Notwithstanding the more limited and the less reliable sources of literature (including the Bible) there was, nevertheless, substantial and even abundant material of a historical character from which to construct a bridge of the-continuous-history-of-literature over and beyond the gulf of the Dark Ages. The preservation and circulation of literature, not only sacred but profane as well, by means of written symbols, is not limited to one language, nor to mediæval times,--nor to the Christian Era--but reaches back into a remote age. Considering the slow and laborious process of book-making and the generally low stage of interest in literature throughout wide areas of the earth and for lengthy periods of time, the amplitude of the manuscript productions of the world, as evidenced in the ancient libraries and religious "houses" with their various utilities, is one of the marvels of history--a veritable wonder of the world. Note an incident of the New Testament record which, within the realm of sacred literature, illustrates the process by which literature in general has been disseminated: We are informed in one of the books of the New Testament that, early in the fourth decade of the first century (on the first Pentecost after the crucifixion of Jesus), "there were dwelling at Jerusalem, Jews, devout men out of every nation under heaven." And in the effusion of the Holy Spirit which came upon them then and there, they exclaimed--amazed and bewildered--"How hear we every man, in our own tongue, wherein we were born? Parthians, and Medes, and Elamites, and the dwellers in Mesopotamia, and in Judea, and Cappadocia, in Pontus, and Asia, Phrygia, and Pamphylia, in Egypt, and in the parts of Libya about Cyrene, and strangers of Rome, Jews and proselytes, Cretes and Arabians, we do hear them speak in our tongues the wonderful works of God." (The Acts 2:8-11.) As many as fifteen distinct nationalities and races were represented in this assemblage. It was, indeed, a cosmopolitan congregation and was composed of inhabitants from the then known world; and nothing is more probable than that representatives of those gathered at Jerusalem were among the "three thousand" added to that primitive company of believers on that occasion and that, when many of them went back to their native lands, they returned instinct with devotion to their new-found Master, and that, in their own respective and widely separated countries--under the impact of this new and inspiring hope which had been begotten within them at Jerusalem--they sowed the seed which bore the precious fruitage of evangelism in many lands throughout the early centuries of our Era. Indeed, the wide dispersion of the first Apostles and disciples of Jesus to the East, to the West, and to the South--into eastern Asia, into Europe, and into northern Africa--in the face of efforts to repress, and over obstacles and against contending forces everywhere, can best or only be accounted for on some such historical