With this feeling, and with a loyal adherence to the leading principles that have now been specified, we may at once pass onward to the difficulties which the succeeding chapter will present, and consider, generally and popularly, what would seem to be the limits to which revision should be carefully confined.

CHAPTER IV.

NATURE AND LIMITS OF REVISION.

revision.

We have now before us a difficult portion of the subject, Different opinions as and one on which some preliminary consideration is espe- to extent of cially necessary. That a revision is desirable would seem to be the opinion of the majority of thoughtful and unprejudiced persons, but how far that revision should extend is a matter in which we observe great diversity of sentiment. In the minds of some, revision means only sober and guarded change, there, and there only, where truth and faithfulness positively require it. In the minds of others, it is simply synonymous with rashness and innovation : our venerable Version is to be disfigured and Frenchified; our familiar religious words are to be altered; all that is dear to the simple and devout believer is to be cleared away by modern criticism or marred by inconsiderate change.

That writers and thinkers of this latter class show plainly that they know very little of the history of the English Bible, and very inadequately estimate the deep conservatism in the English mind in regard of the one Book, is perfectly evident; but that they obtain a sort of hearing is also clear, and that they tend to import prejudice and bias into the whole subject is unfortunately clearer still.

With such writers and thinkers it is impossible to argue.

H

Antecedent prejudice renders them commonly impervious to the force of fair considerations, and leaves them only in the attitude of half-angry opposition. Such opponents we cannot hope to conciliate; but there are many, very many, deeply interested in the subject, who do confessedly feel great anxiety as to the degree of revision to which a nineteenth century might advance. Even considerations, such as those of the preceding chapter, drawn from the history of former revisions, fail to satisfy; as the not unreasonable fear is ever ready to show itself, that this principle of least possible alteration which prevailed, when revision followed revision at no lengthened interval, might be much endangered now from the simple fact that more than two hundred and fifty years have come and gone since the date of the last; and that the very lapse of time and the changes of language and expression necessarily due to it must, by the very nature of the case, seriously affect the question.

Such anticipations are not unnatural; such implied objections are perfectly fair and reasonable, but the answer seems conclusive, that the Version we are considering has really fixed to a great degree the standard of our general as well as of our theological language, and that the English Bible is really our first English classic as well as the Book of Life and Truth. It may be added too that, in a literary point of view, the whole question of language is in a far better state than it was a hundred or one hundred and fifty years ago.1 The

1 See Abp. Trench, On the Auth. Version of the New Test. p. 25,

where some specimens are given of the unhappy revisions of the

wretched attempts at revision in the past century if compared even with the worst and most pretentious efforts of the present century, will show very convincingly that the argument derived from the long interval has no real weight, and that no revision in the present day could hope to meet with an hour's acceptance if it failed to preserve the tone, rhythm, and diction, of the present Authorized Version.1

revision

We may dismiss then this class of objections and objec- Extent of tors, and now turn to the really difficult question which the considered in detail. present Chapter places before us-to what extent is revision to be carried? On what principles are alterations to be introduced, and how far is exact scholarship to be allowed to modify when the case is not one of actual error? Unless some answer is attempted to primary questions such as these, revision will be a leap in the dark. It will be either so occasional and superficial that the usual argumentum inertia, viz., that if there is to be so little change it is really not desirable to disturb the minds of devout persons by touching the Book at all,—will certainly consign the

eighteenth century. The remarks in the work just referred to on 'the English of our Version' (Chap. ii.) are especially deserving of atten

tion.

1 Nothing is more satisfactory at the present time than the evident feelings of veneration for our Authorized Version, and the very generally-felt desire for as little change as possible. In a recent

leading article on this subject in the
Times of May 6 the writer very pro-
perly presses on the revisers a salu-
tary caution that it should be
their aim not to make as many, but
to make as few, alterations as pos-
sible,' and justly remarks that 'it
will often be much better to sacrifice
a point of strict grammatical accu-
racy than to jar the ear and lose the
sympathy of readers.'

Passages involving doctrinal

error.

work when done to the oblivion that fortunately has been the fate of so many revisions; or on the other hand, it will be of such an uneven character (alteration always having a tendency to accelerate, and revisers being always dangerously open to the temptation of using with increasing freedom acquired facilities), that the uniform character of the present Version will always hold its own against the irregular development of its temporary rival. Principles then must be laid down, though at the same time we confess, if there is to be real success, there must always be in reserve a dispensing power for passages where from varied reasons, textual, exegetical, and linguistic, the old rendering must be left untouched. It is here where the great difficulty of the work will be felt, and here also where no rules can be laid down, but where we can ultimately trust to nothing but to sensitive judgment, and to the acquired tact of a watchful experience. Subject to such a necessary limitation we may now endeavour to state and classify those cases to which revision may be properly applied. We will begin with those about which there will be least doubt, and advance gradually to the point where a just conservatism, and a due regard to the principles already laid down seem fairly to stop us.

The first class of passages demanding correction will always be those where there is clear and plain error, and where the incorrectness would be recognised by any competent scholar to whom the passage was submitted. Here our duty is obvious. Faithfulness, and loyalty to God's truth require that the correction should be made unhesitatingly.