02A.05.5. Verse notations etc

Fifth, another feature of the printed format of the KJV that many like and some attack is that each verse notation begins at the left of the column. This feature makes it possible to find a passage more rapidly. Some object that you cannot tell where the major breaks appear in the scripture. But they fail to notice the ¶ symbol which indicates the break or paragraph. The shortcoming of this is that the KJV has the ¶ marks only through Acts 20:1-38. It has been puzzling why the ¶ symbols stop at this point. One person suggested "perhaps the printer ran out of these signs." But a good reply to this was: "That suggestion implies that the type for the whole book was set up before printing, as is the practice today, the stocks of the hand-cut type then used were so small that usually only four pages were set up and printed, the type then being distributed in order to set up the next four, and so on throughout; therefore the long-suffering printer would have just as many ¶ marks for the end as for the start of the Bible." (Bruce, p. 108). The better reply is that it appears the last thing the KJV committee did in preparing it for the printer was to insert the ¶ markings. One report suggests that King James may have become impatient and ordered them to get it printed and they did not have time to complete that task. The American Bible Society has printed an edition of the KJV in paragraph format similar to the ASV and RSV. But generally, even modern printed KJV Bibles end the ¶ markings with Acts 20.