and SAVIOUR, JESUS CHRIST, and his APOSTLES, &c. 391 the two holy men, who had for feveral years been companions in the miniflry, and with united endeavours propagated the gofpel of the Son of God, now took different provinces. Barnabas, with his kinfman, failed to his own country, Cyprus ; and Paul travelled to the churches of Sy- ria and Cilicia, taking Silas with him. The facred writers give us no account of St. Barnabas, after his feparation from St. Paul ; nor are the ecclefiaflical writers agreed amongll themfelves with regard to the a&ions of our apoftle, after his failing for Cyprus : this however feems to be certain, that he did not fpend the whole remainder of his life in that ifland, but vifited different parts of the world, preach- ing the glad-tidings of the gofpel, healing the fick, and working other miracles amongft the Gentiles ; and after long and painful travels, attended with different degrees of fuccefs in different places, he returned to Cyprus, his native country, where he fuffered martyrdom in the follow- ing manner: certainJews comingfrom Syria toSalamis, whereBarnabas was then preach- ing the gofpel, were highly exafperated at his extraordinary fuccefs, fell upon him as he was difputing in the fynagogue, dragged him out, and after the moll inhu- man tortures, honed him to death. His kinfman John-Mark, who was a fperator of this barbarous afion, privately interred his body in a cave, where it remained till the time of the emperor Zeno, in the year of CaxssT 485, when it was difcover- ed lying on his bread, with St. Matthew's gofpel in Hebrew, written with his own hand. An epiffle in Greek is dill extant, which bears this apollle's name : but the church has not received it into the canon of Scrip- turn; and, for that reafon,bothEufebius and St. Jerom call it apocryphal, though they do not deny it's being the work of St. Bar- nabas. Clemens Alexandrinus and Origen often quote it as his, and Monardus, who firfl publifhed the Greek with the old Latin verfion, fufficiently (hews, that it is the fame known to the ancients, becaufe all their quotations are found in it. The flyle of it refembles that of the apoflolic age ; but it appears to have been written fome time after the deflruélion of Jerufa- lem, a period which St. Barnabas may eafily be fuppofed to furvive : the be- ginning of it is wanting, and the infcrip- tion, if ever it had any ; but the matter of it evidently thews, that it was written to fuch Jews as are mentioned in the fifteenth chapter of the ats, who having embraced Chriflianity, dill held, that the obfervanee of the ceremonial lawwas neceffary to fal- vation : but this law St. Barnabas {hews to be abolilhed by the gofpel, and that the cuftoms of it are of no confequence to the Chriflians. The latter part contains excellent precepts, delivered under two different fimilitudes, the one of light, the other of darknefs ; the former under the conduf of the angels of God, the latter under the influence of the angels ofSatan. The way of light is a fummary of what the Chriftian is to do, that he may attain eternal happinefs ; and the way of dark- nefs reprefents thofe particular fins and vices which exclude men from the king- dom ofheaven. He clofes the whole with preffing Chriflians to live in fuch a manner, while they fojourn in this vale of mifery, that they may, after they quit it, enjoy the pleafures of the heavenly Canaan, and in- herit the kingdom of glory for ever and ever. St. PHILIP,
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