A new history of ecclesiastical writers containing an account of the authors of the several books of the Old and New Testament, of the lives and writings of the primitive fathers, an abridgement and catalogue of their works ... also a compendious history of the councils, with chronological tables of the whole / written in French by Lewis Ellies du Pin.

PREFACE.

THE Fourteenth Century furnishes us with many Subjects very Pleasing; for it represents to us the Contests between the Regal Dignity and Priesthood, or rather the Kings and Popes (for the Kingly Function and Priesthood do always fully Agree, although the Men who are raised to those Great Dig∣nities, differ much about the bounds of their Power) the Destruction of a famous and powerful Order, the Church of Rome divided by a Schism of Forty Years continuance, the decay of the Greek Empire, endangering the Ruin of it, the Greek Church disturbed with frivolous Questions, the Order of Franciscan Monks torn in pieces by odd Opinions, and extravagant Practices; Divers Errors taught by Di∣vines, and condemned by the Bishops, or Universities, and several Disorders suppressed by the Constitutions of Councils, and Bishops. The Divines which flourished in this Age followed the Method of the Schools, as their Predecessors had done. The Commentators upon Holy Scripture, the Prea∣chers, and Monks produced nothing great, nor excellent, and the Historians nothing exact, or perfect. But the Study of the Civil Law came to its Perfection almost, and Humane Learning, which had been a long time neglected, was much studied and improved about the middle of this Age by a certain number of ingenious Men, who by imita∣ting the Ancients, were eminent for their Skill in Languages, Oratory and Poetry, and brought again into the World a Desire of Antiquity, and a Love of Profitable and certain Sciences.