l be minted into coin of golden praise
meet for sanctuary use, and comparable in worth and beauty to the
splendid currency of these latter days." This is strictly true, and it is
the conviction which has for some time possessed the author, with the
result that he has been giving less attention to translation, or
transliteration, and more attention to suggestion, adaptation, and
reminiscence. One cannot spend a day with the Greek service books (say
with the Triodion, which contains the incomparable Lenten and Easter
offices) without having his mind filled with thoughts the most beautiful,
thoughts which can sometimes be expressed in almost identical phrase with
the original, but which oftener, in order to do them justice by revealing
them in all their richness, require to be dwelt upon, expanded, and
clothed in appropriate western phrase. This is without doubt the best way
in which to deal with the praise material of the Greek service books, and
the present writer has set himself in this volume to act according to
that conviction. Here, there are fewer translations than in any former
volume, and the greater number of the hymns are reminiscences of the
Greek.

The contents of this book may be ranged under three categories:--A few
translations or renderings, as literal as it is possible or desirable to
make them; centos, or patchwork, _i.e._, pieces which are not versions of
any particular hymn in the original, but which are made up of portions of
various hymns; and suggestions, or reminiscences of the Greek. In the
case of the last, the best that can be said of them is that they owe
their existence in the present instance, to the Greek. While to the
ordinary reader there may be nothing in these suggestions to indicate
their source, no one who is acquainted with the praise of the Eastern
Church will fail to detect here and there certain marks which inevitably
announce their origin. In most cases initial Greek headlines have been
dispensed with, for the reason that they can serve no useful purpose, nor
indicate with any certainty the source of any particular hymn.

When one rises from a contemplation of Christian worship as it is
presented to him in the ancient forms of the Apostolic Church, it is with
pain that his ears are assailed with charges which he knows to be as
lacking in truth as they would be if they were levelled against
ourselves. God knows how far we have all drifted from our ideal, and
those who have the bes