POSTSCRIPT.

INCE I finished this Preface, the Abftracts, and Effays, Lewis Capell's Hiftoria Apoftolica Illuftrata was put into my hands; where the Acts of the apostles are justly and beautifully fet forth. But Capell is very often mistaken in points of chronology, and did not take notice of the three periods of the Acts, nor several of their subdivifions. I am apt to think, that Bishop Pearson was greatly indebted to this tract for what he has left us in his Annales Paulini : though I think the Bishop has corrected a great many mistakes Capell had made in St. Paul's chronology. I mention this, in hopes that fome perfon, who has leifure, and abilities equal to the undertaking, will write the hiftory of the apoftles on Capell's plan, rectifying the chronology (and fo much of the history of the apostles as depends upon it) by Bifhop Pearfon's (which is generally right), and, if he should think fit, the whole of it by these periods, together with a fhort account of the defign and fubject-matter of the epiftles;

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epiftles; and then, I think, we should have the apoftolic story truly told, and well put together, to the great advancement of Chriftian knowledge, and the fatisfaction of the curious and the learned.

HAVING promised to give my reasons in the Poftfcript for differing from Bishop Pearfon (as well as Bishop Lloyd, Dr. Whitby, Mr. Pyle, and others) about the time of Paul's writing his firft Epiftle to Timothy; I will now give them as fhortly as I can. St. Paul's faying to Timothy, "As I befought thee to

abide ftill at Ephefus when I went into "Macedonia, (fo I did it) that thou mightest "charge fome, that they teach no other doc"trine," plainly fhews, that he refers to a requeft lately made to Timothy, and that it was made at a time when he went from Ephefus to Macedonia. This makes it neceffary to refer the time of this requeft, either to the time mentioned, Acts xx. I. or to the time when he went to Coloffe (according to what he writes to Philemon from Rome in his first imprisonment there, defiring him" to prepare "a lodging for him at Coloffe b'), and from thence to Philippi, a city of Macedonia, according to what he writes to them in his first imprisonment at Rome. For these two are

2 I Tim. i. 3.

b Philem. 22.

Philip. i. 23-26. and ii. 24. See the Abfract.

the only times when Paul went from Ephefus
to Macedonia. The firft of these is the be-
ginning of ann. 58. (Bishop Pearson's, the
latter end of 58.) The fecond is ann. 65.
And there I have the happinefs to agree with
that learned prelate. The question is, at which
of these two times it was that Paul wrote this
epiftle? And, I think, it must neceffarily be
the firft, from what occurrs 1 Tim. iv. 11, 12.
"These things command and teach. Let
"no man defpife thy youth." Now was
there any occafion for any apoftolical precept,
if this epiftle was written in 65? Paul would
have Timothy go forth with him, ann. 50%
It is most likely he became his fellow-la-
bourer immediately; and it is plain he was
fo at Theffalonica the next year, from his
joining Timothy with himself and Silas, in
his epiftles to that church; and from his ex-
prefly calling him his fellow-labourer.'
Now we cannot well fuppofe Timothy to be
under twenty, when Paul would have him,
forth with him. If he was twenty years of
go
age in the year 50, he must be thirty-five
years of age in the year 65. Was there any
danger of his being defpifed then on account
of his youth? Thirty is fuppofed to be a
man's ripe age. It was the year in which
men might become priefts under the law.

4 Acts xvi. 3.

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ei Theff. iii. 2.

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About that age John began his ministry, and Jefus his. Could there be any occasion thenfor fortifying Timothy's authority with this injunction, if he was thirty-five years of age when this epiftle was written? It would be very ftrange to fuppofe it.

AND what ftrengthens this proof very much is, that we find the fame precept given to the Corinthians. "Now if Timotheus 66 come let no man defpife him f" (namely, on account of his youth). This epiftle was written ann. 57, as Bishop Pearson agrees, when Timothy muft have been fome years under thirty, on the fuppofition that he was twenty years of age ann. 50; and therefore wanted this apoftolical recommendation. It is therefore highly probable from this text, that the firft epiftle to Timothy was not written at a great diftance of time from the first epiftle to the Corinthians.

THIS is the more probable, because we find feveral of the fame matters treated of in these two epiftles, and often in expreffions (and fometimes in an order) that are exactly the fame, or very near akin to one another. He fpeaks in both for marriage; for the free ufe of meats; about minifters maintenance;

f 1 Cor. xvi. 10.

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