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We know what the precepts of the religion | tion is represented in the several accounts that are; how pure, how benevolent, how disinterested have come down to us. And this inquiry is pro a conduct they enjoin; and that this purity and perly preceded by the other, for as much as the benevolence are extended to the very thoughts reception of these accounts may depend in part on and affections. We are not, perhaps, at liberty the credibility of what they contain. to take for granted that the lives of the preachers of Christianity were as perfect as their lessons; but we are entitled to contend, that the observable part of their behaviour must have agreed in a great measure with the duties which they taught. There was, therefore, (which is all that we assert,) a course of life pursued by them, different from that which they before led. And this is of great importance. Men are brought to any thing almost sooner than to change their habit of life, especially when the change is either inconvenient, or made against the force of natural inclination, or with the loss of accustomed indulgences. "It is the most difficult of all things to convert men from vicious habits to virtuous ones, as every one may judge from what he feels in himself, as well as from what he sees in others."* It is almost like making men over again.

The obscure and distant view of Christianity, which some of the heathen writers of that age had gained, and which a few passages in their remaining works incidentally discover to us, offers itself to our notice in the first place; because, so far as this evidence goes, it is the concession of adversaries; the source from which it is drawn is unsuspected. Under this head, a quotation from Tacitus, well known to every scholar, must be inserted, as deserving particular attention. The reader will bear in mind that this passage was written about seventy years after Christ's death, and that it relates to transactions which took place about thirty years after that event.—Speaking of the fire which happened at Rome in the time of Nero, and of the suspicions which were enter tained that the emperor himself was concerned in causing it, the historian proceeds in his narrative and observations thus:

Left then to myself, and without any more information than a knowledge of the existence of "But neither these exertions, nor his largesses the religion, of the general story upon which it is to the people, nor his offerings to the gods, did founded, and that no act of power, force, and au- away the infamous imputation under which Nero thority, was concerned in its first success, I should lay, of having ordered the city to be set on fire. conclude, from the very nature and exigency of To put an end, therefore, to this report, he laid the case, that the Author of the religion, during the guilt, and inflicted the most cruel punishments, his life, and his immediate disciples after his upon a set of people, who were holden in abhordeath, exerted themselves in spreading and pub-rence for their crimes, and called by the vulgar, lishing the institution throughout the country in Christians. The founder of that name was which it began, and into which it was first car- Christ, who suffered death in the reign of Tiberied; that, in the prosecution of this purpose, they rius, under his procurator Pontius Pilate. This underwent the labours and troubles which we ob- pernicious superstition, thus checked for a while, serve the propagators of new sects to undergo; broke out again; and spread not only over Judea, that the attempt must necessarily have also been where the evil originated, but through Rome also, in a high degree dangerous; that, from the sub-whither every thing bad upon the earth finds its ject of the mission, compared with the fixed opi-way, and is practised. Some who confessed their nions and prejudices of those to whom the mis- sect, were first seized, and afterwards, by their insionaries were to address themselves, they could formation, a vast multitude were apprehended, hardly fail of encountering strong and frequent who were convicted, not so much of the crime of opposition; that, by the hand of government, as burning Rome, as of hatred to mankind. Their well as from the sudden fury and unbridled license sufferings at their execution were aggravated by of the people, they would oftentimes experience insult and mockery; for, some were disguised in injurious and cruel treatment; that, at any rate, the skins of wild beasts, and worried to death by they must have always had so much to fear for dogs; some were crucified; and others were their personal safety, as to have passed their lives wrapt in pitched shirts, and set on fire when the in a state of constant peril and anxiety; and last-day closed, that they might serve as lights to illuly, that their mode of life and conduct, visibly at least, corresponded with the institution which they delivered, and, so far, was both new, and required continual self-denial.

CHAPTER II.

minate the night. Nero lent his own gardens for these executions, and exhibited at the same time a mock Circensian entertainment; being a spectator of the whole, in the dress of a charioteer, sometimes mingling with the crowd on foot, and sometimes viewing the spectacle from his car. This conduct made the sufferers pitied; and though they were criminals, and deserving the severest punishments, yet they were considered as There is satisfactory evidence that many profess-sacrificed, not so much out of a regard to the pubing to be original witnesses of the Christian miracles, passed their lives in labours, dangers, and sufferings, voluntarily undergone in at testation of the accounts which they delivered, and solely in consequence of their belief of those accounts; and that they also submitted from the same motives, to new rules of conduct.

AFTER thus considering what was likely to happen, we are next to inquire how the transac

* Hartley's Essays on Man, p. 190.

lic good, as to gratify the cruelty of one man.'

Our concern with this passage at present is only so far as it affords a presumption in support of the proposition which we maintain, concerning the activity and sufferings of the first teachers of Christianity. Now considered in this view, it proves three things: 1st, that the Founder of the

*This is rather a paraphrase, but is justified by what the Scholiast upon Juvenal says; Nero maleficos homines tæda et papyro et cera supervestiebat, et sic ad ignem admoveri jubebat."-Lard. Jewish and Heath Test. vol, i. p. 359.

institution was put to death; 2dly, that in the The testimony of the younger Pliny belongs to same country in which he was put to death, the a later period; for although he was contemporary religion, after a short check, broke out again and with Tacitus and Suetonius, yet his account does spread; 3dly, that it so spread, as that, within not, like theirs, go back to the transactions of thirty-four years from the author's death, a very Nero's reign, but is confined to the affairs of his great number of Christians (ingens eorum multi-own time. His celebrated letter to Trajan was tudo) were found at Rome. From which fact, written about seventy years after Christ's death; the two following inferences may be fairly drawn: and the information to be drawn from it, so far as first, that if, in the space of thirty-four years from it is connected with our argument, relates princiits commencement, the religion had spread through-pally to two points; first, to the number of Chrisout Judea, had extended itself to Rome, and there tians in Bithynia and Pontus, which was so conhad numbered a great multitude of converts, the siderable as to induce the governor of these prooriginal teachers and missionaries of the institu- vinces to speak of them in the following terms; tion could not have been idle; secondly, that when" Multi, omnis ætatis, utriusque sexus etiam;— the Author of the undertaking was put to death as a malefactor for his attempt, the endeavours of his followers to establish his religion in the same country, amongst the same people, and in the same age, could not but be attended with danger. Suetonius, a writer contemporary with Tacitus, describing the transactions of the same reign, uses these words: "Affecti suppliciis Christiani, genus hominum superstitionis novæ et maleficæ." "The Christians, a set of men of a new and mischievous (or magical) superstition, were punished."

Since it is not mentioned here that the burning of the city was the pretence of the punishment of the Christians, or that they were the Christians of Rome who alone suffered, it is probable that Suetonius refers to some more general persecution than the short and occasional one which Tacitus describes.

neque enim civitates tantum, sed vicos etiam et agros, superstitionis istius contagio pervagata est.” "There are many of every age and of both sexes; nor has the contagion of this superstition seized cities only, but smaller towns also, and the open country." Great exertions must have been used by the preachers of Christianity to produce this state of things within this time. Secondly, to a point which has been already noticed, and which I think of importance to be observed, namely, the sufferings to which Christians were exposed, without any public persecution being denounced against them by sovereign authority. For, from Pliny's doubt how he was to act, his silence concerning any subsisting law on the subject, his requesting the emperor's rescript, and the emperor, agreeably to his request propounding a rule for his direction, without reference to any prior rule, it may be inferred, that there was, at that time, no public edict in force against the Christians. Yet from this same epistle of Pliny it appears, "that accusations,

Juvenal, a writer of the same age with the two former, and intending, it should seem, to commemorate the cruelties exercised under Nero's go-trials, and examinations, were and had been, vernment, has the following lines:†

"Pone Tigellinum, tædå lucebis in illâ,
Quâ stantes ardent, qui fixo gutture fumant,
Et latum medià sulcum deducit↓ arenâ.

"Describe Tigellinus (a creature of Nero,) and
you shall suffer the same punishment with those
who stand burning in their own flame and smoke,
their head being held up by a stake fixed to their
chin, till they make a long stream of blood and
melted sulphur on the ground."

If this passage were considered by itself, the subject of allusion might be doubtful; but when connected with the testimony of Suetonius, as to the actual punishment of the Christians by Nero, and with the account given by Tacitus of the species of punishment which they were made to undergo, I think it sufficiently probable, that these were the executions to which the poet refers.

going on against them in the provinces over which he presided; that schedules were delivered by anonymous informers, containing the names of persons who were suspected of holding or of favouring the religion; that, in consequence of these informations, many had been apprehended, of whom some boldly avowed their profession, and died in the cause; others denied that they were Christians; others, acknowledging that they had once been Christians, declared that they had long ceased to be such." All which demonstrates, that the profession of Christianity was at that time (in that country at least) attended with fear and danger: and yet this took place without any edict from the Roman sovereign, commanding or authorising the persecution of Christians. This observation is further confirmed by a rescript of Adrian to Minucius Fundanus, the proconsul of Asia:* from which rescript it appears that the custom of the people of Asia was to proceed against the Christians with tumult and uproar. This disorderly practice, I say, is recognised in the edict, because the emperor enjoins, that, for the future, if the Christians were guilty, they should be legally brought to trial, and not be pursued by importunity and clamour.

These things, as has already been observed, took place within thirty-one years after Christ's death, that is, according to the course of nature, in the life-time, probably, of some of the apostles, and certainly in the life-time of those who were converted by the apostles, or who were converted in their time. If then the Founder of the religion was put to death in the execution of his design; if the first race of converts to the re- Martial wrote a few years before the younger ligion, many of them, suffered the greatest ex-Pliny: and, as his manner was, made the suffertremities for their profession; it is hardly credible,ings of the Christians the subject of his ridicule.t that those who came between the two, who were companions of the Author of the institution during his life, and the teachers and propagators of the institution after his death, could go about their undertaking with ease and safety.

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*Lard. Heath. Test. vol. ii. p. 110.

† In matutina nuper spectatus arena
Mucius, imposuit qui sua membra focis,
Si patiens fortisque tibi durusque videtur,
Abderitanæ pectora plebis habes;
Nam cum dicatur, tunicâ præsente molesta,
Ure manum: plus est dicere, Non facio.

Forsan "thure manum."

Nothing, however, could show the notoriety of the | ment which are casually and undesignedly dis fact with more certainty than this does. Martial's closed; forasmuch as this species of proof is, of testimony, as well indeed as Pliny's, goes also to all others, the least liable to be corrupted by fraud another point, viz. that the deaths of these men or misrepresentation. were martyrdoms in the strictest sense, that is to say, were so voluntary, that it was in their power, at the time of pronouncing the sentence, to have averted the execution by consenting to join in heathen sacrifices.

The constancy, and by consequence the sufferings of the Christians of this period, is also referred to by Epictetus, who imputes their intrepidity to madness, or to a kind of fashion or habit, and about fifty years afterwards, by Marcus Aurelius, who ascribes it to obstinacy. "Is it possible (Epictetus asks) that a man may arrive at this temper, and become indifferent to those things from madness or from habit, as the Galileans? "Let this preparation of the mind (to die) arise from its own judgment, and not from obstinacy like the Christians."+

CHAPTER III.

There is satisfactory evidence that many, professing to be original witnesses of the Christian miracles, passed their lives in labours, dangers, and sufferings, voluntarily undergone in attestation of the accounts which they delivered, and solely in consequence of their belief of those accounts; and that they also submitted, from the same motives, to new rules of conduct.

Or the primitive condition of Christianity, a distant only and general view can be acquired from heathen writers. It is in our own books that the detail and interior of the transaction must be sought for. And this is nothing different from what might be expected. Who would write a history of Christianity, but a Christian? Who was likely to record the travels, sufferings, labours, or successes of the apostles, but one of their own number, or of their followers? Now these books come up in their accounts to the full extent of the proposition which we maintain. We have four histories of Jesus Christ. We have a history taking up the narrative from his death, and carrying on an account of the propagation of the religion, and of some of the most eminent persons engaged in it, for a space of nearly thirty years. We have, what some may think still more original, a collection of letters, written by certain principal agents in the business, upon the business, and in the midst of their concern and connexion with it. And we have these writings severally attesting the point which we contend for, viz. the sufferings of the witnesses of the history, and attesting it in every variety of form in which it can be conceived to appear: directly and indirectly, expressly and incidentally, by assertion, recital, and allusion, by narratives of facts, and by arguments and discourses built upon these facts, either referring to them, or necessarily presupposing them.

I remark this variety, because, in examining ancient records, or indeed any species of testimony, it is, in my opinion, of the greatest importance to attend to the information or grounds of argu

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I may be allowed therefore, in the inquiry which is now before us, to suggest some conclusion of this sort, as preparatory to more direct testimony.

1. Our books relate, that Jesus Christ, the founder of the religion, was, in consequence of his undertaking, put to death, as a malefactor, at Jerusalem. This point at least will be granted, because it is no more than what Tacitus has recorded. They then proceed to tell us, that the religion was, notwithstanding, set forth at this same city of Jerusalem, propagated thence throughout Judea, and afterwards preached in other parts of the Roman empire. These points also are fully confirmed by Tacitus, who informs us, that the religion, after a short check, broke out again in the country where it took its rise; that it not only spread throughout Judea, but had reached Rome, and that it had there great multitudes of converts; and all this within thirty years after its commencement. Now these facts afford a strong maintain. What could the disciples of Christ exinference in behalf of the proposition which we pect for themselves when they saw their Master put to death? Could they hope to escape the persecuted me, they will also persecute you, was dangers in which he had perished? If they have the warning of common sense. With this example before their eyes, they could not be without a full sense of the peril of their future enterprise. 2. Secondly, all the histories agree in representing Christ as foretelling the persecution of his followers:

"Then shall they deliver you up to be afflicted, and shall kill you, and ye shall be hated of all nations for my name's sake."*

"When affliction or persecution ariseth for the word's sake, immediately they are offended."+

"They shall lay hands on you, and persecute you, delivering you up to the synagogues, and into prisons, being brought before kings and rulers for my name's sake:-and ye shall be betrayed both by parents and brethren, and kinsfolks and friends, and some of you shall they cause to be put to death."+

"The time cometh, that he that killeth you, will think that he doeth God service. And these things will they do unto you, because they have not known the Father, nor me. But these things have I told you, that when the time shall come, ye may remember that I told you of them."s

I am not entitled to argue from these passages, that Christ actually did foretell these events, and that they did accordingly come to pass; because that would be at once to assume the truth of the religion: but I am entitled to contend, that one side or other of the following disjunction is true; either that the Evangelists have delivered what Christ really spoke, and that the event corresponded with the prediction; or that they put the prediction into Christ's mouth, because, at the time of writing the history, the event had turned out so to be: for, the only two remaining suppositions appear in the highest degree incredible; which are, either

* Mat. xxiv. 9.

Mark iv. 17. See also chap. x. 30.

Luke xxi. 12-16. See also chap. xi. 49.
John xvi. 4 See also chap. xv. 20; xvi. 33.

that Christ filled the minds of his followers with | nothing in the circumstances of the times which fears and apprehensions, without any reason or authority for what he said, and contrary to the truth of the case; or that, although Christ had never foretold any such thing, and the event would have contradicted him if he had, yet historians who lived in the age when the event was known, falsely, as well as officiously, ascribed these words to him.

3. Thirdly, these books abound with exhortations to patience, and with topics of comfort under distress.

"Who shall separate us from the love of Christ? Shall tribulation, or distress, or persecution, or famine, or nakedness, or peril, or sword? Nay, in all these things we are more than conquerors through Him that loved us."*

required patience,-which called for the exercise of constancy and resolution? Or will it be pretended that these exhortations (which, let it be observed, come not from one author, but from many) were put in, merely to induce a belief in after-ages, that the Christians were exposed to dangers which they were not exposed to, or underwent sufferings which they did not undergo? If these books belong to the age to which they lay claim, and in which age, whether genuine or spurious, they certainly did appear, this supposition cannot be maintained for a moment; because I think it impossible to believe, that passages, which must be deemed not only unintelligible, but false, by the persons into whose hands the books upon their publication were to come, should nevertheless "We are troubled on every side, yet not dis- be inserted, for the purpose of producing an effect tressed; we are perplexed, but not in despair; per-upon remote generations. In forgeries which do secuted, but not forsaken; cast down, but not destroyed; always bearing about in the body the dying of the Lord Jesus, that the life also of Jesus might be made manifest in our body;-knowing that he which raised up the Lord Jesus shall raise us up also by Jesus, and shall present us with you. For which cause we faint not; but, though our outward man perish, yet the inward man is renewed day by day. For our light affliction, which is but for a moment, worketh for us a far more exceeding and eternal weight of glory."+ "Take, my brethren, the prophets, who have spoken in the name of the Lord, for an example of suffering affliction, and of patience. Behold, we count them happy which endure. Ye have heard of the patience of Job, and have seen the end of the Lord; that the Lord is very pitiful, and of tender mercy."

not appear till many ages after that to which they pretend to belong, it is possible that some contrivance of that sort may take place; but in no others can it be attempted.

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CHAPTER IV.

There is satisfactory evidence that many, professing to be original witnesses of the Christian miracles, passed their lives in labours, dangers, and sufferings, voluntarily undergone in attestation of the accounts which they delivered, and solely in consequence of their belief of those accounts; and that they also submitted, from the same motives, to new rules of conduct.

"Call to remembrance the former days, in which, after ye were illuminated, ye endured a THE account of the treatment of the religion, great fight of afflictions, partly whilst ye were and of the exertions of its first preachers, as stated made a gazing-stock both by reproaches and afflic-in our Scriptures (not in a professed history of pertions, and partly whilst ye became companions of secutions, or in the connected manner in which I them that were so used; for ye had compassion of am about to recite it, but dispersedly and occasionme in my bonds, and took joyfully the spoiling of ally, in the course of a mixed general history, your goods, knowing in yourselves, that ye have which circumstance alone negatives the supposiin heaven a better and an enduring substance. tion of any fraudulent design,) is the following: Cast not away, therefore, your confidence, which" That the Founder of Christianity, from the comhath great recompense of reward; for ye have need of patience, that, after ye have done the will of God, ye might receive the promise."§

mencement of his ministry to the time of his violent death, employed himself wholly in publishing the institution in Judea and Galilee; that, in order "So that we ourselves glory in you in the to assist him in this purpose, he made choice out churches of God, for your patience and faith in all of the number of his followers, of twelve persons, your persecutions and tribulations that ye endure. who might accompany him as he travelled from Which is a manifest token of the righteous judg-place to place; that, except a short absence upon ment of God, that ye may be counted worthy of the kingdom for which ye also suffer."ll

We rejoice in hope of the glory of God; and rot only so, but we glory in tribulations also; knowing that tribulation worketh patience, and patience experience, and experience hope."T

"Beloved, think it not strange concerning the fiery trial which is to try you, as though some strange thing happened unto you; but rejoice, inasmuch as ye are partakers of Christ's sufferings. -Wherefore let them that suffer according to the will of God, commit the keeping of their souls to him in well doing, as unto a faithfulCreator."** What could all these texts mean, if there was

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a journey in which he sent them, two by two, to announce his mission, and one of a few days, when they went before him to Jerusalem, these persons were steadily and constantly attending upon him; that they were with him at Jerusalem when he was apprehended and put to death; and that they were commissioned by him, when his own ministry was concluded, to publish his Gospel, and collect disciples to it from all countries of the world." The account then proceeds to state, "that a few days after his departure, these persons, with some of his relations, and some who had regularly frequented their society, assembled at Jerusalem; that, considering the office of preaching the religion as now devolved upon them, and one of their number having deserted the cause, and, repenting of his perfidy, having destroyed himself, they proceed ed to elect another into his place, and that they

Hitherto the preachers of the new religion seem to have had the common people on their side; which is assigned as the reason why the Jewish rulers did not, at this time, think it prudent to proceed to greater extremities. It was not long, however, before the enemies of the institution found means to represent it to the people as tend ing to subvert their law, degrade their lawgiver, and dishonour their temple. And these insinua tions were dispersed with so much success, as to induce the people to join with their superiors in the stoning of a very active member of the new community.

were careful to make their election out of the number of those who had accompanied their Master from the first to the last, in order, as they alleged, that he might be a witness, together with themselves, of the principal facts which they were about to produce and relate concerning him;* that they began their work at Jerusalem by publicly asserting that this Jesus, whom the rulers and inhabitants of that place had so lately crucified, was, in truth, the person in whom all their prophecies and long expectations terminated; that he had been sent amongst them by God; and that he was appointed by God the future judge of the human species; that all who were solicitous to secure to The death of this man was the signal of a themselves happiness after death, ought to receive general persecution, the activity of which may be him as such, and to make profession of their be-judged of from one anecdote of the time:-" As lief, by being baptized in his name." The his- for Saul, he made havoc of the church, entering tory goes on to relate, "that considerable numbers into every house, and haling men and women, accepted this proposal, and that they who did so, committed them to prison." This persecution formed amongst themselves a strict union and so- raged at Jerusalem with so much fury, as to drive ciety; that the attention of the Jewish govern- most of the new converts out of the place, except ment being soon drawn upon them, two of the the twelve apostles. The converts, thus "scatprincipal persons of the twelve, and who also had tered abroad," preached the religion wherever they lived most intimately and constantly with the came; and their preaching was, in effect, the Founder of the religion, were seized as they were preaching of the twelve; for it was so far carried discoursing to the people in the temple; that, after on in concert and correspondence with them, that being kept all night in prison, they were brought when they heard of the success of their emissaries the next day before an assembly composed of the in a particular country, they sent two of their chief persons of the Jewish magistracy and priest-number to the place, to complete and confirm the hood; that this assembly, after some consultation, mission. found nothing, at that time, better to be done to- An event now took place, of great importance wards suppressing the growth of the sect, than to in the future history of the religion. The persethreaten their prisoners with punishment if they cutions which had begun at Jerusalem, followed persisted; that these men, after expressing, in de- the Christians to other cities, in which the autho cent but firm language, the obligation under which rity of the Jewish Sanhedrim over those of their they considered themselves to be, to declare what own nation was allowed to be exercised. A they knew, to speak the things which they had young man, who had signalized himself by his seen and heard,' returned from the council, and hostility to the profession, and had procured a reported what had passed to their companions; commission from the council at Jerusalem to seize that this report, whilst it apprized them of the any converted Jews whom he might find at Da danger of their situation and undertaking, had no mascus, suddenly became a proselyte to the reliother effect upon their conduct than to produce in gion which he was going about to extirpate. The them a general resolution to persevere, and an new convert not only shared, on this extraordinaearnest prayer to God to furnish them with assist-ry change, the fate of his companions, but brought ance, and to inspire them with fortitude, propor-upon himself a double measure of enmity from tioned to the increasing exigency of the service."s A very short time after this, we read "that all the twelve apostles were seized and cast into prison; that being brought a second time before the Jewish Sanhedrim, they were upbraided with their disobedience to the injunction which had been laid upon them, and beaten for their contumacy; that, being charged once more to desist, they were suffered to depart; that however they neither quitted Jerusalem, nor ceased from preaching, both daily in the temple, and from house to house; and that the twelve considered themselves as so entirely and exclusively devoted to this office, that they now transferred what may be called the temporal affairs of the society to other hands."**

*Acts i. 21, 22. † Acts xi. ↑ Acts iv. 32. & Acts iv. Acts v. 18. Acts v. 42 **I do not know that it has ever been insinuated, that the Christian mission, in the hands of the apostles, was a scheme for making a fortune, or for getting money.But it may nevertheless be fit to remark upon this passage of their history, how perfectly free they appear to have been from any pecuniary or interested views whatever. The most tempting opportunity which occurred, of making a gain of their converts, was by the custody and management of the public funds. when some of the richer members, intending to contribute their fortunes to the common support of the society, sold their posses2 N

the party which he had left. The Jews at Damascus, on his return to that city, watched the gates night and day, with so much diligence, that he escaped from their hands only by being let down in a basket by the wall. Nor did he find himself in greater safety at Jerusalem, whither he immediately repaired.-Attempts were there also soon set on foot to destroy him; from the danger

sions, and laid down the prices at the apostles' feet. Yet, so insensible, or undesirous, were they of the advantage which that confidence afforded, that we find they very soon disposed of the trust, by putting it into the hands, not of nominees of their own, but of stewards formally elected for the purpose by the society at

large.

We may add also, that this excess of generosity, which cast private property into the public stock, was so far from being required by the apostles, or imposed as a law of Christianity, that Peter reminds Ananias that he had been guilty, in his behaviour, of an officious and voluntary prevarication; for whilst," says he, "thy estate remained unsold, was it not thine own? and after it was sold, was it not in thine own power?" *Acts vi. 12.

† Acts viii. 3.

Acts viii. 1. "And they were all scattered abroad:" but the term "all" is not, I think, to be taken strictly as denoting more than the generality; in like manner as in Acts ix 35 "And all that dwelt at Lydda and Saron saw him, and turned to the Lord."

§ Acts ix.

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