Rev A Brandram No.24
Madrid, 27th October 1848
My Dear Friend,
Your letter of the 9th inst. came duly to hand, as did also its precursor of the 18th of September. The former date inclined me to the understanding that I should soon leave this city and country, and the latter found me, in consequence, placing a Stone and an Inscription over Remains dear and affecting to my remembrance, and enhanced perhaps by the thought that I should soon take the last look at that sacred spot until the Lord come.
Your Resolution for my remaining is, we ought to think, of God, and the result of our prayers for his heavenly direction. We may, and I hope shall, seeing this idea justified in visible results. But yet God works often without showing us what he is doing.
I feel, I assure you, greatly thankful to God, and most kindly towards yourself and all the Committee, for the very friendly and favourable manner in which you have spoken of my poor movements and labours in this wilderness. Also, I feel in a similar way, as to your leaving me without any special directions, in the confidence, as you kindly say, that I "will do the very best that circumstances will admit of." It is my earnest prayer to God every day, and more than daily, that he would enable me so to do. I have also, I doubt not, your continued help in prayer. This is all we earthen, and earthly vessels can do. God only is the worker, and the producer of results.
I am glad, at such a time as this, to be able to give you a little encouragement. Soon after my reaching this city I learned that the subject of Religious Liberty had just been debated and advocated extensively in the two leading daily newspapers published here. One was for, and the other of course against this great act of Justice, Wisdom, and Good Policy. But the opposition was the means leading the advocate of the measure to fuller statements on the subject than otherwise he would have given. In these articles and defence of Religious Liberty there is an openness, a fullness, and the launching out into the subject, and I may add a compromise of the political party concerned, such as have never been seen or read before in this country.
I rejoice in these articles, and give thanks to God for them; and begin to think, that the night is far spent with us, and that our Spanish Bible day is near at hand. I have made it my business to see, and through suitable introductions, the writer of these articles, who is the chief Editor and Proprietor of the Journal. I have signified to him how honourable to himself these articles are, and how useful to this country, and have a gratifying they will prove to all truly enlightened people in England and other foreign countries, intimating to him at the same time, that I had taken measures for their being translated into English, and published in a London newspaper. I have grounds to believe that my visit and communications were acceptable, and may prove useful. This is one of the little ways I which perhaps I follow up my mission, and do as I can. – The newspapers containing the articles in question I have sent to England, and they will be translated by Mr. Rule, and printed in The Christian Times, a lately started Weekly Paper which you can see.
As to a plan and purposes of operations I have as yet formed none, but shall only apprise you of such when projected. In the meantime I have lost little as to travelling in the coming to this city, as our weather is singularly unfavourable. For more than a month past we have had quite winter weather, everybody fully wrapped up in their cloaks in the streets, frequent rains, a low thermometer, and even some frost and snow. This premature winter is noticed in all our journals.
I have, since my return to Madrid got acquainted with a Bible priest, rather a phenomenon in this country. But yet I believe there are many such in Spain. At present we cannot see them, but Religious Liberty will bring them out, and they will be our coadjutors. This Priest is a Bible man in two senses, for not only is he favourable to the diffusion and use of the Scriptures, but he is also a learned man in the original of the Old Testament. He is Professor of Hebrew in the University of Madrid, and has read the Hebrew Scriptures for 20 years. He some time ago finished a translation of the book of Psalms, on which he was occupied more or less for 13 years. This translation is now in my hands, and is entirely at your disposal. I have looked into this work with some attention, and with much interest. I like it much. It is close, clear, and elegant. It is accompanied by some notes by way of justifying the renderings he has given and in these the Vulgate is handled very freely, and with no deference to it.
When we have Religious Liberty in Spain, the appearance of this work in print will form quite an era in Spanish Biblical Criticism and advanced translation. It is necessary that it should first appear with the justifying notes, but afterwards you could print the text alone, and you would have the author's fullest consent for the same. – Before I leave this Bible and Biblical Spanish priest I must add of him, that he is perhaps the most advanced man in favor of Religious Liberty in Spain; and he is not a private friend to it merely, as some are, but an open bold advocate and herald of it. He was a member of Congress in 1837, and then and there boldly declared his views, and earnestly advocated the measure. He had few coadjutors, and was opposed by many, and more especially by one of great power at that time, and whose advocacy, he said, would have carried the measure. That opponent is now in banishment, and wandering in foreign lands, having by flight at Seville made his escape when on the way to the Philippine Islands, "where angry Spain sends her outcast sons."
We have another Bible and Biblical man in Spain. It is our friend Usoz. He has had the very best education Spain can afford, and three years at Bologna in Italy added to it. The Hebrew was an early object of attention to him, and he was a fellow student with the gentleman I have noticed, and both ordered that the same time a Hebrew Bible and Lexicon from Paris when neither were to be found in Spain. The Greek is as well known to our friend as the Hebrew. His daily occupation is the translation of the Holy Scriptures, both of the Old and New Testament, and to which he considers himself called in the Providence of God. I have just now under my hand for examination, the first eight chapters of St. Luke. – It is a curious circumstance that these two Bible and Biblical friends of old should have become unacquainted with each other, and that your foreign Bible messenger should be the means of renewing that acquaintanceship. Perhaps they may henceforth labour in union in the great work of giving to Spain an improved version in its noble language, of the Holy Scriptures from the original tongues.
I have had letters from Gibraltar, and am sorry to learn that my letter from Toulouse, containing directions to our Jew friend in Tangier, never arrived in Gibraltar, and still less of course in Africa. One of my letters is from a Mr. Benoliel, a converted Jew, who is sent out by the British Missionary Society for the Jews. You will be glad to learn that it was one of your Hebrew New Testaments which he found in Gibraltar that was the means of his conversion. He is a native of Tangier, and our friend there is his cousin. His parents and family are all there, and are greatly grieved on account of his conversion, which they of course call apostasy. He is about to visit that place, and I shall be curious to know how he gets on there. I have written to him, and given him some names in Tangier and Tetuan that may be useful to him. – I have also made up the blank occasioned by the loss of the letter from Toulouse.
I am glad to learn that your purse is empty, and that you were obliged to make an Appeal to the Bible Public. It will have a happy effect, no doubt, more ways than one. What cause for thanksgivings that all old doors remain fully open, whilst two new ones, of an extensive nature, quite shut hitherto, have been burst open by the earthquake we have had, and which is still heaving the nations. O when shall we be able to add Spain and Italy and Austria? Perhaps your Appeal Money will not be all come in till you are enabled to extend and enforce your claim by telling the public that Spain is also open, and is crying aloud for the bread of life. – Please to put me down for Ten Pounds.
I remain, My Dear Friend,
Affectionately Yours,
James Thomson.