The hypothesis that Clement’s quotation is made memoriter from our Gospel is very far from being inadmissible.  Were it not that the other passage seems to lean the other way, I should be inclined to regard it as quite the most probable solution.  Such a fusion is precisely what would and frequently does take place in quoting from memory.  It is important to notice the key phrases in the quotation.  The opening phrases [Greek:  ouai to anthropo ekeino; kalon aen auto ei ouk egennaethae] are found exactly (though with omissions) in Matt. xxvi. 24.  Clement has in common with the Synoptists all the more marked expressions but two, [Greek:  skandalisai] ([Greek:  -sae] Synoptics), the unusual word [Greek:  mulos] (Matt., Mark), [Greek:  katapontisthaenai] ([Greek:  -thae] Matt.), [Greek:  eis taen thalassan] (Mark, Luke), [Greek:  hena ton mikron] ([Greek:  mou] Clement, [Greek:  touton] Synoptics).  He differs from them, so far as phraseology is concerned, only in writing once (the second time he agrees with the Synoptics) [Greek:  ton eklekton mou] for [Greek:  ton mikron touton], by an easy paraphrase, and [Greek:  peritethaenai] where Mark and Luke have [Greek:  perikeitai] and Matthew [Greek:  kremasthae].  But on the other hand, it should be noticed that Matthew has, besides this variation, [Greek:  en to pelagei taes thalassaes], where the two companion Gospels have [Greek:  eis taen thalassan]; where he has [Greek:  katapontisthae], Mark has [Greek:  beblaetai] and Luke [Greek:  erriptai]; and in the important phrase for ‘it were better’ all the three Gospels differ, Matthew having [Greek:  sumpherei], Mark [Greek:  kalon estin], and Luke [Greek:  lusitelei]; so that it seems not at all too much to say that Clement does not differ from the Synoptics more than they differ from each other.  The remarks that the author makes, in a general way, upon these differences lead us to ask whether he has ever definitely put to himself the question, How did they arise?  He must be aware that the mass of German authorities he is so fond of quoting admit of only two alternatives, that the Synoptic writers copied either from the same original or from each other, and that the idea of a merely oral tradition is scouted in Germany.  But if this is the case, if so great a freedom has been exercised in transcription, is it strange that Clement (or any other writer) should be equally free in quotation?

The author rightly notices—­though he does not seem quite to appreciate its bearing—­the fact that Marcion and some codices (of the Old Latin translation) insert, as Clement does, the phrase [Greek:  ei ouk egennaethae ae] in the text of St. Luke.  Supposing that this were the text of St. Luke’s Gospel which Clement had before him, it would surely be so much easier to regard his quotation as directly taken from the Gospel; but the truer view perhaps would be that we have here an instance (and the number of such instances in the older MSS. is legion) of the tendency to interpolate by the insertion of parallel passages from the same or from the other Synoptic Gospels.  Clement and Marcion (with the Old Latin) will then confirm each other, as showing that even at this early date the two passages, Matt. xxvi. 24 and Matt. xviii. 6 (Luke xvii. 2), had already begun to be combined.