But soon after Paul had left them with the most pleasing hopes of their spiritual growth, he was astonished to hear of a change for the worse, which took place among them. Either some Jews of their country, or some others who lately arrived at Galatia, from other parts of Asia Minor, where Paul had laboured, took pains to pervert them. They made no attempts to unsettle their minds in the views of the Unity of the Godhead, and the principal facts of christianity, nor attempted to draw them back to the worship of idols. Nor did they formally deny the atonement of Christ, nor endeavour to draw them from christian worship. Yet was it another gospel, though it deserved not the name of gospel,* to the love of which they seduced them. They assured them, that they could not be saved without circumcision, and prevailed on them to Judaize so far, as to observe the rites of Moses in various instances.† They took pains to estrange them from Paul, and to draw them over to themselves, and to a worldly spirit of conformity, loving to appear fair in the eyes of men, and seeming to be zealous for good works, not to practise them, but to avoid the persecution which attended the cross of Christ. To give the better effect to their insinuations, they instilled into them disrespectful ideas of Paul as far inferior to the other apostles, and, as it seems, represented the mother church of Jerusalem, with the college of apostles there, as coinciding with themselves in doctrine.

Thus the self-righteous poison, which first issued from Jerusalem, was brought into this distant province, where the ignorance and simplicity of the people unacquainted with Jewish modes and habits, gave it the freest room to operate. These false teachers still called themselves christians, and the mischief which they introduced, seems at first sight no great one. So, I doubt not, some fashionable perversions of evangelical truth at this day, of a similar kind, appear to many to be of no great consequence. It is no fault of mine, that this Galatian delusion appears strongly to resemble

them. I have represented things as they appear to me from the Epistle. The great evil lurking under all this, was the adulteration of the faith of Jesus, and of In no dependance on him alone for all salvation. Epistle does the apostle speak so sharply or express himself so vehemently. It appears to have come warm from a charitable heart, just after the reception of the disagreeable tidings. He professes himself astonished at their defection from Christ; and execrates any man or even angel, who should preach any other way of salvation. If such a person still call himself a christian, and hold the historical facts of the gospel, the case is not altered for the better; the deception only passing more current on that account.* He asserts, that if they mixed circumcision, or any work of the law, with Christ in the article of justification, Christ would be of no effect to them.† He must be their whole Saviour, or he would be nothing; law and grace in this case being quite opposite. He marks the mere worldly nature of the doctrine they were embracing, it would make them mere Jews indeed, proud, self-righteous, void of the love of God and man, and no better in their spiritual state than they were while idolaters. Thus they would lose all the liberty of the gospel, and be mere slaves in religion, like all unconverted persons, whose bottom is merely self-righteous. He points out to them the peculiar nature of the gospel, as perfectly distinct from any thing that mere man is apt to teach or ready to embrace. In the historical part of the Epistle he vindicates his own apostolical character, inculcates throughout in all possible variety of language, and with his usual copiousness, both of clear argument and strong diction, the all-important article of justification, and presses the necessity of continuing in it, in order to be benefited by it. Otherwise we make Christ the minister of sin, or of condemnation, build again what we have destroyed, and, as far as in us lies, make him to have died in vain. He appeals to their own experience of the happy fruits of the gospel, which they had felt

Chap.i. Chap. v. Chap. vi. toward the end. Chap. v. iv. 9

within, and represents himself as travailing in birth for them, till Christ be formed in them. He expresses himself dubious of their state, and desirous of visiting them, that he might adapt his language to their perilous situation. He wishes that their evil advisers were cut off, so mischievous were they to souls, and assures them, that the divine vengeance would overtake them. He informs them, that the persecution, which he himself endured, was on account of this very doctrine. This it was that stirred up the enmity of the human heart; and this doctrine being lost, the gospel becomes a mere name, and christianity is lost in the group of common religions.

It will be proper for us to bear in mind the apostle's reasonings on this subject, and to apply them to every period of church history; since it is evident, that the rise or fall of this great christian article, must determine the vigour or decline of real religion in all ages. He neglects not however in his usual manner to inculcate the necessity of good works, as the just fruits and evidences of a real christian state,* and particularly encourages them to works of mercy, attended with a patient and cheerful prospect into eternity, and animated with genuine charity.†

There is reason to hope, that the best effects attended the Epistle. No very long time after, the apostle again visited these churches, and went over the whole country, strengthening "all the disciples." This is all that I can collect of the history of this church from scripture, except a single hint in another Epistle, in which he recommends to the Corinthians to use the same plan for the relief of the poor saints, which he had suggested to the Galatians. From the influence which he hence appears to have had in Galatia, it is probable, that the Judaical perversion was overcome.

* Chap. v. toward the end. † Chap. vi. Acts xviii. 23. § 1 Cor. xvi. 1.

SECTION VIII.

Philippi.

THE dispensation of the gospel is doubtless the greatest blessing that can be vouchsafed to any country. But the times and the seasons God hath reserved to himself. Even in this sense salvation is of grace; and divine providence alone orders and appoints, that the gospel shall be preached here or there, as he pleases. Paul and Silas, if left to themselves, in their progress to the west, would have evangelized Pergamus or Asia propria and Bithynia, but were prevented by special intimations of the Holy Spirit. They came now to Troas, so called from its being the place, or near the place, where old Troy had stood, by the sea-coast, uncertain whither they should go next, and perhaps little apprehensive, that God now, for the first time, was introducing his gospel into Europe. A nightly vision in which a Macedonian intreated Paul to come over into his country and help them, determined at once their destination. They sailed from Troas to the island of Samothracia, and the next day to Neapolis, a Macedo nian sea-port, whence through the gulf of Strymon they came to Philippi, the first city of that part of Macedonia, which they would meet with in their way from Neapolis. So I understand St. Luke's expression Пpar; for Thessalonica was the capital of Macedonia.

The

city itself, though originally Macedonian, and so named from Philip the father of Alexander, was then a Roman colony, inhabited by Roman citizens, and regulated by Roman laws and customs. The region itself had been renowned for constituting the third of the four great monarchies under the arms of Alexander, and the place itself had been something more than half a century ago the scene of a famous battle between two Roman parties engaged in a civil war. Neither of those seasons

* Acts xvi. 7.

would have been at all convenient for the gospel. The present was a scene of tranquillity and order under the Roman government; and Macedonia, though now only a Roman province, was going to be the subject of transactions infinitely more noble than those which adorn the history of its greatest princes.

The first appearances did not promise any thing remarkable. They spent a few days at first with little prospect of success. They found a few Jews here, who used on the Sabbath-day to frequent an oratory out of the city by the river-side, and some women, religiously disposed, resorted thither. It was the constant method of the apostles to join themselves to Unitarians, wherever they could find them, as the first opening for the gospel of Christ. They did so here and spake to the women. One of them was Lydia, a person of some property. Her heart the Lord opened, that "she "attended to the things which were spoken by Paul." She was baptized with her family, and with affectionate importunity prevailed on the apostle and his companions to make her house their home in Philippi. Here we have the beginnings of the Philippian church; but the conversion was sound and stable, and her progress in the divine life seems of the same kind as that of Cornelius. Vexed at the prospect, Satan employed a girl possessed with a spirit of Python to bring the gospel into contempt, if possible. She constantly followed the christian preachers, and bore them the most honourable testimony. Paul was grieved, as being fully sensible of the ill effect, which a supposed union between Christ and Python* must occasion in the minds of men. He was at length enabled miraculously to eject the demon. The proprietors of the girl who had made a traffic of of her oracular powers, finding that she was dispossessed of the demon, wreaked their vengeance on Paul and Silas, and by slanderous accusations induced the magistrates to scourge them severely, and to commit

The very term leads me to apprehend, that the oracular work of the Pythian Apollo among the Pagans had something diabolical in it; and the story before us demonstrates the reality of such delusions, and that human fraud and sagacity alone are not sufficient to account for them.

VOL. I.

10