The primary sources are simply the records and remains left by the people who lived at any given time. Such materials, it will be readily seen, give the nearest and truest account of the ideas, feelings, motives, and beliefs, as well as of the deeds and actions, of man. An original source is, therefore, merely a source back of which one cannot go for historical information. It is apparent, consequently, that the primary sources are the more important because they are the very foundations of history. "No documents, no history," tersely declared Langlois. The primary sources put us in vital connection with the thoughts, doings, and institutions of past times. In them one sees reflected the spirit of the age. Every line, every word, is a revelation. The student is led to feel history, to actually know men and women of the past, and thus to comprehend our own civilisation in the earlier periods of its evolution. The primary sources cannot be accepted and assigned their true value, however, until their authenticity and genuineness are determined, and the element of personal equation is taken into account. Even then final judgment can never be absolute. For the sake of giving a clear conception of the range of the primary sources the following classification may be of assistance: A.--Written sources of the subjoined kind: I.--Public official documents: 1. Acts of councils and synods. 2. Letters, bulls, briefs, rescripts, and regests of popes, patriarchs, and bishops. 3. Confessions of faith. 4. Liturgies, hymns, etc. 5. Church canons and laws, and monastic rules. 6. Decrees and letters of kings, nobles, and civic assemblies. 7. Laws of states. II.--Private writings of personal actors and observers: 1. The Apostles. 2. Church fathers. 3. Heretics and reformers. 4. Heathen. 5. Chroniclers and historians. 6. Missionaries. 7. Clergy and laity. III.--Inscriptions on churches, public buildings, tombs, monuments, coins, seals, etc. B.--Unwritten sources of the following character: I.--Buildings: 1. Churches and baptisteries. 2. Tombs and monuments. 3. Civic edifices. 4. Private dwellings. II.--Art: 1. Sculpture--images and emblems. 2. Painting and fresco. 3. Mosaics. 4. Ecclesiastical vestments and ornaments. 5. Church furniture and vessels. III.--Rites and ceremonies. IV.--Oral traditions.