Luke, after fulfilling the mission to Corinth, returns to Philippi with the contributions, and is there joined by St. Paul, whom he accompanies to Jerusalem; his journey thither is circumstantially related in the Acts, xx. 6. to xxi. 17., and need not be repeated here.

St. Luke, as usual, is entirely silent respecting his own proceedings. There are, however, the strongest reasons for believing that, during the two years of St. Paul's imprisonment at Cæsarea, he composed his Gospel.

There are several indications in that work which tend to prove that it was written in Judea. In the first place, he tells us in his preface that his object was to give an account of "the things which had been accomplished amongst us ” (πεπληροφορημένων εν ήμιν πραγματων), showing that he was then writing in the scene of the events. In the next place, his descriptions are those of a person familiar with the localities, and who was upon the spot at the time of writing: thus, in relating the triumphant entry of our Lord into Jerusalem, he informs us of the exact place where the attendant multitudes burst out into Hosannas it was on "the descent of the Mount of Olives" (Luke xix. 37.), a circumstance only noticed by him. The last proof of the Judean origin of the Gospel is the manner in which he makes use of the national denomination, "the Jews," as compared with the use he makes of it in the Acts. A person writing in the country does not think of giving the national denomination to its inhabitants, except in cases where it is unavoidable; but writing out of it he very naturally does. Now in the Gospel St. Luke only uses the word "Jew" five times, and that in cases where he could not help it namely, "the King of

the Jews," ""the elders of the Jews," "a city of the Jews;" but he never uses it when speaking of the people in general. In the Acts, on the other hand, it is used no less than eighty-two times.

I infer from these indications that St. Luke's Gospel was written in Judea; but if so, it must have been written before he quitted it with St. Paul on his voyage to Rome, for there is no later period to which its composition can be referred. It was therefore written between A.D. 58 and A.D. 60, under circumstances of all others the most favourable for historical investigation, on the spot where the transactions took place, and with constant opportunities of intercourse with those chiefly engaged in them. To this beloved friend of the Great Apostle of the Gentiles, himself, as I have shown, a leading member of the mission which first bore the light of the Gospel into Europe, every means of information at that time in the possession of living witnesses must have been accessible.

In the narrative of the voyage we have a minute account of the events of the life of St. Luke till the arrival of St. Paul at Rome, and we learn from the Epistles to the Colossians and Philemon that he was still there when they were written. The only subsequent notice in Scripture respecting him is that in 2 Tim. iv. 11., where we are told that he alone was with the apostle in the very crisis of his fate, "when the time of his departure was at hand," and when all but Luke had forsaken him. From his not being included in the greetings to the Philippians, it has been inferred, with great probability, that he had previously left Rome. This is confirmed by his silence as to the events alluded to in Philip. i. 12., as "having

fallen out unto the furtherance of the Gospel." St. Luke mentions the results of these events when he states that St. Paul taught the "things which concern the Lord Jesus Christ with all confidence, no man forbidding him" (Acts, xxviii. 31.). We can only account for this silence by supposing that he was not present when they took place. The change of style also, from that of an eye-witness, when he relates what took place on their arrival at Rome, to that of a historian, when he gives an account of the two succeeding years, points to the same conclusion.

When St. Paul ascertained that his case could not come before the Emperor for a considerable length of time, and that till it was decided he was in no personal danger, we find that his first care was to despatch Tychicus to the churches in Asia Minor. We may suppose that Luke would be sent on a similar mission; but if so, the church at Philippi is clearly the one to which conjecture would lead us. Now, there is, I think, very strong reason for believing that he actually was there when the epistle to that church was written, and that the "true yoke-fellow " (iv. 3.), addressed in it, was no other than St. Luke. Had it been a Philippian presbyter that was meant, we must suppose that he would have named him; whereas, if he sent Luke to the Philippians, as he did Tychicus to the Asiatic churches, it would be unnecessary. The terms in which the message is expressed show clearly that it was addressed to one of the class of St. Paul's friends to which St. Luke belonged; and from the evident allusions to what took place on his former visit to Philippi (compare Philip. iv. 3., with Acts, xvi. 13.), it must have been one of those who were with him at the time. Now, we know

very accurately those who were the members of the mission. It consisted at first of Paul and Silas. Timothy joined them at Lystra (Acts, xvi. 1.), and the author of the Acts at Troas (Ib. v. 10.). There is no mention of any other of the apostle's companions; nor does St. Luke's style of narration afford any warrant for supposing that there were any except those mentioned. The true yoke-fellow must, therefore, have been either Timothy, Silas, or Luke. Timothy it could not be, for he was at Rome when St. Paul wrote the epistle (2 Cor. i. 1.). Neither, I apprehend, could it be Silas; he disappears from the page of sacred history at least ten years before the date of the epistle, a circumstance which could not have happened had he continued a fellow-labourer of St. Paul. The last time we hear of him is with St. Paul at Corinth, where he wrote the Second Epistle to the Thessalonians, about A.D. 56., in which city he preached along with St. Paul (see 2 Cor. i. 19.), and where he appears to have remained. After St. Paul's departure, he probably returned to Jerusalem, and joined St. Peter, for next time we hear of him is in connection with that apostle (1 Peter, v. 12.). We are thus led to fix upon St. Luke. The very terms of the message point to one who was a beloved friend as well as a fellow-labourer.

Assuming that the true yoke-fellow and the author of the Acts are identical, we are furnished with the date of the Acts, both with respect to time and place. It was written, or at any rate finished, at Philippi, and sent from thence to Theophilus, in the summer of A.D. 63. It ends in one respect abruptly, as every history written by a contemporary inevitably must; but in so far as respects

the history of the progress of the Gospel, which it was the author's object to record, the work is brought down to a period at that time certainly the brightest which had yet occurred in its annals. In order to estimate its importance, we must lay aside our knowledge of subsequent events, and view it from the same point as the author did, and, as far as we can, enter into it with the same feelings. His object in the Acts was to record the progress of Christianity, as it had been his object in his "former treatise" to record its rise. He begins the Acts when the number of Christians together was about an hundred and twenty, and traces the progress of the Gospel throughout Syria, Asia Minor, into Europe. At the first planting of a Christian church in this quarter of the globe Luke himself assisted; and we have every reason for believing that he continued to labour with success in the same field; that the church at Philippi, with which he was more immediately connected, had received the unqualified approbation of St. Paul; that other churches had sprung up in Macedonia and the more distant regions of Greece; and that the Great Apostle of the Gentiles, he whose career it was his special object to narrate, was then in the capital of the civilised world, "preaching the kingdom of God, and teaching those things which concern the Lord Jesus Christ with all confidence, no man forbidding him." If we can divest ourselves of our knowledge of the persecutions which were so soon to follow, it is difficult to imagine a conjuncture which afforded brighter prospects of the success of the cause in which he laboured.

As a history, therefore, "the Acts" concludes at a well