Page:The Apocryphal New Testament (1924).djvu/513

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ACTS OF ANDREW AND PAUL
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The extent to which these Acts have been influenced by the sophistic romances of the pagan world has been much discussed, and probably exaggerated. The Canonical Acts at first served as the model of the genre: of that there can be no doubt. It is with Andrew that I begin to perceive the possibility that the author writes with an eye on his pagan colleagues in the art of fiction, just as Flamion has shown that he has also an eye on the philosophy that was popular in his day. Xanthippe and Polyxena seem to me more nearly related to the novels than any of the apostolic romances proper; the Clementine romance is another example of the borrowing of motifs from secular fiction. But on the whole it seems safer to say that these fables were intended rather to rival than to imitate the pagan novels—to supply Christians with a substitute and an antidote.

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