t;
and accordingly he argues with them on this basis. But they also
superadded other writings, to which they appealed, while heretics of a
different type, as Marcion for instance, adopted some one Gospel to the
exclusion of all others. He therefore urges not only that four Gospels
alone have been handed down from the beginning, but that in the nature
of things there could not be more nor less than four. There are four
regions of the world, and four principal winds; and the Church
therefore, as destined to be conterminous with the world, must be
supported by four Gospels, as four pillars. The Word again is
represented as seated on the Cherubim, who are described by Ezekiel as
four living creatures, each different from the other. These symbolize
the four Evangelists, with their several characteristics. The
predominance of the number four again appears in another way. There are
four general covenants, of Noah, of Abraham, of Moses, of Christ. It is
therefore an act of audacious folly to increase or diminish the number
of the Gospels. As there is fitness and order in all the other works of
God, so also we may expect to find it in the case of the Gospel.

What is the historical significance of this phenomenon? Can we imagine
that the documents which Irenaeus regards in this light had been
produced during his own lifetime? that they had sprung up suddenly
full-armed from the earth, no one could say how? and that they had taken
their position at once by the side of the Law and the Psalmist and the
Prophets, as the very voice of God?

The author of _Supernatural Religion_ seems to think that no explanation
is needed. 'The reasons,' he writes, 'which he [Irenaeus] gives for the
existence of precisely that number [four Gospels] in the Canon of the
Church illustrate the thoroughly uncritical character of the Fathers,
and the slight dependence which can be placed upon their judgments'
[263:1]. Accordingly he does not even discuss the testimony of Irenaeus,
but treats it as if it were not. He does not see that there is all the
difference in, the world between the value of the same man's evidence as
to matters of fact, and his opinions as to the causes and bearings of
his facts. He does not observe that these fanciful arguments and shadowy
analogies are _pro tanto_ an evidence of the firm hold which this
quadruple Gospel, as a fact, had already obtained when he wrote. Above
all, I must suppose from his silence that he regards this t