4. For while one saith He now specifies the particular kind of contentions, (152) and he does this by personating the Corinthians, that his description may have more force — that each one gloried in his particular master, as though Christ were not the one Master of all (Matthew 23:8.) Now, where such ambition still prevails, the gospel has little or no success. You are not, however, to understand that they declared this openly in express words, but the Apostle reproves those depraved dispositions to which they were given up. At the same time it is likely, that, as a predilection arising from ambition is usually accompanied with an empty talkativeness, (153) they openly discovered by their words the absurd bias of their mind, by extolling their teachers to the skies in magnificent terms, accompanying this at the same time with contempt of Paul and those like him.
(152) “ Qui estoyent entr’eux;” — “Which were among them.”
(153) “ Cette ration de jetter son coeur sur un homme par ambition, est accompagnee d’un sot babil;” — “This way of setting one’s heart upon an individual through ambition, is accompanied with a foolish talkativeness.”