52   EARLY TFLEORIES OF TRANSLATION

and Geneva saw the first printing of most of the early English versions of the Scriptures. The Great Bible was set up in Paris. Indeed foreign printers had so large a share in the English Bible that it seemed sometimes advisable to limit their influence. Richard Grafton writes ironically to Cromwell regarding the text of the Bible: "Yea and to make it yet truer than it is, therefore Dutchmen dwelling within this realm go about the printing of it, which can neither speak good English, nor yet write none, and they will be both the printers and correctors thereof " ;' and Coverdale and Grafton imply a similar fear in the case of Regnault, the Frenchman, who has been printing service books, when they ask Cromwell that "henceforth he print no more in the English tongue, unless he have an Englishman that is learned to be his correcton" 2 Moreover, versions of the Scriptures in other languages than English were not unknown in England. In 1530 Henry the Eighth was led to prohibit "the having of holy scripture, translated into the vulgar tongues of English, French, or Dutch." 3 Besides this general familiarity with foreign translations and foreign printers, a more specific indebtedness must be recognized. More's attack on the book "which whoso calleth the New Testament calleth it by a wrong name, except they will call it Tyndale's testament or Luther's testament" 4 is in some degree justified in its reference to German influence. Coverdale acknowledges the aid he has received from "the Dutch interpreters: whom (because ,to their singular gifts and special diligence in the Bible) I have been the more glad to follow." 6' The preface to the version of 1611 says, "Neither did we think much to consult the translators or commentators, Chaldee, Hebrew, Syrian, Greek, or Latin, no, nor the Spanish, French, Italian, or Dutch." 6 Doubtless a great part of the debt lay in matters of exegesis, but in his familiarity with so great a

Pollard, p. 220.   2 Ibid., p. 239.   3 Ibid., p. 163.

4 Ibid., p. 126.   5 Ibid., p. 203.   6 Ibid., p. 371.

THE TRANSLATION OF THE BIBLE   53

number of translations into other languages and with the discussion centering around these translations, it is impossible that the English translator should have failed to obtain suggestions, both practical and theoretical, which applied to translation rather than to interpretation. Comments on the general aims and methods of translation, happy turns of expression in French or German which had their equivalents in English idiom, must frequently have illuminated his difficulties. The translators of the Geneva Bible show a just realization of the truth when they speak of "the great opportunity and occasions which God hath presented unto us in this Church, by reason of so many godly and learned men; and such diversities of translations in divers tongues."

Of the general history of Biblical translations, already so frequently and so adequately treated, only the barest outline is here necessary. The various Anglo-Saxon translations and the Wycliffite versions are largely detached from the main line of development. From Tyndale's translations to the Authorized Version of 1611 the line is surprisingly consecutive, though in the matter of theory an early translator occasionally anticipates views which obtain general acceptance only after a long period of experiment and discussion. Roughly speaking, the theory of translation has as its two extremes, the Roman Catholic and the Puritan positions, while the 1611 version, where its preface commits itself, compromises on the points at issue.

As is to be expected, the most definite statements of the problems involved and of their solution are usually found in the comment of those practically engaged in the work of translation. The widely discussed question whether or not the people should have the Scriptures in the vulgar tongue scarcely ever comes down to the difficulties and possibilities of the actual undertaking. More's lengthy attack on Tyndale's New Testament is chiefly concerned with matters

Pollard, p. 280.