The Translators to the Reader.
ed a virtuous man, though he have made many slips in his life, (else there were none virtuous, for in James 3. 2.many things we offend all,) also a comely man and lovely, though he have some warts upon his hand; yea, not only freckles upon his face, but also scars, No cause therefore why the word translated should be denied to be the word, or forbidden to be current, notwithstanding that some imperfections and blemishes may be noted in the setting forth of it. For what ever was perfect under the sun, where Apostles or apostolick men, that is, men endued with an extraordinary measure of God's Spirit, and privileged with the privilege of infallibility, had not their hand? The Romanists therefore in refusing to hear, and daring to burn the word translated, did no less than despite the Spirit of grace, from whom originally it proceeded, and whose sense and meaning, as well as man's weakness would enable, it did express. Judge by an example or two.
Plutarch in Camillo.Plutarch writeth, that after that Rome had been burnt by the Gauls, they fell soon to build it again: but doing it in haste, they did not cast the streets, nor proportion the houses, in such comely fashion, as had been most sightly and convenient. Was Cataline therefore an honest man, or a good patriot, that sought to bring it to a combustion? Or Nero a good Prince, that did indeed set it on fire? So by the story of Ezra. 3. 12.Ezra and the prophecy of Haggai it may be gathered, that the temple built by Zerubbabel after the return from Babylon was by no means to be compared to the former built by Solomon: for they that remembered the former wept when they considered the latter. Notwithstanding might this latter either have been abhorred and forsaken by the Jews, or profaned by the Greeks? The like we are to think of translations. The translation of the Seventy dissenteth from the Original in many places, neither doth it come near it for perspicuity, gravity, majesty. Yet which of the Apostles did condemn it? Condemn it? Nay, they used it, (as it is apparent, and as St. Hierome and most learned men do confess;) which they would not have done, nor by their example of using of it so grace and commend it to the Church, if it had been unworthy the appellation and name of the word of God. And whereas they urge for their second defence of their vilifying and abusing of the English Bibles, or some pieces thereof, which they meet with, for that hereticks forsooth were the authors of the translations: (hereticks they call us by the same right that they call themselves catholicks, both being wrong:) we marvel what divinity taught them so. We are sure Tertull. de præscript. contra hæreses.Tertullian was of another mind: Ex personis probamus fidem, an ex fide personas? Do we try men's faith by their persons? We should try their persons by their faith. Also St. August. 3. de doct. Christ. cap. 30.St. Augustine was of another mind: for he, lighting upon certain rules made by Tychonius a Donatist for the better understanding of the word, was not ashamed to make use of them, yea, to insert them into his own book, with giving commendation to them so far forth as they were worthy to be commended, as is to be seen in St. Augustine's third book De Doctr. Christ. To be short, Origen, and the whole Church of God for certain hundred years, were of another mind: for they were so far from treading under foot (much more from burning) the translation of Aquila a proselyte, that is, one that had turned Jew, of Symmachus, and Theodotion, both Ebionites, that is, most vile hereticks, that they joined them together with the Hebrew original, and the translation of the Seventy, (as hath been before signified out of Epiphanius) and set them forth openly to be considered of and perused by all. But we weary the unlearned, who need not know so much; and trouble the learned, who know it already.
Yet before we end, we must answer a third cavil and objection of their's against us, for altering and amending our translations so oft; wherein truly they deal hardly and strangely with us. For to whom ever was it imputed for a fault (by such as were wise,) to go over that which he had done, and to amend it where he saw cause? St. August. Epist. 9.St. Augustine was not afraid to exhort St. Hierome to a Palinodia or recantation. The same St. Augustine was not ashamed to St. August. lib. Retract.retractate, we might say, revoke, many things that had passed him, and doth even glory that he Video interdum vitia mea. St. August. Epist. 8.seeth his infirmities. If we will be sons of the truth, we must consider what it speaketh, and trample upon our own credit, yea, and upon other men's too, if either be any way an hinderance to it. This to the cause. Then to the persons we say, that of all men they ought to be most silent in this case. For what varieties have they, and what alterations have they made, not only of their service books, portesses, and breviaries, but also of their Latin translation? The service book supposed to be made by St. Ambrose, (Officium Ambrosianum) was a great while in special use and request: but Durand. lib. 5. cap. 2.Pope Adrian, calling a council with the aid of Charles the Emperor, abolished it, yea, burnt it, and commanded the service book of St. Gregory universally to be used. Well, Officium Gregorianum gets by this means to be in credit; but doth it continue without change or altering? No, the very Roman service was of two fashions; the new fashion, and the old, the one used in one Church, and the other in another; as is to be seen in Pamelius a Romanist, his preface before Micrologus. The same Pamelius reporteth out of Radulphus de Rivo, that about the year of our Lord 1277 Pope Nicolas the third removed out of the churches of Rome the more ancient books (of service,) and brought into use the missals of the Friers Minorites, and commanded them to be observed there; insomuch that about an hundred years after, when the above named Radulphus happened to be at Rome, he found all the books to be new, of the new stamp. Neither was there this chopping and changing in the more ancient times only, but also of late. Pius Quintus himself confesseth, that every bishoprick almost had a peculiar kind of service, most unlike to that which others had; which moved him to abolish all other breviaries, though never so ancient, and privileged and published by Bishops in their Dioceses, and to establish and ratify that only which was of his own setting forth in the year 1568. Now when the Father of their Church, who gladly would heal the sore of the daughter of his people softly and slightly, and make the best of it, findeth so great fault with them for their odds and jarring; we hope the children have no great cause to vaunt of their uniformity. But the difference that appeareth between our translations, and our often correcting of them, is the thing that we are specially charged with; let us see therefore whether they themselves be without fault this way, (if it be to be counted a fault to correct) and whether they be fit men to throw stones at us: O tandem major parcas insane minori: They that are less sound themselves ought not to object infirmities to others. If we should tell them, that Valla, Stapulensis, Erasmus, and Vives, found fault with their vulgar translation, and consequently wished the same to be mended, or a new one to be made; they would answer peradventure, that we produced their enemies for witnesses against them; albeit they were in no other sort enemies, than as St. Paul was to the Gal. 4. 16.Galatians, for telling them the truth: and it were to be wished, that they had dared to tell it them plainlier and oftner. But what will they say to this, That Pope Leo the tenth allowed Erasmus' translation of the New Testament, so much different from the
