Secondly, That Epiphanius contradicts Jerome; in asserting, _what “Jerome does not admit_,” the identity of the Ebionite Gospel with that of St. Matthew. Premising that one and the same work is to be understood as described, by the several titles, “Nazarene Gospel,” “Ebionite Gospel,” “Gospel according to the Hebrews,” “Gospel according to the Twelve Apostles,” I would submit that the first of these allegations is more plausible than true, and that the second is wholly untenable. The contradictory statements of Epiphanius are the following: (a.) “They (_i.e._ the Nazarenes) have the Gospel of Matthew _most entire_ in the Hebrew language among them; for this, truly, is still preserved among them, as it was at first, in Hebrew characters. But I know not whether they have taken away the genealogy from Abraham to Christ.”[123] (b.) “In that Gospel which they (_i.e._ the Ebionites) have called the Gospel according to St. Matthew, which is _not entire and perfect, but corrupted and curtailed_, and which they call the Hebrew Gospel,” &c.[124] The verbal contradiction between these two passages, is no doubt manifest enough; and in a writer of more accuracy than Epiphanius, might have justified the proposal of Casaubon (approved by Jones) to effect a violent reconciliation, by the conjectural insertion of the negative adverb in the former sentence, which would then describe the document as _not_ wholly perfect. But the looseness of this author’s style appears to me sufficient to explain the opposition between the statements; which seem indeed, to look defiance at each other, when brought by force, face to face; but which at the intervals of separate composition, may be, by no means, irreconcilable. That in the first, Epiphanius designed the phrase “most entire,” to be understood with considerable latitude, is evident from the expression of suspicion which instantly follows, that the genealogy might probably be absent. And if the work in question contained a quantity of matter additional to Matthew’s Gospel, whilst it also _omitted_ some of its integral parts; it seems not unnatural that the same writer, who with his thoughts running on its redundancies, had at one time called it a _most full_ copy, should at another, when dwelling on its deficiencies, style it an incomplete edition of the first Evangelist. But it is more important to observe, that _on the points_ for which the _Editors of the Improved Version_ adduce the testimony of Epiphanius, viz., to identify the Gospel of Matthew with that of the Nazarenes and Ebionites, and to attest the absence from this book of the story of the miraculous conception, there is here _no contradiction whatever_. In _both_ passages he states the work to be Matthew’s, and in _neither_, according to Dr. Tattershall, does he say that the first two chapters were wanting. The harmony then, on these, the only points in dispute, is complete.