The Argument of the First Epistle of S. Paul to the Corinthians

HOW S. Paul planted the Church at Corinth, continuing there a year and an half together, we read Act. 18. After that, when he was at Ephesus Act. 19, about the end of the three years that he abode there, he wrote this first Epistle to the Corinthians. For even as S. Luke there writeth, when these things were ended, Paul purposed in the Spirit,¹ when he had gone over Macedonia and Achaia, to go to Jerusalem: so likewise doth S. Paul himself write here: I will come to you ²in Achaia, when I shall have gone over Macedonia, for I will go over Macedonia. but I will tarry at Ephesus until Pentecost,

The matter that he writeth of, is not one, as in the Epistle to the Romans, but divers. partly such faults of theirs, as were signified unto him by them that were of Chloe 1 Cor. 1, 11. partly such questions as themselves wrote to him of, And concerning the things that you wrote to me. 1 Cor. 7, 1. for so we may (as it seemeth) divide the Epistle into these two parts. Or, to put all together, he writeth of eight things: 1 Of certain Schisms beginning among them, by occasion of certain preachers, whom in the Second Epistle he toucheth more plainly as being False apostles chap. 1. 2. 3. 4. 2 Of an incestuous fornicator, and some that went to law before infidel judges. chap. 5. 6. 3 Of Matrimony and Continency. chap. 7. 4 Of meats sacrificed to Idols. chap. 8. 9. 10. 5 Of his Traditions. chap. 11. 6 Of the Gifts of the Holy Ghost. chap 12. 13. 14. 7 of the Resurrection. chap. 15. 8 of the Contributions that he gathered of the Gentiles, to succour the Christian Jews at Jerusalem. chap. 16.