Note 85 — CONRAD AND WALBURGA. CHAPTER II. (continued 2)

The natural history and topography of the 1611 Bible are ludicrously incorrect, because they abandoned the Vulgate and translated at random. Yet the Vulgate was translated from the Septuagint, and revised in the Holy Land by St. Jerome with the aid of Jewish scholars who knew the geography and natural history of the country. The Septuagint was made in Egypt, while Hebrew was still the language of the nation, by men thoroughly acquainted with their native country. Was it not sheer madness for gentlemen in England in the seventeenth century, with a mere smattering of Hebrew, to think that they could render geographical and zoölogical terms more accurately? Is not their presumption the real matter to be sneered at?