It must be said, however, for the King, that he did press for a prompt completion of the work, and that “it should be done by the best learned in both universities.” Indeed, if the final dedication of the translators to the “most High, and Mighty Prince James” (which many a New England boy of fifty years ago wrestled with in the weary lapses of too long a sermon) were to be taken in its literal significance, the obligations to him were immense; after thanking him as “principal mover and author of the work,” the dedication exuberantly declares that “the hearts of all your loyal and religious people are so bound and firmly knit unto you, that your very name is precious among them: Their eye doth behold you with comfort, and they bless you in their hearts, as that sanctified person, who, under God, is the immediate author of their true Happiness.” The King’s great reverence for the Scriptures is abundantly evidenced by that little tractate of his--the _Basilikon Doron_--not written for publication (though surreptitiously laid hold of by the book-makers) but intended for the private guidance of his eldest son, Prince Henry, in that time heir to the throne. The little book shows large theologic discretions; and--saving some scornings of the “vaine, Pharisaicall Puritaines”--is written in a spirit which might be safely commended to later British Princes. “When yee reade the Scripture [says the King] reade it with a sanctified and chast hart; admire reverentlie such obscure places as ye understand not, blaming only your own capacitie; reade with delight the plaine places, and study carefully to understand those that are somewhat difficile: preasse to be a good textuare; for the Scripture is ever the best interpreter of itselfe.” Some forty odd competent men were set out from the universities and elsewheres for the work of the Bible revision. Yet they saw none of King James’ money, none from the royal exchequer; which indeed from the King’s disorderly extravagances, that helped nobody, was always lamentably low. The revisers got their rations, when they came together in conference, in Commons Hall, or where and when they could; and only at the last did some few of them who were engaged in the final work of proof-reading, get a stipend of some thirty shillings a week from that fraternity of book-makers who were concerned with the printing and selling of the new Bible.