forge an epistle in the name of St. Paul. Is it credible that it should come into his head to give such a direction as this; so remote from every thing of doctrine or discipline, every thing of public concern to the religion or the church, or to any sect, order, or party in it, and from every purpose with which such an epistle could be written? It seems to me that nothing but reality, that is, the real valetudinary situation of a real person, could have suggested a thought of so domestic a nature.

What was the mercy which St. Paul here commemorates, and what was the crime of which he accuses himself, is apparent from the verses immediately preceding: "I thank Christ Jesus our Lord, who hath enabled me, for that he counted me faithful, putting me into the ministry; who was before a blasphemer, and a persecutor, and iniurious: but I obtained mer. cy, because I did it ignorantly in unbelief." (ch. i. 12, 13.) The whole quotation plainly refers to St. Paul's original enmity to the Christian name, the interposition of Provi. dence in his conversion, and his subsequent designation to the ministry of the Gospel; and by this reference affirms indeed the substance of the apostle's history delivered in the Acts. But what in the passage strikes my mind most powerfully, is the observation that is raised out of the fact. "For this cause I obtained mercy, that in me first Jesus Christ might show forth all long-suffering, for a pattern to them which should hereafter believe on him to life everlasting." It is a just and solemn reflection, springing from the circumstances of the author's conversion, or rather from the impression which that great event had left upon his memory. It will be said, perhaps, that an impostor acquainted with St. Paul's history, But if the peculiarity of the advice be obser- may have put such a sentiment into his mouth; vable, the place in which it stands is more so. or, what is the same thing, into a letter drawn The context is this: “Lay hands suddenly on up in his name. But where, we may ask, is no man, neither be partaker of other men's such an impostor to be found? The piety, the sins: keep thyself pure. Drink no longer wa- truth, the benevolence of the thought, ought ter, but use a little wine for thy stomach's sake to protect it from this imputation. For, though and thine often infirmities. Some men's sins we should allow that one of the great masters are open beforehand, going before to judgment; of the ancient tragedy could have given to his and some men they follow after." The direc- scene a sentiment as virtuous and as elevated tion to Timothy about his diet stands between as this is, and at the same time as appropriate, two sentences, as wide from the subject as pos- and as well suited to the particular situation sible. The train of thought seems to be bro- of the person who delivers it; yet whoever is ken to let it in. Now when does this happen? conversant in these inquiries will acknowledge, It happens when a man writes as he remem- that to do this in a fictitious production is bebers; when he puts down an article that oc-yond the reach of the understandings which curs the moment it occurs, lest he should af- have been employed upon any fabrications that terwards forget it. Of this the passage before have come down to us under Christian names. us bears strongly the appearance. In actual letters, in the negligence of real correspondence, examples of this kind frequently take place; seldom, I believe, in any other production. For the moment a man regards what he writes as a composition, which the author of a forgery would, of all others, be the first to do, notions of order, in the arrangement and succession of his thoughts, present themselves to his judgment, and guide his pen.

CHAPTER XII.

THE SECOND EPISTLE TO TIMOTHY.

No. I.

This

IT was the uniform tradition of the primitive church, that St. Paul visited Rome twice, and twice there suffered imprisonment; and No. V. that he was put to death at Rome at the conChap. i. 15, 16. "This is a faithful say-clusion of his second imprisonment. ing, and worthy of all acceptation, that Christ opinion concerning St. Paul's two journeys to Jesus came into the world to save sinners; of Rome is confirmed by a great variety of hints whom I am chief. Howbeit, for this cause I and allusions in the epistle before us, comparobtained mercy, that in me first Jesus Christ ed with what fell from the apostle's pen in might show forth all long-suffering, for a pat- other letters purporting to have been written tern to them which should hereafter believe in from Rome. That our present epistle was him to life everlasting." written whilst St. Paul was a prisoner, is dis

tinctly intimated by the eighth verse of the others; so that Timothy, who is here exhortfirst chapter: "Be not thou therefore ashamed "to come shortly unto him," (ch. iv. 9.) ed of the testimony of our Lord, nor of me his might have arrived, and that Mark," whom prisoner." And whilst he was a prisoner at he was to bring with him," (ch. iv. 11.) might Rome, by the sixteenth and seventeenth ver- have also reached Rome in sufficient time to ses of the same chapter: "The Lord give mer- have been with St. Paul when the four epis cy unto the house of Onesiphorus; for he oft tles were written; but then such a supposi refreshed me, and was not ashamed of my tion is inconsistent with what is said of Dechain: but when he was in Rome he sought mas, by which the posteriority of this to the me out very diligently and found me." Since other epistles is strongly indicated: for in the it appears from the former quotation that St. other epistles Demas was with St. Paul, in the Paul wrote this epistle in confinement, it will present he hath "forsaken him, and is gone hardly admit of doubt that the word chain, to Thessalonica." The opposition also of sen. in the latter quotation, refers to that confine- timent, with respect to the event of the perment; the chain by which he was then bound, secution, is hardly reconcileable to the same the custody in which he was then kept. And imprisonment. if the word "chain" designate the author's confinement at the time of writing the epistle, the next words determine it to have been written from Rome: "He was not ashamed 1. In the twentieth verse of the fourth chapof my chain; but when he was in Rome he ter, St. Paul informs Timothy, "that Erastus sought me out very diligently." Now that it abode at Corinth," Egarros spent & Kozivo. was not written during the apostle's first im- The form of expression implies, that Erastus prisonment at Rome, or during the same im- had staid behind at Corinth, when St. Paul left prisonment in which the epistles to the Ephe-it. But this could not be meant of any journey sians, the Colossians, the Philippians, and from Corinth which St. Paul took prior to his Philemon, were written, may be gathered, first imprisonment at Rome; for when Paul with considerable evidence, from a comparison of these several epistles with the present.

I. In the former epistles the author confidently looked forward to his liberation from confinement, and his speedy departure from Rome. He tells the Philippians (ch. ii. 24.) "I trust in the Lord that I also myself shall come shortly." Philemon he bids to prepare for him a lodging; "for I trust," says he, "that through your prayers I shall be given unto you." (ver. 22.) In the epistle before us he holds a language extremely different: "I am now ready to be offered, and the time of my departure is at hand. I have fought a good | fight, I have finished my course, I have kept the faith: henceforth there is laid up for me a crown of righteousness, which the Lord, the righteous Judge, shall give me at that day." (ch. iv. 6-8.)

The two following considerations, which were first suggested upon this question by Ludevicus Capellus, are still more conclusive.

departed from Corinth, as related in the twentieth chapter of the Acts, Timothy was with him: and this was the last time the apostle left Corinth before his coming to Rome; because he left it to proceed on his way to Jerusalem; soon after his arrival at which place he was taken into custody, and continued in that custody till he was carried to Cæsar's tribunal. There could be no need therefore to inform Timothy that "Erastus staid behind at Corinth" upon this occasion, because if the fact was so, it must have been known to Timothy, who was present, as well as to St. Paul.

2. In the same verse our epistle also states the following article: "Trophimus have I left at Miletum sick." When St. Paul passed through Miletum on his way to Jerusalem, as related Acts xx. Trophimus was not left II. When the former epistles were written behind, but accompanied him to that city. He from Rome, Timothy was with St. Paul; and was indeed the occasion of the uproar at Jeis joined with him in writing to the Colossians, rusalem in consequence of which St. Paul was the Philippians, and to Philemon. The pre-apprehended; for "they had seen," says the sent epistle implies that he was absent. historian, "before with him in the city, TroIII. In the former epistles Demas was with phimus an Ephesian, whom they supposed that St. Paul at Rome: "Luke, the beloved phy-Paul had brought into the temple." This was sician, and Demas, greet you." In the epis-evidently the last time of Paul's being at Mitle now before us: "Demas hath forsaken me, letus before his first imprisonment; for, as having loved this present world, and is gone hath been said, after his apprehension at Jeto Thessalonica." rusalem, he remained in custody till he was sent to Rome.

IV. In the former epistles, Mark was with St. Paul, and joins in saluting the Colossians. In the present epistle, Timothy is ordered to bring him with him, "for he is profitable to me for the ministry." (ch. iv. 11.)

The case of Timothy and of Mark might be very well accounted for, by supposing the present epistle to have been written before the

In these two articles we have a journey referred to, which must have taken place subsequent to the conclusion of St. Luke's history, and of course after St. Paul's liberation from his first imprisonment. The epistle, therefore, which contains this reference, since it appears from other parts of it to have been written

while St. Paul was a prisoner at Rome, proves | is bestowed in the epistle upon one parent, and that he had returned to that city again, and upon her sincerity in the faith, no notice is undergone there a second imprisonment.

taken of the other. The mention of the grandmother is the addition of a circumstance not found in the history; but it is a circumstance which, as well as the names of the parties, might naturally be expected to be known to the apostle, though overlooked by his historian.

No. III.

Chap. iii. 15. "And that from a child thou hast known the Holy Scriptures, which are able to make thee wise unto salvation."

This verse discloses a circumstance which agrees exactly with what is intimated in the quotation from the Acts, adduced in the last number. In that quotation it is recorded of Timothy's mother," that she was a Jewess." This description is virtually, though, I am satisfied, undesignedly, recognised in the epistle, when Timothy is reminded in it, "that from a child he had known the Holy Scriptures."

I do not produce these particulars for the sake of the support which they lend to the testimony of the fathers concerning St. Paul's second imprisonment, but to remark their consistency and agreement with one another. They are all resolvable into one supposition: and although the supposition itself be in some sort only negative, viz. that the epistle was not written during St. Paul's first residence at Rome, but in some future imprisonment in that city; yet is the consistency not less worthy of observation: for the epistle touches upon names and circumstances connected with the date and with the history of the first imprisonment, and mentioned in letters written during that imprisonment, and so touches upon them, as to leave what is said of one consistent with what is said of others, and consistent also with what is said of them in different epistles. Had one of these circumstan-" The Holy Scriptures" undoubtedly_meant ces been so described as to have fixed the date the Scriptures of the Old Testament. The exof the epistle to the first imprisonment, it pression bears that sense in every place in would have involved the rest in contradiction. which it occurs. Those of the New had not And when the number and particularity of the yet acquired the name; not to mention, that articles which have been brought together un-in Timothy's childhood, probably, none of them der this head are considered; and when it is existed. In what manner then could Timothy considered also, that the comparisons we have have known" from a child" the Jewish Scripformed amongst them, were in all probability tures, had he not been born, on one side or on neither provided for, nor thought of, by the both, of Jewish parentage? Perhaps he was writer of the epistle, it will be deemed some- not less likely to be carefully instructed in them, thing very like the effect of truth, that no in- for that his mother alone professed that relivincible repugnancy is perceived between them.gion. No. II.

No. IV.

Chap. ii. 22. "Flee also youthful lusts; but follow righteousness, faith, charity, peace, with them that call on the Lord out of a pure heart."

In the Acts of the Apostles, in the sixteenth chapter, and at the first verse, we are told that Paul "came to Derbe and Lystra, and behold a certain disciple was there named Timotheus, the son of a certain woman which was a Jew- "Flee also youthful lusts." The suitableness ess, and believed; but his father was a Greek." of this precept to the age of the person to whom In the epistle before us, in the first chapter and it is addressed, is gathered from 1 Tim. chap. at the fourth verse, St. Paul writes to Timo-iv. 12: "Let no man despise thy youth." Nor thy thus: "Greatly desiring to see thee, being do I deem the less of this coincidence, because mindful of thy tears, that I may be filled with the propriety resides in a single epithet; or joy, when I call to remembrance the unfeign- because this one precept is joined with, and foled faith that is in thee, which dwelt first in lowed by a train of others, not more applicable thy grandmother Lois, and thy mother Eunice; to Timothy than to any ordinary convert. and I am persuaded that in thee also." Here It is in these transient and cursory allusions we have a fair unforced example of coincidence. that the argument is best founded. When a In the history, Timothy was the "son of a Jew-writer dwells and rests upon a point in which ess that believed:" in the epistle, St. Paul ap- some coincidence is discerned, it may be doubtplauds "the faith which dwelt in his mothered whether he himself had not fabricated the Eunice." In the history it is said of the mo- conformity, and was endeavouring to display ther," that she was a Jewess, and believed:" and set it off. But when the reference is conof the father," that he was a Greek." Now tained in a single word, unobserved perhaps when it is said of the mother alone" that she by most readers, the writer passing on to other believed," the father being nevertheless men-subjects, as unconscious that he had hit upon tioned in the same sentence, we are led to sup- a correspondency, or unsolicitous whether it pose of the father that he did not believe, i. e. were remarked or not, we may be pretty well either that he was dead, or that he remained assured that no fraud was exercised, no impounconverted. Agreeably hereunto, whilst praise sition intended.

in the quotation from the epistle Lystra is No. V. mentioned, and not Derbe. And the distincChap. iii. 10, 11. "But thou hast fully tion will appear on this occasion to be accuknown my doctrine, manner of life, purpose, rate; for St. Paul is here enumerating his perfaith, long-suffering, charity, patience, perse-secutions: and although he underwent grievcutions, afflictions, which came unto me at ous persecutions in each of the three cities Antioch, at Iconium, at Lystra; what perse- through which he passed to Derbe, at Derbe cutions I endured; but out of them all the itself he met with none: 66 The next day he departed," says the historian, "to Derbe; The Antioch here mentioned was not An- and when they had preached the Gospel to that tioch the capital of Syria, where Paul and Bar-city, and had taught many, they returned again nabas resided "a long time;" but Antioch to Lystra." The epistle, therefore, in the in Pisidia, to which place Paul and Barnabas names of the cities, in the order in which they came in their first apostolic progress, and are enumerated, and in the place at which where Paul delivered a memorable discourse, the enumeration stops, corresponds exactly which is preserved in the thirteenth chapter with the history.

Lord delivered me."

of the Acts. At this Antioch the history re- But a second question remains, namely, how lates, that the "Jews stirred up the devout these persecutions were "known" to Timoand honourable women, and the chief men of thy, or why the apostle should recall these in the city, and raised persecution against Paul particular to his remembrance, rather than and Barnabas, and expelled them out of their many other persecutions with which his micoasts. But they shook off the dust of their nistry had been attended. When some time, feet against them, and came into Iconium....probably three years, afterwards (vide PearAnd it came to pass in Iconium, that they went son's Annales Paulinas,) St. Paul made a seboth together into the synagogue of the Jews, cond journey through the same country, "in and so spake, that a great multitude both of order to go again and visit the brethren in the Jews and also of the Greeks believed; but every city where he had preached the word of the unbelieving Jews stirred up the Gentiles, the Lord," we read, Acts, chap. xvi. 1. that, and made their minds evil-affected against the" when he came to Derbe and Lystra, behold brethren. Long time therefore abode they a certain disciple was there named Timothespeaking boldly in the Lord, which gave tes- us." One or other, therefore, of these cities, timony unto the word of his grace, and grant- was the place of Timothy's abode. We read ed signs and wonders to be done by their hands. moreover that he was well reported of by the But the multitude of the city was divided; brethren that were at Lystra and Iconium; and part held with the Jews, and part with so that he must have been well acquainted with the apostles. And when there was an assault these places. Also again, when Paul came to made both of the Gentiles and also of the Jews, Derbe and Lystra, Timothy was already a diswith their rulers, to use them despitefully and ciple: "Behold, a certain disciple was there to stone them, they were aware of it, and fled named Timotheus." He must therefore have unto Lystra and Derbe, cities of Lycaonia, and been converted before. But since it is exunto the region that lieth round about, and pressly stated in the epistle, that Timothy was there they preached the Gospel.... And there converted by St. Paul himself, that he was came thither certain Jews from Antioch and "his own son in the faith;" it follows that he Iconium, who persuaded the people, and hav-must have been converted by him upon his ing stoned Paul, drew him out of the city, supposing he had been dead. Howbeit, as the disciples stood round about him, he rose up and came into the city: and the next day he departed with Barnabas to Derbe: and when they had preached the Gospel to that city, and had taught many, they returned again to Lystra, and to Iconium, and to Antioch." This account comprises the period to which the allusion in the epistle is to be referred. We have so far therefore a conformity between the history and the epistle, that St. Paul is asserted in the history to have suffered persecutions in the three cities, his persecutions at which are appealed to in the epistle; and not only so, but to have suffered these persecutions both in immediate succession, and in the order in which the cities are mentioned in the epistle. The conformity also extends to another circumstance. In the apostolic history, Lystra and Derbe are commonly mentioned together:

former journey into those parts; which was the very time when the apostle underwent the persecutions referred to in the epistle. Upon the whole, then, persecutions at the several cities named in the epistle are expressly recorded in the Acts: and Timothy's knowledge of this part of St. Paul's history, which knowledge is appealed to in the epistle, is fairly deduced from the place of his abode, and the time of his conversion. It may farther be observed, that it is probable from this account, that St. Paul was in the midst of those perse. cutions when Timothy became known to him. No wonder then that the apostle, though in a letter written long afterwards, should remind his favourite convert of those scenes of affliction and distress under which they first met.

Although this coincidence, as to the names of the cities, be more specific and direct than many which we have pointed out, yet I apprehend there is no just reason for thinking

the author,) one point is plain, namely, if the epistle had been forged, and the author had inserted a quotation in it merely from having seen an example of the same kind in a speech ascribed to St. Paul, he would so far have imitated his original, as to have introduced his quo

it to be artificial: for had the writer of the character, which the future state of morals epistle sought a coincidence with the history among them verified: whatever was the reaupon this head, and searched the Acts of the son (and any of these reasons will account for Apostles for the purpose, I conceive he would the variation, supposing St. Paul to have been have sent us at once to Philippi and Thessalonica, where Paul suffered persecution, and where, from what is stated, it may easily be gathered that Timothy accompanied him, rather than have appealed to persecutions as known to Timothy, in the account of which persecutions Timothy's presence is not mentation in the same manner; that is, he would tioned; it not being till after one entire chapter, and in the history of a journey three years future to this, that Timothy's name occurs in the Acts of the Apostles for the first time.

CHAPTER XIII.

THE EPISTLE TO TITUS.

No. I.

A VERY characteristic circumstance in this epistle, is the quotation from Epimenides, chap. i. 12: "One of themselves, even a prophet of their own, said, The Cretans are alway liars, evil beasts, slow bellies."

Κρητες αεί ψευσται, κακα θηρία, γαστέρες αρχαι.

have given to Epimenides the title which he saw there given to Aratus. The other side of the alternative is, that the history took the hint from the epistle. But that the author of the Acts of the Apostles had not the Epistle to Titus before him, at least that he did not use it as one of the documents or materials of his narrative, is rendered nearly certain by the observation, that the name of Titus does not once occur in his book.

It is well known, and was remarked by St. Jerome, that the apophthegm in the fifteenth chapter of the Corinthians, "Evil communications corrupt good manners," is an Iambic of Menander's:

Φθείρουσιν ήθη χρησθ ̓ ὁμιλίαι κακαι·

Here we have another unaffected instance

of the same turn and habit of composition... Probably there are some hitherto unnoticed; and more, which the loss of the original authors renders impossible to be now ascertained.

No. II.

I call this quotation characteristic, because no writer in the New Testament, except St. Paul, appealed to heathen testimony; and because St. Paul repeatedly did so. In his celebrated speech at Athens, preserved in the seventeenth chapter of the Acts, he tells his audience, that "in God we live, and move, and have our being; as certain also of your own poets have said, For we are also his off-sons left by the writer to preside in their resspring."

There exists a visible affinity between the Epistle to Titus and the First Epistle to Timothy. Both letters were addressed to per

pective churches during his absence. Both letters are principally occupied in describing the qualifications to be sought for, in those whom they should appoint to offices in the church; The reader will perceive much similarity of and the ingredients of this description are in manner in these two passages. The reference both letters nearly the same. Timothy and in the speech is to a heathen poet; it is the Titus are likewise cautioned against the same same in the epistle. In the speech, the apos- prevailing corruptions, and in particular, atle urges his hearers with the authority of against the same misdirection of their cares and poet of their own; in the epistle he avails him- studies. This affinity obtains, not only in the self of the same advantage. Yet there is a va- subject of the letters, which from the similaririation, which shows that the hint of inserting ty of situation in the persons to whom they a quotation in the epistle was not, as it may were addressed, might be expected to be somebe expected, borrowed from seeing the like practice attributed to St. Paul in the history; and it is this, that in the epistle the author cited is called a prophet, “one of themselves, even a prophet of their own." Whatever might be the reason for calling Epimenides a prophet: "Unto Timothy, my own son in the faith: whether the names of poet and prophet were Grace, mercy, and peace, from God our Father occasionally convertible; whether Epimenides and Jesus Christ our Lord. As I besought thes in particular had obtained that title, as Gro- to abide still at Ephesus, when I went into Matius seems to have proved; or whether the cedonia," &c. 1 Tim. chap. i. 2, 3.

what alike, but extends, in a great variety of instances, to the phrases and expressions. The writer accosts his two friends with the same salutation, and passes on to the business of his letter by the same transition.

appellation was given to him, in this instance, "To Titus, mine own son after the common as having delivered a description of the Cretan faith: Grace, mercy, and peace, from God the