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"who temporarily put on the form of some object which entrances the senses of the individual, and causes him to do whatever best pleases "the beguiler." 8. Periodically changing vision, such as that of the cat, which changes at noon and at midnight. "I have now fully explained to you," continued the priest, "the eight different orders of sight variously possessed by human beings and by the animal tribes "generally, each order differing considerably from the others. It "therefore should neither astonish nor perplex you if I tell you of the "existence of infinite vision." (Japan, vol. i. p. 94.)

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It is not merely to raise a smile that we have given this brief note of what is called a Buddhist sermon, in which, however, the mythological element is so much more distinctly to be traced than the religious element. The intermixture of careful observation with pure assumption is such as to throw some light on the quaint and marvellous self-contradictions of the Japanese character. There is the same resolve apparent to begin at the beginning, and exhaustively to survey the pale of thought, which is displayed in the manner in which Young Japan has carried out the inaugural promise of the present Mikado. There is the proof of careful observation of natural facts, as in the case of the nictitating membrane of the owl. the vertically-cloven pupil of the cat, and the lidless eyes of the fish. There is also a further process of observation, as in the case of the notice of the vision of the eagle, although this may perhaps be somewhat exaggerated. Side by side with this we find the assertion of magical powers attributed to certain animals, as of a well-known and indisputable fact. There is the confusion of the observed fact that certain animals see with very little light with the statement that they can see by means of light which they themselves emit. There is the attribution, as in Aryan folk-lore, of the power of seeing forms invisible to man to the dog, and also to the monkey, instead of, as in our ghost legends, to the horse. And there is the final leap from the physical to the metaphysical, from the human to the divine, which characterises all teaching that casts loose from the safe moorings of induction. We can partially understand, as we thus analyse the process of thought passed through by the Buddhist priest, how it is that there exists in Japan so much that is of a high order of taste and of intelligence, side by side with so many survivals of the child or of the savage.

ART. VI.-The New Testament of our Lord and Saviour Jesus Christ translated out of the Greek. Being the Version set forth A.D. 1611 compared with the most ancient authorities, and revised A.D. 1881. Oxford and Cambridge University Press.

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T is now rather more than twenty-five years since we discussed in this Journal the propriety and duty of amending the form of the publication of the Authorised Version of the Holy Scriptures then in use, and of subjecting the version itself to revision by a competent body of scholars and theologians, acting under the authority of the Crown.* Since that period a vast improvement has been made by the publiIcation of the Old and New Testaments in numerous editions which leave nothing to be desired in point of typography. The poetry is distinguished from the prose, and the sense is no longer broken by obtrusive divisions of chapters and verses, useful only for the purpose of reference. But a far greater work remained to be accomplished. The text of the Scriptures had yet to be cleared from error by the light of modern criticism, and the language of Scripture in our modern tongue to be adapted to the vernacular intelligence of the people, without impairing the matchless dignity, solemnity, and beauty of the elder version. We expressed a hope in 1855 that a time might come when a company of erudite persons should be appointed under the Royal Head of the Anglican Church to perform this work, and we have now the happiness to see an important portion of it completed. The presentation to Queen Victoria of the Revised Version of the New Testament, prepared by her command, is unquestionably an event of great. historical moment and interest in the annals of her Majesty's reign, of the Church of England, and of the Protestant faith of this nation, and we heartily trust that it will conduce to the spread of piety and sound learning throughout the English-speaking world; for a work like this is addressed to future ages and to the British race in all parts of the globe. But at the same time we cannot but express our apprehension that in some respects the expectations entertained of this work will be disappointed. Nor can we omit to notice that the authors of this Version have preserved an ungenerous and unbecoming silence as to the labours of their predecessors. in this labour. The Speaker's Bible' especially anticipated

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* See 'Edinburgh Review,' vol. cii, p. 413, 'Paragraph Bibles.'

by several years the formation of these Venerable Companies; and although in that edition the text of the Authorised Version has been retained, there is scarcely any question of verbal or theological criticism which is not discussed and elucidated in the notes, often with great ability.

So long a period of time has elapsed since the last revision of the New Testament, and so great is its superiority to all the preceding translations, that we are exposed to the strong temptation of attaching to the so-called Authorised Version an attribute of finality to which those who were concerned in its production laid no claim, and to which, for reasons that we purpose to adduce, it cannot justly be regarded as entitled. The profound and varied learning of King James's revisers, now universally admitted by all competent scholars, and their marvellous command of the English tongue, as displayed in those parts of their work in which the Authorised Version varies from all its predecessors, as well as their consummate skill in the selection and retention of those words and phrases which had been adopted in some one or other of the earlier versions, justly entitle them to the grateful admiration of the English-speaking people of all countries and of all times. It would occupy too much of the limited space at our command were we to dwell upon a theme on which other and abler writers have so frequently and so eloquently expatiated. It must suffice us to observe that if, in our comparison of the Authorised Version of A.D. 1611 with the Revised Version of A.D. 1881, we shall have occasion to point out some of the errors or deficiencies of the former, the result of our investigation has been to enhance in no small degree the high estimate which we had previously formed of the merits of a work which, when judged

the standard of the age in which it was produced, may well be regarded as unsurpassed in the entire range of literature, whether sacred or profane.

The same reason which we have assigned for not dwelling on the merits of the Authorised Version of 1611 constrains us also to restrict within the narrowest limits our historical survey of its numerous predecessors. However important, both in its immediate and in its ultimate results, the version of the Holy Scriptures produced in the fourteenth century by Wycliffe and Nicholas de Hereford, and revised by Purvey, that version, as it is well known, was not derived directly from the original sources, but was simply a translation from the Latin Vulgate. It was reserved for the illustrious Tyndale, the importance of whose work is now felt and acknowledged, to confer upon the English Church and nation a boon of the

same character as that which Jerome conferred upon the Western Church collectively, and, as regards the whole of the New Testament and a portion of the Old Testament, to accomplish the one absorbing object of his life-viz., to cause the boy that drove the plough to know more of the Scriptures than the higher dignitaries of the Roman Church. It was not until Tyndale had learned by bitter experience that there was no place in England in which this work could be accomplished that he resolved to encounter poverty, exile, bitter absence 'from friends, hunger, and thirst, and cold,' in the execution. of his great design. It was at Hamburg, where he first found refuge, that he began to print the New Testament; and it was at Cologne that he appears to have completed the task which he had undertaken. It was at Worms, where Luther had a few years previously borne witness before the Emperor, that Tyndale prepared two more editions of his New Testament; and it was at Vilvorde, near Brussels, in the year 1536, after thirteen years of exile, poverty, and persecution, that this illustrious martyr, when fastened to the stake, uttered his last prayer for the accomplishment of the work to which he had cheerfully devoted his life, Lord, open the 'King of England's eyes.'

One year previously to the martyrdom of Tyndale, Coverdale had completed his translation of the Old and New Testaments, and there appear to have been two distinct issues of the work in the year 1535, and one in the year 1536. As regards those portions of the Old Testament which Tyndale had completed-viz., the Pentateuch and the Book of Jonah, and the entire New Testament, Coverdale availed himself freely of Tyndale's translations, revising them by the aid of the Swiss-German version of Zwingli and Leo Judah, with constant reference to Luther, Pagninus, and the Vulgate. In the year following, another edition of the English Bible, to which the name of Matthew has been given, was ready for publication. This Bible was composed of Tyndale's translation of the Pentateuch and of the New Testament, a translation of the books from Joshua to 2 Chronicles, which Tyndale is believed to have left behind him, and of the remaining books of the Old Testament and the Apocrypha from the Bible of Coverdale. Professor Westcott, of whose History of the English Bible' we have availed ourselves, directs the special attention of his readers to the fact that the New Testament of Matthew's Bible differs considerably in details from Tyndale's revised edition of 1534, but is found to coincide, except in slight and probably accidental varia

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tions, with the last edition which Tyndale published in 1535, an edition which, as the title-page affirms, was diligently 'corrected and compared with the Greek.'

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In the year 1539, the Great Bible appeared. This Bible contained the text of Matthew's Bible as its basis, revised by Coverdale with the help of Sebastian Münster's Latin version of 1534-5. Other editions of this Bible, with Archbishop Cranmer's Prologue, followed in 1540 and 1541. The supervision of two of these editions was entrusted by King Henry VIII. to Bishops Tunstall and Heath. The former of these prelates had been amongst the fiercest of the opponents of Tyndale, and was actively concerned in the collection and burning of such copies of the New Testament as his agents had been able to procure; and so it was, as Professor Westcott remarks, that at last, by a strange irony, "my lord of London" authorised what was in a large part substantially the very work of Tyndale, which he had before condemned and burnt.' Many new editions of the Bibles previously published appeared in the reign of Edward VI., but no new translation or revision was undertaken during that period. Towards the end of the reign of Queen Mary, during which no English Bible appeared, the work of revision was energetically and successfully carried on by the English refugees at Geneva; and in the year 1557 the celebrated Genevan Testament appeared, with an Introductory Epistle by Calvin. The complete translation of the Bible followed in 1560, with a dedication to Queen Elizabeth, whose accession to the throne had partially broken up the Genevese colony, but did not interfere with the work of revision. The Genevan Bible was the work of able and accomplished scholars, who were capable of the work of translation as well as of revision; and their work is justly described by Professor Westcott as the most important ⚫ revision which the English Bible underwent before the final 'settlement of the received text.'

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Little need be said about the Bishops' Bible, which was undertaken by Archbishop Parker about 1563-4, and, with the aid of several of the bishops and other learned men, was completed and published in 1568. A second and revised edition of this Bible appeared in 1572. The execution of this work, as may be inferred from some of the correspondence which is still extant, is in some respects unsatisfactory. The Hebrew scholarship of the revisers was manifestly unequal to the task which they undertook. The revision of the New

Testament, however,' as Professor Westcott has observed, 'will repay careful study.'

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