el; and Moses, who was destined to the high
office of a great legislator, was instructed in all the wisdom of the
most learned nation then existing. The Jewish law-giver, though under
the guidance of inspiration itself, did not fill his station the worse
for this preparatory instruction. To how important a use the Apostle
converted _his_ erudition, we may infer from his conduct in the most
learned and polished assembly in the world. He did not unnecessarily
exasperate the polite Athenians, by coarse upbraiding, or illiterate
clamor, but he attacked them on their own ground. With what
discriminating wisdom, with what powerful reasoning did he unfold to
them that God whom they ignorantly worshiped! With what temper, with
what elegance, did he expose their shallow theology! Had he been as
unacquainted with _their_ religion, as they were with _his_, he had
wanted the appropriate ground on which to build his instruction. He
seized on the inscription of their own pagan altar, as a text from which
to preach the doctrine of Christianity. From his knowledge of their
errors, he was enabled to advance the cause of truth. He made their
poetry, which he quoted, and their mythology which he would not have
been able to explode, if he had not understood it, a thesis from which
to deduce the doctrine of the Resurrection; thus softening their
prejudices, and letting them see the infinite superiority of that
Christianity which he enforced, to the mere learning and mental
cultivation on which they so highly valued themselves. By the same
sober discretion, acute reasoning, and graceful elegance, he afterward
obtained a patient hearing, and a favorable judgment from King Agrippa."

"It has always appeared to me," returned Dr. Barlow, "that a strong
reason why the younger part of a clergyman's life should be in a good
measure devoted to learning is, that he may afterward discover its
comparative vanity. It would have been a less difficult sacrifice for
St. Paul to profess that he renounced all things for religion, if he had
had nothing to renounce; and to count all things as dross in the
comparison, if he had had no gold to put in the empty scale. Gregory
Nazianzen, one of the most accomplished masters of Greek literature,
declared that the chief value which he set upon it was, that in
possessing it, he had something of worth to esteem as nothing in
comparison of Christian truth. And it is delightful to hear Selden and
Grotius, and Pascal and