FRANKLIN'S " PROJECT OF A NEW VERSION."
[To THE EDITOR OP THE " SPECTATOR."] SIR,—I should better have said simply that Franklin's sugges- tion of a new version was not a serious proposition, than that it was made in sport. I regret that he should have spoken otherwise than seriously in any matter connected with the Bible; but he had no purpose of mocking the sacred book. One of the friends to whom he read the bagatelle was probably the Bishop of St. Asaph.
In Matthew Arnold's "Culture and Anarchy," that accom- plished critic compares a verse in Franklin's paraphrase of a passage in the Book of Job, with the same verse in the Authorised Version, and says :—" After all, there is a stretch of humanity beyond Franklin's victorious good sense." Other able writers (among them a recent reviewer in the Spectator), seem to suppose that he really thought his paraphrase better than the old translation. An examination of the facts of the case convinced me of the contrary. The paraphrase was made to teach a political lesson, and the pretended " proposition" was prefixed to it only to attract attention. The humanity which appreciates the simple beauty and dignity of the language of our English Bible was quite within the reach of Franklin's tether.—I am, Sir, &c.,
Providence, R.I. THOMAS CHASE.
Previous page
