Luke was probably not the first to divide his work into a "former treatise" covering "both" the sayings and doings of Jesus "until the time that he was taken up," and a second devoted to the work of the apostles after they had received the charge to proclaim the gospel "to the uttermost parts of the earth." "Many," as he tells us, had already undertaken to "draw up narratives" (_diegeses_) of this kind, of which the one Luke himself has chiefly employed, had originally, as we concluded, a sequel like his own Book of Acts. There are even features of the Petrine source of Acts which particularly connect it with Roman doctrine (_e. g._ Acts x. 10-15; _cf._ Rom. xiv. 14 and Mark vii. 18 f.) and even with the person of Mark (Acts xii. 12). Its balance between Peter and Paul and its close with the establishment of Christianity at Rome, are also suggestive that the greater part of Luke's second treatise came _ultimately_ from the same source as his first. But the division of the work into two parts: (1) the gospel among the Jews; (2) the gospel among the Gentiles, would have followed, independently of any such precedent, from the whole purpose and structure of the work. Christianity is to be proved in the light of its origin, and in spite of the hostility of the Jews among whom it arose, and whose sacred writings it adopts, to be the original, true, revealed religion. To prove this it must be shown that the rejection and crucifixion of Jesus by his own people as a result of his earthly ministry was due not to his own failure to meet the ideal of the Scriptures in question, but to _their_ perversity and wilful blindness. If it is important to prove in the former treatise that the opposition of the controlling authorities among the Jews was due to this perversity and jealousy, it is at least equally so to show that the lowly and devout received him gladly. Hence the peculiar hospitality of Luke toward material showing Jesus' acceptance of and by the humbler and the outcast classes, the poor and lowly, women, Samaritans, publicans and sinners. The idyllic scenes of his birth and childhood are cast among men and women of this type of Old Testament piety, quietly "waiting for the kingdom of God." During his career it is these who receive and hang upon him. Even on Calvary _one_ of the thieves must join with this throng of devout and penitent believers. Jesus' preaching begins with his rejection by his own fellow-townsmen only because "no prophet is accepted in his own country"; though before their attempt to slay him he proves from Scripture how Elijah and Elisha had been sent unto the Gentiles. His ministry ends with his demonstration to the disciples after his resurrection from "Moses and all the prophets" how that "it was needful that the Christ should suffer before entering his glory," and that after his rejection by Israel "repentance and remission of sins should be preached in his name among all nations, beginning at Jerusalem."