(and how happy I am to make such quotations, God knoweth! for they bear my spirit up in the Phil. iv. 10. hopelessness of this controversy), "But I rejoiced in the Lord greatly, that now at the last your care of me hath flourished again; wherein ye were also careful, but ye lacked opportunity. Not that I speak in respect of want; for I have learned, in whatsoever state I am, therewith to be content, I know both how to be abased, and I know how to abound; and in all things I am instructed both to be full and to be hungry, both to abound and to suffer need. I can do all things through Christ which strengtheneth me. Notwithstanding ye have well done, that ye did communicate with my affliction, Now, ye Philippians, know also that in the beginning of the Gospel, when I departed from Macedonia, no church communicated with me as concerning giving and receiving, but ye only. For even in Thessalonica ye sent once and again unto my necessity. Not because I desire a gift; but I desire fruit that may abound to your account. But I have all and abound: I am full, having received of Epaphroditus the things which were sent from you, an odour of a sweet smell, a sacrifice acceptable, well-pleasing to God. But my God shall supply all your need, according to his riches in glory, by Christ Jesus." This is the Apostle's receipt in full for his wages; this is his voluntary confession of his robbery; this is the help with which he was helped at Corinth of these good Philippians. And as the former

quotations are a proof of his most nice and chary delicacy lest the Gospel of Christ should be breathed on with any aspersion, and of his magnanimity to bear every extreme of hardship, rather than the missionary calling should be calumniated; let this stand for the proof of his most generous spirit to partake and receive brotherly help. And let it divide and distinguish that chariness and magnanimity from the natu ral pride and independence of the human heart; from which the former spirit is as distinct and distinguishable, as the spirit of Christ, who gave all heaven's glory up and took mendicant crumbs of men, is distinct and distinguishable from Satan's spirit, who, though the brightest of the sons of the morning, could not brook the rich endowment because he had to give for it an act of reverence to the Most High God. And let it show, moreover, into what straits Paul passed, and with what difficulties he was beset around, in following out his missionary peregrinations, and how he had no dependence upon foreign churches; (for no one communicated with him save this of Philippi, whose gift he knew not of and expected not, till Epaphroditus brought it in his hand). And, finally, let it show how the Lord, the Son of Peace, forsook not in his wandering, his hungered, his own laborious workman, whose niggard craft, oft interrupted, yielding him but a bare support, he brought him supplies from afar, and made them to follow him to Thessalonica, to Corinth, to Rome, every where through the heathen desert,

Another apparent de

viation men

as the waters of Meribah and the quails of the morning and the evening, followed the sandy parched footing of the camp of Israel.

tioned in the

3d Epistle of John, proves the

same.

After perusing which examples, will any one say that Paul conformed not to the ritual of the missionary school, because he took foreign supplies when they were offered, and wrought with his hands when it served his turn? Thou art right, he conformed not; that is, he did more than conform; he was an Apostle, and more than an Apostle, for he magnified the Apostleship. Go thou and do likewise. Be more than a Missionary, magnify the Missionary office, and in such a way show thy non-conformity to thy Lord's commission and passport. But first, be careful that thou art a Missionary, and that the office in thy hand is not minished of its due size nor shorn of its proper beams. I have heard quoted, as another deviation from the letter of the missionary charter, what is obscurely hinted at in the Epistle of John, addressed to Gaius, in these words, loved, thou doest faithfully whatsoever thou doest to the brethren and to strangers; which have borne witness of thy charity before the church: whom if thou bring forward on their journey after a godly sort, thou shalt do well; because that for his name's sake they went forth, taking nothing of the Gentiles. We, therefore, ought to receive such, that we may be fellow-helpers of the truth." This, like the former, proveth more for the spirit of the missionary charter, than if it had been in

"Be

most exact conformity with its letter; showing, first, that the travellers and ambassadors of the kingdom, in these times, were wont to be brought on their way from place to place by the charity of brethren, even though strangers, and did not hesitate to be beholden to their charity; secondly, that they went forth to the Gentiles without any means of conveying themselves thither, but needed assistance to reach the scene of their labours and having reached the harvest-field, they put in their sickle and reaped without any hire, taking nothing for their reward, but passed on dependent as before upon the bounty of the brethren. So much the passage proves, that these Christian expeditions were undertaken without any dependence upon ways and means, and were executed without any fee or reward; but it does by no means prove that while they were with the Gentiles they refused to be beholden to them for their subsistence. They took nothing from the Gentiles, and needed to be helped on their way, that is, they departed as poor as they came; but how they fared amongst them is not stated, because it was not necessary for the Apostle to state more than their present condition, as his argument for the brethren to help them. The passage, therefore, is nothing more than a certificate of the poverty and disinterestedness of these Missionaries, given under the hand of an Apostle to a brother, who, on other occasions, had been helpful to the brethren. How much it supports

Other deviations, at

the spirit of the Apostolical school of Missionaries, any one can see; how it beareth upon the present school, it is not yet the time to discourse of at large.

And other instances of this kind occur in the

testing the Apostolical record. Paul, writing to Philemon same infe- from his bonds in Rome, desires him to pro

rence.

vide him a lodging, trusting that through their prayers he would be given to them. He was then Paul the aged, and Philemon was his dearly beloved brother and fellow-labourer, from whom he might, without fear of misconstruction, ask such a favour; yet with what delicacy he touches upon pecuniary matters, any one who reads that model of delicate affection may well apprehend. At Rome, in like manner, he dwelt two years in his own hired house, and received all that came in unto him; because he was there as a prisoner upon parole, and accommodated his apostolic character to his forced conditions: but on his journey to Rome, the Missionary constitution was fulfilled to the letter by the brethren at Puteoli, with whom he was desired to stay seven days; and also by the brethren at Rome, who met him at the Three Taverns, and conducted him on his way. In like manner, Titus is instructed to bring Zenas the lawyer, and Apollos, on their journey diligently, that nothing be wanting unto them. In like manner, he writes to the Corinthians concerning Timotheus, that they would "conduct him forth in peace, that he may come unto me." And of