apostolicfathers0201clem - Carmel Apologetics

THE GENUINENESS. 349
reference to the existing Ignatian letters is undeniable. The only
question is whether the Curetonian or the Vossian letters are the source
of quotation. Of this question I have already disposed (see above,
pp. 287, 289).
During the next few decades there was no great literary activity in
the Christian Church; and the extant remains are exceptionally meagre.
It is very rarely that we find in these any notice which throws light on
the earUer literature of Christendom. In the case of Ignatius however
we have one quotation, though not by name, in Peter of Alexandria
(see above, p. 145). If indeed we could with confidence assign the
Apostolical Constitutions to this period (and seemingly they ought not to
be placed later), the evidence would be largely reinforced ;
for the
influence of the Ignatian letters is perceptible again and again
in this
work (see above, p. 145).
EusEBius OF C^SAREA is
Separated from Origen by a period of
half a century or more but ; Pamphilus
is a link of connexion between
the two. Reasons are given above (p. 289) for supposing that with
respect to the Ignatian literature Eusebius availed himself of the same
sources of information from which Origen had before drawn.
If so, the
evidence which he supplies is carried back to the earlier half of the
third century, when Origen lived and wrote. However this may be,
the account of the Ignatian letters in Eusebius is so full and so definite,
that it needs no comment and leaves nothing to be desired (see above,
p. 146 sq).
From the age of Eusebius onward the testimony
is of the most
varied kind. The Ignatian Episdes appear whole or in part, not only
in the original Greek, but in Syriac, Armenian, Coptic, Latin, and
(at least in quotations) Arabic. They are abridged, expanded, and
imitated. They are quoted equally by orthodox Catholics and Monophysite
heretics. No early Christian writing
outside the Canon is
attested by witnesses so many and so various in the ages of the
Councils and subsequently.
And in this many-tongued chorus there is not one dissentient voice.
Throughout the whole period of Christian history before the Reformation,
not a suspicion of their genuineness is breathed, though they were
quoted in controversy, and not a few disputants were deeply interested
in denying their genuineness. Even spurious and interpolated Ignatian
matter is
accepted on the credit of the more authentic epistles. One
witness indeed has been called against them ; but, when crossquestioned,
he entirely fails to substantiate the case which he was
summoned to support. Nicephorus, Patriarch of Constantinople