ibes his relations
to Polycarp will not admit of a date many years later. But his
strong sense of the continuity of Church doctrine and the
exceptional veneration that he accords to the Gospels seem alone
to exclude the supposition that any of them should have been
composed in his own lifetime. He is fond of quoting the
'Presbyters,' who connected his own age with that, if not of the
Apostles, yet of Apostolic men. Pothinus, bishop of Lyons, whom he
succeeded, was more than ninety years old at the time of his
martyrdom in the persecution of A.D. 177 [Endnote 326:2], and
would thus in his boyhood be contemporary with the closing years
of the last Evangelist. Irenaeus also had before him a number of
writings--some, e.g. the works of the Marcosians, in addition to
those that have been discussed in the course of this work--in
which our Gospels are largely quoted, and which, to say the least,
were earlier than his own time of writing.

Clement of Alexandria began to flourish, ([Greek: egnorizeto])
[Endnote 327:1], in the reign of Commodus (180-190 A.D.), and had
obtained a still wider celebrity as head of the Catechetical
School of Alexandria in the time of Severus [Endnote 327:2] (193-
211). The opinions therefore to which he gives expression in his
works of this date were no doubt formed at a earlier period. He
too appeals to the tradition of which he had been himself a
recipient. He speaks of his teachers, 'those blessed and truly
memorable men,' one in Greece, another in Magna Graecia, a third
in Coele-Syria, a fourth in Egypt, a fifth in Assyria, a sixth in
Palestine, to whom the doctrine of the Apostles had been handed
down from father to son [Endnote 327:3].

Tertullian is still bolder. In his controversy with Marcion he
confidently claims as on his side the tradition of the Apostolic
Churches. By it is guaranteed the Gospel of St. Luke which he is
defending, and not only that, but the other Gospels [Endnote
327:4]. In one passage Tertullian even goes so far as to send his
readers to the Churches of Corinth, Philippi, &c. for the very
autographs ('authenticae literae') of St. Paul's Epistles [Endnote
327:5]. But this is merely a characteristic flourish of rhetoric.
All for which the statements of Tertullian may safely be said to
vouch is, that the Gospels had held their 'prerogative' position
within his memory and that of most members of the Church to which
he belonged.

But the evidence of the Fathers is most d