Life of John Coleridge Patteson : Missionary Bishop of the Melanesian Islands eBook

This eBook from the Gutenberg Project consists of approximately 1,026 pages of information about Life of John Coleridge Patteson .

Life of John Coleridge Patteson : Missionary Bishop of the Melanesian Islands eBook

This eBook from the Gutenberg Project consists of approximately 1,026 pages of information about Life of John Coleridge Patteson .
the opportunity comes, go on with these things, and I hope find them really useful.  I know you like to hear what I am doing; but be sure to keep it all quiet, let no one know but Father and Joan.  You might carelessly tell it to anyone in fun, and I don’t wish it to be known.  Especially don’t let any of the family know.  Time enough if I live out my Oxford year, and have really mastered the matter pretty well.  Remember this is taken up with a view to elucidate and explain what is so very hard in Hebrew.  Hebrew is to be the Hauptsache, this the Hulfsmittel, or some day I hope one of several such helps.  It is very important to accustom one’s mind to the Denk and Anschauungswerk of the Orientals, which is so different from that of Europeans or their language.  How hard are the metaphors of the Bible for this reason!’

There is something in all these long apologies and strenuous desire for secrecy about these Arabic studies that reminds one that the character was a self-conscious introspective one, always striving for humility, and dreading to be thought presumptuous.  A simpler nature, if devoid of craving for home sympathy, would never have mentioned the new study at all; or if equally open-hearted, would have let the mention of it among home friends take its chance, without troubling himself as to their possible comments.  Indeed, it is curious to observe how elaborate he was at this period about all his concerns, meditating over the cause of whatever affected him.  It was a form of growth; and dropped off when the time of action arrived, and his character had shaped itself.  It must be remembered, too, that his habit of pouring out all his reflections and feelings to his sisters, and their preservation of his letters, have left much more on record of these personal speculations than is common.

His father made a much simpler matter of the Arabic matter, in the following characteristic letter:—­

’Feniton Court:  September 14, 1852,

’My dearest Coley,—­So far from thinking you wrong in learning Arabic, I feel sure that you are quite right.  However, we shall keep your secret, and not say anything about it.  I am heartily glad that you should acquire languages, modern as well as ancient.  You know I have often pressed the former on your and Jem’s notice, from myself feeling my deficiency and regret at it.  I can well understand that Arabic, and I should suppose Syriac also, must be of the greatest use towards a true understanding of much of the Old Testament:  a great deal of which is doubtless not understood by those who understand only our translation, or even the Septuagint, which I suspect to have many passages far from a faithful vehicle of the meaning of the original.  I was greatly delighted with your theological letter, so to speak, as well as with the first, and look to have some jolly conversations with you on such subjects.

Copyrights
Project Gutenberg
Life of John Coleridge Patteson : Missionary Bishop of the Melanesian Islands from Project Gutenberg. Public domain.