PREFACE

TO THE AMERICAN EDITION.

NEANDER’S aim, in the work from which this volume is a translation, was to employ the most striking facts of Church History for general Christian edification. The faith, the zeal, and the piety of the early missionaries and martyrs of the Church, and the Christian life of individuals, and even of communities, amid periods of darkness and delusion, are commemorated here with that genial sympathy for pure religion, however and wherever manifested, which so strongly characterized. Neander. His charity may, in some few instances appear excessive; but excess of love is so rare, that it may well be excused.

J. M’Clintock.

April 10, 1851.