But if Jewish prejudices no longer offered the same formidable opposition to the soldiers of the Cross, as before in Palestine and the neighbouring countries, the Apostle and his fellow-labourers had now to encounter fresh enemies not less deadly. [Sidenote: Vice and superstition mixed with intellectual unbelief.] In the highly civilized cities of Greece they encountered on the one hand the full tide of heathenism with all its degrading vices and superstitions, and on the other, Pagan philosophy with its hard sceptical temper and intellectual pride. Influences such as these may account for the comparatively small results which seem to have followed the preaching of St. Paul at Philippi, Thessalonica[21], and Berea, and the prominence given to women as being more easily touched by the good tidings of the Gospel. [Sidenote: Open conflict with Satan.] At Philippi is noticeable the conflict between the visible power of Satan and the Power of { 39} One stronger than he, in the casting out by St. Paul of the evil spirit of Python from the soothsaying woman. This was an earnest of the final issue of that great contest between the kingdom of Satan and the Kingdom of God, which was now beginning in the very strongholds of darkness, and is to continue to the end of time.
We may also remark the first mention of the title and rights of a Roman citizen claimed by St. Paul for himself and St. Silas after their illegal imprisonment.
[Sidenote: A.D. 54. Athenians little inclined to believe.]
At Athens St. Paul came in contact with the most intellectual and philosophical minds of heathendom; but heathen philosophy made the Athenians very little inclined to accept the supernatural mysteries of the Christian Faith. They listened indeed with eager curiosity to the "new thing" which the great Apostle proclaimed "in the midst of Mars' Hill;" and yet when their intellectual pride was required to bow itself down, to acknowledge something more than a Neology, and to believe in the supernaturalism of the Resurrection, they only "mocked" the teacher. St. Paul, therefore, departed from the city where his cultivated mind had been stirred at the sight of so many great intellects "wholly given to idolatry[22]." [Sidenote: Athens afterwards a Bishopric.] But yet his visit was not without its fruits; and Dionysius, a member of the great Council of the Areopagus, is believed to have been the first Bishop of the Church in Athens[23].