Preface.

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The First Series of the Nicene and Post-Nicene Library of the Christian Fathers, containing, in fourteen volumes, the principal works of St. Augustin and St. Chrysostom, has been completed in less than four years, according to the Prospectus of the Publisher issued in 1886.

I am happy to state that the Second Series, containing the chief works of the Fathers from Eusebius to John of Damascus, and from Ambrose to Gregory the Great, will be issued on the same liberal terms, as announced by the Publisher.

The present volume opens the Second Series with a new translation and critical commentary of the historical works of Eusebius, by my friends, Dr. Arthur C. McGiffert and Dr. Ernest C. Richardson, who have bestowed a vast amount of labor of love on their tasks for several years past. I desired them to make these works a reliable and tolerably complete Church History of the first three centuries for the English reader. I think they have succeeded. Every scholar will at once see the great value and superiority of this over every other previous edition of Eusebius.

The next two volumes will contain the Church Histories of Socrates, Sozomen, Theodoret, and Evagrius. For further details the reader is referred to the Publisher’s announcement at the end of this volume.

PHILIP SCHAFF

New York, March, 1890.