[Footnote 349: Here also we have a point of unusual historical importance. As we first find a new Canon among the Gnostics so also among them (and in Marcion) we first meet with the traditional complex of the Christian _Kerygma_ as a doctrinal confession (_regula fidei_), that is, as a confession which, because it is fundamental, needs a speculative exposition, but is set forth by this exposition as the summary of all wisdom. The hesitancy about the details of the _Kerygma_, only shews the general uncertainty which at that time prevailed. But again, we see that the later Valentinians completely accommodated themselves to the later development in the Church (Tertull. adv. Valent. I: communem fidem adfirmant) that is attached themselves, probably even from the first, to the existing forms, while in the Marcionite Church a peculiar _regula_ was set up by a criticism of the tradition. The _regula_ as a matter of course, was regarded as Apostolic. On Gnostic _regulæ_ see Iren. I. 21. 5, 31. 3, II. præf. II. 19. 8, III. II. 3, III. 16. 1, 5, Ptolem. ap Epiph. h. 33. 7, Tertull. adv Valent. I. 4, de præscr. 42, adv Marc. I. 1, IV. 5, 17, Ep. Petri ad Jacob in Clem. Hom. c. 1. We still possess in great part verbatim the _regula_ of Apelles, in Epiphan II. 44, 2 Irenæus (I. 7. 2) and Tertull (de carne. 20) state that the Valentinian _regula_ contained the formula, '[Greek: gennêthenta dia Marias]', see on this p. 203. In noting that the two points so decisive for Catholicism the Canon of the New Testament and the Apostolic _regula_ were first, in the strict sense, set up by the Gnostics on the basis of a definite fixing and systematising of the oldest tradition we may see that the weakness of Gnosticism here consisted in its inability to exhibit the publicity of tradition and to place its propagation in close connection with the organisation of the churches.]
[Footnote 350: We do not know the relation in which the Valentinians placed the public Apostolic _regula fidei_ to the secret doctrine derived from one Apostle. The Church in opposition to the Gnostics strongly emphasised the publicity of all tradition. Yet afterwards though with reservations, she gave a wide scope to the assumption of a secret tradition.]