From thence our two associates, after having shook the dust of their feet against their opposers, repaired to Iconium, where they again met with opposition on the part of the Jews who even irritated the Gentiles against them, which compelled them to fly to Lystra in Lycaonia. There according to the Acts of the Apostles, Paul thought it necessary to perform a miracle, well knowing that nothing is more efficacious than a prodigy in making an impression on the minds of the vulgar. He then cured a lame man. This miracle convinced the idolators, who took Paul and his comrade for Gods, and under this idea would have offered them sacrifices. However this wonder did not produce the same effect upon the Jews; these apparently regarded it as a deception, or some trick of which they were not the dupes. In fact we see that the Jews, who nevertheless yielded to no people in credulity, so far from being moved by Paul's miracle, that they stoned him as a malefactor and left him for dead. From this unlucky affair he however extricated himself and returned to Antioch, whence he set out in order to give an account of the success of his mission, from which it appears that he had no reason for self congratulation, since, if he made a number of recruits for Jesus, he had succeeded at the expence of much personal ill usage. Nevertheless the Nazarenes, or Ebionites, i. e. the first of the Jews, who had embraced the doctrine of the Apostles, were persuaded that the religion of Christ was merely a reformed Judaism. Always attached to the practices of the Mosaic law, they believed themselves called upon to evince their zeal in its favour; in consequence of which they pretended that the Gentiles, converted by the Apostles, ought, like themselves, to submit to the rite of circumcision. But Paul and Barnabas strongly opposed this opinion*; they were well aware that so painful an operation, especially after a certain age, would be very likely to dishearten the heathen whom they had drawn to their sect. But as the affair appeared very important they referred the decision to the Apostles who remained at Jerusalem. In consequence Paul and Barnabas, and also the partisans of circumcision, repaired, thither, each with the view of maintaining their own opinion. The question was argued, and our two missionaries convinced the Apostolic College of the necessity of freeing the Gentiles from a rite at which they revolted. Thus, according to the author of the Acts of the Apostles, (who appears to have been devoted to St. Paul's party) it was decided, that the newly converted Gentiles should be exempted from a ceremony which, until now, had been regarded as highly essential, since it had been ordained by the Divinity himself. * See Acts of Apostles, chap. xv. ver. 5; see also in the second chapter, of this work what is said of the Nazarenes.