It is to be obser\^ed that this wTiter sometimes speaks as a Gentile, a fact which some have found it difficult to account for, on the supposition that he was a Hebrew, if not a Levite as well. But so, also, St. Paul sometimes speaks as a Roman, and sometimes as a Jew ; and, owing to the mLxed character of the early Church, he wTites to the Romans (iv. i ) as if they were all Israelites, and again to the same Church (Rom. xi. 13) as if they were all Gentiles. So this writer some- times identifies himself mth Jewish thought as a son of Abraham, and again speaks from the Christian position as if he were a Gentile, thus identifying himself with the cathohcity of the Church.