are, the unaffectedness and
simplicity with which the author notes his presence upon certain
occasions, and the entire absence of art and design from these notices,
would have been sufficient to persuade my mind that, whoever he was, he
actually lived in the times, and occupied the situation, in which he
represents himself to be. When I say, "whoever he was," I do not mean to
cast a doubt upon the name to which antiquity hath ascribed the Acts of
the Apostles (for there is no cause, that I am acquainted with, for
questioning it), but to observe that, in such a case as this, the time
and situation of the author are of more importance than his name; and
that these appear from the work itself, and in the most unsuspicious
form.

II. That this account is a very incomplete account of the preaching and
propagation of Christianity; I mean, that if what we read in the history
be true, much more than what the history contains must be true also.
For, although the narrative from which our information is derived has
been entitled the Acts of the Apostles, it is, in fact, a history of the
twelve apostles only during a short time of their continuing together at
Jerusalem; and even of this period the account is very concise. The work
afterwards consists of a few important passages of Peter's ministry, of
the speech and death of Stephen, of the preaching of Philip the deacon;
and the sequel of the volume, that is, two thirds of the whole, is taken
up with the conversion, the travels, the discourses, and history of the
new apostle, Paul; in which history, also, large portions of time are
often passed over with very scanty notice.

III. That the account, so far as it goes, is for this very reason more
credible. Had it been the author's design to have displayed the early
progress of Christianity, he would undoubtedly have collected, or at
least have set forth, accounts of the preaching of the rest of the
apostles, who cannot without extreme improbability be supposed to have
remained silent and inactive, or not to have met with a share of that
success which attended their colleagues.

To which may be added, as an observation of the same kind,

IV. That the intimations of the number of converts, and of the success
of the preaching of the apostles, come out for the most part
incidentally: are drawn from the historian by the occasion, such as the
murmuring of the Grecian converts; the rest from persecution; Herod's
death; the sending of