Page:Lives of the apostles of Jesus Christ (1836).djvu/23

 *ceived, under the personal instruction of their master, had fitted them mainly for this very warfare; and they had seen him, times without number, sweep away all these refuges of lies. But, with the polished and truly learned philosophers of Athens, or the majestic lords of Rome, they would have felt the want of that minute knowledge of the characters and manners of both Greeks and Romans, with which Paul was so familiar, by the circumstances of his birth and education, in a city highly favored by Roman laws and Grecian philosophy. Thus was it wisely ordained, for the complete foundation and rapid extension of the gospel cause, that for each great field of labor there should be a distinct set of men, each peculiarly well fitted for their own department of the mighty work. And by such divinely sagacious appointments, the certain and resistless advance of the faith of Christ was so secured, and so wonderfully extended beyond the deepest knowledge, and above the brightest hopes of its chief apostles, that at this distant day, in this distant land, far beyond the view even of the prophetic eye of that age, millions of a race unknown to them, place their names above all others, but one, on earth and in heaven; and to spread the knowledge of the minute details of their toils and triumphs, the laborious scholar should search the recorded learning of eighteen hundred years, and bring forth the fruits in the story of their lives.

With such limitations and expansions of the term, then, this book attempts to give the history of the lives of the apostles. Of some who are thus designated, little else than their names being known, they can have no claim for a large space on these pages; while to a few, whose actions determined the destiny of millions, and mainly effected the establishment of the Christian faith, the far greater part of the work will be given.

The of this work should be found in all that has been written on the subject of New Testament history, since the scriptural canon was completed. But "who is sufficient for these things?" A long life might find abundant employment in searching a thousand libraries, and compiling from a hundred thousand volumes, the facts and illustrations of this immense and noble subject; and then the best energies of another long life would be needed to bring the mighty masses into form, and give them in a narrative for the mind of the unlearned. What, then, is here attempted, as a substitute for this immensity? To give a clear distinct narrative of each apostle's life, with such illustrations o