We left off last term, Gentlemen, upon a note of protest. We wondered why it should be that our English Version of the Bible lies under the ban of schoolmasters, Boards of Studies, and all who devise courses of reading and examinations in English Literature: that among our “prescribed books” we find Chaucer’s “Prologue,” we find Hamlet, we find Paradise Lost, we find Pope’s “Essay on Man,” again and again, but the Book of Job never; The Vicar of Wakefield and Gray’s “Elegy” often, but Ruth or Isaiah, Ecclesiasticus or Wisdom never. + 

I propose this morning: + 

to enquire into the reasons for this, so far as I can guess and interpret them; + 

to deal with such reasons as we can discover or surmise; + 

to suggest today, some simple first aid: and in another lecture, taking for experiment a single book from the Authorised Version, some practical ways of including it in the ambit of our new English Tripos. This will compel me to be definite: and as definite proposals invite definite objections, by this method we are likeliest to know where we are, and if the reform we seek be realisable or illusory. + 