LITERARY INTELLIGENCE.

Mr. Bulmer, whofe tafte feems only to be equalled by his industry, is about to publifh the Chace of Somerville, to correfpond with Goldsmith's Poems.

Mr. Bewick, of Newcastle, has prepared for the press two volumes of the Natural Hiftory of Birds, in the ftyle and manner of his Quadrupeds.

The second volume of Boydell's Rivers is in a state of confiderable forwardness.

A most magnificent work in Natural History, by Bauer, will foon appear. It is a defcription of eighty different kinds of heaths, from specimens cultivated in the gardens at Kew. We have seen some of the plates, and may fay, without hefitation, that they are unrivalled..

Mr. John Ireland's work, the object of which is the further illuftration of Hogarth, and which will contain plates from paintings of the artist hitherto withheld from the public view, will be published in the fpring.

A Letter from Parma informs us that Profeffor De Roffi is about to publish Annales Hebræo-Typographici, Sec. XV. We expect with no fmall degree of pleafure the Manuscript Collection of Aubrey, from the Afhmolean Museum. They are to be published under the title of an " Apparatus for the Lives of the moft celebrated eminent English Poets, and other celebrated Perfons of the fixteenth and seventeenth Centuries." The work will be accompanied by many original letters from diftinguished characters.

ERRATA IN OUR LAST.

For Fourteen Shillings, the Price of General Washington's Official Letters, read Twelve Shillings.

ART. 1. A new and literal Tranflation from the original Greek, of all the Apoftolic Epifiles. With a Commentary and Notes, philological, critical, explanatory, aud practical. In four Volumes. To which is added, a Hiftory of the Life of the Apoftle Paul. By James Macknight, D. D. Author of a Harmony of the Gospels, &c. 4to. 51. Elmfly, &c. 1795. Alfo an Edition in three Volumes 4to. containing the fame Materials, excepting the Greek Text, and common English Verfion, and the Life of St. Paul. 31. 151. Same publithers, &c.

THERE is nothing that more strongly confirms our opi

nion of the cautious and deliberate prudence with which a revifion of our public Verfion of the Scriptures ought to be undertaken,

I i

BRIT, CRIT. VOL. VI. NOV. 1795.

undertaken, than thefe laborious efforts of learned men, fo ably calculated to affift in conducting fuch a plan to its perfection. So pernicious muft it be frequently to agitate and unfettle the minds of men upon fuch fubjects, that we fhould hope that this task, whenever it shall be again performed, may be completed for ever. With pleafure therefore, we behold a mass of materials accumulating, by which the judgment of the revisers may be affifted, and by which they will be led to weigh almost every word and phrafe of the original, before they determine upon any alteration in that excellent verfion which muft ever form the ground-work of the whole. Dr. Macknight, whofe judicious work on the Harmony of the Gofpels has long been a ftandard book among divines, has here offered a valuable accellion to the fubfifting treasures of this nature. We find, in the important book before us, a new tranflation, as the author thinks it may be called, though preferving as much as poffible the words of the old; a continued commentary; abundant notes, with prefaces and preliminary differtations fufficient to explain every part of the defigns, both of the original writer, and of the tranflator. No writer could poffibly take greater pains, than have been used by Dr. Macknight, to poflefs his readers with the exact knowledge of what he has, and what he has not performed. In the larger edition, the common verfion, the Greek text, and the new tranflation, are printed in parallel columns: in the fmaller, where the two former are wanting, the difference is only in point of convenience, fince a copy of each laid open will eafily fupply the deficiency; and in both, the new tranflation is fo printed, as to diftinguish all its variations. All the words and claufes of the new translation which are different from the common Englith verfion, are printed in italics, and where words are fupplied to fill up the elliptical forms of the original, it is completely diftinguished whether the addition proceeds from the old tranflators or the 'prefent, by printing the fupplementary words of the former in Roman capitals, thofe of the latter, in capitals of the Italic form. For all the principal differences the notes or the preliminary differtations aflign the reafons, and the lefs important will eafily be comprehended by the judicious reader. In a work of this nature fuch exact care is highly commendable, and will make it easy for those who fhall hereafter examine this verfion, with a view to the correction of that which is in public ufe, to fift and .eltimate the reafons of the author, and form deliberate decifions on every doubtful paffage.

In a fhort addrefs immediately prefixed to the verfion itself, which Dr. Macknight calls a Premonition to the Reader, he

thus

thus enumerates the particulars of which his alterations confift:

"1. In fubftituting modern English words and phrafes in place of fuch as are now become obfolete. 2. In correcting the language of the common verfion, where it is ungrammatical. 3. In rejecting ambiguous expreflions, of which there are many in our English bible. 4. In placing the words of the tranflation in the order which the correfponding words hold in the original, as often as either the meaning, or the perfpicuity of any paffage depends on that order. 5. In fap plying the elliptical expreffions properly and for the most part, either from what goes before, or from what follows in the text. 6. In excluding all fuch words and claufes as have been added by our tranflators unneceflarily. Of this kind, there are a number in their verfion which hurt the fenfe. 7. In accurately marking thofe words, which in the common tranflation are added to the text, without being marked as added; but which being retained in this, as neceffary to complete the fenfe, it was fit to diftinguish them from the original words, that the reader may judge of their propriety. 8. In rightly construing the Greek text, where it requires to be conftrued; and in tranflating the paffages according to that right conftruction. 9. In tranflating the Greek words and phrafes according to their true literal meaning, both where they have been miftranflated, and where they have been paraphrafed becaufe in general, the literal, will be found to agree better with the context, and to be more emphatical and beautiful, than any free tranflation whatever. 10. In not varying the tranflation of the fame words and phrafes in the fame fentence, unlefs they are evidently ufed in different fenfes: a rule which our tranflators have often tranfgreffed, to the darkening of the meaning of many paffages. 11. In altering the pointing of fome fentences, for the purpose of rendering their meaning more confonant to the context. 12. In tranflating the Greek particles properly, according to that variety of meaning, in which they are used by the facred writers." P. 144.

Before we attempt, in any degree, to examine or estimate the verfion itself, we must give fome account of the preliminary matters contained in the first volume. These are ushered in by a general preface, in which the neceffity or propriety of a new tranflation is argued, from the imperfections of the vulgate, and from the influence that verfion has had upon most of the vernacular tranflations, particularly our own. Refpecting the framers of the old Italian verfion, which St. Jerome only corrected in fuch places as feemed neceffarily to demand it, this learned divine concludes fairly enough, that, though we know not who they were, we may believe that they were not more intelligent or more fkilful in the Scriptures than their cotemporaries (Tatian, Irenæus, and Tertullian) whose writings ftill remain; and confequently that they were not perfectly qualified for making an accurate tranflation of writings divinely inspired, wherein many ideas, respecting religion, are introduced, which

they did not fully comprehend. Refpecting the English ver. fions, after giving a history of them, (profeffedly taken from the hiftorical accounts of Antony Johnfon and John Lewis, in 1730 and 1739), Dr. M. concludes, that they are not properly different tranflations, but different editions of Tyndal and Coverdale's tranflation, which he contends, was made from the vulgate. The alterations in general refpected, he fays, the language rather than the fenfe; and even the laft tranflation called the King's, though in general much better than the reft, being radically the fame, is not a little faulty, as it was not thoroughly and impartially corrected by the revifers. We are inclined to think, that this argument is preffed rather too far, but at the fame time we hold, that it is not neceffary to prove fo much, in order to justify a new tranflation fo publifhed as this is, with all its peculiarities fairly expofed to dif cuffion. The author's opinion of the Vulgate Tranflation, being very judicious, we thall here return to give the particulars of it in his own words.

"More particularly the ancient tranflators, that their verfions might be ftrictly literal, not only rendered the Greek text verbatim, but introduced the Greek idioms and fyntax into their verfions, by which they rendered them not a little obfcure. Nevertheless, by closely following the original, they were reftrained from indulging their own fancy in the tranflation, and have fhewn us what were the readings of the Greek copies which they made use of, which certainly are no Imall advantages. Farther, fo great was their anxiety to give an exact reprefentation of the original, that when they did not know the meaning of any Greek word in the text, they inferted it in their version, in Latin characters, without attempting to explain it. This method is followed, not only in the vulgate, but in the Coptic or Egyptian verfion, which is fuppofed to have been made in the fifth century, (No. 1509). Some words of the text the ancient tranflators have omitted, either because they were wanting in their copies, or because they did not know how to tranflate them. Other words they tranflated erroneously. Befides,

"Greek words in Latin charafters, are found in the following paffages of the Vulgate: Mat. v. 29. Si occulus tuus dexter (onavdahi(er) jeandalizat te. John vii. 2. Exnyanya, Scenopegia.-John xvi. 7. Si ego non abiero (o wapanλnt) Paracletus non veniet ad vos.-1 Cor. iv. 13. Omnium (aspinux) peripfema ufque adhuc.—1 Cor. v. 7. Sicut eftis (alvun) azymi.-Heb. xi. 37. Circuierunt (xv jendwrais) in 'melatis. - Pet. ii. 18. Exokios is interpreted by Dyfcolis, which is a Greek word of equally difficult interpretation."

+"Of erroneous tranflations in the vulgate, numerous examples might be given; but the following may fuffice: Mat. vi. 11. Panem noftrum (smiecior) fuperfubftantialem.—James v. 16. vigyeμiv, affidua.