T H O M AS Lord Arcbbisbop of CANTERBURY,

PRESIDENT;

And to The Right Reverend
The BISHOPS

Of the fame Province,
His GRACE's Suffragans ;

And to the Reverend

The CL ERG Y

Of the Lower House
OF CONVOCATION;

THIS
Historical Preface,

WITH THE
Four ensuing VOLUMES

therein refer'd to,

Are with all due Submission offer'd
To Their, and the Publick serious CON-
SIDERATION, By

The Author.

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TO THE

READER

Y Historical Preface, especially, as now

including both the University's and

Convocation's Proceedings, is so full and particular, that it prevents the Neceflity of any other long Preliminary Discourse in this place. I shall therefore be as brief as possible ; and rather call this an Advertisement, than a Preface to the Reader ; Who is here to observe, that I have been oblig'd to make some Alterations in this

Design since it was first propos'd ; tho' not at all to his disadvantage, either as. Purchaser or Reader. Thus I have not publish'd the Arabick Didascaly as I formerly intended since it proves to be not the Genuine Do&trine of the Apostles , as I once hoped, but a partial and spurious Edition of the καθολική διδασκαλία, or former Six Books of the Constitutions and to be generally taken from them verbatim ; so that there was no necessity of repeating it. Yet is its Preface, which seems plainly to belong to the Original Doctrine of their Apostles, exa&ly here set down; and the Contents of its several Chapters also. And for a compensation I have added the Accounts of the University's and Convocation's Proceedings relating to me; as also the Apologerick of Eunomius, together with the common Edition of the sea

oud

cond Book of Apocryphal Esdras in a diftin& Co lumn, beyond what I promis'd : all which is much more than I at first estimated that

Arabick Didascaly, and about as much as it really proves to be, by Dr. Grabe's Account of it. 'Tis also to be observed, that I have directed the placing of that larger Additional Piece, of Apocryphal Efdras, at the end of the Smaller Fourth, and not of the Larger First Volume, for greater. Conveniency both of the Binder and Reader. Tis farther to be noted, as to Ignatius's Larger Epistles, that I have almost always printed by A. B. Usher's most accurate Edition ; and that in the Various Readings at the bottom of each Page, A. Signifies the Auguft an or Augsburgh Copy: B. the Leicestershire Copy, now in the Bodleian LibraryNo that of Gasper Nidpruck ? and 7. that of Thuanus, which are all the Greek MSS. which we have of those

' Larger Epistles. The Greek of the smaller is according to the laft Oxford Edition, which was made from Profeffor

Salvinus's exact Transcript out of the Medicean, or only Greek Copy of them, and so can have no various Readings at all. I include Ruinart's Copy of the Epiltle to the Romans under this Head; tho it be wanting in the Medicean MS. The English Translation of the Larger Epistles is my own but as carefully revis’d by some

Learned Friends, especially by one excellently 88. blarke. skilfa in tuch matters. The Engll of the See Wý lluitar Smaller is that of the Right Reverend and LearAnemerintah. ll. ned the Lord Bishop

of Lincoln, in his Second and more accurate Edition of the Apoftolical Fathers. The Greek of the Conftitution's themfelyes is according to the Original Venice Edition 8. 11. 1563. whence all the other are derivd, ana which was chiefly made from a very good Copy From Creie, and allo in párt from two interpo

lated