ment. Chaps. 2:28; 3:18-20; 4:17, 18; 5:14, 15. These
fundamental truths the apostle reiterates in various forms and
connections, intermingling with them various admonitions and promises of
a more particular character. He dwells with especial fulness on the
evidences of discipleship as manifested in the daily spirit and life.
There is perhaps no part of God's word so directly available to the
anxious inquirer who wishes to know what true religion is, and whether
he possesses it. He who, in humble reliance on the illumination of the
divine Spirit, applies to himself this touchstone of Christian
character, will know whether he is of God, or of the world that lies in
wickedness.

16. SECOND AND THIRD EPISTLES OF JOHN. These two short epistles are so
closely related to each other in style and manner that they have always
been regarded as written by one and the same person. In considering,
therefore, the question of their authorship we take them both together.
Though reckoned by Origen (in Eusebius' Hist. Eccl., 6. 25) and by
Eusebius himself (Hist. Eccl., 3. 25; Demonstratio Evangel. 3. 5) among
the disputed writings, the external testimony to their apostolic
authorship is upon the whole satisfactory, embracing the names of
Irenaeus, Clement of Alexandria, Dionysius of Alexandria, Jerome, etc.
When we take into account the small extent of these epistles it is plain
that no unfavorable inference can be drawn from the silence of
Tertullian and others. Nor is there any internal evidence against them.
That the man who, in his gospel, studiously avoids the mention of his
own name, describing himself as "the disciple whom Jesus loved," and, in
his first epistle, simply classes himself with the other apostles--"that
which _we_ have seen and heard," etc.--should in these epistles, where
some designation of himself was necessary, speak of himself as "the
elder" is not surprising. Compare 1 Peter 5:1.

17. Concerning the date of these two epistles we know nothing. The
object of the first seems to have been to set before the lady to whom it
was addressed the importance of a discriminating love, which
distinguishes between truth and falsehood, and does not allow itself to
aid and abet error by misplaced kindness towards its teachers.

In the second the apostle, writing to Gaius, commends to his
hospitality, certain missionary brethren, who were strangers in the
place where this disciple lived. It would seem that the design of these