and most of them are now rare: it is by no means certain that the text of the Hymns, as published in 1712, did not appear in his lifetime. But this, at least, is certain, that in 1712, little more than a year after the Bishop's death, published by Charles Brome, in which the text of the Нymns was given by him, and upon his authority, exactly as it stands in the "Book of Praise," (except that, in the twenty-first line of the Morning Hymn, the old reading, "I wake, I wake," was still retained; the correction, or substitution, of "Awake, Awake," being first made in a later edition;) and, at the same time, the advertisement of 1705, repudiating as spurious the Hymns of the "Conference," and stating that "the genuine are to be had only of Charles Brome," &c., was repeated, as it continued to be in still later editions.
The text of 1712, without any further change, (except that just noticed), was repeated in every later edition of the "Manual;" that of 1697—1709 never afterwards re-appearing, until brought forward in Mr. Anderdon's biography:—nor does it appear that any exception was ever, until now, taken to the authenticity of Brome's text of 1712, and of the subsequent editions, notwithstanding the fact, that several of the readings of the original text of the Morning and Evening Hymns, which had been altered in 1712, have continued to be current in popular hymn-books down to the present day.
The theory of those who now of this text must be, that Brome, the proprietor of the copyright, who was most interested in maintaining the credit and value of the genuine text, and who was so prompt to resent and expose its corruption by another hand, was himself guilty of largely corrupting it—for no conceivable motive—as soon as the Bishop was in his grave; and that the original and only genuine text was suppressed by him, once for all, without objection or remonstrance from any one, and with the acquiescence of everybody even at Winchester College, where the "Manual" must have been in most frequent demand and use, and where the original text of the Hymns was familiarly known. This opinion seems to me to be contrary to
