And now that you have learnt from me the hazard that cast me among you I will tell you that I am a Jew like yourselves:  one born in Tarsus, a great city of Cilicia; a Roman citizen as you have heard from me, a privilege which was not bought by me for a great sum of money, nor by any act of mine, but inherited from my father, a Hebrew like yourselves, and descended from the stock of Abraham like yourselves.  And by trade a weaver of that cloth of which tents are made; for my father gave me that trade, for which I thank him, for by it I have earned my living these many years, in various countries and cities.  At an early age I was a skilful hand at the loom, and at the same time learned in the Scriptures, and my father, seeing a Rabbi in me, sent me to Jerusalem, and while I was taught the law I remember hearing of the Baptist, and the priests of the Temple muttering against him, but they were afraid to send men against him, for he was in great favour with the people.  Afterwards I returned to Tarsus, where I worked daily at my loom until tidings came to that city that a disciple of John was preaching the destruction of the law, saying that he could destroy the Temple and build it up again in three days.  We spoke under our breaths in Tarsus of this man, hardly able to believe that anyone could be so blasphemous and reprobate, and when we heard of his death upon a cross we were overjoyed and thought the Pharisees had done well; for we were full of zeal for the traditions and the ancient glory of our people.  We believed then that heresy and blasphemy were at an end, and when news came of one Stephen, who had revived all the stories that Jesus told, that the end of the world was nigh and that the Temple could be destroyed and built up again, I laid my loom aside and started for Jerusalem in great anger to join with those who would root out the Nazarenes:  we are now known as Christians, the name given to us at Antioch.

I was telling that I laid aside my loom in Tarsus and set out for Jerusalem to aid in rooting out the sect that I held to be blasphemous and pernicious.  Now on the day of my arrival in that city, while coming from the Temple I saw three men hurrying by, one whose face was white as the dead, with a small crowd following; and everyone saying:  not here, not here!  And as they spoke stones were being gathered, and I knew that they were for stoning the man they had with them, one Stephen, they said, who had been teaching in the Temple that Jesus was born and died and raised from the dead, and that since his death the law is of no account.  So did I gather news and with it abhorrence, and followed them till they came to an angle, at which they said:  this corner will do.  Stephen was thrown into it, and stones of all kinds were heaped upon him till one spattered his brains along the wall, after which the crowd muttered, we shall have no more of them.