The Armenian schools and universities and their outpour of great scholars and writers have already been spoken of, but of course Armenian youths, eager for the best of the world's learning, did not confine themselves to their own country; they studied in Constantinople, Athens, Antioch, Alexandria, and wherever great teachers were located. All were zealous Christians, and the books they have left behind were Christian literature, not works of mere enjoyment. A very rich and valuable literature it is, too, in my judgment the most so of any single body that exists; though much of it has perished in the recent destruction of everything Christian the Turks can reach. My readers will not credit my opinion of it, because most of it has never been translated, but that makes it all the more valuable now, it has so much that is new to add to the stores of the world. It is not necessary to give them all, but to point out the chief writers. The fifth century is called the Golden Age of Armenian literature. First in point of time as well as importance comes the Armenian Bible. The furious opposition of the Church in the Middle Ages to letting the people have the Bible to read in their own tongues seems perfectly ridiculous, when we remember that in the early Christian church every people had it in their own language, and it was thought to be the greatest work for a heathen people that could be done, to translate the Bible for them. It was not thought needful then to keep the word of God in a strange tongue, so that the people could neither read it for themselves nor understand it when it was read to them.