Page:Encyclopædia Britannica, Ninth Edition, v. 8.djvu/410

Rh 390 E N G E N G changes the style of the language employed in the existing version be closely followed. 5. That it is desirable that Convocation should nominate a body of its own members to undertake the work of revision, -who shall be at liberty to invite the co-operation of any eminent for scholarship, to whatever nation or religious body they may belong.&quot; The report was adopted, and two companies were formed for the revision of the Authorized Version of the Old and New Testaments respectively, consisting of members of convocation and other distinguished Biblical scholars. During the eight years that have elapsed since their appointment the two companies have devoted themselves assiduously to the discharge of the task assigned them, and it is understood that their work is now (1878) approaching completion, but no part of the new revision has yet been published. Biblio- There is still much to be learned respecting the bibliographical grapliy. history of the English Bible, but several useful works have appeared among the many that have been been written on the subject. The earliest attempt was An Historical Account of the several English Translations of the Bible, &c., by Anthony Johnson, 1730. This was followed in 1731 by Lewis s Complete History of the several Translations of the Holy Bible and New Testament into English, which was, until recently, the standard work on the subject. Archbishop Newcome wrote An Historical View of the English Bibli cal Translations, etc., with a list of the various editions from 1526 to 1776, which was published at Dublin in 1792. In 1821 Arch deacon Cotton brought out A List of Editions of the Bible and parts thereof in English, from the year 1505 to 1820, which has been republished in a corrected and enlarged form, and is a work of much value. The Annals of the English Bible, by Christopher Anderson, printed in two volumes in 1845, was a well-meant attempt to give a complete view of the subject, but is exceedingly diffuse, and is deficient in critical value. Far the most valuable account extant of the Manuscript English Bible is that which forms the preface to Forshall and Madden s edition of the Wickliffite Bible, published at the Clarendon Press in 1850. Taking equally authoritative posi tions as regards the printed English Bible are Westcott s General View of the History of the English Bible, 1868, and the exhaustive account given of the Authorized Version of 1611 in the introduction to Scrivener s Cambridge Paragraph Bible, 1873. More recently has appeared, in two volumes, Eadie s The English Bible : an Exter nal and Critical History of the various English Translations of Scripture, 1876, which is the fullest popular account extant of the whole subject. The most complete list of printed English Bibles is, however, that contained in The Bibles in the Caxton Exhibition, by Henry Stevens, 1878, where much valuable bibliographical in formation on the subject is to be found. (J. H. BL.) ENGLISH LANGUAGE. In its widest sense, the name is now conveniently used to comprehend the language of the English people from their settlement in Britain to the present day, the various stages through which it has passed being distinguished as Old, Middle, and New or Modern English. In works yet recent, and even in some still current, the name English is confined to the third, or at most extended to the second and third of these stages, since the language assumed in the main the vocabulary and grammatical forms which it now presents, the oldest or inflected stage being treated as a separate language, under the title of Anglo-Saxon, while the transition period which connects the two has been called Semi-Saxon. This view had the justification that, looked upon by themselves, either as vehicles of thought or as objects of study and analysis, Old English, or Anglo-Saxon, and Modern English are, for all practical ends, distinct languages, as much so, for ex ample, as Latin and Spanish. No amount of familiarity with Modern English, including its local dialects, would enable the student to read Anglo-Saxon, three-fourths of the vocabulary of which have perished and been recon structed within 800 years ; l nor would a knowledge even of these lost words give him the power, since the grammatical system, alike in accidence and syntax, would be entirely strange to him. Indeed, it is probable that a 1 A careful examination of several letters of Boswortli s Anglo-Saxon Dictionary gives in 2000 words (including derivatives and compounds, but excluding orthographic variants * 535 which still exist as modern English words. modern Englishman would acquire the power of reading and writing French in less time than it would cost Mm to attain to the same proficiency in Old English; so that if the test of distinct languages be their degree of practical difference from each other, it cannot be denied that &quot; Anglo- Saxon &quot; is a distinct language from Modern English. But when we view the subject historically, recognizing the fact that living speech is subject to continuous change in certain definite directions, determined by the constitution and cir cumstances of mankind, as an evolution or development of which we can trace the steps, and that, owing to the abundance of written materials, this evolution appears so gradual in English that we can nowhere draw distinct lines separating its successive stages, we recognize these stages as merely temporary phases of an individual whole, and speak of the English language as used alike by Cynewulf and by Tennyson, just as we include alike King Alfred and Mi- Bright as members of the English race. 2 It must not be forgotten, however, that in this wide sense the English language includes, not only the literary or courtly forms of speech used at successive periods, but also the popular and, it may be, altogether unwritten dialects that exist by their side. Only on this basis, indeed, can we speak of Old, Middle, and Modern English as the same language, since in actual fact the precise dialect which is now the cultivated language, or &quot; English &quot; par excellence, is not the descend ant of that dialect which was the cultivated language or English of Alfred, but of a sister dialect then sunk in obscurity, even as the direct descendant of Alfred s &quot;Englisc&quot; is now to be found in the neglected and non- literary rustic speech of Wiltshire and Somersetshire. Causes which, linguistically considered, are external and accidental, have shifted the political and intellectual centre of England, and along with it transferred literary and courtly patronage from one form of English to another ; if the centre of influence had happened to be fixed at York or on the banks of the Forth, both would probably have been neglected for a third. The English language, thus defined, is not &quot;native&quot; to Britain, that is, it was not found here at the dawn of history, but was introduced by foreign immigrants at a date many centuries later. At the lloman Conquest of the island, the languages spoken by the natives belonged all (so fai as is known) to the Celtic branch of the Aryan family, modern forms of which still survive in Wales, Ireland, the Scottish Highlands, Isle of Man, and Brittany, while one has quite recently become extinct in Cornwall. Dialects allied to Welsh and Cornish were apparently spoken over the greater part of Britain, as far north as the Firths of Forth and Clyde ; beyond these estuaries and in the isles to the west, including Ireland and Man, dialects akin to Irish and Scottish Gaelic prevailed. The dialect of the Picts in the east of Scotland, according to recent in quiries, presented characteristics uniting the British or Cymric with the Gaelic division. 3 The long occupation of South Britain by the Romans (43-409 A.D.) a period, it must not be forgotten, equal to that from the close of the Middle Ages to the present day, or to the whole duration of Modern English familiarized the provincial inhabitants with Latin, which was probably the ordinary speech of the 2 The practical convenience of having one name for what was the same thing in various stages of development is not affected by the proba bility that (Mr Freeman notwithstanding) Engle and Englisc were, at an early period, not applied to the whole of our Teutonic ancestors in Britain, but only to a part of them. The dialects of Engle and Seaxan were alike old forms of what was afterwards English speech, and so, viewed in relation to it, Old English, whatever their contemporary names might be. 3 As to the place of the Pictish, see Dr W. F. Skene s Four Ancient Books of Wales, I. vii., viii. Prof. Rhys says &quot; the Picts, Mr Skeno notwithstanding, were probably Kymric rather than Goidelic, &quot; Philology, p. 19.