3.

So then after admonishing them to be of one mind, and showing that unanimity comes of humility, and then aiming a shaft at those Jews who were everywhere corrupting the doctrine under a show of Christianity, and calling them "dogs" and "evil workers" (Philip. iii. 2.), and giving admonition to keep away from them, and teaching to whom it is right to attend, and discoursing at length on moral points, and bringing them to order, and recalling them to themselves, by saying, "The Lord is at hand" (Philip. iv. 5.), he makes mention also, with his usual wisdom, of what had been sent, and then offers them abundant consolation. But he appears in writing to be doing them special honor, and never in any place writes any thing of reproof, which is a proof of their virtue, in that they gave no occasion to their teacher, and that he has written to them not in the way of rebuke, but throughout in the way of encouragement. And as I said also at first, this city showed great readiness for the faith; inasmuch as the very jailor, (and you know it is a business full of all wickedness,) at once, upon one miracle, both ran to them, and was baptized with all his house. For the miracle that took place he saw alone, but the gain he reaped not alone, but jointly with his wife and all his house. Nay, even the magistrates who scourged him seem to have done this rather of sudden impulse than out of wickedness, both from their sending at once to let him go, and from their being afterwards afraid. And he bears testimony to them not only in faith, or in perils, but also in well-doing, where he says, "That even in the beginning of the Gospel, ye sent once and again unto my need" (Philip. iv. 15, 16.), when no one else did so; for he says, "no Church had fellowship with me in the matter of giving and receiving"; and that their intermission had been rather from lack of opportunity than from choice, saying, "Not that ye took no thought for me, but ye lacked opportunity." (Philip. iv. 10.) Let us also, knowing these things, and having so many patterns, and the love that he bore them--for that he loved them greatly appears in his saying, "For I have no man like minded, who will care truly for your state" (Philip. ii. 20.); and again, "Because I have you in my heart, and in my bonds,"--