Because the Gospel of the Hebrews is not preserved, is not in the Canon, it does not follow that its value was slight, its accuracy doubtful. Its disappearance is due partly to the fact of its having been written in Aramaic, but chiefly to that of its having been in use by an Aramaic‐ speaking community which assumed first a schismatical, then a heretical position, so that the disfavour which fell on the Nazarene body enveloped and doomed its Gospel as well. The four Canonical Gospels owe their preservation to their having been in use among those Christian communities which coalesced under the moulding hands of St. John. Those parties which were reluctant to abandon their peculiar features were looked upon with coldness, then aversion, lastly abhorrence. They became more and more isolated, eccentric, prejudiced, impracticable. Whilst the Church asserted her catholicity, organized her constitution, established her canon, formulated her creed, adapted herself to the flux of ideas, these narrow sects spent their petty lives in accentuating their peculiarities till they grew into monstrosities; and when they fell and disappeared, there fell and disappeared with them those precious records of the Saviour’s words and works which they had preserved. The Hebrew Gospel was closely related to the Gospel of St. Matthew; that we know from the testimony of St. Jerome, who saw, copied and translated it. That it was not identical with the Canonical first Gospel is also certain. Sufficient fragments have been preserved to show that in many points it was fuller, in some less complete, than the Greek Gospel of St. Matthew. The two Gospels were twin sisters speaking different tongues. Was the Greek of the first Gospel acquired, or was it original? This is a point deserving of investigation before we fix the origin and determine the construction of the Hebrew Gospel. According to a fragment of a lost work by Papias, written about the middle of the second century, under the title of “Commentary on the Sayings of the Lord,”(247) the apostle Matthew was the author of a collection of the “sayings,” λόγια, of our blessed Lord. The passage has been already given, but it is necessary to quote it again here: “Matthew wrote in the Hebrew dialect the sayings, and every one interpreted them as best he was able.”(248) These “logia” could only be, according to the signification of the word (Rom. iii. 2; Heb. v. 12; Pet. iv. 11; Acts vii. 38), a collection of the sayings of the Saviour that were regarded as oracular, as “the words of God.” That they were the words of Jesus, follows from the title given by Papias to his commentary, Λόγια κυριακὰ. This brief notice is sufficient to show that Matthew’s collection was not the Gospel as it now stands. It was no collection of the acts, no biography, of the Saviour; it was solely a collection of his discourses.