The term [Greek: euangelion] had a technical metaphysical sense in the Basilidian sect and was used to designate a part of the transcendental Gnostic revelations.

The Gospel of Basilides may therefore, as Dr.Westcott suggests, reasonably enough, have had a philosophical rather than a historical character.

The author of 'Supernatural Religion' censures Dr.Westcott for this suggestion [Endnote 189:4], but a few pages further on he seems to adopt it himself, though he applies it strangely to the language of Eusebius or Agrippa Castor and not to Basilides' own work.
In any case Hippolytus expressly says that, after the generation of Jesus, the Basilidians held 'the other events in the life of the Saviour followed as they are written in the Gospels' [Endnote 190:1].

There is no reason at all to suppose that there was a breach of continuity in this respect between Basilides and his school.

And if his Gospel really contained substantially the same events as ours, it is a question of comparatively secondary importance whether he actually made use of those Gospels or no.
It is rather remarkable that Hippolytus and Epiphanius, who furnish the fullest accounts of the tenets of Basilides (and his followers), say nothing about his Gospel: neither does Irenaeus or Clement of Alexandria; the first mention of it is in Origen's Homily on St.Luke.This shows how unwarranted is the assumption made in 'Supernatural Religion' [Endnote 190:2] that because Hippolytus says that Basilides appealed to a secret tradition he professed to have received from Matthias, and Eusebius that he set up certain imaginary prophets, 'Barcabbas and Barcoph,' he therefore had no other authorities.