movement has derived its strength not so much from its
abstract merit as from the intense personal conviction felt by each unit
engaged in it, that the righteousness of the cause was unassailable. The
Puritan never wavered in philosophic doubt. No misgivings disturbed his
soul, and he pursued his object with all the strength of his body.

The Puritan stir in the reign of Charles I was a revival, almost a
continuation, of the half political, half religious activity which in
the previous century had effected the Reformation. The Boer movement in
South Africa, which sprang up after a germination lasting three
generations, was brought about by a recrudescence of the spirit which
made the Boers of the Netherlands rise against Alva and the Spanish
domination in the XVIth century.

In the XVIIth century the Boers of the Netherlands, made a voluntary
settlement in South Africa, and there under the Southern Cross they were
joined by French Puritans, who had fought under Cond