Excerpt from The Gospel According to St. Mark I have long felt the need of a 'Plain Commentary, ' and every parish priest whom I have consulted tells me that his experience is the same. The spread of education has enormously increased the number of readers. Popular literature of all kinds has been produced to cater for those classes which are now entering upon their inheritance of learning. But commentaries on the Bible suitable for ordinary readers do not seem to exist. Such a commentary must be low in price, simple and popular in language, explanatory rather than devotional. The point of view should be that the Bible is the text-book and reference-book of the teaching Church, the infallible witness, but not the sole authority for her teaching. As regards the imagined conflict between science and religion, the commentary ought to assume that there is an underlying unity between the revelation given by God through His Church and His Word and the results of the study of Nature. I think there is a very widespread demand for a commentary on these lines. If this work should meet that demand, I hope to continue the 'Plain Commentary' on other books of the Bible. In some of the comments an indirect reference has been made to the principles of Biblical criticism. It might be helpful, therefore, if a few words were here said about the 'Higher Criticism.' There should be no objection at all to the criticism of the Bible. Criticism is a test of truth. Why fear it? Criticism will have done much good even if it only calls attention to the fact that the Bible record is not our sole authority for the truths on which the Christian religion rests. The living Church has handed down her creeds from the earliest times, and we accept Christian teaching (doctrine) at her mouth. These creeds deal with historical facts which we could accept even if we had the authority of the Church alone. To overthrow Christianity it is required (amongst other things) to be shown that the Church was founded on a lie; rapidly spread in spite of the lie, and even by virtue of the lie; and that she flourishes and still spreads on this basis of a lie! But the Church has an ally. She appeals to the Bible as offering a support to her creeds. It is, therefore, important that the Bible should be most thoroughly examined and tried. This examination, or criticism, has been of the most searching character. So much the better. About the Publisher Forgotten Books publishes hundreds of thousands of rare and classic books. Find more at www.forgottenbooks.com This book is a reproduction of an important historical work. Forgotten Books uses state-of-the-art technology to digitally reconstruct the work, preserving the original format whilst repairing imperfections present in the aged copy. In rare cases, an imperfection in the original, such as a blemish or missing page, may be replicated in our edition. We do, however, repair the vast majority of imperfections successfully; any imperfections that remain are intentionally left to preserve the state of such historical works.