How far is it possible to refute their view? In the domain of the external arguments, the main strength of the revolutionaries, the position is not so favourable to them as Loman wished to represent it. The transference of the first Epistle of Clement to the middle of the second century is not possible._(_104_)_ The fact that Justin knew and used Paul’s writings, while he does not name him, is not explained by the hypothesis that they did not rank for him as Church writings._(_105_)_ The Marcionite text of Galatians reconstructed by van Manen is not better but worse than the canonical text._(_106_)_ If the Ignatian letters, as is now generally held, are genuine, the attestation of the Pauline Epistles is in much better case than was formerly supposed. That Acts says nothing about the literary activity of the Apostle has at most the value of an _argumentum e silentio._ It is not otherwise in regard to the fact that Acts has nothing to say of the conflicts between him and his churches. In regard to the question of priority as between its narrative and that of Galatians there is at least nothing certain to be said. The position of matters is therefore that the Epistles to the Romans and Corinthians are witnessed to by the first Epistle of Clement at the end of the first century, but that neither the legitimate nor the illegitimate [pg 136] representatives of the Tübingen tradition can explain why Justin and the remaining writers of the beginning of the second century are not under the influence of these Epistles, and, with the exception of Clement, do not even mention them. The hypothesis brought forward by Steck and van Manen in regard to different strata within the Epistles and the development which culminates in the antinomianism of the Epistle to the Galatians cannot be proved from the texts; the evidence is read into them by the exercise of great ingenuity. But the negative observation which formed their starting-point holds its ground. Ordinary exegesis has not succeeded in getting rid of the illogical transitions and contradictions and making Paul’s arguments really intelligible. The impression of a certain disconnectedness is not to be denied. But Steck and van Manen have not succeeded in discovering the law and order which ought to prevail in it, and showing how the chaos arose in connexion with the creation of this literature. Against the hypothesis of the origin of Paulinism in the second century there lies the objection that it is built on purely arbitrary assumptions. Whence do Steck and van Manen know anything about anti-Jewish conflicts taking place at that time? There is no evidence of any such thing in the contemporary literature; and the writings of the apostolic Fathers make quite in the contrary direction.