Paul returned again to Ephesus, where he made a sojourn of three years, following his trade for a living, while he founded a church in that city of necromancers, sorcerers, magicians, courtesans, mimics, flute-players,—­a city abandoned to Asiatic sensualities and superstitious rites; an exceedingly wicked and luxurious city, yet famous for arts, especially for the grandest temple ever erected by the Greeks, one of the seven wonders of the world.  It was in the most abandoned capitals, with mixed populations, that the greatest triumphs of Christianity were achieved.  Antioch, Corinth, and Ephesus were more favorable to the establishment of Christian churches than Jerusalem and Athens.

But the trials of Paul in Ephesus, the capital of Asia Minor, the most celebrated of all the Ionian cities,—­“more Hellenic than Antioch, more Oriental than Corinth, more wealthy than Thessalonica, more populous than Athens,”—­were incessant and discouraging, since it was the headquarters of pagan superstitions, and of all forms of magical imposture.  As usual, he was reviled and slandered by the Jews; but he was also at this time an object of intense hatred to the priests and image-makers of the Temple of Diana, troubled in mind by evil reports concerning the converts he had made in other cities, physically weak and depressed by repeated attacks of sickness, oppressed by cares and labors, exposed to constant dangers, his life an incessant mortification and suffering, “killed all the day long,” carrying about him wherever he went “the deadness of the crucified Christ.”

Paul’s labors in Ephesus were nevertheless successful.  He made many converts and exercised an extraordinary influence,—­among other things causing magicians voluntarily to burn their own costly books, as Savonarola afterward made a bonfire of vanities at Florence.  His sojourn was cut short at length by the riot which was made by the various persons who were directly or indirectly supported by the revenues of the Temple,—­a mongrel mob, brought to terms by the tact of the town clerk, who reminded the howling dervishes and angry silversmiths of the punishment which might be inflicted on them by the Roman proconsul for raising a disturbance and breaking the law.

Yet Paul with difficulty escaped from Ephesus and departed again for Greece, not however until he had written his extraordinary Epistles to the Corinthians, who had sadly departed from his teachings both in morals and doctrine, either through ignorance, or in consequence of the depravity which they had but imperfectly conquered.  The infant churches were deplorably split into factions, “the result of the visits from various teachers who succeeded Paul, and who built on his foundations very dubious materials by way of superstructure,”—­even Apollos himself, an Alexandrian Jew baptized by the Apostle John, the most eloquent and attractive preacher of the day, who turned everybody’s head.  In the churches women rose to give their opinions without