have invariably provided it. I am also very grateful to Mr G. H. Elliot, Mr I. R. Guild, Professor R. M. Hare, and Mr P. W. Simpson for much good counsel and practical help that they have given me during the last few years. In acknowledging my indebtedness to all those already named in this paragraph, I wish, however, to make it quite clear that, in compliance with my father’s instructions, I have always, in the last resort, been guided by my own editorial judgement, and am solely responsible for all that I have done.
My friends Professor Barbour, Emeritus Professor David Daiches, Mr Michael Grieve, Mr W. G. Henderson, and Sir Thomas Smith all have so many other responsibilities that, had I initially foreseen how much hard work it would cost us to found and establish the W. L. Lorimer Memorial Trust Fund, I might perhaps have forborne to invite them to accept office as its Trustees; and I cannot sufficiently thank them for all the help they have given me in raising the funds required to finance the production and publication of this memorial volume. In expressing our gratitude to all those who graciously permitted us to name them as Patrons or Sponsors of our Appeal, we wish particularly to mention the supererogatory services so willingly rendered by Dr Jean Balfour, Dr Cant, Sir Kenneth Dover, Dr David Russell, and, not least, Lady Stormonth-Darling. A list of all donors who have not chosen to remain anonymous will be found at the end of this book. In expressing our heartfelt gratitude to all those who have responded to our Appeal, it would be invidious, however, to single any of them out for special mention; and we wish merely to say that, although we have most gratefully received some quite substantial donations, we have been no less grateful for many widows’ mites whose donors, we dare say, could ill afford to make them. It remains to be recorded that we are also very grateful to Mr R. E. Pears, the W. L. Lorimer Memorial Trust Fund’s Honorary Treasurer, for all the advice and assistance that he has so willingly provided, to Mr T. K. Fleming for having so generously helped us to launch our Appeal, and to Mr Alastair M. Dunnett for having so productively promoted it.
Soon after my father handed his manuscripts over to me, I deposited them in the National Library of Scotland for safe-keeping; and I wish to express my gratitude to Professor W. R. Beattie, Professor E. F. D. Roberts, Mr James Ritchie, and Dr T. I. Rae for all their courteous and efficient co-operation. Grateful acknowledgement is also due to the British Academy for permission to print the extract from Mr David Murison’s statement quoted on p. xv.
For much helpful professional advice and assistance I am especially indebted to my friends and colleagues Mr Ruari McLean, Mr Christopher Maclehose, Mr George Thomson, Mrs Stephanie Wolfe Murray, and Mr Charles Wild; and in recording my gratitude to Clark Constable (1982) Ltd for the readiness with which their compositors, readers and managers have always responded to my exorbitant editorial demands, I wish particularly to thank my friends Mr K. G. Dickson and Mr L. Mair for all the trouble they have taken. Most editors can seldom have been so well served by their printers as I have been by mine.
To Miss Sally Glover, Dr W. J. Irvine, Dr J. S. A. Sawers, and all other members of the National Health Service whose care and skill saved me from going blind four years ago, I can only say:
Non è l’ affezion mia tanto profonda
che basti a render voi grazia per grazia:
ma quei che vede e puote a ciò risponda.
Elsewhere22 Dante shortly defines “the vernacular speech” as “that which we acquire without any rule, by imitating our nurses”; and I wish penultimately to record my lifelong gratitude to my dear nurse Gregor for having, inter alia, familiarised me in childhood with our “nobler speech”. In conclusion, I cannot, however, find words sufficient to thank my wife Priscilla for all the help and encouragement that she has abundantly supplied from her store of grace.
Edinburgh
17 February 1983
R. L. C. LORIMER
POSTSCRIPT, Strathtummel, 30 January 1985. The text here printed has been collated with my father’s manuscripts and supersedes those printed in the first three impressions.
I am particularly grateful to Professor G. P. Henderson, for having supplied several corrections, and to Dr A. R. Rennie, formerly Registrar General of Scotland, for having pointed out that in the first impression the genealogy printed on p. 105 contains no record of Isaac’s birth.
R. L. C. L.
THE NEW TESTAMENT
SIGLA
R=MS. Variants written on recto pages.
L=MS. Alternative Renderings written on previous verso pages.
Superior Arabic numerals in printed text refer to Notes contained in Appendix III (below, pp. 457 ff.). All passages stigmatised in the Translator’s manuscript are here enclosed in double square brackets [[ ]].
MATTHEW’S GOSPEL
1 GENEALOGIE O JESUS CHRIST, the son o Dauvit, the son o Abraham: Abraham wis the faither o Isaac; Isaac o Jaucob; Jaucob o Judah an his brithers; Judah o Perez an Zârah, bi Tâmar; Perez o Hezron; Hezron o Ram; Ram o Ammínadab; Ammínadab o Nahshon; Nahshon o Salma; Salma o Boaz, bi Râhab; Boaz o Obed, bi Ruth; Obed o Jessè; Jessè o Kíng Dauvit.
Dauvit wis the faither o Solomon, bi Uríah’s wife; Solomon o Rehoboam; Rehoboam o Abíjah; Abíjah o Asa; Asa o Jehoshaphat; Jehoshaphat o Joram; Joram o Azaríah; Azaríah o Jotham; Jotham o Ahaz; Ahaz o Hezekíah; Hezekíah o Manasseh; Manasseh o Amon; Amon o Josíah; Josíah o Jechoníah an his brithers, at the time o the Cairriein-Awà tae Babylon.
Efter the Cairriein-Awà, Jechoníah wis the faither o Shealtiel; Shealtiel o Zerubbabel; Zerubbabel o Abíud; Abíud o Elíakim; Elíakim o Azor; Azor o Zâdok; Zâdok o Achim; Achim o Elíud; Elíud o Eleâzar; Eleâzar o Matthan; Matthan o Jaucob; Jaucob o Joseph, the husband o Mary, the mither o Jesus, at is caa’d Christ. Sae there is fowrteen generâtions in aa frae Abraham til Dauvit; fowrteen frae Dauvit til the Cairriein-Awà tae Babylon; an fowrteen frae the Cairriein-Awà til Christ.
THIS IS THE storie o the birth o Jesus Christ. His mither Mary wis trystit til Joseph, but afore they war mairriet she wis fund tae be wi bairn bi the Halie Spírit. Her trystit husband Joseph, honest man, hed nae mind tae affront her afore the warld an wis for brakkin aff their tryst hidlinweys; an sae he wis een ettlin tae dae, whan an angel o the Lord kythed til him in a draim an said til him, “Joseph, son o Dauvit, be nane feared tae tak Mary your trystit wife intil your hame; the bairn she’s cairriein is o the Halie Spírit. She will beir a son, an the name ye ar tae gíe him is Jesus, for he will sauf his fowk frae their sins.”
Aa this happent at the wurd spokken bi the Lord throu the Prophet micht be fufilled:
Behaud, the virgin will bouk an beir a son,
an they will caa his name Immanuel—
that is, “God wi us”.
Whan he hed waukit frae his sleep, Joseph did as the angel hed bidden him, an tuik his trystit wife hame wi him. But he bedditna wi her or she buir a son; an he caa’d the bairn Jesus.
2 JESUS WIS BORN at Bethlehem in Judaea i the days o Kíng Herod, an it wis nae time efter his birth or a curn spaemen frae the Aist cam tae Jerusalem an begoud speirin, “Whaur is the Kíng o Jews
