Galatians 4:15

Your blessedness. You beatified me for my sufferings for the faith, and as it were said to yourselves: Happy are we in having such an Apostle! "Happy they who have the privilege of hearing and seeing Paul!" S. Augustine is said to have wished to see three things Christ on earth in the flesh, Rome at the height of her power, and Paul thundering in his preaching. S. Paul now asks the Galatians what had become of their former opinion of him; why they had so soon changed their minds, and given up their love for him, which was once ardent enough to make them pluck out their eyes for him; and inquires whether he had become their enemy for telling them the truth, viz., that no one is justified by the law, but only by faith in Christ.

Ver. 17. They zealously affect you. The Judaisers do all they can to woo you to espouse their cause, and to bring you into subjection to their law, but their object is not good.

They would exclude you. Some texts read include here, which gives a very good meaning. These Judaisers are like crafty wooers, who, when they are seeking to win a wealthy wife, show her every kind of honour and service, and humour her whims in everything; but when they have attained their object, they shut her up, appoint custodians of her person, and treat her as a slave. They are now promising you, Galatians, great things; but they want to shut you up under the law, and shut you out from the liberty that is in Christ.

That ye might affect them. It is not friendship that animates them. They want to gain your confidence, that you may surrender to them, and become their disciples, and give, them ground for public boasting.