Introduction have required independent treatment, have in this case been already discussed by implication under other heads. Still it will be well to devote a few paragraphs to the separate consideration of these.

2. The style of the Epistle has been often truly described as aphoristic and repetitive. And in this is shewn the characteristic peculiarity of St. John's mode of thought. The connexion of sentence with sentence is slightly, if at all, pointed out. It depends, so to speak, on roots struck in at the bottom of the stream, hidden from the casual observer, to whom the aphorisms appear unconnected, and idly floating on the surface. Lücke well describes this style as indicating a contemplative spirit, which is ever given to pass from the particular to the general, from differences to the unity which underlies them, from the outer to the inner side of Christian life. Thus the Writer is ever working upon certain fundamental themes and axioms, to which he willingly returns again and again, sometimes unfolding and applying them, sometimes repeating and concentrating them; so that we have side by side the simplest and clearest, and the most condensed and difficult sayings : the reader who seeks merely for edification is attracted by the one, and the "scribe learned in the Scriptures" is satisfied, and his understanding surpassed and deepened by the other.

:

3. The logical connexion is not as in the Epistles of St. Paul, indicated by the whole superficial aspect of the writing, nor does it bear onward the thoughts till the conclusion is reached. The logic of St. John moves, as Düsterdieck has expressed it, rather in circles than straight onward. The same thought is repeated as seen from different sides is transformed into cognate thoughts, and thus put into new lights, is unfolded into assertion and negation, and the negation again closed up by the repeated assertion (ch. i. 6 f., 8 f., ii. 9 f., &c.). Thus there arise numerous smaller groups of ideas, all, so to speak, revolving round some central point, all regarding some principal theme; all serving it, and circumscribed by the same bounding line. Thus the Writer is ever close to his main subject, and is able to be ever reiterating it without any unnatural forcing of his context: the train of thought is ever reverting back to its central point.

4. Now if we regard the actual process of the Epistle with reference to these characteristics, we find that there is one great main idea or theme, which binds together the whole and gives character to its contents and aim; viz. that fellowship with God the Father and our Lord Jesus Christ, in which our joy is complete; in other words, that right faith in the Son of God manifest in the flesh, in which we overcome the world, in which we have confidence in God, and eternal life.

5. This idea, which pervades the whole Epistle, is set forth in two great circles of thought, which have been already described as the two

portions of the Epistle. These two, both revolving round the one great theme, are also, in their inner construction, closely related to each other. God is light-then our fellowship with Him depends on our walking in the light: God is righteous:- then we are only manifested as children of God, abiding in His love and in Himself, if we do righteousness. But for both our walking in light, and our doing righteousness, there is one common term,-Love: even as God is Love, as Christ walked in Love, out of Love became manifest in the flesh, out of Love gave Himself for us. On the other side, as the darkness of the world, which can have no fellowship with God, who is Light, denies the Son of God and repudiates Love, so the unrighteousness of the children of the world manifests itself in that hatred which slays brethren, because love to brethren cannot be where the love of God in Christ is unknown and eternal Life untasted.

6. Such a style and character of the Epistle, not bound by strict dialectic rules, not hurrying onward to a logical conclusion, but loving to tarry, and to repeat, and to limit itself in smaller circles of thought, shews us the simple heart of a child, or rather the deep spirit of a man who, in the richest significance of the expression, has entered the kingdom of heaven as a little child, and, being blessed in it himself, yearns to introduce his brethren further and further into it, that they may rejoice with him. In his Epistle Christian truth, which is not dialectic only, but essentially moral and living, is made to live and move and feel and

When he speaks of knowledge and faith, it is of a moral existence and possession: it is of love, peace, joy, confidence, eternal life. Fellowship with God and Christ, and fellowship of Christians with one another in faith and love, each of these is personal, real; so to speak, incarnate and embodied.

7. And this is the reason why our Epistle appears on the one hand easily intelligible to the simplest reader, if only his heart has any experience of the truth of Christ's salvation,-and on the other hand unfathomable even to the deepest Christian thinker: but at the same time equally precious and edifying to both classes of readers. It is the most notable example of the foolishness of God putting to shame all the wisdom of the world.

8. But as the matter of our Epistle is rich and sublime, so is it fitted, by its mildness, and consolatory character, to attract our hearts. Such is the power of that holy love, so humble and so gentle, which John had learned from Him in whom the Father's love was manifested. He addresses all his readers, young and old, as his little children: he calls them to him, and with him to the Lord: he exhorts them ever as his brothers, as his beloved, to that love which is from God. itself is in fact nothing else than an act of this holy love.

The Epistle

Hence the

loving, attracting tone of the language; hence the friendly character and winning sound of the whole. For the Love which wrote the Epistle is but the echo, out of the heart of a man, and that man an Apostle, of that Love of God which is manifested to us in Christ, that it may lead us to the everlasting Fount of Love, of joy and of life.

9. I may conclude this description, so admirably worked out by Düsterdieck, with the very beautiful words of Ewald, which he also cites : speaking of the "unruffled and heavenly repose" which is the spirit of the Epistle, he says, "It appears to be the tone, not so much of a father talking with his beloved children, as of a glorified saint, speaking to mankind from a higher world. Never in any writing has the doctrine of heavenly Love, of a love working in stillness, a love ever unwearied, never exhausted, so thoroughly proved and approved itself, as in this Epistle."

SECTION VII.

OCCASION AND OBJECT.

ye

1. The Apostle himself has given us an account of the object of his Epistle: "These things write we, that our joy may be full," ch. i. 4: and again at the close, v. 13: "These things have I written unto you, that ye may know that have eternal life, even to you that believe on the name of the Son of God." In almost the same words does he sum up the main purpose of his Gospel, John xx. 31. He assumes readers who believe on the Son of God: he writes to them to certify them of the truth and reality of the things in which they believe, and to advance them in the carrying out of their practical consequences, in order that they may gain from them confidence, peace, joy, life eternal.

2. This, and no polemical aim, is to be assigned as the main object of the Epistle. As subservient to this main object, comes in the warning against those persons who, by denying that Jesus Christ was come in the flesh, imperilled all these blessed consequences, by seducing men from the faith on which they rested.

3. The fact of these false teachers having come forward in the church was most probably the occasion which suggested the writing of the Epistle. Such seems to be the reference, hinted at in the background by the repeated" because" in ch. ii. 12-14. The previous instruction, settlement, and achievements in the faith of the various classes of his readers, furnished him with a reason for writing to each of them:

such writing desirable.

it being understood, that some circumstances had arisen, which made And what those circumstances were, is not obscurely pointed at in the verses following, ii. 18-25: compare especially ver. 21.

CHAPTER XX.

2 & 3 JOHN.

SECTION I.

AUTHORSHIP.

1. THE question of the authorship of both Epistles is one which will require some discussion. On one point however there never has been the slightest doubt: viz., that both were written by one and the same person. They are, as it has been said, like twin sisters: their style and spirit is the same: their conclusions agree almost word for word. I shall therefore treat of them together in all matters which they have in

common.

2. Were the two Epistles written by the author of the former and larger Epistle? This has been answered in the affirmative by some critics who do not believe St. John to have written the first Epistle: e. g. by Bretschneider and Paulus. Their arguments for the identity of the Writer of the three will serve, for us who believe the apostolicity of the former, a different purpose from that which they intended. But the usual opinion of those who have any doubts on the Authorship has taken a different form. Ascribing the first Epistle to St. John, they have given the two smaller ones to another writer; either to the Presbyter John, or to some other Christian teacher of this name, otherwise unknown to us. Another exception is found to this in the modern critics of the Tübingen school, Baur and Schwegler, whose method of proceeding I have briefly noticed in the Introduction to the former Epistle (§ i. par. 29), and need not further characterize.

3. It will now be my object to enumerate the ancient authorities, and to ascertain on which side they preponderate; whether for, or against, the authorship by the Apostle John.

Irenæus says:

"John the disciple of the Lord urged their condemnation, willing that we should not even say good speed to them: for,

he says, he that biddeth them good speed partaketh, &c." (2 John 10, 11.)

And in another place, already cited (ch. xix. § i. par. 4), he quotes 2 John 7, 8, supposing it to be taken from the first Epistle: but this very circumstance shews him to have had no suspicion that the two were written by different persons.

4. Clement of Alexandria, in a passage already cited above (ch. v. § i. par. 5), cites the first Epistle thus, "John, in his greater Epistle," ... thereby shewing that he knew of more Epistles by that Apostle.

And again in the fragments of the Adumbrations, ed. Potter, p. 1011, he says, "The second Epistle of John, which is written to virgins, is most simple: it was written to a certain Babylonian lady named Electa."

5. Dionysius of Alexandria, in a passage quoted at length below in the Introduction to the Apocalypse (§ i. par. 48), noting that John never names himself in his writings, says, "Not even in the current second and third of John, though they are short Epistles, is John manifestly named, but is signified anonymously under the title the presbyter' (elder).” Whence it appears that Dionysius found no offence in the appellation "the presbyter," but rather a trace of St. John's manner not to name himself. No argument can be raised on the expression "current" that Dionysius doubted the genuineness of the two Epistles. Eusebius calls the first Epistle "the current first of John." All we can say of the expression is, that it gives the general sense of tradition.

Alexander of Alexandria cites 2 John 10, 11 with as the blessed John ordered." And the subsequent Alexandrian writers shew no doubt on the subject.

Cyprian, in relating the opinions of the various bishops in the council at Carthage, relates that one Aurelius quoted from "John the Apostle in his Epistle," the words "If any come to you, &c.," 2 John 10.

He does not in his own writings cite either Epistle, nor does Tertullian. But the above testimony shews that they were received as apostolic and canonical in the North African church.

6. The Muratorian fragment on the canon speaks enigmatically, owing partly to some words in the sentence being corrupt: "The Epistle of Jude and two superscribed 'Of John' are held among catholic Scripture, and Wisdom,' written by friends of Solomon in his honour."

Lücke, Huther, and others, find here a testimony for the Epistles: Düsterdieck on the contrary understands the sentence as meaning that they were not written by John, just as the Wisdom was not written by Solomon.

Most probably the Peschito, or ancient Syriac version, did not contain either Epistle. Cosmas Indicopleustes (Cent. vi.) says that in his time the Syrian church acknowledged but three catholic Epistles, 1 Peter,