es, or contemplative prose not inferior to
Plato's--a people dominated by an utter passion for righteousness."
--_Richard G. Moulton_.

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THE BIBLE IN LITERATURE

THE BIBLE'S PLACE IN LITERATURE

It may well be said that, like our English speech, our literature has
drawn its material and its inspiration from many tongues and peoples.
Its sources are world-wide. Its stream flows from innumerable springs
and fountains. Some of them have been shallow and some have given up
only the waters of bitterness, but many there are which keep the
current broad and pure and deep. And of those fountains that ever pour
out living water the most abounding is our English Bible.

So abundantly has our literature drawn from the Bible that a study of
it is the very beginning of the knowledge of English writings. He
alone can be called educated who knows this Book; for its _style_, its
_substance_ and its _spirit_ are thoroughly woven into the thought and
language of English-speaking people.

In the age of Elizabeth, when the Bible was translated, our English
words were coming fresh coined to our language from the mint of life.
New words were being made out of men's experiences. Such words brought
the pictures and images of things and actions vividly to the mind as
our abstract speech of to-day can never do. It was this living,
concrete language which men like Tindale and Coverdale wrought into
what became the King James Version; and with such mastery that to this
day the Bible has no peer in the vigor, the directness, and the
simplicity of its style. Then, too, in those days religious belief was
often a matter of life and death. Many of the translators finally gave
up their lives rather than to renounce their convictions, and it could
only be that such men would give to the Bible a style that breathes
always the noble dignity and earnestness of martyrs.

Thus he who would appraise our English writings must weigh whatever
they possess of the earnestness, the simplicity, the vigor, the
directness of the Bible. He must himself have mastered well that great
source of English style.

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Then who shall measure the treasures of the Bible substance that our
writers have poured into their books? The Bible has contributed their
language, their plots, their incidents, their characters, their moral
lessons, even their names. Words can no more than faintly suggest how
full to overflowin