tion in the different subjects. In the present case the subject is the relation between Christ and the Church; in the others it is the relation between the members of the Church themselves. And as regards the Parousia, the assertion is that, instead of looking, as Paul does elsewhere, to that great event as the near and certain con- clusion of the world’s end and the consummation of the Kingdom of God, the writer of this Epistle views the future as made up of a series of ages following one upon the other. But this overlooks the con- sideration that the αἰῶνες ἐπερχόμενοι may be those that are to make up the Eternity which opens after the Second Coming. The fact remains, however, that the Parousia does not occupy the place which it has in such Epistles as those to the Thessalonians, and that there is nothing to show that it fills the writer’s vision here as it does there. But this Epistle is separated by years from those earliest writings attributed to Paul. Much had taken place in the interval; the Return of Christ had not been witnessed, but the Kingdom of God had been seen establishing itself far and wide by the preaching of the Gospel. Even in the Second Epistle to the Thessalonians it is recognised that the Parousia cannot enter until certain things have happened; and in the further experience of God's ways as regards the times and the seasons, the Second Coming, though the expectation of it was not lost, came to be regarded as a less immediately impending event.
Pinally, it is affirmed that this Epistle differs essentially from the acknowledged Pauline writings in its view of the Church, and that in more than one respect. It is singular, it is said, in speaking of the Church as one, and it gives a view of the Church which could not have emerged till a considerably later date than that to which Ephesians must be assigned if it is by Paul. To this it is enough to reply first that there is nothing in the Epistle to point to a highly developed condition of the Church. The organisation of the Church is not one of the subjects dealt with. The gifts bestowed upon the Church are brought into view, and are shown to be of various kinds, But they are not such as infer a comparatively late period. There is no mention of rule by bishops and deacons, nor does the external unity of the Church form a feature of this Epistle. The view which is given of the Church as one is indeed the highest found in the Pauline writings. But it is not wholly new. It has its foundations at least in earlier Pauline writings, as, e.g., in 1 Cor. xii, 28 (ἔθετο ὁ Θεὸς ἐν τῇ ἐκκλησίᾳ πρῶτον ἀποστόλους, etc.) ; xv. 9 (διότι ἐδίωξα τὴν ἐκκλησίαν τοῦ Θεοῦ); Gal. i. 13 (ἐδίωκον τὴν ἐκκλησίαν τοῦ Θεοῦ); Phil. iii. 6 (διώκων τὴν ἐκκλησίαν) ; cf. in the Book of Acts (the composition of a Pauline