66 And all the sky from end to end Nothing can hide it from his heat, BRADY AND TATE. No bridegroom on his nuptial day To run his glorious race. From east to west, from west to east, His restless course he goes, And, through his progress, cheerful heat There are few, I believe, who would not prefer the simplicity of the first to the gaudiness of the second of these examples; and where shall we find a more pitiful debasement of poetry into common-place than the two last lines of Brady and Tate's rendering exhibit? We perceive something noble in the idea that nothing can effectually obstruct the influence of the sun; but the mere assertion that he bestows 'cheerful HEAT and vital WARMTH" is so trite, so unnecessary, so tautological, that we must declare it below contempt. and Let us take a few more instances of Brady and Tate's lack of fidelity. In Psalm lxxxix. we find the following eloquent complaint of the reverses with which David was afflicted: "Thou hast cast off and abhorred, thou hast been wroth with thine anointed. Thou hast made void the covenant of thy servant: thou hast profaned his crown by casting it on the ground. Thou hast broken down all his hedges: thou hast brought his strongholds to ruin. All that pass by the way Thou hast set up the spoil him he is a reproach to his neighbours. right hand of his adversaries; thou hast made all his enemies to rejoice. Thou hast also turned the edge of his sword, and hast not made him to stand in the battle. Thou hast made his glory to cease, and cast his throne down to the ground. The days of his youth hast thou shortened: thou hast covered him with shame. How long, Lord? wilt thou hide thyself for ever? shall thy wrath burn like fire? Remember how short my time is: wherefore hast thou made all men in vain?-v. 38-47. BRADY AND TATE, "Thou seemest to have rendered void Of strongholds thou hast him bereft, A public scorn and common prey. To foes advanced by thee to might: His glory has to darkness fled, His throne is levelled with the ground; His youth to wretched bondage led; With shame o'erwhelmed, and sorrow drowned. How long shall we thy absence mourn ? Wilt thou for ever, Lord, retire ? Shall thy consuming anger burn Till that and we at once expire? But loading it with grief and pain !” The above verses are sufficiently ornate; but a little examination will suffice to show how completely the true spirit of the Psalmist has been suffered to evaporate. The very first line is an unnecessary weakening of the original sentiment. Instead of the energetic exclamation, "Thou hast profaned his crown by casting it on the ground," the sacred poet's versifiers make him dolorously complain of dignity destroyed and honour laid in the dust. "Thou hast broken all his hedges," is plainness too insipid for Brady and Tate, so they substitute a lamentation of the defencelessness of "his frontier coasts; while the simple words, "Thou hast brought his strongholds to ruin," are wire-drawn into two whole lines : "Of strongholds thou hast him bereft And brought his bulwarks to decay;" Although, if David had been bereft of his strongholds, he need not have troubled himself about the repair of his bulwarks. Glory flying to darkness for extinction, is not a very sensible image, since such a procedure, so far from making the glory "cease," would but heighten its splendour: nor is there much similarity between the days of youth being shortened, and leading youngsters into "wretched bondage." The meaning of the Psalmist is simply, that David, afflicted with premature care, had early lost the gaiety of youth. "Shall thy wrath burn like fire ?" is a question appropriate both to the speaker and the Deity to whom it is addressed, and conveys a lively idea of the irresistible and dreadful nature of the anger deprecated; but Brady and Tate cannot be content without adding a pretty turn, wholly unlike the sternness of the sacred writings: "Shall thy consuming anger burn, Still more epigrammatic are the lines which usurp the place of the question, Wherefore hast thou made all men in vain ?" 66 "No method to prolong the race But loading it with grief and pain ?” Sternhold and Hopkins, who eve keep to the obvious signification, render the passage with more fidelity, if less elegance : "Why hast thou made the sons of men As things in vain to waste?" Than these points, nothing can be more disagreeable, when so ut terly unjustified by the text. Brady and Tate are continually perpetrating them, in a manner which often completely destroys the identity of the Hebrew bard. Just casting my eye down one of their pages, I found the subjoined specimen of modern trifling foisted upon David: "Man that is in honour, and understandeth not, is like the beasts that perish."-Psalm xlix. 20. BRADY AND TATE. "For man, how great soe'er his state, As like a sensual beast he lives So like a beast he dies." Again: "Lover and friend hast thou put far from me, and mine acquaintance into darkness."-Psalm lxxxviii. 18. BRADY AND Tate. "My lovers, friends, familiars, all Dead, or to me at least expired." Interpolations cannot be avoided; but they should always be consonant with the style of the Psalmist. The interpolations of Brady and Tate, however, are generally tawdry embellishments. "Who will bring me into the strong city? who will lead me into Edom?"-Psalm Ix. 9. This passage neither of the versions under consideration could render without circumlocution. Hopkins have it thus: "But who will bring me at this tide Unto the city strong? Or who to Edom will me guide So that I go not wrong?" Sternhold and The last line of the above quotation falls into its place so naturally, that we can scarcely call it an interpolation. But Brady and Tate are more ambitious, and accordingly dash in some pompous commonplaces. "But who shall quell these mighty powers; I shall but draw two more parallels between the ancient and modern versions, and then have done with my citations: "Hear, O Lord, when I cry with my voice: have mercy also upon me and answer me. When thou saidst, Seek ye my face; my heart said unto thee, Thy face, Lord, will I seek."-Psalm xxvii. 7, 8. STERNHOLD AND HOPKINS. "Lord, hear the voice of my request, For which to thee I cry ; Have mercy, Lord, on me opprest, It is almost superfluous to remark, how the simple grandeur of the Psalmist has been contaminated by Brady and Tate. "God is our refuge and strength, a very present help in time of trouble. Therefore will we not fear, though the earth be removed, and though the mountains be carried into the midst of the sea; though the waters thereof roar and be troubled; though the mountains shake with the swelling thereof. There is a river, the streams whereof shall make glad the city of God, the holy place of the tabernacles of the Most High. God is in the midst of her; she shall not be moved: God shall help her, and that right early."-Psalm xlvi. 1-5. STERNHOLD AND HOPKINS. "The Lord is our defence and aid- Tho' earth do move, we will not fear, No, though the sea do rage so sore His pleasant streams apace, To glad the city of our God, In midst of her the Lord doth dwell, All that against her dare rebel, BRADY AND TATE. "God is our refuge in distress, Torn piecemeal by the roaring tide. A gentler stream with gladness still The royal state of God most high; Here we perceive that a portion of the Psalmist's finest imagery"Though the waters thereof roar and be troubled, though the mountains shake with the swelling thereof," is slurred over by Brady and Tate with scarcely an apology for an equivalent, although evidently required for connexion and completeness. Our poetic diction has been much refined since the time of Sternhold and Hopkins; and hence their version, although a very commendable one for the period which produced it, is, by the roughness of its versification, unfitted for general use. Brady and Tate's, however, is so continually substituting smoothness for nerve-is so gilded with the modern mosaic, profusely used by poetic pretenders instead of the gold which they cannot afford-that the sooner it is superseded the better. I am well aware that the occasional baldness of the language of the Psalms makes some amplification necessary when translating them into metre; but it is rarely requisite that all their isolated characteristics should be faithfully preserved. They should still appear the effusions of a distant age and peculiar people, and not the products of a pietistic rhymester somewhat given to bombast and hyperbole. I do not remember ever to have read a paraphrase of any of the Psalms which pleased me more than that of the 137th, which is usually attributed to Sir Philip Sidney. Steel inserted it in the Guardian as an evidence of the gallant soldier's piety; yet, independent of this consideration, its intrinsic beauty will recommend it to all who have taste to appreciate genuine poetry:— Nigh seated where the river flows, That wat'reth Babel's thankful plain, And more to grieve us thus did say: O, no! we have no voice nor hand Though far I be, sweet Sion's hill, In foreign soil exiled from thee, |