his friend to bring his old cloak from Troas, and to do his
diligence to come before winter.

Unpopular, pure, and penniless, if the gospel story were not true, how
could it have had preachers? They at least believed it.

The last and most convincing testimony which any man can give to the
truth of a statement of fact is to suffer rather than deny it. Many have
wondered why God allowed his dear servants to suffer so much persecution
in the first ages of the Church. One principal reason was to give future
ages an irresistible proof of the sincerity and faithfulness of the
witnesses for Christ. The apostles lived lives of persecution and
suffering for the name of Jesus; sufferings which they might have
avoided if they had only abstained from preaching any more in this name.
But, said they, "We can not but speak of the things which we have seen
and heard." One who had no personal acquaintance with Jesus, and whose
first interview with him was while he was breathing out threatening and
slaughter against the disciples of the Lord, is converted and called to
be an apostle; and behold the prospect Jesus presents to him, "I will
show him _how great things he must suffer for my name_." "The Holy Ghost
testifieth," says Paul, "that in every city bonds and afflictions abide
me. Yet none of these things move me." That at least was a true
prophecy. "Seven times," says Clement, "he was in bonds, he was whipt,
he was stoned; he preached both in the East and West, leaving behind him
the glorious report of his faith, and so having taught the whole world
righteousness, and for that end traveled even to the utmost bounds of
the West, he at last suffered martyrdom by the command of the governors,
and went to his holy place, having become a most eminent pattern of
patience to all ages."[80] Hear his own appeal to those who envied his
authority in the church, "Are they ministers of Christ, I am more: in
labors more abundant, in stripes above measure, in prisons more
frequent, in deaths often. Of the Jews five times received I forty
stripes save one. Thrice was I beaten with rods, once was I stoned,
thrice I suffered shipwreck, a night and a day I have been in the deep:
in journeyings often, in perils of waters, in perils of robbers, in
perils by my own countrymen, in perils by the heathen, in perils in the
city, in perils in the wilderness, in perils in the sea, in perils among
false brethren; in weariness and painfulness, in watchings often