• changed :' Newcome paraphrases thus, Lay aside your notions of temporal greatness in my kingdom." In both, the doctrine of conversion, upheld in the Com. Trans. is attempted, but vainly, to be set aside!

Mark i. 1. The beginning of the gospel of Jesus Christ, the Son of God.' The definite article put in, against their own system, there being no article in the Greek; but they balance it by the note, a son of God.' Ver. 13. And he was tempted by Satan forty days:' on which we have this note: i. e. he was exposed to various trials for the discipline of his mind.' And how were these conducted? By the temptations of Satan, as before. Thus we get nothing by the explanation.

Ver. 35. And in the morning he rose up, while much of the night remained, and went out :'-Literally from the Greek, and without interpolations thus. And very early, in the dark of the morning, rising up, he went out.' The language of the common version is the best. Ch. ii. 22. As a specimen of improved rendering, take this. man putteth new wine into old skins: otherwise the [new] wine bursteth the skins, and the wine is spilled, and the skins will be marred: but new wine must be put into new skins.’

And no

The application of this doctrine to set fastings, ceremonial works, and tithes and offerings, under the New Covenant, is not so often made as it might be, in the comments and discourses of Christian pastors and teachers upon this and other passages.

Ch. vi. 5, 6. And he would not do any mighty work there, [at Nazareth,] except that he put hands upon a few sick, and cured them. And he wondered because of their unbelief.' The change to 'would' from ' could' is most unhappy. The miracles of Christ and his apostles were the appointed means of confirming a belief in his mission: but they plainly required a measure of faith (with a few exceptions found in acts of free and sovereign grace) in the subjects. The faith of the Nazarenes had decayed by reason of worldly-mindedness: they had become familiar by report with the mighty works wrought by his hands; and were not in a disposition to receive him as the Son of God.' Once at home, the despised carpenter, the son of Mary,' (here is proof, again, of his not being Joseph's,) was actually excluded from doing any but mere benevolent miracles; while his doctrine was wondered at, and neglected. How many of the preachers of it have since had the same humiliation to go through!

6

Ver. 27. And then he will send his messengers, and will gather together his chosen from the four winds, from the end of the earth to the end of heaven.'

'Angels' and 'elect' are put in a note as Newcome's, why not in the text. The Scriptural term for the messenger from God to man, and for the man whom God, having proved and found worthy, hath chosen, are here dropt: I conclude, because in neither case could the Editors own the doctrine!

(To be continued.)

THE

YORKSHIREMAN,

A

RELIGIOUS AND LITERARY JOURNAL.

BY A FRIEND.

No. CVIII.

ART. I.-Remarks on an Improved Version of the NEW TESTAMENT, edited by the Unitarian Book Society, 1808.' Royal 8vo., with Notes.

(Continued from page 176.)

Mark xiii. 32. But of that day or hour none knoweth; no, not the angels that are in heaven, nor the Son; but the Father.'

I shall insert here a note which I have characterized in my interleaved copy as the climax of our Editors' daring on the subject !'

'Nor the Son. Ambrose cites MSS. which omit this clause, and complains that it was introduced by the Arians. But all MSS. and versions now extant retain it, and it is cited by early writers. It proves that Christ is not God, because his knowledge is limited. Nor can it be inferred from the climax that he is a superangelic being. All the instruments by which Divine Providence executes its purposes [what does this convey to us as relates to the gospel are called angels: and angels are represented as ministers of Christ, and subject to his orders, at the destruction of Jerusalem. Prophets are said to do what they are commissioned to predict. See Jer. i. 10. Thus Christ is said to have destroyed Jerusalem, and angels are represented as acting under him, when perhaps nothing more is intended than that Christ predicted the event which God in the course of his providence brought to pass.'

'Christ [as they choose to take it, though the text relates to the Son] is not God, because his knowledge is limited.' That is to say, God having been pleased to take our nature upon him, and in that nature and in character of the Son, professing not to know that which the Father hath kept in his own power-is, therefore, no more God! Again, the Son is here placed, as in other Scriptures, above the angels that are in heaven; above

VOL. V.

N

those spirits whom God is pleased to commission, and send (when they become strictly his messengers from heaven, Gr. ayyɛλoɩ,) to announce or execute his purposes on earth. But this would establish his Divine character as 'The Word,'-therefore is it attempted, in the remainder of this note, by a miserable evasion to be got rid of, and the Son reduced to the character of a prophet; which is all, in fact, they allow to his ministry.

The secret counsels of God are with God the Father, (so Scripture informs us, which is our only oracle on the subject,) the things belonging to his mission are with the Son : in other words, the nature of things, and the proprieties of the relation of things to each other, are observed in the revelation of God's will and word to mankind.

Luke, ch. iv. ver. 18. To heal the broken-hearted'-left out and thrust down to a note, (though adopted by Newcome,) because not in the Vatican, Cambridge, and other MSS., nor in Griesbach's text. Why deprive the reader of this morsel of consolation: is it because their own doctrine is so remote from any thing of the kind? I would have written it in, in a Testament of my own, rather than have wanted it. The text in Isaiah shews that it should be here.

Ver. 22. 'And wondered at the graceful words which proceeded out of his mouth, and said, Is not this the son of Joseph ?' Graceful! As if he had merely delivered himself with propriety and elegance! His conduct and discourse are indeed said by John (i. 14) to have been full of grace and truth:' and it is literally words of grace' here-but in a higher sense than that of the orator.

However, the Jews were in a mood at the time to praise him: and therefore the question should be (methinks) rather an observation. This is not Joseph's son!-They wanted to see him lifted up to a due sense of his high origin, and beginning some enterprise for their liberties: he saw their real disposition, and let them know plainly the only terms on which he could serve them ;-and their approbation was converted into fury at once!

Ver. 30. But he passed through the midst of them, and departed." Such is the Divine simplicity of truth, in telling of an act of Omnipotent might! How much would not a Greek or Latin historian have made of his hero on the occasion ?

Ver. 33, 34. The former may be improved, upon both the Common and this version-thus, And in the synagogue there was a man who had a spirit of an unclean demon, which cried out with a loud voice. The antecedents to who and which are here clearly separated; and, I believe, as they should be. But we have here, for the third time at least, to notice the pertinacious rejection of the doctrine of the people of God on this subject, The text says, the man had the spirit of an unclean demon; and the note that he fancied himself' so possessed: the text, that Jesus rebuked the demon; the note, that he replied [to a maniac!] in the popular language! Shall we believe the text or the comment-we cannot give credit to both? Again,

# Ver. 41. With the rebuke, as before, and imposition of silence on the spirits, we have the confession from many' of them, Thou art the Son of God! The Editors forbear to tell us in what sense they understand this

language to have been used by the demons. Was it in the sense in which the Centurion spake, Matt. xxvii. 54; whose confession they take away from him, by their version of his words? Was it not in the sense in which the words are used in the text, John ix. by Christ; and in that, John xx. 31, by his apostle; a sense familiar during our Lord's ministry to the whole people of the Jews-that of the MESSIAH, who was to bring deliverance from their enemies, and a kingdom that should last for ever?

Ch. vii. 37. 'A woman in the city, who had been a sinner.' But a note here attempts to rescue her moral character, and make her many sins (noticed both by the Pharisee and our Lord) into 'very zealous' idolatry : as if that were not also very gross immorality.

Ver. 50. Thy faith hath saved thee.' On this we have the futile note, 'q. d.' Having now become a believer in the true God, thou art admitted to the privileges of the visible church.' The meaning is, doubtless, hath procured through me the remission of thy sins.' have no evidence that she did not believe in God before.

We

Ch. viii. 2. Mary, called Magdalene, out of whom had gone seven demons.' Proof of the weakness, but not of the wickedness, of the woman, before she became a follower of Christ through this happy change! But what do our versionists say of it? "Who had been cured of raving insanity!'

Ch. ix. 39. And, behold, a spirit taketh him, and it suddenly crieth out; and it convulseth him so that he foameth, and bruising him hardly departeth from him.'

The note. This was evidently a case of epilepsy.' The versionists, by their 'it crieth,' make the spirit a being distinct from the child, contrary to their own hypothesis. It was, doubtless, ' a case of epilepsy'-and it is so named by them, in order to lead us away from a belief of the real cause of the fits, the cacodæmon whom Jesus rebuked and dislodged: after which there seems to have been a further extension of Almighty goodness, to heal (not 'cure') the internal lacerations of the bodily frame inflicted by the

tormentor.

O how convincing, to those who had faith, must such miracles have proved: how confirming to the well-disposed, and how confounding to the enemies of the truth: when the cases of the afflicted with divers diseases and torments, from various sources connected with our state as fallen creatures, were thus daily before their eyes;-and, with them, the present and effectual healing, wrought by the mighty power of God' in his beloved Son!

Ver. 49. Then John spake, and said, Master, we saw one casting out demons in thy name; and we forbade him, because he followed not us.' Further evidence here of the application, in that age, of some kind of spiritual coercion to the demons, (by prayer, we may suppose, to God in that behalf,) in the name of Christ. And this by Christ's own allowance: making further imposture too, except we grant that such things were as the gospels so often over relate!

Ch. x. 17. And the seventy returned with joy, saying, Master, even

the demons are subject to us through thy name. 6 18. And he said unto them, I beheld Satan [who had been overcome in the temptation in the wilderness] fallen from heaven, as lightning.' As if he had said, 'I saw him go down by the force of your prayers.' And then he taught them in what to rejoice, rather than in their victory; to wit that (now) their names were written in heaven-they were enrolled there for the spiritual war! And then, enlarging their commission, Jesus himself rejoiced in spirit, and praised the Father, the Lord of heaven and earth, that He had now granted to the prayer of simple faith, that which had been withheld for so many ages from the researches of the wise and prudent of the earth. On all this, our editors have the following frigid note: As lightning. Swiftly and precipitately. The meaning is, I see, and have seen some time since, the kingdom of Satan rapidly diminishing.'

Ch. xi. 2. Here we have the Lord's prayer cut down to what follows, the omission placed in the notes, and no reason assigned!

"And he said unto them, When ye pray, say, 'Ö, Father, sanctified be thy name! Thy kingdom come. Give us day by day the food sufficient for us. And forgive us our sins; for we also forgive every one who trespasseth against us. And bring us not into temptation.'

"

If such was the original measure of the excellent form now in use, I think the church itself very early improved it; and that it behoves us to retain the additions. However, in Matthew, they let pass more, omitting only the doxology; of which they say in a note, that it is wanting in MSS. of the best authority, and is not cited by the most ancient ecclesiastical writers. It is found, however, in some of the ancient versions,' p. 12.

I may here make the general observation that, in this (so called) improved version, the language is in very many places altered for the worse; and in others changed without any other apparent reason than the love of change. In some few passages, it is improved: but there are, in almost every page of the Common Version, smaller changes practicable for the better which must occur to every reader of competent experience and of good taste. Nothing will be gained, I am persuaded, by lowering the style of our version, under the notion of adapting it to modern use. Something must be admitted as a STANDARD (the language itself is becoming worse, having got into the hands of a multitude of incompetent scribes ;) and we cannot have a better, for style, than the present English Bible. Let us carefully preserve this; that the dignity and simplicity yet left to our native tongue may not be lost in absurd additions, and perpetual needless innovations.

Ch. xiii. 16. And ought not this woman, being a daughter of Abraham, whom Satan hath bound, lo, these eighteen years, to be loosed from this bond on the Sabbath-day?'

I must here return (I hope for the last time in these remarks) to the subject of the devil! Satan [say the Editors, in a note] is the personification of the principle of opposition: diseases are attributed to Satan, not because the devil is or was supposed to be the author of them, but because