The farmer and mechanic. [volume] (Raleigh, N.C.) 18??-19??, 1911-07-11

ul'lonS or childhood are stereotypen
III us verses. 1t is the representative
= man best moments; all that
there has been about him Of soft and
gentle, and pure. and penitent. and
good speaks to him forever out of his
English Bible"
The language of the Bible is CON
crete rather han abstract. It's
phrases as q rule, not ONLY contain
beautiful ideas, but call up pictures
10 our minds. It, vocabulary is eighty
per cent Of Arglo-SaXon words. Abb
stract words in English are usually
classical, from the Latin or the Greek.
Anglo-Saxon is the language on the
nome, Of the family. of the heart
rather than Of the intellect. The i'm
presslve and sold speaker or writer
IS usaliy one who uses almost entirely
the AnglO-Saxon elements of our Ian
guage. If d speakers style is fam
bouyant, f1orid, and shallow, we find
usually that it abounds IN classical
words. The thing that charms us in
SUCH a book as Lorna Doone. is the
simplicity of the A~nglo-Saxon Ian
guage that is used, and the best trans
tatlon of the simple and beautiful!
language OF Homer, whose ideas and
word pictures viii always live in lit
erature, is one that is made up al
most entirely of A~nglo-SaAon terms.
We 49, ttAC1 - ooAN ~
tation Of the ideas Of a writer and
quotation of his exact language. The
wonderful lessons Of the Bible, its eie
waited moral teaching Il its beauti-
full ord pictures would have had an
effect IN our literature whatever
English translation might haze been
used. The quotations of Shakespeare
and of the writer's before the seven
teenth century were from TRANSACTIONS
other than the Authorized Version,
but the language of our Author
lzed Version has had a wonderful in
ffuence on the English speech. Luth-
er's Bible served to fix and c0nservo
the German language. To an even
greater degree did the Authorized
Version fix the character Of the Eng
iish tongue for all English speaking
people of the three centuries that have
passed, and the language of the peo-
pie on the continent of Europe ave
been less stable, because they lacked
the same degree Of opportunity to use
their Bible in their own mother
tongues. Many words that had al
most become obsolete in S~hakespeare's
time have survived to the present day
because they were employed IN the
language Of our received version. The
language has changed less in the last
three hundred years than it had
changed in the one hundred years be
+ L a i 1lC IL oio
single book were familiar to all En-
glish speaking people the language OF
the people would preserve the type
thus presented, and that IN this way
it would undergo less change than
would otherwise have been the case.
The observation-disclosures Of its transla-
tors made the English Bible accepta-
BILE to all schools Of thought; the
beauty and simplicity of its diction
made all men to understand and love
it.. The care which they exercised in
their work made it a translation
worthy to survive, and We owe great
thanks and praise to these wise ana
devoted men, not only for this great
est of all versions of the Bible, but
also for the service they rendered to
the English speaking people in Civ
ing to the language unity and peTma-
nence. The obsolete words in the
Authorized Version are SO few tina,
they are conspicuous. This SHOWS
how few words have persisted from
our language during these three nun
dred years, owing to the influence OF
the Authorized Version. We had an
interesting example in the Psalter for
this morning MAY IA, My lips will
be fain when I sing unto thee, mean
ing my lips will be glad The
word 'fain' occurs in shakespeare
both as an adjective and as an ad-
verb frequently. It occurs in the Au-
thorized Version only twice, and both
times as an advcrb. Yet in dignifled
speech or in poetry one would even
today say, L would fain do so and
so, because his word is so familiar
from the language Of the parable OF
the PrOdigal Son.
The English language in
words which would mean nothing ex-
cept for the connection in which they
are used in the Bible, and which Oc-
ours at once to the nearer. In some
instances these words have become 50
familiar that the derived meaning is
thoroughly understood, although we
forget the source of the phrase. Such
expressions are: "A perfect Babel,
"a painted Jezebel,' the Benjamin
- 40 family' tbo of a