can pray that we may
receive a share in the benedictions and glory of the saints. As they who
have seen a beautiful flower-garden, gather a nosegay to smell at the
whole day; so ought we, in reading, to cull out some flowers, by
selecting certain pious reflections and sentiments with which we are
most affected; and these we should often renew during the day; lest we
resemble a man who, having looked at him self in the glass, goeth away,
and forgetteth what he had seen of himself.

Footnotes:
1. St. Chrys. Conc. 3, de Lazaro. t. 1, p. 738, ed. Montfauc.
2. 1 Tim. iv. 13.
3. In angelo cum libello.
4. Heb. xii.
5. St. Aug. Serm. 280, t. 5, p. 1134.
6. Can. 47, Conc. t. 2, p. 1072.
7. St. Caesar. Serm. 95, vel apud St. Aug. t. 5, Append. Serm. 300.
8. St. Nilius, l. 4, ep. 1, Discipulo suo, p. 458. Item, Tr. e
Monastica Exercitatione, c. 34 et c. 43, p. 40 et Peristeria, sect. 4,
p. 99.
9. St. Bonif. ep. 35, Bibl. Patr.
10. Animadv. in Chronic. Eus. ad ann 2187.
11. Conf. l. 8, c. 6.
12. Fleury, l. 97, n. 2, t. 20.
13. Ps. cviii. 18.
14. Lansperg. Enchir. c. 11.

{049}

AN INTRODUCTORY DISCOURSE.

THE lives of the principal martyrs, fathers, and other more illustrious
saints, whose memory is revered in the Catholic church, are here
presented to the public. An undertaking of this kind seems not to stand
in need of an apology. For such are the advantages and so great the
charms of history, that, on every subject, and whatever dress it wears,
it always pleases and finds readers. So instructive it is, that it is
styled by Cicero, "The mistress of life,"[1] and is called by others,
"Moral philosophy exemplified in the lives and actions of mankind."[2]
But, of all the parts of history, biography, which describes the lives
of great men, seems both the most entertaining, and the most instructive
and improving. By a judicious choice and detail of their particular
actions, it sets before our eyes a living image of those heroes who have
been the object of the admiration of past ages; it exhibits to us a
portraiture of their interior virtues and spirit, and gives the most
useful and enlarged view of human nature. From the wise maxims,
experience, and even mistakes of great men, we learn the most refined
lessons of prudence, and are furnished with models for our imitation.
Neither is the narration here interrupted, nor the attention of the
reader hurried from one object to another, as frequently happens in