For a long time the sentiment of the churches in Kentucky was strongly opposed to any new translation or revision of the Scriptures. The “Living Oracles,” a translation made by George Campbell, James Macknight and Philip Doddridge reprinted from London editions in a cheap form by Alexander Campbell, in 1826, was distributed by agents among the early churches of the Reformation, but was not generally read or accepted. I had in my library, till very recently, a dozen or more copies of the first edition of the work, left in the hands of my teacher, who had been an agent for its sale. I gave them away to curious readers, who prized them chiefly for their age. They had been printed about seventy years. For the more reading of that book John Smith was arraigned before the North District Association in 1827. He was formally charged, not only with reading it in his family, but actually quoting it from the pulpit. During the discussion of that serious charge some of the good old preachers present declared King James’ Bible to be the only true word of God. John Smith in reply expressed his deep sympathy for the poor Dutch, who consequently had no word of God among them, and could not read it if they had. A prominent clergyman had, just before this, obtained a copy of the book, and, having read it, atoned for his offense by piously burning it to ashes.In 1862 Benjamin Franklin, while on a visit to Flemingsburg, Ky., called on Henry T. Anderson. who was then preaching there, and at the same time teaching a school. Anderson had been a close student of the Greek and Hebrew for thirty years. Noting many inaccuracies in the common version, he conceived the idea of making a thoroughly new translation, rather than a mere revision of the New Testament. He had already written a few chapters from Matthew’s Gospel, which he now read to Franklin. The latter was so much pleased with them that he insisted that the work so well begun, should go on to completion; and he asked for and obtained the manuscript which he had read, for publication in the American Christian Review.Thus encouraged, Anderson went earnestly to work with a zeal that seemed to absorb his every thought and feeling. He was thoroughly possessed with the spirit of authorship. He forwarded his first chapters to the Review, and at the same time wrote to me, asking me to read and to criticise them unsparingly. Anderson was one of the finest of Greek scholars; his mind, from long, close study of the original, was saturated with Greek idiom. and the original texts were as transparent as crystal to his understanding. But for that very reason, perhaps, he was not critical in the niceties of the English. I complied with his request, and suggested a few verbal changes in the chapters already published. The result of our correspondence was a determination on his part to remove at once to Harrodsburg, that I might join him “in making,” as he said, “a translation that should be faithful to the Greek and faultless in its English.”