It is obvious, from these quotations, that the particular tradition which Irenæus adduces _against the Gnostics_ is the substance of the baptismal creed; and thence, perhaps, it may be inferred that he would confine tradition altogether to the creed. But it must be remembered that, in declining to go to Gnostic tradition, and choosing in preference that which is truly apostolical, the principle of his appeal is this: that the Apostles delivered the doctrines of the Gospel by preaching, &c. to the different Churches, and by individual instruction to the particular persons whom they made bishops of the Churches; that the bishops had delivered down the same mass of truths to the Churches they presided over, and to their successors; and that the truth might be ascertained by discovering what was universally received in all the apostolical sees(353). But this truth was not confined to the creed, for there are other truths as certain as those in the creed, which are not specified in it; and the very creed itself was variable, or rather was variously stated at different times(354). But we are not left to inference alone to learn the views of Irenæus; he instances the epistles of Clement and Polycarp as containing true traditions, and _they_ exhibit other truths beyond those of the creed. Again, the faith, which, if the Apostles had left no writings, he affirms must have been kept up by tradition, and which was, in fact, kept up in barbarous nations without the aid of writing(355), must have been something more extensive than the mere elementary points of belief. Nay, his assertion that when we are in doubt, even upon _trifling_ points, it is a duty to have recourse to the most ancient Churches(356), shows at once that the province of tradition, in his mind, was far wider than the transmission of simply fundamental points; it was a great system of doctrine, discipline, and practice, which such an observation looked at; and there can be but little doubt that, although his subject in his great Treatise leads him to adduce it formally, only on the subject of doctrine, that he found himself bound by it upon all points which appeared to be thus universally handed down in the Churches.