for the original authorities--MSS., Versions, Patristic
quotations--the reader must of necessity consult the great works
of Lachmann, Tregelles, Tischendorf, and others, or the numerous
monographs on separate Books. /3 In the margin of the R.V. a
distinction is made between readings supported by "a few ancient
authorities," "some ancient authorities," "many ancient
authorities," and so on. Such valuation is not attempted in this
work.

12. Considerable pains have been bestowed on the exact
rendering of the tenses of the Greek verb; for by inexactness in
this detail the true sense cannot but be missed. That the Greek
tenses do not coincide, and cannot be expected to coincide with
those of the English verb; that--except in narrative--the aorist
as a rule is _more_ exactly represented in English by our perfect
with "have" than by our simple past tense; and that in this
particular the A.V. is in scores of instances more correct than
the R.V.; the present Translator has contended (with arguments
which some of the best scholars in Britain and in America hold to
be "unanswerable" and "indisputable") in a pamphlet _On the
Rendering into English of the Greek Aorist and Perfect_. Even an
outline of the argument cannot be given in a Preface such as
this.

13. But he who would make a truly _English_ translation
of a foreign book must not only select the right nouns,
adjectives, and verbs, insert the suitable prepositions and
auxiliaries, and triumph (if he can) over the seductions and
blandishments of idioms with which he has been familiar from his
infancy, but which, though forcible or beautiful with other