Page images
PDF
EPUB

WILLIAM TYNDALE.-MILES COVERDALE.

191

of Scotland' (1536) and the first five books of Livy. His diction is very little different from the ordinary English diction of that time.

Translators of the Bible.-Between 1537 and 1539 appeared in rapid succession four translations of the Bible, Tyndale's, Coverdale's, Matthew's, and Cranmer's.

William Tyndale, 1484-1536.—Translation of New Testament, published at Antwerp, 1526.-Little is known of Tyndale's family. He was a native of Gloucestershire, his birthplace probably North Nibley. He was educated at Oxford, and continued there probably as a tutor till 1519. Thereafter, being tutor in the family of Sir John Walsh, of Little Sodbury, in his native county, his antiPopish views became known, exposed him to threats of censure, and finally made England too hot for him, and drove him to Hamburg, 1523-24. Here he laboured at his translation of the Scriptures, holding, with the Reformers of Germany and Switzerland, that the Bible should be in every hand, not in the exclusive keeping of the Church. In 1524-25 he printed two editions of the New Testament by snatches at different places, subject to vexatious interruptions. In 1526 an edition was deliberately printed at Antwerp, and every endeavour used to smuggle it into England. Turning next to the Old Testament, he translated the five books of Moses, which he published in 1530. He revised his New Testament in 1534. Hitherto he had escaped the agents sent to hunt him out and apprehend him. At last, in 1535, an emissary of the English Popish faction tracked him to Antwerp, obtained a warrant from the Emperor, and lodged him in prison. In 1536 he was led to the stake at Antwerp, strangled, and burnt. At that very time, the change having come in Henry's relations with the Pope, the King's printer in London was printing the first English edition of his New Testament.

[ocr errors]

"Tyndale's translation of the New Testament is the most important philological monument of the first half of the sixteenth "century, perhaps, I should say, of the whole period between "Chaucer and Shakspeare, both as a historical relic and as having "more than anything else contributed to shape and fix the sacred dialect, and establish the form which the Bible must permanently assume in an English dress. The best features of the translation "of 1611 are derived from the version of Tyndale, and thus that "remarkable work has exerted, directly and indirectly, a more "powerful influence on the English language than any other single production between the ages of Richard II. and Queen Elizabeth." (Marsh's 'Lectures on the English Language.')

[ocr errors]
[ocr errors]

Miles Coverdale, 1488-1569, published a translation of the whole Bible in 1537. His life was more prosperous than Tyndale's. Hardly any mention is made of him before the date of his transla

tion he would seem to have worked in silence, until the times became favourable to open activity in the cause of the Reformed faith. He was made Bishop of Exeter in 1551. During the reign of Mary he prudently retired to the Continent, returning on the accession of Elizabeth to his former dignity. He is said to have been a native of Yorkshire. His version of the New Testament differs but slightly from Tyndale's. He also wrote several tracts, now much in request among book-hunters.

Matthew's Bible, so called from the name on the title-page, was issued under the superintendence of John Rogers, the proto-martyr of the reign of Mary. It is not a new translation, but a revised edition of Tyndale's Pentateuch and New Testament, with an amended version of Coverdale's translation for the rest of the Bible. Rogers was a native of Warwickshire, was educated at Cambridge, and became the disciple and friend of Tyndale at Antwerp, where he was chaplain to the English merchants. He married a German wife, and left ten children.

Cranmer's Bible (1540) took its name from the celebrated Archbishop Cranmer, 1489-1556. It is substantially a new edition of Matthew's, revised by collation with the original Hebrew and Greek.

Hugh Latimer, 1491-1555, one of the foremost champions of the Reformation, burnt by Queen Mary at Oxford, along with Cranmer and Ridley. He was born at Thurcaston in Leicestershire, the son of a well-to-do yeoman. In 1505 he was sent to Cambridge, where in due course he became a resident Fellow. Always vehement and enthusiastic, he distinguished himself, like another Paul, by his strong attachment to the prevailing faith and his denunciations of the new light. About 1521 he was converted by a priest whom he calls "Little Bilney," and immediately made himself obnoxious to "divers Papists in the University" by the new direction of his zealous and powerful eloquence. He was brought before Wolsey, but the Cardinal found nothing amiss in his preaching, and sent him away in triumph. When Henry wished to invalidate his marriage with Catherine, Latimer sat upon the question as one of a University Commission, and decided in the King's favour. Soon thereafter, in 1530, he was invited to Court, made a royal chaplain, and in 1535, on the elevation of Cranmer to the see of Canterbury, Bishop of Worcester. Never inclined to look at the world on its favourable side, he signalised his preferment by denouncing, with characteristic vehemence, the abuses of the time, declaring that "bishops, abbots, priors, parsons, canons resident, priests and all, were strong thieves-yea, dukes, lords, and all;" and that "bishops, abbots, with such other," should "keep hospitality to feed the needy people, not jolly fellows with golden chains and velvet gowns." In 1539 he got into trouble for

refusing to sign the six Romanistic articles, resigned his bishopric, sought to retire into private life, but was seized, put in the Tower, and "commanded to silence." His voice is not heard again till the reign of Edward VI., when he blazes out as the most stirring of the Reforming preachers, and a man of importance at Court. When Edward died, everything was changed, and Latimer, with other conspicuous Protestants, suffered the last extreme of persecution.

Latimer's sermons are still read with interest. They present an extraordinary contrast to modern sermons. In those days the ministers of the Word did not confine themselves to exegesis and morality in the abstract; they addressed hearers by name, and singling out particular classes, told them with some minuteness how to regulate their lives. Latimer took the utmost advantage of this licence of the pulpit,-told my Lord Chancellor of certain cases that he should attend to personally; warned the King against having too many horses, too many wives, or too much silver and gold; and admonished bishops and judges of their duty in the plainest terms. This was not all in the matter he probably did not go beyond the time; in the manner, he was led by his excess of energy into eccentricities of diction and illustration rendered tolerable only by the power and freshness of his genius. His contemporaries looked upon him much as the present generation looks on Thomas Carlyle. Many could not endure his open defiance of conventionality, and could not speak of him with patience. These he outraged still more by replying to them from the pulpit. He says—

"When I was in trouble, it was objected and said unto me that I was singular, that no man thought as I thought, that I loved a singularity in all that I did, and that I took a way contrary to the King and the whole Parliament, and that I was travailed with them that had better wits than I; that I was contrary to them all."

He then goes on to compare his case with Christ's, and draws a humorous ironical parallel between himself and Isaiah, with a quaint drollery, almost buffoonery, not likely to conciliate those already offended by his eccentric power.

He is often praised for his "vigorous Saxon." It is undoubtedly vigorous, and his illustrations have the stamp of genius. But to his cultivated hearers, the homely turns must have sounded like Yorkshire or broad Scotch in a modern discourse. It is not to be supposed that the Court of Edward VI. heard the following without a smile :

"In the VII. of Jhon the Priests sent out certain of the Jews to bring Christ unto them violently. When they came into the temple and heard Him preach, they were so moved with His preaching that they returned home again and said to them that sent them, Nunquam sic locutus est homo

N

ut hic homo. There was never man spake like this man. Then answered the Pharisees, Num et vos seducti estis? What, ye brain-sick fools, ye hoddy pecks, ye doddy polls, ye huddes, do ye believe Him? Are you seduced also?"

Or the following:

"Germany was visited XX. years with God's Word, but they did not earnestly embrace it, and in life follow it, but made a mingle-mangle and a hotch-potch of it.

"I cannot tell what, partly Popery, partly true religion, mingled together. They say in my country when they call their hogs to the swine trough: Come to thy mingle-mangle; come pyr, come pyr,'-even so they made mingle-mangle of it."

Latimer's "Sermon on the Plougher," and his "Seven Sermons before Edward VI.," are in the series of English Reprints. Several editions of his sermons were issued in the sixteenth century.

John Foxe, 1517-1587, author of the Book of Martyrs,' a native of Lincolnshire. Having studied at Oxford and gained a fellowship, he became openly Protestant, and was expelled in 1545. After various distresses, he had been but a short time comfortably settled as tutor to the Earl of Surrey when Mary ascended the throne, and he had to flee to the Continent and support himself by correcting proofs. After Mary's death he returned and received a prebendary. His 'Book of Martyrs' is an interesting record, reprinted by various religious societies: the facts are not much to be relied on, being based upon popular report, evidently little sifted.

Sir John Cheke, 1514-1557, Professor of Greek at Cambridge, is best known by the impulse he gave to the study of Greek. His life was troubled; he had difficulties with Gardiner about certain innovations in the pronunciation of Greek, and on the accession of Mary had to flee the country for his religion. After some years' precarious wandering, he was caught at Antwerp and brought back; was offered the alternative of recantation or death; recanted, and soon after died of shame and grief.

His only English work is written against the insurrection of Ket the Tanner. Its title is, 'The Hurt of Sedition, how grievous it is to a Commonwealth.'

THIRD QUARTER OF SIXTEENTH CENTURY.

Roger Ascham, 1515-1568, is one of the best-known men of his century. He was more fortunate in his life than More, Latimer, or Cheke. He enjoyed a pension under Henry and Edward, had his pension not only continued but increased by Mary, was made her Latin secretary; after her death became a favourite with Elizabeth, continued to enjoy pension and secretaryship, taught Latin and Greek to the learned Queen, and lived to write that, “in our fore

fathers' time, Papistry as a standing pool covered and overflowed all England." The secret of his success was, that he held no strong opinions in religion, or, at any rate, kept them to himself. When at Cambridge he nearly lost his fellowship by indiscreetly speaking against the Pope. Escaping shipwreck that time, he was careful never to offend again by an obtrusive profession of his faith. A Yorkshireman, son of Lord Scroop's steward, he had little of the Yorkshire vigour; a man of delicate constitution, of gentle and polished manners; noted for his fine penmanship and elegant scholarly acquirements, and having not a little of the dexterity of the courtier.

The Toxophilus' (1545) is a dialogue on archery, sustained by Philologus and Toxophilus-Lover of the Book, and Lover of the Bow. It gives the history of the bow, compares archery with other recreations, recommends it as an exercise for the student, tells the best kind of wood for the bow, discusses the art of shooting, &c.; above all, it declares what England owes to the bow, and urges every Englishman to practise the national weapon. Upon the merits of this side of the treatise he received his pension from Henry. The Schoolmaster' (published in 1570, after his death) discusses the readiest means of acquiring a knowledge of Latin, and criticises the style of Varro, Sallust, Cicero, and Cæsar. In both 'Toxophilus' and the 'Schoolmaster' he takes great liberty of digression, but does little to redeem his promise of great things under modest titles. He announced a Book of the Cockpit,' in defence of his frequenting that place of amusement, but the work was never published. His chief service to English prose is the example he sets, as a scholar and a courtier, of writing in the vernacular. This service is acknowledged by Dr Nathan Drake. Thomas Fuller says of him-" He was an honest man, and a good shooter. Archery was his pastime in youth, which, in his old age, he exchanged for cock-fighting. His 'Toxophilus' is a good book for young men; his 'Schoolmaster' for old; his 'Epistles' for all men."

A collected edition of his English works was published in 1761. Another reprint in 1815 is modernised, not only in the spelling but in the language.

Thomas Wilson, d. 1581, writer on Rhetoric, Logic, &c.-His 'System of Rhetoric and Logic,' pub. 1553, is the first systematic treatise on the English language. He was a man of position, said to have been Dean of Durham, and to have held offices of state under Elizabeth. He made a stand for the purity of the "King's English." 1 He ridiculed fops and scholars for talking Chaucer, and for larding their speech with French-English, with Italianated terms, with inkhorn terms, with "far-fetched colours of gay antiq1 He is, so far as we are aware, the first writer to use this expression.

« PreviousContinue »