CHAPTER XXXI. Objection based on S. Paul's inconsistency in claiming at different times to be a Jew (Acts xxii. 3) and a Roman (Acts xxii. 27).

This same Paul, who often when he speaks seems to forget his own words, tells the chief captain that he is not a Jew but a Roman, although he had previously said, "I am a Jew, born in Tarsus of Cilicia, and brought up ¹⁹⁸ at the feet of Gamaliel, instructed according to the exact teaching of the law of my fathers." But he who said, "I am a Jew," and "I am a Roman," is neither thing, although he attaches himself to both. For he who plays the hypocrite and speaks of what he is not, lays the foundation of his deeds in guile, and by putting round him a mask of deceit, he cheats the clear issue and steals the truth, laying siege in different ways to the soul's understanding, and enslaving by the juggler's art those who are easily influenced. The man who welcomes in his life such a principle as this, differs not at all from an implacable and bitter foe, who enslaving by his hypocrisy the minds of those beyond his own borders, takes them all captive in inhuman fashion. So if Paul is in pretence at one time a Jew, at another a Roman, at one time without law, and at another a Greek,¹⁹⁹ and whenever he wishes is a stranger and an enemy to each |103 thing, by stealing into each, he has made each useless, robbing each of its scope by his flattery.

We conclude then that he is a liar and manifestly brought up in an atmosphere of lying.²⁰⁰ And it is beside the point for him to say : "I speak the truth in Christ, I lie not" (Rom. ix. 1). For the man who has just now conformed to the law, and to-day to the Gospel, is rightly regarded as knavish and hollow ²⁰¹ both in private and in public life.