The Acts of the Apostles

INTRODUCTION xxi
spite of all that has been written on the Acts, has
hitherto been left out of consideration.
To demonstrate historically the power of the Spirit
of Jesus in the Apostles—this was the general theme
of St. Luke. But how indefinite must this theme
have ever appeared in the face of the crowd of phenomena
which presented themselves to the historian I
How was he to master them ? where was he to draw
the limits of subject-matter, of scene, and of actors ?
If he was to steer a fixed and sure course over this
boundless ocean he must discover some guiding prin-
ciple. Again his simple solution of the problem
shows his genius. The power of the Spirit of Jesus
manifested itself most impressively in the Mission^
in that victorious progress wherein the proclamation
of the Gospel was carried from Jerusalem to Rome.
That within a few decades the new religion had
spread from little Galilee throughout the whole
empire, that it had won to itself both Greeks and
barbarians, and had been proclaimed even before
kings and proconsuls—with this fact nothing else
could be compared, and everything worthy of narra-
tion could be subordinated to this theme. This
fact, therefore
—
the expansion of the Gospel—could not
but come to the front as the principle of selection
and exclusion, and as the leading idea which was to
give form to the whole. At the very beginning of
the work it is most distinctly proclaimed : " Ye will
receive the power of the Holy Spirit and will be My
witnesses in Jerusalem and in all Judaea and Samaria
and unto the uttermost parts of the earth
"*"*
;
and it
is expressed yet more impressively in the great scene