In the Preface, the translator, whose mind was now opening to the truth, complains how sadly the Psalms had been neglected; that their place had been occupied by Passionals and Legends of saints; and that books of imitation, which were full of fictitious miracles and foolish dreams, had been preferred before them. He points out their excellency and superiority, not only in comparison with the best books of human composition, but even with the rest of Scripture itself,—as they furnish us with the most eligible expressions for carrying on our correspondence with God, teach us the right way to heaven, and contain the most lucid prophecies of the sufferings and death, the kingdom and glory of Christ. He insists on the necessity of humble prayer to God, for light and direction, in order to our interpreting the Scriptures properly; and ascribes the accomplishment of the present work to the Father of Lights, who had conferred grace upon him proportioned to the arduousness of the task he had undertaken.-A brief description is also given of the different instruments of Hebrew music that are mentioned in the Psalms; and several observations are made respecting the genius of the Hebrew language, such as the frequent changes of person, tense, &c. which shew that the translator was versant in that tongue.

At the close there is an address, in which he repels the objections made to the reading of the Holy Scriptures by the laity; and apologizes for any imperfections which might be found in his translation. "It ought," he says, "properly to have been all in verse, for the original Hebrew is in verse; but the Danish language does not admit of that flexion and ease which are requisite in such a performance." In another part of the same address, he defends the liberty he had taken in not rendering word for word, but giving what appeared to him to be the meaning of the writer: "If," he declares, "I had translated exactly according to the Latin of St.

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Jerom, none would have understood my Danish; nor would it have either head or tail, as every one must perceive from the other versions which have been made of the Psalter, of which all complain that, they are unintelligible, a necessary consequence of their having been verbally translated, and the sound having been followed, rather than the sense." "He that translates," he adds, "from Latin, Greek, or Hebrew, must do it so as to be understood by all who speak the language into which he translates; otherwise it were better for him to abstain from the undertaking, for those who read his translation will soon get weary of what they do not understand, and thereby grow careless about reading the Word of God."

The translation is considered by competent judges as being frequently too paraphrastic, and the expressions too generally accommodated to Christian sentiments for a Jewish writer, but it is remarkably pure in its language, considering the time when it was executed; and the learned Bishop Münter (Den Danske Reformations historie, II Deel. p. 73) assures us, that the works of Pedersen are worthy of a place among the Danish classics.

A still more important work was completed by the same author, in a translation of the NEW TESTAMENT into Danish, published at Antwerp, A. D. 1529. The title of it is, "DET NY TESTAMENT, &c." i. e. "The New Testament, containing the very words and Gospels which Jesus Christ himself preached and taught here on earth, and which his holy Apostles and Evangelists afterwards wrote,―now translated into proper Danish, and corrected, to the praise and honour of God, and the service and benefit of the common people, 1529." The form is small quarto, the paper better than that on which Mikkelsen's translation was printed, and a considerable improvement is observable in the typography. The punotuation is nearly the same, only, what is rather singular, there is seldom any full-stop to be met with. The

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parallel passages are referred to in the margin, by the specification of the chapter. It is entirely exempt from marginal glosses and observations: what the translator deemed necessary to add by way of explanation, he has inclosed within a parenthesis, or expressed paraphrastically in the version itself.

In the preface, which occupies eleven pages, he calls the inhabitants of Denmark, Sweden, and Norway, to thankfulness to God, for having sent them his holy and unadulterated Word, in their own language; adverts to its perversion by the priests and monks, and is very severe upon them for having kept it back from the common people; shewing them, in this respect, to be worse than the Jewish doctors and scribes themselves, who did not hinder Christ, when only twelve years of age, from asking them questions out of the book of the Law. His expressions are not quite so harsh as those made use of by Mikkelsen, in his Address; but the following extracts will shew the reader with how very little ceremony he treated the clerical order, and how zealous he was for the dissemination of Divine Truth, among all classes of "There are many proud clerks," says he "who have a high idea of themselves, and imagine that they have much Scripture-wisdom, and who foolishly maintain, that it is not lawful for any who do not understand Latin, whether they be noblemen, knights, or yeomen, peasants, handicraftsmen, women, or girls, to have the Gospels in their own language, or even so much as to see them. But which all good Christians now know to be an egregious falsehood; for Christ suffered death for the meanest clown or maiden, equally as for the most exalted emperor, king, pope, bishop, or prelate, that ever lived; and it is his pleasure that they should all be saved, the one as well as the other, for with him there is no respect of persons."-" They assert that the keys of the kingdom of heaven are committed unto them, and that they have

the exclusive right of binding and loosing; but Christ addresses them thus: Wo unto you, scribes and pharisees, hypocrites! for ye shut up the kingdom of heaven against men: for ye neither go in yourselves, neither suffer ye them that are entering to go in. Wo unto you, for ye devour widows' houses, and for a pretence make long prayers; therefore ye shall receive the greater damnation!" Matt. xxiii. 13, 14. And again, Wo unto you, scribes and pharisees, hypocrites! for ye pay tithe of mint, and anise, and cummin, and have omitted the weightier matters of the law, judgment, mercy, and faith: these ye ought to have done, and not to leave the other undone.' ver. 23. And St. Paul warns all to beware lest they should be deceived by the philosophy of such clerks; for they always oppose the Word of God, just as the scribes, pharisees, and hypocrites, the bishops and prelates, Caiaphas and Annas, opposed the word and preaching of Christ. Agreeably to the doctrines he taught, his disciples were not to aspire after worldly honours, riches, or power; and when he sent them out, he commanded them to teach gratis, saying, 'Freely ye have received, freely give. Nor did he himself neglect the common people, but, on the contrary, preached to them in the fields, deserts, and woods, to which many thousands flocked to hear him, and generally women, girls, and clowns, rather than clerks and others of a similar description."

To the preface is annexed a list of the Gospels and Epistles, as appointed to be read in the churches. The lives of the Evangelists are prefixed to their writings, and the contents of each book are briefly stated. The order in which the books are placed is nearly the same as in Luther's German version, except that the Epistle to the Hebrews is inserted between the Epistle to Philemon, and those of Peter, instead of following the Epistles of John, as in the editions by Luther; and although Pedersen has not altered the position of St. James's Epistle,

he has very strongly expressed his disapprobation of the manner in which Luther and Mikkelsen had spoken of it. "I cannot conceive," says he, in the preface, "how any should have the assurance to call this Epistle an Epistle of Straw, as if it were of no more value. Yet every Christian well knows that he was an Apostle of Christ, and spake by the Holy Spirit. But what the spirit is by which such speak, is best known to God, from whom nothing can be concealed, and by whom all are to be judged."

The version itself appears to have been raised on the foundation laid by Mikkelsen, though the translator has greatly improved the style, and been careful to banish all foreign words and idioms, and has introduced a superior system of orthography. But notwithstanding the excellencies of this translation, it is allowed to be sometimes too paraphrastic, and in some instances to be disfigured by the adoption of modern terms and phrases, inconsistent with the manners of the age in which the New Testament was written: thus Matt. xxvi. 17. is rendered "Sker Torsdag," "Maundy Thursday;" and xxvii. 6. xopßavav (Eng. "Treasury") is translated, "Thirken's-block,”—“The church-block,' i. e. a block of wood stuck into the ground, the upper end of which is hollowed out, so as to form a box, and firmly secured with iron, leaving a small opening at the top, through which alms are deposited for the poor. This kind of poor-box is very common all over the north of Europe, and is placed either at the church-door, the entrance to the church-yard, or at the road side adjoining to the church. Bastholm has adopted the same word in his translation of 1780.

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The way having been paved for its reception by a four years' circulation of Mikkelsen's version, this improved translation of Pedersen's was welcomed with joy, and read with the utmost avidity. In less than two years a