Saint Cajetan lived in Rome in the early 1500s. He went to Venice and then returned to Rome to found the order of the Theatines.

Saint Teresa of Avila wrote many letters, which are collected here. Her correspondence was most extensive, including bishops, archbishops, kings, ladies of rank, gentlemen of the world, abbots, priors, nuncios, her confessors, her brothers and sisters, rectors of colleges, fathers provincial of the Society of Jesus, nuns and superiors of her convents and monasteries, learned doctors of different religious orders, and even most eminent saints, such as .St. Peter of Alcantara, St. Francis Borgia, St. John of the Cross, &c. In the Letters of St. Teresa it seems to me that all her admirable endowments, both of nature and of grace, can be more clearly discovered than in any of her other works. When we peruse her Life, or The Interior Castle, one is at first inclined to imagine that the Saint was altogether unearthly, unfit for the cares and troubles of life that all her time must have been spent in holding sweet converse with her Beloved, and sighing for the hour when she should be united with Him for ever, and that visions and raptures must have engrossed all the powers of her soul. Others, again, might fancy that the Saint must have been very grave, austere, solemn, exceedingly scrupulous, and given to melancholy. Some might also be inclined to believe that she was quite an enthusiast, led away by the ardent temperament of her character, or the vagaries of an unsteady imagination. But how quickly are such erroneous ideas scattered, when we read her admirable Letters. They soon convince us that the Saint possessed what we call common sense" in a most remarkable manner that so fur from being an enthusiast, she was endowed with a solidity of judgment, and a prudence and sweetness in all her actions, which won the admiration of everyone; that she was so careful to guard against melancholy, as never to allow any one to enter the Order who seemed to be the least infected with it. With regard to herself, we shall see, by perusing her Letters, that she was cheerfulness itself, even in the midst of her greatest trials and afflictions, and withal exceedingly witty, lively, and jocose; indeed, her naivetr is one of the greatest charms of her Letters. These will show us, too, that her raptures and visions did not, in the least, interfere with her ordinary duties, for she was an excellent and most admirable woman of business. Considering her numerous labours, duties, journeys, sicknesses, and infirmities, is it not surprising how she could find time to carry on such an extensive correspondence? Juan de Palafox, the celebrated bishop of Osma, remarks, "that it was principally by her Letters the Saint was enabled to effect the reform of the Carmelite Order."

THE Revelation of God came to the world through the Hebrews, a people unused to abstract speculation, their very language too bald for Philosophy, so that Theology had to take the language of poetry, concrete images taking the place of definitions or syllogisms. These characteristics, whilst they prevented very great development of doctrine, were a safeguard against its perversion. When in the fullness of time Christ brought that complete Revelation of which Judaism was but the prologue, it was to the Hebrews that He spoke. He gave them His whole teaching-but in their own tongue, their own forms, not only of speech but of thought. Yet His Church was to be no longer the Jewish Church, but the Catholic Church. His Revelation was to all mankind and was to be received and assimilated not by the practical ethical Hebrew only, but by the subtleminded Greek, by the Eastern mystic, and by the childlike, untrained mind of far-off Goth and Barbarian. When on the day of Pentecost the Holy Ghost descended upon that little band which Christ had formed and trained, they went forth to bring all minds into captivity to the truth; and these were not minds empty, waiting passively for the truth, but minds already active, with ideas, theories, and habits of thought of their own. Into minds thus preoccupied the Christian Faith was to enter-to seize and act upon and mould them, and, within certain very rigid limits, to be reacted upon by them. When Revelation took its rightful place as Ruler and Judge, then all of natural truth or mental power that a man had was enriched and crowned by it; al1 that was false or imperfect being abolished or rejected. The Faith itself being more clearly set forth, more deeply penetrated, as the minds of men were brought to bear upon it, gave forth all its strength, light, and sweetness. That way lay development-a process which began the first moment a Christian meditated on Christ's teaching, and it shall not cease as long as one of the Faithful remains to keep the Faith. But whenever Faith came to a mind not prepared to give it the first and ruling place, but determined to judge and test it by its own prepossessions, its own prejudices -then the truth became perverted, one-sided: and so were born heresies: so began the first heresy: so will heresies arise until Christ returns and Faith ends in Vision. Well might the Apostles have quailed at the task before them. Silnple Palestinian Jews, how should they commend their faith to the whole Gentile world, a world whose thought was so alien from their own? But their Risen Master had promised that the Holy Ghost should bring to their minds all things whatsoever He had told them. In this knowledge, with this strength, they went forward knowing that whatever their personal weakness, however limited their individual knowledge or capacity, their mission could not fail, for He who had sent them had promised that the gates of hell should not prevail against them and that He would be with them even to the consummation of the world.

It is with the hope that English lay folk will learn to value more highly, and understand more clearly, the beauty, dignity, and antiquity of the Church's public liturgical prayer that this little book has been translated into English. While there are so many books of private devotion-of various degrees of excellence and authority-the one devotional book to be used above all others, which has grown with the Church's growth and nourished the devotion of her saints, which is intimately bound up with her history and full of her spirit, seems to be forgotten, to be set aside as dry and archaic, or to be regarded as the private property of clergy and religious. Yet there is no book richer in treasures of devotion, endowed with higher authority, or more capable of producing in the souls of those who use it digne, attente, ac devote, a devotional temper at once hearty and strong and truly Catholic. It is much to be regretted that the history of the Roman Breviary is so little known, even to those upon whom the Church has laid the obligation of its daily recital throughout the year. Were priests and religious better instructed in the origin, development, and purpose of the book with which in one sense they are so familiar, we are confident they would fulfil their obligation with greater fervour and respect, and by this means the reign of God would be more perfectly realized both in the hearts of those who are priests and in the souls of the faithful entrusted to their care. I t is for the benefit of priests occupied in the work of the ministry, who may have neither the time nor opportunity to consult the works recently published on the Breviary, that we have undertaken to give in the following pages an abstract of the monumental work of Dom Baumer on the history of the Roman Breviary, while making use at the same time of the less voluminous work of Mgr. Batiffo. "We conclude with the following words of Dom Baumer: "The earthly psalmody, or, in other words, the praises of God uttered by the lips of priests and monks, either in their solitary cells or in the choir in church, are but the echo of those eternal songs which the elect, in union with the choirs of saints and angels, sing to the melodies of the heavenly Jerusalem before the throne of the Lamb. May we all find ourselves among the elect, that we may for ever be eternally associated with those choirs of blessed spirits. Here below in our exile let us practise with fervour that which is to be our endless occupation in the realms of bliss in our Father's House.""