The supreme importance of a knowledge of the Acts need hardly be insisted on. Even a slight acquaintance with the nature and contents of the book is quite enough to place beyond dispute its entire usefulness, and even necessity, for the Church historian, the theologian, the Christian apologist, and the preacher. This a few points will easily illustrate. St. Luke in his Gospel tells us of the fulfillment of the promise of redemption in the Incarnation, Resurrection, and Ascension of our Lord; and in this book he records the beginnings of the Christian Church and of the final dispensation of...

No types more beautiful could have been chosen under which to picture the character of our Lord and the souls He came to redeem than those of a shepherd and his flock. As nothing on earth could more fitly illustrate the infinite love and sacrifice of the Saviour than the enduring labors and tenderness of a shepherd, so nothing here below could better portray the multiple wants of our spirits than the needful dependent nature of sheep. After the knowledge we possess of our Redeemer, only a slight acquaintance with the characteristics of pastoral life, as it exists in oriental countries, is...

THE study of Holy Scripture, and, in particular, the study of the Gospels, which give us the living and life-giving words and deeds of our Blessed Redeemer Himself, is at once a duty and a pleasure, a labor and a delight, than which there can be none more vital and all-important to the deeper religious life and fruitfulness of all Christians, and especially of those whose high office it is to guide and instruct others by holy words, precepts, and examples to virtuous living and to the ultimate perfection and rewards of the Christian life. This is what St. Paul was teaching when, moved by the...