Page:John Huss, his life, teachings and death, after five hundred years.pdf/13

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PREFACE
vii

pedia, and Karl Müller also in his Church History. As for the spelling of Bohemian names written with an accent, as Paleč, they are given in this volume as Palecz—this spelling representing the pronunciation in the Czech tongue. The name of the king contemporary with Huss is given as Wenzel| rather than Wenceslaus, the Latin form, or Vaklav, the Bohemian form, although there is an inconsistency when the saint is called St. Wenceslaus|.

The author is not acquainted with Bohemian. Such a knowledge, so far as he is able to make out, is not necessary to a just and full study of Huss. His Bohemian writings, which are not translated, are of a homiletic and devotional character and add nothing to our knowledge of his teachings and only a few facts in his career. His chief works are all in Latin, into which his letters, so far as they were written in Czech, have been translated. Moreover, most of the works of Bohemian authors on the subject of Huss are found in German, as by Palacky|, or in English, as the two recent works by Lützow. All the Latin writings have been consulted. Moreover, I have used the chief Life of Huss written in Bohemian, that of Doctor Flajshans, in a translation made for my private use by one of the Bohemian students of the Western Theological Seminary, Mr. Alois Husak.

The following is a list of original authorities upon which the life of Huss must be based and also a list of most of the secondary works bearing on the subject. All have been used in the preparation of this volume except the Czech works of Huss which have not been translated into Latin, and the writings of Tomek.

HUSS’S LATIN WRITINGS

Historia et Monumenta J. Hus atque Hieronymi Pragensis Confessorum Christi. Nürnb., 1558. 2 vols. Reprinted Frankf., 1715. 2 vols., pp. 627, 542—containing the bulk of Huss’s treatises and letters, and also sermons, with Luther’s prefaces of the three editions of certain of Huss’s writings, Wittenberg, 1536, 1537, acts and docu-