dleton states the rule thus: "When two or "more Attributives joined by a copulative or "copulatives are assumed of the same person or

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thing, before the first Attributive the Article "is inserted; before the remaining ones it is "omitted." This rule, which is incontestably correct, however much half-scholars may cavil at it, Mr. Sharp applies, and with considerable success, to the correction of various mistranslations in our authorised version of the New Testamentseveral of which will be noticed hereafter.

The rule, as has been observed, is in fact as

the operation of this rule; but there was no need to note these as an exception, as his rule embraces only Attributive nouns, which Proper Names are not. What was wanting respecting Proper Names the Bishop of Calcutta has well supplied in the learned work before alluded to. The general rule with respect to them is, that the article should be prefixed upon renewed mention of the name, however illustrious or well known; but not on its first introduction. The exceptions are, the names of Deities (sometimes), and of persons who are supposed to have in some way been made known to the hearer by what has gone before, though not then named; but this occurs but seldom. The reason why proper names do not take the article an their first introduction, rises out of the nature of the Greek Article, which was originally a pronoun;-but a substitute for any noun can never answer the purpose of that noun, if the one intended has not already been made known. For more ample information, and abundance of evidence on this point, I must refer the reader to Bishop Middleton's learned work.

old as the written Greek language. How then came it to be so much overlooked, as to furnish almost direct evidence that it was unknown to the Translators of the common Version? The answer is obvious. The first western version was in Latin,—the Old Italic; and the next, its successor, the Vulgate-was also in Latin-a language which has not the Article; and these, but especially the last mentioned, have had an inconceivable influence on the turn of expression adopted in the European translations. In fact all the school divinity of the West was built upon and supported by the readings of the Vulgate and hence the genuine sense of the original, in many important passages, was entirely lost. The majority of the Latin fathers, in all their comments and controversies, made use only of the Latin translation, precisely as the great majority of our own divines make use only of the common English version: indeed but few of them, comparatively speaking, were qualified to consult the original; and hence many passages, which, in spite of the ambiguity of the Latin, would be understood in their true sense, while Greek continued to be cultivated by the learned among the Romans, came to be ob scured by the Latin fathers, from their ignorance of Greek, and from the infelicity of their own language, in the want of the Article-and

hence the propagation of similar false views, respecting many passages of the New Testament, in the vernacular languages of Europe.

The rule so well illustrated by Mr. Sharp was not, however, unknown to all the critics and expositors. His learned Editor, Dr. Burgess (now Bishop of St. David's), addressing Mr. Sharp on this subject says, "I call the rule yours; for though it was acknowleged and

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applied by Beza and others to some of the "texts alleged by you, yet never was it so pro"minently, because singly, or so effectually, as "in your remarks."

A learned Reviewer (the British Critic for July 1802) in a Note on the words just quoted, correctly observes:-" Beza is not the only one

among biblical critics who has noticed this "idiom: it has occasionally been urged by va"rious writers. Wolfius says, "Articulus To præmittendus fuisset voci Zwry

pos (in Tit. ii. 13) siquidem hic a μeyán s "distingui debuisset.' In loco. Drusius, on "the same text, says, 'Non solum Deus, sed "etiam Deus Magnus, vocatur hic Christus' (in Crit. Sacro); where, though the rule is not mentioned, it is taken for granted as undeniable. Bishop Bull, Calovius, Vitringa, and Dr. Twells, are all referred to by Wolfius, as supporting this sense, on the verse of Titus above

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"mentioned: and Erasmus, who speaks of that passage as ambiguous, had too much know"lege of Greek not to own, that the omission of "the Article had some force against that opinion. Quanquam omissus Articulus in libris Græcis "facit nonnihil pro diversa sententiâ: To Mɛyά“ του Θεοῦ καὶ Σωτῆρος. Evidentius distinxisset personas si dixisset, xal Tou wтpos.""—It It may however, with truth, be allowed that the laws of the Greek idiom as connected with the use of the Article, had not, as a particular philological question, been hitherto sufficiently examined; and Mr. Sharp's work may be considered as the commencement of so useful and important an investigation.

The fact illustrated by Mr. Sharp and those who have followed him, and its certainty, may be summed up in a few words: A language must be consistent with itself, otherwise there could be no certainty respecting the meaning of any thing delivered in it: whatever license it may allow, for brevity, where the nature of the context prevents the possibility of a mistake, it cannot permit any regular rule to be violated where, the context furnishing no aid, confusion or ambiguity would result from such inattention. Without regularity in this particular, the language would be a jumble of confusion.-Nay more-there never was, nor can there ever be

such a language, even among unlettered barbarians; and shall such an absurdity be predicated of the Greek tongue!

It is admitted on all hands that the expression ὁ θεὸς καὶ πατὴρ, [the Gop and FATHER] has reference to one individual, and cannot possibly mean two. Here, of the two Attributive Nouns, joined by the copulative xal, only the first has the Article prefixed. Nor is it denied by any that τοῦ θεοῦ καὶ πατρὸς, and τῷ θεῷ καὶ πατρί, the same words, but in other cases, also refer only to one. In a word, whatever the Attributive Nouns may be that are thus circumstanced, they always refer to the same person, as in the expression, “The grace τοῦ Κυρίου καὶ Σωτῆρος, "of THE LORD and SAVIOUR:" in which expression the two Attributives "LORD" and "SAVIOUR" mean the same individual.

Grammarians need not be told that though the individual intended by the Attributive or Attributives employed in any sentence of this kind, may, as is also often the case when Pronouns are used, be rendered sufficiently obvious by the context, yet cautious writers, to prevent the possibility of a mistake, often name the individual to whom they are applying them; but others, besides learned men, are deeply interested in this subject, and, for their sakes, it is desirable, that this point should be stated in as