Page:Lives of the apostles of Jesus Christ (1836).djvu/391



On the question of Matthew's identity with Levi, Michaelis is full. (Int. III. iv. 1.) Fabricius (Biblioth. Graec. IV. vii. 2,) discusses the question quite at length, and his annotators give abundance of references to authors, in detail, in addition, to those mentioned by himself, in the text.

HIS CALL.

The circumstances of his call, as narrated by himself, are represented as occurring at or near Capernaum. "Jesus, passing out of the city, saw a man named Matthew, sitting at the receipt of custom, and he said to him,—'Follow me.' And he arose, and followed him." This account shows Matthew's occupation, which is also known from the title of "the tax-gatherer," annexed to his name, in his own list of the apostles. This was an occupation which, though unquestionably a source of great profit to those employed in it, and consequently as much sought after as such offices are in these days, and in this country, was always connected with a great deal of popular odium, from the relation in which they stood to the people, in this profitable business. The class of collectors to which Matthew belonged, in particular, being the mere toll-gatherers, sitting to collect the money, penny by penny, from the unwilling people, whose national pride was every moment wounded by the degrading foreign exactions of the Romans, suffered under a peculiar ignominy, and were supposed to have renounced all patriotism and honor, in stooping, for the base purposes of pecuniary gain, to act as instruments of such a galling form of servitude, and were therefore visited with a universal popular hatred and scorn. A class of men thus deprived of all character for honor and delicacy of feeling, would naturally grow hardened, beyond all sense of shame; and this added to the usual official impudence which characterizes all mean persons, holding a place which gives them the power to annoy others, the despised publicans would generally repay this spite, on every occasion, which could enable them to be vexatious to those who came in contact with them. Yet out of this hated class, Jesus did not disdain to take at least one,—perhaps more,—of those whom he chose for the express purpose of building up a pure faith, and of evangelizing the world. No doubt, before the occasion of this call, Matthew had been a frequent hearer of the words of truth which fell from the divinely eloquent lips of the Redeemer,—words that had not been without a purifying and exalting effect on the heart of the publican, though long so degraded by daily and hourly familiarity with meanness and vice. And so weaned was his soul from the love of the gainful pursuit to which he had