The Press. — London, England, 1858-09-04 00:00:00

THE PRESS, SEPTEMBER 4, 1858. ittr a t ur t. _ sverericss for texts, and, at the game time, some contempt for learning. They do not read the Bible, as they read other books, continuously, but catacermatize it, as Plato would say. They divide it into a series of short sayings, which they Os the Authorized Version of the New Testa- sever from their context and quote as maxims, m ent : in Connection with so me Recent Pro- though they were often never intended to be floss& for its Revision. By Richard Chenevix maxims, and not seldom are quite untrue when Trench, D.D., Dean of Westminster. London : considered as general propositions. This manner of treating the Bible must needs be dangerous, J. W. Parker and Son. but at any rate it requires that the exact mean- T H E appearance of this volume suggests to us a ing of these maxims or texts should be clearly remark in praise of newspapers and periodicals. ascertained—in other words, it makes a learned They have to bear so much grave censure that and subtle criticism doubly necessary. Yet the they may well take some pains to draw attention very persons who take this course are disposed to to the claims they have to the thanks of the treat criticism and learning with contempt. The public. Certainly this book would not have been consequences of this singular inconsistency would written but for that loud demand for biblical re- sometimes be amusing if they were not painful. vision which we all remember to have been Since "rebus human's inest quidam orbis," these made through the medium of the public press. consequences cannot be more graphically described The clamour itself has long died away, and some than in the words of a respectable philosopher of might say that it was fruitless ; but here are the antiquity :—" If you ask one of them a question fruits. Through the newspapers and periodicals " (i.e., about his religious opinions), he draws the public made known their wants to the " some obscure little text, as it were, out of a scholars, and the scholars, like wise men, have set " quiver and discharges it at you ; and if you ask themselves to satisfy that want. The world " him to give you an account of the meaning of before newspapers must have been a strange place " this, you will find yourself smitten by a second in many respects; but what strikes us just now " novel distortion of language (i.e., some too is, how far apart in that world must the literary " literally translated Orientalism) ' • and, in short, part and the illiterate part of the community " you will never get any good whatever out of have been ! When books were the only publics- " any individual among them." tions, and there was no class of interpreters between the authors and the readers, how diffi- No revision, however well executed, will ever cult must it have been for the former to adapt root this vice out of religious men, for it is not themselves to the latter ! An author who so much incorrect translation which leads them wished to serve his age must often have longed wrong as their misunderstanding of perfectly that the age would speak and declare its needs. correct renderings into which they are betrayed Newspapers supply this want ; the present age is by their perverse habit of converting a book full certainly not dumb. It criticizes the conduct of of poetry, narrative, and rhetoric, into a collec armies, it prescribes the measures of statesmen, tion of aphorisms. But their confidence in " the it calls for everything which it wants. A short letter that killeth " might be shaken by a revi time ago it clamorously demanded a supply of sion. A perilous shaking that might doubtless Greek criticism. " Five clergymen," distin- be. It way well give us pause to think that it guished for scholarship, respectfully presented might be mischievous to a larger number than it their contribution, and the Dean of Westminster, benefited. But, as the Dean happily quotes, an old and faithful servant of the public, cele- " Nunquam periclum sine periclo vincitur ;" and brated for the skill with which he makes in another place he describes the wholesome nutritious but rather plain food acceptable to the effect that might be produced by such a breeze pampered palate of light readers, has served up a among the dry bones in his own weighty, though new meal with his usual success. perhaps somewhat languid and pedantic phrase : The Dean has apologized in his preface with That very unsettlement in regard of the wordy in which God's message has hitherto been conveyed t i them , might manifest sincerity mper i for the i fection of his work. It is not unlikely that the public may i t na no o t i p th ro e ve m t e o s r s s a om j e as s e m if a ti h e a t p o p a y m b o re re ak e i e n e g ur a a f te t c h i:an t e c i ra de :t . afford him many future opportunities of correct- of formality which ty long habit so easily overgrows our ing what is amiss in it, and, if so, we would reading of the Scripture? it would not be, I think, for earnestly exhort him to avail himself of those op- most of us unprofitable to discover that the words in which pcirtunities. We deeply f feel the force of the the truth has been hitherto conveyed to us, are exchangeable or p other, an in unpleasant nn someet a s it places, might it may prove at be, for thebe tterfi r stm words. might h t T y h e e t objections which are stated in the last chapter of shock, this book to the plan of a revision of the Bible; be a startling of many from a dull, lethargic, unprofitable particularly are we impressed by the objection reading of God's Word ; while in the rousing of the ener that such a revision would widen the breach be- fries of the mind to defend the old, or, before admitting, thoroughly to prove the new, more insight into it might tween us and the Dissenters and the Churches of be gained, with more grasp of its deeper meaning, than America, unless, indeed, which it would be san- s ears of lazy familiarity would have given. For, indeed, guine to hope, the two nations and the multi- according to a profound proverb," What is ever seen is tude of denominations could be brought to never seen; " and a daily familiarity with Scripture, full execute a revision in common. But if this and as it is of unutterable blessings, carries its dangers with it, other objections are for the p regent decisive dangers which the course that is here urged might effect much to remove. against the plan—if we are not ripe for the work, Critics will always divide themselves into two nothing can m ore e ff ec t ua lly recon cile us to classes—those given to praise, and those given to delay than the possession of a handbook of alterations, a table of errata, executed by a corn- blame. Dr. Trench is one of those who by con stitution incline always to the more amiable ex petent hand and published in a cost odious treme ; particularly, he is always disposed to be form. If we cannot yet put the Scriptures Pe in their p ur it y i nto every h an d , t h e next b est thing lavish in panegyric upon whatever is ancient. Hence we are not surprised to find his praise of is that the imperfections of the Authorized Ver sion, th e i r nature and number, s h ou ld b e made the Authorized Version somewhat more warm than that version, in our opinion, deserves. We known as w id e l y as poss ibl e. B y j u di c i ous i n - be made suspect that when he speaks of "the rhythmic sections and omissi ons thi s b oo k m i g ht into suc h a h an db ook, and if every c l ergyman " beauty of the periods, and the instinctive art would make a point o f mas t er i ng it we m i g ht at :‘ ,. wili wh , ich the style rises and falls with its least c ease f or t h e f uture to hear from the lips of .sub t Ject, he is ascribing to the version the the teacher s o f reli • gion ignorant perversions of merits of the original. There is much measured the words of prophets and apostles. and stately rhetoric in the New Testament ; and a version of this can scarcely be other than mu " The body of Christian people in England," sical. It would not be easy to put the Som says the D ean , " h ave never rea li ze d t h e f act t h at n i um Scipionis into altogether unmusical Eng " the Divine utterance was not made at the first lish. Again, the style of our version rises and ti in those very En lish words which they read falls, we believe, with the style of the origin al ; "in their cottages g and hear in their church. and if also with the subject, only b eca use the " Who will not own that the little which this style of the original is adapted to the subject. " faith o f t h e i rs i n the English Bible has in ex- When Dr. Trench goes on to speak of " the " ceoa is nearly or qu it e harmless ?" We must " skilful surmounting of difficulties the most confess that we are not at all disposed to own " real," we admit that our translators dese r v e this. O n t h e contrary, we believe the evil to be this praise ; but it would be strange indeed if which could'iderable and one which all the improvements they did not. Skill of this sort is not ve r y rare ; be made in the Authorized Version and that more than forty of the best scholars of Woul d be insufficient to remove. For religious their ag e , having unlimited time at their disposal, People in England have in general a strong ' should have exhibited a large measure of it might 845 well be taken for granted. As to " the constant " solemnity and seriousness which, by some name " less skill, is made to rest upon all," we think that no nameless skill, but only a very moderate share of good taste was requ►site to insure this, if it has been attained ; that, however, much of the solemnity with which the words of the Au thorized Version sound in our ears is to be attri buted to the association of them in our minds with sacred seasons and rites, and much to the archaism of its language, which in' some places has made it seem more solemn than was neces sary—e. g., the commencement of St. Luke's Gospel, which in the original has a familiar, con versational sound, reads in the Authorized Ver sion like an Act of Parliament. Of course, in a volume like this there was not much room for originality. The chapter, how ever, in which Dr. Trench shows that many of the phrases in our version which had been charged with inaccuracy or impropriety are in reality neither inaccurate nor improper, but simply obsolete, contains several observations which to us at least are new. The most notable of these is upon that passage, " Take no thought for your life what ye shall_ eat," &c. Dr. Trench, by a reference to Julius Cesar, which might as well have occurred to people before, shows that the offensive phrase "Take no thought" meant in the time of James 1., "Do not disturb your selves needlessly about." The passage is in act ii. scene 1— Alas, good Cassius, do not think of him ; If he love Cesar. all that he can do Is to himself: sake thought and die for Cesar— where "take thought" clearly means "take it to heart." NVe must find room for another obser vation, which refers to the Dean's old friend "its." Ile says—" I have observed in English, "Past and Present,' that 'its' nowhere occurs in "our Authorised Version. Lev. xxv. 6. (` of its " own accord') has been since urged as invalidating "my assertion, but does not so really ; for re ference to the first, or indeed to any of the early " editions, will show that in them the passage " stood of it own accord.' Nor is 'it' here a mis '' print for its' ; for we have exactly the same 'by it own accord' in the Geneva Version, Acts " xii. 10; and in other English books of the be " ginning of the seventeenth century, which never " employ its.' " Dr. Trench should have ex plained to us how this phrase " of its own accord" came to be used. The Dean's English style is remarkable in one who studies our language so diligently. Perhaps, however, too much study may here produce the same effect as too little. Certain it is that no style written now-a-days by a writer of mark is less idiomatic, less English than that of this dis tinguished English philologer. We should judge that he has never mastered the art of forgetting himself in writing ; natural writing seems to him slovenly : it is always ringing in his ears, What is the use of my studying language more deeply than others if I am to write like other people after all ? Hence in every sentence curious and uncommon constructions, which if any critic were to find fault with, no doubt the Dean would promptly crush him by , a reference to Bishop Andrewe s Sermons or Holland's Transla tion of Pliny. Besides this, every sentence is lengthened and weakened by a multitude of unnecessary particles, whereas it seems to us that what the Dean calls "a true knower of Eng lish " avoids particles as much as a true knower of Latin. "Even as" is constantly occurring, which we are sure is quite archaic, and could never come naturally to the lips of any one at the present day. "Indeed" appears continually, without any sufficient reason ; and words of this kind are insufferable if they are not necessary. The result of this peculiarity, taken together with the clerical colour of the style, is to make the book read like a clumsy translation of Chrysostom. Again, we have poetical phrases such as " the claim of God's Word to be read with devoutest reverence and honour." What ever Holland or Bishop Andrewes may say to the contrary, we are persuaded that in prose there ought to be an article before the superlative. Also we have Latinisms, as " almost no one" for " hardly any one," and " without all folds " for " without any folds." We might criticize the Dean's English at much greater length if we had room. In another writer such shortcomings might be passed over; but m"a true knower of our language" they ought to meet with Loom