In the accomplishment of their work the Rhemish translators have very faithfully observed the rule which they laid down for themselves, to be “very precise and religious in folowing our copie, the old vulgar approved Latin; not only in sense ... but sometime in the very wordes also, and phrases;” that is to say, they have given a very literal and exact translation of the Vulgate, in many parts extremely Latinized in its diction. A considerable number of words they virtually left untranslated, boldly venturing to transfer the unfamiliar, and in many cases unintelligible, vocables into their English text. Some of these Latinized words have obtained a permanent place in our language, but the larger number have failed to commend themselves.[34] Such then were the chief forms through which, at the close of the sixteenth century, the English Bible had passed. The devout and earnest scholars who from time to time sought to “open the Scriptures” to their fellow-countrymen were for the most part moved by a burning desire to give to God of their very best. They grudged no labour to render their work more complete. They allowed no spirit of self-satisfaction to blind them to a perception of defects. They were too humble and too well convinced of the greatness and manifoldness of their work to fancy that they had reached perfection, but were persevering and self-denying in their endeavours to attain unto it. And they have left behind them for us to follow a noble example of patient continuance in well doing. How in their hands the English Bible has grown, from the first attempt to set it forth in the language of our country to the form in which we are most familiar with it, can be fully learnt only by a careful comparison of the successive revisions to which it has been subjected. To aid my readers in forming some approximate idea of it I append Psalm xxiii., as it appears in the principal Bibles which have been mentioned in this and the preceding lecture. 1. WYCLIFFE’S, 1382. (?) The Lord gouerneth me, and no thing to me shal lacke; in the place of leswe[35] where he me ful sette. Ouer watir of fulfilling he nurshide me; my soule he conuertide. He broȝte doun me upon the sties of riȝtwisnesse; for his name. For whi and if I shal go in the myddel of the shadewe of deth; I shal not dreden euelis, for thou art with me. Thi ȝerde and thi staf; tho han confortid me. Thou hast maad redi in thi siȝte a bord; aȝen hem that trublyn me. Thou hast myche fattid in oile myn hed; and my chalis makende ful drunken, hou riȝt cler it is. And thi mercy shal vnderfolewe me; alle the daȝis of my lif. And that I dwelle in the hous of the Lord; in to the lengthe of daȝis. 2. PURVEY’S, 1388. (?)