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Bible Society would wish or endeavour to violate these rules, is to break the Ninth Commandment after a more flagrant manner than ordinary; and to pretend that they could in effect do so without detection, the eyes of the whole world being upon them, is most pitiable weakness, if it be not deliberate misrepresentation.

I have alluded, my lord, to the conscientious difficulty which many of the committee, as well as many valued friends, lay and clerical, of the Society, felt in regard to the passing the above resolutions, which they believed would shut a door that God had opened for the distribution of his word; and this for a point which they did not consider by any means of essential moment. I think that in this they mistook their path amidst conflicting difficulties: but I honour their motives; and I honour the steady zeal with which they resisted the restriction, on the ground that it would lamentably cripple the energies of the Society, and snatch the Bible from the hands of our Protestant brethren, because they would not receive it otherwise than with the customary annexation. It ought not to be forgotten, in proof of the honesty of those who took this view of the subject, that precisely the same opinion had been strongly expressed by some of those very individuals who in the progress of the discussion took the most zealous part against them. For, my lord, it is a remarkable fact, that among those who have most warmly assailed the measures of the Bible Society, particularly in the matter of the Apocrypha and Roman-Catholic versions, are included some of those very gentlemen who, till of late years, were zealous on the other side, and even goaded the Bible Society into the measures they now reprobate. Mr. Drummond wrote to the Society in 1817, strongly urging the necessity of granting the Apocrypha; and this not in the detached appended manner in which it is used among Protestants, but in a far more perilous form, namely, intermixed with the inspired books, as practised in the Church of Rome under the fatal Tridentine notion of their inspiration. Mr. Drummond says in this letter: I think you are unjust towards the Catholics, and employ yourself uselessly to attempt to force upon them translations unauthorised by their church. What would you say to such an attempt in England?" He proceeds further to argue the matter, and to prove that the Society ought to give the Roman Catholic the Bible with the Apocrypha, in the manner in which they were willing to receive it. And what he preached he practised; for at his own expense he published in 1819, an edition of the Italian Bible, with an intermixed Apocrypha.

Such was the opinion of one of the most zealous opposers of the Bible Society's proceedings in the matter of the Apocrypha. That this gentleman altered his mind conscientiously, and after full deliberation, I feel assured; and I am far from viewing it as a reproach to any man, that he is better informed to-day than he was yesterday: but is it candid to visit upon the committee of the Bible Society, as a wilful and aggravated crime, a measure which involved much conscientious difference of opinion, and in which some of their most zealous accusers were their companions; all parties having exercised their best judgment to do that which appeared to them, under the difficult circumstances of the case, most for the glory of God by the diffusion of his holy word?

But to turn from Mr. Drummond; who was it that procured the only edition of the Rheims Popish New-Testament in a cheap form, without note or comment, which was ever circulated in Ireland? Who so loudly boasted of it at public meetings, and to this hour is constantly including it in his aggregate list of " scriptural education" in that island? Who was the means of sending forth some twenty thousand copies of such popish translations as the following, to enlighten the cabins of Ireland? "Except

ye do penance, ye shall all likewise perish;" " Jacob worshipped the top of his rod ?" Who thus upheld the Papist in his Popery, and by every copy of this heretical version subtracted from the funds which might have been employed in pure biblical circulation? I answer, incredible as it may appear, Mr. Gordon, vice-president of the Protestant Trinitarian BibleSociety. I say not this by way of censure: the act was well meant, and I am aware of the difficulties which beset the question of litigated versions; and the benevolent promoters of the scheme thought it better to give the Rheims version than none at all: but then, what an extremity of party spirit is it to see all right in one man, and the very same thing wrong in another; and to blame the Bible Society and its present conductors for matters past and settled years since, and which, whether blame-worthy or not, have nothing to do with the existing circumstances of the institution. It was not till some time after the British and Foreign Bible Society adopted its anti-apocryphal resolutions, that even the American Bible Society, profiting by its experience, voted a similar restriction. I will only add the following important facts; that the Society's apocryphal circulation was a mere fraction of its issues, and was only yielded to where it was considered indispensable; that the Society has never issued an English edition thus accompanied; that it has published large editions of German, French, and other Bibles without the Apocrypha, for circulation where copies of this kind could be made use of: that it has never translated the Apocrypha into a new language; and that its agents, before the passing of the resolutions of 1826, prevailed upon some continental societies to print editions without the Apocrypha: but the difficulties which occurred induced those societies to re-instate it in future editions. These things shewed no overweening love for the Apocrypha.

Those members of the Society who still think that the circulation of the Apocrypha where the Holy Scriptures would not be received without it, was lawful, and in concordance with many scriptural examples and precedents, and who would sooner distribute our reading-desk Bibles than none at all, may fairly say, that I have enfeebled their argument by not defending their principle; but in truth, be that principle right or wrong, I have deliberately put it out of the discussion, as not necessary to the point in hand. If their judgment be right, that the Society ought to have gone on as before, and that there was no adequate reason for the restriction, it will not alter the case as it stands at the present moment. Since 1826 the circulation of the Apocrypha has been forbidden by the Society's rules; and the only present inquiry is, Have these rules been obeyed? If they have, the Society comes out clear from its ordeal; for to go back to what Mr. Drummond recommended, or others practised, or any member of the Society said or did years ago, is widely beside the mark. The rule has passed; and, since its passing, no opposition has been made to it: the opinions of individuals may or may not have altered, but the law of the Society is now clearly defined; and the only question is, Has it been violated?

I affirm, and I have taken pains to examine into the facts, that it has not been violated; and that even those individuals who most lamented the adoption of the restriction are as honest and zealous as their fellows in enforcing it. But I will bring your lordship evidence which our opposing friends will, perhaps, value more than mine; namely, the evidence of all the host of Sackville-street writers, not one of whom has ventured to exhibit a tittle of proof to the contrary-with the single exception, and exceptions prove rules, of the story of the three hundred Italian Bibles. Mr. Haldane, indeed, asserts, as before stated, that" the apocryphal question is not settled; only what was formerly done directly, is now done in an in

direct manner:" but though he asserts this, he adduces no evidence to prove it; and no one will doubt that if he could have gleaned one single fact that could have been brought to glance that way, the world would not have been deprived of the knowledge of it. Here, then, is Mr. Haldane's own best, because negative, testimony up to this hour to confront his own assertion.

But I must not forget the Sackville-street writer's box of Italian Bibles. It is true that it is but one solitary lot of books among the millions of copies that have issued from the Bible Societies of Europe, and as the Society's concerns are so large and widely scattered, any man who had read the thirteenth chapter of the first of Corinthians might not unnaturally have conjectured that it was just possible that some mistake might have occurred; that at all events it was not likely that such a body of men as the conductors of the British and Foreign Bible Society would have deliberately-I had almost said foresworn themselves, just for the overpowering love of the Apocrypha, to get a few Italian copies into circulation. Still, coming out opportunely from Sackville-street as an astounding fact, and with threefold notes of admiration, and pregnant insinuations of the Society's perfidy, just on the eve of the formation of the new Trinitarian Society, it was somewhat startling. But does your lordship observe where the writer finds this very fact of the Italian Bibles? In the Society's own Report! The Society and their correspondent state, in the Report and Appendix for 1830, in a manner the most candid and convincing, the circumstances under which some copies of the Italian Bible with the Apocrypha had been sent out from the depôt in Paris; but, instead of giving this statement, which shewed the vigilance of the Society and their zeal to prevent apocryphal circulation, the anonymous writer mistates the facts, keeps back the explanation, and prefaces the whole with a charge, insinuated, but not ventured to be asserted, that the Society had grossly violated its pledge. The whole mass of the Sackville-street documents being in the same style, this passage is no rarity; but it may be worth while just to state the facts. Suppose, my lord, remembering Mr. Southey's blessing on the man that invented parallel columns, I exhibit the matter after that goodly fashion.

"Notwithstanding the parent committee pledged themselves in the face of the whole world, three or four years ago, to give up directly or indirectly circulating the Apocrypha;

in the last Annual Report it is admitted by them that this Socinian agent of theirs in Paris, Mr. Kieffer, had continued the practice up to that time.

They did so pledge themselves, and there is not an atom of proof that they have violated their pledge. Mr. Haldane himself dares not attempt to shew that they have. Even if Professor Kieffer's mistake had been wilful, yet his own published letter shews that the Bible Society was guiltless of it, and proves how strict were the directions he had received.

They do not admit that Professor Kieffer is a Socinian, and are not likely to do so on anonymous authority, in the face of authentic records to the contrary; nor do they admit that he had 66 continued the practice" of issuing the Apocrypha; but quite the contrary, that, so far from its being his practice, he was not aware that in a single instance he had done so; and when he heard the statement respecting the Italian Bibles it "came upon him," he says,

The only colour

which they put upon this gross breach of every principle of honour, good faith, and truth

is the assertion that Professor Kieffer did it unintentionally. What, circulate Bibles unintentionally!!! This is the most unintentional act that was, perhaps, ever performed."

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A plainer story is not on record than this; and on it I would pledge myself anew to the good conduct of the Society. On the adoption of the anti-apocryphal restriction, every known copy of the Apocrypha belonging to the Society was destroyed: and the faithfulness with which this was done, I can myself attest; for, happening to go accidentally one day to the BibleSociety house on other business, I found the committee settling how to dis-: pose of some apocryphal stock, for which they had an offer from a trunk-maker to purchase it to stain and obliterate it for lining boxes; but lest even a single leaf should get abroad, they preferred sending the whole to a paper mill to be ground to pulp. I thought the caution superfluous, and that lining trunks would have been a very good allocation; but I did not then sufficiently appreciate Sackville-street ingenuity.

Nor were the officers of the Society less urgent upon their correspondents and agents abroad; as appears by the following extract from a letter from: Professor Kieffer, dated Paris, Nov. 17, 1826.

"The moment I received the order of the committee not to distribute Bibles with the Apocrypha, I caused all the Bibles of De Sacy, whether in sheets or bound, to be removed from the Society's warehouse, and carried to one belonging to Mr. Smith, so that there is no longer a single Bible containing the Apocrypha in the Society's warehouse. The Committee may rest assured that I shall not put a single Bible with the apocryphal books into circulation."

No man whose own heart is not so hardened by the deceitfulness of sin as to impute to others the basest motives without a shadow of reason, can doubt that Professor Kieffer thought that every copy of the apocryphal editions was effectually removed. He overlooked, however, among the stock some copies of an edition of the Italian Bible which contained the Apocrypha, and upon intelligence being sent him that some of these badgot into circulation, he writes under date of March 13, 1830,"Your letter of the 8th inst. was like a clap of thunder to me. I had been so persuaded that the copies of the Italian Bible sent to me from London in 1823 did not contain the Apocrypha that the thought never entered my mind to examine them, and the more so as in your letters there had always been mention made of none but De Sacy's Bibles. My persuasion in this respect was so firm, that the Rev. Mr. Olivier, at Paris, having some months ago written to me to inquire if there were any Italian Bibles without the Apocrypha in the Society's warehouse, and what was the price of them, I told him, in reply, that the Italian Bibles which were in the warehouse did not contain the Apocrypha, and that they cost eight francs.”

Professor Kieffer goes on to state in what manner the mistake occurred: but the only necessary question is, whether it really was a mistake; and I pity the heart of the man who can doubt it. Sufficient proof that it was. CHRIST. OBSERV. No. 364. 2 H

so, even were there no other, would be found in the offer to sell these very Bibles to Mr. Olivier; for Mr. Olivier is the agent to the Edinburgh BibleSociety; and it is not very likely that the Professor would have chosen the agent of Mr. Haldane and his Edinburgh friends for his confidant in wickedness. The whole matter was merely such an inadvertency as no society, no mercantile house, is exempt from. But after all, what is its amount? Three hundred Bibles were sent to Paris in 1823; in October, 1824, sixtyfour copies had been disposed of, and there have been returned to Earlstreet, from Paris, Cette, Marseilles, and Lausanne, 149 copies: so that the whole number that had gone out from 1824 to 1830, was only eightyseven copies; and of these eighty-seven copies, the majority, for any thing that appears to the contrary, had been issued before the passing of the Society's restrictive resolutions in 1826. The whole matter then comes to this, that in the multitudinous transactions connected with the issue of nearly three million of copies of the word of God during six years, a few score copies with the Apocrypha happened to escape the vigilance of one of the Society's foreign agents, who thought that he had effectually cleared the warehouse of such mixed copies; and that as soon as the circumstance was known it came upon him like a clap of thunder, and he explained the whole to the satisfaction of every reasonable or candid mind. It once happened to me, my lord, in search of health and exercise, to take my spade and convert a potatoe bed into a flower border: and I thought I had done my work effectually; but so it was, that notwithstanding all my care, here and there a solitary tuber escaped my vigilance, and some half dozen intrusive leaflets were seen next spring peeping out among my choicest flowers. I nipped them, and there was an end of the matter: but I should have felt much astonished if any person had written a pamphlet to prove that I had falsified my word, and, while I pretended to plant flowers, was secretly promoting the growth of potatoes, and had added three notes of admiration to make the matter more convincing. I deal lightly with the subject, for to treat it gravely would be impossible. If any man does really believe that the escape of these imprisoned Italian Apocryphas was really a deep-laid plot to restore Apocryphal circulation, and that the committee in London were privy to it, I can only say that he is a man to be placed in a phrenological museum, but not a man to be reasoned with. But even the anonymous writer does not directly assert this; nor does Mr. Haldane directly assert it: and indeed the case is clear, that if the Society had broken its engagement, instead of one small batch of Apocryphas, we should have had them cropping up upon every side; all Europe would have been one potatoe garden; we should have heard claps of thunder from Moscow to Madrid: but our friends do not assert; they only insinuate, and there lies the evil, for many excellent persons, not making due distinctions, mistake insinuations for assertions, and assertions for proofs, and go and repeat what they have heard unwitting of the slander. And thus have the charges against the Bible Society been assiduously bruited, till by dint of repetition they came by many persons to be believed. But do these unsparing assertors remember a remarkable passage in the exploded Apocrypha, which, though not of Divine inspiration, conveys so excellent a lesson, so beautifully expressed, that with it I shall close the present letter; and if, after reading it, our friends should wish to relieve themselves by recurring to a portion of Holy Writ, I would urge on them, and let me urge on myself, that most beautiful chapter already alluded to, St. Paul's description of Christian charity. The Apocryphal passage occurs in Ecclesiasticus, and is as follows :-"Admonish a friend, it may be he hath not done it; or if he have, that he do it no more: admonish thy friend, it may be he hath not said it; and if he have, that he speak it not again. Admonish a friend, for many times it is a slander; and believe not every tale."

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