oes indeed
derive a very slight countenance from the repetition of the
language of the last quotation: this repetition, however, occurs
at too short an interval to be of importance. But the theory that
the Clementine writer is quoting from a document older than the
two Synoptics, and indeed their common original, is excluded by
the amount of matter that is common to the two Synoptics and
either not found at all or found variantly in the Clementines. The
coincidence between the Synoptics, we may assume, is derived from
the fact that they both drew from a common original. The
phraseology in which they agree is in all probability that of the
original document itself. If therefore this phraseology is wanting
in the Clementine quotations they are not likely to have been
drawn directly from the document which underlies the Synoptics.
This conclusion too is confirmed by particulars. In the first
quotation we cannot set down quite positively the Clementine
expansion of [Greek: tois aitousin auton] as a later form, though
it most probably is so. But the strange and fantastic phrase in
the last quotation, [Greek: to apistoun auton meros meta ton
hupokriton thaesei], is almost certainly a combination of the
[Greek: hupokriton] of Matthew with a distorted reminiscence of the
[Greek: apiston] of Luke.

We have then the same kind of choice set before us as in the case
of Justin. Either the Clementine writer quotes our present
Gospels, or else he quotes some other composition later than them,
and which implies them. In other words, if he does not bear
witness to our Gospels at first hand, he does so at second hand,
and by the interposition of a further intermediate stage. It is
quite possible that he may have had access to such a tertiary
document, and that it may be the same which is the source of his
apocryphal quotations: that he did draw from apocryphal sources,
partly perhaps oral, but probably in the main written, there can,
I think, be little doubt. Neither is it easy to draw the line and
say exactly what quotations shall be referred to such sources and
what shall not. The facts do not permit us to claim the exclusive
use of the canonical Gospels. But that they were used, mediately
or immediately and to a greater or less degree, is, I believe,
beyond question.

CHAPTER VII

BASILIDES AND VALENTINUS.

Still following the order of 'Supernatural Religion,' we pass
with the critic to another group of heretical wri