bed. Nor is this, as in the New Testament, the style merely of modern translators; it is that of the original, as well as of all the ancient translations. The Septuagint says Kaio, the Vulgate sedit. Houbigant is the only translator I know who (misled I suppose by the ordinary style of Latin authors) has said decubuit. The Hebrew word is a jashab, which never signifies to lie. Now, whether a man on a bed takes his repast sitting, after the European manner, with his feet on the floor, or after the Turkish, with his legs across under him, his posture differs totally from that of the ancient Greeks and Romans, who lay at their length.

The words of the prophet Amos have also been thought to favour the same opinion: "Wo to them that lie upon beds of ivory, and stretch themselves upon their couches, and eat the lambs out of the flock, and the calves out of the stall, that chant to the sound of the viol," &c. Amos vi. 4, &c. Here the prophet upbraids the people with their sloth and luxury, specifying a few instances in their manner of living. But nothing is said that implies any other connexion among these instances, than that of their being the effects of the same cause, voluptuousness. have no more reason to connect their eating the lambs and the calves with their lying stretched on beds of ivory, than we have to connect with this posture their chanting to the sound of the viol, and anointing themselves with ointments.

We

But in the Apochryphal writings, which are posterior in composition to those of the Old Testament, and probably posterior to the Macedonian conquests, though prior to the books of the New, we have the first indications of this change of posture. It is said of Judith, (xii. 15,) in the common version, that "her maid laid soft skins on the ground for her over against Holofernes, that she might sit and eat upon them," aç TO ƐODLELV KATAKλevoμevnv en avrov, literally, that she might eat lying upon them. Again, in Tobit, (ii. 1,) avɛɛσa тov payɛv, not "I sat," but I lay down to eat. Other examples might be given, which render it probable that this fashion was first introduced into Judea by the Greeks, before the Jews became acquainted with the Romans. A sure evidence this, that the Jews were not so obstinately tenacious of every national custom as some have represented them. It is very remarkable, that in our Saviour's time the change was so universal in Judea, that the very common people always conformed to it. The multitudes which our Lord twice fed in the desert, are by all the Evangelists represented as lying, not sitting, upon the ground. It is strange that our translators have here, by misinterpreting one word, as invariably exhibited them practising a custom which they had abandoned, as they had formerly, by the unwarranted and unnecessary change of a name, given ground to think that there was an alteration in their customs when there

was none.

4. I know it is commonly pleaded in excuse for such deviations

from the original as that whereof I am now speaking, that the posture is a circumstance no way material to the right understanding of the passages wherein it is occasionally mentioned; that besides, to us moderns, there appears in the expressions lying down to eat, and laying themselves at table, from their repugnancy to our customs, an awkwardness which, so far from contributing to fix our minds on the principal scope of the author, would divert our attention from it. In answer to the first of these objections, I admit that it is sometimes, not always, as will soon be shown, of no consequence to the import of a passage, whether a mere circumstance, which is but occasionally mentioned, and on which the instruction conveyed in the story does not depend, be rightly apprehended or not. The two miracles of the

the same, whether

loaves and fishes are to all valuable purposes the people partook of their repast sitting or lying. The like may be said of the greater part of such narratives. For this reason I do not except against a general expression, as, placed themselves at table, where a literal version would be attended with the inconvenience of appearing unnatural; but I could never approve, for the sake of elegance or simplicity, a version which in effect misrepresents the original; or, in other words, from which one may fairly deduce inferences that are not conformable to fact. Concerning the other exception, I cannot help observing, that it is only because the expression lying at table is unusual, that it appears awkward. If the first translators of the Bible into English had thought fit, in this instance, to keep close to the original, the phrases would not now have sounded awkwardly. But it must be owned, that no translators enjoy at present equal advantages with those who had, in a manner, the forming of our language in regard to things sacred. Their versions, by being widely dispersed, would soon give a currency to the terms used in them, which there was then no contrary use to counterbalance. And this is the reason why many things which might have been better rendered then, cannot now so well be altered.

5. But to show that even such errors in translating, however trivial they may appear, are sometimes highly injurious to the sense, and render a plain story not only incredible but absurd, I must entreat the reader's attention to the following passage, as it runs in the common version: "One of the Pharisees desired Jesus that he would eat with him: and he went into the Pharisee's house, and sat down to meat. And behold a woman in the city, which was a sinner, when she knew that Jesus sat at meat in the Pharisee's house, brought an alabaster box of ointment, and stood at his feet behind him weeping, and began to wash his feet with tears, and did wipe them with the hairs of her head, and kissed his feet, and anointed them with the ointment," Luke vii. 36-38. Now a reader of any judgment will need to reflect

but a moment, to discover that what is here told is impossible. If Jesus and others were in our manner sitting together at table, the woman could not be behind them, when doing what is here recorded. She must in that case, on the contrary, have been under the table: the chairs on which the guests were seated would have effectually precluded access from behind. It is said also, that she stood while she bathed his feet with tears, wiped them with the hairs of her head, anointed, and kissed them. Another manifest absurdity. On the supposition of their sitting, she must have been at least kneeling, if not lying on the floor. These inconsistencies instantly disappear when the Evangelist is allowed to speak for himself, who, instead of saying that Jesus sat down, says expressly that he lay down, avekλn. And to prevent, if possible, a circumstance being mistaken or overlooked, on which the practicability of the thing depended, he repeats it by a synonymous term in the very next verse. "When she knew that Jesus lay at table,” ανακειται. The knowledge of their manner at meals makes every thing in this story level to an ordinary capacity.

6. At their feasts matters were commonly ordered thus: Three couches were set in the form of the Greek letter II, the table was placed in the middle, the lower end whereof was left open, to give access to the servants for setting and removing the dishes and serving the guests. The other three sides were enclosed by the couches, whence it got the name of triclinium. The middle couch, which lay along the upper end of the table, and was therefore accounted the most honourable place, and that which the Pharisees are said particularly to have affected, was distinguished by the name TOWTOKλiola, Matt. xxiii. 6. The person entrusted with the direction of the entertainment was called apxırpıkdivos, John ii. 8. The guests lay with their feet backwards, obliquely across the couches, which were covered, for their better accommodation, with such sort of cloth or tapestry as suited the quality of the entertainer. As it was necessary, for the convenience of eating, that the couches should be somewhat higher than the table, the guests have probably been raised by them three feet and upwards from the floor. When these particulars are taken into consideration, every circumstance of the story becomes perfectly consistent and intelligible. This also removes the difficulty there is in the account given by John (xiii., 23, 25,) of the paschal supper, where Jesus being set, as our translators render it, at table, one of his disciples is said, in one verse, to have been leaning on his bosom, and, in another, to have been lying on his breast. Though these attitudes are incompatible with our mode of sitting at meals, they were naturally consequent upon theirs. As they lay forwards, in a direction somewhat oblique, feeding themselves with their right hand, and leaning on their left arm; they no sooner intermitted, and reclined a little, than the head of each came close to

the breast of him who was next on the left. Now, a circumstance (however frivolous in itself) cannot be deemed of no consequence, which serves to throw light upon the sacred pages, and solve difficulties otherwise inextricable. This case, though not properly requiring the use of any ancient or foreign name, I could not help considering minutely in this place, on account of its affinity with the other topics of which I had been treating.

7. I shall add a few things, on the manner adopted by other translators in rendering what relates to this usage. With regard to the Latin versions, it may naturally be supposed that the Vulgate would be literal, and consequently, in this particular, just. There was no temptation to depart from the letter. It suited their customs at that period, as well as the idiom of their language. And though it did not suit the customs of the times of modern Latin interpreters, they could have no motive, in this article, to desert the manner of the ancient translator, expressed in a phraseology which both Latin and Greek classics had rendered familiar. As to the translations into modern tongues, Luther appears to have been the first who, in his translation into German, has in this particular forced the Evangelists into a conformity with modern fashions. The translator into modern Greek has adopted the same method, putting ɛkatoε for avεkλion, &c. The French translator, Olivetan, has avoided the false translation of sitting for lying, and also the apparent awkwardness of a literal version. In the passage from Luke, above quoted, he says, Il se mit à table; and speaking of the woman, Laquelle ayant connu qu'il etoit à table. In the miraculous increase of the loaves and the fishes in the desert, Matt. xv. 35, he thus expresses himself: Il commanda aux troupes de s'arranger par terre. Diodati has, in the first of these passages, adopted the same method with the French translator, saying si mise a tavola; and ch'egli éra a tavola; in the other, he has fallen into the error of our common version, and said, Jesu commandò alle turbe, che si mettessero a sedere in terra. Most other French versions have taken the same method of eluding the difficulty. But all the late English versions I have seen, follow implicitly the common translation.

8. To come now to offices and judicatories: It must be acknowledged, that in these it is not always easy to say, as was remarked in a preceding Dissertation, whether the resemblances to, or differences from, offices and judicatories of our own, ought to induce us to retain the original term, or to translate it. But whatever be in this, or however the first translators ought to have been determined in their choice between these methods, the matter is not equally open to us in this late age as it was to them. The election made by our predecessors, in this department, has established an use which, except in some particular cases, it

would be dangerous in their successors to violate; and which, therefore, unless where perspicuity or energy requires an alteration, ought to be followed. For example, who could deny that the Greek terms αγγελος, αποστολος, διαβολος, might not have been as well rendered messenger, missionary, slanderer, as the words iepevç, vπNOEτNS, AVTIDIKOç, are rendered priest, minister, adversary. In regard to the import of the words, there does not appear to me to be a closer correspondence in the last-mentioned than in the first. Besides, as the first are themselves no other than Greek translations of the Hebrew words jw, mw, b, satan, shaluch, malach, which the Seventy have not judged necessary to retain in another language, and in this judgment have been followed by the writers of the New Testament; they have given the example of translating, rather than transferring, these appellatives into other languages-the last name, satan, being the only one which is ever retained by them, and that very seldom.

But the true source of the distinction that has been made in this respect by European translators, is not any particular propriety in the different cases, but the example of the old Latin translator. The words which he retained, with such an alteration in the orthography as adapted them to the genius of the tongue, we also retain; and the words which he translated, we translate. Because he said angelus, apostolus, diabolus, which are not properly Latin words, we say angel, apostle, devil, not originally English. Had he, on the contrary, used the terms nuncius, legatus, calumniator, we had probably substituted for them messenger, missionary, slanderer, or some terms equivalent. For, in those cases wherein the Latin interpreter has not scrupled to translate the Greek by Latin words, neither have we scrupled to render them by English words. I am, however, far from affirming, that the interpreters of the Latin church, either in the old Italic or in the present Vulgate, have acted from caprice in their choice; though I do not always discover reasons of such weight for the distinctions they have made, as should lead us implicitly to follow them.

There is only one example in titles of this sort, wherein the moderns have taken the freedom to judge differently. The Greek Tapakλnтos, in John's Gospel, is always retained by the author of the Vulgate, who uses paracletus, but has not been followed by later translators. Erasmus has sometimes adopted this word, and sometimes said consolator, and is followed in both by the translator of Zuric. Castalio says confirmator, and Beza advocatus. Most modern versions in Italian, French, and English, have in this instance followed Erasmus in the import they have given the word, in preference even to Beza. And of these our common version is one, using the word comforter. Nay, some French translators from the Vulgate have deserted that version, rendering the word either consolateur or avocat. In general,