It is difficult to read without impatience the rough words that are applied to the early Christian writers and to contrast the self-complacency in which our own superior knowledge is surveyed.

If there is something in which they are behind us, there is much also in which we are behind them.

Among the many things for which Mr.Arnold deserves our gratitude he deserves it not least for the way in which he has singled out two sentences, one from St.Augustine and the other from the Imitation, 'Domine fecisti nos ad te et irrequietum est cor nostrum donec requiescat in te,' and, 'Esto humilis et pacificus et erit tecum, Jesus.' The men who could write thus are not to be despised.
But beyond their more general testimony it is not clear what else the early Fathers could be expected to do.

They could not prove-- at least their written remains that have come down to us could not prove--that the Gospels were really written by the authors traditionally assigned to them.

When we say that the very names of the first two Evangelists are not mentioned before a date that may be from 120-166 (or 155) A.D.and the third and fourth not before 170-175 A.D., this alone is enough, without introducing other elements of doubt, to show that the evidence must needs be inconclusive.