To some persons such a formidable array of evidence may seem conclusive in favour of any reading: but it can only seem so to those who do not realize the weight of counter-testimony.
But by far the most considerable injury which has resulted to the Gospel from this cause is the suspicion which has alighted in certain quarters on the last twelve verses of the Gospel according to St.Mark.

[Those verses made up by themselves a complete Lection.

The preceding Lection, which was used on the Second Sunday after Easter, was closed with the Liturgical note 'The End,' or [Greek: TO TELOS], occurring after the eighth verse.

What more probable, nay, more certain result could there be, than that some scribe should mistake the end of the Lection for the end of St.Mark's Gospel, if the last leaf should chance to have been torn off, and should then transcribe no more[159]?
How natural that St.
Mark should express himself in a more condensed and abrupt style than usual.

This of course is only put forward as an explanation, which leaves the notion of another writer and a later date unnecessary.