yet already on his arrival at Corinth he had beer away from home several years, and journeyed clear across Asia Minor and into Europe; but now, at last, it is conjectured, it was imperative that he return home at once. Now while the first part of this argument is unquestionably true, there is not a particle of evidence to sustain the conclusion arrived at; yet it must be said that this course of reasoning has all the merits of plausibility and may very well have been the facts of the matter. At any rate, there is not a scintilla of evidence that any shadow fell athwart the friendship of Paul and Silas, or that Silas was ever found wanting in his sacrifices for the Cross. A few years later we find him Peter's amanuensis at Rome and the bearer of his first epistle to "the strangers scattered throughout Pontus, Galatia, Cappadocia, Asia, and Bithynia," in part of which regions he had in earlier years jointly with Paul been the founder of many churches.

And so the after life of Silas abundantly justified St. Paul in choosing him of all men to be the companion of his second missionary journey-the greatest missionary journey in the annals of Christianity.

IV

What the Friendship of Paul and Silas Meant to Each

To Silas the friendship of Paul meant the lifting of himself to Paul's moral hight and outlook, the sharing of Paul's master passion for souls, the privilege of linking his name forever with Paul's second

missionary journey, the opportunity and joy of sharing Paul's labors and perils from Antioch across Asia Minor to Troas, across the Hellespont to Philippi, across Macedonia and Greece to the city of Corinth.

And the friendship of Silas meant to Paul the filling of the void in his heart made by his separation from Barnabas; it meant the closest sympathy and companionship for weary years of labor in many a hostile city, and in journeyings over hundreds of leagues of unknown mountains and perilous valleys. It meant the staunchest assistance in the founding of churches all through Asia Minor, and of the great European churches at Philippi, Thessalonica, and Corinth. It meant the consolidating and perfecting of his abruptly terminated work at Berea, and the counsel freely given together with Timothy's, in the composition of the two letters to the church at Thessalonica, which were written under the joint names and salutations of the three men.

And if, as seems probable, Silas's mission to the many churches of Asia Minor under the direction of St. Peter was after Paul's death, then we have in his friendship with Paul one of the hall-marks of the world significance of a great friendship—the perpetuation of a man's life work through his friends after his own death; for it was among some of these very churches to which Peter wrote, that Paul labored many years, to the care of these that he gave such nights of sleepless anxiety, and to some of them that

he himself wrote in a passion of blood and tears and awful imprecations that Galatian Epistle.

And so it is a fitting close to the life of this friend of Paul's, that our last glimpse of him should find him setting out on a mission to that very field where he and Paul had labored so long and faithfully together, and that his last known work should be a sort of sealing to that departed Christian gladiator of still more fruit in a region which had cost him such labor, anguish, and prayer.

CHAPTER V

Timothy--Paul's Best Loved Friend

The story of Timothy's career is contained in the following books and passages:-Acts 16:1, 20:4, Rom. 16:21, 1 Cor. 4:17, 16:10-11, 2 Cor. 1:1 and 19, Phil. 1:1 and 2:19-23, Col. 1:1-15, 1 Thes. 1:1 and 3:2-6, 2 Thes. 1:1-2, Phm. 1:1-3, and the books of 1st and 2nd Timothy, and Heb. 13:23.

HOU therefore, my son, be strong in the grace that is in Christ Jesus. And the things that thou hast heard of me among many witnesses, the same commit thou to faithful men, who shall be able to teach others also. Thou therefore endure hardness, as a good soldier of Jesus Christ."

So wrote the aged Paul from his dungeon in Rome to his youthful friend Timothy, pastor at Ephesus, scores of leagues away across the seas. The words are found in the last letter the old warrior ever wrote, and were probably penned and dispatched only a few days or weeks before he received his crown. The above quotation contains and illustrates the two profoundest of the world-significant phases of human friendship, those two great princi

ples which we are striving ever to keep prominently before us in our study of St. Paul and those friendships of his which have changed the world:-first, that in a true friendship the stronger friend is ever lifting the weaker and lesser to his own hights of courage and achievement, and so multiplies himself in life; and, second, by thus pouring into the heart and soul of another his one master passion, his own life and mission are perpetuated in the life and mission of his surviving friends and the generations that follow.

The important place held by Timothy in the New Testament and in the early church, is evidenced in many ways, most of which we shall endeavor to touch upon. But superficially Timothy's importance is brought prominently to our notice by the fact that his name occurs in twelve of the twenty-seven books of the New Testament:-Acts, Romans, 1st and 2nd Corinthians, Philippians, Colossians, 1st and 2nd Thessalonians, 1st and 2nd Timothy, Philemon, and Hebrews.

Not one of the Twelve Apostles is named in nearly so many books. In fact the name of no other man is found in so many save that of Paul only which is found in fifteen books:-his own thirteen epistles, and Acts and 2nd Peter. Timothy also holds the unique distinction of being the only man to whom two of the inspired books of Scripture were originally written as private letters of a friend. In making this statement I do not forget that Luke addressed both his Gospel and Acts to "Theophilus."

But