s.
_Secondly_, the translators came to the task looking to the _thoughts_,
not to the _style_. Their object was not that of all other translators,
to imitate and rival the beauty of _style_. Their sole object was to
render faithfully, and in a plain, appropriate style, the _thoughts_
of the sacred writers. Hence they became _thoroughly imbued with the
spirit_ of the original, and gave an incomparably better version of the
Hebrew and Greek Testaments than any or all of them together could have
done of any classic. Had each of them left us translations of some
classic, I hesitate not to say they would not now have been found in
any library but as mere curiosities. _Thirdly_, the number of persons
employed contributed very much to prevent any _personal_ style from
prevailing, and gave to the whole an air of plain, simple uniformity.
_Fourthly_, the era was providential in one important view. As the
translation was made before all the bitterness of sectarian spirit
distracted the English Protestant church, it was executed far less with
a view to party differences than could have been the case at any time
afterwards. _Fifthly_, fortunately the only great religious difference
that could have affected it was the dispute with the Catholic church,
and, as to that, all Protestants were agreed in England on every
important point. _Sixthly_, the English language was then at the
happiest stage of its progress, with all the strength, simplicity, and.
clearness of the elder literature, whilst, at the same time, it was free
from the cant of the age of Charles I. and Cromwell, from the vulgarity
and levity of that of Charles II., and from the artificial character of
that of Anne.

Such a translation is an illustrious monument of the age, the nation,
the language. It is, properly speaking, less a translation than an
original, having most of the merit of the _former_ as to _style_, and
all the merit of the _latter_ as to _thought_. It is the noblest, best,
most finished classic of the English tongue.

[Footnote 47: A native of South Carolina, distinguished in the law and in
literature.]

* * * * *

=_Henry C. Carey, 1793-._= (Manual, p. 504.)

From "Principles of Social Science."

=_155._= AGRICULTURE AS A SCIENCE.

That agriculture may become a science, it is indispensable that man
always repay to the great bank from which he has drawn his food, the
debt he thereby has contracted. The earth, as h