There can be little doubt that of all the services rendered by the late Rector to learning the most widely known is his introduction to anthropologists and comparative religionists of the concept of mana. The debates excited by his short and modest survey of the matter, just before the beginning of this century, have not yet died down, and the “odd piece of twine” wherewith he proposed to bind certain facts together has grown into a thick rope, known by many fine names, such as preanimim, predeism, orendism and so forth, which is stoutly hauled upon by some, while others stumble over it or try to unwind it or prove that it was never really there, or at least that it has replaced something much earlier which formed an essential and legitimate part of the tackle. It is indeed a remarkable thing, on which a Hellenistic philosopher might have founded a thoughtful treatise on the inscrutable ways of Chance, that that one lecture and its unassuming successors raised such a pother, whereas the much longer, more elaborate and by no means unlearned or ill-reasoned work of J. H. King, only eight years earlier, fell still-born from the press and owes its reintroduction to science to the bitter opponent of all such theories of the origin of religion, the redoubtable Father Wilhelm Schmidt.

A certain affinity between Aristeas and III Maccabees is to be expected, for both books derive from a single environment — the Jewish community of Alexandria, both have a major purpose in common — that of setting forth the relations of the Jews to their non-Jewish rulers in as favorable a light as possible, and, most important, both are Greek books, written according to Greek canons of form; they are not, like other books on the periphery of Scripture with which they have been associated, translations from Hebrew or Aramaic, nor do they follow the forms of such works. Each is what would be called in the progymnasmata or curriculum of the rhetoricians διήγησις or narratio. Theon declares (70.25) that the canon is to be followed not only by intending rhetors but by writers in various categories; the διήγησις he defines (78.15) as λόγος ἐκθɛτικὸς πραγμάτων γɛγονότων ἢ ὡς γɛγονότων. Cicero, again without doubt following ancient principles of criticism, sets forth the difference between a continuous chronological history and a narratio in his invitation to Lucceius to write a treatise on his life (Ad Familiares 5.12). Whereas history serves veritas and utilitas, a narratio may supply delectatio also. The ancient canon of veracity for such treatises is clearly stated by the grammarian Asclepiades of Myrlea, in Sextus Empiricus, Adversus Grammaticos 252.

This list of treatises on preaching begins with the year 1500 and extends to the present time. It is thus a sequel to Mediaeval Artes Praedicandi: A Hand-List (Ithaca, New York 1934) and Mediaeval Artes Praedicandi: A Supplementary Hand-List (Ithaca 1936) by Harry Caplan, and to Artes Praedicandi (Paris-Ottawa 1936) by Th.-M. Charland, wherein are listed manuscripts and printed editions of tractates composed in the Middle Ages. The present list of printed books (which contains also a few manuscripts) includes as many titles as the compilers have been able to collect over a period of several years. We have, where possible, examined the books themselves, but in many instances direct observation was not feasible, and we have naturally relied on a wide variety of bibliographical sources. In making our list public we are acceding to requests made by a number of students of the doctrine and history of rhetoric and homiletics, and we hope that it may, with all its deficiencies, prove useful to investigators in these fields. We intend to follow this list of Latin treatises with like lists of treatises written in other languages of Europe.

In Cross's excellent translation of the Russian Primary Chronicle a misunderstanding in the famous passage describing Yaroslav's encouragement of religion and learning has obscured an historical point. Cross translates,

“Thus Yaroslav, as we have said, was a lover of books and as he wrote many, he deposited them in the Church of St. Sophia which he himself founded. He adorned it with gold and silver and churchly vessels and in it the usual hymns are raised to God at the customary seasons. He founded other churches in the cities and districts, appointing priests and paying them out of his personal fortune. He bade them teach the people, since that is the duty which God has prescribed them and to go often into the churches. Priests and Christian laymen thus increased in number.”