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conference nruch was said concerning the imperfections 

 of the existing translations of the Scriptures. The king 

 himself, who was often present at these meetings, ex- 

 pressed a strong opinion on that point of the debate. ' I 

 wish,' said he, 'some special pains were taken for a uni- 

 form translation, which should be done by the best learned 

 in both universities, then reviewed by the bishops, presented 

 to the privy council, and, lastly, ratified by royal authority, 

 to be read in the whole church, and no other.' Out of this 

 speech of the king's arose the present English Bible ; for 

 the suggestion soon ripened into a resolution. As this is 

 the Bible which has now for more than two centuries been 

 the only Bible allowed to be read in the English church, 

 and as it is also the Bible universally used in dissenting 

 communities, we may be expected to give a more extended 

 notice of it than of the former editions. Fifty-four of the 

 persons in that age most distinguished for that particular 

 species of learning which such a duty required were selected 

 for the work, according to the king's suggestion : finally, 

 forty-seven of them undertook it. They divided themselves 

 into six independent classes, to each of which a certain 

 portion of the work was assigned. Each person in the class 

 was to produce his own translation of the whole committed 

 to them : these several translations were to be revised at a 

 general meeting of the class. When the class had agreed 

 upon their version, it was to be transmitted to each of the 

 other classes, so that no part was to come out without the 

 sanction of the whole body. 



Two of the classes sat at Westminster, two at Oxford, and 

 two at Cambridge. The instructions which they received 

 from the king were, that they should adhere to the Bishops' 

 Bible, which was then ordinarily read in the churches, 

 making as few deviations from it as possible. They were, 

 however, to use the other versions, and to consult the trans- 

 lations which had been made into other modern languages ; 

 and they were to keep in the old ecclesiastical words, such as 

 church, &c. When a word had divers significations, ' that 

 should lie kept which had been most commonly used by 

 the antient fathers, being agreeable to the propriety of the 

 place, and the analogy of faith.' No marginal notes were 

 to be used, except for the further explication of some 

 Greek or Hebrew word. References to parallel passages 

 might be given. They were to call in the assistance of 

 any learned man who was known to have made this subject 

 his study. 



They were employed upon the work for three years, 

 namely from 1607 to 1610 ; proceeding with that delibera- 

 tion and care which so weighty an undertaking required. 

 The names of the divines engaged in it, and the portions 

 are known which were committed to each class, are preserved. 

 If we say that there arc few names among them which have 

 acquired a lasting celebrity, we are only saying of them what 

 is the usual fate of divines. The name of Bishop Andrews 

 is the first in place and the first in celebrity. It is believed 

 that Bancroft, then Archbishop of Canterbury, though not 

 one of the professed translators, had much to do in the super- 

 intendence of the work. It came forth from the press of 

 Robert Barker in 1611. 



This is then the great sera in the history of the English 

 Bible. From that time to the present there hag been no 

 serious intention entertained in the church of any revision 

 of this translation. It is admitted universally that it is 

 in the main an admirable translation. But many per- 

 sons in the church who have thought that, excellent as it 

 confessedly is, it is not the best possible translation ; and 

 that it seems as if the time was arrived for revising the 

 work of the divines of the days of King James, especially 

 since the general principles of translation seem now to be 

 better understood than heretofore, and the investigations of 

 men of learning in the manuscripts of both the Old and 

 New Testament in the originals have led to the establish- 

 ment of a text which is allowed to make a nearer approach 

 to the text as left by the original writers, than that which 

 was used by King James's translators. 



It has however been found that every subsequent edition 

 of the Bible has deviated not only in spelling, but slightly 

 aUo in other respects, from the original edition of 1611. 

 Thus, the Rev. T. Curtis has lately shown that the use of 

 the distinctive Italic and capital letters in that edition has 

 by no means been scrupulously copied in those that have 

 followed it. In this respect it appears, however, that the 

 alterations which have been made are really amendments, 

 bv which the typography of the modern editions is made 



more conformable to the principle adopted by the trans 

 lators. On the other hand, it has been shown, and espe- 

 cially by the Rev. Dr. Lee of Edinburgh, both in a pam- 

 phlet published by him in 182C, and in his evidence given 

 before a committee of the House of Commons in 1831, that 

 the prohibition against the received version of the Bible 

 being printed by any persons except the king's printers and 

 the two English universities has by no means secured that 

 accuracy in the impressions with a view to which it is pro- 

 fessed that the restriction is maintained. Thus, in an Edin- 

 burgh edition of 1816, we have in Luke vi. 29, 'Him that 

 taketh away thy cloak, forbid to' (for 'not') 'to take away 

 thy coat also;' and 1 Cor. xiv. 40, 'Let all tongues' (for 

 ' things') ' be done decently and in order. 1 So, in a stereo- 

 type edition, published by the king's printers in England in 

 1819, in 1 Cor. viii. 6, instead of 'To us there is but one 

 God,' the reading is ' To us three is but one God.' Many 

 of the older editions abound in such errors to a much 

 greater extent. Mr. Curtis has also pointed out, even in 

 some of the most recent editions, the occasional occurrence 

 of such errors as ' heart' for hart,' 'son' for 'sun,' 'forth' 

 for ' four,' &c. 



But while nothing has been done by authority, many 

 persons have produced new and, as they presume, improved 

 translations of particular books. Dr. Geddes, a Catholic 

 divine, but who had no particular attachment to his church 

 to influence him in his version, published a translation of 

 the historical books of the Old Testament. Lowth, Bishop 

 of London, and Dodson, a learned layman, both published 

 translations of the Prophecy of Isaiah ; iBlayney, a transla- 

 tion of the minor prophets, and Stock, an Irish bishop, of 

 the book of Job. Other translations of other books of the 

 Old Testament have appeared, nor have there been wanting 

 those who have attempted the too arduous task of translat- 

 ing the whole of these books. Numerous translations have 

 been published of the New Testament, of which we may 

 particularly single out as the works of men of learning and 

 high character that by Gilbert Wakefield and that by New- 

 come, the Archbishop of Armagh. 



Still more numerous have been the editions of the English 

 Bible in the version of King James, with notes, paraphrases, 

 and practical expositions. Our limits will not allow of our 

 entering upon an enumeration of these works. We must, 

 however, name as works which are highly esteemed, the 

 Family Bible, prepared by the Rev. Thomas Scott, rector of 

 Aston-Sandford, in Buckinghamshire, a clergyman of what 

 are called evangelical sentiments ; the Commentary on the 

 Bible by Adam Clarke, LL.D., a leading minister among 

 the Wesleyan Methodists ; and the Family Bible of the 

 Rev. Charles Wellbeloved, of York, a Presbyterian minister 

 of Unitarian sentiments, a work at present incomplete, in 

 which the learned author has united valuable critical matter 

 for the accomplished scholar, with much useful information 

 for the unlearned reader. 



BIBLE SOCIETIES. Associations, supported by vo- 

 luntary contributions, for the general circulation of copies of 

 the Sacred Scriptures, may be regarded as belonging pecu- 

 liarly to the present century. Whatever had previously 

 been done, either by societies or individuals, in the way of 

 translating or printing the Bible, is insignificant when com- 

 pared with what has been done in the last thirty years, 

 from 1804 to 1835. Previous to the formation of the British 

 and Foreign Bible Society, the associations in Great Britain 

 which included among their objects the circulation of the 

 Bible were: 



1. The Society for the Propagation of the Gospel in New 

 England, originally incorporated by an ordinance of parlia- 

 ment in 1649, and re-incorporated in 1661, after the Re- 

 storation. The missionary Eliot, known as the Apostle of 

 the American Indians, after labouring to reduce the lan- 

 guage of the tribes then surrounding the infant colony to 

 writing, effected a translation of the Bible into it, which was 

 printed in 1663 at the expense of the corporation. This 

 edition of the Bible, which is dedicated to Charles II., con- 

 tains the Psalms of David, attempted to be done into Indian 

 metre, which Cotton Mather tells us wave used in the con- 

 gregations of the converted natives. 



2. The Society for Promoting Christian Knowledge, 

 established in 1698. It had caused an edition of the New 

 Testament to be printed in Arabic, the whole of the Scrip- 

 tures in Manx, and four editions of the Scriptures in the 

 Welsh language. 



3. The Society for tho Propagation of the Gospel in 



