through Him alone will the heart be enabled to become pure, by the expulsion of every evil spirit from the heart. For many spirits dwelling in it do not allow it to be pure, but each of them, while in divers parts they riot there in unseemly lusts, performs its own works. And, it seems to me, the heart is somewhat like an inn. For that, also, is both bored and dug into, and often filled with the ordure of men, who abide there in revelry, and bestow not one single thought upon the place, seeing it is the property of another. And in such wise is it with the heart, so long as no thought is given to it, being impure, and the dwelling-place of many demons, but as soon as the alone good Father has visited it, it is sanctified and shines through with light, and the possessor of such a heart becomes so blessed, that he shall see God."(1) According to Canon Westcott this passage contains two of the "clear references" to our Gospels upon which he bases his statement, namely to Matt. v. 8, and to Matt. xix. 17. Now it is clear that there is no actual quotation from any evangelical work in this passage from the Epistle of Valentinus, and the utmost for which the most zealous apologist could contend is, that there is a slight similarity with some words in the Gospel, and Canon {64} Westcott himself does not venture to call them more than "references." That such distant coincidences should be quoted as evidence for the use of the first Gospel shows how weak is his case. At best such vague allusions could not prove anything, but when the passages to which reference is supposed to be made are examined, it will be apparent that nothing could be more unfounded or arbitrary than the claim of reference specially to our Gospel, to the exclusion of the other Gospels then existing, which to our knowledge contained both passages. We may, indeed, go still further, and affirm that if these coincidences are references to any Gospel at all, that Gospel is not the canonical, but one different from it. The first reference alluded to consists of the following two phrases: "But one only is good [------]..... the alone good Father" [------]. This is compared with Matt. xix. 17:{1} "Why askest thou me concerning good? there is one that is good" [------].(2) Now the passage in the epistle, if a reference to any parallel episode, such as Matt. xix. 17, indicates with certainty the reading: "One is good the Father" [------]. There is no such reading in any of our Gospels. But although this reading does not exist in any of the Canonical Gospels, it is well known that it did exist in uncanonical Gospels no longer extant, and that the passage was one upon which various sects of so-called heretics laid great stress. Irenseus quotes it as one of {65}