The age-herald., 1902-05-05
THE BIBLE IN LITERATURE.
Its Value Rises Largely from Its Eie-
 mental Character.

From the Philadelphia Press.
 In the course of a brief but pregnant paper on the literary aspects of the Bible in the current number of "The Indepen- dent" Prof R. G. Moulton of the Uni versity of Chicago touches upon the ar- tistic qualities of the King James yer sion and suggests, but does not answer, the question: Why is this translation so highly est eemed by the Englsh-speak- ing race?
 In stating the query, Prof. Moulton im- piles of course, that the version has qualities which justify it's consideration on purely literary grounds. He declares that "too much cannot be said so far as its language is concerned; it's dignity of diction, force and felicity of expression: its rhythmic flow and wealth of imag cry" But he Is at the same time, of the impression that Literature, in the strict CT sense, Is conspicuous by It's absence" because "all through the centuries of rab- binical and medieval doctors the highest truth was conceived as a series of isolated propositions, and the translators labored to make each verse a thing of beauty" with the result that, in Mr Moultons opinion, they produced ''an accumula- tion of good thlngs-llterature cut into lengths-with the beauty not of poem, but of q scrapbook." Not to inquire into the justice of this estimate, it Is inter- esting to ask whether apart from the biological significance, there is not in the type of mind that made and that still admires this translation a bias which compels it's admiration, even though the version were far more faulty in the matter of technique than Prof. Moulton himself appears to consider 1t.
 It seems not unlikely that the correct answer suggested by John Burroughs in another current article-that on Liter ary Values in the April Century. There the writer lays stress on the necessity for the English author to place natural ness above art. He points out that all the great English masters have done this, and he adds 'The literary values of the Bible (by which, of course, the King James version is meant), doubtless arises largely from its elemental char acter. The utterance of sim pie, unletter- eQ men IdTDCTS, SdllOIS, have great force and impressiveness from the same cause; there are in them the virtue and the seriousness of real things" In other words the Anglo-Saxon mind values a literary conscience above a literary consciousness, and is generally better fitted to produce work great be- cause of it's art. The former is the req son why Poe Is most admired by the French and has never been really popular at home; the latter is the reason why Grants Memoirs" hold justiflably high place in English literature.
 To the man whose native tongue is English, the French Bible seems trivial not only for the superficial reason that what he considers its sacred names have a light sound but because the work of translation has been done, to his serious sense with an eye that is not intent on the fundamental significance of the ori- ginal text. The AngloSaxon race, which produced the Puritan conscience demands that eye upon the fundamentals. Her poets, to endure for her must have a message, and though the time may be at nano when ior ner' too, beauty VIII alone suffice, she is as yet firm in her demand for the soul behind the words. The makers of the King James version were all for that They did unconscious ly what the most conscious artist will do subtly when he is seeking for force, they relied upon simplicity. That is what even Saint-Beuve meant when he said that the peasant always has style and that ito speak in literature with the perfect rec titude and artlessness of the movement of animals and the unimpeachableness of the sentiment of trees in the woods and grass by the roadside is the fiawless triumph of art