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him, (for that this Epistle was written at his first coming to Rome we have shewed elsewhere,) to excite him to a mighty care and fidelity in his business, and in undermining the false and subtile insinuations of seducers. In it he orders Timothy to come to him with all speed to Rome; who accordingly came, and joined with him in the several Epistles written thence to the Philippians, Colossians, and to Philemon; as his name, in the front of those Epistles, does abundantly declare. During his stay at Rome, he was upon some occasion cast into prison, and thence released and set at liberty about the time of St. Paul's enlargement, as he clearly intimates in the close of his Epistle to the Hebrews; after which he came back to Ephesus; nor is it probable that he any more removed from thence, till his translation into heaven. And here it was that he became acquainted with St. John, whose apostolical province mainly lay in Asia, and the parts about Ephesus; and so the Acts, under the name of Polycrates, one of his successors, (doubtless of good antiquity, being those mentioned and made use of by Photius,) report that he conversed with, and was an auditor of, St. John the Divine, who lay in the bosom of our Lord. The Ephesians were people of great looseness and impiety; their manners were wanton and effeminate, profane and prodigal: they banished Herniodorus only because he was more sober and thrifty than the rest; enacting a decree, ‘Let none of ours be thrifty.' They were strangely bewitched with a study of magic, and the art of sorcery and divination; miserably given to idolatry, especially the temple and worship of Diana, for which they were famous through the whole world. Among their many idola

trous festivals there was one called Catagogion, which was celebrated after this manner;-habiting themselves in a rustic dress, and covering their faces with ugly vizors, that they might not be known, with clubs in their hands, they carried idols in a wild and frantic manner up and down the more ancient places of the city, singing certain songs and verses to them; and without any compassion or respect, either to age or sex, setting upon all persons that they met, they beat out their brains, glorying in it as a brave achievement, and a great honour to their gods. This cursed and execrable custom gave just offence to all pious and good men, especially St. Timothy, whose spirit was grieved to see God so openly dishonoured, human nature sunk into such a deep degeneracy, and so arbitrarily transported to the most savage barbarities by the great murderer of souls. The good man oft endeavoured to reclaim them by lenitive and mild entreaties; but, alas! gentle physic works little upon a stubborn constitution. When that would not do, out he comes to them into the midst of the street, upon one of these fatal solemnities, and reproves them with some necessary sharpness and severity; but cruelty and licentiousness are too headstrong to brook opposition; impatient of being controlled in their wild extravagances, they fall upon him with their clubs, beat and drag him up and down, and then leave him for dead; whom some Christians finding yet to breathe, took up and lodged him without the gate of the city, when the third day after he expired. He suffered martyrdom on the thirtieth day of the fourth month. It happened, as some will have it, in the time of Nerva; while others more probably referred it to the

reign of Domitian,-it being done before St. John's return from his banishment in Patmos, which was about the beginning of Nerva's reign. Being dead, the Christians of Ephesus took his body, and decently interred it in a place called Pion, (Piron, says Isidore, who adds, that it was a mountain,) where it securely rested for some ages, till Constantine the Great, or, as others, his own son Constantius, caused it to be removed to Constantinople, and laid up, together with those of St. Andrew and St. Luke, in the great church erected by Constantine to the holy apostles."

Tuesday in Holy-Week.

LAST OPPORTUNITIES. OUR LORD'S WORDS
IN THE TEMPLE.

PASSAGES FROM HOLY SCRIPTURE.

“THE Lord whom ye seek shall suddenly come to His temple, even the Messenger of the covenant, whom ye delight in: behold, He shall come, saith the Lord of hosts.

“But who may abide the day of His coming? and who shall stand when He appeareth? for He is like a refiner's fire, and like fuller's sope: and He shall sit as a refiner and purifier of silver: and He shall purify the sons of Levi, and purge them as gold and silver,

that they may offer unto the Lord an offering in righteousness.

"Then shall the offering of Judah and Jerusalem be pleasant unto the Lord, as in the days of old, and as in former years.

"And I will come near to you to judgment: and I will be a swift witness against the sorcerers, and against the adulterers, and against false swearers, and against those that oppress the hireling in his wages, the widow, and the fatherless, and that turn aside the stranger from his right, and fear not Me, saith the Lord of hosts.

"For I am the Lord, I change not; therefore ye sons of Jacob are not consumed."

"Jesus went into the temple of God, and cast out all them that sold and bought in the temple, and overthrew the tables of the money-changers, and the seats of them that sold doves, and said unto them, It is written, My house shall be called the house of prayer; but ye have made it a den of thieves."

"And the blind and the lame came to Him in the temple; and He healed them."

"And when the chief priests and scribes saw the wonderful things that He did, and the children crying in the temple, and saying, Hosanna to the son of David; they were sore displeased, and said unto Him, Hearest Thou what these say? And Jesus saith unto them, Yea; have ye never read, Out of the mouth of babes and sucklings Thou hast perfected praise ?"

"And when He was come into the temple, the chief priests and the elders of the people came unto Him as He was teaching, and said, By what authority

doest Thou these things? and who gave Thee this authority ?"

"And He looked up, and saw the rich men casting their gifts into the treasury. And He saw also a certain poor widow casting in thither two mites.

"And He said, Of a truth I say unto you, that this poor widow hath cast in more than they all: for all these have of their abundance cast in unto the offerings of God: but she of her penury hath cast in all the living that she had."

MEDITATION ON OUR BLESSED LORD IN THE TEMPLE.

"Thus in the vestibule of His temple, in the house of alms, He that sat in His temple as the refiner and purifier of silver hath set the value and marked the nature of eternal treasure. Nor was this incident unworthy to occupy so great a place in the Divine dispensation; that He should call unto Him His disciples, and with them all that would wish to be so from the beginning to the end of time, to set before them this decision of the eternal Judge. By this action, the forerunner and token of His great judgment, He points out to them, as in the scales of the sanctuary, the true value of human charity, as it shall be found when He shall call' unto Him 'the heavens from above, and the earth, that He may judge His people;' when He shall bring His saints with Him, and His disciples shall be His assessors in the judgment. Nor was the principle itself one unimportant in human philosophy; for the great heathen master of ethics, though he considered liberality to depend on the means of the giver, stumbled especially on this point, thinking that worldly riches

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