Page:Lives of the apostles of Jesus Christ (1836).djvu/517

 Seleucia, the nearest port, only twelve miles from Antioch, and there embarked for the island of Cyprus, the eastern end of which is not more than eighty miles from the coast of Syria. The circumstance that more particularly directed them first to this island, was probably that it was the native home of Barnabas, and with this region therefore he would feel so much acquainted as to know its peculiar wants, and the facilities which it afforded for the advancement of the Christian cause; and he would also know where he might look for the most favorable reception. Landing at Salamis, on the south-eastern part of the island, they first preached in the synagogues of the Jews, who were very numerous in Cyprus, and constituted so large a part of the population of the island, that some years afterwards they attempted to get complete possession of it, and were put down only by the massacre of many thousands. Directing their efforts first to these wandering sheep of the house of Israel, the apostles everywhere preached the gospel in the synagogues, never forsaking the Jews for the Gentiles, until they had been driven away by insult and injury, that thus the ruin of their nation might lie, not upon the apostles, but upon them only, for their rejection of the repeated offers of salvation. Here, it would seem, they were joined by John Mark, the nephew of Barnabas, who was probably staying upon the island at that time, and who now accompanied them as an assistant in their apostolic ministry. Traversing the whole island from east to west, they came to Paphos, a splendid city near the western end, famed for the magnificent temple and lascivious worship of the Paphian Venus, a deity to whom all Cyprus was consecrated; and from it she derived one of her numerous appellatives, Cypris being a name under which she was frequently worshipped; and the females of the island generally, were so completely devoted to her service, not merely in temple-worship, but in life and manners, that throughout the world, the name ''Cyprian woman'', even to this day, is but a polite expression for one abandoned to wantonness and pleasure. The worship of this lascivious goddess, the apostles now came to exterminate, and to plant in its stead the dominion of a faith, whose essence is purity of heart and action. At this place, preaching the gospel with openness, they soon attracted such general notice, that the report of their remarkable character soon reached the ears of the proconsul of Cyprus, then resident in Paphos. This great Roman governor, by name Sergius Paulus, was a man of intelligence and