Mk xiv, 65 (Mt xxvi, 67, 68; Lk xxii, 63, 64): Mr. Smith finds the influence of Matthew upon Luke in this passage, in the fact that while Mark says that they "spat upon Jesus, blindfolded him and smote him, Matthew records the first and third of these actions, Luke the second and third."[78] Why Luke omits the spitting, may not be easy (or necessary) to say. But that Luke here shows the reverse of any influence from Matthew is indicated in the fact that whereas Matthew follows Mark in relating, first the examination of Jesus, then the mockery, and third the denials of Peter, Luke rearranges the Marcan narrative to make it run, first the denials, second the mockery, and third the examination. He has received his suggestion for this rearrangement from the fact that Mark, just before he begins the story of the mockery, has mentioned that Peter was outside the hall, warming himself by the fire.[79] It has seemed (quite naturally) to Luke that this is the place where the story of the denials should be related, tho Mark inserts the story of the mockery before he goes on[80] with the denials. In a passage where Luke has so thoroughly rearranged Mark it seems unnecessary to account for his omission of one word, especially by such a remote theory as that of Mr. Smith; and in a passage, too, where his rearrangement of Marcan material contradicts Matthew's slavish following of it. Mk xv, 42 (Mt xxvii, 57; Lk xxiii, 54): "Where Mark says, 'When the even was come because it was the preparation, that is the day before the Sabbath,' Matthew says, 'When even was come,' and Luke 'the rest.'"[81] But Luke does not quite say "the rest." He says,[82] "It was the day of preparation, and the Sabbath was dawning." And this he says, not in the same connection, nor with the same purpose, as Mark (and Matthew). Mark and Matthew use their statement about the evening having come as an introduction to their story about the request of Joseph of Arimathea. Luke tells his story of Joseph without any such introduction, and mentions the time only after he has finished that story, apparently with reference to the story of the women which follows, rather than to that of Joseph which precedes. The argument of the last paragraph will apply here. It will not be necessary to go with equal care thru the five other instances in which Mr. Smith detects in a similar way the influence of Matthew upon Luke.[83] He admits "two, or three, or at the most four, cases of Marcan expressions" of which (without explanation) it might appear that Luke uses the first part and Matthew the last. His willingness to push his theory to the extreme may be inferred from his general estimate of the character of Luke as a writer: "He blurs, obliterates, blunders, fabricates, falsifies, flattens out, mutilates, murders."[84]