Calmet thinks that St. Paul was induced to this, because Aquila was a convert from Judaism, and Justus from Paganism, on which account the Gentiles might come and hear him with more liberty. When the apostle departed from Corinth, Aquila and Priscilla accompanied him to Ephesus, where he left them to profit that church by their instructions and examples. While he went to Jerusalem, they rendered St. Paul very great services in that city, and ever exposed their own lives to preserve his. They had returned to Rome, when the apostle wrote his epistle to the Romans; for in it he salutes them with great encomiums, Rom. xv. 4. However, they did not continue at Rome, for they had come back to Ephesus when St. Paul wrote his second epistle to Timothy, in which he desires them to salute them in his name, 2 Tim. iv. 19. What became of them afterwards is not known. The Greeks call Aquila bishop and apostle.

TIMOTHEUS, or TIMOTHY, an eminent evangelist of the apostolic age, born at Lystra, in Asia. His father was a Greek, but his mother Eunice, and his grandmother Lais, were Jewesses, and they educated him in the true religion. He became an early convert, and a great favourite of St. Paul, whom he accompanied to Philippi, Thessalonica, and Berea. Episcopists and Papists say he was the first bishop of Ephesus; but this is contested by the Presbyterians. He was stoned to death, A. D. 97.

TITUS, a celebrated evangelist, a Greek by birth, and a convert of St. Paul, who wrote a letter to him, which is still extant. After going to Corinth, and preaching the Gospel there, he settled the affairs of the church in Crete; and then went by the apostle's order to Dalmatia, whence, after spreading the Gospel there, he returned to Crete, and propagated it in the adjacent islands. Of the time or manner of his death, nothing certain is recorded.

HERMAS, an ecclesiastical writer of the first century; and, according to Origen, Eusebius, and Jerome, the same whom St. Paul salutes in the end of his epistle to the Romans. He wrote a book in Greek some time before Domitian's persecution, A. D. 95, entitled The Pastor, from his representing an angel speaking to him in it under the form of a shepherd. The Greek text is lost, but a very ancient Latin version of it is extant. Some of the fathers have considered this book as canonical. The best edition of it is that of 1698, where it is to be found among the other apostolic fathers, illustrated with the notes and corrections of Cotelerius and Le Clerc. With these it was translated into English by Archbishop Wake, the best edition of which is that of 1710.

PHILETUS, a man mentioned by St. Paul in his second epistle to Timothy, ii. 16-18, along with Hymenæus, as persons who had erred and denied the resurrection. We have nothing

very certain concerning Philetus, but a fabulous story by Abdias, in the life of St. James Major, to the following purpose. St. James the son of Zebedee, passing through the synagogues of Judea and Samaria, and preaching, Hermogenes and Philetus strenuously opposed him, affirming that Jesus Christ was not the Messiah. Hermogenes was a notable magician, and Philetus was his disciple, who being converted, was desirous to bring his master to St. James; but Hermogenes bound him up so by his magic art, that he could not come to the apostle. But Philetus found means to make St. James acquainted with what had happened to him; upon which St. James unbound him, and Philetus came to him. Hermogenes perceiving how ineffectual his art was against the saint, became himself also a convert.

PHILEMON, a rich citizen of Colosse in Phrygia, who was converted to the Christian faith, with Appia his wife, by Epaphras the disciple of St. Paul, Coloss. ii. 1. Perhaps we should have known nothing of St. Philemon, had it not been an account of his slave Onesimus, who having robbed him, and run away from him, came to Rome, where he found St. Paul, and was very serviceable to him. St. Paul converted him, baptized him, and sent him back to his master Philemon, to whom he wrote a letter, still extant, which passes for a masterpiece of that kind of eloquence, natural, lively, strong, and pathetic, that was peculiar to St. Paul. Philemon, (i. 2.) had made a church of his house; and all his domestics, as well as himself, were members. His charity, liberality, and compassion, were a sure refuge to all that were in distress. The apostolical constitutions say, that St. Paul made him bishop of Colosse; but the Menæa insinuate, that he went to Gaza in Palestine, of which he was the apostle, and where he suffered martyrdom, with his wife, in the time of Nero.

ONESIMUS, was a Phrygian by nation, a slave to Philemon, and a disciple of the apostle Paul. Onesimus having run away from his master, and also having robbed him, Philem. 18, went to Rome while St. Paul was there in prison the first time. As Onesimus knew him by repute his master Philemon being a Christian, he sought him, acquainted him with what he had done, owned his flight, and did him all the service Philemon himself could have done, had he been at Rome. St. Paul brought him to a sense of the greatness of his crime, instructed him, converted him, baptized him, and sent him back to his master Philemon with a letter, inserted among St. Paul's epistles, which has universally been acknowledged as canonical. This letter had all the success he could desire. Philemon not only received Onesimus as a faithful servant, but as a brother and a friend; and after a little time, he sent him back to Rome to St. Paul, that he might continue his services to him in his

prison. After this Onesimus carried such epistles as the apos tle wrote at that time, as that to the Colossians, A. D. 62.

GAIUS, Paul's disciple, was probably a Macedonian, but settled at Corinth, where he lodged with the apostle during his abode in that city. Romans xv. 23. When Paul went into Asia, Gaius and Aristarchus accompanied him to Ephesus, where they abode with him some time. In the sedition raised there, about great Diana, the Ephesians ran to the house of Gaius and Aristarchus, whom they dragged to the theatre. However, no harm happened to either of them, as the commotion was appeased by the prudence of the town clerk. Gaius is said to have been bishop of Thessalonica.

ZERAS, a lawyer, who was an early Christian convert, and companion of St. Paul. Tit. iii. 15.

QUADRATUS, a disciple of the apostles, was a native of Athens, and according to some, the angel or bishop of Philadelphia, mentioned in the Revelations. He is also said to have been bishop of Athens. He presented an apology for the Christians to the Emperor Adrian, of which only a fragment re

mains.

JUDAS BARSABAS, a minister of the synod at Jerusalem, who was sent with Paul, Barnabas, and Silas, to publish their decree against the Judaising teachers among the Gentile churches at Antioch. He is also styled a prophet. Acts xv. 32.

ALEXANDER, the coppersmith, an early professor of, and apostate from Christianity, whom the apostle Paul delivered over to Satan.

SOSIPATER, or SOPATER, a kinsman of St. Paul, of whom he speaks in Rom. xvi. 21.

STEPHANAS, one of the first Christian converts at Corinth, baptized by Paul. He came to Paul at Ephesus along with Fortunatus and Achaicus.

PHEBE, a deaconess of the port of Corinth called Cenchrea. St. Paul had a particular esteem for her; and Theodoret thinks he lodged at her house, while he continued at Corinth. She brought to Rome the epistle he wrote to the Romans, wherein she is commended in so advantageous a manner. Rom. xvi. 1, 2.

PAUL, first bishop of Narbonne, or Sergius Paulus the proconsul, converted and made bishop by St. Paul, was descended from one of the best families of Rome. It is said the apostle called him Paul from his own name. The Spaniards venerate him as their apostle; and say he died a martyr at Narbonne.

ARISTARCHUS of Thessalonica, a primitive Christian, who attended Paul to Ephesus, where he was in danger of his life in the riot raised by Demetrius; and afterwards to Rome, where he was beheaded along with him.

DEMETRIUS, a silversmith, of Ephesus, who made little

models of Diana's temple there, with her image included therein. Vexed at the success of the Gospel, and the danger of his loss of business by the inhabitants turning their backs on idolatry, he convened a mob of his fellow-tradesmen, and represented to them the danger of their craft, and idolatrous worship. They were immediately inflamed with rage; and, assisted by part of the inhabitants, they raised, for some hours, a terrible outcry, Great is Diana of Ephesus. See Acts xix. 24. Whether this was the Demetrius who afterwards became a Christian convert, and had a good report of all men, 3 John xii., we know not, but the power of the Gospel was frequently displayed in making its most zealous enemies its warmest friends.

SIMON MAGUS, or the Sorcerer, was a native of Gihon, a village of Samaria. He visited Egypt, where he probably became acquainted with the mysteries in the Alexandrian school, and learned those theurgic or magical operations, by means of which it was believed that men might be delivered from the power of evil demons. Upon his return to Samaria, the author of the Clementine Recognitions relates, that he imposed upon his countrymen by high pretensions to supernatural powers. And St. Luke attests, that this artful fanatic, using sorcery, had bewitched the people of Samaria, giving out that he was some great one, and that he obtained such general reverence in Samaria, that the people all believed him to be" the great power of God." By the preaching of Philip the Deacon, he was, with other Samaritans, converted to the Christian faith, and admitted into the church by baptism. His conversion, however, seems not to have been real; for, upon seeing the miraculous effects of the laying on of the apostles' hands, he offered them money to purchase similar powers. He probably thought Peter and John magicians like himself, but better skilled in the art of deceiving the multitude. Being sharply reproved for this impiety, he seems by his answer to have been sensible of his sin; but his repentance, if sincere, was of short duration. Returning to his former practices of imposture, he travelled through various provinces of the empire, opposing the progress of the Gospel; and arriving at Rome, he led away vast numbers by his pretended miracles. How long he lived in that metropolis, or in what manner he died, we have no certain accounts. The Christian writers tell us, that being raised in the air by two demons, he was deprived of their support by the prayers of St. Peter and St. Paul, and falling, broke his legs. By some he is thought to have been the person mentioned by Suetonius, who, undertaking to fly in the presence of Nero, fell to the ground with such violence, that his blood spurted up to the gallery where the emperor was sitting. The sum of this impostor's doctrine was, that from the Divine Being, as a fountain of light, flow various orders of æons, or eternal natures, subsisting within the pleni

tude of divine essence; that beyond these, in the order of emanation, are different classes of intelligences, among the lowest of which are human souls; that matter is the most remote production of the emanative power; which, on account of its infinite distance from the Fountain of Light, possesses sluggish and malignant qualities, which oppose divine operations, and are the cause of evil; that it is the great design of philosophy to deliver the soul from its imprisonment in matter, and restore it to that divine light from which it was derived; and that for this purpose God had sent him, one of the first æons of men. To his wife Helena he also ascribed a similar kind of divine nature, pretending that a female con inhabited the body of this woman, to whom he gave the name of Wisdom; whence some Christian fathers have said, that he called her the Holy Spirit. He also taught the transmigration of souls, and denied the resurrection of the body.

DOSITHEUS, an early heresiarch, a magician of Samaria, who pretended to be the true Messiah. Among his thirty disciples he admitted a woman, whom he called the Moon. He retired to a cave where he starved himself to death, that he might persuade his followers that he was ascended into heaven. His followers always staid twenty-four hours in the same posture in which they were in when the sabbath began.

CERINTHUS, one of the first heresiarchs, being contemporary with the apostles. He ascribed the creation not to God but to angels; and taught that circumcision ought to be retained under the Gospel. He is looked upon as the head of the converted Jews, who raised, in the church of Antioch, the dissension mentioned in Acts xv. He published a work under the title of Apocalypse, whence some pretend that he was the author of St. John's Revelation.

MENANDER, the founder of the heresy of the Menandrians. Some say he was a disciple of Simon Magus. He taught that no person could be saved, unless he were baptized in his name; and he conferred a peculiar sort of baptism, which would render those who received it immortal in the next world; exhibiting himself to the world with the phrenzy of a lunatic, as a promised saviour. Irenæus, Justin, and Tertullian, say, that he pretended to be one of the ons sent from the pleroma, or ecclesiastical regións, to succour the souls that lay groaning under bodily oppression; and to support them against the viodence and stratagems of the dæmons that hold the reins of empire in this sublunary world; a doctrine built upon the same foundation with that of Simon Magus.

CERDON, a Syrian, who being accused of Manichæism, came to Rome in the time of the emperor Heginus, and abjured his errors, about A. D. 56; but was afterwards convicted of persisting in them and cast out of the church. Cerdon asserted