They were neither philosophers, nor orators, nor educated men. They were from a class of mankind denominated by the ruling nations, barbarians; they were of that nation among the barbarians, whom all the rest of the world particularly despised; they were of that portion of the nation, which was least esteemed by its own members. They were poor, without the least worldly consideration or influence. They were acquainted with no craft but that of publicans and fishermen. They had never learned any language but that of Galilee, and yet they were to preach to people of all languages. Such were the men whose work it was to assault the high and fenced walls of Judaism; to break the power of heathenism, though entrenched in the vices of the people; upheld by the craft of their priesthoods; defended by the power of all nations; and sanctioned by the traditions of immemorial ages. Such were the men who were to go into the proud schools of philosophy; show their wisdom to be foolishness; teach their teachers; bring out captives to the humble faith of the crucified Nazarene; and baptize them in the name of the Father, and the Son, and the Holy Ghost.

All

9th. Consider the circumstances of depression and discouragement in which they commenced this work. The enemies of their Master had just succeeded in putting him to the shame of the cross, under accusation of capital guilt. Their taunting language to the agonizing victim: "Come down from the cross, if thou be the Son of God," shows what a death-blow they supposed themselves to have given to his cause. his disciples had forsaken him and fled. The stone upon the mouth of his sepulchre was not heavier than the weight upon their hearts, when they beheld him dead and buried. After a few days, they assembled together again in Jerusalem, when an upper room contained the whole congregation of those that believed in Christ. Their cause was universally supposed to have died with its Master. The fact that he had not been saved by the power of God from the disgrace of

all his claims.

crucifixion, was regarded every where as a perfect answer to Such was the beginning of the propagation These were the desperate circumstances in which the unfriended, unprotected, ridiculed apostles were to set up their banner. What could they do?

of the gospel.

10th. Consider the mode they adopted. They sought no favour from worldly influence; courted no human indulgence; waited for no earthly approbation; paid as little deference to rank, or wealth, or human learning, as to poverty and meanness. They spake as men having authority; as ambassadors, commissioned from a throne, and sustained by a power before which, they had a right to demand that priests, and philosophers, and kings, should submit. "Not with enticing words of man's wisdom," did they seek to advance their cause; but in simple reliance upon "the demonstration of the Spirit." Instead of selecting such doctrines as would best conciliate their hearers, and concealing the rest; they fixed their preaching most emphatically on what they knew was the special topic of derision and mockery both to Jew and Greek: glorying in nothing save in the cross of Christ. Instead of seeking retired and ignorant people as the subjects of their efforts; instead of a double doctrine, as the philoso phers had one thing for the world, another for their disciples

a part for the novice the whole only for the initiatedthey kept back nothing, any where; declaring boldly the whole gospel in the most public places and before the greatest enemies. "Jesus and the resurrection," were preached as freely to Epicureans and Stoics in Athens, as to publicans and sinners in Jerusalem. Instead of accommodating their declarations in any degree to the vainglorious and vicious characters of those whom they addressed; they declared the wrath of God to be "revealed from heaven against all ungodliness and unrighteousness of men." To every soul that would be a Christian, they issued the requirement, "depart from iniquity," "crucify the flesh, with its affections and lusts," and be willing to be esteemed a fool and persecuted to death for Christ's

sake.

Such was the mode selected by these powerless Galileans, by which to subdue the fierce opposition of the proud, self-righteous Jews, and to make Christians out of Greeks and Romans, alike devoted to degrading vices, and puffed up with the conceit of superior wisdom.

11th. Now let us see in what manner the attempt to propagate christianity was received. It was met every where by the most strenuous hostility, and the fiercest persecution From the first discourse of the apostles, down to the three hundred and fifth year of the christian era, persecution never entirely ceased, while its more public and general onsets followed one another in such close succession, that the church had hardly time to bury her dead before she was called to prepare more candidates, by thousands at a time, for the tortures and triumphs of martyrdom. The preaching of the apostles began at Jerusalem, and there also persecution began. Saul hunted Christians with the appetite of a bloodhound Stephen was the first victim. Soon the brethren were scattered far and wide by the fury of the storm. James was slain with the sword; Peter, imprisoned for execution; Paul, scourged and stoned, and pursued so continually that, in every city, bonds and afflictions awaited him. Whatever Jewish hate, goaded on by a jealous priesthood, could do, was put in requisition to crush the cause. All the devices that Roman governors, seconded by the superstitions and passions of the several nations of heathenism, could employ, were united in the one business of driving back the advancing cause of Christ. His disciples were calumniated as atheists; enemies of man; murderers and devourers of their own children; and as guilty of the most loathsome and horrible practices.* Instruments of torture were exhausted. Jews and Gentiles, soldiers, slaves, governors, and emperors, racked

"The Atheists," was the universal name for Christians. To the charge of dire hostility to all religion, was added that of combined rebellion against all law and all mankind. 'Irreligiosi in Casares, hostes Cæsarum, hostes populi Romani," was their universal character, among their enemies.

their ingenuity to find out new ways of tempting Christians to unfaithfulness, and, when they were steadfast, of increasing their agonies without hastening their death. Every province, and city, and village, was a scene of martyrdom. The great principle of the ruling powers was, that this "superstition," as they called it, must at all hazards be put down. “In a short time, the punishments of death were so common, that, as related by the writers of those times, no famine, pestilence, or war, ever consumed more men at a time." The edict of Trajan, commanding the presidents to inflict capital punishment on all who would not renounce christianity, was never abrogated while heathenism reigned in Rome.* What persecution was in the heart of the empire, it was also in Africa, Persia, Arabia, Capadocia, Mesopotamia, Nicomedia, Phrygia, and in almost every place where the christian name was known. "Those who suffered for the cause of Christ, men, women, youths of both sexes, were so numerous as to be estimated only in the mass." "In torments they stood stronger than their tormentors; their bruised and mangled limbs proving too hard for the instruments with which their flesh was racked and pulled from them; the blows, however often repeated, could not conquer their impregnable faith; even though they not only sliced and tore off the flesh, but raked into their very bowels." Such is the description given by one of those who thus endured to the end. The strong language in the Epistle to the Hebrews is eminently applicable. Some "were tortured, not accepting deliverance; others had trial of cruel mockings and scourgings, yea, moreover of bonds and imprisonment: they were stoned, they were sawn asunder, were tempted, were slain with the sword: they wandered about in sheep-skins, and goat-skins; being destitute, afflicted, tormented: they wandered in deserts, and in mountains, and in dens and caves of the earth.”‡

Christians were often the victims of popular fury, as well as of public edicts and imperial authority. Every odious

* Lardner, iv. 300.

+ Cyprian.

Heb. xi. 35-38.

slander was propagated against them for the purpose of instigating the rage of the populace. The evidence of abject slaves or of persons forced by torture to testify as an in censed community desired, was used to justify the most dreadful explosions of vulgar hate. Did a drought occur? It was a proverbial explanation, that "if God refused rain, the Christians were in fault." Did the Nile refuse its annual irrigation, or the Tiber overflow its banks? Did earthquake, or famine, or any other public calamity, excite the popular mind? A ready cause was in every mouth; the anger of the gods on account of the increase of christianity! A ready sacrifice to propitiate the offended deities was immediately resorted to; the slaughter of the Christians! How the better informed of society endeavoured to stimulate the mob to these hecatombs of innocent victims, may be judged from the fact, that "Porphyry, a man who wished to be accounted a philosopher, found a cause for the inveteracy of an infectious and desolating sickness in this, that Esculapius could not exert any effectual influence on the earth in consequence of the prevalence of christianity."*

Such, then, were the obstacles which opposed the propagation of the gospel. Who, in their anticipation, must not have said: "If this cause be of man, it must come to naught?" Either it must die a natural death in the obscurity of its birth, or be torn to pieces at the first onset of its foes, or else it must be of God,-protected and advanced by His power.

Before proceeding to speak of the success of the apostles, we may deduce, from the premises we have established, a conclusive proof of the power by which they acted.

It is certain that they understood the difficulties, and anticipated the dangers, of their work. As men of ordinary understanding, they must have foreseen, while, by the predictions of Christ, they were distinctly apprized of, the obstacles and perils they would encounter. Nevertheless, with a perfect knowledge of their own weakness, they undertook

*Neander's Ch. Hist.