in the trials and sufferings of their leaders; as to suppose that while
the leaders submitted to manual labor, to buffeting, to be reckoned the
filth of the world, to be accounted as sheep for the slaughter, his
brethren lived in affluence, ease, and honor! despising manual labor!
and living upon the sweat of unrequited toil! But on this point we are
not left to mere inference and conjecture. The apostle Paul in the
plainest language explains the ordination of Heaven. "But _God hath_
CHOSEN the foolish things of the world to confound the wise; and God
hath CHOSEN the weak things of the world to confound the things which
are mighty; and base things of the world, and things which are despised
hath God CHOSEN, yea, and THINGS WHICH ARE NOT, to bring to nought
things that are."[A] Here we may well notice,

[Footnote A: 1 Cor. i. 27, 28.]

1. That it was not by _accident_, that the primitive churches were made
up of such elements, but the result of the DIVINE CHOICE--an arrangement
of His wise and gracious Providence. The inference is natural, that this
ordination was co-extensive with the triumphs of Christianity. It was
nothing new or strange, that Jehovah had concealed his glory "from the
wise and prudent, and had revealed it unto babes," or that "the common
people heard him gladly," while "not many wise men after the flesh, not
many mighty, not many noble, had been called."

2. The description of character which the apostle records, could be
adapted only to what are reckoned the _very dregs of humanity_. The
foolish and the weak, the base and the contemptible, in the estimation
of worldly pride and wisdom--these were they whose broken hearts were
reached, and moulded, and refreshed by the gospel; these were they whom
the apostle took to his bosom as his own brethren.

That _slaves_ abounded at Corinth, may easily be admitted. _They_ have a
place in the enumeration of elements of which, according to the apostle,
the church there was composed. The most remarkable class found there,
consisted of "THINGS WHICH ARE NOT"--mere nobodies, not admitted to the
privileges of men, but degraded to a level with "goods and chattels;" of
whom _no account_ was made in such arrangements of society as subserved
the improvement, and dignity, and happiness of MANKIND. How accurately
this description applies to those who are crushed under the chattel
principle!

The reference which the apostle makes to the "deep poverty of the
churches