WRITINGS OF THE APOSTOLIC FATHERS, WITH SOME NOTICES OF THE APOCRYPHAL NEW TESTAMENT WRITINGS.
1. A wide distinction should be made between the writings of the apostolic fathers which are acknowledged to be genuine, or the genuineness of which may be maintained on more or less probable grounds, and the large mass of spurious works afterwards palmed upon the Christian world as the productions of apostles or their contemporaries. The latter constitute properly the New Testament Apocrypha, though the term is sometimes applied in a loose way to both classes of writings. The writings of the apostolic fathers, though possessing no divine authority, are valuable as showing the state of the Christian churches at the time when they were composed in respect to both doctrine and discipline, as well as the various errors and divisions by which they were troubled. Their testimonies to the genuineness of the New Testament have been already considered. Chap. 2, No. 10. Some of the apocryphal works also, worthless as they are for instruction in the doctrines and duties of Christianity, throw much light on the religious spirit, tendencies, and heretical sects of the times to which they belong. Others of these writings are unutterably absurd and puerile, worthy of notice only as showing the type of the puerilities current in the age of their composition.