PARAPHRASE II. 12-16.-"I came to Troas, and had a great field open before me. But I was so anxious for news from you, that not finding Titus there, I passed over the Egean, and came to Europe. There, thanks be to God, I heard the tidings that out of my feeble efforts God had brought the spectacle of a glorious triumph, and that the incense of the triumphal sacrifice in my life and teaching had penetrated far and wide. Alas! that there should be a darker side; for to some it is not the scent of life and health, but of poison and death."

In these few abrupt words we have a glimpse of the outward scene which witnessed events and feelings on which the whole of this Epistle is founded. It is but a glimpse, closed almost as soon as revealed. We cannot dwell, as else we should wish, on the striking thought of the Apostle standing day by day on the wooded shores of that classic region, under the heights of Ida, vainly expecting the white sail of the ship which was to bring back his friend from Corinth. We cannot allow ourselves to thread with him the maze of the lofty islands of Lemnos, and Tenedos, and Samothrace, as he sought once more the great continent to which, from that same city of Troas, he had five years before been invited by the vision of the Macedonian stranger. The more striking are these associations to us, the more conclusive is the proof which the absence of any such allusions in this Epistle furnishes, of their slight effect on the mind of the Apostle. Even the description of

the actual meeting with Titus, so full of dramatic interest, is dissolved in the burst of thankfulness which expresses itself in imagery not borrowed from the neighbouring localities, but from the gorgeous spectacles in the Imperial City as yet unseen and remote.

But perhaps the most remarkable feature of the passage is the sudden transition from the bright to the dark side of the picture, from the thought of the benefits to the thought of the evil effects of his teaching. Probably here, as elsewhere in this Epistle, his consciousness of the sympathy between himself and the Corinthian Church is checked by the recollection of his opponents. which immediately afterwards comes openly to view. and interrupts by a long digression the joyous strain on which he had just entered. But this feeling of the double aspect of Christianity, of its failures side by side with its successes, of its judgments and responsibilities side by side with its blessings and privileges, is characteristic, not only of this juncture of the Apostle's life, nor of his writings only, but of all parts of the New Testament. "The falling and rising again of many in Israel," "a sword" and "a fire upon earth," "the Son of man finding no faith when he comes," are amongst the many instances in which, as here, a shade of pensive and melancholy foreboding goes along with the most triumphant exultation; most unlike the unqualified confidence and security of the partial and one-sided views of Religion, which, within or without the pale of Christianity, have from time to time appeared,—most like the mingled fortunes of good and evil which have been the actual condition of Christendom, as recorded in history.

(II.) DIGRESSION ON THE APOSTOLICAL MISSION. II. 16-VI. 10.

(1.) The Plainness and Clearness of the Apostolical Service. II. 16-IV. 6.

16 καὶ πρὸς ταῦτα τίς ἱκανός; 17 οὐ γάρ ἐσμεν ὡς οἱ πολλοὶ

A double train of thought here comes across him, and, as it were, chokes his further utterance. First, there is the consciousness roused within him, by his own impassioned expressions, of the greatness and responsibility of his mission. This vents itself in the question "And who is sufficient for these things?" (kal πρὸς ταῦτα τίς ἱκανός;) The abruptness of the connexion is shown by the abruptness of the construction. (For a similar use of xal, compare ii. 2., xal τίς ὁ εὐφραίνων ;) "These things" (TavTa) relate to the responsibilities just described.

But, secondly, this sense of the greatness of his mission, and of his own inadequacy to fulfil it, is blended with the thought (latent in the previous verses) of the calumnious insinuations and evil designs of his opponents, so as to call out the feeling that, though he was not worthy, much less were they; that though he was not worthy, he still was free from the charges of dishonesty and meanness which they brought against him; that though he was not worthy

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in himself, yet he was worthy
by the help of God, who
had, raised him to a level
with the office to which he
had been called.
had been called. The conflu-
ence of these three contrasts
is protracted from ii. 17. to iv.
6., and thus the direct an-
swer which might have been
expected to the question in
ii. 16.,—(“In his own strength
no one is sufficient,") is in fact
exchanged for the suppressed
answer [I am sufficient],
for I stand on a ground
quite different from that of
my opponents, or from that
which they ascribe to me."
But still the direct answer is
given by implication, in iii. 5.
6., where he explains in what
sense he was, and was not,
"sufficient;" and the whole
course of the argument, show-
ing how, in spite of all weak-
nesses and difficulties, he was
enabled to accomplish the vast
work set before him, is re-
sumed in iv. 1. for a moment,
and then at still greater length
in iv. 7.-16. That the argu-
ment is continuous from ii.
16., through c. iii., is evident
from the recurrence of ikavòs
in iii. 5. 6.

καπηλεύοντες τὸν λόγον τοῦ θεοῦ, ἀλλ ̓ ὡς ἐξ εἰλικρινείας, ἀλλ ̓ ὡς ἐκ θεοῦ κατέναντι θεοῦ ἐν χριστῷ λαλοῦμεν.

* κατενώπιον τοῦ Θεοῦ,

III. 1'Αρχόμεθα πάλιν ἑαυτοὺς συνιστᾶν ; ἢ μὴ χρήζομεν ὡς [πέρ] τινες συστατικῶν ἐπιστολῶν πρὸς ὑμᾶς ἢ ἐξ ὑμῶν;