rce it contained. Paul was
aware of this himself, though he expressed it with perfect modesty,
when he said, "For this cause I obtained mercy, that in me as chief
might Jesus Christ show forth all His long-suffering for an ensample of
them who should hereafter believe on Him to everlasting life."

4. His conversion proved the power of Christianity to overcome the
strongest prejudices and to stamp its own type on a large nature by a
revolution both instantaneous and permanent. Paul's was a personality
so strong and original that no other man could have been less expected
to sink himself in another; but, from the moment when he came into
contact with Christ, he was so overmastered with His influence that he
never afterward had any other desire than to be the mere echo and
reflection of Him to the world.

But, if Christianity showed its strength in making so complete a
conquest of Paul, it showed its worth no less in the kind of man it
made of him when he had given himself up to its influence. It
satisfied the needs of a peculiarly hungry nature, and never to the
close of his life did he betray the slightest sense that this
satisfaction was abating. His constitution was originally compounded
of fine materials, but the spirit of Christ, passing into these, raised
them to a pitch of excellence altogether unique.

Nor was it ever doubtful either to himself or to others that it was the
influence of Christ which made him what he was. The truest motto for
his life would be his own saying, "I live, yet not I, but Christ liveth
in me." Indeed, so perfectly was Christ formed in him that we can now
study Christ's character in his, and beginners may perhaps learn even
more of Christ from studying Paul's life than from studying Christ's
own. In Christ Himself there was a blending and softening of all the
excellences which makes His greatness elude the glance of the beginner,
just as the very perfection of Raphael's painting makes it
disappointing to an untrained eye; whereas in Paul a few of the
greatest elements of Christian character were exhibited with a
decisiveness which no one can mistake, just as the most prominent
characteristics of the painting of Rubens can be appreciated by every
spectator.

5. A Great Thinker.--Christianity obtained in Paul, secondly, a great
thinker. This it specially needed at the moment. Christ had departed
from the world, and those whom He had left to represent Him were
unlettered f