[93] The draft of this Bill is preserved in the State Paper Office (Domestic Interreg., Bundle 662, f. 12), and is given in full by Dr. Stoughton, Church of the Commonwealth, p. 543.
[94] Errata to the Protestant Bible, Pref. p. 3., ed. 1737.
[95] In the library of Trinity College, Dublin, there is a manuscript in three volumes of an English version of the Bible, by Ambrose Ussher, brother of Archbishop Ussher. The date assigned to it is about 1620. It does not, however, seem to be in any proper sense a revision of the version of 1611, but rather an independent revision based upon the earlier versions. In an “epistle dedicatorie” to James I. the writer describes himself as having “leisurelie and seasonablie dressed” and “served out this other dish” while His Majesty was “a doing on” the “seasonable sudden meale” which the translators had hastily prepared. He further states that he did not oppose “to our new translation old interpretationes alreadie waighed and reiected,” but “fresh and new that yeeld new consideration and that fight not onlie with our English Bible, but likelie with all translated bibles in what language soeuer and contrarieth them.” As far as can be gathered from the examination of a single chapter, the work seems chiefly based upon the Genevan. The version is incomplete. Vol. i. contains Genesis, Exodus, Leviticus, Numbers, Deuteronomy, Joshua (imperfect), Judges, Ruth, Samuel; vol. ii. contains Kings, Chronicles, Ezra, Nehemiah (imperfect), Esther, and a Latin version of part of Joshua; vol. iii. contains Job, Psalms (partly in Latin), Proverbs, Song of Solomon, Ecclesiastes, Isaiah, Jeremiah, Lamentations, Ezekiel, Daniel (partly in Latin), the Minor Prophets, the first chapter of St. John’s Gospel, Romans, Corinthians, Philemon, James, Peter, John, Apocalypse (partly in Latin), Jude.—Royal Commission on Historical Manuscripts, Fourth Report, pp. 589-598.
[96] The Life and Death of Mr. Henry Jessey, p. 47.
[97] Mace’s rendering of James iii. 5, 6 is the passage most frequently quoted in illustration of his style. “So the tongue is but a small part of the body, yet how grand are its pretensions, a spark of fire! what quantities of timber will it blow into a flame? the tongue is a brand that sets the world in a combustion, it is but one of the numerous organs of the body, yet it can blast whole assemblies: tipped with infernal sulphur it sets the whole train of life in a blaze.” It is but right, however, to state that this is perhaps the very worst passage in the book. The following verses are a fair specimen of his ordinary style. Acts xix. 8, 9: “At length Paul went to the synagogue, where he spoke with great freedom, and for three months he conferred with them to persuade them of the truth of the evangelical kingdom, but some of them being such obdurate infidels as to inveigh against the institution before the populace, he retired, and taking the disciples with him, he instructed them daily in the school of one Tyrannus.”
A yet more offensive specimen of this style of translation was supplied by the New Testament published in 1768, by E. Harwood, and entitled, A literal translation of the New Testament, being an attempt to translate the Sacred Writings with the same Freedom, Spirit, and Elegance with which other English Translations from the Greek Classics have lately been executed; a work which, however faithfully it may represent the inflated and stilted style which then prevailed, can now be read only with astonishment and disgust.
[98] Worsley died before the publication of the volume. It was edited by M. Bradshaw and S. Worsley.
[99] In 3 vols., 8vo. A second edition in 2 vols., 8vo., was published in 1795. Memoirs of Gilbert Wakefield, vol. i. p. 355; vol. ii. p. 468.
[100] The work was intended to form eight vols. 4to.
[101] Scrivener, Introduction to the Criticism of the New Testament, p. 397.