good both these
positions alike. Otherwise it can have no standing ground. My object in
the following investigations is to show that neither position is
tenable.

Polycarp was born more than thirty years before the close of the first
century, and he survived to the latter half of the second. The date of
his birth may be fixed with some degree of certainty as A.D. 69 or 70.
At all events it cannot have been later than this. At the time of his
martyrdom, which is now ascertained to have taken place A.D. 155 or 156
[90:1], he declared that he had served Christ eighty-six years [90:2];
and, if this expression be explained as referring to the whole period of
his life (which is the more probable supposition), we are carried back
to the date which I have just given.

Thus Polycarp was born on the eve of a great crisis, which was fraught
with momentous consequences to the Church at large, and which more
especially made itself felt in the Christian congregations of his own
country, proconsular Asia. The fall of Jerusalem occurred in the autumn
of the year 70. But at the final assault the Christians were no longer
among the besieged. The impending war had been taken as the signal for
their departure from the doomed city. The greater number had retired
beyond the Jordan, and founded Christian colonies in Pella and the
neighbourhood. But the natural leaders of the Church--the surviving
Apostles and personal disciples of Christ--had sought a home elsewhere.
From this time forward it is neither to Jerusalem nor to Pella, but to
proconsular Asia, and more especially to Ephesus as its metropolis, that
we must look for the continuance of the original type of Apostolic
doctrine and practice. At the epoch of the catastrophe we find the
Apostle John for a short time living in exile--whether voluntary or
constrained, it is unnecessary to inquire--in the island of Patmos. Soon
after this he takes up his abode at Ephesus, which seems to have been
his head-quarters during the remainder of his long life [91:1]. And John
was not alone in choosing Asia Minor as his new home. More especially
the companions of his early youth seem to have been attracted to this
neighbourhood. Of two brother Apostles and fellow-countrymen of
Bethsaida this is distinctly recorded. Andrew, the brother of Simon
Peter, appears in company with John in these later years, according to
an account which seems at least so far trustworthy [91:2]. The presence
of Philip, the