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Two lectures given by the medical missionary and explorer David Livingstone after his return to England from his travels in Africa (1841-1856) form the core of this book, which was originally published in 1858, the year when Livingstone set off on the British Zambezi expedition. The book also contains a biography, a letter from Adam Sedgwick (then Professor of Geology at Cambridge), and a thorough appendix covering the scientific results of the journey, describing the geography, mineralogy, diseases, and the language and cultural aspects of the peoples Livingstone encountered. Finally, Livingstone reports on the needs and prospects for further missionary work in Africa. Although Livingstone himself felt his calling was now to pursue purely scientific exploration, he hoped that the lectures and their subsequent publication would encourage other missionaries to continue his work of evangelisation.

Henry Martyn (1781-1812) was born in Cornwall and educated at Cambridge. After hearing about the success of William Carey's mission at Serampore, he abandoned his intended career as a barrister to become a missionary, and joined the East India Company as a chaplain. During six years spent mostly in India he produced Hindi, Urdu and Persian translations of the New Testament. He is best remembered for these and other scripture translations which remained popular in India until the end of the nineteenth century. This memoir draws on Martyn's personal letters and diary. It was first published in London in 1816, soon after Martyn's untimely death in Persia, and appeared in a second edition (reissued here) in 1819. Part 1 covers his early life, Part 2 begins with his arrival in India and describes his missionary work, and Part 3 recounts Martyn's exhausting journey to Persia and his death.

George Fox (1810-1886) compiled this memoir of his younger brother to inspire Rugby schoolboys to emulate this devout alumnus and become missionaries themselves. It was first published in 1850; the 1880 edition reissued here was the sixth printing and included a new preface and appendix recounting the successful establishment of the Rugby Fox Mastership at Masulipatam, India, where Fox had preached among the Telugu people of the British Madras Presidency. Containing an impressive quantity of personal letters and excerpts from his journal, the book provides insights into Fox's spiritual development and religious trials in the first half of the nineteenth-century. It includes unsympathetic accounts of the Telugu and India in general, but also recounts Fox's missionary strategies and goals, often reporting specific conversations or incidents. This content provides useful source material for scholars studying the British mission to India, the British empire, or nineteenth-century personal devotion.

Medieval historian G. G. Coulton relinquished his own holy orders in 1885 but remained firmly engaged with Christianity. This 1919 collection of lectures is a radical and impassioned discussion of how Christianity must change to meet the needs of post-war society as soldiers return from the trenches. Drawing parallels between the lives of Jesus Christ and St Francis of Assisi, Coulton highlights how ambiguities in the surviving accounts of both men have diverted the original course of their ministry and, with it, the objectives and outlook of the church. The author also takes on the weaknesses in both Catholic and agnostic arguments and advocates a simplifying and democratisation of Christianity and the resolving of denominational differences. Included alongside the lectures is the author's comprehensive response to a number of questions raised by the original lecture series which provides a useful conclusion to the controversial anti-Catholic's plea for religious modernisation.

Reginald Heber (1783-1826), second bishop of Calcutta, was appointed to the role in 1823, and had for a long time been interested in the Church of England's overseas missions. His diocese in the subcontinent had been established less than a decade before, in 1814, and included India, southern Africa and Australia. Heber travelled extensively throughout, visiting remote Anglican communities and later publishing journals about his travels. In addition, he was well-known as a hymn-writer. Sermons Preached in India, however, was published posthumously in 1829, and edited by his widow, Amelia. This volume also illustrates Heber's zeal to carry out his work across his diocese, the location of his sermons range from Delhi to Dum Dum. Missionaries would have been a significant part of his diocese, and these homilies reflect many of the difficulties faced by Anglicans living in a place that had its own strong religious beliefs.

James Hudson Taylor (1832-1905), the founder of the large and respected China Inland Mission, wrote the pamphlet China's Spiritual Need and Claims in 1865. It was subsequently published as a book and reprinted in numerous editions. This volume contains the seventh edition, first published in 1887. The work is both a survey of Protestant missionary activity in China since the treaty of Tientsin in 1858 and a recruitment pamphlet that inspired many English men and women to travel to China as missionaries. It provides a wealth of demographic and cultural information about nineteenth-century China and about the western missionaries stationed there. As one of the most popular works on Protestant missions during the nineteenth century, it is an essential source for understanding the motivations of Victorian missionaries in general as well as Taylor's own beliefs. It is an indispensable source for researchers in mission history.

This memoir, compiled from the journals of Hannah Kilham, traces the life of this remarkable woman (1774-1832). It was prepared for publication in 1837 by her stepdaughter, Sarah Biller, who emphasises those aspects of her stepmother's life that support the representation of her as an independent and pioneering women in order to make further claims for women. In 1796 Hannah Kilham joined the Society of Methodists and became an advocate for the poor, for exploited children and for Irish immigrants. She voyaged to Sierra Leone wishing to bring Christianity to its inhabitants and on her third visit to the country she established a school there. Hannah Kilham fought for the rights of slaves and former slaves and against the practices of colonialism and colonial trade. She also produced textbooks for the study of African languages and established herself as a politically astute chronicler of missionary and educational activities.

This account of the life of the missionary John Williams (1796-1839), first published in 1843, celebrates his character and his achievements in evangelizing the South Sea islands. Williams believed that the spread of Christianity, 'civilization', and commerce went hand-in-hand, and his work in and around Tahiti and Rarotonga from the time of his first posting there by the London Missionary Society in 1817 was largely well received. In 1830 he became the first person to introduce Christianity to Samoa and, after returning to England in 1834 to raise money and support for the cause, he returned to the Pacific as a celebrity. His final voyage was to Eromango in the New Hebrides, where he was killed and eaten. This violent death combined with the success of his earlier missions caused him to be regarded as a heroic figure and inspired much popular literature.

Rabi'a, a female Sufi saint, was born in 717 CE and released from slavery to lead a life in pursuit of purity and perfect union with God. Her teachings and the numerous miracles attributed to her have made her an influential and revered figure in Sufi theology. This authoritative 1928 biography of the saint was written by Margaret Smith, who mastered numerous eastern languages, travelled extensively, and published a number of translations of important Arabic texts. Smith's linguistic skill and her immersion in the culture she studied has produced a book still considered an important account of Rabi'a's life. Smith also includes an incisive discussion of the role of women in early Islamic mysticism and an examination of Sufi doctrine, and examines the issues of celibacy and sainthood in Islam. A biography of one exceptional woman written by another.

John Henry Newman (1801-1890) was an English priest and theologian, whose highly publicised and controversial conversion to Catholicism helped to dispel prejudice towards Catholics in Victorian society. After graduating from Trinity College, Oxford, Newman was ordained as an Anglican deacon in 1824. He gradually became more conservative in his beliefs, becoming a member of the Oxford Movement before converting to Catholicism and being received into the Roman Catholic Church in 1845; he was made a cardinal in 1879. This volume, first published in 1864, contains Newman's classic religious autobiography. Writing in response to a perceived attack on Catholicism by historian and novelist Charles Kingsley, Newman describes his changing religious beliefs between 1833 and 1845 and discusses his spiritual motivations for converting. Newman's emotional sensitivity and clear style ensured the popularity of this volume, which was extremely influential in establishing him as the leading exponent of Catholicism in Victorian England.

St Paul's conversion to Christianity transformed a vicious persecutor of Christians into one of the most important and influential figures in the foundation of the early church. Paul's broad theological knowledge and his ambitious vision for the faith made him a major force in the development of Christianity from its origins as an obscure Jewish sect. W. L. Knox's 1925 biography examines what influenced Paul's theological ideas and how his desire to extend the church's reach to gentiles and the wider world put him in opposition with other early church figures like St Peter. Placing Paul's work in the social and religious context of Jerusalem following the death of Jesus, Knox evokes the atmosphere of persecution in Jerusalem and the inner social dynamics of the early Christian sect, evaluating Paul's impact on the growing church and the particular ideas and elements of doctrine that prevailed as a result of his involvement.

George Augustus Selwyn (1809-1878) was the first Anglican Bishop of New Zealand, with Selwyn College, Cambridge later named in his honour. New Zealand was declared an independent British colony in 1841 and the Diocese of New Zealand was established in the same year. After graduating from St. John's College, Cambridge in 1831, Selwyn had been ordained priest in 1834 and consecrated as the first Bishop of New Zealand in 1841. This volume, first published in 1844, contains a series of journals and letters written by Selwyn during his first two years in New Zealand. He provides an intimate and detailed description of the organisation and society of the new colony and the growth of new settlements including Auckland and Wellington. He also describes the landscape and lives of the Maori in remote areas mostly untouched by colonisation, providing a fascinating account of the early history of colonial New Zealand.

Methodist missionary Thomas Birch Freeman (1809-1890) was one of the most successful missionaries of his day, founding churches in Nigeria and the Gold Coast. The son of an African father and English mother, he possessed great diplomatic skills in dealing with colonial administrators and native rulers, and Methodist churches spread rapidly using literate converts as lay preachers, particularly among freed and repatriated slaves. His resignation was caused by financial problems due to poor accounting. His Journal was serialised in a Methodist periodical between 1840 and 1843, published as a book in 1843, and revised the following year. His attempts to get the slave trade and the practice of human sacrifice abolished in Dahomey were frustrated, but he was much more successful in founding missions. The book is a fascinating picture of life in West Africa in the mid-nineteenth century.

Hugh Bourne (1772-1852) was a Methodist preacher who is best known as the co-founder of the Primitive Methodist movement. After converting to Methodism in 1799, Bourne became influenced by the evangelical American Lorenzo Dow (1777-1834) and together with William Clowes held an open-air evangelical meeting in 1807. Such gatherings were prohibited by the Methodist Conference, and the two were expelled by the Methodist Society in 1808. They formed the Primitive Methodist Connexion in 1810, with Bourne assuming a leading role in the movement. This volume, first published in 1854 and written by Bourne's nephew John Walford, contains a detailed biography of Bourne. Using private papers inherited on Bourne's death, his childhood, conversion and the founding of the movement are described, with his leadership of the Connexion also discussed. This biography provides valuable information concerning Bourne's life and motivations during and after the founding of the movement.

This volume was published in 1911 for the New York Bible and Common Prayer Book Society to celebrate the three hundredth anniversary of the King James Bible. The Rev. Henry Barker, described in the preface as 'a late presbyter of this church' but about whom little is known, gives a full historical account of the manuscript origins of the Bible, the development of the biblical canon and the early efforts, made by reformers such as Wyclif in the fourteenth century and Tyndale in the sixteenth, to translate the Bible into the vernacular and thus make its content more accessible to the laity. Barker provides a clear and factual account not only of the evolution of the Bible in English but also of the background of social and political change that fostered the various early translations.

Holliday Bickerstaff Kendall (1844-1919) was a Methodist minister and a social historian. Born into a family of Primitive Methodist ministers, Kendall himself served as a minister between 1864 and 1903. This volume, written during his retirement and first published in 1919, contains Kendall's history of the origins and development of the Primitive Methodist movement. The movement originated with Hugh Bourne (1772-1852) and William Clowes (1780-1851), who attempted to restore the mass evangelism they thought had been lost in the Wesleyan Church after 1810. Kendall explores the social and political context of this period, and discusses Bourne's and Clowes' influence on the origins of the movement. He then describes the growth and development of the movement in the nineteenth century, discussing the expansion of the church until 1918. This clear and concise volume is considered the definitive work on the history of the movement.

This catalogue, prepared in two parts between 1876 and 1878 and reissued here in one volume, analyses ninety-eight Hebrew manuscripts held at Cambridge University Library. Wonderfully discursive, lively and opinionated, it is the crowning achievement of Solomon Marcus Schiller-Szinessy (1820-90), the first Jewish scholar appointed by Cambridge to teach Talmudic and Rabbinic literature. Assessing not only the contents of the manuscripts, the work also examines their ownership, scribal marks and marginalia, authorship and textual traditions. The first part analyses seventy-two biblical scrolls, codices and commentaries, including thirteenth- and fourteenth-century Sefardi Bibles and outstanding editions of commentaries by Abraham ibn Ezra and Rashi, along with lesser-known but significant commentators. The second part, which was never formally published, examines a further twenty-six rabbinic manuscripts, including the famous Cambridge Mishnah - one of only three complete Mishnaic manuscripts.

Julius Wellhausen (1844-1918) first published this work in German in 1878. Reissued here is the 1885 English translation of a revised 1883 version. Intended as a multi-volume work, this first book now stands as a self-contained work. A biblical scholar and orientalist, Wellhausen was professor of theology at Greifswald (until resigning for reasons of conscience) and then professor at Halle, Marburg and Gottingen. An early exponent of scientific philology, he placed the Pentateuch in a historical-social context, setting aside theological traditions. In this work, he sets out his method and argues that the Pentateuch is a synthesis of four independent narratives. He then examines the history of worship, sacrifice, sacred feasts, priests, and the law in ancient Israel. Wellhausen is a central figure in modern biblical studies, his theory dominated scholarship for a century, and his pioneering work remains of great interest in the field.

This three-volume account of the life of John Wesley (1703-91) was published in the year of his death. Written by John Hampson (c.1753-1819), a Church of England clergyman and former Methodist preacher, the work also contains a thorough review of Wesley's writings and a history of Methodism. Hampson's excellent overview of contemporary assessments of the preacher is more balanced than John Whitehead's two-volume Life of the Rev. John Wesley (1793-6), which has also been reissued in this series. Volume 1 explores Wesley's lineage and early life, including his journey to America in 1735 and his conversion in 1738. This volume also contains short chapters on his brothers Samuel and Charles. Drawing on a wide range of sources, the work remains important for its informed appraisal of this religious movement and its founder.

This three-volume account of the life of John Wesley (1703-91) was published in the year of his death. Written by John Hampson (c.1753-1819), a Church of England clergyman and former Methodist preacher, the work also contains a thorough review of Wesley's writings and a history of Methodism. Hampson's excellent overview of contemporary assessments of the preacher is more balanced than John Whitehead's two-volume Life of the Rev. John Wesley (1793-6), which has also been reissued in this series. Volume 2 traces the growth of Methodism in both England and North America, covering Wesley's itinerant preaching, the death of his mother, and theological differences with his brother Charles. It also gives an account of Wesley's increased activity in ordaining priests for travel to America. Drawing on a wide range of sources, the work remains important for its informed appraisal of this religious movement and its founder.

This three-volume account of the life of John Wesley (1703-91) was published in the year of his death. Written by John Hampson (c.1753-1819), a Church of England clergyman and former Methodist preacher, the work also contains a thorough review of Wesley's writings and a history of Methodism. Hampson's excellent overview of contemporary assessments of the preacher is more balanced than John Whitehead's two-volume Life of the Rev. John Wesley (1793-6), which has also been reissued in this series. Volume 3 gives an account of Wesley's death, but is predominantly concerned with a critique of Methodist theology, activity and mode of preaching. It gives a measured assessment of Wesley's character and reflects on the opposition to the work's previous volumes displayed by Wesley's executors, highlighting the struggle over his legacy - a matter of great importance in the history of Methodism.

Edward Bean Underhill (1813-1901), the energetic and much-travelled secretary of the Baptist Missionary Society, was active throughout his life in publishing and researching Baptist history. This 1881 biography of his recently-deceased friend James Phillippo (1798-1879) is based on diaries, a manuscript autobiography and papers made available to Underhill by Phillippo's family. Phillippo devoted over fifty years to Baptist missionary work in Jamaica and was a fierce advocate for the abolition of slavery. He landed in Jamaica in 1823, and developed a strong following, despite being banned from preaching to slaves on several occasions. In the 1830s he helped to establish free villages where newly emancipated (and now homeless) slaves could settle. Underhill's thorough account of Phillippo's eventful life focuses specially on the missionary's hard-won victories over his wealthy and powerful opponents. The book includes a list of the many schools and churches established by Phillippo in Jamaica.

This book first appeared in 1849, during the renaissance of English Catholicism that followed the 1829 Relief Act. It contains three anonymous translations of early modern biographies. The first, published in Latin in Cologne in 1617 by Sebastiano Berettari (1543-1622), and translated here from an Italian manuscript version of 1670, focuses on the Jesuit missionary to Brazil Joseph Anchieta (1534-97), praising his 'talent and diligence in human affairs' and his 'heroic virtues'. The second, based on Caspar Peter Lull's account published in both Latin and German in 1682, briefly describes the life of the nun Alvera of Virmundt (1617-49) as a model of female piety full of 'virtue and perfection'. The third is devoted to the Belgian Jesuit John Berchmans (1599-1621), remembered as a 'holy young man', and is translated from an 1826 Paris edition of a text published in 1706 by Nicholas Frizon (d. 1737).

In 1829 the Church Missionary Society began operations in the African kingdom of Abyssinia (Ethiopia). The Anglican clergyman Charles Isenberg (1806-64) joined the mission there in 1835, followed by Johann Ludwig Krapf (1810-81) in 1837. Soon afterwards, opposition to the Society's presence in Abyssinia caused them to leave. However, they were determined to establish a base in the central Ethiopian kingdom of Shoa (Shewa), and did so in 1839, entering from the Yemeni port of Mocha. Isenberg stayed in the capital, Ankobar, from 7 June until 6 November 1839, while Krapf remained until 1842 and travelled to other, lesser-known parts of the country. This work, published in 1843, is an account of their period of missionary activity, told through their journals. It begins with a geographical account of the region by the leading specialist of the time, James MacQueen (1778-1870), widely considered one of his most important works.

Scottish minister and social reformer Thomas Chalmers (1780-1847) is famous as the leader of the group of 470 ministers who left the Church of Scotland in 1843 to found the Free Church of Scotland, and as the author (in 1834) of the first Bridgewater Treatise (also reissued in this collection). Along with his theological interests, Chalmers was deeply concerned with educational reform in schools and universities. In 1827 he published this paper on university endowments, asserting that it was the state's responsibility to support religious and educational institutions, because churches, schools, and universities maintained the nation's Christian principles and character. Chalmers argued that only endowed national establishments were capable of ensuring the religious and moral well-being of the individual. In addition to his appeal for university endowments, he also advocated (unusually for his time) the extension of full civil rights to dissenters and Catholics.

The Revd Samuel Marsden (1765-1838) was an influential religious figure in Australia, New Zealand and Tahiti. Educated at St John's College, Cambridge, and having spent time in Australia as a missionary to convicts and aborigines, from 1814 until his death he worked as a missionary to the Maori in New Zealand. First published in 1858, this biography, which uses Marsden's own letters and memoirs by friends and colleagues to explore his life and work, was edited by the historian J. B. Marsden (1803-70) who was not in fact related to his subject. Vivid and anecdotal, the work reveals Marsden's strong religious beliefs and his dedication to the welfare of the war-torn native peoples, even though his activities were not always popular. The editorial commentary sets Marsden's work within a social and historical context, and the study concludes with some appendixes documenting his lasting influence on New Zealand and Tahiti.

A. Lukyn Williams (1853-1943) presents here a wide range of examples of Christian apologetic writings about Judaism. Taking material from the earliest years of the Christian Church until the Renaissance, the book investigates sources with Syriac, Greek, Spanish, and Latin origins. It includes observations on lost or possible books such as the first 'Book of Testimonies' posited by J. Rendel Harris (with whom Williams did not fully agree) which pre-dated the Biblical Gospels; incomplete early treatises; and scriptural extracts. Concerned more with historical detail than with exegesis, Williams' study provides extensive scholarly commentaries on all the texts included and covers possible dates of origin, sources, intended audience, and biographical information about the authors. First published in 1935 with the aim of offering source material in an area often neglected by scholars, the book remains a useful resource for students and scholars of Christian-Jewish relations.

In this two-volume work, J. Rendel Harris (1852-1941) fundamentally shaped Biblical scholarship in the twentieth century, arguing for the existence of a 'first known treatise on Christian theology', antedating the New Testament. A palaeographer, Harris examined recurring textual corruptions of Old Testament passages in early Christian writers and surmised an underlying collection, which he called the 'Testimony Book'. The book, Harris believed, collected Biblical testimonia - passages prophesying Christ - in order to prove the legitimacy of the new Christian faith. These arguments against Judaic theology marked, in Harris's opinion, the beginnings of the Christian written tradition. Volume 2 (1920) seeks to demonstrate how the New Testament relied upon the 'Testimony Book', by examining Galatians, Hebrews and other letters and gospels. 'The starting point of the modern study of the use of the Old Testament in the New', this is a work of enduring importance to religion scholars.

Much of the work of James Rendel Harris (1852-1941), palaeographer and biblical scholar, focused on the translation and understanding of early Christian writing, and this collection of two volumes of essays examines two key texts. The first work in this reissue, published in 1896, discusses the book known as 'The Shepherd of Hermas'. This early work, thought to be written in Rome around the first or second century CE, is composed of three parts: visions, commandments and similitudes. Harris examines aspects of the work, such as how to interpret the ninth similitude - as allegory or literally - and discusses in detail questions about translation. Themes of other essays include the legendary library of Prester John in Abyssinia, the third-century writer Gaius the Presbyter and problems surrounding the fourth-century Codex Euthalianus. The second work, published in 1889, is concerned with the apocalyptic language in the book of Baruch.

A masterpiece of rhetoric and an impassioned defence of faith in the face of persecution, this work represents a key work in the Latin patristic canon. Addressing the magistrates of the Roman court, Tertullian submits 'the real facts in the case of the Christians', defending the legitimacy of the new faith while charging its detractors with hypocrisy and worse. Scathing, eloquent and defiant, the Apology demonstrates the importance of classical rhetoric to the identity of the controversial religion and its recent converts. This edition (1917), accompanied by a complete commentary by J. E. B. Mayor and translation by Alexander Souter, has been called 'by the far the best commentary ever published' on the work. Published posthumously from Mayor's extensive Cambridge lecture notes, the commentary is a starting point for anyone seeking a full understanding of the text's critical history. Souter's English translation makes it accessible to experts and non-experts alike.