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Voltaire and Lord Herbert had an equal disbelief in both. Naturally, none of these writers held that Philostratus wrote in direct imitation of the Gospels, as it would have marred their point to do so. But equally naturally the orthodox writers, beginning with Huet, bp. of Avranches, and coming down through Paley to our own day, have considered Philostratus a direct though concealed antagonist of Christianity. This view has been opposed in Germany by Meiners, Neander, Buhle, and Jacobs, and in England by Watson (Contemp. Rev. Feb. 1867). Baur took an intermediate view in his Apollonius von Tyana und Christus, Tübingen, 1832), which in its main outline will we think commend itself as by far the most probable account. According to this view Philostratus wrote with no strictly polemical reference to Christianity, but, in the eclectic spirit of his time, strove to accommodate Christianity to the heathen religion. We are disposed to believe, without attributing to Philostratus any formal design of opposing or assimilating Christianity, that he was strongly influenced by its ideas and history.

The central aim of his biography is to set forth, not merely wise precepts in the abstract, but an example of supreme wisdom for humanity to imitate. It is not implied by this that Philostratus considered Apollonius as entirely and necessarily unique among men; but it is implied that he considered him as more than a mere teacher of doctrine, as a pattern to men in his own person, as one in whom wisdom and truth were incorporate. He wished men to honour Apollonius himself, and not merely to study or believe certain truths delivered by Apollonius. This cannot, we think, be doubted by any one who reflects on the whole tone of the book. Apollonius is called "divine"; his disciples stand in an altogether different relation to him from that in which the disciples of Socrates stand to Socrates; they do not argue with him as equals with an equal; they follow him, listen to him, are rebuked by him. His miracles, again, do not result from his being in possession of any secret communicable to other men, but arise from his own nature and wisdom. Such a character must remind us, however different in some respects, of the Christ of the Gospels. But was any character like this, or approaching to this, drawn by any heathen writer before Christ? We think not. Philosophy and magic, the search after knowledge and the search after power, were familiar to men who had never heard of Christianity; but this ideal is different from either, and from both of them united. Those who affirm that Philostratus never thought of the Christian history in his work, say that he intended Apollonius as a rival to Pythagoras. But by whom was Pythagoras portrayed as this superhuman ideal? Not certainly by any writer of the centuries before Christ. Even Plutarch (Numa, c. viii.) does not set him up as an ideal exemplar. Is it possible that the age of Caracalla and Severus, so eclectic, so traditional, so unoriginal, can of its own mere motion have gone off into this new and unheard-of line?—unheard of, that is, unless, as we must, we suppose it to have been borrowed

from Christianity. The Christians were not then by any means an unknown sect; so well known were they that Alexander Severus (with a singular parallelism to the supposed conduct of Philostratus) placed Christ with Abraham, Orpheus, and Apollonius himself, among his household gods. Secondly, the resemblance to the Gospel histories is in particular instances very broad indeed. The miraculous birth of Proteus, and the circumstances attending it; the healing of demoniacal possessions (was the idea of such possessions in any way familiar to the Greeks?); the raising of the dead; the appearance of Apollonius to two of his disciples after his deliverance from Domitian; his ascent to heaven, and appearance after his death,—these are points of similarity that cannot be evaded: and, taken together with the central idea of the book, they seem to imply that Philostratus consciously borrowed from the Gospels. It should be noticed that the very striking resemblances between the biography of Apollonius and the Gospels are resemblances in externals; the inner spirit is entirely different: in the one we find the self-contained philosophic spirit, striking even amid all the rhetoric and tawdry marvels with which Philostratus has dressed it; in the other, the spirit of the insufficiency of self.

Those who wish to examine the whole question respecting Apollonius should consult Baur, op. cit.; Kayser's Philostratus; Zeller's Philosophie der Griechen; and the writers noticed above.

[J.R.M.]

Apostolic Fathers. Definition of the Term.—The adjective Apostolicus (ἀποστολικός) is used to denote either morally or doctrinally accordance with the Apostles, or historically connexion with the Apostles. In this latter sense it is especially applied to churches founded directly by Apostles, or to persons associated with and taught by Apostles. The former are Apostolicae ecclesiae; the latter Apostolici viri, or Apostolici simply. See especially Tertull. de Praescr. 32, "ut primus ille episcopus aliquem ex apostolis vel apostolicis viris, qui tamen cum apostolis perseveravit, habuerit auctorem et antecessorem. Hoc enim modo ecclesiae apostolicae census suos deferunt sicut Smyrnaeorum ecclesia Polycarpum ab Joanne collocatum refert, sicut Romanorum Clementem a Petro ordinatum itidem," with the whole context. Cf. also de Praescr. 20, 21; adv. Marc. i. 21, v. 2; de Carn. Chr. 2; de Pudic. 21. Hence among the Evangelists, while St. Matthew and St. John are Apostoli, St. Mark and St. Luke are Apostolici (adv. Marc. iv. 2). In accordance with this usage the term Apostolic Fathers is confined to those who are known, or may reasonably be presumed, to have associated with and derived their teaching directly from some Apostle. In its widest range it will include Barnabas, Hermas, Clemens, Ignatius, Polycarp, Papias, and the writer of the epistle to Diognetus. Some of these fail to satisfy the conditions which alone entitle to a place among the works of the Apostolic Fathers. Thus the "Shepherd" of Hermas has been placed in this category, because it was supposed to have been written by the person of this name mentioned by St. Paul (Rom. xvi.