Before his departure from Corinth, Paul was joined again hy Luke, as we infer from the change in the narrative from the third to tlie first person. We have alread}^ seen tiiat he was bent on making a journey to Jerusalem, for a special purpose and within a limited time. With this view he was intending to go by sea to Syria. But he was made aware of some plot of'the Jews for his destruction, to be carried out through this voj'age; and he determined to evade their malice by changing his route. Several brethren were asso- ciated with him in this expedition, the bearers, no doubt, of the collections made in all the churches for the poor at Jerusalem. These were sent on by sea, and probal)ly the money with them, to Troas, where they were to await Paul. He, accompanied hy Luke, went northwards tiirough Macedonia. The st3'le of an eye- witness again becomes manifest. "From Philippi," saj'S the writer, " we sailed away after the days of un- leavened bread, and came unto them to Troas in five days, where we abode seven days." The marks of
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time throughout this journey have given occasion to much ulironological and geographical discussion, which brings liefore the reader's mind the difficulties and un- certainties of travel in that age, and leaves the precise determination of the dates of this historj' a matter for reasonable conjecture rather than for positive state- ment. But no question is raised as to the times men- tioned which need detain us in the course of the nar- rative. During the stay at Troas there was a meeting on the first day of the week "to break bread," and Paul was discoursing earnestly and at length Avith the brethren. He was to depart the next morning, and midnight found them listening to his earnest speech, with many lights burning in the upper chamber in which they had met, and making the atmosphere op- pressive. A j'outh named Eutvchus was sitting in the window, and was gradually overpowered by sleep, so that at last he fell into the street or court from the third story, and was taken up dead. The meeting was interrupted by this accident, and Paul went down and fell upon him and embraced him, saying, "Be not disturbed, his life is in him." His friends then ap- pear to have taken charge of him, while Paul went up again, first presided at the breaking of bread, after- wards took a meal, and continued conversing until daybreak, and so departed.
While the vessel which conveyed the rest of the party sailed from Troas to Assos, Paul gained some time by making the journc}' by land. At Assos he went on board again. Coasting along b}' Mit3'lene, Chios, Samos, and Trogyllium, they arrived at Miletus. The apostle was thus passing by the chief Church in Asia ; but if he had gone to Ephesus he might have arrived at Jerusalem too late for the Pentecost, at which festival he had set his heart upon being pres- ent. At ililetus, however, there was time to send to Ephesus ; and the elders of the Church were invited to come down to him there. This meeting is made the occasion for recording another characteristic and representative address of Paul (Acts xx, 18-35). This spoken address to the elders of the Ephesian Church may be ranked with the Epistles, and throws the same kind of light upon Paul's apostolical relations to the churches. Like several of the Epistles, it is in great part an appeal to their mamories of him and of his work. He refers to his labors in "serving tiie Lord"' ainong them, and to the dangers he incurred from the plots of the Jews, and asserts emphaticall}' the unre- serve with which he had taught them. He then men- tions a fact which will come before us again presently, that he was receiving inspired warnings, as he ad- vanced from citj- to city, of the bonds and afflictions awaiting him at Jerusalem. It is interesting to ob- serve that the apostle felt it to be his duty to press on in spite of these warnings. Having formed his plan on good grounds and in the sight of God, he did not sec, in dangers which might even touch his life, how- ever cle:irly set before him, reasons for changing it. Other arguments might move him from a fixed pur- pose—not dangers. His one guiding principle was to discharge the ministry whicli he liad received of the Lord Jesus, to t 'stify the Gospel of the grace of God. Speaking to his present audience as to those whom he was seeing for the last time, he proceeds to exhort them with unusual earnestness and tenderness, and expresses in conclusion that anxiety as to practi- c.il industry and lilicrality wliich has been increasing- ly occupying his mind. In t Tms strongly resembling the language of tlio Epistles to the Thessalonians and Corinthians, he jdeads liis own example, and entreats them to follow it, in " laboring for the support of the weak." "And when he had thus spoken, he kneeled down and prayed with them all : and thoy all wept sore, and fell on Paul's neck, and kissed him, sorrow- ing most of all for the words which lie spake, that tiiey should see his face no more. And they accom- panied him to the ship." This is the kind of narrative