Christianity

Matteo Ricci in China, 1583-1610

Father Ricci spent many years on his mission near Canton. Nora C. Buckley describes how, eventually, this Jesuit's skills in mathematics and astronomy were welcomed in Peking.

John Wesley and America

John Wesley spent two years as a chaplain in Georgia in the 1730s; Stuart Andrews describes how forty years later he was much preoccupied with the War of Independence.

John Company and the Evangelical Influence

The East India Company, writes R. Cecil, had at first shown a ‘modest interest’ in the civilization of their native subjects; but Evangelical pressure groups recommended a very different attitude.

Christianity’s First History Book

‘The Acts of the Apostles’ was written in the first century A. D. and describes a vital thirty years in the expansion of Christianity. J.K. Elliott studies its production and influence.

Bento de Goes’ Search for Cathay

Nora C. Buckley describes how a soldier from the Azores became a Jesuit priest in India and how his extensive travels proved that ‘Cathay’ was in fact China.

Adrian IV: England’s Only Pope

M. Foster Farley describes how, during his five years in the Vatican, Nicholas Breakspear had important dealings with the Holy Roman Empire, England and Ireland, and the Norman kingdom of Sicily.

William Beaw: Bishop and Secret Agent

John R. Guy introduces the soldier, churchman, and Royalist Fellow of New College who served Russia and Sweden during Cromwell’s years of power, and who returned to post-Restoration Britain to become a prominent parson in the Church of Wales.

The Salisbury Book of Hours

J.P. Harthan describes The Salisbury Book of Hours; compiled in Rouen about 1425, the prayer-book owes its name to one of the best English commanders in France.