THE FIRST EPISTLE OF PAUL THE APOSTLE TO THE CORINTHIANS - Chapter 4 - Verse 18
Verse 18. Now some are puffed up. They are puffed up with vain
confidence; they say that I would not dare to come; that I would be
afraid to appear among them, to administer discipline, to rebuke
them, or to supersede their authority, Probably he had been detained by
the demand on his services in other places, and by various providential
hinderances from going there, until they supposed that he stayed away
from fear. And possibly he might apprehend that they would think he had
sent Timothy because he was afraid to come himself. Their conduct was an
instance of the haughtiness and arrogance which men will assume when they
suppose they are in no danger of reproof or punishment.