Christian Reunion

the history of one movement, but of many; proceeding sometimes in parallel, sometimes in intersecting courses ; now the political and now the religious element predominating: indeed, more than once, in the same country, at the same period, two distinct currents of irenical purpose are manifest; as in France, in 1631, when the partial union between Lutherans and Reformed was accomplished at the Synod of Charenton, while Richelieu was aiming at a wider scheme, which should have brought the whole nation into one ecclesiastical organization. And so when, at the beginning of the century, a member of the Oratorian order in France attempted the first history of Reunion, inspired by the somewhat sanguine hope that, under the auspices of the First Napoleon, Western Christendom might be finally united, he abandoned all effort at philosophical treatment, or even classification of any sort, and narrated, as detached incidents, each irenical effort, with its measure of success or failure.1 And even when, a generation later, the German scholar Karl Hering, performed the same task, on a larger scale, with greater knowledge and a more catholic spirit, the reader yet seeks in vain an answer to the natural questions which the history suggests, as to the connection between the different efforts, the respective share of political interest, and growth of religious feeling; above all, as to the principles on which the leaders of each movement based their proposals for peace, and ...