e theory--indeed, so far
as I remember, the only attempt at a theory--offered to account for this
Epistle by those who deny its genuineness or its integrity, connects it
closely with the Ignatian letters. If forged, it was forged by the same
hand which wrote the seven Vossian Epistles; if interpolated, it was
interpolated by the person who expanded the three genuine Epistles into
the seven. According to either hypothesis, the object was to recommend
the Ignatian forgery on the authority of a great Dame; the motive
betrays itself in the thirteenth chapter, where Polycarp is represented
as sending several of the Ignatian Epistles to the Philippians along
with his own letter. This theory is at all events intelligible; and, so
far as I can see, it is the only rational theory of which the case
admits.

Let us ask then, whether there is any improbability in the
circumstances, as here represented. Ignatius had stayed at Philippi on
his way to martyrdom; the Philippians had been deeply impressed by their
intercourse with him; writing to Polycarp afterwards, they had requested
him to send them a copy of the martyr's letter or letters to him; he
complies with the request, and appends also copies of other letters
written by Ignatius, which he happened to have in his possession. Is
this at all unnatural? Suppose on the other hand, that the letter of
Polycarp had contained no such reference to Ignatius and his Epistles,
would it not have been regarded as a highly suspicious circumstance,
that, writing to the Philippians so soon after Ignatius had visited both
Churches, Polycarp should have said nothing about so remarkable a man?
When I see how this argument from silence is worked in other cases, I
cannot doubt that it would have been plied here as a formidable
objection either to the truth of the Ignatian story, or to the
genuineness of Polycarp's Epistle, or to both. My conclusion is that
this notice proves nothing either way, when it stands alone. If the
other contents of the Polycarpian Epistle are questionable, then it
enforces our misgivings. If not, then this use of the notice is only
another illustration of the over-suspicious temperament of modern
criticism, which, as I ventured to suggest in an earlier paper, must be
as fatal to calm and reasonable judgment in matters of early Christian
history, as it is manifestly in matters of common life. The question
therefore is narrowed to this issue, whether the Epistle of Polycarp