Respecting the latter, it appears from Eusebius that he published commentaries on the Gospels of St. Matthew and St. John.  Of the latter Eusebius says the first five books wore composed at Alexandria, but of the whole work on St. John only twenty-two books have come down to us.  (Bk. vi. ch. 24.) Now Origen was born a few years (at the most twenty) after the death of Justin; and we have seen how the author of “Supernatural Religion” evidently considers the works of Justin to be anterior to the Fourth Gospel.  Is it credible, or oven conceivable, that a man of Origen’s intellect, learning, and research should write twenty or thirty books of commentaries on a false Gospel which was forged shortly before his own time?

He expressly states that the Church knew of but four Gospels:—­

“As I have understood from tradition respecting the four Gospels, which are the only undisputed ones in the whole Church of God throughout the world.  The first is written according to Matthew, the same that was once a publican, but afterwards an Apostle of Jesus Christ, who, having published it for the Jewish converts, wrote it in Hebrew.  The second is according to Mark, who composed it as Peter explained to him, whom he [Peter] also acknowledged as his son in his general epistle, saying, ’The elect Church in Babylon salutes you, as also Mark, my son.’  And the third according to Luke, the Gospel commended by Paul, which was written for the converts from the Gentiles; and, last of all, the Gospel according to John.”  Extract from Origen’s first book of his commentaries on St. Matthew, quoted by Eusebius (vi. 25)

As regards Cyprian, the following quotation will suffice:—­

“The Church, setting forth the likeness of Paradise, includes within her walls fruit-bearing trees, whereof that which does not bring forth good fruit is cut off and is cast into the fire.  These trees she waters with four rivers, that is, with the four Gospels, wherewith, by a celestial inundation, she bestows the grace of saying baptism.”  Cyprian, Letter lxxii. to Jubaianus.

As regards Hippolytus I have counted above fifty references to St. Matthew and forty to St. John, in his work on the “Refutation of Heresies,” and “Fragments.”  I append in a note a passage taken from his comment on the Second Psalm, preserved to us by Theodoret.  The reader will be able to judge from it from what sources he derived his knowledge of Christ.  I give it rather for its devotional spirit than its evidence for the four. [126:1]

We now come to the conclusion of the second century.  Between the years 180 and 200 or 210 A.D., there flourished three writers of whom we possess somewhat voluminous remains.  Irenaeus, who was born about 140 at the latest, who was in youth the disciple of Polycarp, who was himself the disciple of St. John.  Irenaeus wrote his work against heresies about the year 180, a little after he had succeeded Pothinus as Bishop of Lyons, and was martyred at the beginning of the next century (202).