Why This History Is Needed

Hard as it is to speak worthily of this blessed man, and though silence would be the safer and less perilous course, I am bound nevertheless, if I would escape the charge of negligence and laziness, to draw a portrait in words, as it were, as a memorial of the godly prince, in imitation of what the painter’s art does. For I would be ashamed of myself if I did not use my best efforts, weak and of little worth though they are, in praise of one who honored God with such surpassing devotion. I think too that my work will be instructive and necessary on other grounds, since it will describe those royal and noble actions that are pleasing to God, the Sovereign of all. For would it not be disgraceful if the memory of Nero, and of other impious and godless tyrants far worse than he, should find diligent writers to dress up the story of their worthless deeds in elegant language and record them in lengthy histories, while I kept silent? For God himself has granted me such an emperor as no history records, and has allowed me to come into his presence and enjoy his acquaintance and company. [a]

So if it is anyone’s duty, it is certainly mine to proclaim his virtues fully to all in whom the example of noble actions can inspire the love of God. For some who have written the lives of worthless men, and the history of deeds that do little to improve morals, have done it from private motives, either love or hatred, and possibly in some cases with no better aim than to display their own learning. With refined and elegant language they have unduly heightened their descriptions of actions that are base in themselves. In this way they have become teachers, to those whom God’s favor had kept apart from evil, not of good but of things that should be buried in silence and darkness. But my narrative, however unequal to the greatness of the deeds it has to describe, will still gain luster from the bare telling of noble actions. And surely the record of conduct that has pleased God will offer a study that is far from unprofitable, indeed most instructive, to people of well-disposed minds.