The following pages, though to some extent following the lines already set forth in the author's larger work Persecution in the Early Church (1906), seek to fulfill a different purpose, and to appeal to a wider class of readers. We propose in the following pages to tell the story of the martyrs of the Early Church. The tale of their dauntless heroism is one which men can never willingly let die. In part, no doubt, the value that the Christian Church has always attached to martyrdom must be attributed to the example of Jesus; if for the moment we may contemplate the Crucifixion, not in its eternal significance as the atonement for the world's sin, but under its aspect as an episode in human history. By a sure instinct the Church discerned in the death of the martyr the repetition of the central sacrifice of Calvary. - p. v-4.