public instructor, she was, no doubt, "apt to teach;" and there must have been something most interesting and impressive in her private conversation. It is a remarkable fact that one of the ablest preachers of the apostolic age was largely indebted to a female for his acquaintance with Christian theology. The accession, at this juncture, of such a convert as Apollos was of great importance to the evangelical cause. The Church of Corinth, in the absence of Paul, much required the services of a minister of superior ability; and the learned Alexandrian was eminently qualified to promote its edification. He was "an eloquent man, and mighty in the Scriptures."* After sojourning some time at Ephesus, it seems to have occurred to him that he would have a more extensive sphere of usefulness at Corinth; and "when he was disposed to pass into Achaia, the brethren wrote exhorting the disciples to receive him." It soon appeared that his friends in Asia had formed no exaggerated idea of his gifts and acquirements. When he reached the Greek capital, he "helped them much which had believed through grace; for he mightily convinced the Jews, and that publicly, shewing by the Scriptures that Jesus was Christ."+ His surpassing rhetorical ability soon proved a snare to some of the hypercritical Corinthians, and tempted them to institute invidious comparisons between him and their great apostle. Hence in the first epistle addressed to them, the writer finds it necessary to rebuke them for their folly and fastidiousness. "While one saith, I am of Paul, and another, I am of Apollos, are ye," says he, " not carnal? Who then is Paul, and who is Apollos, but ministers by whom ye believed, even as the Lord gave to every man? I have planted, Apollos watered, but God gave the increase." § * Acts xviii. 24. Acts xviii. 27, 28. + Acts xviii. 27. § 1 Cor. iii. 4-6. When Aquila and Priscilla were at Ephesus expounding "the way of God more perfectly" to the Jew of Alexandria, Paul was travelling to Jerusalem. Three years before, he had been there to confer with the apostles and elders concerning the circumcision of the Gentiles; and he had not since visited the holy city. His present stay seems to have been short-apparently not extending beyond a few days at the time of the feast of Pentecost,-and giving him a very brief opportunity of intercourse with his brethren of the Jewish capital. He then "went down to Antioch"-a place with which from the commencement of his missionary career he had been more intimately associated. "After he had spent some time there, he departed and went over all the country of Galatia and Phrygia in order, strengthening all the disciples." + On a former occasion, after he had passed through the same districts, he had been "forbidden of the Holy Ghost to preach the word in (the Proconsular) Asia; " but, at this time, the restriction was removed, and in accordance with the promise made to the Jews at Ephesus in the preceding spring, he now resumed his evangelical labours in that far-famed metropolis. There must have been a strong disposition on the part of many of the seed of Abraham in the place to attend to his instructions, as he was permitted "for the space of three months" to occupy the synagogue, “disputing and persuading the things concerning the kingdom of God."§ At length, however, he began to meet with so much opposition that he found it expedient to discontinue his addresses in the Jewish meeting-house. "When divers were hardened and believed not, but spake evil of that way before the multitude, he departed from them, and separated the disciples, disputing daily in the school of one Tyrannus." || This Tyrannus was, in all probability, a Gentile convert, * Acts xviii. 22. § Acts xix. 8. + Acts xviii. 23. || Acts xix. 9. Acts xvi. 6. and a teacher of rhetoric-a department of education very much cultivated at that period by all youths anxious to attain social distinction. What is here called his "school," appears to have been a spacious lecture-room sufficient to accommodate a numerous auditory. About this time the Epistle to the Galatians was, in all likelihood, written. The Galatians, as their name indicated, were the descendants of a colony of Gauls settled in Asia Minor several centuries before; and, like the French of the present day, seem to have been distinguished by their lively and mercurial temperament. Paul had recently visited their country for the second time, and had been received by them with the warmest demonstrations of regard; but meanwhile Judaizing zealots had appeared among them, and had been only too successful in their efforts to induce them to observe the Mosaic ceremonies. The apostle, at Antioch, and at the synod of Jerusalem, had already protested against these attempts; and subsequent reflection had only more thoroughly convinced him of their danger. Hence he here addresses the Galatians in terms of unusual severity. "I marvel,” he exclaims, "that ye are so soon removed from him that called you into the grace of Christ unto another gospel "-" O foolish Galatians, who hath bewitched you that ye should not obey the truth, before whose eyes Jesus Christ hath been evidently set forth, crucified among you?" At the same time he proves that the sinner is saved by faith alone; that the Mosaic institutions were designed merely for the childhood of the Church; and that the disciples of Jesus should refuse to be en 66 That this epistle was written after the second visit appears from Gal. iv. 13. Mr Ellicott asserts that "the first time" is here the preferable translation of тò πрóτεрov, and yet, rather inconsistently, adds, that "no historical conclusions can safely be drawn from this expression alone." See his “Critical and Grammatical Commentary on Galatians,” iv. 13. + Gal. i. 6, iii. 1. tangled" with any such "yoke of bondage." His epistle throughout is a most emphatic testimony to the doctrine of a free justification. Some time after Paul reached Ephesus, on his return from Jerusalem, he appears to have made a short visit to Corinth. There is no doubt that he encountered a variety of dangers of which no record is to be found in the Acts of the Apostles; and it is most probable that many of these disasters were experienced about this period. Thus, not long after this date, he says-" Thrice I suffered shipwreck, a night and a day I have been in the deep."§ There are good grounds for believing that he now visited Crete, as well as Corinth; and it would seem that these voyages exposed him to the "perils in the sea" which he enumerates among his trials. On his departure from Crete he left Titus behind him to "set in order the things that were wanting, and to ordain elders in every city;" ¶ and in the spring of A.D. 57 he wrote to the evangelist that brief epistle in which he points out, with so much fidelity and wisdom, the duties of the pastoral office.** The silence of Luke respecting this visit to Crete is the less remarkable, as the name of Titus does not once occur in the book of the Acts, though there is distinct evidence that he was deeply interested in some of the most important transactions which are there narrated.tt Paul, about two years before, had been prevented, as has * Gal. ii. 16, iv. 1–4, v. 1. + 1 Cor. xvi. 7; 2 Cor. xii. 14, xiii. 1. The Acts take no notice of various parts of his early career as a preacher. Compare Acts ix. 20-26 with Gal. i. 17. § 2 Cor. xi. 25. 2 Cor. xi. 26. T Titus i. 5. ** See Titus i. 6-11, ii. 1, 7, 8, 15, iii. 8-11. The reasons assigned in support of a later date for the writing of this epistle do not appear at all satisfactory. Paul directs the evangelist (Titus iii. 12) to come to him to Nicopolis, for he had "determined there to winter." This Nicopolis was in Greece, in the province of Achaia, and we know that Paul wintered there in A.D. 57-58 Acts xx. 2, 3. See Schaff's " Apostolic Church,” i. 390. ++ 2 Cor. ii. 13, vii. 6, 13, viii. 6, 16, 23, xii. 18; Gal. ii. 1, 3. been stated, by a divine intimation, from preaching in the district called Asia; but when he now commenced his ministrations in Ephesus, its capital, he continued in that city and its neighbourhood longer than in any other place he had yet visited. After withdrawing from the synagogue and resuming his labours in the school of Tyrannus, he remained there" by the space of two years; so that all they which dwelt in Asia heard the word of the Lord Jesus, both Jews and Greeks."* Meanwhile the churches of Laodicea, Colosse, and Hierapolis appear to have been founded.† The importance of Ephesus gave it a special claim to the attention which it now received. It was the metropolis of the district, and the greatest commercial city in the whole of Asia Minor. Whilst it was connected by convenient roads with all parts of the interior, it was visited by trading vessels from the various harbours of the Mediterranean. But, in another point of view, it was a peculiarly interesting field of missionary labour; for it was, perhaps, the most celebrated of all the high places of Eastern superstition. Its temple of Artemis, or Diana, was one of the wonders of the world. This gorgeous structure, covering an area of upwards of two acres, was ornamented with columns one hundred and twenty-seven in number, each sixty feet high, and each the gift of a king.§ It was nearly all open to the sky, but that part of it which was covered, was roofed with cedar. The image of the goddess occupied a comparatively small apartment within the magnificent enclosure. image, which was said to have fallen down from Jupiter,|| was not like one of those pieces of beautiful sculpture which Acts xix. 10. This + See Col. iv. 13, 15, 16. These churches were not, however, founded by Paul. See Col. ii. 1. "This was the largest of the Greek temples. The area of the Parthenon at Athens was not one fourth of that of the temple of Ephesus."-Smith's Dictionary of Greek and Roman Geography, Art. EPHESUS. § Conybeare and Howson, ii. 72. || Acts xix. 35. |