Notes on the Study of the Bible among our Forefathers. 85 Taliesin and Aneurin, though they may have been contempo rary with him, and acquainted with the sacred writings, did no more than patch some shreds of Christianity on the Druidic superstitions (cf. Palgrave, Engl. Commonwealth, I. 155). Of Gildas, then, we must inquire as to the progress which the British Church had made in studying the Bible. Nothing need be said of the Historia Britonum: but the declamatory work, entitled his Epistola, is full of extracts from the Old and New Testaments. He finds a series of invectives and remon- strances in Genesis, Exodus, Deuteronomy, 1 Samuel, 2 Samuel, 1 Kings, 2 Kings, 2 Chronicles, Job, Psalms, Proverbs, Ecclesi- astes, Isaiah, Jeremiah, Lamentations, Ezekiel, Hosea, Joel, Amos, Micah, Habakkuk, Zephaniah, Haggai, Zechariah, Mala- chi : St Matthew, St John, Acts, Romans, 1 and 2 Corinthians, Galatians, Ephesians, Philippians, Colossians, 1 Thessalonians, 1 and 2 Timothy, Titus, Hebrews, 1 and 2 St Peter : and also in the Books of Esdras, Ecclesiasticus and Wisdom. Many of these extracts tally with the version of St Jerome : others with the Old Italic (or at least the " Versio Antiqua," printed in Sabatier) : but in some few cases they are considerably different from both. The reason of this multiplicity of versions has been pointed out by St Augustine (De Doctrina Christiana, Lib. n. c. xi. 16). One instance is subjoined : Vulgata Nova. Gildas. Rom. i. 21, 22. ' Quia cum cognovissent Deum, * Quia quum cognoverunt Deum, non sicut Deum glorificaverunt aut non sicut Deum magnificaverunt, gratias egerunt ; sed evanuerunt in aut gratias egerunt ; sed evanue- cogitationibus suis et obscuratum runt in cogitationibus suis et oc- est insipiens cor eorum, dicentes csecatum est insipiens cor eorum: enim se esse sapientes stulti facti dicentes se esse sapientes, stulti sunt.' facti sunt/ The 'Versio Antiqua ' only dif- In omitting enim, Gildas adheres fers in reading cognoverunt for closely to the Greek, cfxio-Kovres cognovissent. (hat cro^oi k.t.. I have remarked in this case, and in others also where various readings occur in the Epistles of St Paul, that Gildas had before him the same text as Pseudo-Ambrose and Sedulius, of whom the latter was most probably an Irishman (cf v Cave, Hist. Liter, ad an. 818).
