"And when there had been much disputing, Peter rose up, and," alluding to the affair of Cornelius, "said unto them, Men and brethren, ye know how that a good while ago God made choice among us, that the Gentiles by my mouth should hear the word of the gospel, and believe." He then reminded them, that the Holy Ghost had been visibly poured out upon those Gentile converts, showing that in the eyes of Him Who seeth the heart, they were as acceptable as the Jewish converts; and that therefore it could not be necessary for them to observe the ceremonial part of the Law, which Jesus came to do away with. The Jews themselves had never kept the Law so perfectly as to deserve the favour of God; and now that Jesus had delivered them from the observance of that Law, why should the Gentiles be required to observe it. "Now therefore," Peter asks, "why tempt ye God," why provoke ye Him to anger in opposing His Will, "to put a yoke upon the neck of the disciples, which neither our fathers nor we were able to bear? But we believe that through the grace of the Lord Jesus Christ we shall be saved, even as they." Such words from St. Peter, who was well known to have been formerly of a different opinion, could not fail to produce an effect upon his hearers, who now listened quietly and patiently to what was told them by St. Paul and St. Barnabas. "Then all the multitude kept silence, and gave audience to Barnabas and Paul, declaring what miracles and wonders God had wrought among the Gentiles by them." When these two Apostles had ended their history, and "held their peace," James, the ruler and director of the Church, declared it to be his opinion, that it was most certainly the Will of God, that the Gentiles should be received into the Christian Church _without_ being required to keep the Law, as the Jewish teachers had insisted; and that this had been the intention of the Lord from the beginning, and had been accordingly foretold by the prophets. "Wherefore," said he, "my sentence is, that we trouble not them, which from among the Gentiles are turned to God: but that we write unto them, that they abstain from pollutions of idols, and from fornication, and from things strangled, and from blood. For Moses of old time hath in every city them that preach him, being read in the synagogues every sabbath day."