Acts 7:18

18. Simon saw Simon now takes no share in the laying on of hands. He stood by, a spectator, and saw. Simon the Magus is intently gazing on Simon the Apostle: the very emblem of error and sin malignly eyeing the power of Christian truth and holiness, incapable of understanding its nature. He sees a work performed on the young Samaritan converts that raises them above themselves. He notes how beautiful and miraculous the results. These apostles he sees are higher than the deacon; they are the topmost masters of the new system, the possessors of the original wonder-working power, alone able to impart that power to others. From them, and not from their subordinate Philip, must the true primal secret be obtained.

Offered them money He hopes to buy a seat in the apostolic college. From his name a mercenary traffic in holy things has, through the Christian ages, been called simony. “It is fortunate for us,” Dr. Hackett well says, “that our religious institutions in this country require us to obtain our knowledge of the term from a lexicon.”