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IV
PREFACE
'
syllabic scripts, and many others-is given nt the end
of the book.
These details are but the prose of a great vision–
the vision of learned scholars poring over the H ebrew
and Greek originals : of patient, painstaking pioneers
in all parts of Christ's Church, listening to strange
words, reducing them to · order, an.d then to \ovriting,
so that
all
men may receive God's Message, each in
his mother-tongue.
In these specimens philologists
will find materials for the comparison of cognate or
diverse forms of speech. But to the Bible Society th ey
stand for over
328
millions of books distributed all
over the earth during the last 118 years. They picture
multitudes of mankind receiving their first and their
increasing knowledge of God from such printed pages.
They bear witness to the marvellous fact that no tongue,
the most crude or the most refined, has yet been
discovered into which it has been found impossible
to translate that Gospel which is the common property
of the human race. And they speak of a work which
is always progressing. Once every six or seven weeks
son1e fresh language is added to the list. When we
include those versions of Scripture published by other
agencies, there are now about
700
formf:t of human
speech in which sorne portion of the Bible has been
printed in order to tell men of the love of God.
THE BIBLE
HousE, LoMDON,
August,
1922.
R.
KILGOUR,
Editorial Superintendent.