ercy of which he speaks, not as referring to any deliverance from
past marital encumbrances, but to the gift of faithfulness. Then he says
that in view of the present distress from persecution, while it is good
to be married, it is at least not less good to be single. "But and if
thou marry, thou hast not sinned; and if a virgin marry, she hath not
sinned. Yet such shall have tribulation in the flesh, and I would spare
you." The tribulation he speaks of refers to the double portion of the
"present distress" to which the married would be subject. His principal
argument in favor of the unwedded state is that those who remain in it
are enabled to devote themselves more completely to the service of God.

But there was no sign in the Apostolic Church of that morbid enthusiasm
for virginity which fills the pages of the post-Nicene writers. We know
that Peter was married; and there is evidence that he took his wife with
him on his missionary journeys. "Have we not," says Paul, "power to lead
about a sister, a wife, as well as other apostles, and the brothers of
the Lord, and Cephas?" Tradition also informs us that Peter had a
daughter whose name was Petronilla. The Apostle Philip had three
daughters. Eusebius quotes from a letter written by Polycrates, who was
bishop of the church at Ephesus, to Victor, Bishop of Rome, in which he
says: "Philip, one of the twelve Apostles, sleeps in Hierapolis, and his
two aged virgin daughters. Another of his daughters, who lived in the
Holy Spirit, rests at Ephesus." Eusebius also in the same passage
speaks, on the authority of Proculus, of "four prophesying daughters of
Philip;" but it is most likely that he here confounds the deacon Philip
with the apostle of the same name. From Acts we learn that the former
had four daughters who prophesied and labored with their father at
Caesarea in Palestine.

Paul, in his Epistles, gives the names of about eighty friends and
disciples; about twenty more are referred to in the Acts of the
Apostles. Quite a large proportion of these are women, to whom the
Apostle sends kindly greeting. His mention of them is always in the
terms of respectful regard, and never merely complimentary or carefully
polite. To many of these women he was deeply indebted for the care with
which they had ministered to his comfort as he journeyed to and fro on
his missionary tours; the names of some of them were treasured in his
memory as those of zealous and valued fellow laborer