and "did despite to the spirit of grace." So, both in the eastern and western parts, which is that "to sin" thus "wilfully after they had re- not inconsistent with the time he had after his deceived the knowledge of the truth, there" could parture from Rome. But of the latter we have "remain" for them "no more sacrifice for sins;" better evidence. Sure I am, an author beyond nothing but a certain fearful looking for of judg- all exception, St. Paul's contemporary and fellowment and fiery indignation which should devour" laborer, I mean Clemens, in his famous epistle to these "adversaries." And "a fearful thing it the Corinthians, expressly tells us, that being a was," in such circumstances, "to fall into the preacher both in the east and west, he taught hands of the living God;"* who had particularly righteousness to the whole world, and went to the said of this sort of sinners, that "if any man utmost bounds of the west: which makes me the drew back, his soul should have no pleasure in more wonder at the confidence of one (otherwise a him." Hence it is, that every where in this epis-man of great parts and learning) who so peremptle he mixes exhortations to this purpose, that torily denies that ever our apostle preached in the "they would give earnest heed to the things which west, merely because there are no monuments left they had heard, lest at any time they should let in primitive antiquity of any particular churches them slip;" that "they would hold fast the con- there founded by him; as if all the particular pasfidence, and the rejoicing of the hope, firm unto sages of his life, done at so vast a distance, must the end," and "beware, lest by an evil heart of needs have been recorded, or those records have unbelief they departed from the living God;" come down to us, when it is so notoriously known, that they would "labor to enter into his rest, lest that almost all the writings and monuments of any man fall after the example of unbelief; that those first ages of Christianity are long since leaving the" first "principles of the doctrine of perished; or as if we were not sufficiently asChrist, they would go on to perfection, showing sured of the thing in general, though not of what diligence to the full assurance of hope unto the particulars he did there. Probable it is, that he end; not being slothful, but followers of them, went into Spain, a thing which himself tells us he who through faith and patience inherit the pro- had formerly once and again resolved on. Cermises;" that they would "hold fast the profession tain it is, that the ancients do generally assert it, of the faith without wavering, not forsaking the without seeming in the least to doubt of it. Theassembling of themselves together, (as the man-odoret and others tell us, that he preached not ner of some was,") nor "cast away their confidence, which had great recompence of reward;" that they had need of patience, that after they had done the will of God, they might receive the promise;" that they "would not be of them who drew back unto perdition, but of them that believed to the saving of the soul;" that "being encompassed about with so great a cloud of witnesses," who with the most unconquerable constancy and resolution had all holden on in the way 8. To what other parts of the world St. Paul to heaven, "they would lay aside every weight, preached the gospel, we find no certain footsteps and the sin which did so easily beset them, and in antiquity, nor any further mention of him till run with patience the race that was set before his return to Rome, which probably was about the them;" especially "looking unto Jesus, the au- eighth or ninth year of Nero's reign. Here he thor and finisher of their faith, who endured the met with Peter, and was, together with him, cross, and despised the shame;" that therefore thrown into prison; no doubt in the general per"they should consider him that endured such con- secution raised against the Christians, under the tradiction of sinners against himself, lest they pretence that they had fired the city. Besides should be wearied and faint in their minds;" for the general, we may reasonably suppose there that "they had not yet resisted unto blood, striving were particular causes of his imprisonment. Some against sin; looking diligently, lest any man should of the ancients make him engaged with Peter in fail of the grace of God, lest any root of bitter-procuring the fall of Simon Magus, and that that ness springing up should trouble them, and there-derived the emperor's fury and rage upon him. by many be defiled." By all which, and much more that might be observed to this purpose, it is evident what our apostle's great design was in this excellent epistle. 66 7. Our apostle being now, after two years' custody, perfectly restored to liberty, remembered that he was the apostle of the Gentiles, and had therefore a larger diocess than Rome, and accordingly prepared himself for a greater circuit, though which way he directed his course is not absolutely certain. By some he is said to have returned back into Greece, and the parts of Asia, upon no other ground that I know of, than a few intimations in some of his epistles that he intended to do so. By others he is thought to have preached Heb. x. 26-31. only in Spain, but that he went to other nations, and brought the gospel into the isles of the sea, by which he undoubtedly means Britain; and therefore elsewhere reckons the Gauls and Britons among the nations which the apostles, and particularly the tent-maker, persuaded to embrace the law of Christ. Nor is he the only man that has said it, others having given in their testimony and suffrage in this case.* St. Chrysostom give us this account; that having converted one of Nero's concubines, a woman of whom he was infinitely fond, and reduced her to a life of great strictness and chastity, so that now she wholly refused to comply with his wanton and impure embraces; the emperor stormed thereat, calling the apostle a villain and imposter, a wretched perverter and debaucher of others, giving order that he should be cast into prison; and when he still persisted in persuading the lady * It is on an expression in the epistle of Clemens Romanus to the Corinthians, that the opinion reClemens says, that "he came to the borders of the specting Paul's journey into Spain chiefly rests: west;" but it is argued on the other side, that Rome or Italy only was intended by this expression.-ED. to continue her chaste and pious resolutions, commanding him to be put to death. 9. How long he remained in prison is not certainly known at last his execution was resolved on ;* what his preparatory treatment was, whether scourged as malefactors were wont to be in order to their death, we find not. As a Roman citizen by the Valerian and the Porcian law, he was exempted from it; though by the law of the twelve tables notorious malefactors, condemned by the centuriate assemblies, were first to be scourged, and then put to death; and Baronius tells us, that in the church of St. Mary, beyond the bridge of Rome, the pillars are yet extant, to which both Peter and Paul are said to have been bound and scourged. As he was led to execution, he is said to have converted three of the soldiers that were sent to conduct and guard him, who within a few days after, by the emperor's command, became martyrs for the faith. Being come to the place, which was the Aqua Salvia, three miles from Rome, after some solemn preparation, he cheerfully gave his neck to the fatal stroke. As a Roman he might not be put upon the cross, too infamous a death for any but the worst of slaves and malefactors, and therefore was beheaded; accounted a more noble kind of death, not among the Romans only, but among other nations, as being fitter for persons of better quality, and more ingenious education: and from this instrument of his execution the custom, no doubt, first arose, that in all pictures and images of this apostle, he is constantly represented with a sword in his right hand. Tradition reports (justified herein by the suffrage of many of the fathers) that when he was beheaded, a liquor more like milk than blood flowed from his veins, and spirted upon the clothes of his executioner; and had I list or leisure for such things, I might entertain the reader with little glosses that are made upon it. St. Chrysostom adds, that it became a means of converting his executioner, and many more to the faith; and that the apostle suffered in the sixty-eighth year of his age. Some question there is, whether he suffered at the same time with Peter; many of the ancients positively affirm, that both suffered on the same day and year; others, though allowing the same day, tells us that St. Paul suffered not until the year after; nay, some interpose the distance of several years. A manuscript writer of the lives and travels of Peter and Paul. brought amongst other venerable monuments of antiquity out of Greece, will have Paul to have suffered no less than five years after Peter, which he justifies by the authority of no less than Justin Martyr and Irenæus. But what credit is to be given to this nameless author, I see not; and therefore lay no weight upon it, nor think it fit to be put into the balance with the testimonies of the ancients. Certainly if he suffered not at the very same time with Peter, it could not be long after, not above a year at most. The best is, which of them soever started first, they both came at last to the same end of the race; to those palms and crowns which are reserved for all good men in heaven, but most eminently for the martyrs of the Christian faith. 10. He was buried in the Via Ostiensis about two miles from Rome, over whose grave, about the year 318, Constantine the Great, at the instance of pope Sylvester, built a stately church, within a farm which Lucina, a noble Christian matron of Rome, had long before settled upon that church. He adorned it with a hundred of of the best marble columns, and beautified it with the most exquisite workmanship; the many rich gifts and endowments which he bestowed upon it, being particularly set down in the life of Sylves ter. This church, as too narrow and little for the honor of so great an apostle, Valentinian, or rather Theodosius the emperor, (the one but finishing what the other began,) by a rescript directed to Sallustius, prefect of the city, caused to be taken down, and a larger and more noble church to be built in the room of it: further beautified (as appears from an ancient inscription) by Placidia the empress, at the persuasion of Leo, bishop of Rome. What other additions of wealth, honor, or stateliness, it has received since, concerns not me to inquire. SECTION VIII. The description of his Person and Temper, to gether with an account of his Writings. THOUGH we have drawn St. Paul at large, in the account we have given of his life, yet may it be of use to represent him in little, in a brief account of his person, parts, and those graces and virtues, for which he was more peculiarly eminent and remarkable. For his person, we find it thus described. He was low, and of little stature, and somewhat stooping, his complexion fair, his counkind of beauty and sweetness in them, his eyetenance grave, his head small, his eyes carrying a brows a little hanging over, his nose long, but hair of his head, mixed with gray hairs. Somegracefully bending, his beard thick, and like the what of this description may be learnt from LuPaul's disciples, he calls him by way of derision, cian, when in the person of Trypho, one of St. high-nosed, bald-pated Galilean, that was caught up through the air unto the "third heaven," where he learnt great and excellent things. That he was very low, himself plainly intimates, when he tells us, they were wont to say of him, that "his bodily presence was weak, and his speech contemptible* in which respect he is styled by Chrysostom, ο τρίπηχυς ανθρωπος, a man three cubits [or a little more than four foot] high, and yet tall enough to firm and athletic constitution, being often subject reach heaven. He seems to have enjoyed no very to distempers. St. Jerome particularly reports, that he was frequently afflicted with the head-ache, and that this was thought by many to have been the thorn in the flesh, the messenger of Satan sent to buffet him," and that probably he intended some such thing by "the temptation in his flesh,"t which he elsewhere speaks of: which, however it may in general signify those afflictions that came upon him, yet does it primarily denote those diseases and infirmities that he was obnoxious to. over the rest of his brethren: entrusted he was with great power and authority in the church, but never affected dominion over men's faith, nor any other place, than to be a helper of their joy; nor ever made use of his power, but to the edification, not destruction of any. How studiously did he decline all honors and commendations that were heaped upon him? When some in the church of Corinth cried him up beyond all measures, and under the patronage of his name began to set up for a party; he severely rebuked them, told them, that it was Christ, not he that was crucified for them; that they had "not been baptized into his name," which he was so far from, that he did not remember that he had baptized above three or four of them; and was heartily glad he had baptized no more, lest a foundation might have been laid for that suspicion; and that this Paul, indeed, whom they so much extolled, was no more than a minister of Christ, whom our Lord had appointed to plant and build up his church. 2. But how mean soever the cabinet was, there was a treasure within more precious and valuable, as will appear, if we survey the accomplishments of his mind. For as to his natural abilities and endowments, he seems to have had a clear and solid judgment, quick invention, a prompt and ready memory; all which were abundantly improved by art, and the advantages of a more liberal education. The schools of Tarsus had sharpened his discursive faculty by logic and the arts of reasoning, instructed him in the institutions of philosophy, and enriched him with the furniture of all kinds of human learning. This gave him great advantage above others, and ever raised him to a mighty reputation for parts and learning; insomuch that St. Chrysostom tells us of a dispute between a Christian and a heathen, wherein the Christian endeavored to prove against the Gentile, that St. Paul was more learned and eloquent than Plato himself. How well he was versed, not only in the law of Moses and the writings of the prophets, but even in classic and foreign writers, he has left us sure 4. Great was his temperance and sobriety, so ground to conclude, from those excellent sayings far from going beyond the bounds of regularity, which here and there he quotes out of heathen that he abridged himself of the conveniences of authors. Which, as at once it shows that it is not lawful and necessary accommodations; frequent unlawful to bring the spoils of Egypt in the service were his hungerings and thirstings, not constrainof the sanctuary, and to make use of the advan-¦ed only, but voluntary: it is probably thought that tages of foreign studies and human literature to divine and excellent purposes, so does it argue his being greatly conversant in the paths of human learning, which upon every occasion he could so readily command. Indeed he seemed to have been furnished out on purpose to be the doctor of the Gentiles; to contend with, and confute the grave and the wise, the acute and the subtile, the sage and the learned of the heathen world, and to wound them (as Julian's word was) with arrows drawn out of their own quiver. Though we do not find, that in his disputes with the Gentiles he made much use of learning and philosophy; it being more agreeable to the designs of the gospel, to confound the wisdom and learning of the world by the plain doctrine of the cross. 3. These were great accomplishments, and yet but a shadow to that divine temper of mind that was in him, which discovered itself through the whole course and method of his life. He was humble to the lowest step of abasure and condescension, none ever thinking better of others, or more meanly of himself. And though, when he had to deal with envious and malicious adversaries, who, by vilifying his person, sought to obstruct his ministry, he knew how to magnify his office, and to let them know, that he was “no whit inferior to the very chiefest apostles ;" yet out of this case he constantly declared to all the world, that he looked upon himself as an abortive, and an untimely birth, as “the least of the apostles, not meet to be called an apostle; and as if this were not enough, he makes a word on purpose to express his humility, styling himself cλax(50TEOOV, "less than the least of all saints," yea," the very chief of sinners." How freely, and that at every turn, does he confess what he was before his conversion-a blasphemer, a persecutor, and injurious both to God and men? Though honored with peculiar acts of the highest grace and favor, taken up to an immediate converse with God in heaven; yet did not this inspire him with a supercilious loftiness he very rarely drank any wine; and certain is it, 5. His kindness and charity was truly admira ble; he had a compassionate tenderness for the office, warning, reproving, entreating, persuading, poor, and a quick sense of the wants of others: "preaching in season and out of season," by to what church soever he came, it was one of his night and by day, by sea and land; no pains too first cares to make provision for the poor, and to much to be taken, no dangers too great to be stir up the bounty of the rich and wealthy; nay, overcome. For five-and-thirty years after his himself worked often with his own hands, not only conversion, he seldom stayed long in one place; to maintain himself, but to help and relieve them. from Jerusalem, through Arabia, Asia, Greece, But infinitely greater was his charity to the souls round about to Ellyricum, to Rome, and even to of men, fearing no dangers, refusing no labors, the utmost bounds of the western world, "fully going through good and evil report, that he might preaching the gospel of Christ:" running (says gain men over to the knowledge of the truth, re- St. Jerome) from ocean to ocean, like the sun in duce them out of the crooked paths of vice and the heavens, of which it is said, "his going forth idolatry, and set them in the right way to eternal is from the end of the heaven, and his circuit unto life. Nay, so insatiable his thirst after the good the ends of it;" sooner wanting ground to tread of souls, that he affirms, that rather than his coun-on, than a desire to propagate the faith of Christ. trymen the Jews should miscarry, by not believing Nicephorus compares him to a bird in the air, that and entertaining the gospel, he could be content, in a few years flew round the world: Isidore the nay wished, that "himself might be accursed from Pelusiot, to a winged husbandman, that flew from Christ for their sake;" i. e. that he might be place to place to cultivate the world with the most anathematized and cut off from the church of excellent rules and institutions of life. And while Christ, and not only lose the honor of the aposto- the other apostles did as it were choose this or late, but be reckoned in the number of the abject that particular province, as the main sphere of and execrable persons, such as those are who are their ministry, St. Paul overran the whole world separated from the communion of the church. An to its utmost bounds and corners, planting all instance of so large and passionate a charity, that places where he came with the divine doctrines lest it might not find room in men's belief, he ush-of the gospel. Nor in this course was he tired ered it in with this solemn appeal and attestation, out with the dangers and difficulties that he met that “he said the truth in Christ, and lied not, his with, the troubles and oppositions that were raised conscience bearing him witness in the Holy against him. All which did but reflect the greater Ghost." And as he was infinitely solicitous to gain lustre upon his patience; whereof, indeed (as men over to the best religion in the world; so was Clement observes) he became a most eminent he not less careful to keep them from being se- pattern and exemplar, during the biggest troubles duced from it, ready to suspect every thing that and persecutions, with a patience triumphant and might "corrupt their minds from the simplicity that unconquerable. As will easily appear, if we take is in Christ." "I am jealous over you with a but a survey of what trials and sufferings he ungodly jealousy," as he told the church of Corinth; derwent, some part whereof are briefly summed an affection of all others the most active and vigi- up by himself. In labors abundant, in stripes lant, and which is wont to inspire men with the above measure, in prisons frequent, in deaths most passionate care and concernment for the good often; thrice beaten with rods, once stoned, thrice of those for whom we have the highest measures suffered shipwreck, a night and a day in the deep; of love and kindness. Nor was his charity to in journeyings often, in perils of waters, in perils men greater than his zeal for God, endeavoring of robbers, in perils by his own countrymen, in with all his might to promote the honor of his perils by the heathen, in perils in the city, in pemaster. Indeed, zeal seems to have had a deep rils in the city, in perils in the wilderness, in perils foundation in the natural forwardness of his temper. in the sea, in perils among false brethren; in How exceedingly zealous was he, while in the weariness, in painfulness, in watchings often, in Jews' religion, of the traditions of his fathers; hunger and thirst, in fastings often, in cold and how earnest to vindicate and assert the divinity of nakedness; and besides these things that were the Mosaic dispensation, and to persecute all of a without, that which daily came upon him, the care contrary way, even to rage and madness; and of all the churches. An account though very when afterwards turned into a right channel, it great, yet far short of what he endured; and ran with as swift a current; carrying him out, wherein, as Chrysostom observes, he does podpa against all opposition, to ruin the kingdom and the perpiaev, modestly keep himself within his meapowers of darkness, to beat down idolatry, and to sures; for had he taken the liberty fully to have plant the world with right apprehensions of God, enlarged himself, he might have filled hundreds of and the true notions of religion. When, at Athens, martyrologies with his sufferings. A thousand he saw them so much overgrown with the gross-times was his life at stake; in every suffering he est superstition and idolatry, giving the honor that was a martyr, and what fell but in parcels upon was alone due to God to statues and images, his others, came all upon him; while they skirmished zeal began to ferment and to boil up into paroxysms of indignation; and he could not but let them know the resentments of his mind, and how much herein they dishonored God, the great parent and maker of the world. 6. This zeal must needs put him upon a mighty diligence and industry in the execution of his * 2 Cor. xi. 2. only with single parties, he had the whole army of sufferings to contend with. All which he generously underwent with a soul as calm and serene as the morning-sun; no spite or rage, no fury or storms could ruffle and discompose his spirit: nay, those sufferings, which would have broken the back of an ordinary patience, did but * 2 Cor. xi. 23, et seq. 2 make him rise up with the greater eagerness and resolution for the doing of his duty. made it any part of his study and design. Indeed, St. Jerome is sometimes too rude and bold in his censures of St. Paul's style and character. He tells us, that being a Hebrew of the Hebrews, and admirably skilled in the language of his na tion, he was greatly defective in the Greek tongue, (though a late great critic is of another mind, affirming him to have been as well, or better skilled in Greek than in Hebrew, or in Syriac,) wherein he could not sufficiently express his conceptions in a way becoming the majesty of his sense and the matter he delivered, nor transmit the elegancy of his native tongue into another language; that hence he became obscure and intricate in his expressions, guilty many times of solecisms, and scarce tolerable syntax, and that therefore it was 7. His patience will yet further appear from the consideration of another, the last of those virtues we shall take notice of in him, his constancy and fidelity in the discharge of his place, and in the profession of religion. Could the powers and policies of men and devils, spite and oppositions, torments and threatenings have been able to baffle him out of that religion wherein he had engaged himself, he must have sunk under them, and left his station. But his soul was steeled with a courage and resolution that was impenetrable, and which no temptation either from hopes or fears could make any more impression upon, than an arrow can that is shot against a wall of marble. He wanted not solicitation on either hand, both not his humility, but the truth of the thing that 2 from Jews and Gentiles; and questionless might, in some degree, have made his own terms, would he have been false to his trust, and have quitted that way that was then every where spoken against. But, alas! these things weighed little with our apostle, who "counted not his life to be dear unto him, so that he might finish his course with joy, and the ministry which he had received of the Lord Jesus." And therefore, when under the sentence of death in his own apprehensions, could triumphantly say, "I have fought a good fight, I have finished my course, I have kept the faith" and so indeed he did, kept it inviolably, undauntedly to the last minute of his life. The sum is, he was a man, in whom the divine life did eminently manifest and display itself; he lived piously and devoutly, soberly and temperately, justly and righteously, careful "always to keep a conscience void of offence both towards God and man." This he tells us was his support under suffering, this the foundation of his confidence towards God, and his firm hopes of happiness in another world: "this is our rejoicing, the testimony of our conscience, that in simplicity and godly sincerity we have had our conversation in the world."* 8. It is not the least instance of his care and fidelity in his office, that he did not only preach and plant Christianity in all places whither he came, but what he could not personally do, he supplied by writing. Fourteen epistles he left upon record, by which he was not only instrumental in propagating Christian religion at first, but has been useful to the world ever since, in all ages of the church. We have all along, in the history of his life, taken particular notice of them in their due place and order: we shall here only make some general observations and remarks upon them, and that as to the style and way wherein they are written, their order, and the subscriptions that are added to them. For the apostle's style and manner of writing, it is plain and simple; and though not set off with the elaborate artifices and affected additionals of human eloquence, yet grave and majestical, and that by the confession of his very enemies; "his letters, say they, are weighty and powerful." Nor are there wanting in them some strains of rhetoric, which sufficiently testify his ability that way, had he made him say, that "he came not with the excellency of speech, but in the power of God." A censure from any other than St. Jerome that would have been justly wondered at; but we know the liberty that he takes to censure any, though the reverence due to so great an apostle might, one would think, have challenged a more modest censure at his hands. However, elsewhere ne cries him up as a great master of composition, that as oft as he heard him, he seemed to hear not words, but thunder; that in all his citations he made use of the most prudent artifices, using simple words, and which seemed to carry nothing but plainness along with them; but which way soever a man turned, breathed force and thunder; he seems entangled in his cause, but catches all that comes near him; turns his back, as if he intended to fly, when it is only that he may overcome. 9. St. Peter long since observed, that in Paul's epistles there were "some things hard to be understood;"* which surely is not altogether owing to the profoundness of his sense, and the mysteriousness of the subject that he treats of, but in some degree to his manner of expression;† his frequent Hebraisms, (common to him with all the holy writers of the New Testament,) his peculiar forms and ways of speech, his often inserting Jewish opinions, and yet but tacitly touching them, his using some words in a new and uncommon sense, but above all, his frequent and abrupt transitions, suddenly starting aside from one thing to another, whereby his reader is left at a loss, not knowing which way to follow him, not a little contributing to the perplexed obscurity of his discourses. Irenæus took notice of old, that St. Paul makes frequent use of these hyperbata, by reason of the swiftness of his arguings, and the great fervor and impetus that was in him, leaving many times the designed frame and texture of his discourse, not bringing in what should have immediately connected the sense and order, till some distance after; which, indeed, to men of a more nice and delicate temper, and who will not give themselves leave patiently to trace out his rea * 2 Pet. iii. 16. This is not likely to have been the case: Peter, as a Hebrew, must have been too thoroughly imbued with the customs and phraseology of his nation to speak in this manner of mere idiomatic difficulties.-ED. |