FIRST EPISTLE TO TlilOTHY. 173 



Macedonia, before he wrote his epistle to the Coriuthia:is, 

 that supposition is inconsistent with the terms and tenor of 

 the epistle throughout ; for the writer speaks unifbrriily of 

 his intention to return to Timothy at Ephesus, and not of 

 his expecting Timothy to come to him in Macedonia* 

 "These things write I unto thee, hojnng to come unto thee 

 slwrtly: but if I tarry long, that thou may est know how 

 Ihou oughtest to behave thyself in ihe house of God." Chap. 

 3 : 14, 15. " Till I come, give attendance to reading, to 

 exhortation, to doctrine." Chap. 4 : 13. 



Since, therefore, the leaving of Timothy beliind at Ephc' 

 sus when Paul went into Macedonia, suits not with any 

 journey into Macedonia recorded in the Acts, I concur with 

 Bishop Pearson in placing the date of this epistle and the 

 journey referred to in it, at a period subsequent to St. Paul's 

 first imprisonment at Rome, and consequently subsequent to 

 the era up to which the Acts of the Apostles brings his his- 

 tory. The only difficulty which attends our opinion is, that 

 St. Paul must, according to us, have come to Ephesus after 

 his liberation at Rome, contrary, as it should seem, to what 

 he foretold to the Ephesian elders, that " they should see his 

 face no more." And it is to save the infallibility of this 

 prediction,- and for no other reason of weight, that an earlier 

 date is assigned to this epistle. The prediction itself, how- 

 ever, when considered in connection with the circumstances 

 under which it was delivered, does not seem to demand so 

 much anxiety. The words in question are found in tho 

 twenty-fifth verse of the twentieth chapter of the Acts : 

 "And now, behold, I know that ye all, among whom I 

 have gone preaching the kingdom of God, shall see my face 

 no more." In the twenty-second and twenty-third verses 

 of the same chapter, that is, two verses before, the apostle 

 makes this declaration: "And now, behold, I go bound in 

 the spirit unto Jerusalem, not knowing the things that shall 

 befall me there : save that the Holy Ghost witnesseth iu 

 every city, saying, that bonds and afflictions abide me." This 



