ldo lo que fol gmaton bono sif Jegt vol td bus ART. VI.-PAUL AT EPHESUS. IN A SET OF PICTURES! er h

THE city of Ephesus figures so much in the narrative and Epistles of the Apostle Paul, that it may be interest↓ ing to attend to some of the scenes where he appears in connection with it. The subject leads us to a place that is renowned in sacred history, and brings before us a few of the most striking incidents of a life eventful for himself and for mankind. By associating the great missionary to the Gentiles with a single spot of his labors and suffer ings, we may gather several remarkable transactions into one group, and make them more distinctly present to us! We may get a sort of epitome of his whole career by ob serving what befell him, and how he bore himself, in one city. It was a famous city. It was called one of the eyes of Asia. It was large, bright, powerful. He was determined to open it to the light of the everlasting Gos pel. He was determined to give to that proud name a divine celebrity of which it had no conception. In one of his Epistles he speaks of himself as resolving to "tarry” there; and the reasons that he gives for that resolution will appear strange enough to indolent and timid persons. They were, that there was a great deal of work to be done, and a great number of enemies to oppose him in the doing of it. Here was one of the most magnificent capitals of the earth, and he was only a visitor in it. But its splendor had nothing to dazzle, and its pleasures nothing to tempt him. He thought only how it might be converted to God. He would stay there because it wanted him, and he could serve it, and not because he was himself in want of any thing it could give; not be cause it contained all that art could minister to enjoyment, but because it was the post of danger. "For a great door and effectual is opened unto me,” was his language, "and there are many adversaries." The door of its temple of Diana, that was gorgeous with all the mira cles of Grecian genius, was open to him. But it was only that he might denounce the idolatry within. The door of its theatre was open to him, but it was only that he might be dissuaded from risking his life there to no purpose. It was through the door of perilous duty which it threw wide to him that he resolutely passed;

1

1850.1

Paul in the Synagogue.

435 and, but for that, he cared nothing for any of its stately gates. 40 TPA A ZLATTITA_17-17 TRÅ

We will go with the Apostle, then, to Ephesus; and as we tarry with him there awhile, we will look at him in the following order of circumstances: Paul in its synagogue; Paul in the school of Tyrannus; Paul with its silversmiths; Paul with its conjurors; Paul with its beasts; Paul with its Church elders.

t

-i

Paul in the synagogue at Ephesus. Thither his steps were the earliest directed. There were his countrymen, bis spiritual kinsmen, those of the same faith in which he had been brought up, of a race and law that separated them strongly from the rest of mankind. His sympathies began with them. In various parts of his writings, he speaks of them with the deepest interest and affection, though they were his chief opponents, and were always stirring up hostility against him among every people whom he went to address. He could not forget that they shared together the reproach that was cast by the heathen world upon all the children of Abraham; that he hon ored, to a certain extent, with them the same peculiar usages; and that both had been instructed from childhood in the sacred books of the same legislator, psalmists, and prophets. He was anxious to persuade them that the prophetic testimony had now received its fulfilment; that their Christ had come, and they were not to look for an other. Therefore he went into their synagogue, humble building, certainly, compared with the architec tural magnificence that surrounded it, but it drew within its walls the men and women on whose behalf he was so earnestly engaged; and for three months at a time he reasoned with them, and strove to convince them, concerning the kingdom of God. He did not assail their former persuasions, for he shared them. He did not mean that they had hitherto believed in an error and a fable, for he maintained that they had been educated in the truth, in divinely communicated truth. He had not to lay anew in their minds the foundation of a just religious belief, for it was strong there, already. They were zeal, ots for the doctrine of One only Living and True God. But they had not yet received Jesus Christ, whom the Father sanctified and sent into the world. He was anxious that they should embrace this doctrine also; that

་་

an

they should add the love of the Gospel to the strength of the Law, and the revelation of immortality to the temporal rewards of well-doing; that they should increase their faith, not detract any thing from it, and through the further way which had just been disclosed go forward to perfection. But these endeavours of his met with only a partial success. Many would not hear. Many would not believe when they did hear. And some turned fiercely upon their teacher, and publicly attacked what they looked upon as a schism in their ancient Church, and rejected with a passionate obstinacy the grace that was bringing salvation. Then he departed from them, carrying with him those who were willing to listen.

Behold him now, no longer in the sacred place that was appropriated to the worship and religious instruction of his nation, but in the school-room of a Grecian sophist, whose name was Tyrannus, There he discoursed, not on the Jewish Sabbaths only, but every day in the week; setting forth the wonders that had been done in the land of Judah and by the Galilean lake, and the light that had gone forth from thence to bless the Gentiles. His audi ence was no longer composed of Jews only. Together with his own countrymen came the Ephesian citizens, and the strangers, of various creed and of none, that chanced to be mingled with them at the time. For two years he kept up this course of Christian indoctrination. He addressed himself by turns to the religious wants of the different parts of his assembly. With that ingenious versatility by which he became all things to all, he recommended his word now to those who had been brought up in idolatry, and now to the disciples of Moses, who could conceive and allow of nothing beyond his mono. theistic law. Both of them, all of them, received in their due season the instruction which each required. He argued with the Hebrew from his own Scriptures, and with the Greek from certain of his own poets, winning men of every way of thinking to the truth as it is in Jesus. Thus, the school of Tyrannus-that uncertain person, who probably, after the manner of his tribe, made a trade of using vain arguments for still vainer speculations, and would undertake with equal readiness the defence of either side, as if nothing was divinely trueechoed at last with a voice that was always in strong and

1850.]

Paul with the Silversmiths.

437

affectionate earnest; whose various tones sprang from one living sentiment, breathed the same generous pur pose, and declared constantly a central reality, to which the hearts of all people should be turned, from every diversity of opinion, and from the whole circumference of the earth. Here Paul proclaimed one religious truth, around which all others were to arrange themselves harmoniously; and that was the mission of a Redeemer clothed with the combined power of the new and the elder. covenant. Still more. This school of a doubtful or false wisdom, deserted by its former master, and consecrated by the coming of an ambassador of Christ, became now a seminary for all that part of the world; and in "the space of two years" it acquired a name that the whole tide of time will never cover over.

Paul with the silversmiths is the third scene to be pre sented. Here we lose sight of the Jewish disciples altogether. There is no longer any trace of their interference.' The synagogue is at a distance, and the school too, with its many Israelitish faces. We are in a heathen place, → in a city that makes no recognition of one God, even the Father. In the midst of it rises a temple for profane rites. It is dedicated to a goddess; and she is not a chaste one, though bearing the name of Diana. The image that was feigned to have fallen down from Jupiter was but the representation of the powers of nature. It was not even intended as the slightest emblem of Him who is the Omnipotent Ruler of nature. It is not only an idol, but of an earthly expression and a rude cast. Over it, however, rises one of the seven wonders of the world. We have all heard the names of a few illustrious artists of Greece, when she was in the height of her fame. Their works were but a part of its embellishment. Their statues stood there, of the purest marble. Their paintings glowed upon the polished walls. The wor

shipper of Jehovah would naturally turn away with abhorrence from such a sight, that set forth to his eyes with so much splendor an abominable superstition. But we may be sure to find the active Apostle where there was the most to be confronted; and we are next to see him in connection with this famous edifice. It was in this way. Every natural spot that acquires renown, and every marvellous work of human hands, is apt to collect persons 4TH S. VOL. XIII. NO. III.

VOL. XLVIII.

38

ཆ

around it who are maintained in some degree by the cu riosity of strangers. They are guides to it, or they furnish the visitor with something by which to remember it, It was so in the present case. There was a company of artificers, who occupied themselves with making little silver models of Diana's shrine;-perhaps of the whole temple, perhaps of that part where her image was set up. These persons were alarmed for their gains. They were told that "this Paul had turned away much people" by representing that "they were no gods which were made with hands." They therefore proceeded to excite the populace against him. Covering their worldly interest under the garb of religious zeal, which has been very common always, they cried out that the temple of their goddess was likely to be despised, and her magnificence to be destroyed whom all Asia and the world worshipped. Then rose the shout, "Great is Diana of the Ephesians," and the whole city was full of confusion. The multitude seized upon two of Paul's companions, and hurried them before an assembly called suddenly together in the public hall. He himself would have gone in to address the tumultuous meeting, and was scarcely restrained, when not only his disciples, but some of the chief men of the place, besought him not to adventure himself into the throng. His reasoning and his pure zeal could have availed nothing there to himself or to his cause. He had made the desired impression, and it was enough. The Ephesian idolatry had received an immedicable wound. His prudence now took the place of his fervid self-devotion; and, after the uproar had ceased, he called to him his converts and embraced them, and then set out for Macedonia.

[

Before his departure, however, we must see him with the conjurors, over whose minds he gained a great ascendency. This city had long abounded with persons of such a stamp. It had become a proverb throughout the country for the number of magical books that were there published. What these were, it is easier to guess at than to describe. They were used for the purposes of divination and sorcery. They were meant to put men into certain relations with supernatural powers of evil. We may suppose them to have been consulted and employed often by those who were only credulous, or inquisitive, or am