EDITORIAL NOTE

While there is a general agreement among the writers as to principles,
the greatest freedom as to treatment is allowed to writers in this
series. The volumes, for example, are not of the same length. Volume
II, which deals with the formative period of the Church, is, not
unnaturally, longer in proportion than the others. To Volume VI, which
deals with the Reformation, has been allotted a similar extension. The
authors, again, use their own discretion in such matters as footnotes
and lists of authorities. But the aim of the series, which each writer
sets before him, is to tell, clearly and accurately, the story of the
Church, as a divine institution with a continuous life.

W. H. Hutton



PREFACE


The late appearance of this volume of the series needs some
explanation. Portions of the book have been written at intervals; but
it is only the enforced idleness of a long convalescence after illness
which has given me the requisite leisure to finish it.

I have tried to avoid overloading my pages with details of political