The account which Paul gives of his visit not only ignores any such decree, but excludes it. In the first place, taking into account the Apostle's character and the spirit of his Epistle, it is impossible to suppose that Paul had any intention of submitting, as to higher authority, the Gospel which he preached, for the judgment of the elder Apostles and of the Church of Jerusalem.(1) Nothing short of this is involved in the account in the Acts, and in the form of the decree which promulgates, in an authoritative manner, restrictive clauses which "seemed good to the Holy Spirit" and to the Council. The temper of the man is well shown in Paul's indignant letter to the Galatians. He receives his Gospel, not from men, but by direct revelation from Jesus Christ and, so far is he from submission of the kind implied, that he says: "But even though we, or an angel from heaven, should preach unto you any Gospel other than that which we preached to you, let him be accursed. As we have said before, so say I now again: If any man preach any Gospel to you other than that ye received, let him be accursed."(2) That the Apostle here refers to his own peculiar teaching, and does so in contradistinction to the Gospel preached by the Judaizers, is evident from the preceding words: "I marvel that ye are so soon removing from him that called you in the grace of Christ unto a different Gospel; which is not another, only there are {268} some that trouble you, and desire to pervert the Gospel of Christ."(1) Passing from this, however, to the restrictive clauses in general, how is it possible that Paul could state, as the result of his visit, that the "pillar" Apostles "communicated nothing" after hearing his Gospel, if the four conditions of this decree had thus been authoritatively "communicated"? On the contrary, Paul distinctly adds that, in acknowledging his mission, but one condition had been attached: "Only that we should remember the poor; which very thing I also was forward to do."(2) As one condition is here mentioned, why not the others, had any been actually imposed? It is argued that the remembrance of the poor of Jerusalem which is thus inculcated was a recommendation personally made to Paul and Barnabas, but it is clear that the Apostle's words refer to the result of his communication of his Gospel, and to the understanding under which his mission to the Gentiles was tolerated. We have already pointed out how extraordinary it is that such a decision of the Council should not have been referred to in describing his visit, and the more we go into details the more striking and inexplicable, except in one way, is such silence. In relating the struggle regarding the circumcision of Titus, for instance, and stating that he did not yield, no, not for an hour, to the demands made on the subject, is it conceivable that, if the exemption of all Gentile Christians from the initiatory rite had {269}