8 LEEUWENHOEK AND HIS “LITTLE ANIMALS” 
words—as nearly as possible—but above all I want you to 
understand him; and I do not forget the warning issued to the 
translators of the Targums (the Aramaic versions of the old 
Hebrew testament): “He who translates quite literally is a 
liar, while he who adds anything is a blasphemer.” The Rev. 
Dr Pusey hit the nail on the head, I think, when he said (in- 
troducing his English rendering of St Augustine) that a 
translation of an author should be “a re-production’ in another 
language, ‘with as little sacrifice as may be of what is peculiar 
to him”: adding feelingly that “it is very difficult to avoid 
introducing some slight shade of meaning, which may not be 
contained in the original.” This, and more than this, I dis- 
covered for myself many years ago. Long ago I realized the 
truth of the Italian saying “ traduttore traditore ”—a trans- 
lator is no better than a traitor. Instinctively I dislike and 
distrust translations, and it is only by the trony of fate that I 
now appear before you in the garb of a translator myself. I 
would also add, in the words of another interpreter of St 
Augustine (the Rev. Marcus Dods): “That the present trans- 
lation also might be improved, we know; that many men were 
fitter for the task, on the score of scholarship, we are very 
sensible ; but that anyone would have executed it with intenser 
affection and veneration for the author, we are not prepared to 
admit.” 
In making my translations for you I have always tried— 
with what success you must judge—to preserve the flavour of 
Leeuwenhoek’s own writings, yet at the same time to satisfy 
the requirements of the most up-to-date protistologist : and 
when I have had to translate the words of other authors, or of 
old documents, I have always tried to preserve their individual 
peculiarities in a like manner. My ideal has not (I know) been 
attained, but it is probably unattainable : nevertheless, you will 
(I hope) perhaps allow me some small credit for possessing, in 
these uninspired times, even an ideal, towards which I have 
ever striven. No similar attempt has ever been made by 
another—despite its crying need. No protozoologist or bactert- 
ologist has ever before so much as read, or even pretended to 
read, all Leeuwenhoek’s extant writings on these subjects ; and 
those authors who have previously offered to interpret his dis- 
coveries have usually gone ludicrously astray themselves (whereof 
I shall give you many instances). Almost everything that has 
yet been written about Leeuwenhoek’s work on protozoa and 
