All that we know, then, of Marcion's Gospel is simply what Tertullian and Epiphanius have stated with regard to it. It is, however, undeniable, and indeed is universally admitted, that their object in dealing with it at all was entirely dogmatic, and not in the least degree critical(1). The spirit of that age was indeed so essentially uncritical(2) that not even the canonical text could waken it into activity. Tertullian very clearly states what his object was in attacking Marcion's Gospel. After asserting that the whole aim of the Heresiarch was to prove a disagreement between the Old Testament and the New, and that for this purpose he had erased from the Gospel all that was contrary to his opinion, and retained all that he had considered favourable, Tertullian proceeds to examine the passages retained,(3) with the view of proving that the Heretic has shown the same "blindness of heresy" both in that which he has erased and in that which he has retained, inasmuch as the passages which Marcion has allowed to remain are as opposed to his system, as those which he has omitted. He conducts the controversy in a free and discursive manner, and whilst he appears to go through Marcion's Gospel with some regularity, it will be apparent, as we proceed, that {92} mere conjecture has to play a large part in any attempt to reconstruct, from his data, the actual text of Marcion. Epiphanius explains his aim with equal clearness. He had made a number of extracts from the so-called Gospel of Marcion which seemed to him to refute the heretic, and after giving a detailed and numbered list of these passages, which he calls [------], he takes them consecutively and to each adds his "Refutation." His intention is to show how wickedly and disgracefully Marcion has mutilated and falsified the Gospel, and how fruitlessly he has done so, inasmuch as he has stupidly, or by oversight, allowed much to remain in his Gospel by which he may be completely refuted.(1) As it is impossible within our limits fully to illustrate the procedure of the Fathers with regard to Marcion's Gospel, and the nature and value of the materials they supply, we shall as far as possible quote the declarations of critics, and more especially of Volkmar and Hilgenfeld, who, in the true and enlightened spirit of criticism, impartially state the character of the data available for the understanding of the text. As these two critics have, by their able and learned investigations, done more than any others to educe and render possible a decision of the problem, their own estimate of the materials upon which a judgment has to be formed is of double value. With regard to Tertullian, Volkmar explains that his desire is totally to annihilate the most dangerous heretic of his time,--first (Books i.--iii.), to overthrow Marcion's system in general as expounded in his "Antitheses,"--and then (Book iv.) to show that even the Gospel of Marcion {93}