The writers hitherto alleged had all lived and conversed with some of the apostles.  The works of theirs which remain are in general very short pieces, yet rendered extremely valuable by their antiquity; and none, short as they are, but what contain some important testimony to our historical Scriptures.*

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* That the quotations are more thinly strewn in these than in the writings of the next and of succeeding ages, is in a good measure accounted for by the observation, that the Scriptures of the New Testament had not yet, nor by their recency hardly could have, become a general part of Christian education; read as the Old Testament was by Jews and Christians from their childhood, and thereby intimately mixing, as that had long done, with all their religious ideas, and with their language upon religious subjects.  In process of time, and as soon perhaps as could be expected, this came to be the case.  And then we perceive the effect, in a proportionably greater frequency, as well as copiousness of allusion.—­Mich.  Introd. c. ii. sect. vi. _________

VII.  Not long after these, that is, not much more than twenty years after the last, follows Justin Martyr (Lardner, Cred. vol. i. p. 258.).  His remaining works are much larger than any that have yet been noticed.  Although the nature of his two principal writings, one of which was addressed to heathens, and the other was a conference with a Jew, did not lead him to such frequent appeals to Christian books as would have appeared in a discourse intended for Christian readers; we nevertheless reckon up in them between twenty and thirty quotations of the Gospels and Acts of the Apostles, certain, distinct, and copious:  if each verse be counted separately, a much greater number; if each expression, a very great one.*

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* “He cites our present canon, and particularly our four Gospels, continually, I dare say, above two hundred times.”  Jones’s New and Full Method.  Append. vol. i. p. 589, ed. 1726. _________

We meet with quotations of three of the Gospels within the compass of half a page:  “And in other words he says, Depart from me into outer darkness, which the Father hath prepared for Satan and his angels,” (which is from Matthew xxv. 41.) “And again he said, in other words, I give unto you power to tread upon serpents and scorpions, and venomous beasts, and upon all the power of the enemy.” (This from Luke x. 19.) “And before he was crucified, he said, The Son of Man must suffer many things, and be rejected of the Scribes and Pharisees, and be crucified, and rise again the third day.” (This from Mark viii. 31.)