This work is a volume found in the American Authors Series. The editor made no effort to annotate Mather's text completely. He gives in footnotes the sense of the quotations in foreign languages, and comments briefly on most of the names and incidents alluded to in the text which seemed to need elucidation for the modern reader. He makes no effort to identify Mather's biblical references or the sources of Mather's quotations, except where to do so seemed valuable as an indication of the range of his information. Found within are selections from Mather's Magnalia Christi Americana, The Christian Philosopher, and Political Fables.