The Acts of the Apostles

CONCLUSION 299
events, and its author had sufficient knowledge to
justify him in coming forward as an historian. Judged
from ahnost every possible standpoint of historical
criticism it is a solid, respectable, and in many respects
an extraordinary work ; and its author''s courage is
also extraordinary—the courage with which he ap-
proaches the task of describing the complicated history
of a religious movement still in process of most active
development. The talent of personal characterisation
was certainly wanting to the author; miracles and
supernatural cures so fascinated him that he practi-
cally dispensed himself from all profounder considera-
tion of the inner life of his characters. Neither is
this to be wondered at. In these workers of miracles
nothing seemed so great as the very fact that they
worked miracles, that they possessed this gift, that
the Divine power had become their own. What
value in comparison could be assigned to the personal
quahties of these men, however rich their characters
might have been ? All these things necessarily paled
in the light of that tremendous gift
If the results that we have arrived at are correct,
it will be necessary to revise no small portion of the
history of the Apostolic Age as it is related by critics
of to-day. A work like Weizsacker''s "Apostolic
Age," with its thorough-going depreciation of, indeed
contempt for, the Acts of the Apostles, will need
correction in many chapters. Moreover, we now
learn that St. Paul ought no longer to be judged
so exclusively by his own works. This has been done
by critics since Baur with a self-confident exclusiveness
such as they are not accustomed to show when
!