Nor was the condition of the brethren, generally, better than that of the apostles.  The position of the apostles doubtless entitled them to the strongest opposition, the heaviest reproaches, the fiercest persecution.  But derision and contempt must have been the lot of Christians generally.  Surely we cannot think so ill of primitive Christianity as to suppose that believers, generally, refused to share in the trials and sufferings of their leaders; as to suppose that while the leaders submitted to manual labor, to buffeting, to be reckoned the filth of the world, to be accounted as sheep for the slaughter, his brethren lived in affluence, ease, and honor! despising manual labor! and living upon the sweat of unrequited toil!  But on this point we are not left to mere inference and conjecture.  The apostle Paul in the plainest language explains the ordination of Heaven.  “But God hath CHOSEN the foolish things of the world to confound the wise; and God hath CHOSEN the weak things of the world to confound the things which are mighty; and base things of the world, and things which are despised hath God CHOSEN, yea, and THINGS WHICH ARE NOT, to bring to nought things that are."[A] Here we may well notice,

[Footnote A:  1 Cor. i. 27, 28.]

1.  That it was not by accident, that the primitive churches were made up of such elements, but the result of the DIVINE CHOICE—­an arrangement of His wise and gracious Providence.  The inference is natural, that this ordination was co-extensive with the triumphs of Christianity.  It was nothing new or strange, that Jehovah had concealed his glory “from the wise and prudent, and had revealed it unto babes,” or that “the common people heard him gladly,” while “not many wise men after the flesh, not many mighty, not many noble, had been called.”

2.  The description of character which the apostle records, could be adapted only to what are reckoned the very dregs of humanity.  The foolish and the weak, the base and the contemptible, in the estimation of worldly pride and wisdom—­these were they whose broken hearts were reached, and moulded, and refreshed by the gospel; these were they whom the apostle took to his bosom as his own brethren.

That slaves abounded at Corinth, may easily be admitted. They have a place in the enumeration of elements of which, according to the apostle, the church there was composed.  The most remarkable class found there, consisted of “THINGS WHICH ARE NOT”—­mere nobodies, not admitted to the privileges of men, but degraded to a level with “goods and chattels;” of whom no account was made in such arrangements of society as subserved the improvement, and dignity, and happiness of MANKIND.  How accurately this description applies to those who are crushed under the chattel principle!