519.

A

PARTY of actors played "Douglas" at the Trades' Hall, in Glasgow. The bills said of the chief impersonator that "his histrionic powers had procured him the appellation of the Third Roscius;"" but nevertheless added, that this was his first appearance on any stage."

520.

THE chief Oxford divines concerned in the

translation of the Bible, which was undertaken by the command of James I., were the following:

Dr George Abbot, Dean of Winchester, afterwards Archbishop of Canterbury.

Dr Thomas Ravis, Dean of Christ Church, afterwards Bishop of London.

Dr Giles Thompson, Dean of Windsor, afterwards Bishop of Gloucester.

Dr Miles Smith, of Brazenose College, afterwards Bishop of Gloucester.

Sir Henry Saville, Warden of Merton College. Dr John Harding, President of Magdalen College. Dr John Reynolds, President of Christ Church College.

Dr Thomas Holland, Rector of Exeter College, and Professor of Divinity.

Dr Richard Kilby, Rector of Lincoln College, and Professor of Hebrew.

Dr Aglionby, Principal of Edmund Hall.

Mr Harmar, Fellow of New College, and afterwards Warden of Winchester College.

The rules to be observed in this translation were as follow:

1. The ordinary Bible read in the church, commonly called the Bishop's Bible, to be followed, and as little altered as the truth of the original will permit.

2. The names of the prophets and the holy writers, with the other names of the text, to be retained as nigh as may be, according as they are vulgarly used.

3. The old ecclesiastical words to be kept, viz., the word "church" not to be translated "congregation," &c.

4. When a word hath divers significations, that to be kept which hath been most commonly used by most of the ancient fathers, being agreeable to the propriety of the place, and the analogy of the faith.

5. The division of the chapters to be altered, either not at all, or as little as may be, if necessity so require.

6. No marginal notes at all to be affixed, but only for the explanation of the Hebrew or Greek words, which cannot without some circumlocution so briefly and fitly be expressed in the text.

7. Such quotations of places to be marginally set

down as shall serve for the reference of one scripture to another.

8. Every particular man of each company to take the same chapter, or chapters, and having translated or amended them severally by himself where he thinketh good, all to meet together, confer what they have done, and agree for their parts what shall stand.

9. As any one company hath despatched any one book in this manner, they shall send it to the rest to be considered of seriously and judiciously, for his Majesty is very careful in this point.

10. If any company, upon the review of the book so sent, doubt or differ upon any place, to send them word thereof, note the place, and withal send their reasons; to which, if they consent not, the difference to be compounded at the general meeting, which is to be of the chief persons of each company at the end of the work.

11. When any place of special obscurity is doubted of, letters to be directed, by authority, to send to any learned man in the land, for his judgment of such a place.

12. Letters to be sent from every bishop to the rest of his clergy, admonishing them of this translation in hand, and to move and charge as many as are skilful in the tongues, and have taken pains in that kind, to send his particular observations to the company, either at Westminster, Cambridge, or Oxford.

13. The directors in each company to be the Deans of Westminster and Chester for that place, and the King's professors in the Hebrew or Greek in either university.

14. These translations to be used where they agree better with the text than the Bishop's Bible, viz., Tindal's, Matthew's, Coverdale's, Whitchurch's, Geneva.

15. Besides the said directors before mentioned, three or four of the most ancient and grave divines, in either of the universities, not employed in translating, to be assigned by the Vice-Chancellor, upon conference with the rest of the heads, to be overseers of the translations, as well Hebrew as Greek, for the better observation of the 4th rule above specified.

The first time any part of the Holy Scripture was printed in English was in the year 1526, when the New Testament, translated by William Tindal, was published at Antwerp. Of this impression, almost the whole was bought up and burned at St Paul's Cross by Bishop Tunstal and Sir Thomas More. He afterwards revised and corrected his translation, and printed it again about the year 1530.

In the year 1532 Tindal published a complete translation of the Bible, except the Apocrypha. While a second edition was preparing, he was taken up and burnt in Flanders for heresy.

This work, however, was carried on by John Rogers, who was superintendent of a church in

Germany. He translated the whole of the Apocrypha, revised Tindal's translation, and dedicated it to Henry VIII., under the borrowed name of Thomas Matthews, for which reason it has been commonly called Matthews' Bible. It was printed at Hamburg in 1537, by Grafton and Whitchurch. In the reign of Edward VI., Rogers came into England, and was appointed to a prebend of St Paul's, and to the vicarage of St Sepulchre's. He was the first martyr that suffered in the reign of Queen Mary.

When it was resolved to print the Bible in a large volume, and to procure an order to have it set up in all churches for public use, Miles Coverdale (who was afterwards Bishop of Exeter, and who in the reign of Queen Mary fled and settled at Geneva) was employed to revise Tindal's translation, which was reprinted in 1540. As Cranmer was concerned in this edition, it has generally gone under his name.

Some English, who fled to Geneva to avoid the persecutions of Queen Mary, translated the New Testament into their native language. It was printed at Geneva, by Conrad Badius, in 1557, and was the first New Testament in English with the distinction of verses by numeral figures. This division was first made by the celebrated Robert Stephens in 1551, and four years after that the Latin Bible was divided in the same manner. But it was not till the year 1560 that the whole