Heracleon, commenting on St. John i. 3, insists that 'all things' can but signify this perishable world and the things that are therein: not essences of a loftier nature. Accordingly, after the words 'and without Him was not anything made,' he ventures to interpolate this clause,--'of the things that are in the world and in the creation[462].' True, that the Evangelist had declared with unmistakable emphasis, 'and without Him was not anything' (literally, 'was not even one thing') 'made that was made.' But instead of 'not even one thing,' the Valentinian Gnostics appear to have written 'nothing[463]'; and the concluding clause 'that was made,' because he found it simply unmanageable, Valentinus boldly severed from its context, making it the beginning of a fresh sentence. With the Gnostics, ver. 4 is found to have begun thus,--'What was made in Him was life.' Of the change of [Greek: oude hen] into [Greek: ouden][464] traces survive in many of the Fathers[465]: but [Symbol: Aleph] and D are the only Uncial MSS. which are known to retain that corrupt reading.--The uncouth sentence which follows ([Greek: ho gegonen en auto zoe en]), singular to relate, was generally tolerated, became established in many quarters, and meets us still at every step. It was evidently put forward so perseveringly by the Gnostics, with whom it was a kind of article of the faith, that the orthodox at last became too familiar with it. Epiphanius, though he condemns it, once employs it[466]. Occurring first in a fragment of Valentinus[467]: next, in the Commentary of Heracleon[468]: after that, in the pages of Theodotus the Gnostic (A.D. 192)[469]: then, in an exposure by Hippolytus of the tenets of the Naaeseni[470], (a subsection of the same school);--the baseness of its origin at least is undeniable. But inasmuch as the words may be made to bear a loyal interpretation, the heretical construction of St. John i. 3 was endured by the Church for full 200 years. Clemens Alex, is observed thrice to adopt it[471]: Origen[472] and Eusebius[473] fall into it repeatedly. It is found in Codd. [Symbol: Aleph]CD: apparently in Cod. A, where it fills one line exactly. Cyril comments largely on it[474]. But as fresh heresies arose which the depraved text seemed to favour, the Church bestirred herself and remonstrated. It suited the Arians and the Macedonians[475], who insisted that the Holy Ghost is a creature. The former were refuted by Epiphanius, who points out that the sense is not complete until you have read the words [Greek: ho gegonen]. A fresh sentence (he says) begins at [Greek: En auto zoe en][476]. Chrysostom deals with the latter. 'Let us beware of putting the full stop' (he says) 'at the words [Greek: oude hen],--as do the heretics. In order to make out that the Spirit is a creature, they read [Greek: ho gegonen en auto zoe en]: by which means the Evangelist's meaning becomes unintelligible[477].'