versions of Europe are the works of single men, definitely stamped with their impress and bearing their names. A German writer somewhat contemptuously remarks that it took nearly a century to accomplish in England the work which Luther achieved in the fraction of a single lifetime. The reproach is exactly our glory. Our version is the work of a Church and not of a man. Or rather it is a growth and not a work. Countless external influences, independent of the actual translators, contributed to mould it; and when it was fashioned the Christian instinct of the nation, touched, as we believe, by the Spirit of God, decided on its authority. But at the same time, as if to save us from that worship of the letter, which is the counterfeit of true and implicit devotion to the sacred text, the same original words are offered to us in other forms in our Prayer-Book, and thus the sanction of use is distinguished from the claim to finality. Our Bible in virtue of its past is capable of admitting revision, if need be, without violating its history. As it gathered into itself, during the hundred years in which it was forming, the treasures of manifold labours, so it still has the same assimilative power of life.

One Version only in old times, the Latin Vulgate, can in this respect be compared with it. This also was formed by private efforts silently and slowly till it was acknowledged by the acceptance of the Western Church. One supremely great man, Jerome, partly revised and partly renewed it, and by a strange coincidence even he could not displace the old Psalter which had been adopted for public use. But the English Bible has what the Latin Bible, as far as we know, had not. It has not only the prerogative of vitality while the other has been definitely fixed in one shape, but it has also the seal of martyrdom upon it. In this too it differs from the other great modern versions. Luther defied his enemies to the last. Lefevre in extreme old age mourned that when the opportunity was given him he had not been found worthy to give up his life for Christ. Calvin died sovereign at

Geneva. But Tindale, who gave us our first New Testament from the Greek, was strangled for his work at Vilvorde: Coverdale, who gave us our first printed Bible, narrowly escaped the stake by exile: Rogers, to whom we owe the multiform basis of our present Version, was the first victim of the Marian persecution: Cranmer, who has left us our Psalter', was at last blessed with a death of triumphant agony.

The work was crowned by martyrdom and the workmen laboured at it in the faith and with the love of martyrs. The solemn words in which they commend the Bible to their readers, the prayers which they offer for the spiritual enlightenment of their countrymen, the confessions which they make of their own insufficiency, have even now lost nothing of their eloquence. These are the moral of the story.

'I haue here translated,' writes Tindale, and these were his first words, '(brethern and susters moost dere and 'tenderly beloued in Christ) the newe Testament for youre 'spirituall edyfyinge, consolacion, and solas: Exhortynge 'instantly and besechynge those that are better sene in 'the tonge then y, and that have hyer gyft of grace to 'interpret the sence of the scripture, and meanynge of 'the spyrite, then y, to consydre and pondre my laboure, 'and that with the spyrite of mekenes. And yf they perceyve in eny places that y have not attayned the 'very sence of the tonge, or meanynge of the scripture, 'or haue not geven the right englysshe worde, that they 'put to there hande to amende it, remembrynge that so 'is there duetie to doo. For we have not receyved the 'gyft of god for oure selues only, or forto hyde them: 'but forto bestowe them vnto the honouringe of god and 'christ, and edyfyinge of the congregacion, which is the 'body of christ.'

'As for the commendacyon of Gods holy scripture,' writes Coverdale, 'I wolde fayne magnifye it as it is 'worthy, but I am farre vnsufficiet therto. & therfore 1 But see note 1, p. 280.

'I thoughte it better for me to holde my tonge, then 'with few wordes to prayse or commēde it: exhortynge ye (most deare reader) so to loue it, so to cleue vnto it, '& so to folowe it in thy daylye conuersacyon, y' other 'men seynge thy good workes & the frutes of y* holy 'goost in the, maye prayse the father of heauen, & geue 'his worde a good reporte for to lyue after the lawe of 'God, and to leade a vertuous conuersacyon, is the greatest 'prayse y' thou canst geue vnto his doctryne...'

'Euery man,' writes Cranmer, 'that commeth to the 'readynge of thys holy booke ought to brynge wyth him 'fyrst and formoste thys feare of almyghtye God, and 'then nexte a fyrme and stable purpose to reforme hys 'awne selfe accordyng ther vnto, and so to continue, 'procede, and prospere frō tyme to tyme, shewynge hym 'selfe to be a sober and frutefull hearer ad learner, whych 'yf he do, he shall proue at the length well able to 'teache, though not wyth his mouth, yet with his liuynge 'and good example, whych is suer the moost lyuely, and ' effecteouse forme and maner of teachyng.'

'It remaineth, that we commend thee to God, and to 'the Spirit of his grace, which is able to build further 'than we can aske or thinke. Hee remoueth the scales 'from our eyes, the vaile from our hearts, opening our 'wits that we may vnderstand his word, enlarging our 'hearts, yea correcting our affections, that we may loue 'it aboue gold and siluer, yea that we may loue it 'to the end. Ye are brought vnto fountaines of liuing 'water which yee digged not: doe not cast earth into them 'with the Philistines, neither preferre broken pits before 'them with the wicked Iewes. Others haue laboured, and 'you may enter into their labours; O receiue not so great 'things in vaine, O despise not so great saluation !............ 'It is a fearefull thing to fall into the hands of the liuing 'God; but a blessed thing it is, and will bring vs to 'euerlasting blessednes in the end, when God speaketh 'vnto us, to hearken; when he setteth his word before vs,

'to reade it; when he stretcheth out his hand and calleth, 'to answere, Here am I; here we are to doe thy will, 'O God. The Lord worke a care and conscience in vs to 'know him and serue him, that we may be acknowledged 'of him at the appearing of our Lord Iesus Christ, to 'whom with the holy Ghost, be all prayse and thankes'giuing. Amen.'

APPENDICES.

I. SPECIMENS OF THE EARLIER AND LATER WYCLIFFITE

II.

VERSIONS.

CHRONOLOGICAL LIST OF Editions of BIBLES AND OF

PARTS OF THE BIBLE OF CRITICAL IMPORTANCE IN THE
HISTORY OF THE AUTHORISED VERSION.

II. COLLATION OF I JOHN IN THE THREE TEXTS of Tindale.
IV. AN EXAMINATION OF THE SOURCES OF COVERDALE'S
NOTES.

V. SPECIMENS OF THE NOTES OF TINDALE and Matthew. VI. SPECIMENS OF THE LATIN-ENGLISH TESTAMENTS OF COVERDALE.

VII. PASSAGES FROM THE PENTATEUCH AND HISTORICAL BOOKS IN TINDALE, COVERDALE, &C.

VIII. THE RELATION OF THE WYCLIFFITE TO THE LATER

VERSIONS.

IX. THE REVISION OF THE AUTHORISED VERSION.

X.

PHRASES IN THE PSALMS MARKED IN THE PSALTER OF
THE GREAT Bible as addITIONS FROM THE VULGATE.

XI. SOURCES OF THE NOTES IN MATTHEW'S BIBLE.
XII. NOTES ON THE TRANSLATORS OF THE AUTHORISED
VERSION.

XIII. RULES FOR THE TRANSLATION OF THE AUTHORISED
VERSION AS REPORTED TO the Synod of Dort.