In compliance with a wish so kindly expressed by your Lordship, I shall
now endeavour to communicate in writing the substance of what I took the
liberty of stating in the Committee of the British and Foreign Bible
Society. The observations there made chiefly respected the state of
religion on the continent of Europe—especially as connected with that
institution whose Committee I had the honour of addressing; and they were
exclusively such as had been suggested to me during a journey of eight
months through the various countries, to which it was my endeavour to
draw the attention of your Lordship and the Committee.
I must beg leave, however, to preface this brief and inadequate statement
by two or three observations.
In the first place, I must intreat that if this written document should
not be found precisely to correspond in expression or detail with the
address to the Committee, the difference may be ascribed, not to
intention, but to a defect of memory. That address was altogether
extempore; and my recollection of particular expressions I may have
employed, is very imperfect.
In the next place, I wish to have it understood, that although I should
not have committed this statement to the press, except at the wish of
some members of the Committee of the Bible Society, I, myself am alone
responsible for the facts and opinions it contains. It was highly
satisfactory to me to discover that many of the views taken by myself of
the subjects upon which I spoke, corresponded with those of a large
proportion of the Committee. In other points, I might not be so
fortunate as to agree with that majority. But, whatever might be the
amount of that agreement or disagreement, I desire alone to be made
responsible for the contents of this paper.
I must also be permitted to say that, in this communication, a few names
and particulars have been suppressed, which I did not hesitate to produce
to the Committee. It is obvious that circumstances which might safely be
named within walls, from which they were not likely to escape; might
produce inconvenience, if published and circulated upon the continent of
Europe.
I shall now proceed to give the substance of what I ventured to offer to
the Committee.
My first visit was to France, where I remained almost continually
journeying for several months. It was a satisfaction to me to arrive at
Paris in time to attend the annual public meeting of the Bible Society.
I can truly say that the meeting was in the highest degree interesting.
The character of the reports, especially those of the Ladies’ and
Mechanics’ Society—the attendance of so many ministers of religion—the
introduction of extempore speaking—the feeling of warmth and zeal which
seemed almost universally to prevail—left me no doubt but that a deep
interest pervaded the minds of large numbers on the subject of the
circulation of the Scriptures. I afterwards visited many of the
auxiliaries, great and small, of the Society in different provinces, and
the hopes formed at the meeting at Paris were not disappointed. It
happened to me to pass through one small village in a very solitary
situation in the centre of France, where three associations had been
formed—one of children, another of young women, and a third of the
population at large. In this village, under a very pious and able
minister, Mr. Duvivier, it was interesting to observe to what an extent
education had gone hand in hand with the circulation of the word of God.
Some of the children in the school repeated, as a Sunday task, not less
than two hundred verses of the New Testament.
With many of the larger auxiliaries of the Society, I was particularly
gratified. In some districts the circulation of the Scriptures was very
considerable. In others, much still remained to be done. The Protestant
ministers were the general agents and protectors of the institution; and,
there were many of them full of activity. Two collateral benefits of the
Bible Society were particularly obvious in France,—in the first place,
the truly valuable object which it supplied to many pious, active, and
benevolent minds, which powers might have been otherwise unemployed: and
in the next place, the rallying point which it afforded for the really
pious of all classes. It is difficult to say to what an extent the
society has enlarged the efficiency, and strengthened the union of the
religious body amongst the Protestants.
Such was the influence of these and other circumstances on my own mind,
that I often found occasion to observe to my fellow travellers, that, if
ever I had doubted the benefits of the society, those doubts must now
have vanished.
Amongst both Catholics and Protestants much good has been accomplished by
the British and Foreign Bible Society. By means of one of the most
active agents of this institution, the late Mr. Owen, the society was
regularly established amongst the Protestants. And, amongst the
Catholics, even where the Bible Society has not been able to obtain any
regular establishment by means of our agents, a large number of Bibles
and Testaments has been distributed in the schools, hospitals, and
prisons, and amongst the population at large. I have seen the Testaments
of this society in various important schools; in the hands of the sick,
and in the wards of the hospital. I have known them carried to the
infirm and the dying by those who are so emphatically and justly called
the Sœurs de la Charité. I had myself also the happiness of distributing
five hundred copies of those so kindly committed to me by the society in
a prison containing upwards of four thousand individuals. We cannot
believe that these various gifts have been made in vain. Much of the
fruit will be discovered only on the great day, when the secrets of all
hearts shall be disclosed. But in the mean time no man can follow the
course of the Bible without perceiving the benefits resulting from its
circulation. In one instance, I cannot but doubt that the conversion of
a large body from Popery to Protestantism, in a city in the south of
France, has been materially assisted by the operations of this society.
There are yet two points in connexion with France, on which I feel it
necessary to trouble the Committee. In the first place, I have a debt of
justice and gratitude to render to Professor Kieffer, your society’s
agent at Paris. I will here say nothing on the subject of his opinions
with regard to the distribution of the Apocryphal books, except that,
whether he is right or wrong, he has found many both good and wise men on
the continent and elsewhere, who agree in the views which he has adopted.
With respect to his religious orthodoxy, which I understand has been most
unjustly called in question in this country, I feel it right to say, that
no one who knows him can entertain a doubt.
As to talents, diligence, vigilance, and zeal, as an agent of this
society, he has few equals, and can scarcely have a superior. As a man
of business, of regularity, vigour, and dispatch, he is very
conspicuous—and those who know the immense deficiency of business-like
habits on the continent, will know how to value such important qualities
in the agent they employ.
The other subject respects the decision of the British and Foreign Bible
Society, as to the distribution of the Apocryphal books. It would be
unjust to deny that, when the question concerning the rejection of these
books was first proposed to the Bible Societies in France, they almost
unanimously declared their strong preference for Bibles with the
Apocrypha. In the _Lutheran_, which is the smaller part of the
Protestant church of France, this preference still, to a considerable
degree, prevails. But among the members and ministers of the _Reformed_
church, and especially those who felt the real value of the word of God,
I was rejoiced to find, how few dissented from your late resolution. And
I feel assured that, when the question comes to be presented to
continental churches in all its bearings, and the danger is shown of thus
commingling error with truth, their grounds of opposition will be
removed; and they will feel it their duty to pursue the same course as
that in which your society has so wisely taken the lead.
It remains only with regard to France, that I should take the liberty of
urging upon the Committee the duties of the most strenuous and
affectionate co-operation. It is impossible not to consider the general
state of the Protestant churches as much advanced during the interval of
five years when I before visited them. The political feeling of the
Protestants appeared to me a good deal improved; and the government in
general of France has done much to deserve their confidence and
gratitude. The Protestants themselves seem to me much more sensible of
the state of decay in their church; and are in proportion desirous of its
restoration to life. It is true that heterodoxy of a very deplorable
kind has, to a considerable degree, crept into the universities of that
country. But I was often struck by observing, that when some of the
clergy taught in those universities, entered upon the discharge of their
pastoral office; and it became their direct object to withdraw the
profligate from sin, and lead the miserable to comfort—to confirm the
wavering, to meet the wants and wishes of our fallen nature, to assuage
the sufferings of an awakened conscience, and supply a strong refuge in
the hour of death, they have been compelled to desert their own ground,
and seek, within the enclosure of orthodox and evangelical religion, the
weapons of their warfare, and the means of consolation and of joy. I was
delighted indeed to find some of those who had been instructed in the
Neological school, among the most zealous promoters of the truth as it is
in Christ.
I shall next beg of the Committee to pass on with me from France to
_Italy_. To the northern parts of this country, however, my visit was
alone extended; and there I found the same obstacles to exist against the
free circulation of the word of God, of which other travellers have
complained. One exception however may be stated, and that with regard to
a people whose cause has excited a warm and most honourable interest in
this country—the Protestant inhabitants of Piedmont. They, in common
with the other Protestant subjects of the King of Sardinia, are now
permitted to receive books of every kind, on payment of duty, and, on the
condition that they are neither sold, lent, nor given to Catholics. This
concession came at a time of peculiar importance; as it facilitated the
introduction of the large grant of Bibles lately made by this society to
the Protestant inhabitants of the vallies. And I learned from the
principal agent of the Bible Society in those quarters, that they had
received nearly 5000 {6} Bibles and Testaments from different
institutions. These grants are of greater value at this moment, when the
Vaudois Committee in London is so wisely and assiduously labouring to
establish schools of various kinds in these vallies. I am requested to
present the cordial thanks of the ministers of the Vaudois church to this
society.
The next point to which I would call the attention of this Committee, is
Geneva. The character and services of the Bible Society in that city
have, it appears to me, been grievously misrepresented in some of the
recent publications in this country, on the subject of the Apocryphal
controversy. From the fact of the society in Geneva not discovering much
zeal for the distribution of the Geneva version of 1805, of which the
orthodoxy was called in question, the consequence has arisen, that the
friends of that version have gradually seceded from the ranks of the
institution. And, let it be recorded to the praise of the society at
Geneva, that, when the great mass of the continental Bible Societies were
anxious, by establishing counter resolutions of their own, to manifest a
spirit of resistance to the Anti-Apocryphal resolution of the London
Committee, the Geneva Society opposed this measure, and publicly
manifested its fidelity towards the British and Foreign Bible Society,
and its lively gratitude for the favours bestowed upon it through a
series of years. Assisted by powerful auxiliaries, and especially by
that of Satigny, under the administration of a most enlightened and
devout member of the church, M. le Pasteur Gaussen, they are doing much
for that part of Switzerland, and supplying an example on the continent,
of sending money for the distribution of books in remote parts of the
world. Of two individuals, occupying distinguished posts in that
society, I must say a few words. Its president, M. Vernet, is a person
who has experimentally felt the value of the Bible, and manifested, in
circumstances of deep trial, his confidence in its instructions and
consolations; and the secretary, M. Gautier, is an individual in whose
friendship as a Christian, and zeal as a member of this society, I have
found much cause to rejoice. That the Committee is not framed upon a
more comprehensive and generous principle, is to be regretted; but it
labours assiduously and successfully as to the great object for which it
is brought together.
The Bible Society of the Canton de Vaud has acted upon the principle of
securing to itself a permanent income, for the perpetual distribution of
the Holy Scriptures, independent of new contributions—by funding its
capital. This measure has displeased many individuals in the Canton; and
has probably assisted to give birth to other societies in Lausanne and
its neighbourhood, acting upon a different principle. I speak from
pretty accurate knowledge of that Canton, when I say, that the state of
religion is very remarkably improved in it. It is impossible that any
one who reads the religious publications of the day should be ignorant of
the severe measures adopted by the government of the Canton de Vaud,
within a few years, to prevent religious meetings, and otherwise obstruct
the course of true religion. But the advancement in piety, and
especially amongst the members of the Established Church, is not a little
conspicuous. I can truly say, that I visited no place where the spirit
of religious enquiry was more alive, and where the taste was more
extended for simple biblical reading. The severity of the government has
in a great measure relaxed. The piety of the people has increased. Is
it unfair to consider as one of the instruments of this improvement,
that, in addition to the number of Bibles before in circulation there has
been circulated, by the Bible Society of that place, 15,000 copies of the
word of God, amongst a population of 160,000 persons?
As to the newly revised edition of Osterwald’s Bible, published at
Lausanne, it is impossible not to condemn in it both the deviations from
the original, and the employment, in what are called the improvements, of
a great deal of paraphrastic language. In speaking of that edition of
the Bible, I think it right, however, to bear my humble testimony to the
general character of the authors of this revision; and to state my
conviction of the facility with which your Committee may have been
betrayed into something of undue confidence in them. The gentlemen
engaged in that revision, were some of them amongst the persons in the
highest general estimation for talents and piety: of Professor Levade,
the president of the Lausanne Bible Society, I may say that a more
faithful friend to the general distribution of the Scriptures cannot be
found. I have myself taken the liberty of strongly expressing my dissent
from him upon various subjects connected with the society in general, and
the Lausanne edition in particular. But I must be allowed to say to his
honour, that, independent of the labour and cost he has sacrificed on
this edition of the Bible, he has for a series of years sustained the
burden of the Cantonal Bible Society on his almost unassisted shoulders,
and continues to exhaust the strength of his declining age in giving
efficiency to the operations of this Institution.
The next Bible Society of importance which I visited was that of Basle.
I was there soon brought into communication with the Committee on the
subject of their temporary estrangement from your Society on the ground
of the late resolution as to the Apocryphal Books. I endeavoured to
explain to the Committee the probable result of the resolutions to which
they had come of refusing to be even the agents of those Societies which
had resolved in no way to assist in the circulation of the Apocrypha.
When they found that the decision of the London Committee was the result,
not of prejudice, but of conscience, they at once gave up their own
resolutions, and acquiesced in the proposal which was made to them. They
passed a resolution expressive of their kind sympathy towards the British
and Foreign Bible Society; and they undertook still to serve it as
agents; although, at the same time, they could not, according to their
judgment of the question, consent personally, and for themselves, to
circulate Bibles without the Apocryphal Books. I cannot easily convey to
you the high opinion which I formed of the Committee of the Bible Society
of Basle, and of its venerable President, the Antistes. The interest
which they feel, and the labour which they devote to the distribution of
the Scriptures is what I have never seen exceeded in any other place, and
I can have no doubt, that whatever commission you are pleased to entrust
to them, will be judiciously and faithfully executed.
It is my wish in the last place to say something on the state of Germany.
And here the few observations I have to offer will be of a somewhat more
general nature, or, at least, less confined to particular societies.