Publisher's Synopsis
THIS series of Handbooks is designed to meet a need, which, the Editors believe, has been widely felt, and which results in great measure from the predominant importance attached to Dogmatic and Moral Theology in the studies preliminary to the Priesthood. That the first place must of necessity be given to these subjects will not be disputed. But there remains a large outlying field of professional knowledge which is always in danger of being crowded out in the years before ordination, and the practical utility of which may not be fully realised until some experience of the ministry has been gained. I t will be the aim of the present series to offer the sort of help which is dictated by such experience, and its developments will be largely guided by the suggestions, past and future, of the Clergy themselves. To provide Textbooks for Dogmatic Treatises is not contemplated-at any rate not at the outset. On the other hand, the pastoral work of the missionary priest will be kept constantly in view, and the series will also deal with those historical and liturgical aspects of Catholic belief and practice which are every day being brought more into prominence. That the needs of English-speaking countries are, in these respects, exceptional, must be manifest to all. In point of treatment it seems desirable that the volumes should be popular rather than scholastic, but the Editors hope that by the selection of writers, fully competent in their special subjects, the information given may always be accurate and abreast of modern research. The kind approval of this scheme by His Grace the Archbishop of Westminster, in whose Diocese these manuals are edited, has suggested that the series should be introduced to the public under the general title of THE WESTMINSTER LIBRARY. It is hoped, however, that contributors may also be found among the distinguished Clergy of Ireland and America, and that the Westminster Library will be representative of Catholic scholarship in all English speaking countries. Each page of our books are hand inspected. If they do not pass inspection, then the book si not reprinted. UNTIL comparatively recent days the Church in England had to struggle for her very existence. Three hundred years had passed away during which every force that the world could wield was brought against her, from the rack and the gallows down to civil disabilities and social ostracism. It was with difficulty that her children could be educated in their faith or their fathers practise it. She went, as has been said, down into the catacombs again, content if she could but preserve the deposit committed to her trust, to bring it up once more into the light of day so soon as this tyranny should be overpast. That time has at last arrived, and the security of her position once more has been marked by such events as the recent Eucharistic Congress held publicly in London.
