Let A1, A2, ···, An be events on a given probability space and let Br, n be the event that exactly r of the A's occur. Let further Sk (n) be the kth binomial moment of the number of the A's which occur. A sufficient condition is given for the existence of lim P (Br,n), as n→ + ∞, in terms of limits of the Sk(n)'s and a formula is given for the limit above. This formula for the limit is similar to the sieve theorem of Takács (1967) for infinite sequences of events and in the proof we make use of Takács's analytic method. The result is immediately applicable to the limit distribution of the maximum of (dependent) random variables X1, X2, ···, Xn by choosing Aj = {Xj ≧ x}. Our main theorem is reformulated for this special case and an example is given for illustration.