THE PSYCHOLOGY OF ST. PAUL. 



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Discussion. 



Dr. A. WrTHERS Green : A few years ago I heard a celebrated 

 Nonconformist minister in an evening Gospel Service declare that 

 the road of the Damascus journey and interview was not that of a 

 real transaction, but of an imaginary mental one. Now comes in 

 print from an Anglican divine in high status a similar trifling with 

 the wonderful account. To our forefathers the event was very 

 real, for you may see on the pediments over the western entrance 

 of St. Paul's Cathedral the facts depicted in stone in plain 

 detail. To them all was as certain as the cock which crowed 

 thrice, which is also to be found behind St. Peter to the north, 

 and by the side of St. Paul. Those who suggest that Saul of Tarsus 

 was the subject of an epileptic trance display their ignorance. 

 St. Luke doubtless knew that in epilepsy consciousness is lost and 

 that at the end of a seizure, when reason returns, the past fit 

 remains a perfect blank with no memory to record it. So that the 

 medicus carissimus and companion of St. Paul and author of the 

 Acts of the Apostles would know how true and substantial was his 

 friend St. Paul's graphic description. 



Mr. M. L. Rouse thought that though it might seem as if Paul 

 was compelled to become a Christian by the blinding heavenly light 

 and the Divine voice and words, they ought not to forget that he 

 afterwards said to Festus and Agrippa, " I was not disobedient to 

 the heavenly vision." So, had he chosen, there was a possibility of 

 his rejecting the mercy and grace which the Lord had offered him. 

 Paul's " thorn in the flesh " was, he thought, defective eyesight, but 

 Sir William Ramsay considered that it was epilepsy. 



Mr. John Tennant wished to correct Mr. Rouse. Prof. Ramsay 

 had suggested that St. Paul was afflicted with malaria, not epilepsy. 



Prof. Langhorne Orchard reminded the Meeting that St. Paul, 

 alluding to his sight of Our Lord on the way to Damascus, 

 associated it with historical facts. He points out that Christ died 

 for our sins, that He was buried, that He rose again the third day, 

 and that He was seen by many witnesses on different occasions. 

 Last of all St. Paul records, " He was seen of me also, as of one born 

 out of due time." He adds this as an historical fact to the four 

 historical facts just mentioned. He was not the man to base a 

 serious faith upon an imaginary foundation. And his great knowledge 



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