The only other witness now remaining to be examined is Polycarp.  It has often been affirmed that he distinctly acknowledges the authority of these letters; and yet, when honestly interrogated, he will be found to deliver quite a different deposition.  But, before proceeding to consider his testimony, let us inquire his age when his epistle was written.  It bears the following superscription:—­“Polycarp, and the elders who are with him, to the Church of God which is at Philippi.”  At this time, therefore, though the early Christians paid respect to hoary hairs, and were not willing to permit persons without experience to take precedence of their seniors, Polycarp must have been at the head of the presbytery.  But, at the death of Ignatius, when according to the current theory he dictated this letter, he was a young man of six and twenty. [403:1] Such a supposition is very much out of keeping with the tone of the document.  In it he admonishes the widows to be sober; [403:2] he gives advice to the elders and deacons; [403:3] he expresses his great concern for Valens, an erring brother, who had once been a presbyter among them; [403:4] and he intimates that the epistle was written at the urgent request of the Philippians themselves. [403:5] Is it at all probable that Polycarp, at the age of six and twenty, was in a position to warrant him to use such a style of address?  Are we to believe he was already so well known and so highly venerated that a Christian community on the other side of the Aegean Sea, and the oldest Church in all Greece, would apply to him for advice and direction?  We must be prepared to admit all this, before we can acknowledge that his epistle refers to Ignatius of Antioch.

Let us attend now to that passage in the letter to the Philippians where he is supposed to speak of the Syrian pastor.  “I exhort all of you that ye obey the word of righteousness, and exercise all patience, which ye have seen set forth before your eyes, not only in the blessed Ignatius, and Zosimus, and Rufus, but also in others of you.” [404:1] These words would suggest to an ordinary reader that Polycarp is here speaking, not of Ignatius of Antioch, but of an Ignatius of Philippi.  If this Ignatius did not belong to the Philippian Church, why, when addressing its members, does he speak of Ignatius, Zosimus, Rufus, and “others of you?” Ignatius of Antioch could not have been thus described.  But who, it may be asked, were Zosimus and Rufus here mentioned as fellow-sufferers with Ignatius?  They were exactly in the position which the words of Polycarp literally indicate; they were men of Philippi; and, as such, they are commemorated in the “Martyrologies.” [404:2] It is impossible, therefore, to avoid the conclusion that the Ignatius of Polycarp was also a Philippian.

It appears, then, that this testimony of the pastor of Smyrna has been strangely misunderstood.  Ignatius, as is well known, was not a very uncommon name; and it would seem that several martyrs of the ancient Church bore this designation.  Cyprian, for example, tells us of an Ignatius in Africa who was put to death for the profession of Christianity in the former part of the third century. [405:1] It is apparent from the words of Polycarp that there was also an Ignatius of Philippi, as well as an Ignatius of Antioch.