gh Tarsus
itself enjoyed the privilege of self-government. The number and
variety of the inhabitants were still further increased by the fact
that, like the city of Glasgow, Tarsus was not only a center of
commerce, but also a seat of learning. It was one of the three
principal university cities of the period, the other two being Athens
and Alexandria; and it was said to surpass its rivals in intellectual
eminence. Students from many countries were to be seen in its streets,
a sight which could not but awaken in youthful minds thoughts about the
value and the aims of learning.

16. Who does not see how fit a place this was for the Apostle of the
Gentiles to be born in? As he grew up, he was being unawares prepared
to encounter men of every class and race, to sympathize with human
nature in all its varieties, and to look with tolerance upon the most
diverse habits and customs. In after life he was always a lover of
cities. Whereas his Master avoided Jerusalem and loved to teach on the
mountainside or the shore of the lake, Paul was constantly moving from
one great city to another. Antioch, Ephesus, Athens, Corinth, Rome,
the capitals of the ancient world, were the scenes of his activity.
The words of Jesus are redolent of the country, and teem with pictures
of its still beauty or homely toil--the lilies of the field, the sheep
following the shepherd, the sower in the furrow, the fishermen drawing
their nets; but the language of Paul is impregnated with the atmosphere
of the city and alive with the tramp and hurry of the streets. His
imagery is borrowed from scenes of human energy and monuments of
cultivated life--the soldier in full armor, the athlete in the arena,
the building of houses and temples, the triumphal procession of the
victorious general. So lasting are the associations of the boy in the
life of the man.

17. Paul's Home.--Paul had a certain pride in the place of his birth,
as he showed by boasting on one occasion that he was a citizen of no
mean city. He had a heart formed by nature to feel the warmest glow of
patriotism. Yet it was not for Cilicia and Tarsus that this fire
burned. He was an alien in the land of his birth. His father was one
of those numerous Jews who were scattered in that age over the cities
of the Gentile world, engaged in trade and commerce. They had left the
Holy Land, but they did not forget it. They never coalesced with the
populations among which they dwelt bu