The life and work of St. Paul

SECOND EPISTLE TO THE CORINTHIANS. 417
authority than Paul, who claimed that he had in no respect fallen short of the most
super-apostolic Apostles.i A mere laic in eloquence he might be, but there was at
them was
any rate no defect in his knowledge ; and the proof of this as regards
obvious in everything among all men,* unless, indeed, he had transgressed by humiliating
himself for their exaltation by preaching to them gratuitously. Other
Churches he plundered, preaching to the Corinthian, and being paid his wages by
others. And though he was in positive want while among them, he did not benumb
them with his exactions, as though he were some gymnotus, but was helped by
Macedonians, and kept and would keep himsolf from laying any burden whatever
on them. That boast no one should obstruct, 3 not (God knows) because he did not
love them, but because he would cut off the handle from those who wanted a handle,
and that, in this topic of boasting, he and his opponents might be on equal grounds.
The last remark is a keen sarcasm, since, if they charged Paul with taking money,
they charged him with the very thing which he did not do, and which they did.*
"For such," ho adds with passionate severity, "are false Apostles, deceitful workers,
transforming themselves into Apostles of Christ { nor is this to be wondered at, for
Satan himself transforms himself into an angel of light.* It is no great thing then,
if alsp His ministers transform themselves as ministers of righteousness, whose end
shall be according to their works. Again I say, Let no one think mo a fool ; or, if
you do, receive me even as you would receive a fool, that I too, as well as they, may
boast a little." He claims nothing lofty or sacred or spiritual for this determined
boasting. It was a folly, but not one of his own choosing. Since many adopted
this worldly style of boasting, he would meet them with their own weapons and the
;
Corinthians, since they were so wise, would, he was sure, gladly tolerate mere harmless
fools, seeing that they tolerated people much more objectionable people who
enslaved, devoured, 5 took them in people who assumed the most arrogant pretensions
people who smote them in tho
"
face.' Of course all this ia to my discredit,
it shows how weak I was in not adopting a similar line of conduct. Yet, speaking
in this foolish way, I possess every qualification which inspires them with this
audacity. I, like them, am a Hebrew, an Israelite, of the seed of Abraham 8 I ani
;
not only, as they claim to be, a minister of Christ, but (I am speaking in downright
madness) something more." And then follows the most marvellous fragment ever
written of any biography a ; fragment beside which the most imperilled lives of the
most suffering saints shrink into insignificance, and which shows us how fractional
at the best is onr knowledge of the details of St. Paul's life "in toils moro
of
abundantly, in stripes above measure, in prisons more abundantly, in deaths oft ;
tho Jews five times received I forty stripes save one ; thrice was I beaten with rods ;
once was I stoned thrice I suffered ; shipwreck a ; night and day have I spent in
the deep; 9 in journeyings often ; in perils of rivers, in perils of robbers, in perils
i xi. 5, ruv vtrepXiof 'AworToAaM/j literally " the extra-super Apostles." There is undoubtedly
a sense qf indignation in the use, twice over, of t&is strange colloquialism ; but it is aimed, not at the
Twelve, with whom St. Paul's relations were always courteous and respectful, but at tho extravagant
and purely human claims (mere superiority, Kara, }