powers; and here it met Bar-Jesus, who sought to oppose it with selfish and quick-witted hostility. Such Jewish impostors, false prophets by old Hebrew statute, abounded in the empire; trading in imposture, pandering to the wily or to the weak-minded. Through that superior religious knowledge which every Jew possessed, or by that quackery which esoteric associates kept secret among themselves, or even by mere trickery and vulgar fortunetelling, they often contrived to obtain both secret and open influence over ignorant, inquisitive, or superstitious minds. Many of the higher classes among the Jews practised these arts, as is shown by the abundant references of the Talmud. The nation which refused Christ's miracles was imposed on by jugglery. It would not have the sun, as he rose upon it and it chased the meteor, flitting through the marshes. It listened not to the divine oracle, and it now crouched to those "that peep and mutter." It spurned away the truth, and there fell upon it a "strong delusion to believe a lie," to give heed "to profane babblings," and occupy itself with "foolish and unlearned questions." The religious instinct sought gratification; and having rejected its appropriate pabulum, but still hungering and clamouring for bread, it got a stone. Throughout the Roman empire religious conviction was shaken; the state-worship no longer impressed; spiritual delusions were breaking up, and in this transitional state impostors found ample scope for the exercise of their ingenuity, and profited by it.

The "deputy of the country" was in these circumstances, and Bar-Jesus-son of Jesus or Joshua, "was with him,”—had attached himself to his court, and pro

bably exercised no little sway over him as a confidential adviser. The proconsul was a "prudent"—or intelligent man, one that thought for himself; he had apparently thrown off the religion of his country, but had adopted none other. He had seen the folly of idolatry, and may have revolted at the filthy Paphian worship, consecrated lust. He had ceased to adore "gods many, and lords many," but had not done homage to the one Jehovah; the altar of Venus no longer charmed him, and yet was he haunted with the inquiry" Wherewith shall I come before the Lord?" The old faith was gone, but it had not been succeeded by a newer and better creed. His soul was groping in darkness, scarce knowing what it yearned after, and uncertain where and how to find the object of its desires. To a mind under such painful and distracting apprehensions, any doctrine claiming divine authority is welcome, and the theology of this Jewish magician must have to some extent commended itself. It brought with it the great truths of the unity and spirituality of the Divine Being—a refreshing doctrine to a mind wearied out with the very names of numberless divinities. But he was not satisfied, and the same desire that brought him under the power of Elymas, and upon which Elymas had traded, led him to send for the preachers of a new religion-to learn what other novelties they introduced, or what deeper mysteries they might expound. He could not be supposed to know much of the gospel, yet he seems to style it "the word of God," for it was in its character of a divine revelation that he wished to hear it. It was not speculation or philosophy that his soul thirsted after, but an oracular intimation of

duty and destiny. He would not be chilled with Stoicism, nor lulled into Epicurean indifference. His anxiety was not to hear hypotheses, or be amused with reverie, but to have something said to him of his religious interests, something which referred itself to a divine source, and brought with it supreme authority.

The addresses or conversations of the evangelists produced a deep impression on the mind of the proconsul. The sorcerer who had arrogated to himself the Arabic term Elymas, or wise man-wizard-a term still applied to the Mahometan doctors in the Turkish empire, could not suffer those impressions to be deepened, but sought by every means to disturb and remove them. His selfish schemes would all vanish if his patron should yield to the teaching of the two strangers. Such an issue must at all hazards be prevented, and therefore the impostor withstood the apostle, and sought to prejudice the mind of the governor against him. He sought "to turn away the deputy from the faith;" he was loath to lose his victim, and struggled hard to retain him in bondage. How he strove to keep his ground is not known; but, perhaps, if the rebuke of Saul have any special reference to the mode of his antagonism, it points to sophistry and malignant insinuation; perversion of facts, and wilful misinterpretation of doctrines and motives; an attempt so to picture the faith in its proofs, precepts, experiences, or results, as to induce the deputy to dislike it, suspect its teachers, and refuse their message. So pertinacious was he and dexterous, that an example must be made of him; and Saul's first miracle must be one of judgment on a spiteful and

irreclaimable adversary. The contest was, whether Elymas the sorcerer or the truth of Christ was to have the ascendancy over the mind of the insular governor. The new power was about to dash and confound the old and cunning errors, and to show its superiority to all that kind of hidden deceit, charms, and "curious arts" with which it might be ignorantly and popularly identified. It was to disentangle itself from all those superstitions which, from Syria and Judea, had overspread the empire. Just as Bar-Jesus was with Sergius Paulus, so had a Syrian seeress been with Marius in his campaigns; so had oriental astrologers been occasionally with Pompey, Cæsar, and Crassus; so had Thrasyllus been with the emperor Tiberius; and Josephus speaks of a Cypriot named Simon who rose into high favour with the governor Felix. The apostle Peter had already unmasked another Simon, and a few years later the Ephesian converts burned their costly books. Banished from Rome again and again, those spiritualists maintained a place in it, for they were feared, and yet courted; and while they were frowned upon, they could not be dispensed with. Thus Saul, the king of Israel, had put down all that had "familiar spirits," and yet, in his extremity, he resorted to a woman reported to have one of them.

Saul, henceforth to be named Paul, has been during this mission rising to a full conception of his apostolical dignity and prerogative. "The Spirit of God came upon him" to do a mightier act than Samson ever did by the same influence. Intensely conscious of his position and what it involved at that awful moment, and looking on the wizard with an eye that read his soul, the anathema burst from

his lips. It was no idle rebuke-his word came with power. The magician might be appalled at the fulmination, but could scarce expect such an instant retribution. Filled with the Holy Ghost-armed with a supernatural power to chastise the incorrigible-Paul said: “O full of all subtilty and all mischief, thou child of the devil, thou enemy of all righteousness, wilt thou not cease to pervert the right ways of the Lord ?" What a concentration of scorn and wrath! every word withers and denounces. O full of all subtilty!—a master of low cunning and ingenious retort; so that he easily turned the edge of the apostle's arguments. He understood the weak points in the character of Sergius Paulus, and knowingly plied him with such objections as should most powerfully tell upon him. Such subtilty is not penetration, and such casuistic ingenuity soon imposes on its possessor, and he comes to have faith in his own coinage. And all mischief-facility of evil-working; he was clever in his mischief. Highest mischief, not to enter into the kingdom himself, nor yet to suffer the proconsul to enter either; infinite harm so to trade on man's spiritual instincts, and tamper with his eternal destiny!

Thou child of the devil-the devil's own; not a child of Jesus the Blessed, as thy name is, but a child of the devil -proving thy lineage by showing thy father's spirit and doing thy father's work, the very work he did in Eden when by hellish craft and falsehood he seduced the first pair to their ruin. He tempted Eve by the tree of knowledge, insinuated into her mind doubts of God's disinterestedness, as if He were jealous lest she should rise to an equality with