The name of the book is taken from the LDS Church's "Articles of Faith", an 1842 creed written by Joseph Smith.
In 1891, when the First Presidency of the LDS Church asked Talmage to produce a work of theology that could be used in church schools, Talmage decided to use Smith's Articles of Faith as an outline of his work.
Like Talmage's later work Jesus the Christ, Articles of Faith is today regarded as a Mormon classic.
For many years, Articles of Faith and Jesus the Christ were among the few non-scriptural works that full-time LDS Church missionaries were asked to study.
However, Articles of Faith is no longer part of the "approved missionary library.