Archbishop Usher ("Proleg. ad Ignat. Ep.," chap, iii.). thought Polycarp was the angel of the Church at Smyrna, referred to in Revelations ii., 8. A trivial objection to this is, that it would make Polycarp live until 100 years afterwards, as the old father is alleged to have lived on through all the early persecutions, only to suffer death in 167, under the reign of the mild and gentle Antoninus. Later critics, however, have decided that Statius Quadratus, under whom he is said to have died, was pro-consul in a.d. 154-5 or 155-6--all of which shows the very reliable nature of early Christian records. He is said to have declared that he served Christ for eighty-six years, but learned authorities are again divided as to whether he meant that as his age, or as dating from the time of his conversion. Irenæus, from whom we get our information concerning Polycarp, gives us the following choice anecdote, which illustrates how these Christians loved one another: "There are also those who heard from him that John, the disciple of the Lord, going to bathe at Ephesus, and perceiving Cerinthus within, rushed out of the bath-house without bathing, exclaiming, 'Let us fly, lest even the bathhouse fall down, because Cerinthus, the enemy of the truth, is within.' And Polycarp himself replied to Marcion, who met him on one occasion and said, 'Dost thou know me?' 'I do know thee, the firstborn of Satan'" ("Irenæus against Heresies," book iii., chap, iii., sec. 4., p. 263, Vol. V. "Ante-Nicene Christian Library"). In the so-called Epistle of Polycarp to the Philippians, which consists of a string of quotations from the Old Testament and Paul, occurs this passage: "For whosoever does not confess that Jesus Christ has come in the flesh, is antichrist; and whosoever does not confess the testimony of the cross, is of the Devil; and whosoever perverts the oracles of the Lord to his own lusts, and says that there is neither a resurrection nor a judgment, he is the first-born of Satan" (chap, xii., p. 73). Schwegler and Hilgenfeld consider the insertion of this phrase, "firstborn of Satan," as proof of the inauthenticity of the Epistle. They argue that the well-known saying was employed to give an appearance of reality to the forgery. Nor are there wanting other indications of its spuriousness. It refers to the mythical martyr journey of Ignatius, and while treating him as dead in chapter ix., has him alive and kicking again in chapter xiii.