3. And now it is time to direct attention to the important bearing of the foregoing remark on the main point at issue. The true import of what Eusebius has delivered, and which has at last been ascertained, will be observed really to set his evidence in a novel and unsuspected light. From the days of Jerome, it has been customary to assume that Eusebius roundly states that, in his time _almost all the Greek copies_ were without our “last Twelve Verses” of S. Mark’s Gospel:(434) whereas Eusebius really _does nowhere say so_. He expresses himself enigmatically, resorting to a somewhat unusual phrase(435) which perhaps admits of no exact English counterpart: but what he says clearly amounts to no more than this,—that “_the accurate_ copies, at the words ἐφοβοῦντο γάρ, circumscribe THE END (ΤΟ ΤΕΛΟΣ) of Mark’s narrative:” that _there_, “in almost all the Copies of the Gospel according to Mark, is circumscribed THE END.” He says no more. He does not say that _there_ “is circumscribed _the Gospel_.” As for the twelve verses which follow, he merely declares that they were “_not met with in all_ the copies;” i.e. that some copies did not contain them. But this, so far from being a startling statement, is no more than what Codd. B and א in themselves are sufficient to establish. In other words, Eusebius, (whose testimony on this subject as it is commonly understood is so extravagant [see above, p. 48-9,] as to carry with it its own sufficient refutation,) is found to bear consistent testimony to the two following modest propositions; which, however, are not adduced by him as reasons for rejecting S. Mark xvi. 9-20, but only as samples of _what might be urged_ by one desirous of shelving a difficulty suggested by their contents;— (1st.) That from _some_ ancient copies of S. Mark’s Gospel these last Twelve Verses were away. (2nd.) That in _almost_ all the copies,—(whether mutilated or not, he does not state,)—the words ΤΟ ΤΕΛΟΣ were found immediately after ver. 8; which, (he seems to hint,) let those who please accept as evidence that there also is _the end of the Gospel_.