Excerpt from The Holy Bible, Vol. 1: Containing the Old and New Testaments With the Apocryphal Books

In the commentary however the case is far otherwise. Here some copies so differ from others, that it is only in the first twenty or thirty psalms that any correspondence is found beyond an occasional trace of a common original. In the Mss. Of the earlier text the commentary is brief; in those of the latter it extends to three or four times the bulk, and in respect to the greater part of the work may be regarded as an entirely new exposition. To a Ms. In the Bodleian Library, containing the shorter comment, some verses are prefixed, which give several curious particulars of its history. The verses as well as the Ms. Appear to be of the time of Henry the Sixth 0. The writer states in them, that the work was undertaken at the request of dame Margaret Kirkby, a recluse, probably at Hampole; that the autograph copy of the author was still remaining at the nunnery, attached by chains to his tomb; that the writer's own Ms. Was a faithful transcript from the original; and that many copies in ordinary use had been corrupted by the Lollards. Upon examination, however, the enlarged 00m mentary appears to contain no controversial matter, nor any sentiments indicative of the Lollard party. Indeed, a few passages of the shorter exposition, which reflect upon the luxury and worldliness of the higher clergy, are altogether omitted or greatly softened down. The character of these and like passages led Humphrey Wanley to ascribe the more compendious comment to Wycliffe himself in his younger days°. If Wanley's notion be received, it will be necessary to suppose that the larger com mentary was composed by Wycliffe - in later life, or what is perhaps not less probable, by one of the more moderate of his followers. One cannot, however, refuse to credit the main facts averred in the verses just quoted from the Bodl. Ms and it seems therefore more likely, that the copy to which Wanley particularly referred, agreeing as it does with this Ms. Except in a few unimportant variations, represents substan tially the original of rollep.

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