HAMILTON SCIENTIFIC ASSOCIATION 97 



general favor. Throughout, it indeed abounds in passages 

 of exquisite beauty. Kach reader of his Bible dwells on some 

 favorite text. Prof. Saintsbury thought the following one 

 from Solomon's song, almost, if not quite, unrivalled iu the 

 English language : " Set me as a seal upon thine heart, as a 

 seal upon thine arm ; for love is strong as death, jealousy is 

 cruel as the grave ; the coals thereof are coals of fire which 

 have a most vehement flame." Who too but has felt the ma- 

 jesty of that verse in Isaiah where the Almighty is character- 

 ized as " the high and lofty One that inhabiteth eternity." 

 In this magnificent passage Wycliffe used the word " ever- 

 lastingte," which after a short life became obsolete. 



In 1869 Constantine Tischendorf, in the authorized vers- 

 ion of the New Testameiit published by Tauchnitz as his 

 thousandth volume of "British Authors," gave marginal 

 variations from the Vatican, Siniatic, and Alexandrine Greek 

 manuscripts, which date from the fourth and fifth centuries. 

 His introduction first made known to many lovers of the 

 Bible that these New Testament documents were centuries 

 older than those used in translating any Bible in general use. 

 Moreover, many deemed it desirable that archaic words and 

 obsolete expressions of the King James' Bible should be 

 brought into conformity with changes in the English language 

 incident to three centuries of growth. These and other 

 reasons led to the Canterbury resolutions 1870, and to the 

 Revised Version of 1881-85.- As was to be expected, the Re- 

 vised Version has both merits and defects. Of its improve- 

 ments the putting of all scriptural quotations from the ancient 

 poets into rhythmical form, and a closer rendering of delicate 

 shades of meaning characteristic of the Greek verbs, have 

 found general favor. But trivial changes of well-known 

 verses and words, and these not always for the better, but 

 sometimes for the worse, ran counter to the national taste, 

 and the King James' Version is still in popular favor. 



The scope of this paper has been confined to consideration 

 of the outward form of the Bible ; but I venture on a couple 

 of reflections as to its spirit. Not long before the Christian 



