vian
liturgies, 394. Meager productiveness of the Catholic Church,
394. The Americanizing of the Roman Church, 396.

CHAP. XXII.--TENDENCIES TOWARD A MANIFESTATION OF UNITY 398-420

Growth of the nation and national union, 398. Parallel growth
of the church, 399; and ecclesiastical division, 400. No
predominant sect, 401. Schism acceptable to politicians, 402;
and to some Christians, 403. Compensations of schism, 404.
_Nisus_ toward manifest union, 405. Early efforts at
fellowship among sects, 406. High-church protests against
union, 407. The Evangelical Alliance, 408. Fellowship in
non-sectarian associations, 409. Cooperation of leading sects
in Maine, 410. Various unpromising projects of union: I. Union
on sectarian basis, 411. II. Ecumenical sects, 412. III.
Consolidation of sects, 413. The hope of manifested unity,
416. Conclusion, 419.

A HISTORY OF AMERICAN CHRISTIANITY.

CHAPTER I.

PROVIDENTIAL PREPARATIONS FOR THE DISCOVERY OF AMERICA--SPIRITUAL
REVIVAL THROUGHOUT CHRISTENDOM, AND ESPECIALLY IN THE CHURCH OF SPAIN.

The heroic discovery of America, at the close of the fifteenth century
after Christ, has compelled the generous and just admiration of the
world; but the grandeur of human enterprise and achievement in the
discovery of the western hemisphere has a less claim on our admiration
than that divine wisdom and controlling providence which, for reasons
now manifested, kept the secret hidden through so many millenniums, in
spite of continual chances of disclosure, until the fullness of time.

How near, to "speak as a fool," the plans of God came to being defeated
by human enterprise is illustrated by unquestioned facts. The fact of
medieval exploration, colonization, and even evangelization in North
America seems now to have emerged from the region of fanciful conjecture
into that of history. That for four centuries, ending with the
fifteenth, the church of Iceland maintained its bishops and other
missionaries and built its churches and monasteries on the frozen coast
of Greenland is abundantly proved by documents and monuments. Dim but
seemingly unmistakable traces are now discovered of enterprises, not
only of exploration and trade, but also of evangelization, reaching
along the mainland southward to the shores of New England. There are
vague indications that these beginnings of Christian civilization wer