happens to be accompanied with a feverish habit, the advan tages of this particular construction will be very important. 6 After this refpiratory process is over, the patient usually paffes the night without the leaft interruption from the cough, and feels no farther moleftation from it than, as I observed before, once or twice in the morning to throw off the trifling leakage which, unperceived, had dripped into the bronchia and veficles during the night; the thinner parts of which being evaporated, what remains is foon got rid of with a very gentle effort.' Mr. Mudge informs us, that if the inhaler be used the fame night that the catarrhous cough has made its appearance, it will, in ordinary cafes, be productive of an immediate cure ; but if the foreness of the respiratory organs, or the violence of the cough, fhew the cold which has been contracted to be very fevere, he advifes that the inhaler, without the opiate, should be repeated for the fame time the next morning; as it alfo ought, if the ufe of the inhaler has been delayed till the fecond night. If the cough however has continued fome days, it will be neceffary to employ both parts of the process at night and the fucceeding morning, as the complaint is then more confirmed. After trying various pectoral ingredients, Mr. Mudge informs us that he found the vapour of none of them fo inoffenfive and falutary as that from warm water alone. When the inhaler is ufed in a few hours after the feizure of the cough, we are told that the patient is infallibly furprised with an immediate cure; but in proportion as the application of this remedy is delayed, the diforder becomes more obftinate. If, fays our author, the patient expectorates with ease and freedom a thick and well-digefted inoffenfive phlegm, there is generally but little doubt of his spitting off the disorder, with common care, in a few days; and till that is accomplished, a proper dofe of elixir paregoricum for a few fucceffive nights will be found very useful in fuppreffing the fatiguing irritation and ineffectual cough, occafioned by a matter which, dripping in the early ftate of the disease into the bronchiæ during the night, is commonly at that time too thin to be dif charged by thofe convulfive efforts. If, however, notwithstanding a free and copious expectoration, the cough fhould ftill continue, and the discharge, inftead of removing the complaint, should itself, by becoming a disease, be a greater expence than the conftitution can well. fupport, it is poffible that a tender patient may fpit off his life through a weak, relaxed pair of lungs, without the leaft appearance of purulence, or any fufpicion of fuppuration. In thofe circumftances, befides, as was mentioned before, increafing the general perfpiration by the falutary friction of a flannel waistcoat, change of fituation, and more especially long journies on horseback, conducted as much as poffible through a thin, fharp, dry air, will feldom fail of removing the complaint. • But, on the contrary, if the cough fhould, at the fame time that it is petulant and fatiguing to the breaft, continue dry, husky, and without expectoration; provided there is reafon to hope that no tubercles are forming, or yet actually formed, there is not perhaps a more efficacious remedy for it than half a drachm of gum ammoniacum, with eighteen or twenty drops of laudanum made into pills, and taken at bedtime, and occafionally repeated. This excellent remedy fir John Pringle did me the honour to communicate to me, and I have accordingly found it, in a great many inftances, amazingly fuccessful, and generally very expeditiously fo, for it feldom fails to produce an expectoration, and to abate the diftreffing fatigue of the cough. In thofe circumstances I have likewise found the common remedy of gfs. or ii. of bals. fulph. anifat. taken twice a day, in a little powdered sugar, or any other vehicle, a very efficacious one. I have also, many times, known a falutary revulfion made from the lungs by the fimple application of a large plaifter, about five or fix inches. diameter, of pix Burgund. between the shoulders; for the perfpirable matter, which is locked up under it, becomes fo fharp and acrid, that in a few days it feldom fails to produce a very confiderable itching, fome little tendency to inflammation, and, very frequently, a great number of boils. This application fhould be continued (the plaifter being occafionally changed) for three weeks, or a month, or longer, if the complaint is not fo foon removed.' When we confider the frequency of the catarrhous cough in this climate, and that it often lays the foundation of obftinate and fatal complaints, we cannot but receive uncommon fatisfaction from the account of a method of cure, so eafy, fimple, and fuccefsful as that which is here defcribed. Befides an explicit detail of the use of the inhaler, and the circumstances in which it is indicated, Mr. Mudge has occafionally prefented his readers with many valuable remarks on pulmonary diforders in general; to which is annexed an ingenious theoretical treatife on the vis vita, fo far as it is concerned in preferving or reinftating the health of an animal. VOL. XLVI. Dec. 1778. E e Ifaiah Ifaiah. A new Tranflation; with a Preliminary Differtation, and Notes critical, philological, and explanatory. By Robert Lowth, D. D. F. R. SS. Lond. and Goettin. Lord Bishop of London. 410. 18s. boards. Cadell. [Continued from p. 334-1 IT T is univerfally allowed, that a tranflation fhould be an exact reprefentation of the original. But the means, by which this is to be performed, are not fo generally ascertained. Some are advocates for paraphraftic verfions; and pretend, that Horace countenances this opinion, when he says, De Art. Poet. v. 133. • Nec verbum verbo curabis reddere, fidus Interpres." But in this paffage the author is fpeaking of tragic poets, not. of translators, If, fays he, you take your fable from Homer, you must not follow the original in every minute circumstance, and give us word for word: this is the business of a faithful tranflator, not of a poet. Horace therefore does not here exprefs his disapprobation of a literal tranflation, but rather the contrary. At leaft, his authority is abfurdly produced in favour of vague and paraphraftic verfions. Cicero tranflated two orations of Efchines and Demofthenes; and he tells us, that in this performance he pursued the following plan: Nec converti ut interpres, fed ut orator, fententiis iifdem, & earum formis, tanquam figuris, verbis ad noftram confuetudinem aptis, in quibus non verbum pro verbo neceffe habui reddere, fed genus omnium verborum, vimque fervavi: non enim ea me annumerare lectori putavi oportere, fed appendere *. What liberties Cicero took on this occafion we do not know; for his tranflations are loft. But we must remember, that his plan,, admitting it to be right, cannot be purfued in all cafes with equal propriety. He tranflated as an orator;' and confequently might be allowed to deviate from the original, in order to exprefs himself with more energy, grace, and harmony. St. Jerom quotes this paffage as a juftication of his usual practice in tranflating. Profiteor me, fays he, non verbum è verbo, fed fenfum exprimere de fenfu.' 'And he gives us a reafon for this practice: Si ad verbum interpretor, abfurdè refonat.' But then he very properly adds: Si ob neceffitatem aliquid in ordine, vel in fermone mutavero, ab interpretis videbor officio receffiffe +. * Cic. de Opt. Gen. Orat. § 14. Hieron. de Opt. Gen. interpretandi, vol. ii. p. 366. A mo A modern author of reputation totally difclaims the idea of a literal translation. To tranflate, says he, fervilely into modern language an ancient author, phrase by phrase, and word by word, is prepofterous. Nothing can be more unlike the original than fuch a copy. It is not to fhew, it is to disguise the author; and he who has known him only in this dress, would not know him in his own. A good writer inftead of taking this inglorious and unprofitable task upon him will joûter contre original,' rather imitate than tranflate, and rather emulate than imitate. He will transfufe the fenfe and fpirit of the original into his own work; and will endeavour to write, as the ancient author would have done, had he written in the fame language +. These principles, we confefs, are ufually obferved by the generality of tranflators; but they are principles, which admit of great latitude, and fhould be purfued with the utmost caution in tranflating the fcriptures. Here, if we strike out into a paraphraftic verfion, and imitate rather than tranflate,' we fhall probably mifreprefent the author's meaning, and pursue a phantom of our own creation. If we obferve Cicero's rule, making use of terms and phrafes adapted to the prefent mode,' we deftroy, at least, one of the distinguishing characteristics of fcripture, its apxaïques, its air of antiquity; and alter its lineaments; as a painter, who compli ments a lady of fixty with a face of thirty. If we attempt to give it any rhetorical embellishments, we diveft the facred authors of that plain and primitive cloathing, which is fuitable to their venerable characters; and imitate the conduct of Herod, who arrayed our Saviour in gorgeous robes, and thus exposed him to derision. What courfe fhall we then purfue? There is no way but one. The most literal tranfation is the beft, where the language will bear it, and the fenfe and fpirit of the author can be fully expreffed. A paraphrafe fhould never be admitted, but when a literal tranflation is impracticable; and this we will venture to say, is very feldom the cafe in tranflating into the English language. We entirely agree with this learned and judicious writer, when he says, The first and principal bufinefs of a tranflator is to give the plain literal and grammatical fenfe of his author i the obvious meaning of his words, parafes, and fentences, and to exprefs them in the language into which he tranflates, as far as may be, Boileau. Boling. on Hift. p. 63. in equivalent words, phrafes, and fentences. Whatever indul gence may be allowed him in other respects; however excufeable he may be, if he fail of attaining the elegance, the fpirit, the fublimity of his author; which will generally be in fome degree the cafe, if his author excells at all in those qualities; want of fidelity admits of no excufe, and is intitledto no indulgence. This is peculiarly fo in fubjects of high importance, fuch as the Holy Scriptures, in which fo much depends on the phrafe and expreffion; and particularly in prophetical books of Scripture; where from the letter are often deduced deep and recondite fenfes, which muft owe all their weight and folidity to the juft and accurate interpretation of the words of the prophecy. For whatever fenfes are fuppofed to be included in the prophet's words, fpiritual, myftical, allegorical, analogical, or the like, they must all intirely depend on the literal fenfe. This is the only foundation upon which fuch interpretations can be fecurely raised; and if this is not firmly and well established, all that is built upon it will fall to the ground.' The author illuftrates this obfervation by the following example. • IF DUD NIN♫, If. li. 20. does not fignify WS CEUTICK slov, like parboiled bete, as the lxx. render it, but like an oryx, (a large, fierce, wild beaft) in the toils; what becomes of Theodoret's explication of this image? Καθευδονίες ὡς σευτλίον ἡμιεφθον] Εδειξεν αυτων δια μέν τε ύπνε το ράθυμον, δια δε τ8 λαχανε το ανανδρον. According to this interpretation the prophet would exprefs the drowfinefs and flaccidity, the flothfulness and want of fpirit, of his countrymen. Whereas his idea was impotent rage, and obftinate violence, fubdued by a fuperior power; the Jews taken in the fnares of their own wickednefs, ftruggling in vain, till overspent and exhaufted they fink under the weight of God's judgments. And Procopius's explication of the fame paffage, according to the rendering of the words by Aquila, Symmachus, and Theodotion, which is probably the true one, is almost as foreign to the purpofe: "He compares, faith he, the people of Jerufalem to the oryx, that is to a bird; because they are taken in the fnares of the devil, and therefore are delivered over to wrath." Such ftrange and abfurd deductions of notions and ideas, foreign to the author's drift and defign, will often arife from the invention of commentators, who have nothing but an inaccurate tranflation to work upon. This was the cafe of the generality of the fathers of the Chriftian church, who wrote comments on the Old Teftament: and it is no wonder, that we find them of little fervice in leading us into the true meaning. and the deep fenfe of the prophetical writings.' It being then a tranflator's indifpenfible duty faithfully and religiously to exprefs the fenfe of his author, he ought to take great care that he proceed upon just principles of criticifm 3 |