work, published the _Historia Universal de las Cosas de Nueva Espana_, composed by our Franciscan about the year 1550, and his version of the Sacred Scripture, when first announced to the literary world, was thus described by M. Beltram: "J' ai une trouvaille a vous montrer, la plus interressante, je crois, de toutes celles que vous avez déja vues ... on y voit un beau reste de l'illustre philanthrope et moine Bernardino de Sahagun" (_Le Mexique_, vol. ii. pag. 167. Paris, 1830). Nevertheless, this version was destined to remain still thirty years a hidden treasure, and it was only in 1858 that its publication was commenced in Milan by the accomplished Mexican scholar Biondelli. From the introduction of the learned editor we learn that Bernardino's version comprised almost all the New Testament and a portion of the Old, and that its date was anterior to those commemorated by Mr. Horne, the manuscript from which the text was printed having been copied in the year 1530. (_See Evangeliarium, etc., ex antiquo codice Mexicano nuper invento depromptum._ Milan, 1858, 4to, page xlix. 576). Returning to the old continent, the first country which we meet is our own beloved land. Now was the Bible _a sealed Book_ in our Catholic island, and were our sainted fathers enemies of, or strangers to, its inspired truths? Oh! ask the great apostle of North England, St. Aidan, whose disciples, as Bede informs us, "whether they were of the clergy or of the laity, were bound to exercise themselves either in reading the Scriptures or in learning the Psalms" (_Hist. Eccl._, iii. 5). Ask St. Livinus, "who", as his ancient biographer relates, "was trained up from his youth by his holy Master, Benignus, in singing David's Psalms, and reading the holy Gospels". Ask St. Columbanus, in whose "breast the treasures of the Holy Scriptures were so laid up, that within the compass of his youthful years he set forth an elegant exposition of the Book of Psalms" (_Vita, cap._ 2); or ask the Northumbrian King Alfred, of whom Bede again writes that, "residing in Ireland, he imbibed there celestial wisdom in his attentive soul, and became a man most learned in the Scriptures: having left his native country and his pleasant fields, that in diligent exile he might learn the mystery of godliness". St. Furse, from his youth, was taught to drink in heavenly wisdom at the sacred source of the inspired volume. St. Columbanus expressly exhorts his disciple Hunaldus to its diligent study: "Sint tibi divitiae, divinae dogmata legis" (_epist. ad Hunald._); St. Patrick himself teaches us that "meditation on the Sacred Scriptures gives strength and vigour to the soul"; "St. Kieran", as Dr. King learnedly writes, "when thirty years old, went to Rome and spent there twenty years reading the Divine Scriptures and collecting copies of them" (_Ch. Hist. of Irel._, i. 323): and as to St. Columba, we may adopt the words of the Campleton minister,