St. Paul in Athens

“We, at Athen3, are lovers of the beautiful.” — Pencles.

“That city which was the envy and wonder of the — Demades.

“There still survive to her everlasting possessions. On the one hand the memory of her exploits: on the other the splendour of the monuments consecrated in former days.” — Demosthenes.

“Rome ranks as the third: Athens and Jerusalem as the other two. The three people of God’s election: two for things temporal and one for things eternal.” — Dr. Arnold.

We had recently been on the track of other Biblical scenes and memories. A few days before, while sailing among the Isles of the Archipelago, a distant view of Patmos was obtained, with its serrated outlines and undying associations. An appropriate sequel to this was a visit to the ruins of Ephesus, identified with the labours and sojournings of more than one Apostle; — perhaps its predominating remembrance that of being the home, in later years, of the Beloved Disciple; his grave most probably somewhere among the thickets of Mount Prion. Now we were approaching a city which, in its one New Testament allusion, belongs exclusively to St. Paul. His route hither from the north had been along the coast of the Island of Eubcea, doubling Cape Colonna — the historic promontory of Sunium — ‘’ Sunium’s marble steep,” at the entrance to the Saronic Gulph. Sunium, which had long been familiarised by the drawings of Turner and the Grecian Williams, was, in our case, passed in the dark; but an opportunity was given on the return voyage of seeing the remarkable eminence, crowned with the twelve Doric columns in picturesque ruin, of the Temple of Minerva, in front of which Plato, with a glorious prospect before him, was wont to discourse to his disciples on the mysteries of mind and matter. It is truly a befitting outpost to these classic shores — the “Beautiful Gate” of the Attic Temple. In its original perfection, it must have been an object, alike for guidance and welcome, as dear to the Greek mariner, as the first sight of the southern cliffs of England are to our own.^

That morning hour cannot soon be forgotten, when, after skirting the southern slopes of Hymettus, which for some distance had intercepted the inland view on our right, the unmistakable grey Acropolis presented itself on its bold rock, at a distance of seven or eight miles. It was as impressive as ever, with all the hoar of antiquity around it; lacking chiefly what, while Athens was in her glory, must have formed to all voyagers a prominent feature, and one which, lingering on to St. Paul’s time, could not fail to arrest him and his companions — the colossal statue of Minerva Promachus, “The Minerva of bronze,”

* The pillars of the temple give the Cape its modern name, “Colonna.”

as it was termed; tutelary goddess of the city, keeping watch and ward over the priceless treasures at her side.^ The Island of Salamis was in front.

Forgetting for a moment the havoc which intervening ages have wrought, let us at once transport ourselves in imagination, eighteen centuries ago, and follow the footsteps of the Great Apostle. “As we near the entrance,” is a graphic description of his arrival in the harbour, “the land rises and conceals all the plain. Idlers come down upon the rocks to watch the coming vessel. The sailors are all on the alert. Suddenly an opening is revealed; and a sharp turn of the helm brings the ship in between two moles, on which towers are erected. We are in smooth water, and anchor is cast in seven fathoms in the basin of the Pirseus.” We cannot be far wrong in supposing that it was some time in early autumn, when, passing through this, its seaward gate, St. Paul made his way to the city of Pericles and Themistocles, Socrates and Plato. Athens, it

Promachus (irpSyttaxos). Her spear and helmet were made from the brazen shields taken at the battle of Marathon; and though thirty-five miles distant, the point of the spear and crest of the helmet were said ta be visible in rounding the Cape. The statue of the reputed goddess survived Paul’s visit more than three centuries, as in A.D. 395 “it was said to have scared away Alaric when he came to sack the Acropolis.” — See Dr. Smith’s “History of Greece,” p. 396.

2 Howson and Conybeare’s “Life and Epistles of St. Paul,” vol. i. p. 374.

must be remembered, was not in his day the Athens of these great men. She was in her prime and glory five hundred years before; “a distance of time,” as a writer observes, “as wide as that which separates us from the Plantagenets.” Her glory had culminated, alike politically, and intellectually. She had been superseded by Corinth as the true capital of the province and seat of the government. Two centuries had placed her under the iron foot of imperial ubiquitous Rome. The latter, however, was too magnanimous to forget the debt she and her subject kingdoms owed to the “Mother of Arts and Eloquence.” To a considerable extent she safeguarded and conserved the walls, temples, and other public buildings, of her illustrious rival: although not a few statues were deemed a fair subject of spoliation and pillage, for the adornment of the Capitol, Forum, and the Palaces of the Palatine. The Eagles of the Empire, as is well known, were unscrupulous as to where they winged their flight and planted their talons. But, while the Caesars would tolerate no competitor in arms, they ungrudgingly conceded to Athens superiority in other realms. Augustus made her a free city of the Empire in the province of Achaia, allowing her to retain her independence, and recognising her as the great ‘’Artshop” of the world. Although therefore fallen from her pristine splendour, and in other ways deteriorating and deteriorated, we must not think of the chief city of the Hellenes, on the occasion of Paul’s visit, as having abnegated all that had -made her for centuries distinguished. Her golden age had passed, but her silver one remained. She was more than the mere effete and passive trustee of art-treasures.^ Even her philosophic schools, of which we shall hereafter speak, still lingered, and indeed survived for some centuries later. “The physical might of Rome,” it has been well said, “had subdued Greece; but the mind of Greece had mastered Rome. The Greeks became the teachers of their conquerors. The deities of Greece were incorporated into the national faith of Rome. Greek literature became the education of the Roman youth. Greek philosophy was almost the only philosophy the Roman knew. Rome adopted Grecian arts, and was insensibly moulded by contact with Grecian life. So that the world in name and government was Roman, but in feeling and civilisation Greek.”

1 In an article in our leading journal on the most recent valuable discovery of statues in the Acropolis, the writer — evidently an authority on art — mentions, that in the first century, corresponding with St. Paul’s visit, “the technical skill of the Attic sculptors was hardly less than in its prime.” — The Times, Feb. 25, 1886.

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