possible encouragement to that
excellent work,' and that if previous overtures had received a cold
reception, yet that the clergy generally were zealous in the cause.
Bonel, the Prussian king's minister in London, wrote in 1711 to
Frederick that he thought the service of the Church of England was 'the
most perfect, perhaps, that is among Protestants,' that conformity
between the Prussian and English Churches would be received with great
joy in England, but that the conformity desired related more to Church
government than to any ritual or liturgy, and that Episcopacy was
generally looked upon as the only apostolical and true ecclesiastical
form of government. Later in the year, Jablonski placed in the hands of
Baron Prinz his more matured 'Project for introducing Episcopacy into
the King of Prussia's dominions.' Leibnitz engaged to interest the
Electress of Hanover in the proposal. He was afraid, however, that the
thirty-nine articles would be considered 'a little too much Geneva
stamp' at Berlin. The negotiations continued, but the interest of the
King had slackened; the proceedings of the Collegium Charitativum at
Berlin, which sat under the presidency of Bishop Ursinus, were somewhat
discredited by the wilder schemes started by Winkler, one of its chief
members; the grave political questions debated at Utrecht diverted
attention from ecclesiastical matters; Archbishop Sharp, who had taken
an active part in the correspondence, became infirm; and the conferences
were finally brought to a termination by the death, early in 1713, of
Frederick I.[337] Frederick William's rough and contracted mind was far
too much absorbed in the care of his giant regiment, and in the amassing
of treasure, to feel the slightest concern in matters so entirely
uncongenial to his temper as plans for the advancement of Church unity.

With the earlier years of the century all ideas of a closer relationship
between English and foreign Protestantism than had existed heretofore
passed away. The name of Protestant was still as cherished in popular
feeling as ever it had been; but soon after the beginning of the
Georgian period little was heard, as compared with what lately had been
the case, of the Protestant cause or the Protestant interest. In truth,
when minds were no longer intent upon immediate dangers, the bond was
severed which had begun to keep together, notwithstanding all
differences, the Reformed Churches in England and on the Continent.