Space does not allow me to give in detail these quotations, which are numerous; it would be still more out of the province of this introduction to enter into the arguments by which the rationalistic writers endeavor to reconcile these quotations with their hypotheses. I can but briefly indicate a few of them, referring the student to the larger works for the examination in detail of the parallelism between these early ecclesiastical writers and the Fourth Gospel. Justin Martyr thus refers to the testimony of John the Baptist: “I am not the Christ ... for he cometh who is stronger than I, whose shoes I am not meet to bear” (comp. John 1:19-27). He cites Christ as saying, “Unless ye be born again, ye shall not enter into the kingdom of heaven,” and adds the comment, “Now that it is impossible for those who have been born to go into the matrices of the mother is evident to all” (comp. John 3:3-5). Tatian refers to the sayings, “The darkness comprehends not the light” (comp. John 1:5), and “All things were by him, and without him was not anything made” (comp. John 1:5, 3). Hegessippus (A. D. 125) refers to “that which is spoken in the Gospels, ‘That was the true light which lighteth every man who cometh into the world’” (comp. John 1:9). In the writings of the Naaseni and Peratæ, Gnostic sects of the beginning of the second century, we have several unmistakable references to sayings that are peculiar to the Fourth Gospel. “I am the door,” (comp. John 10:7); “As Moses lifted up the serpent in the wilderness, even so must the Son be lifted up,” (comp. John 3:14); “If thou hadst known who it is that asketh thee, thou wouldest have asked of him, and he would have given thee living water, springing up,” (comp. John 4:10); “The Saviour hath said, ‘That which is born of flesh is flesh, and that which is born of the Spirit is spirit,’” (comp. John 3:6); “Except ye eat my flesh and drink my blood, ye shall not enter the kingdom of heaven,” (comp. John 6:53). These are by no means all the citations from the writers of the first two centuries which appear to have been taken from the Fourth Gospel, but they will suffice to give the reader an idea of the nature of the evidence which is regarded by most Christian writers, and by some rationalistic critics--Matthew Arnold, for example--as establishing the fact that the Fourth Gospel was in existence and recognized as an authority in the Church in the beginning of the second century. If this is the fact, it is reasonably certain that it was the work of the Apostle John, since if it had been written by any one else as early as that date, that is, during the lifetime of some of the contemporaries of John, the forgery would certainly have been detected.