Perhaps some of your readers will state where the correct text may be met with.
B.G.J.
Emancipation of the Jews.—In Francis' History of the Bank of English, p. 24., mention is made of an offer on the part of the Jews to pay 500,000l. to the state on the following conditions;—1. That the laws against them should be repealed; 2. That the Bodleian Library should be assigned to them; 3. That they should have permission to use St. Paul's Cathedral as a Synagogue. It is stated, on the authority of a letter in the Thurloe State Papers, that this proposition was actually discussed. The larger sum of 800,000l. was demanded; but, being refused, the negotiation was broken off. This proposition is said to have been made shortly before the elevation of Cromwell to the Protectorate. The subject is an interesting one in these days, when Jewish disabilities are under discussion.
I wish to offer two queries:—1. Is this story confirmed by any contemporary writer? 2. Is it conceivable that the Jews would have consented to worship in a cruciform church, such as was old St. Paul's, which was standing at the time this offer is supposed to have been made?
H.M. AUSTEN.
St. Peter's, Thanet.
The Complutensian MSS.—Has not there been an account of these MSS. published in London in 1821? My authority for this Query is to be found in a work of Dr. D. Antonio Puigblanch:—
"En el año 1821 per encargo que hice desde Madrid se imprimio mio aca en Londres, de que es falso este rumor[2], pues en la biblioteca de la Universidad de Alcala quedaban pocos meses antes en gue estune en ella siete manuscritos biblicos en aquellas dos lenguas[3], que son sin duda los mismos siete de que hace mencion en la Vida del Cardenal Cisneros, Alfonso de Castro, doctor téologo de la misma Universidad, i escritor contemporaneo o de poco tiempo después, parte de los cuales manuscritos, es a saber, los caldéos, son de letra de Alfonso de Zamora, que es uno de los tres judíos conversos editores de la Complutense."—Opusculos Gramatico-Satiricos del Dr. D. Antonio Puigblanch, Londres [1832], p. 365.
If the Chaldee and Hebrew MSS. of the Complutensian Polyglot were at Alcala in 1821, when were they removed to Madrid, and in what library at Madrid are they now? The Greek MSS. are supposed to have been returned to the Vatican Library. If the Chaldee MSS. are in the handwriting of one of the editors, as stated by Puigblanch, they cannot be of much value or authority. I shall add another Query:—Are they paper or parchment?
E.M.B.