FEU-ARDENTIUS'S PREFACE.

You expend so many labors and never cease to incur such expenses for the sake of illuminating a very rich library, especially with the monuments of the ancients whose writings have not yet been brought to light. Furthermore, you do not deny these things to anyone, but rather you contribute and provide all your help and industry to learned men for the translation of the same in both languages (or rather, that which ought to be translated); and you assist and provoke printers to publish them. Eusebius highly commends Constantine (book 4, On the Life of Constantine) for having spent the treasures of his empire to the great benefit of the Church in acquiring and neatly transcribing sacred books which previous tyrants had endeavored to destroy by fire; he commends Alexander of Jerusalem for having built a noble library in which he deposited the monuments of ecclesiastical men (book 6, History ch. 14, 17, and 25 = 20, 23, 32); he also commends the industry of Pamphilus the martyr, who established another library adorned with the writings of illustrious men; and finally, he commends Ambrose for having supported seven swift scribes, as well as girls well-trained in the art of writing, with many stipends, so that, at the dictation of Origen, they might take down the explanations of the sacred books to be transmitted to posterity. Jerome also praises Pantaenus (book On Illustrious Men) because he brought back with him to Alexandria the Gospel of Matthew, found among the Indians in Hebrew, written in the hand of Bartholomew. Augustine, as Possidius reports (book On the Life of Augustine, ch. 31), commanded that the library of Hippo be diligently guarded when he was departing from life.