Untitled

Daily Telegraph (Napier), Issue 3143, 25 July 1881, Page 2

The English papers to hand by the Suemail hare copious reviews of the revised New Testament, and the question naturally suggests itself, what is to be the fate of the Revised Version. Eraser's Magazine says that tbat is a question which can of course, be definitely answered only after the version has passed through the ordeal ot publsc opinion. But, judging by analogous cases in the past, there is little reason to be sanguine as to the favorable reception which awaits it, at least in the immediate present. We know bow bigh the Vulgate now stands io the

estimation of the church of Rome. Well, that is substantially the revision of the Old Latin made by St. Jerome in tne fifth century. And how was his work received when it appeared? Why, it was condemned with the greatest severity, and he himself assailed with the utmost virulence, while the greatly improved version which he bad produced did not obtain general acc?ptance in the Church till after a period of 200 years! Tbink again how dear to everyone is now our existing Authorised Vernon, how proud we are of its general faithfulnes as well as its noble style, and bow attached to its sweet and solemn utterances. And how wa' it ushered into the world ? Why, it lay neglected and despised for the first fifty years of its existence, while one of the greatest scholars of the age declared that he " would rather be torn in pieces by wild horses than impose such a version on the poor churches of England !" How then can it be expected that tbe new revision will escape the fate of those that have preceded it ? The present writer well remembers that when as a Company of revisers, we first took our seats around the long table in the Jerusalem Chamber, the Bishop of Gloucester and Bristol, who has throughout acted as chairman, plainly warned us not to be over-sanguine as to the immediate success likely to attend our work."