In order to meet this objection I must say a few words about the composition of the Gospels. For indeed your question shews a complete misapprehension of the manner in which the Gospels grew up, and of the ancient notions about authorship. In particular, you are far too free in the use of the word “forgeries.” The book called the _Wisdom of Solomon_ contains some of the noblest sentiments that have ever found eloquent expression, and yet the philosophic author who composed it (probably in Alexandria about eight or nine centuries after Solomon’s death) does not hesitate to appeal to the Almighty in words by which he ascribes the authorship to Solomon himself: “Thou hast chosen me to be a king of Thy people and a judge of Thy sons and daughters: Thou hast commanded me to build a temple upon Thy Holy mount,” (ix. 7, 8). Now do you call him a forger? The book of Ecclesiastes, one of our own canonical books, declares that it was written by “the son of David, king in Jerusalem” and that the author was a “King over Israel in Jerusalem,” (i. 1-12). No one now (worth mentioning) believes these statements to be true. Yet would you call the composer of Ecclesiastes a forger? Probably in both cases the authors felt that they were honouring the memory of the great king in thus introducing new truths to the world under the protection of his name. I believe many other instances might be given of the literary laxity of ancient times. But besides, in the case of the Gospels, you must remember that authorship hardly came into question at all events for a long time. The story of the life of Christ would be, in some shape, current among the Church as the common property of all, as soon as the Apostles began to proclaim the Gospel. Probably it was not, for some time, reduced to writing. Among the Jews the Old Testament was spoken of as Writing or Scripture; but their most revered and sacred comments on it were retained in oral tradition: and hence all through the New Testament you will find that “Scripture” refers to the Old Testament, and that no mention is made of the doctrine about Christ except as “tradition” or “teaching.” What therefore would probably at first be current in the Church, perhaps for thirty or forty years after Christ’s death, would be simply a number of “traditions” or oral versions of the Gospel, current perhaps in different shapes at the great ecclesiastical centres, such as Jerusalem, Antioch, Ephesus, Alexandria, Rome, yet presenting a general affinity, and all claiming to represent “the Memoirs of the Apostles” or to be “the Gospel of the Lord Jesus Christ.”