UNIVERSALITY OF THe bible 9 distorted passages formerly correctly rendered by 'translating in accordance with Attic idiom phrases that convey in later Greek a wholly different sense, the sense which the earlier translators in happy ignorance 'had recognized that the context demanded.' Be this as it may, nothing that is said about versions or translations or texts ought ever to be allowed to make us feel that we are removed even by one step from the very mind of God as He has revealed it to us in His Holy Word. The Bible not only occupies a unique place in the literature and life of the human race, and has some inherent power of its own which no other book has ; it bears evidence of having been given in order that it might be rendered into other tongues. It loses less than any other book by being translated; and manifold testimony has been borne to the fact that the Authorized Version in particular resembles a book in its original language rather than a translation. The tongue of 'the Hebrew, the idioms of Hellenistic Greek, lent them'selves with a curious felicity to curious felicity to the purposes of 'translation.' Although it is Oriental in its origin, the Bible is at home in the West as truly as in the East. Other sacred books, like trees, have their zones of vegetation beyond which they cannot grow; but whereever man can live, the Bible can flourish as native to the soil. And nowhere has this been made more manifest than during these bygone three centuries in our own land. BOOK I THE ENGLISH BIBLE PRIOR TO THE AUTHORIZED VERSION CHAPTER I TRANSLATIONS OF PSALTER AND OTHER PORTIONS OF SCRIPTURE 'Apart from their own transcendent beauty and universal truth, the Psalms have enriched the world by the creation of a literature which, century after century, has not only commanded the admiration of sceptics, but elevated the characters of innumerable believers, encouraged their weariness, consoled their sorrows, lifted their doubts, and guided their wandering footsteps.'-PROTHERO, The Psalms in Human Life. BOOK I THE ENGLISH BIBLE PRIOR TO THE AUTHORIZED VERSION CHAPTER I TRANSLATIONS OF PSALTER AND OTHER WITH ITH the exception of the merest anonymous fragments, the appearance of translations into the vernacular of portions of the Bible is coincident with the beginnings of English literature. Caedmon was the 'first Englishman-it may be the first individual of 'Gothic race-who exchanged the gorgeous images of 'the old mythology for the chaste beauties of Christian 'poetry.' He was a servant in the monastery at Whitby, and was an old man who knew nothing of the art of verse when the gift of song came to him. He had the care of the cattle; and one evening after he had gone to the stable, he fell asleep, with his mind full of the songs he had heard the others sing, and with his heart sore because he could not sing as they could. As he slept, One came to him who said: 'Caedmon, sing me some song.' But he could only reply sadly, as he had so often done to his fellow-servants, that he could not sing. The Heavenly Visitor, however, assured him that he would sing, and told him to sing of the beginning of created things. Whereupon he began to recite verses to God's praise; and when he awoke, he found that he could not only remember them, but |