4412. CONCERNING PAUL. Paul is among the worst of the apostles, which has been made known to me by ample experience. The love of self, whereby he was ensnared before he preached the gospel, remained with him also afterwards, and because he was then, for the most part, in a like state, he was prompted by that love and by his nature to wish to be in scenes of tumult. He did all things from the end of being greatest in heaven, and of judging the tribes of Israel. That he remained such afterwards appears from very much experience, for I spoke with him more than with others; nay, he is such, that the rest of the apostles in the other life rejected him from their company, and no longer recognize him for one of themselves. [I know it] also from the fact that he associated himself to one of the worst devils, who would fain rule all things, and pledged himself to this spirit to obtain for him his end; besides many other things, which it would be too tedious to relate. If all the things which I know concerning Paul should be related, they would be enough to fill sheets. That he wrote epistles does not prove that he was such [as that would seem to imply], for even the impious can preach well and write epistles; it is one thing to be, and another to speak and to write, as was also said to him. Moreover he has not mentioned, in his epistles, the least word of what the Lord taught, nor cited one of his parables, so that he received nothing from the life and discourse of the Lord, as was also said to him, when yet in the Evangelists is the very Gospel itself.