and
cruel mutilations. And when they adopted Christianity, though their
morality was generally austere, their credulity was intense. In the
2nd century many of them embraced the new revelations of Montanus, and
in the 4th they largely affected the hard Puritanism of Novatian. In
religious matters the Celts are very little {152} inclined to
fickleness, and their superstitions are more closely connected with
dreaminess than with vehemence.

The following facts also deserve attention; (1) It would be strange if
Acts gave us no account of Churches in which St. Paul took so much
interest. If Galatia be North Galatia, there is no such account in
Acts. If it be South Galatia there is, and the polite and natural
manner of addressing the inhabitants of the cities of Antioch, Derbe,
etc., would be "Galatians." Their bond of union was association in one
Roman province. (2) It is improbable that St. Paul would take the very
difficult journey necessary for visiting the Celtic Galatians. His
usual plan was to travel on Roman high-roads to the big centres of
population. North Galatia was both isolated and half-civilized. Also,
he says that he visited the Galatians on account of an illness (iv.
13). It is incredible that he would have chosen the long unhealthy
journey to North Galatia when he was ill. But it is extremely probable
that he left the damp lowlands of Pamphylia for the bracing air of
Pisidian Antioch. The malady was probably the malarial neuralgia and
fever which are contracted in those lowlands. (3) The Epistle contains
technical legal terms for adoption, covenant, and tutor, which seem to
be used not in the Roman but in the Greek sense.[1] They would hardly
be intelligible except in cities like those of South Galatia where the
institutions were mainly Greek.

Assuming that the "Galatians" are those of South Galatia, we note that
in Gal. iv. 13 St. Paul speaks of preaching to them "the first time."
This first time must be the occasion mentioned in Acts xiii., xiv. The
second time is that in Acts xvi. 1-6. The Christians were mainly
converts from heathenism (iv. 8; v. 2; vi. 12), but some were no doubt
Jews or proselytes. {153} After the second visit of St. Paul, his
converts were tampered with. Some Judaizers had put a perverse
construction upon his action in promulgating the decrees of the Council
of Jerusalem of A.D. 49, and in circumcising Timothy. They urged that
St. Paul had thereby acknowledged