images, whereas in the original it includes under the denomination of graven things, the columns of stones, which were the objects of worship to many of the ancient nations.

In two other texts, Rom. xi. 4.; Acts xix. 35, it is acknowledged that image does not occur in the original. It has been preserved in the Protestant version as a memorial of the devotion which the reformed translators paid to this important word. It was their most useful auxiliary and they have rewarded its services by still giving it a niche in the inspired writings.

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LIMBUS PATRUM AND PURGATORY.

On this subject, after a long preamble in which he shows but little acquaintance with the Catholic doctrine, Dr. Ryan calls on Popish divines to show that the twelve texts mentioned by Ward prove the doctrine or existence of the Limbus patrum or purgatory. But this is unnecessary in the present instance. The point to be determined is, whether the Hebrew word 3 denotes the grave, as it is rendered in the Protestant version, or the state of the soul after death, as it was understood by the Catholic translators. Now, 1st, that it will admit of the latter meaning must be acknowledged by Dr. Ryan himself: since in three instances to allow its insertion, the word grave has been expunged in the corrected editions of the Protestant Bible. 2nd. The proper Hebrew term for the grave is

both meanings to the Hebrew word, I can oppose to their authority that of the ancient Greek and Latin interpreters, who as invariably render adno, inferi, infernus, as they do TP, ταφοσ, μνημα, sepulchrum. It is from them that the true meaning of this ancient language is to be learned. If, however, Dr. Ryan refuses to submit to them, I trust he will not reject the authority of St. Peter, who in Acts xi. 27, translates it adno, and in obedience to whom the correctors of the Protestant Bible have in this instance erased the word grave, by which it had been rendered in the more ancient editions.

Dr. Ryan wishes to persuade his readers that Ward introduced the text from Heb. v. 7, as a proof of the existence of purgatory. Why should he thus misrepresent his adversary? In discoursing of the foregoing texts. Ward had occasion to mention that article of the creed, in which Christians profess their belief in the descent of our Saviour into hell: and this had led him to censure the opinion of Calvin and Beza that the descent into hell was only a metaphorical expression, significative of the anguish of despair, and the horrors of damnation, which Jesus felt on the cross. To countenance so blasphemous an idea, the Protestant translators added their mite; and in rendering that passage, in which St. Peter alludes to the prayer of Jesus on the cross, tell us that he was heard in that which he feared. The Greek is άworna vλabelao, which in the Catholic version is translated, he was heard for his reverence. What plea may be offered in defence of the Protestant rendering I know not. Dr. Ryan has offered none. I may therefore assume that it is indefensible.

is שאיל nor can I find any proof that • קבו

ever employed in that sense in the scriptures. (a) In every passage in which it occurs, it will easily bear the meaning ascribed to it by the Catholic translators: in some it cannot bear that which is given to it in the Protestant version. Thus, when Jacob said, "I will go down into unto my son mourning;" he could not mean the grave. He certainly did not conceive Joseph's soul to have been buried: and as for his body he could not expect to find it in the grave, as he believed it to have been devoured by wild beasts. In favour of his opinion Dr. Ryan adduces the Samaritan version in which this text, as he says, is rendered the grave. I fear, however, that, unable to read the Samaritan version itself, he has been deceived by the treacherous authority of its Latin translator. The Latin translator of the Samaritan version has indeed rendered Gen. xxxvii. 35, sepulchrum: but in the version itself we read, b, which is evidently the same word as the Hebrew, and has the same meaning; and which the same translator in the parallel passages, Gen. xlii. 38; xliv. 29, 31, has rendered by the Latin word Inferi. 3rd. If modern Lexicographers give

(a) In the passages usually refered to, 1 Kings xi. 6, 10, it is rendered adno, inferi, by the ancient translators. They looked on his old age, as a figurative expression for him in his old age.

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JUSTIFICATION AND THE REWARD OF GOOD WORKS.

DR. RYAN observes that the texts enumerated

by Ward in this section were too obscure to induce the Protestant translators to misrender them. But this is shifting the question. The point in debate is not, whether these texts be obscure or not; but whether they be fairly rendered in the Protestant version. Ward asserts they are not: and I think he has made out a pretty strong case. The Protestant translators were violent champions in favor of justification by faith only, and whoever consults this version will find that they had two sets of English words to express the Greek word dixy and its derivavations. When they were united in the scriptures with the word faith, then they were rendered by just, justice, justification; but if they were united with words expressive of the reward or practice of good works, just and justification disappeared, and righteous and righteousness were adopted in their place. If nothing unfair were meant, what motive could they have for this verbal legerdemain? How comes it, that the same

Greek words should be cautiously rendered by two different sets of English words, and that these should be alternately adopted as they favoured the opinions of the translators, or were adverse to those of their antagonists.

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MERIT AND MERITORIOUS WORKS.

IN this section Ward produces five texts which, he maintains, have been falsely rendered in the Protestant Bible. In answer, Dr. Ryan compares these texts as they now stand, with the same passages in the Catholic version, and very gravely asks where is the difference? But know, gentle reader, that he quotes from the amended version, in which the three principal corruptions have been corrected; while Ward complains of the original translation. Such artifices are but sorry indications of the confidence which Dr. Ryan professes in the goodness of his cause.

Of the remaining texts, one (Coloss. i. 12), according to the Catholic version, declares that God has made us worthy; according to the Protestant, has made us meet to be partakers of the inheritance of the saints. The Greek is

ixavooavti: and as the Protestant translators have rendered ixavoo worthy in Matt. iii. 11, and viii. 8, I see not why they should here have rendered it meet, were it not to avoid the Catholic doctrine of merit. The other passage is in Ps. cxix. 112, in which is rendered for reward, by the Catholic; unto the end, by the Protestant version. There is something very singular in the fate of this word. If in this passage the Catholic translator has rendered it for reward, in verse 33 of the same psalm he has rendered it always: and in like manner, if in this passage the Protestant translator has rendered it unto the end, in Psalm xix. 12, he has rendered it reward. In this confusion of renderings I should think it the most prudent to adhere to the ancient Greek interpreter, rather than the modern translators. He probably possessed more accurate MSS, and certainly was more intimately acquainted with the original language.

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FREE WILL.

Or the seven texts enumerated by Ward under this head, three, according to Dr. Ryan, have been corrected; a sufficient proof that in the original Protestant version they were rendered corruptly. It will be easy to vindicate Ward's remarks on the remaining four.

1st. The Greek text, 1 Cor. xv. 10, is susceptible of two meanings: that the grace of God laboured alone, or that the grace of God and the apostle laboured together. The ProThe Pro

testant version, by inverting the words, "which was with me," appears to restrain the sense to the former meaning, and in that respect is not a faithful representation of the original.

2nd. Romans v. 6, the apostle says that of ourselves we were άo@svsia, which the Protestant version renders without strength. The true meaning is weak: but weakness does not imply a total deprivation of strength.

3rd. The Protestant version renders At Evτolai άντε βαρειαι εκ εισιν, 1 John v. 3, his commandments are not grievous. Instead of grievous And Ward contends we should read heavy. that he is accurate will, I trust, appear by comparing this passage with that in St. Matt. xi. 30.

4th. Matt. xix. 11, is rendered in the Protestant version: all men cannot receive this saying. Dr. Ryan acknowledges that cannot is an interpolation, by proposing a different version of his own, in which that word is omitted. The translators must have trusted much to the credulity of their readers, when they dared thus to add to the meaning of the original. Their disciples however, unconscious of the deception, prided themselves on their imaginary happiness; and, while they derived new lights from the blunders and corruptions of the translators, wondered at their former ignorance, and pitied the blindness of the slaves of Popery.

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INHERENT JUSTICE.

AMONG the new doctrines sported by the apostles of the reformation, was that of imputative justice. No man, how virtuously soever he might have lived, could be just or righteous indeed, but only in as much as the justice or righteousness of Christ was imputed to him. With the merits or demerits of this opinion I have no concern: but among the texts by which it was assailed or defended, Ward has selected six, which he maintains to have been corrupted by the zeal of the Protestant translators. Dr. Ryan contents himself with replying very gravely, that neither do the Catholic versions prove, nor the Protestant versions disprove the contrary doctrine of inherent justice.

Of all the theological champions, with whom it has been my lot to be acquainted, Dr. Ryan conducts controversy in the most singular manner. Ward had asserted that in more than one hundred passages the Protestant version of the scriptures was corrupted: he noticed in DETAIL every one of these corruptions, and subjoined to each the reasons on which he founded his charge. Then came Dr. Ryan, and undertook to rebut the accusations. But how does he proceed? Does he refute each of Ward's arguments? No, he does not so much as mention them. A reader, who had perused none but Dr. Ryan's tract, would not know that Ward had a single reason to offer. The Doctor.

throughout appears attempting to silence a dumb adversary, to conquer a man who makes no resistance. Now whence arises this conduct in Dr. Ryan? Was he unwilling to refute Ward's argument? But who can suspect of unwillingness in such a cause the self-created representative of the Ryans, who lost so extensive a territory by the papal grant of Ireland to Henry II. ? Was he unable to refute them? I believe he was. However, let his reasons have been what they may, this is certain, that instead of answering, he has passed over the arguments of Ward, as if he had never seen them. But to proceed to the texts in question.

1st. The first is a passage of considerable obscurity, Rom. v. 18. By the Rhemish translators it has been rendered with the most scrupulous and laudable fidelity, while the Protestant translators have undertaken to make it more clear by supplying such words, as they thought wanting. If Ward complain of these additions, it is probable that his complaint was not unfounded since in the corrected editions they have been expunged, and their place has been supplied by other additions taken, as it appears, from the sixteenth verse. The alteration I think judicious yet after all, it gives us not the words of the sacred texts, but only the conjectures of its Protestant translators.

2nd. We are told in the Protestant version, Rom. iv. 3, that Abraham believed God and that it was accounted unto him for righteousness. What is the meaning of these last words, for righteousness? Do they not imply the same as instead of righteousness? Such, at least, is the rendering, and the explication of Beza, the master of our translators: pro justitia, i. e. vice | et loco justitiæ. Now I appeal to any man acquainted with the Greek and Hebrew languages, whether such can be the meaning either of St. Paul, ἑλόγισθη άτυῳ ἐισ δικαιοσύνην, or of the writer of Genesis from whom the Apostle quotes,

,יחשכה לך כדקה

3rd. In Ephes. i. 6, the Apostle says that God ἐχαρίτωσεν ἡμᾶς ἐν τῷ ἡγαπημενῳ. Ward has made it sufficiently clear from the ancient Greek writers, that exaqirwoer means, has made us agreeable or ple sing in his eyes. The Protestant translators have rendered it, has made us accepted. At first sight it may perhaps appear that the two renderings are nearly alike; but a closer inspection will discover that the former is adverse, the latter favourable to the doctrine of imputative justice. Ward then was probably accurate in attributing this rendering to the prejudices of the translators in favor of their own opinion.

4th. The false translation of 2 Cor. v. 21, is corrected in the more modern Bibles. Whoever consults Ward will see what unjustifiable liberties the original translators took with their text. But on this head Dr. Ryan is silent. He would fain persuade his readers, it is of the present and not of the ancient version that Ward complains. Such artifices are unworthy of a writer, who is convinced of the goodness of his cause.

5th. The two remaining texts, Dan. vi. 22;

||

Rom. iv. 6, are noticed by Ward principally as instances of the horror which the reformers seems to have entertained for the word justice. That they might not pollute their pages with such a term, they have inserted innocency in the former, and righteousness in the latter passage.

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IN FAVOUR OF THE

SUFFICIENCY OF FAITH ALONE.

THIS section, like most others, offered Dr. Ryan a subject of imaginary triumph. Out of the six corrupt renderings noticed by Ward, he boasts that four have been corrected in the later editions of the Bible. He must be a weak adversary indeed, who can envy him such a triumph. I shall therefore proceed to the two remaining texts.

Among the separatists from the Church of Rome at the period of the reformation, no less than among the separatists from the Church of England at the present day, it was a favourite doctrine, that justification by faith consisted in a full assurance of salvation. Whoever could work in himself this conviction, was secure of future happiness. His assurance was infallible; it would preserve him from ever falling, so as to forfeit his claim to the kingdom of heaven. Among the texts adduced in favour of this opinion was that of the epistle in the Hebrews, x. 22, with this difference, that former fanatics could only appeal to the assurance of faith of the ancient Protestant version, while modern fanatics may appeal to the full assurance of faith of the present amended edition. But does the original text, sv nλngo

toto, warrant such a rendering? I have no hesitation in asserting, that it does not, and I found my assertion on the authority of those who could not have been ignorant of the true meaning of the Greek language, the ancient doctors of the Greek Church. By these the ingoogia лotεwσ is said to be, a full and perfect faith, a faith that believes without doubting whatever God has revealed. Ταυτα, says Theodoret, έτωσ έχειν πιστευοντεσ, και πασαν διχονοιαν τησ ψυχησ εξορίζοντεσ. Τύτο γαρ πληροφοριαν εχάλεσεν.(α) It is, according to Theophylact, nouo л8лiпowμενη και αδιστακτος. (3)

The last text is Luke xviii. 43, Thy faith hath saved thee, instead of hath made thee whole. That this is a false rendering, is acknowledged. I shall therefore only ask, why it was first inserted in the original version, and why it is still preserved in the corrected edition ?

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APOSTOLICAL TRADITIONS.

On this subject I shall be content to refer the reader to the Errata, No. XVI., where he will see

(a) Theod. in Ep. ad Heb., c. x. (b) Theod. in eund. loc.

what reasons Ward had for censuring the Protestant translators; and shall only notice Dr. Ryan's artifice in attempting to persuade us, that two of the five texts condemned by his adversary agree with the Popish translation." What then did Ward accuse the Protestants of mistranslating, when they translated in the same sense as the Rhemish divines? No such thing, Dr. Ryan meant to say, that the ancient rendering of the Protestant Bible in these two passages was so evidently false, that it has since been corrected according to the Catholic translation. Had he said this, he would have said the truth.

MISCELLANEOUS CHARGES.

On this head I shall notice the principal passages. It would fatigue the patience of the reader to go through them all.

On marriage. "In the Popish version," says Dr. Ryan, we read, this is a great sacrament in ours, this is a great mystery. (Eph. v. 22.) Ward allows that the word signifies mystery in Greek, and in Latin sacrament: surely then we are not chargeable with mistranslation."(a) Never perhaps was there a more intrepid writer than Dr. Ryan; never one who cared less for detection, or trusted more to the credulity of his readers. Does Ward then condemn the words, this is a great mystery, as a false translation? On the contrary, he approves of it as a true one. But he condemned the original Protestant rendering, this is a great secret; a rendering so very faulty that Dr. Ryan was ashamed to notice it, and therefore endeavoured, by calumniating his adversary, to keep it a great

secret.

On prayers in_an unknown tongue. In 1 Cor. xiv. the Protestant translators have added the epithet unknown in five different passages; and in answering this charge, Dr. Ryan very adroitly becomes the assailant, and accuses the Catholic translators of having omitted it in the same passages. What then? Does it occur in the original? No; but it is necessary to complete the sense. So Dr. Ryan may think; but the apostle thought otherwise. He did not insert it; and if he did not, I cannot conceive whence any translator can derive authority to insert it for him. If you will have the people to study their faith in the scriptures, let them at least have the scriptures as they were originally written. Let the stream flow to them pure from its source, without the admixture of foreign

matters.

With respect to the texts, 1 Cor. xiii.; 1 Cor. i. 10; and 1 Tim. iii. 6, Ward's charges are directed against the ancient Protestant version; and Dr Ryan charges him with misrepresentation because these passages are corrected in the modern amended editions!!

James i. 13. Let no man say, that he is tempted of God: for God is not a tempter of (a) Anal., p. 40.

DR. RYAN has repeatedly challenged the "Popish clergy" to reply to his analysis: he cannot be offended that I have accepted the invitation. If in the cause of my reply, I have shown that he has often adopted artifices unworthy a scholar and a divine; that he was frequently misrepresented, and still more frequently concealed the arguments of his adversary, the blame must attach not to me, but to himself. He volunteered in the controversy: he must be answerable for the manner in which he has conducted the contest.

Besides those parts of the Analysis which I have noticed, Dr. Ryan has offered some arguments respecting the Lambeth Register, and added answers to Ward's queries. With these I have no concern. My only object was to refute his remarks with respect to the Protestant version of the scriptures. As, however, it would be uncivil to take my leave without replying to these queries, which he has placed at the end of his pamphlet, I shall endeavour to do it as concisely and as satisfactorily as I can.

The three first queries ask, how the Vulgate can be an infallible standard for other translations? I answer, that the Vulgate is a version deservedly of high authority, but I never yet met with a Catholic who considered it as infallible.

But

Q. IV. Is the translation of the Bible responsible for the errors or excesses of Beza, or others, who had no hand in any of our versions? A. It is not. Nor does Ward say it is. many of the first translators were the pupils of Calvin and Beza, and it was not irrelevant to trace in the work of the masters the errors of their disciples.

Q. V. Did the Protestant Churches ever pretend to be infallible in these translations or otherwise?

A. I know not whether they did or not. But this I know, they ought to have done so. Whence can a Protestant ignorant of the original languages, derive the knowledge of the Christian faith, but from the translation of the Bible? If then, that translation be fallible, or manifestly erroneous, how can he have any security that his faith be true? Built on an unsafe foundation, it can never acquire stability. The translation of the Bible must be infallible, or at least authentic, or the Protestant in question must always live in uncertainty.

Q. VI. Did not the translators of the Bible of the year 1683 correct forty errors in our old ones ?

A. The reformers of the old Protestant trans

(b) Anal., p. 42.

lations did correct forty errors, and should have corrected forty more.

Q. VII. Having adopted the very words of the Popish English Bible in very many instances, is it fair to charge them in every page with malice, design, and misinterpretation?

A. Ward does not often charge them with malice, design, and misinterpretation. His charges are principally levelled against the original translators. He approves in many places of the conduct of the reformers of the Protestant version; in some he condemns them, I fear, justly.

Q. VIII. It always proves a bad cause to represent an opponent's argument as weaker than it is. Show where I exhibit Ward's objections as less strong than they are?

A. In every division almost without exception. This I think I have sufficiently proved in the preceding pages.

Q. IX. According to Ward, the apostles had a Christian doctrine, a rule of faith, before the New Testament was written; prove that they had it?

A. If by a rule of faith Dr. Ryan means the thirty-nine Articles, I do not believe that the apostle had them either before the scripture was written or afterwards. But of this I am sure, that before the scripture was written the apostles preached the Christian doctrine, and established churches in which it was taught.

I

humbly conceive that they must have had a knowledge of it, and have imparted that knowledge to their disciples.

Q. X. Will not the Greek professor at Maynooth admit that the word qanak signifies once for all?

A. As I have not the honour to be acquainted with the Greek professor at Maynooth, I am unable to answer the question.

Qs. XI. XII. XIII. XV. regard the meaning of Greek words. For answer I must request the reader to consult the preceding pages.

Q. XIV. Was it not more decent in an apostle to lead about a wife than a strange

woman ?

A. I do not see how he could, unless he were married. Our blessed Redeemer was often attended by holy women of his kindred; why might not an apostle also?

Q. XVI. The word лaçαлτшμά signifies fault as well as sin. The Romanists render it sin: why may we not render it fault without being guilty of misconstruction?

A. I see no great sin in rendering παραπτωμά fault, nor any great fault in rendering it sin.

Q. XVII. Did not Adrian IV. grant Ireland to Henry II., and did not Alexander IV. confirm that grant?

A. Did not Dr. Ryan undertake to refute the "Errata," and has he not failed in almost every point?