Excerpt from Laurentia: A Tale of Japan The incidents embodied in the following little tale, though for the most part founded on fact, are not related with strict regard to historical ao curacy, or to the chronological order in which they took place. It has been attempted to give a-pic ture of the Church of Japan in the sixteenth cen tury, and to illustrate in the shape of a narrative the peculiar character of the Japanese converts to Christianity, rather than to compose a regular historical tale. But it may be safely asserted that not one trait of heroism, not one act of self-sacri fice, not one sentiment of exalted virtue from the lips of priest or catechumen, woman or child, which finds place in these pages, but has its coun terpart in the annals of a Church founded by a saint, fruitful in the most remarkable virtues, and which, after a hundred years' duration, did not die away from the decline of faith or the lukee warmness of its members, but was suddenly ex tinguished as it were in a sea of blood, leaving behind it glorious records of its existence, but not one priest to carry on the service of religion, and but very few Christians to perpetuate its memory. 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.