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Chap. ii.
External
History.

he closes his disclaimer of Joye's edition reflects at once his vigour and its tenderness. There is in it something of the freedom and power of Luther, but it is charged with a simple humility which Luther rarely if ever shews. ...'My part,' Tyndale writes, 'be not in Christ if mine 'heart be not to follow and live according as I teach, and 'also if mine heart weep not night and day for mine own 'sin and other men's indifferently, beseeching God to 'convert us all and to take his wrath from us and to be 'merciful as well to all other men, as to mine own 'soul, caring for the wealth of the realm I was born in, for the king and all that are thereof, as a tender-hearted 'mother would do for her only son.

'As concerning all I have translated or otherwise 'written, I beseech all men to read it for that purpose I 'wrote it, even to bring them to the knowledge of the 'Scripture. And as far as the Scripture approveth it, 'so far to allow it, and if in any place the word of God 'disallow it, there to refuse it, as I do before our Saviour 'Christ and His congregation. And when they find fault 'let them shew it me, if they be nigh, or write to me if 'they be far off: or write openly against it and improve 'it, and I promise them, if I shall perceive that their 'reasons conclude I will confess mine ignorance openly.

'Wherefore I beseech George Joye, yea and all other 'too, for to translate the Scripture for themselves, whether 'out of Greek, Latin, or Hebrew. Or, if they will needs, "...let them take my translations and labours, and change, 'and alter, and correct and corrupt at their pleasures, 'and call it their own translations and put to their own 'names, and not to play bo-peep after George Joye's 'manner...But I neither can nor yet will suffer of any 'man that he shall go, take my translation, and correct 'it without name, and make such changing as I myself

'durst not do, as I hope to have my part in Christ, "though the whole world should be given me for my 'labour'.'

1 W. T. yet once again to the 'Christian Reader' in the N. T. of 1534. I cannot find this address in my copy of Tyndale's Works published by the Parker Society. Part of it is given in the Life, pp. lxii. ff. The Grenville fragment of Tyndale's first quarto Testament with glosses has been perfectly reproduced in photo-lithography by Mr E. Arber, London, 1871.

The first octavo has been printed: (1) by Mr Offor, but this edition, though verbally accurate, is wholly

untrustworthy in spelling; and (2) in fac-simile by Mr F. Fry with most scrupulous exactness.

The revised edition of 1534 (M. Emperour) is given in Bagster's Hexapla, carefully and well, as far as I have observed.

The final revision of 1535 [or 1534 G. H.] has not yet been published as a whole or in a collation, though it is from this that Tyndale's work has passed directly into our Authorised Version.

NOTE to p. 52.

Mr F. Fry has made an ample collection of the spellings peculiar to or characteristic of the edition of 1535. By the help of this, which he most kindly communicated to me, I have drawn up the following table of the substitutions of vowel sounds. They seem to me to fall (as Mr W. A.Wright has suggested) under the general description which Bosworth has given of the peculiarities of the Flemish orthography: Anglo-Saxon Dictionary, p. cxi. The unequal distribution of the peculiarities to which attention has been called already (p. 51, n. 1) is a most important fact in this connexion:

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belaeved (beleved 1534), decaev-
able (decevable 1534), dekaeye
(dekeye 1534), naedeth (nedeth ue for u
1534)

crueses, ruele, ruelers.

Chap. ii.
External
History.

Chap. ii.
External
History.

2. COVER

PALE.

His early connexion with More and Crumwell.

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Tyndale's character is heroic. He could see clearly the work to which he was called and pursue it with a single unswerving faith in GOD and in the powers which GOD had given him. It was otherwise with Miles Coverdale, who was allowed to finish what Tyndale left incomplete. The differences of the men are written no less on their features than on their lives. But our admiration for the solitary massive strength of the one must not make us insensible to the patient labours and tender sympathy of the other1. From the first Coverdale appears to have attached himself to the liberal members of the old party and to have looked to working out a reformation from within through them. As early as 1527 he was in intimate connexion with Crumwell and More'; and in all probability it was under their patronage that he was able to prepare for his translation of Holy Scripture. How long he thus laboured we cannot tell3. In 1529 he met Tyndale at Hamburgh', and

Some sounds are expressed in different ways, especially 'o.' Thus we have aloene and aloone; boeldely and booldly; boethe and booth; coete and coote; hoeme and hoome; loeke and louke (loke 1534); noene and noane; stoene and stoone; thoese and thoose; whoem and whoom. So also we have theare and theere; tought and thaught (taught).

Other exceptional forms are tappe (top), touth (to the 1534), waere and woere (where), woeld (would); te (the); mouny (money).

1 The later Puritanism of Cover dale is consistent with this view of his character. He was a man born rather to receive than to create impressions.

2 Anderson, I. p. 186.

3 In an undated letter to Crumwell he says, evidently in reference

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Chap. ii.
External
History.

must have continued abroad for a considerable part of the following years up to 1536. In the meantime a great change had passed over England since the 'Bill' of 1530'. At the close of 1534 a convocation under the presidency of Cranmer had agreed to petition the king that he would 'vouchsafe to decree that a translation of 'the Scriptures into English should be made by certain 'honest and learned men whom the king should nomi'nate; and that the Scriptures so translated should be 'delivered to the people according to their learning'.' Crumwell, who must have been well aware of the turn which opinion had taken, seems now to have urged Coverdale to commit his work to the press. At any rate by 1534 he was ready, 'as he was desired,' 'to set press. 'forth' (i.e. to print) his translation, and the work was finished in October, 1535.

But up to the present time the place where it was printed is wholly undetermined, though most bibliographers agree that it was printed abroad. Various conjectures have been made, but when examined minutely they are found to be unsupported by any substantial evidence. The wood-cuts and type are certainly not those used by Egenolph of Frankfort, to which however they bear a very close resemblance.

1 See p. 44:

Strype, Cranmer, p. 34. It is uncertain whether it was after this resolution (as seems most likely), or not till after the corresponding resolutions of 1536, that Cranmer endeavoured to engage the bishops in a translation or revision of the English Bible [New Testament], of which attempt Strype has preserved an amus. ing anecdote: Cranmer, p. 48.

Strype says that Cranmer took 'an 'old English translation which he 'divided into nine or ten parts...to 'be sent to the best learned bishops

On the other

'and others, to the intent they should
'make a perfect correction thereof.'
It has been argued that the epithet
'old' can only refer to a copy of the
Wycliffite version-as if that were
available for such a purpose; but in
point of fact the epithet is not found
in Foxe's MSS., to which Strype re-
fers as the authority for his account.

The date is added in the edition
of 1550. The words do not imply
that he commenced it then.

Mr F. Fry on Coverdale's Bible of 1535, P. 32. On this point I have satisfied myself completely.

His Bible sent to the

Chap. ii.
External
History.

Three titlepages.

The differ ences of the title-pages.

hand, no book printed by Froschover of Zurich has yet been found with more than the two larger kinds of type used in Coverdale's Bible'. The question is further complicated by the fact that the title-page and preliminary matter were reprinted in a different (English) type2, and the five remaining title-pages represent three distinct issues, two in 1535, and one in 1536. Two copies have a title-page corresponding to the body of the book, dated 1535, and one of them preserves a single page of the original preliminary matter. Another copy has a titlepage in English type, corresponding to the English preliminary matter, dated also 1535. The two other titlepages are printed in English type, but with the date 15363. Thus there can be no reason to doubt that the book was issued both with the foreign and English titlepages, &c., though it may still be doubted whether the English title-page, &c. belongs to 1536 or to 15355.

One important difference between the foreign and

1 Mr Fry, .c. p. 28. It is right to add that I am convinced, on internal grounds, that Froschover was the printer, though at present no satisfactory direct evidence of the fact can be adduced. Froschover, it may be add ed, printed the edition of 1550.

[Dr Ginsburg informs me that he has complete typographical proof that the Bible was printed by Froschover.] 2 Probably, as Mr Fry shews, by Nycolson: I. c. p. 20.

In the same way the title-page and preliminary matter of the edition of 1550 printed abroad were cancelled, and a new title-page &c. printed in England substituted in their place.

3 See App. II.

The fragment of the foreign printed Prologue offers only one important variation from the corresponding part of the English Prologue: Mr Fry, l. c. p. 18.

It is of course impossible to deter

mine the cause of the suppression of the foreign title-page and Prologue. Coverdale may have explained too much in detail the Douche and La'tin' sources from which he borrowed to suit the wishes of his patrons or publishers. The change in the titlepage suggests the conjecture, which is however otherwise unsupported.

5 It is possible (as has been suggested to me) that when some copies of the English title-page had been struck off with the date 1535, corresponding to the imprint, this date was afterwards changed in the setting of the page to 1536 to suit the actual time of the English issue; so that the two title-pages belong really only to one issue. The only difference observable in the fac-similes of the two title-pages is the inversion of one of the ornaments on the side of BIBLIA.

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