BIBLE SOCIETY. A religious society, hav ing exclusively for its object the translation and diffusion of the Sacred Scriptures. Such asso ciations must he regarded as a natural form of expression of Christian benevolence, acting ac cording to the principles of Protestantism. and seeking to take advantage of the facilities afforded by the art of printing: but a long period elapsed after the Reformation before a Bible soci ety was formcd—during xvhich, hOWPVer, an ex tensive diffusion of the Scriptures took place, and partly by the agency of associations which in cluded it among other means for the advancement of Christianity. ItnecessaK,ily became, along with the translation of the Scriptures, one of the ob jects to which missionary societies directed their energy. But perhaps the first association ever formed for the sole and specific purpose of pro viding copies of the Scriptures for those who were destitute of them was that founded by Baron Ilildebrand von Canstein, an intimate friend of Simonet-. in conjunction with Franeke at II .ale, which, down to 1834, when other Bible societies were beginning to make their ap pearance in Germany, had distributed 2,754,350 copies of the Bible and about 2,000,000 collies of the New Testament. The impulse, however, to the formation of the Bible societies now exist ing in all parts of Protestant Christendom pro ceeded from England, where in 1780 an asso ciation was formed for the distribution of Bibles among soldiers and sailors. it was at first simply called Bible Society': it exists at the present day, and is now known as the Naval and 'Military Bible Society, and, confining itself to its original specific object, has accomplished much good. It is not an uninteresting circum stance that, the first ship in which Bibles were distributed by this society was the ill-fated Roma qcoryc. In the beginning of 1792 a similau association was formed in London, un der the name of the French Bible Society. with a similar limited and specified object of dis tributing Bibles in the French tongue. It was probably the attitude assumes] by infidelity in France which gave occasion to the formation of this society. hut the greater part of its funds, having been remitted to Paris for the printing of the Bible there, was lost, and everything belong ing to the Society destroyed in the tumult of the Revolution. It was not till 1802 that the first steps were taken toward the formation of the Barrisim AND Foam>: Minx SOCIETY, the parent of a multitude of similar institutions. and the establishment of which must be regarded as a great epoch in the history of this braneb of Christ hum beneficence: nom- was the Society fully organized and established till March 7. 1804. Its fOl'Illat ION took place in consequenee of the deep impression made maw the mind of the 'Rev. Thomas Charles, of Bala. in \Vales, by the desti• tut ion of the Sacred Scriptures which he found to exist in the sphere of his labors, and particularly by a eireumstance strikingly illustrative of that destitution. Sleeting a little girl. 'Mary .Jones a name had in lining remembrance by the friends of Bible Societies—lie inquired if she eonld re peat the text from which he had preaehed on the preceding Sunday. Instead of giving a prompt reply. as she had been accustomed to do, she re mained silent. and then, weeping, told him that the weather had been so bad she could not get to read the Bible. She had been accustomed to travel every week seven miles over the hills to a place where she could obtain access to the Welsh Mr. Charles, on his next visit to London, brought the subject of the want of 'Bibles in Wales to the notice of the of the Religious Tract Society (q.v.), when it was suggested by Sir.
Hughes, a member of the committee, that a society might be formed for the purpose of sup plyMg Bibles, not only in Wales, hut wherever destitution existed throughout the world. The Society was constituted on the widest possible basis, Churchmen and Dissenters being alike in cluded in it and soon attained a greatness cor m esiamding with that of the other religious societies, the London :Missionary Society (see SlIssioNs), and the Religious Traet Society, which had been formed on similar principles a few years before. It was indeed able to ex pend only about £619 in the first year of its existence, but its annual income gradually in creased to an average of £70,000, and in 1875-76 it amounted to £116,802, derived from the dona tions, legacies. collections, etc.. and applicable to the general purposes of the Society, besides £10`1 for a special object (the 'Roxburghe fund'), and £105,410 derived from sales of Bibles and Testa ments, abstraets. monthly reports, etc., show ing the net receipts for the year to be £222,320. Auxiliary and branch societies and dependent as sociations rapidly sprang up in all parts of Great Britain and in the Colonies, the number of which at present amounts to between 5000 and 6000. Large sums have, of course, been spent by the British and Foreign Bible Society for the diffu sion of the Authorized English Version of the Bible. The fundamental law of the Society has, up to the present time, restricted it to the publi cation of this version only in English; but a change in its constitution has now been made, by which the Revised Version can hereafter be pub lished. It has also spent large sums in printing and circulating the Scriptures in the different Celtic languages spoken in Great Britain and Ire land. It has developed an effective system of agencies for thoroughly meeting the needs of Great Britain. The foreign department of this work has gradually become, with the progress of missions, one of its chief functions. it stands ready to print the translations of the Bible prepared by missionaries and offered for publication, and in many cases has been forward to initiate the undertaking of such translations. The translation, printing, or distribution of the whole or part of the I3ible has been promoted by the Society directly in 296 languages or dialects, and indirectly in 67: a total of 363. Its list now contains the Bible in 100 languages, complete New Testaments in 100 more. and some portion of the Scriptures in more than 150 others. To print these. over 50 different styles of eharae turs are required. The payments made by the Society for the services of translators, revisers, and proof-readers amounted in this last fiscal year to about £4,000. The extent of its opera tions can be measured in some degree by its is sues. These, during tile last two years, were: The total issues for the Society for the 97 years since its foundation in 1804 amount to nearly 170,000.0011 copies. Its income for the same year reached an aggregate of £221,535. 6 shillings, and 6 pence. These stupendous figures become still more impressive by a closer survey of its work in various foreign mission-fields of the world, where the Society maintains agents to direct its opera tions. These operations are now conducted on a scale practically coextensive with the advancing tide of modern missionary conquest, so that wher ever the missionary goes, and sometimes before he goes, the eolporteur is found at his task of Scripture distribution.