Irenaeus - Adv. haer. III 11,8
And therefore the Gospels are in accord with these things, among which Christ Jesus is seated. For that according to John relates His original, effectual, and glorious generation from the Father, thus declaring, In the beginning was the Word, and the Word was with God, and the Word was God. John 1:1 Also, all things were made by Him, and without Him was nothing made. For this reason, too, is that Gospel full of all confidence, for such is His person. But that according to Luke, taking up [His] priestly character, commenced with Zacharias the priest offering sacrifice to God. For now was made ready the fatted calf, about to be immolated for the finding again of the younger son. Matthew, again, relates His generation as a man, saying, The book of the generation of Jesus Christ, the son of David, the son of Abraham; and also, The birth of Jesus Christ was on this wise. This, then, is the Gospel of His humanity; for which reason it is, too, that [the character of] a humble and meek man is kept up through the whole Gospel. Mark, on the other hand, commences with [a reference to] the prophetical spirit coming down from on high to men, saying, The beginning of the Gospel of Jesus Christ, as it is written in Esaias the prophet,— pointing to the winged aspect of the Gospel; and on this account he made a compendious and cursory narrative, for such is the prophetical character. And the Word of God Himself used to converse with the ante-Mosaic patriarchs, in accordance with His divinity and glory; but for those under the law he instituted a sacerdotal and liturgical service. Afterwards, being made man for us, He sent the gift of the celestial Spirit over all the earth, protecting us with His wings
https://www.newadvent.org/fathers/0103311.htm
The order is evident and clear:
- John
- Luke
- Matthew
- Mark
Because there always is a time when and where the usurper still has to play a modest role, in the background, while working on his grand evil scheme - and we're witnessing it right here
John is evidently Chrestian with his abundance of The Father, Luke is *Ev "done right" and it is Matthew who took care of the latter - and Mark must have felt very discarded with his trailing role whereas it was him who broke in the Chrestian horse; and marvellously successfully I might add
On topic: two hostile witnesses and two friendly ones - and with this order it is evident that Irenaeus is clutching at straws here, hanging on by a proverbial fingernail.
So he managed to counter the 2 gospels with 2 of his own, hence 4 was a given number and he would likely have ditched Mark if he hadn't been desperately dependent on at the very least matching John and Luke - and who knows what else circulated on the Chrestian side, Philip would certainly have been part of that.
So perhaps this 4 was even worse, he simply had to throw in Luke by redacting *Ev because he couldn't have just John and then his Matthew to counter that; he needed overweight, an upper hand
So Irenaeus threw in *Ev as well but only his own version of it; two birds with one stone. Mark at the back for good measure, and there we have it: 4 gospels "printed" by the Church of which the first two would be recognised by most Chrestians who'd lose interest after the first half page perhaps.
A nice cock&bull story to go along with it, and who knows, people may still fall for it even well over a dozen centuries later...