Jerome accordingly issued an improved version of the New Testament, beginning with the Gospels. For this purpose he made a careful comparison of old Greek manuscripts (codicum Graecorum emendata conlatione sed veterum). In his version he was also careful only to make an alteration when a real change of meaning was necessary, retaining in all other cases the familiar Latin wording. The Gospels were in the order which has been the prevailing one since his day—Matthew, Mark, Luke, John. [Sidenote: Augustine.] We learn from the great Church Teacher AUGUSTINE, who lived in Africa about the same time (354-430), that there was an endless variety and multitude of translators (latinorum interpretum infinita varietas, interpretum numerositas). He tells us that while it was possible to count the number of those who had translated the Bible—_i.e._ the Old Testament—from Hebrew into Greek, the Latin translators were innumerable; that in the early age of the Christian faith (primis fidei temporibus), no sooner did anyone gain possession of a Greek Codex, and believe himself to have any knowledge of both languages, than he made bold to translate it (ausus est interpretari). [Sidenote: Itala.] The advice he himself gives is to prefer the _Italic_ version to the others, as being the most faithful and intelligible (in ipsis autem interpretationibus Itala praeferatur; nam est verborum tenacior cum perspicuitate sententiae. _De Doctrina Christiana_, ii. 14, 15). [Sidenote: Vulgate.] On the ground of this passage, the pre-Jeromic versions have been comprehended under the title of the =Itala=, as distinguished from Jerome’s own work, which is called the =Vulgate=, seeing that it became the prevailing text in the Church of the Middle Ages. By the Itala, Augustine himself, however, must have referred to a particular version, and, according to the usage of that time, the word cannot mean anything else than a version originating in or prevalent in Italy—_i.e._ the North of Italy, what is called Lombardy. It is not difficult to understand how it came to pass that Augustine used such a version in Africa, seeing that he was a pupil of Ambrose, Bishop of Milan. In recent times Burkitt has revived the opinion that by Itala Augustine means neither more nor less than Jerome’s Revision of the Gospels. He demonstrates that Augustine’s _De Consensu_, written about the year 400, is based on Jerome’s revised text. In this, Zahn[93] agrees with him on grounds that admit of no question so far as this point is concerned. But Wordsworth-White[94] will not admit the inference that Augustine must have meant this Revision when he spoke of Itala in the year 397, seeing that in his letter to Jerome,[95] written in 403, he thanks God for the interpretation of the Gospel, “quasi de opere recenter cognito,” while in his earlier letters to Jerome[96] he makes no mention of it: “quod mirandum esset si in opere ante sex annos publici iuris facto eam collaudasset.”[97]