Page:Lives of the apostles of Jesus Christ (1836).djvu/180

 have been more successful than Philip, who stood next to the martyred Stephen on the list of the seven Hellenist servants of the church, and who appears to have been second not even to his great fellow-servant in ability and energy. His home was in Caesarea, on the sea-coast; but he had higher objects than merely to take refuge in his own domestic circle; for instead of thus indulging his feelings of natural affection, he also turned his course northward, and made his first sojourn in the city of Samaria, where he immediately began to preach Christ to them, as the common Messiah, so long desired by Samaritans as well as Jews. Here, the people being ruled by no tyrannical sectaries, like the Pharisees and Sadducees, and the various orders of ecclesiastical power in Jerusalem, were left entirely to follow the impulse of their better feelings towards the truth, without the fear of any inquisition into their movements. Under these happy circumstances of religious freedom, they all with one accord gave heed to the preaching of Philip, hearing and seeing the wonderful works of kindness which he did. For foul spirits, which, possessing many sufferers, had long wasted their bodies and deranged their minds, now at the word of this preacher of Christ, came out of many of them, crying with a loud voice in attestation of the irresistible power which had overcome them. Many also that were affected with palsies and that were lame, were healed in the same miraculous manner; so that, in consequence of this removal of so many bodily and spiritual evils, there was great joy in the city, at the arrival of this messenger of mercy. But before the coming of Philip, the people of Samaria had been the subjects of arts of a somewhat different kind, from a man who could claim for his works none of the holy character of disinterested humanity, which belonged to those of the preacher of Christ. This was one Simon, a man who, by the use of some magical tricks, had so imposed upon the simple-minded citizens, that they were profoundly impressed with the notion, which he was anxious to make them believe, namely, that he was a great man. To him they all, both young and old, paid the deepest reverence, in consequence of the triumphant ability displayed by him in the arts of sorcery; and so low were their notions of the nature of miraculous agency, that they concluded that the tricks which he played were tokens of divine interposition in his favor, and universally allowed that he was himself a personification of the mighty power of God. But when Philip came among them, and exhibited the genuine