‘What prophecies are these?’ you ask. ‘For all that was foretold was written down after the event.’ Tell me when, and where, and by whom, and how long ago? Shall we say it was fifty years ago or a hundred? Therefore a hundred years ago there was nothing at all written down. Then how did the world receive the teaching and all other things, as memory did not suffice? How did they know that Peter was crucified? How after this did it occur to men to foretell such things, for instance, as that the Gospel should be preached in the whole world, that the Jewish dispensation should stop and not come back again? How would those who had staked their lives for the Gospel have borne to see it counterfeited? How were the writers trusted when there were no more miracles? How did those writings penetrate into uncivilised lands, and into India, and even unto the farthest extremities of the ocean, if the speakers were not worthy of faith? Now, who were the writers? When and where did they write? Why did they write? Was it to make themselves famous? Why did they ascribe the Scriptures to others? Were they desirous of embodying a system of doctrine? Then was it true or false? For if they looked upon it as false, there was no pretext for their coming forward at all; but if as true, there was no need of counterfeits, as you truly say. Moreover, the prophecies are such that up to the present day what has been said cannot be restricted by time. If, on the one hand, the destruction of Jerusalem took place many years ago, there are other prophecies dating from the same time which reach up to His coming. Examine these, if you like—as, for instance, _I am with you always, even unto the consummation of time_, and, _Upon this rock I will build My Church, and the gates of hell shall not prevail against it_; again, _This Gospel shall be preached to all nations_, and the deed of the woman who was a sinner, and many more than these. Now, whence comes the truth of this prophecy if it was an invention? How have the gates of hell not prevailed against the Church? How is Christ always with us? If He were not with us, the Church would not have conquered. How has the Gospel been spread about the whole world? Our adversaries are able to bear witness to the antiquity of our Scriptures—I mean Celsus and his party, and the man of Batavia after him—for they did not contradict what those who came after them put together; moreover, the whole world with one voice has received it. For if it was not the grace of the Spirit, there could not have been so great an unity from end to end of the earth, but the inventors would speedily have been convicted, nor would successes so great have been produced by forgeries and falsehood. Do you not see the whole world coming to meet it, and error extinguished?—the mortification of monks shining brighter than the sun? Do you not see bands of virgins, the piety of barbarians, men all serving under one yoke? Nor are these things foretold by us alone, but