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a contradiction being actually incurred, of any I remember to have met with. "Once," saith St. Paul, "was I stoned." Does the history relate that St. Paul, prior to the writing of this Epistle, had been stoned more than once? The history mentions distinctly one occasion upon which St. Paul was stoned, viz. at Lystra in Lycaonia. "Then came thither certain Jews from Antioch and Iconium, who persuaded the people; and, having stoned Paul, drew him out of the city, supposing he had been dead." (Chap. xiv. 19.) And it mentions also another occasion, in which "an assault was made both of the Gentiles, and also of the Jews with their rulers, to use them despitefully, and to stone them; but they were aware of it," the history proceeds to tell us, "and fled into Lystra and Derbe." This happened at Iconium, prior to the date of the Epistle. Now had the assault been completed; had the history related that a stone was thrown, as it relates that preparations were made both by Jews and Gentiles to stone Paul and his companions; or even had the account of this transac tion stopped, without going on to inform us that Paul and his companions were "aware of their danger and fled," a contradiction between the history and the Epistle would have ensued. Truth is necessarily consistent: but it is scarcely possible that independent accounts, not having truth to guide them, should thus advance to the very brink of contradiction without falling into it.

Secondly, I say, that if the Acts of the Apostles be silent concerning many of the instances enumerated in the Epistle, this silence may be accounted for, from the plan and fabric of the history. The date of the Epistle synchronises with the beginning of the twentieth chapter of the Acts. The part, therefore, of the history, which precedes the twentieth chapter, is the only part in which can be found any notice of the persecutions to which St. Paul refers. Now it does not appear that the author of the history was with St. Paul until his departure from Troas, on his way to Macedonia, as related chap. xvi. 10.; or rather indeed the contrary appears. It is in this point of the history that the language changes. In the seventh and eighth verses of this chapter the third person is used. "After they were come to Mysia, they assayed to go into Bithynia, but the Spirit suffered them not; and they passing by Mysia came to Troas :" and the third person is in like manner constantly used throughout the foregoing part of the history. In the tenth verse of this chapter, the first person comes in: "After Paul had seen the vision, immediately we endeavoured to go into Macedonia; assuredly gathering that the Lord had called us to preach the Gospel unto them." Now, from this time to the writing of the Epistle, the history occupies four chapters; yet it is in these, if in any, that a regular or continued account of the apostle's life is to be expected: for how succinctly his history is delivered in the preceding part of the book, that is to say, from the time of his conversion to the time when the historian joined him at Troas, except the particulars of his conversion itself, which are related circumstantially, may be understood from the following observations: The history of a period of sixteen years is comprised in less than three chapters; and of these, a material part is taken up with discourses. After his conversion, he continued in the neighbourhood of Damascus, ac cording to the history, for a certain considerable, though indefinite length of time, according to his own words (Gal. i. 18.) for three years; of which no other account is given than this short one, that "straightway he preached Christ in the synagogues, that he is the Son of God; that all that heard him were amazed, and said, Is not this he that destroyed them which called on this name in Jerusalem? that he increased the more in strength, and confounded the Jews which dwelt at Damascus ; and that, after many days were fulfilled, the Jews took counsel to kill him." From Damascus he proceeded to Jerusalem: and of his residence there nothing more particular is recorded, than that "he was with the apostles, coming in and going out; that he spake boldly in the name of the Lord Jesus, and disputed against the Grecians, who went about to kill him." From Jerusalem, the history sends him to his native city of Tarsus. (Acts, chap. ix. 30.) It seems probable, from the order and disposition of the history, that St. Paul's stay at Tarsus was of some continuance; for we hear nothing of him, until, after a long apparent interval, and much interjacent narrative, Barnabas, desirous of Paul's assistance upon the enlargement of the Christian mission, "went to Tarsus for to seek him." (Chap. xi. 25.) We cannot doubt that the new apostle had been busied in his ministry; yet of what he did, or what he suffered, during this period, which may include three or four years, the history professes not to deliver any information. As Tarsus was situated upon the sea-coast, and as, though Tarsus was his home, yet it is probable

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he visited from thence many other places, for the purpose of preaching the Gospel, it is not unlikely that in the course of three or four years he might undertake many short voyages to neighbouring countries, in the navigating of which we may be allowed to suppose that some of those disasters and shipwrecks befel him, to which he refers in the quotation before us, "thrice I suffered shipwreck, a night and a day I have been in the deep." This last clause I am inclined to interpret of his being obliged to take to an open boat, upon the loss of the ship, and his continuing out at sea in that dangerous situation, a night and a day. St. Paul is here recounting his sufferings, not relating miracles. From Tarsus, Barnabas brought Paul to Antioch, and there he remained a year but of the transactions of that year no other description is given than what is contained in the last four verses of the eleventh chapter. After a more solemn dedication to the ministry, Barnabas and Paul proceeded from Antioch to Cilicia, aud from thence they sailed to Cyprus, of which voyage no particulars are mentioned. Upon their return from Cyprus, they made a progress together through the Lesser Asia; and though two remarkable speeches be preserved, and a few incidents in the course of their travels circumstantially related, yet is the account of this progress, upon the whole, given professedly with conciseness; for instance, at Iconium it is said, that they abode a long time, (Chap. xiv. 3.) yet of this long abode, except concerning the manner in which they were driven away, no memoir is inserted in the history. The whole is wrapped up in one short summary, “They spake boldly in the Lord, which gave testimony unto the word of his grace, and granted signs and wonders to be done by their hands." Having completed their progress, the two apostles returned to Antioch," and there they abode long time with the disciples." Here we have another large portion of time passed over in silence. To this succeeded a journey to Jerusalem, upon a dispute which then much agitated the Christian church, concerning the obligation of the law of Moses. When the object of that journey was completed, Paul proposed to Barnabas to go again and visit their brethren in every city where they had preached the word of the Lord. The execution of this plan carried our apostle through Syria, Cilicia, and many provinces of the Lesser Asia; yet is the account of the whole journey dispatched, in four verses of the sixteenth chapter. SECTION X.

Chap. iii. 1. "Do we begin again to commend ourselves? or need we, as some others, Epistles of commendation to you?"

"As some others." Turn to Acts xviii. 27. and you will find that, a short time before the writing of this Epistle, Apollos had gone to Corinth with letters of commendation from the Ephesian Christians; "and when Apollos was disposed to pass into Achaia, the brethren wrote, exhorting the disciples to receive him." Here the words of the Epistle bear the appearance of alluding to some specific instance, and the history supplies that instance; it supplies at least an instance as apposite as possible to the terms which the apostle uses, and to the date and direction of the Epistle, in which they are found. The letter which Apollos carried from Ephesus, was precisely the letter of commendation which St. Paul meant; and it was to Achaia, of which Corinth was the capital, and indeed to Corinth itself (Acts, chap. xix. 1.) that Apollos carried it; and it was about two years before the writing of this Epistle. If St. Paul's words be rather thought to refer to some general usage which then obtained among Christian churches, the case of Apollos exemplifies that usage; and affords that species of confirmation to the Epistle, which arises from seeing the manners of the age, in which it purports to be written, faithfully preserved.

SECTION XI.

Chap. xiii. 1. "This is the third time I am coming to you :" TрITOY THто EPXoμXI.

Do not these words import that the writer had been at Corinth twice before? Yet, if they import this, they overset every congruity we have been endeavouring to establish. The Acts of the Apostles record only two journies of St. Paul to Corinth. We have all along supposed, what every mark of time except this expression indicates, that the Epistle was written between the first and second of these journies. If St. Paul had been already twice at Corinth, this supposition must be given up and every argument or observation which depends

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upon it, falls to the ground. Again, the Acts of the Apostles not only record no more than two journies of St. Paul to Corinth, but do not allow us to suppose that more than two such journies could be made or intended by him within the period which the history comprises; for, from his first journey into Greece to his first imprisonment at Rome, with which the history concludes, the apostle's time is accounted for. If, therefore, the Epistle were written after the second journey to Corinth, and upon the view and expectation of a third, it must have been written after his first imprisonment at Rome, i. e. after the time to which the history extends. When I first read over this Epistle, with the particular view of comparing it with the history, which I chose to do with out consulting any commentary whatever, I own that I felt myself confounded by the text. It appeared to contradict the opinion which I had been led, by a great variety of circumstances, to form; concerning the date and occasion of the Epistle. At length, however, it occurred to my thoughts to inquire, whether the passage did necessarily imply that St. Paul had been at Corinth twice; or, whether, when he says, "This is the third time I am coming to you," he might mean only that this was the third time that he was ready, that he was prepared, that he intended to set out upon his journey to Corinth. I recollected that he had once before this purposed to visit Corinth, and had been disappointed in this purpose; which disappointment forms the subject of much apology and protestation, in the first and second chapters of the Epistle. Now, if the journey in which he had been disappointed was reckoned by him one of the times in which "he was coming to them," then the present would be the third time, i.e. of his being ready and prepared to come; although he had been actually at Corinth only once before. This conjecture being taken up, a farther examination of the passage and the Epistle, produced proofs which placed it beyond doubt. "This is the third time I am conring to you:" in the verse following these words, he adds, "I told you before, and foretel you, as if I were present the second time; and being absent, now I write to them which heretofore have sinned, and to all other, that, if I come again, I will not spare." In this verse, the apostle is declaring beforehand what he would do in his intended visit: his expression therefore," as if I were present the second time," relates to that visit. But, if his future visit would only make him present among them a second time, it follows that he had been already there but once.-Again, in the fifteenth verse of the first chapter, he tells them, "In this confidence, I was minded to come unto you be fore, that ye might have a second benefit." Why a second, and not a third benefit? why deurepay, and not TPITYY xapy, if the TITOV Epoua in the thirteenth chapter, meant a third visit? for, though the visit in the first chapter be that visit in which he was disappointed, yet, as it is evident from the Epistle, that he had never been at Corinth from the time of the disappointment to the time of writing the Epistle, it follows, that if it were only a second visit in which he was disappointed then, it could only be a second visit which he proposed now. But the text which I think is decisive of the question, if any question remain upon the subject, is the fourteenth verse of the twelfth chapter: "Behold the third time I am ready to come to you :" Ide TAITOV ETOIμws Exu It is very clear that the τριτον ετοίμως εχω ελθειν of the twelfth chapter, and the τριτον τετσ ερχομαι of the thirteenth chapter, are equivalent expressions, were intended to convey the same meaning, and to relate to the same journey. The comparison of these phrases gives us St. Paul's own explanation of his own words; and it is that very explanation which we are contending for, viz. that TpToy Tто Exμι does not mean that he was coming a third time, but that this was the third time he was in readiness to come, TITOV ETOUS EX. Upon the whole, the matter is sufficiently certain: nor do I propose it as a new interpretation of the text which contains the difficulty, for the same was given by Grotius long ago; but I thought it the clearest way of explaining the subject, to describe the manner in which the difficulty, the solution, and the proofs of that solution, successively presented themselves to my inquiries. Now, in historical researches, a reconciled inconsistency becomes a positive argument. First, because an impostor generally guards against the appearance of inconsistency; and, secondly, because, when apparent inconsistencies are found, it is seldom that any thing but truth renders them capable of reconciliation. The existence of the difficulty proves the want or absence of that caution, which usually accompanies the conscious. ness of fraud; and the solution proves, that it is not the collusion of fortuitous propositions which we have to deal with, but that a thread of truth winds through the whole, which preserves every circumstance in its places

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SECTION XII.

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Chap. x. 14-16. "We are come as far as to you also, in preaching the Gospel of Christ; not boasting of things without our measure, that is, of other men's labours; but having hope, when your faith is increased, that we shall be enlarged by you, according to our rule, abundantly to preach the Gospel in the regions beyond you."

This quotation affords an indirect, and therefore unsuspicious, but at the same time a distinct and indubitable recognition of the truth and exactness of the history. I consider it to be implied by the words of the quotation, that Corinth was the extremity of St. Paul's travels hitherto. He expresses to the Corinthians his hope, that, in some future visit, he might "preach the Gospel to the regions beyond them;" which imports that he had not hitherto proceeded "beyond them," but that Corinth was as yet the farthest point or boundary of his travels. Now, how is St. Paul's first journey into Europe, which was the only one he had taken before the writing of the Epistle, traced out in the history? Sailing from Asia, he landed at Philippi: from Philippi, traversing the eastern coast of the peninsula, he passed through Amphipolis and Apollonia to Thessalonica : from thence through Berea to Athens, and from Athens to Corinth, where he stopped; and from whence, after a residence of a year and a half, he sailed back into Syria. So that Corinth was the last place which he visited in the peninsula; was the place from which he returned into Asia; and was, as such, the boundary and limit of his progress. He could not have said the same thing, viz. "I hope hereafter to visit the regions beyond you,” in an Epistle to the Philippians, or in an Epistle to the Thessalonians, inasmuch as he must be deemed to have already visited the regions beyond them, having proceeded from those cities to other parts of Greece. But from Corinth he returned home; every part therefore beyond that city, might properly be said, as it is said in the passage before us, to be unvisited. Yet is this propriety the spontaneous effect of truth, and produced without meditation or design.

For St. Paul's journies, the Reader is referred to the Map which accompanies the Acts of the Apostles.

Dr. Lightfoot, in his Chronology of the New Testament, has made some good observations on the date of this Epistle; and the circumstances by which that date is ascertained: collating, as Dr. Paley has done, the Epistle with those parts of the history in the Acts, which refer to it.

The following is the substance of what he says on this subject :—

A new year being now entered, and Paul intending for Syria, as soon as the spring was a little up, he sends Titus beforehand to Corinth, to hasten their collections for the saints in Judea, that they might be ready against Paul should come thither. And with Titus he sends two other brethren; and by them all, he sends the Second Epistle to the Corinthians. The proof that it was written and sent at this time, and in this manner, is plain, by these places and passages in it: Chap. ix. 2, 3, 4. I know the forwardness of your mind, for which I boast of you to them of Macedonia: yet have I sent the brethren, lest our boasting of you should be in vain; lest haply they of Macedonia come with me, &c. Chap. xii. 14. Behold the third time I am coming to you. Chap. xiii. 1. This is the third time I am coming to you. And, Chap. viii. 16. But thanks be unto God, who put the sume earnest care into the heart of Titus for you. Ver. 17. Being more forward of his own accord, he went unto you. Ver. 18. And with him we have sent the brother whose praise is in the gospel. Ver. 22. And we have sent with them our brother, whom we have oftentimes proved diligent in many things, &c.

The apostle, in this Second Epistle to Corinth, first excuses his not coming to them, according as he had promised in his First Epistle, 1 Cor. xvi. 5. clearing himself from all lightness in making, and from all unfaithfulness in breaking, that promise; and fixing the principal reason upon themselves and their present condition : because he had not yet intelligence, when he went first into Macedonia, of any reformation among them of those

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enormities that he had reproved in his First Epistle; therefore he was unwilling to come to them in heaviness, and with a scourge. This, his failing to come, according to his promise, had opened the mouths of several in his disgrace, and false teachers took any other occasion to vilify him, which he copiously satisfies, and vindicates himself all along in the Epistle. His exceeding zealous plainness with them, and dealing so home and thoroughly against their misdemeanours as he did, was one advantage that his enemies took to open their mouths against him, and to withdraw the hearts of the Corinthians from him; and chiefly because he was so urgent against the works of the law as to justification, and those rites which the Jews, even the most of those that were converted 'to the gospel, too much doated on.

After he had sent away this Epistle by Titus, Erastus and Mark, if our conjecture fail not, and had given notice to the Corinthians of his speedy coming to them, and warning them to get their collections ready against he came, he provided for his journey into Syria, which he had intended so long: partly to visit the churches in these parts, and partly to bring up the collections he had got for the poor of Judea, of which, he had promised to the three ministers of the circumcision, Peter, James, and John, that he would be careful, Gal. ii. 10. Acts, Chap. xx. 4. And there accompanied him into Asia, Sopater of Berea: and of the Thessalonians, Aristarchus and Secundus; and Gaius of Derbe, and Timotheus: and of Asia, Tychicus and Trophimus. Ver. 5. These going before tarried for us at Troas. Ver. 6. And we sailed away from Philippi, after the days of unleavened bread, But when Paul, and this his company, are all going for Asia together, why should they not set out together; but these go before, and tarry at Troas, and Paul and some other of his company come after? Nay, they were all to meet at Troas, as it appeareth, ver. 6. Why might they not then have gone altogether to Troas?

The reason of this was, because Paul himself was to go by Corinth and not minding to stay there but very little, because he hastened to Jerusalem, he would not take his whole train thither, but sends them off the next way they could go to Troas, himself promising and resolving to be speedily with them there. He had promised a long time to the church of Corinth to come unto them, and he had newly sent word in that Epistle that he had lately sent, that now his coming would be speedy, 2 Cor. xii. 14. Behold the third time I am ready to come to you: and chap. xiii. 1. This is the third time that I am coming to you. Not that he had been there twice before, for since his first departing thence, (when he had stayed a long time together, at his first planting of the Gospel in that place,) there is neither mention nor probability of his being there again; but this was the third time that he was coming, having promised and intended a journey thither once before, but was prevented, 2 Cor. i. 15, 16, 17. But now he not only promises by the Epistle that he will come, but staketh the three brethren that he had sent thither, for witnesses and sureties of that promise, 2 Cor. xiii. 1, 2. that in the mouth of these witnesses his promise might be established and assured. See the Introduction, Sect. xi.

Now the time is come that he makes good his promise; and whilst the rest of his company go directly to the next cut to Troas, he himself and Luke, and whom else he thought good to retain with him, go about by Corinth. And now to look a little further into the reason of their thus parting company, and of Paul's short stay at Corinth when he came there, we may take into our thoughts, (besides how much he hastened to Je rusalem,) the jealousy that he had, lest he should not find all things at Corinth so comfortable to himself, and so creditable to them, before those that should come with him, as he desired. He has many pass

ages in the Second Epistle that he wrote to them, that glance that way: for though, as to the general, there was reformation wrought among them, upon the receiving his First Epistle, and thereupon he speaks very ex cellent things of them; yet were there not a few that thought basely of him, 2 Cor. x. 12. and traduced him and his doctrine, Chap. xi and xii. and gave him cause to suspect that his boasting of that church to the churches of Macedonia might come off but indifferently, if the Macedonians should come with him to see how all things were there, 2 Cor. ix. 4. And therefore it was but the good policy of just fear, grief, and prudence to send them by another way, and he had very just cause to stay but a little while when he came there. Lightfoot's Works, Vol. I. pag. 310, &c.