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 SCIENCE OF HISTORY 
 
 ON AN EVANGELICAL BASLS. 
 
 BY EUREKA 
 
 Xasuville, Tenn.: 
 SOUTHERN METHODIST PUBLISHING HOUSE. 
 
 PRINT EI) FOR THE AUTHOR. 
 
 1882. 
 
THE 
 
 SCIENCE OF HISTORY 
 
 m AN -EVANGELICAL BASIS. 
 
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 7). ^ , ^aynJjJ^- 
 
 BY EUREKA? 
 
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 .fAUG 7 1832/1 
 
 Nashville, Tenn.: 
 SOUTHERN METHODIST PUBLISHING HOUSE. 
 
 PRINT KP rOR THE AUTIIOli. 
 
 1882. 
 
 7^ 
 
CoPYKiGHT Secured. 
 
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THE SCIENCE OF HISTORY 
 
 ON AN EVANGELICAL BASIS, 
 
 CHAPTER I 
 
 THE Science of History has not yet been discov- 
 ered; its discovery has hardly .been attempted, 
 for its existence has been only vaguely suspected. 
 It seems strange that this should be so, when we 
 consider the great importance of the subject, and 
 the almost unlimited range of scientific effort in our 
 day. The daring spirit that animates the scientific 
 mind laughs at apparent impossibilities, and has 
 demonstrated its triumphant power by vast achieve- 
 ments which have repeatedly startled the world. 
 But History has hitherto eluded or defied its all-com- 
 prehending grasp. It is the more surprising that 
 History has escaped the peiietrating analysis of Sci- 
 ence, since this subject, as a general study, has not 
 been neglected by any means in recent times. On 
 the contrary, never before has History received such 
 extensive and careful attention from the learned. 
 Every source of original information has been ex- 
 plored with laborious research. Secondary author- 
 ities have been reviewed, collated, and critically 
 studied to great advantage. Distinct Sciences, as 
 
 (3) 
 
4 The Science of History 
 
 Archaeology and Philology, have been special!}^ cul- 
 tivated, that they might be forced to pay a generous 
 tribute to the solution of great historical problems. 
 Brilliant professors and practical statesmen have 
 made it the favorite field of their literary labor, and 
 thus brought to its aid the united resources of ge- 
 nius, learning, and experience. This labor has not 
 been in vain. It has thrown a flood of light upon 
 the disordered march of humanit}^ through the cen- 
 turies of time. Many seemingly hopeless compli- 
 cations have been simplified and explained — obscure 
 transactions have been illustrated ; while the epoch- 
 making scenes in the great drama of nations have 
 been variously described by men of difl:erent tem- 
 peraments and education, reproducing in their sev- 
 eral prejudices the conflicting forces of the original 
 events; so that, in the crossed and blended lights 
 of critics and advocates, the great deeds of the past 
 stand out with life-like distinctness on the canvas 
 of our imaginations. 
 
 But not one of these writers has attempted to 
 assert or define with scientilic precision the laws 
 which govern the vast and varied range of histori- 
 cal events, nor traced successfully the subtle track 
 of moral and religious principle which runs like a 
 golden thread through every part, and binds the 
 whole into a beautiful and grand system of provi- 
 dential wisdom, justice, and power. Indeed, it 
 seems scarcely to have entered into the thoughts of 
 the wise that the Science of History might one day 
 take its place beside that of Astronomy for the sim- 
 plicity of its principles and the exactness of its ver- 
 
On an Eoangelical Basis. 5 
 
 ifications. Of course, we do not mean to say that 
 men have not, from time immemorial, moralized 
 and philosophized over the lessons of History. One 
 of the most familiar claims and admissions in the 
 literature of Christendom is that of the amenability 
 of History to some sort of systematic government, 
 either intrinsic or extraneous. From the times of 
 Bossuet and Vico to those of Comte and Guizot, 
 various extensive and ingenious systems of Philoso- 
 phy have been constructed upon the data supplied 
 by ]N"arrative History; but in every instance they 
 are so vague in principles and results, so utterly in- 
 capable of verifications, that they cannot claim to 
 be scientific in character. Science is always con- 
 sistent with itself; but so unscientific are these Phi- 
 losophies that the hand of each system is against 
 that of every other. Indeed, the very spirit that 
 animates the Philosophies of History seems in- 
 spired by the principle that History is not, and can- 
 not be, a proper field for scientific study. So that, 
 having no scientific aims at the beginning, it is but 
 natural they yield no scientific results at the end. 
 
 Several causes conspire to produce this fixilure of 
 Science to illuminate the mysteries of History, two 
 of which we shall briefly discuss: 
 
 1. There is an apparent incompatibility between 
 the innate, generally-admitted belief in the free- 
 agency of man, and the claim that historical events 
 are determined and controlled by exact, invariable 
 laws. This can be shown to be a superficial difii- 
 culty by a brief argument. ^"0 believer in the 
 Bible will deny that a minute and perfect system of 
 
6 The Science of History 
 
 Providence presides over all outward human aftairs. 
 This Providence determines, with imperial decision, 
 the circumstances surrounding our lives ; but it is 
 not construed as inconsistent with free-agency, be- 
 cause its jurisdiction is confined to the outward 
 condition of man, and affects his spiritual freedom 
 only indirectly. ISTow Science, from an evangelical 
 stand-point, is only a systematic explanation of the 
 works of God; and if we can discover the true, 
 systematic explanation of the providential govern- 
 ment of God over the nations of the world, we shall 
 have as complete a Science of History as it is pos- 
 sible to obtain. This achievement would be no 
 more incompatible with the doctrine of free-agency 
 than the dogma of Providence is, for it is only an 
 elucidation of that dogma in actual operation. 
 
 It will not serve an opponent to assert that these 
 laws are so hidden and spiritual as to defy the pow- 
 ers of man to discover and formulate them cor- 
 rectl3\ Not a century since many laws of Chemis- 
 try and Electricit}^ were shrouded in the same pro- 
 found myster}^ but now they are so clear that we 
 wonder only that they remained hidden so long. 
 Besides, it is but reasonable to suppose that as Sci- 
 ence, in the hands of skeptics, has been allowed to 
 militate against religion, it may now have a special 
 spiritual gift by which it shall be compelled to 
 prove and magnify that religion against which it 
 has been perverted so freely and so long. 
 
 2. The almost inextricable confusion of clatci 
 which reigns in the domain of History presents a 
 stupendous difficulty to the discovery of the princi- 
 
On an Evangelical Basis. 7 
 
 pies upon which they all depend. Bat this does 
 not imply that there are no overruling and connect- 
 ing principles. The aspects of I^ature to the untu- 
 tored savage present many apparently conflicting 
 events, which are really beautiful examples of order 
 to the man of Natural Science. If we discover the 
 true principles of Providence, we shall find that 
 they, like other scientific laws, have in themselves 
 a marvelous power of reducing chaos to order. 
 Things apparently antagonistic will be found, in- 
 the light of correct principles, to possess unsus- 
 pected features in common. Just as, in Natural 
 Philosophy, the falling of a stone and the rising of 
 eider-down through the air are both due to the law 
 of gravitation, though the phenomena are exactly 
 opposite in outward appearance, so in Chemistry 
 the terrible explosion of nitro-glycerine and the 
 suffocating power of carbonic acid are both ex- 
 plained by the law of affinity. 
 
 Fortunately, we have already supplied in the in- 
 fallible word of revelation the fundamental princi- 
 ples upon which Historical Science must ever rest; 
 for, as we have already said, this Science is possible 
 only as it discovers the track and unfolds the meth- 
 ods of Divine Providence. In the Bible is found 
 the only rational and adequate statement of Prov- 
 idence that man possesses. There is revealed its 
 origin, its scope, its perfection, its subservience to 
 moral and religious ends, and its glorious consum- 
 mation in carrying the blessings of true religion to 
 all the nations of the earth. The Bible freely reveals 
 all that is necessary to a full understanding of the 
 
8 The Science of History 
 
 divine action in History. Hence, it is not a pre- 
 sumptuous, but really a pious task, to study and 
 discover the Science of Histor}', since it involves 
 no proud intrusion of the fleshly mind into the 
 reserved depths of divine counsels, but only a 
 humble, conscientious, careful application of the 
 principles He has given to a clearer elucidation of 
 human experience and destiny. But according to 
 the Bible, and the voice of common sense, History 
 is the joint product of God and man. As in the 
 kingdom of grace man is saved by man, and God 
 accepts human co-workers in carrying on his cause, 
 so in the kingdom of Providence man is divinely 
 ruled, but it is through human instruments, and in 
 accordance with the principles of human nature and 
 the earthly surroundings of man. Hence, there are 
 certain fundamental and necessary principles in 
 Historical Science that are derived from the hu- 
 man side of the great subject; and the application 
 even of revealed principles to explain Providence 
 in History cannot reach a correct result unless 
 guided by a correct analysis of the human factor 
 involved. Human life, in its historical bearings, 
 naturally and exhaustively divides itself into four 
 grand attributes — the physical nature, the mental 
 faculties, the emotional capacities, and the moral 
 powers. Corresponding with these, man's historical 
 motives, purposes, and actions, should be classified 
 into four divisions: 1. The domestic, or social; 2. 
 The political, ornational; 3. The ecclesiastical, or 
 international; 4. The spiritual, or ecumenical. Of 
 course, these divisions are never entirely distinct 
 
On an Evangelical Basis. 9 
 
 from, or independent of, one another; for while 
 man is acting in his highest capacity as a spiritual 
 being, he does not for a moment lose his true phys- 
 ical character. But one or the other of these ele- 
 ments is always in the ascendency, and, by reason 
 of its predominance, gives its characteristics to the 
 action of the hour. But though these divisions thus 
 interlap and coalesce, they will be found of indis- 
 pensable utility in discussing the Science of History, 
 just as similar classifications of mental faculties, 
 though they are necessarily indivisible, are essen- 
 tial to the successful treatment of Psychology. 
 
 Having indicated some of the first principles in- 
 volved in our subject, we now proceed to state the 
 propositions which we believe to lie at the basis of 
 this Science, and will then endeavor to illustrate 
 and confirm them by numerous citations from the 
 course of Ancient and Modern History. 
 
 I. All crises or events of History having social, v 
 political, ecclesiastical, or spiritual significance, re- 
 volve in cycles of time of fixed and unchanging 
 durations. 
 
 II. Each class of crises or events revolves in its 
 own peculiar cycle, as follows: Social crises in terms 
 of four years, political crises in terms of forty years, 
 ecclesiastical crises in terms of four hundred years, 
 and spiritual crises in terms of four thousand years. 
 
10 The Science of History 
 
 CHAPTER II. 
 
 OTT account of the immense time involved, the 
 comparative brevit}^ of History, and poverty of 
 data, for at least one-half of the world's career, it is 
 impossible to give the spiritual cycles of History 
 as full iUustration as is desirable; but the items 
 here adduced to prove its truthfulness are as sat- 
 isfactory as the nature of the case admits, and 
 combine, without exception, to support the theory 
 advanced. 
 
 I. Adam and Jesus stand at the head of spiritual 
 epochs of marked and exactly opposite characteris- 
 tics. Sacred History contrasts with impressive force 
 their respective places in the career and destiny of 
 the race. The lirst Adam was made a living soul; 
 the second Adam (Jesus) was made a quickening 
 spirit. By the first came sin and death; by the 
 second came atonement and resurrection. Usher, 
 in making a careful compilation of chronology from 
 the best historical source, computes that an interval 
 of exactly four thousand years intervened between 
 the creation of Adam and the birth of Christ. 
 Some authors of late years have endeavored to dis- 
 credit the chronology of Usher, because of a fan- 
 cied necessity of conceding a greater age to the 
 world in accordance with the w^ild estimates of the 
 radical school of geologists ; but it is an unques- 
 tionable fact that the Hebrew Scriptures are the 
 
On an Evangelical Basis. 11 
 
 most authentic, conscientiously-prepared, and care- 
 fully-preserved historical records of the race, and 
 they should be preeminent in authority on pure- 
 ly historical subjects. Therefore, we take Usher as 
 our general guide in this treatise. 
 
 II. The dispersion of the human race after the 
 Deluge was caused by sin; it is therefore properly 
 classed as a spiritual event. Unfortunately, its pre- 
 cise date cannot now be fixed, but several consider- 
 ations almost demonstrate that it took place in the 
 latter part of the twenty-second century B.C. 
 
 Before that time the family of Noah would not 
 have been so numerous as to have led to the disper- 
 sion; and had it occurred later, we should have had 
 in Prohme History more distinct legends and fuller 
 accounts of so great an event. Doubtless the evil 
 w^hich led to this signal providence was, like those 
 of subsequent times, of slow growth, and occupied 
 most of the century between 2200 and 2100 B.C. 
 The great barriers then instituted between the na- 
 tions of the earth by the God of Providence have 
 retained their divisive power almost intact for four 
 thousand years. From their grim ramparts forty 
 centuries look down on us; but who that has stud- 
 ied the progress of this nineteenth century but real- 
 izes that these ancient walls are being rapidh^, mys- 
 teriously removed by the same providential hand 
 that raised them up? Railways, steam-ships, tele- 
 graphs, lightning printing-presses, postal unions, 
 geographical explorations, popular governments, 
 and missionary work, are conspiring with ever-in- 
 creasing energy to restore the lost brotherhood of 
 
12 The Science of History 
 
 man; and we cannot doubt that great achievements 
 on this line of human progress will crown the his- 
 tory of the near future. 
 
 III. In close connection with the dispersion is 
 narrated in Sacred History the usurpations and des- 
 potic career of l^imrod. He was the institutor of 
 autocratic government in the race of I^oah. The 
 old patriarchal governments, as is clear from the 
 analogy of Eastern tribes in our day, was a mild, 
 almost nominal rulership, resting upon the consent 
 and affections of the subject; but since the evil 
 example of ]S[imrod, the human race has been gen- 
 erally subjected to monarchical oppression of vari- 
 ous kinds. 
 
 Republican governments have prevailed in small 
 areas and for short periods, but the virus of Nim- 
 rod's sin, too tamely submitted to by the race at 
 first, has sooner or later shown itself everywhere; 
 it has infected the world, and caused innumerable 
 sufferings among men. But in the hitter half of 
 the eighteenth century A.D., the incisive dogma — 
 "All men are born free and equal" — became the 
 corner-stone of American liberty and French repub- 
 licanism. It has ever since been as leaven in the 
 mass of Christendom, preparing with irresistible 
 power the way of the universal Republic, or at least 
 compelling monarchies and aristocracies to concede 
 the most liberal privileges and enlarged powers to 
 their nominal subjects. The growth of this great 
 principle has lately extorted a constitution even 
 from the Turkish Sultan. Japan is on the high- 
 road to constitutional freedom, and every indication 
 
On an Evangelical Basis. 
 
 10 
 
 points to the probability that by the close of this 
 century China and India will be marching in the 
 same direction. 
 
 Absolute monarchy has always rested, as at the 
 beginning, on a basis of spiritual depravity. The 
 struo'de to dislods-e it from its evil intrenchments 
 has been a long and desperate one, during which 
 four thousand years have rolled by; but such is the 
 spiritual regeneration of the race, secured by ad- 
 vancing Christianity, that victory is now assured. 
 The day when a king's word could till the world 
 with woe is rapidly passing away, and when it goes, 
 it does so never to return. 
 
 IV. Domestic slavery is an ancient and wide- 
 spread institution. Its origin cannot be accounted 
 for but by the spiritual degeneracy of mankind. 
 Had E'oah's descendants lived uprightly, no occasion 
 for slavery could have arisen among them: it could 
 not have come from famine or want, since true hu- 
 manity would have dictated that no such ungener- 
 ous advantage should be taken of a neighbor's 
 necessities ; it could not have arisen by right of cap- 
 tivity, since in that case there would have been no 
 war ; it could not have come from fugitives seeking 
 asylums, since there would have been no fugitives 
 but those from justice, and these would have been 
 extradited or treated more generously than reduced 
 to slavery. The malediction of Noah against Ca- 
 naan points directly to the theory that it was spe- 
 cially connected with sin. When it began to be 
 practiced by Noah's descendants we do not know 
 exactlv. Even as early as the time of Abraham it 
 
14 The Science of History 
 
 existed among the best men of the day, and is spok- 
 en of as a well-established custom ; so that we are 
 justified in assigning its origin as coeval, or nearly 
 so, with the great apostasy of Nimrod. If this is 
 correct, the vast eftbrts and large success in all 
 Christian and Mohammedan countries during this 
 centur}^ to extinguish slavery is another striking 
 illustration of the four-thousand-year period in Hu- 
 man History. The coincidence deserves to be 
 marked too, that as we have shown that slavery 
 almost certainly arose when political and military 
 despotism came into existence, so in modern times 
 the movement to eradicate slavery has followed as 
 one of the correlated results of advancing political 
 freedom in the world. 
 
 V. "War was a natural consequence of the dis- 
 persion, so long as the different tribes occupied 
 contiguous territories, and any of them were ruled 
 by selfish, ambitious chiefs. When the tribes grew 
 into nations, and became more deeply involved in 
 the errors of false religion, war only assumed larger 
 proportions, fiercer forms, and more frequent occur- 
 rence. War, keeping pace with the progress of 
 sin — upon which it is founded — has prevailed so 
 constantly that some philosophers have considered 
 man naturally a fighting animal; but in the day 
 when true religion will gain a deeper hold on the 
 race, it will fall down dead at the feet of the Prince 
 of Peace. Hence the prophet speaks of the anni- 
 hilation of war as one of the incidents of the regen- 
 erated humanity that Christianity is working out 
 for the world. Even now we can see that this mon- 
 
On an Ecangelical Basis. 15 
 
 ster is weakening in bis terrible power to desolate 
 tbe eartb. Witbin sixty-five years past tbere has 
 been no general war in Europe; and bardly an in- 
 ternational war, involving two or more nations, bas 
 lasted during tbis time more tban one year of active 
 campaigning. Tbis is a great gain for peace, com- 
 pared witb otber periods of similar lengtb. Tbe 
 vast growtb of commerce is exerting a powerful 
 cbeck upon all warlike movements, and there are 
 great parties growing up in all tbe leading States ot 
 the world who are resolutely opposed to war except 
 in cases of tbe sternest necessity. Tbe siren song, 
 *'^The empire is peace," made France unanimous 
 for ^N'apoleon in 1852, and Germany equally enthu- 
 siastic for William in 1870. These incidents show 
 bow the masses yearn for peace, and that tbe prog- 
 ress of popular government advances tbe cause of 
 peace. Tbe w^orld w^ill pay undying honors to tbe 
 name of Gladstone wdien it comes to realize bow 
 much he has contributed to its achievement of per- 
 petual peace. In tbis paragraph we assign the ori- 
 gin of war in the race of ISToab to a period just 
 subsequent to tbe dispersion ; hence, if its terrible 
 reign is to last exactly four thousand years, we could 
 not realize deliverance until the progress of Chris- 
 tian civilization restores more fully tbe lost brother- 
 hood of man, and establishes more clearly tbe in- 
 terdependence of nations. 
 
 VI. Inspired truth assures us that tbe race of 
 ISToab bad been preserved uncontaminated by sin, 
 unclouded by error, until the Deluge. Soon after 
 that event an incident occurred, recorded in Gen. 
 
16 The Science of History 
 
 ix. 20-27, showing that this great fountain of truth 
 was no longer unpolluted — there was a spot even 
 upon this sun of righteousness. A singular weak- 
 ness has impelled some to defend the second father 
 of mankind from all blame in this matter; but 
 [N'oah and all other men are made to stand as sin- 
 ners before God by revealed truth. None that has 
 ever worn the form of humanity — except Jesus — is 
 spotless. If Noah then was a sinner saved b}^ grace, 
 how does it degrade his name to admit that his par- 
 ticular sin was drunkenness, indulged in but once in 
 his life? It is the only rational explanation of the 
 advent of sin and error into Noah's race. This 
 event occurred, we believe, about 2331 B.C., and, 
 as a consequence, spiritual darkness began to over- 
 spread the race. In the progress of Christianit}^, 
 durino^ the srreat relio-io-political convulsion of En- 
 glish History — A. D. 1648-88 — one luminous princi- 
 ple dawned on the world — that of Toleration. It 
 exhibited itself in practical application first in the 
 American colonies of Rhode Island, Pennsylvania, 
 Maryland, and the Carolinas. It was feeble at lirst, 
 but it has spread rapidly over the world, and is now 
 filling the earth with light and joy. The history 
 of "Anathema" from Noah to William III. would 
 show a dark four thousand years of Human History, 
 but according to the promise "at eventide" in the 
 world's progress "there is light" again. The great 
 principle here fought for and realized at last is, that 
 no man, however eminent, has a right to hurl divine 
 curses upon his fellow-man, wdiether he is in error 
 or not. "To his own master he standeth or fall- 
 
On an Evangelical Basis. 17 
 
 eth;" therefore we, his, fellow-servants, are not to 
 curse, but entreat, the erring. 
 
 VII. The great archaeological discoveries of this 
 century bear directly upon these cycles of History. 
 Of the original foundations and careers of the first 
 o-reat monarchies of the world we have known little, 
 except from Scripture and wild legends, till the de- 
 cipltering of hieroglyphics and excavations in the 
 East in recent years. We hold that these king- 
 doms, founded about 2200 B.C., with the contami- 
 nation of sin which infected more or less the whole 
 race even at that early day, fell, and their memo- 
 rials perished with them, because of their unre- 
 pented sin. Hence, the cause of their decay was 
 coeval with their institution, and the impenetrable 
 cloud of darkness which so long hid the demoraliz- 
 ino; details of their sins from human kind was an 
 appropriate and necessary punishment for their 
 flagrant departure from the pure principles of the 
 earlier age. After a dreary interval of four thou- 
 sand years the eye of the world is again providen- 
 tially turned upon them, to read the inevitable 
 consequences of national sin, and to find in the 
 resurrected cities of the East new proofs of the di- 
 vinity of the gospel of the resurrection, now so 
 fiercely assailed by sin. Hence we see that, after a 
 full spiritual cycle of four thousand years, the very 
 nations that first led the world astray from true re- 
 ligion are compelled by Providence to throw light 
 and confirmation upon its importance and history, 
 and thus help forward the work they once retarded. 
 YIII. Philological investigation unites with, and 
 2 
 
18 The Science of History 
 
 goes hand in hand with, archix^ological research. 
 Confusion of human speech is expressly decLared 
 to have been a direct punishment and preventive 
 of sin. The divisive tendencies of diverse lan- 
 guages have exerted an immense influence upon the 
 whole subsequent history of mankind ; but in the 
 present century the study of Philology has been 
 developed to such an extent that the languages of 
 almost the whole world have been analyzed, classi- 
 fied into groups, and studied with scientific order; 
 so that man has attained a power over human 
 speech never before possessed; and as sin at first 
 gave rise to the confusion of languages, the evan- 
 gelical work of missionaries in translating the Bible 
 into foreign tongues has been the first motive and 
 chief factor in this great achievement of advancing 
 civilization. The almost universal translation of 
 the Bible is the best illustration of the progress of 
 the world in conquering the barriers of diverse 
 speech. Four thousand years ago sin was retarded 
 in its conquest of the world by the confusion of 
 speech ; but as sin finally overleaped the obstruction, 
 so grace is overcoming it now. 
 
 IX. The development of the mechanical and sci- 
 entific arts is also illustrative of this cycle. Noah's 
 immediate descendants Avere evidently in a high 
 state of civilization in this respect. The structure 
 of the immense ark and the building of the ambi- 
 tious Tower of Babel — "whose top should reach to 
 heaven" — prove the advancement of that genera- 
 tion in material things. The vast edifices of ancient 
 Babylon, Egypt, and Nineveh, testify to the same 
 
On an Evangelical Basis. 19 
 
 truths. The decline in the sciences and arts was 
 caused by political disorders, wars, conquests, etc. — 
 indirect results of sin ; so we hold that the great 
 revival of mechanical industries, arts, and sciences, 
 in our time, is a return to, and an improvement 
 npon, the old order of things, and is due indirectly 
 to the religious elevation of the people who have 
 produced them; for it is an indisputable fact that 
 they have been most wonderfully developed in 
 those countries most advanced in religious and po- 
 litical progress. The decline in these things has 
 lasted four thousand years from its first advent to 
 the complete restoration in our day. 
 
 X. Intemperance has been a great spiritual enemy 
 of man. Its effect upon Noah gave rise to the first 
 great schism in his family. It was intemperance 
 that opened Pandora's box upon !N"oah's race when 
 it ejected from him an injudicious anathema upon 
 Canaan (for we hold that that utterance is given in 
 Scripture as a fact, not as an inspiration). It has 
 intensified every evil that befalls man, and stren- 
 uously opposed every good to which he aspires. 
 Many protests have gone up from anguished earth 
 to merciful Heaven against it. The Xazarite law 
 of Moses, the Rechabite vovv^ of the perpetual fam- 
 ily, the Essene dogma, Mohammed's prohibition, 
 and monkish asceticism, have successively proved 
 vain ; but in modern times a movement has begun 
 that promises success after four thousand years 
 of failure. In > the seventeenth century A.D., the 
 Quakers adjured intemperance by Church -vow; 
 in the eighteenth century the Methodists arose, 
 
20 The Science of History 
 
 Avith the same principles in practice ; in the nine- 
 teenth century great organizations have arisen in 
 the two foremost nations of Christendom to banish 
 it b}^ law from the face of the earth. All evan- 
 gelical Christians will soon be united and zealous 
 in the contest, and when that is realized, success 
 becomes only a question of short time. The insid- 
 ious evil that undermined the glory of the patri- 
 archal ago will be eradicated when Christianity is 
 crowned with its glorious and predestined triumph 
 over the world. 
 
On an Evangelical Basis. 
 
 21 
 
 CHAPTER III. 
 
 IN the early part of Ecclesiastical History the same 
 difficulties as in the spiritual cycles preclude the 
 exactness of demonstration which is desirable; but 
 all the meager materials at hand fall readily and 
 naturally into line of proof, testifying unanimously 
 the truth of the principle stated. 
 
 I. We begin this line of historical study with a 
 brief discussion of the incident mentioned in Gen. 
 ix. 20-27— that of the breach between Noah and 
 Ham. This has been already referred to as a spir- 
 itual event. It is many-sided, and has also its eccle- 
 siastical bearing and connections; and to these as- 
 pects we now direct our attention. It w^as the first 
 recorded appearance of evil in the family and patri- 
 archate of Noah; it led to a train of consequents 
 which finally broke down the old patriarchal system 
 of ecclesiastical worship, as well as opened the pit 
 whence clouds of spiritual darkness overspread the 
 whole race. The date cannot be definitely fixed, 
 and we assign it to 2331 B.C. as the most probable, 
 for the narrative infers that it was the first occur- 
 rence of importance after the Deluge, and happened 
 at a time when the whole family was yet dwelling 
 in one homestead, or in immediate proximity to one 
 another. It is only in accordance with what we 
 know of human nature to hold that, in consequence 
 of this malediction, a schism more or less defined 
 
0!-7 
 
 The Science of History 
 
 took place in the family. Ham's children felt ag- 
 grieved and degraded, while the descendants of 
 Shem and Japheth were rendered corresponding- 
 ly elated and overbearing by this act, which had 
 mnch the effect of any indiscreet parental partiality. 
 Any thing that has the semblance of partiality in a 
 family never fails to prod ace jealousy and feuds. 
 But as if God would seal up the incipient source of 
 evil providentially, ISTimrod grows up in the next 
 generation, from the despised and accursed branch, 
 a man of vast personal prowess and individual re- 
 sources. That he was a man of great usefulness to 
 the infant race in subduing wild beasts is highly 
 probable. Proper appreciation of his services might 
 liave restored the impaired peace of the race ; but 
 when have men ever shov»Mi themselves ready to 
 utilize the providence which raises up great men 
 from despised places or families? Jnlins Ciesar, 
 l^apoleon Bonaparte, and Jesus, illustrate this sad 
 truth. Nimrod's services were made use of, but the 
 prejudice incited against his fomily by the maledic- 
 tion could not be overcome. Gifted with mighty 
 resources, with high contempt for the petty weak- 
 ness of others, he became soured against his kind 
 on account of their ungenerous treatment, and 
 launched out on his reckless, ruinous career. Of 
 course, we do not assert these as indubitable facts, 
 for the details at this place are not at hand; but 
 they are presented as the most rational explanation 
 of those few facts that are given, and their reliabil- 
 ity is to be strengthened by showing that this is 
 the nniform course of History in subsequent times 
 
On an UoangcUcal Basis. 
 
 9?. 
 
 when tljG details become more abundant and avail- 
 able. Thus Nimrod, instead of becoming the bond 
 of restored harmony, became tlie stirrer up of new 
 disorders that overturned every foundation of the 
 patriarchal system. The progress of evil was baf- 
 fled, retarded, by providential intervention in the 
 dispersion of the race; but the cankering process 
 went on until it reached its culmination about 1931 
 B.C., wdien the lirst recorded instance of wide- 
 spread conquest took place, Chedorlaomer being 
 the leader. It is evident that at this time military 
 government had entirely superseded patriarchal au- 
 thority in the regions of the Euphrates, its chief seat 
 after the Deluge. The exile of Terah and Abraham, 
 most probably the last adherents of the patriarchal 
 system at this same period, confirms the entire pros- 
 tration of the post-diluvian patriarchate, just four 
 hundred years after its first infringement by evil. 
 
 II. At this juncture Abraham emerges from the 
 silent history of Ur, and appears as the head of a 
 ]iew ecclesiastical cycle. There is scarcely a doubt 
 tliat Abraham was a political exile, as well as a 
 graciously-commissioned servant of God. Indeed, 
 to consider him a political exile, the legal represent- 
 ative of the old order of things, explains ichj he 
 was the graciously-commissioned servant of God. 
 lie was persecuted for righteousness' sake, hence 
 God became his defender and guide. The two are 
 not at all incompatible. Jesus was compelled — 
 humanly speaking — to flee with Joseph to Egypt 
 when a babe, yet that flight was directed and in- 
 spired by angelic vision; and so the spiritual and 
 
24 The Science of History 
 
 political were joint factors in the Saviour's life— 
 why not also in that of Abraham ? The date usu- 
 ally given for Abraham's call is 1921 B.C. ; but this 
 is on the supposition that he came almost directly 
 from Ur to Canaan. There is no violence done to 
 the record to hold that his journey from Ur was 
 about 1931, and that he remained at least ten years 
 at Charan, as indeed the narrative seems to infer. 
 That the providential mission of Abraham had di- 
 rect reference to the political and ecclesiastical im- 
 provement of Egypt, as w^ell as to the securing of 
 Canaan to his own posterity, cannot be doubted by 
 the candid student of Historj^ and Revelation. At 
 his first arrival in Canaan a drought compelled him 
 to visit Egypt immediately. Josephus, who had 
 access to, and was well informed on, the ancient 
 records of different nations, declares that Abraham 
 instructed the priests and chief men of Egypt in 
 many religious truths. The whole course of the 
 succeeding providence indicates that it was the 
 ruling design of this cycle to establish an ecclesias- 
 tical alliance between the Abrahamic and Egyptian 
 races; for when at first Abraham's visit was cut 
 short by his moral cowardice, and its purpose tem- 
 porarily foiled, about two centuries afterward, by a 
 most singular intervention of Providence, Joseph, 
 the most virtuous of the great-grandchildren of 
 Abraham, became the political saviour and priest- 
 ly counselor of Egypt, and continued in ofhce for 
 more than half a century, "teaching his senators 
 wisdom, and binding his ]3i'iiices at his pleasure." 
 lie introduced radical changes in the land-tenure 
 
On an Edangellcal Basis. 25 
 
 g3'steni of the kingdom, and aolidified its political 
 power thereby; and it is impossible to suppose that 
 so 2food and so wise a man could have continued so 
 long in power without making his influence felt in 
 modifying idolatry, and counteracting heresy there. 
 Besides his personal influence, the whole Jacobite 
 family was reintroduced into Egypt under the most 
 auspicious circumstances, and thus tlie way was 
 reopened and widened for leavening the whole 
 kingdom with true religion. And even when the 
 reaction against this foreign influence was success- 
 ful, the cruel persecutions of the succeeding Pha- 
 raohs were not permitted to defeat entirel}^ this 
 great design of Providence ; for again, two hun- 
 dred years after Joseph, Moses was raised up by an 
 amazins^ divine intervention, and became sinoruhirlv 
 fitted, as the adopted heir to the throne, "learned 
 in the wisdom of Egypt," as well as by Hebrew 
 blood and nurture, to achieve the final accord of the 
 two races to their mutual advantage in political and 
 ecclesiastical affairs. Josephus asserts that this 
 providence was even more marked by Moses becom- 
 ing a great military leader of Egyptian armies at an 
 early age, bringing the whole nation under deep 
 gratitude to him. Indeed, every thing about his 
 early history marks him out as the one man who 
 might reconcile the Abrahamic and Egyptian races, 
 and lead them both out into a clearer light of ac- 
 (piired and revealed truth. But it all became of no 
 avail when the inveterate prejudices of the Egyp- 
 tians and the servile ingratitude of his own people 
 caused him to flee as an exile to Midian, 1531 B.C. 
 
26 The Science of History 
 
 We have claimed that Abraham left iTr 1931 B.C. 
 as ail exile, with a providential destiny and mission 
 to Egypt; now, just four hundred years afterv/ard, 
 Moses goes into exile from Egypt, having failed to 
 fulfill the Abrahamic mission there. That flight 
 is the starting-point of a new era of Ecclesiastical 
 History. As a lonely exile in Midian, a sorrowful 
 stranger in a strange land, yet with the paternal 
 counsels and domestic sympathy of Jethro, Moses 
 received that additional personal discipline and 
 training that made him. tlie " meekest man on 
 earth," qualifying him for becoming the deliverer 
 and lawgiver of the chosen people of God. And 
 in these hard lessons of adversity, teaching and 
 preparing him for his great future work, Moses w^as 
 only repeating in person the experience of Abraham 
 through a similar period four hundred years before. 
 It is a coincidence not to be overlooked, that a 
 bondage of four hundred years for his descendants 
 W'as foretold to Abraham in Gen. xv. 13. Was this 
 intended to give a key to solve the mysteries of 
 similar fluctuations in the subsequent cycles of Ec- 
 clesiastical History ? 
 
 III. It is needless to dilate upon this new cycle 
 more than just to refer to its several stages. First, 
 its forty years of preparation, followed by the glori- 
 ous exodus; then its forty years' schooling in the 
 wilderness, followed in turn by the triumphant pas- 
 sao^e into Canaan; then a2:ain its victorious wars, 
 and sad disasters, till Othniel vindicated their power 
 of permanent possession in the fortieth year; after- 
 ward the ceaseless story of foreign invasion and do- 
 
On an JEmnr/cUccd Basis. 27 
 
 tnestic iiisilrrection shows that the nation who sol- 
 emnly vowed to have the Lord for their lung were 
 becomino; more and more profoundly insensible to 
 their high vocation and ecclesiastieal duties. The 
 cycle closes in seemingly impenetrable clouds of 
 despair, when, provoked by the iniquity even of the 
 priests around His altar, the hand of Providence 
 delivers the choice outward testimony of Moses's 
 administration — the sacred ark — to the power of 
 Israel's enemies, and " Ichabod "—a cry of mingled 
 contrition and despair—goes up from the home of 
 the faithless successor of Aaron. This event oc- 
 curred, as correctly as we can make it, 1181 B.C. 
 
 IV. But this awful calamity, under the hand of 
 Providence, was made to AVork its own cure, as far 
 as it could be cured. The ark had come hitherto to 
 be idolatrously esteemed, as possessing divine virtue 
 irrespective of the rectitude of its attendants; as 
 the palladium of public safety, its presence in a 
 camp even of sinners would insure them victory. 
 Its captivity dissipated this materialistic error, and 
 made a profound impression upon the people. The 
 necessity of public I'eformation was felt by all. 
 Samuel had been providentially prepared and placed 
 in a position to turn this impression to good account. 
 He introduced a more systematic form of Judicial 
 administration, as is evidenced by his yearly circuit 
 of the whole land. Tveducing chaos to order, he 
 caused the light of hope to arise upon the darkness 
 of national despair. Later he broke the bondage 
 of Philistine oppression, and laid wisely the foun- 
 dations upon which Saul, David, and Solomon, after- 
 
28 The Science of History 
 
 ward built. Without the preliminarj work of 
 Samuel the glory of Solomon's reign would never 
 have risen on Israel— just as the exile of Moses was 
 a necessary precursor to the conquest of Canaan by 
 Joshua. Thus again, as it had been with Abraham 
 and Moses, a period of disaster, danger, and sorrow, 
 became the starting-point and inspiration of a new 
 era in Ecclesiastical History. 
 
 Samuel seems to have intended to establish some 
 sort of hereditary government in his own family, 
 which, though not a kingdom in name, would have 
 given the nation all the benefits of established order 
 and settled succession. This mild monarchy, a 
 modified form of the old theocrac}^, was thwarted, 
 probably by the jealousy of the tribal chiefs. The 
 aristocracy of that day, as of all others, would ac- 
 cept political redemption from a humble family 
 like Samuel's, but could not endure its permanent 
 aggrandizement by the possession of hereditary 
 chief power in the land. "With factious complaints 
 against his sons, they demand a king 'Mike the 
 nations" around them. In 1491 they had prom- 
 ised Moses that the Lord should be their King; in 
 1095 they demand a change. The royal era which 
 thus grew out of Samuel's reformation maintained 
 national independence under Saul, extended its 
 sway over neighboring tribes under David', and 
 reached its culminating glory under the grand mon- 
 archy of Solomon. Then came rebellion, secession, 
 civil wars, wide-spread idolatry, desolating droughts, 
 and foreign invasion — an unending series of afilic- 
 tions, showing the rebuke of Providence for the 
 
On an Uo angelical Basis. 29 
 
 multiplying wickedness of the people under the 
 leadership of the kings. The final eclipse began 
 when Hoshea, the murderer, ascended the throne of 
 Israel, 730 B.C. Soon after Samaria was taken, 
 and Israel carried into captivity, while the prophetic 
 voice of Isaiah denounced the same fate as speedily 
 to overtake Judah. 
 
 . V. When Samuel had been ejected from the su- 
 preme political power he seems to have given his 
 chief attention, doubtless by inspiration, to devel- 
 oping the schools of the prophets. These pious 
 counselors, raised up at irregular intervals as the 
 judges in the preceding cycle, were the constant 
 guide, prop, and safeguard of the throne through- 
 out the royal cycle; and when now the royal power 
 began to fail, it loomed up on the stormy horizon 
 as if to battle with the elements of fate in their 
 own appointed dominion. In this time of thick- 
 enino- dangers and terrible diasters Isaiah stands 
 forth preeminent in the sublimity of his faith, ma- 
 jestic in the conscious alliance with a spiritual power 
 that rides upon the storm, and holds the waters in 
 the hollow of His hand. It was he that assured 
 the anxious Ahaz of safety when "Ephraim and 
 Syria were confederate against Judah." It was he 
 that pronounced doom upon Sennacherib's splendid 
 host when it was yet flushed with victory. 
 
 Isaiah's life, character, and prophecy, became a 
 
 new inspiration to the nation that was expiring, 
 poisoned by the eifluvia of its own corruption. He 
 
 looked through the gloom of two hundred years, 
 
 and held up to the faith of his countrymen Cyrus, 
 
30 The Science of History 
 
 the Gentile savionr of the nation. His spirit per- 
 petuated itself in Jeremiah, Ezekiel, Daniel, Ezra, 
 Mordecai, ITehemiah,.and others, who successfully 
 carried the truth and practice of righteousness 
 through all the temptations and terrors of captivi- 
 ty, and returned with it at last to be reestablished 
 in its ancient chosen place at Jerusalem. Thus, 
 through the efficiency of the prophets, the captivity 
 was overruled by Providence to spread the knowl- 
 edge of revelation to vast regions wdiere it had been 
 hitherto wholly unknown. 
 
 The captivity of the Jews to Asiatic nations, be- 
 ginning thus about 730 B.C., continued, with slight 
 changes and modifications, till the conquest of Per- 
 sia by Alexander, four hundred years afterward, 
 when it was transferred to European nations. The 
 great design of this era is generally conceded to 
 have been to cleanse Israel from idolatry, and it is 
 certain that after this time they were effectually 
 cured of this evil; but for another reason it may 
 well be believed that one important end to be sub- 
 served was the carrying of revelation to Eastern 
 nations. Asiatics are naturally credulous, and 
 prophecy was the best form of carrying to them the 
 knowledge of the truth, because it suited precisely 
 their spiritual predilections. 
 
 VI. But when the captivity was transferred to 
 European nations, at the conquest of Persia by Al- 
 exander, 330 B.C., we see at once that Providence 
 has brought out new developments of spiritual 
 power in His chosen people, to lit them for success- 
 fully bearing testimony to Greece and Rome also. 
 
Oil an JEc angelical JBasis. 31 
 
 These are a literary people, given to pliilosopliical 
 discussions; hence, under Simon the Just, schools 
 begin to arise in Judea, and tlie literary powers of 
 the chosen people were developed by a close, sys- 
 tematic study of revealed truth, and exercised by the 
 subtle debates of Sadducees, Pharisees, and Essenes, 
 while their social and political systems were brought 
 more effectively under the law, thus qualifying them 
 to bear li^-ht to the cultured and free nations of 
 
 o 
 
 Europe. 
 
 YII. The cycle of European captivity reached 
 its linal crisis in the great Jewish rebellion against 
 Kome A.D. 66-70, four hundred years after Alex- 
 ander's conquest. It issued in the crushing out of 
 the Hebrew nationality, and the destruction of Jeru- 
 salem, with its gorgeous ceremonial worship and te- 
 dious masses of traditionary precepts. But the good 
 hand of Providence had anticipated and foretold 
 this evil. Forty years befn-e ample provision was 
 made for the impending catastrophe in the gospel 
 of Jesus, and by means of the gospel the true ec- 
 clesiastical life of the Israelite nation was reformed 
 and readjusted to the exigencies of a new cycle that 
 was about to dawn on the world — the apostolic age 
 in Ecclesiastical History. Christianity unfolded its 
 true principles but slowly at first, even to its di- 
 vinely-instructed heralds. It was exceedingly diffi- 
 cult for these men to shake ofi' the exclusivism of 
 their times and their nation, and put the gospel 
 upon the broad platform of international equality, 
 which its genius imperatively demanded. The con- 
 secrated genius of Paul, sustained by a life-time of 
 
32 The Science of History 
 
 unparalleled labors, was necessary to put Christian- 
 ity upon its true historical basis. The great task was 
 just accomplished, and greatly aided by the fall of 
 Jerusalem and the abolition of its temple service. 
 After this Christianity, like an infant Hercules, 
 enveloped by the serpent of heathen superstition 
 and immorality, was engaged hand to hand in mor- 
 tal conflict with all the powers of Gentile darkness. 
 In this long conflict Christianity triumphed, but not 
 decisively. When it gained imperial patronage and 
 adherence from Constantine, so great was the antag- 
 onism of paganism still that it, with other circum- 
 stances, led to the establishment of Constantinople 
 as a second capital of the Empire. In the subse- 
 quent centuries, therefore, Constantinople is the 
 exponent of the victorious gospel, and Rome of 
 pagan obstinacy in rejecting Christ. 
 
 YIIL With this distinction in mind, the contrast 
 between A.D. 70 and A.B. 470 is vividly illustra- 
 tive of the retributive providence concerning eccle- 
 siastical afi*airs. In A.D. 66-70 heathen Rome was 
 trampling under foot remorselessly the holy city 
 Jerusalem ; in A.D. 466-70 Rome, herself down- 
 trodden by repeated invasions of Gothic and Vandal 
 hordes, through a barbarian chieftain, was humbly 
 supplicating help, military aid, from the Christian 
 city Constantinople, to sustain her fast-departing 
 national life. The help was given, but it did not 
 avail, and in a very few years the Empire of the 
 West expired. This introduced what might be 
 called the Gothic, monkish, or controversial era in 
 Ecclesiastical History. 
 
On an Evangelical Basis. 33 
 
 IX. We hold that the humiliation and extinction 
 of the Western Empire was a providential retribution 
 upon Rome for the savage destruction visited upon 
 Jerusalem four hundred years before, and therefore 
 fitly illustrates the ecclesiastical cycle. It maybe 
 said in opposition that Jesus foretold this destruc- 
 tion, and consequentl}^ approved it. This is a non 
 seguitur. Every thing that is given in an inspired 
 history is not given with divine approval, and 
 prophec}^ in one aspect is only history miraculously 
 written in advance of the fact. Besides, when God 
 appoints a nation to do a particular act of provi- 
 dence, they may render themselves as obnoxious by 
 their cruel manner of doing as those were who were 
 to be punished. " I was angrj^ but a little, but they 
 helped it forward" — i. e., outran the due measure of 
 correction. 
 
 In the fifth century Home was largely Christian- 
 ized, but its ruling powers were very much under 
 pagan influence. Even the Christian Church at 
 Rome was deeply under the influence of the pa- 
 gan spirit of jealousy toward Constantinople. This 
 jealousy had its origin in the pagan obstinacy 
 against the Christian policy of Constantine, and 
 when paganism waned, it inoculated its corrupt 
 spirit into the Roman Church, and this is the vital 
 germ of all of Rome's corruptions. 
 
 X. During the long interregnum of the Western 
 Empire the Church of Rome became more and 
 more prominent locally and internationally. For 
 more than two hundred years it availed itself of 
 every opportunity to weaken the Eastern Church, or 
 
 3 
 
34 The Science of History 
 
 veto the imperial policy in Church affairs. After- 
 ward, in the celebrated controversy on image-wor- 
 ship, it boldly broke away altogether from subjec- 
 tion to Constantinople, and after one hundred and 
 seventy-five years was a chief agent in reestablish- 
 ing the Empire of the West, A.D. 800. This added 
 greatly to its influence, which was still further in- 
 creased by the skillful use it made of the disorders 
 which prevailed among Charlemagne's successors. 
 This restoration of Roman influence upon the world 
 is seen in that under its encouragement the image- 
 worship was finally forced upon the Greeks, A.D. 
 842, and the Greek Emperor obliged to depose 
 Photius and restore Ignatius to the patriarchate of 
 Constantinople, A.D. 868. This was just four hun- 
 dred years after the beginning of the extreme de- 
 pression of Roman prestige, A.D. 466-70. Rome's 
 political power fell about A.D. 466-70; its ecclesi- 
 astical power began to triumph over both East and 
 West about A.D. 866-70. 
 
 XL The Roman ecclesiastical power, however, 
 was not fastened upon the world without great 
 opposition and fluctuating stages, in a conflict of 
 centuries' duration. The instances just above men- 
 tioned were rather prophetic of what would be in 
 the future than illustrative of the ordinary state of 
 afifairs at that time. The German Empire arose to 
 combat the claims of the Papacy, but by its monop- 
 oly of education, its army of monks, its power over 
 the superstitions of the age, and its use of the cru- 
 sading enthusiasm, the Papacy triumphed, and 
 reached its full development in A.D. 1268-72. At 
 
On an Evangelical Basis. 35 
 
 that time, in the death of Conrad, the ancient en- 
 emy of the popes (Hohenstaufen family) became 
 extinct. The Pope was courted by the Eastern 
 Empire, but newly restored to his throne. His 
 dominion was almost world-wide and absolute. 
 
 XII. But at the very moment of triumph the 
 process of decay showed itself. The death of King 
 Louis of France, in A.D. 1270, quenched the cru- 
 sading craze that had been so helpful to the Sicilian 
 vespers in 1282; and the long war that followed 
 showed that, under favorable circumstances, the 
 will of the Pope might be baffled. The quarrel 
 of Philip of France with Boniface, in A.D. 1301-5, 
 showed Europe how to assert her freedom; and 
 the successful resistance of Louis of Bavaria com- 
 pletely disrobed the Pope of his wonderful prestige 
 for a time. But so well-organized a system, having 
 so deep a hold on society, education, and theology, 
 could not be shaken off" in one or two generations; 
 once commenced, however, there could be no rest: 
 the reforming spirit took various forms in succeed- 
 ing generations, and was met by alternating in- 
 trigue, concession, persecution, and war. The last 
 religious war, made upon distinctly avowed relig- 
 ious papal principles, was that of Louis XIV., in 
 1672, when he required the Dutch to receive the 
 Catholic religion as a preliminary of peace. Wars 
 have since been made in the interest, and by the 
 instigation, of Rome, but no nation has since avowed 
 its subjection to Rome while warring for it. 
 
 XIII. From another line of study the four-hun- 
 dred-years' periods may be clearly traced in Church- 
 
36 The Science of History 
 
 history. At a very early period a jealousy existed 
 between the Churches of Rome and Constantinople, 
 the old and new capitals respectively of the Roman 
 Empire. This slumbering lire of enmity sprang up 
 with more than former violence in a contest be- 
 tween Pope Martin I. and Emperor Constantine in 
 A.D. 649-53. The Pope was arrested, exiled, and 
 died of his sufferings, it is said. This prompt action 
 of the Emperor appeared to succeed at first, but it 
 only intensified the former animosities; for in A.D. 
 692, at the Trullan Council, the two Churches were 
 again in opposition, and soon after the image-wor- 
 ship contest separated them very bitterly. For 
 several centuries these difterences continued with 
 fluctuating but generally increasing violence, until 
 they reached a second great crisis at the solemn ex- 
 communication of the Greeksby the Romans in A.D. 
 1054, four hundred years after the former period. 
 
 XIV. The political exigencies of the following 
 centuries and a superficial regard for Christian 
 principles also gave rise to frequent and urgent 
 efi:brts to heal these divisions, but always without 
 success. 
 
 XV. At last a third great crisis in this sad history 
 occurred A.D. 1453, when Constantinople was cap- 
 tured by the Turks, as the Greeks assert, and as 
 reason corroborates, because Roman Catholics with- 
 held aid from the struggling Greeks on account of 
 their refusal to abandon their ecclesiastical dogmas 
 in favor of Romish ones. In consequence, the 
 Greek Church has been dreadfully downtrodden for 
 four hundred years. 
 
On an Evangelical Basis, 8T 
 
 XVI. But at last, in the good providence of God, 
 a fourth great crisis came in A.D. 1853, when the 
 mighty armies of Russia were marshaled for the re- 
 ligfous amelioration of their suffering fellow-Chris- 
 tians. And let every Western Christian blush to 
 read it— Protestant England and Papal France dared 
 to forbid and oppose it. The hand of Providence is 
 there, and it is predestined to succeed. Imperial 
 France has already been crushed in her inflated mil- 
 itary pride, and Protestant England, under Glad- 
 stone's lead, is learning nobler principles than to 
 oppress Eastern Christians for the benefit of Mo- 
 hammed's brutal followers. 
 
 XVII. And again, from a difi*erent stand-point, 
 the same rule appears. The first intervention of 
 the Romans in Jewish government was by Pompey, 
 in 63 B.C. The quarrel w^hich gave rise to this 
 action runs back to Queen Alexandra's reign, 78 
 B.C. Four hundred years after this Christianity, 
 the historical heir of Judaism, gained its first open 
 victory over the Roman Empire, in the conversion 
 of Constantine, in A.D. 323. At the beginning of 
 this cycle we see the military power of Rome tri- 
 umphing over the moral and religious kingdom of 
 Judah ; at its close is to be seen in turn the triumph 
 of this religious power over the decayed military 
 prowess of its conqueror. 
 
 XVIII. The pagan opposition to Constantine was 
 so great that he built a new city— Constantinople— 
 for'his residence and capital. This was the germ 
 of a divided empire and a divided Church ; it there- 
 fore marks a great era in both. The jealousy be- 
 
38 The Science of History 
 
 tween the cities and patriarchates gave immense 
 trouble in the following centuries. 
 
 XIX. At last, during the image-worship contest, 
 in 726-30, Rome and the "West were severed com- 
 pletely in politics and Church government from the 
 East, four hundred years after the building of Con- 
 stantinople, which became the occasion of division. 
 Rome rebelling against the Empqror, its rightful 
 governor, in A.D. 726, was indorsed by the West- 
 ern Powers, the French particularly. 
 
 XX. But in A.D. 1122 Rome assumed an equally 
 independent attitude toward the German (successor 
 to the French) Emperor, and finally triumphed 
 over all the political powers of the West. Nothing 
 stopped her career, though many efforts were made, 
 till 1520-30, when Martin Luther led the people 
 against her. 
 
 XXI. From that day the power of Rome has 
 waned, and every indication emphasizes the proba- 
 bility that when the next crisis comes, in A.D. 1920, 
 she, as it was in 1520, will have ceased forever as a 
 stirrer up of strife and rebellion, and become en- 
 tirely reorganized. 
 
 The movement of Rome could not have succeed- 
 ed but by the help and indorsement of Pepin and 
 Charlemagne. They were aiders and abettors of 
 the Avrong, and in 1120 their successors were right- 
 fully the victims of the same high claims on the 
 part of Rome. In 726 and 1120 the popes claimed 
 to be acting in the religious interest of the people 
 against their false rulers. In 1520 Luther turned 
 this principle against the Pope, for he championed 
 
On cm Evangelical Basis. 39 
 
 the cause of the people against the false rulers of the 
 Church. Truly it was a retribution against Kome. 
 But this law is as evident in International as in 
 Ecclesiastical History. 
 
 XXII. The ancient Persian Empire was devel- 
 oped into an international one (that is, one involv- 
 ing many nations in its history) with the reign of 
 Cyrus, 570-30 B.C. After existing for two hundred 
 years, this empire was overturned by Alexander; 
 and while great changes occurred in many respects, 
 by the infusing of the Grecian blood and spirit in 
 the East, the identity of the old structure was not 
 destroyed. It was not till 170 B.C. that there was 
 any attempt, for instance, to introduce Grecian 
 idolatry; but just four hundred years after Cyrus, 
 arising from the same portion of Asia, came the 
 Parthian, a totally different kingdom. 
 
 XXIII. The independence of Parthia was first 
 asserted as a province about 250 B.C., but it was 
 not secured so early, and it did not become an in- 
 ternational kingdom till about 170-40 B.C. For 
 four hundred years the Parthian State was the rival 
 of Rome — the Colossus of the East. 
 
 XXIV. But about A.D. 226-60 the second Per- 
 sian Kingdom arose, subverted the Parthian, spread 
 over the East, and became the energetic antagonist 
 of Rome. 
 
 XXV. It held its sway till Mohammedanism 
 arose, in 628-51, completely destroyed it, gathering 
 up all the fragments, and reorganizing them for 
 herself. The Persian Kingdom had lived just four 
 hundred years. 
 
40 The Science of History 
 
 XXVI. The interior structure of the Moham- 
 medan Empire underwent a radical change when 
 Togrul Bey led the Seljukian Turks into Persia and 
 Syria. This was in 1028-55, four hundred years 
 after the first appearance of the Caliphate. Xow 
 that ancient name yielded up its military and polit- 
 ical prerogatives, and was supplanted by the Sul- 
 tanate. 
 
 XXVII. Again the face of Mohammedan His- 
 tory underwent a grand change from the policj^ of 
 Amarath I. and Mohammed IL, in A.D. 1440-81, 
 four hundred years after Togrul Bey. 
 
 XXVIII. Still again, in the present century, an- 
 other four hundred years having elapsed, the Mo- 
 hammedan power is declining, as it arose. In 1840 
 united Europe had to defend the Sultan from his 
 own subordinates; in 1853 Europe was again called 
 upon to defend him from Russia; in 1869-73 Egypt 
 was practically freed ; in 1877-81 the larger portion 
 of his European dominion was torn from him. 
 Thus, in an unbroken succession of six cycles, the 
 law is seen to prevail in Oriental History. 
 
 XXIX. In English History, in its international 
 relations, we may observe this law: A great revolu- 
 tion took place in English History in the seventh 
 century. It was the introduction of Christianity 
 from abroad, hence an international event. 
 
 XXX. In the eleventh century another wave of 
 foreign influence swept over England, and left its 
 permanent mark^ — the Danish and Xorman ascend- 
 ency under Sweyn and William I. 
 
 XXXI. In the fifteenth century the French inva- 
 
On an Evangelical 13asis. 41 
 
 sion of Henry V., and the civil war consequent 
 upon its failure, was an international affair that 
 changed the entire organization of government and 
 the whole current of English History — paving the 
 way for the elevation of the people which came aft- 
 erward. 
 
 XXXn. In the nineteenth century a revolution- 
 ary system of popular reform is radically affecting 
 the whole structure and scope of English society 
 and politics; the influence of France and America 
 on its origin and development is manifest, hence it 
 is international in character. Thus there are four 
 great crises of English International History follow- 
 ing each other at regular periods of four hundred 
 years. 
 
 This law might be shown to be applicable to the 
 history of every other great nation of the earth, but 
 lack of space forbids farther detail at this point. 
 
42 The Science of History 
 
 CHAPTEE lY. 
 
 THE fortj-years' periods are easily detected and 
 traced in almost every part of Humau History. 
 We direct our attention lirst to their appearance in 
 Sacred Historj^ where many instances occur, and 
 are specially marked out by the inspired pen. 
 
 I. The approaching Deluge was foretold one hun- 
 dred and twenty years in advance of the fact. This 
 is an exact multiple of forty years. But we allude 
 to it here not to prove the principle, but to suggest 
 that if we had fuller details of the political corrup- 
 tions which preceded and provoked that catastro- 
 phe, we could doubtless divide it into its separate 
 subordinate cycles of forty years each — just as it 
 will be shown to be practicable in other portions of 
 History. Moses's very infancy was marked with 
 political and providential significance. He was 
 forty years old when he failed in the first great po- 
 litical efibrt of his life, and became in consequence 
 an exile in Midian. After another forty years his 
 people were prepared to follow him, and he to lead 
 them ; and his second political attempt was a glori- 
 ous success in delivering them from political servi- 
 tude to Egypt. Again, for forty years he ruled 
 them in the desert, defeated, through their wicked- 
 ness, in establishing them in Canaan. But at the 
 close of this period Joshua led the hosts over Jordan 
 
On an Evangelical Basis. 43 
 
 and into Canaan. The early history of Israel in 
 Canaan is classified by the author of the Judges 
 into forty or eighty-years' periods. There was forty 
 years' rest under Othniel, eighty years' rest under 
 Ehud, forty years' rest again under Deborah and 
 Barak, then forty years more under Gideon. Then 
 succeeded a number of short judgeships, aggregat- 
 ing seventy-nine years ; or if we, as is allowable by 
 the narrative, give one year to the disorder under 
 Abimelech, exactly eighty years in broken adminis- 
 trations result. This was followed again by forty 
 years' subjection to the Philistines, which brings us 
 to nearly forty years of Saul's reign. The reign of 
 Saul was forty years, those of David and Solomon 
 of equal length ; so that, from the birth of Moses, 
 1571 B.C., to the accession of Rehoboam, 975 B.C. 
 — six hundred years — there is an almost unbroken 
 recurrence of the fort3^-years' periods in the political 
 history of the chosen people. After this the same 
 truth could be shown, but as its crises are not so 
 well marked, it would involve too protracted a dis- 
 cussion for this short treatise ; but at the close of 
 the Sacred Histories the same truth reappears more 
 discernibly in the forty years' interval, from the 
 preaching of John the Baptist and Jesus, to the war 
 which closed with the destruction of Jerusalem. 
 These facts might seem simply curious wdien stud- 
 ied in isolation from the same recurring principle 
 among all other nations; but when we see the same 
 principle in action during the most noted periods 
 of all other nations, it is difficult to resist the 
 conviction that Sacred History was purposely so 
 
44 The Science of History 
 
 arranged to indicate the great law of Political His- 
 tory to its students. 
 
 11. The most illustrious generations of Grecian 
 History and the golden age of the Romans will 
 testify to this truth. From the battle of Marathon, 
 490 B.C., to the conquest of Persia by Alexander, 
 330 B.C., was one hundred and sixty years, and it 
 naturally divides itself into four distinct periods of 
 forty years each. These two events are the most 
 important in Grecian History : one was the inspi- 
 ration, the other the culmination, of Grecian mili- 
 tary and political glory. The splendid achievement 
 at Marathon awoke Greece to an insatiable ambi- 
 tion for glory, as well as an undying devotion to 
 liberty. That ambition rested not till it led Alexan- 
 der's host to the jungles of India in their triumph- 
 ant progress. Brilliant triumphs over the mighty 
 host of Persians became the one object of national 
 ambition. It sustained them against the fearful 
 numbers of Xerxes, and scarcely less dangerous 
 warfare of the more prudent Artaxerxes, until it 
 compelled the latter to seek peace in 450 B.C., 
 which was concluded, with ever}^ advantage to 
 Greece, the next year. This closed the iirst forty 
 years, with constantly increasing glory. 
 
 But already the dangers of the future cast dark 
 shadows on the political situation of Greece. Dur- 
 ing this first period Athens had been elevated by. 
 the military genius of Miltiades, Themistocles, and 
 Cimon, far above the other States of Greece, and 
 it was under her leadership that these great tri- 
 umphs were obtained. Naturally she became proud 
 
On an Evangelical Basis. 45 
 
 and overbearing toward the others; while Sparta 
 could not conceal her envy of her more powerful 
 sister, and became the rallying-point for all anti- 
 Athenian malcontents. The two States had already 
 come to blows before the peace with Persia, and it 
 required all the prestige and wisdom of Cimon to 
 rearrange harmony between them. In the hour of 
 triumph that sage leader was swept away by sudden 
 death, and no master-hand remained to guide the 
 helm of State so as to secure internal concord for 
 Greece. Athens and Sparta, improving the Persian 
 peace, with mutual schemes of aggrandizement, soon 
 reopened and developed increasing and deepening 
 rivalries. The Peloponnesian war followed inevita- 
 bly from this state of things. From the first Ath- 
 ens was unsuccessful in the field; then later on she 
 was fearfully ravaged with pestilence, losing Peri- 
 cles by it; but the proud spirit of her great people 
 bore up nobly. Then came the great disaster be- 
 fore Syracuse, which, generously used by her adver- 
 saries, might have opened the way for peace; but 
 instead, they derived from it a new impulse to seek 
 the complete destruction of Athens. Her allies 
 were seduced or forced to desert her, and at last 
 her enemies even negotiated a close alliance with 
 the reprobated Persian. By this treaty they ob- 
 tained the financial and military aid that finally 
 enabled them to crush Athens; so that this treaty 
 may be considered a real turning-point in the 
 Peloponnesian war. It took place 410 B.C., forty 
 years after the former treaty of Greece with Persia. 
 Contrast now the relative position of Greece and 
 
46 The Science of History 
 
 Persia in 450 and 410 B.C. At the first date vic- 
 torious Athens, at the head of united Greece, was 
 dictating a humiliating treaty to Persia ; at the sec- 
 ond date diplomatic Persia was utilizing divided 
 Greece to crush the power that had so humiliated 
 her forty years before. One political cycle had 
 completely reversed the status quo of the former. 
 Sparta now stood in Athens's place at the head of 
 Greece, and it seems a providential retribution upon 
 her infamous treatment of the latter that the only 
 disgraceful treaties the Greeks ever made with Per- 
 sia was after she was in ascendency, while she was 
 enjoying the ill-gotten fruit of her envy and treach- 
 ery toward Athens. She did not, however, reap her 
 reward fully until the close of the forty years fol- 
 lowing her first alliance with Persia: 370 B.C. her 
 military power and political prestige were both 
 hopelessly broken on the field of Leuctra by the 
 celebrated Epaminondas of Thebes. Sparta, now 
 as craven-spirited in unexpected disaster as she had 
 been ignoble in unmerited prosperity, meanly 
 begged the aid of that Athens she had so deeply 
 wronged forty years before. And such are the 
 wonderful transformations of time that Athens 
 granted the request, and once more became the 
 ally of her betrayer. 
 
 Thebes now became, in turn, the leading power 
 of Greece, but the united opposition of Sparta and 
 Athens thwarted her in a consolidation and en- 
 largement of her power. The connection between 
 this and the succeeding crisis may be readily seen, 
 however, when we remember that about this time 
 
On an Evangelical Basis. 47 
 
 Philip of Macedon, father of Alexander, was car- 
 ried a hostage to Thebes. There he learned the 
 art of war from Epaminondas, the greatest general 
 of the age. So that the thirst and capacity for mil- 
 itary glory in Philip and Alexander was kindled 
 by the hero of Leuctra. Such was its potent influ- 
 ence that, while the father in youth was only a host- 
 age-prince in a strange city, the son became the 
 far-famed conqueror of Persia just forty years after- 
 ward. There is no mere ftmciful connection be- 
 tween the victory of Leuctra 370 B.C. and the con- 
 quest of Persia 330 B.C., for Alexander was the 
 military heir of Epaminondas in only the third 
 generation. He was the worthy son of a worthy 
 sire in a military sense. 
 
 III. The most tumultuous times of Koman His- 
 tory show the marks of this law regulating their 
 apparently disordered convulsions. The violent re- 
 sistance of the Patricians to the popular reformations 
 attempted by the Gracchi will serve to illustrate 
 it. They extended from 132 to 120 B.C., and were 
 marked by intervening fluctuations in 128 B.C., 
 when the reaction against Tiberias Gracchus's policy 
 was arrested by the suspicious d*eath of the younger 
 Scipio; and again in 124 B.C., when Caius Gracchus 
 took up the unfinished task of his brother. The 
 whole movement failed, however, for it was opposed 
 by slander, bribery, and violence. But it was a 
 movement imperatively needed by the State, and 
 embodied a principle of righteousness which could 
 not fail if Rome was to survive. Hence, forty 
 years afterward, the same issues were reopened — 
 
48 The Science of History 
 
 this time by a Patrician — M. Drusus Livias, called 
 the Patrician Gracchus. His assassination 91 B.C. 
 led to the social war and enfranchisement of the 
 Italians. This in turn led, in 88 B.C., to the out- 
 break between Marius and Sylla. The popular par- 
 ty was successful at first under Marius and Cinna; 
 but in 84 B.C., when Sylla returned from the East, he 
 reasserted the Patrician principles, and achieved a 
 complete supremacy for them in 80 B.C. Here we 
 see a series of political tumults from 92 to 80 B.C., 
 with intervening fluctuations from 88 to 84 B.C., 
 just as forty years before. Thus the Patricians were 
 successful, but the people could not be kept down. 
 Under the masterly leadership of Julius CfBsar the 
 popular cause revived, and soon became again a for- 
 midable power. Under the Triumvirate — Csesar, 
 Pompey, and Crassus — it ruled the State. Crassus 
 died 53 B.C., Pompey veered around to the Patri- 
 cians in 52 B.C., and thus the incipient step of civil 
 war was taken. In 48 B.C. the crisis of civil war 
 came, when Pompey was signally defeated at Phar- 
 salia. In 44 B.C. the Patrician cause again got foot- 
 hold under Brutus and Cassius; but in 40 B.C. the 
 popular party, represented by the second Trium- 
 virate, was completely and permanently successful. 
 Thus again, from 52 to 40 B.C., there were twelve 
 years of tumults, civil wars, and proscriptions, just 
 as there had been forty years before, from 92 to 80 
 B.C. The whole tendency of Roman politics was 
 now toward an imperial government, based on pop- 
 ular rights, rather than an aristocracy, supported 
 by Patrician franchises. Lepidus was partly forced, 
 
On an Ecangdical Basis. 49 
 
 partly bribed, out of Augustus's patb, and after teu 
 years the degenerate Antony was swept away by 
 military power. But liberty was deeply rooted at 
 Rome. Mere suspicion of an attempt to eradicate 
 its revered principles had proved fatal to Julius 
 Ca3sar when in the height of power and reputation; 
 therefore Augustus moved very cautiously toward 
 his object, and its full attainment again illustrates 
 the forty-years' periods. He had already possessed 
 himself of many chief offices of the Republic, and 
 thus preserved the form, while he undermined the 
 spirit, of the Republic. The process of consolida- 
 tion was completed when, 12 B.C., he succeeded Le- 
 pidus in the high-priesthood — an office which, in 
 able hands, might have been an efficient obstacle to 
 his success. In 8 B.C. he issued a decree of taxa- 
 tion and census throughout the Empire; and the 
 execution of this scheme of consolidation was co- 
 incident with B.C. 0, as we learn from ]N"ew Testa- 
 ment History. Thus the real consolidation of the 
 Roman Empire took place 12 to B.C., correspond- 
 ing with the political changes of forty years before. 
 
 IV. When the Western Empire was sinking be- 
 neath the inundations of barbarian hosts the same 
 principle appears. In A.D. 410-11 one wave of in- 
 vasion overflowed under Alaric; in 451 Attila was 
 ravaging Italy and threatening to destroy Rome. 
 The Vandals, under Genseric, conquered the im- 
 portant province of Africa in A.D. 429; in A.D. 468 
 the only serious attempt was made for its recovery, 
 and failed. 
 
 V. In Modern Ecclesiastical History, in its polit- 
 4 
 
50 The Science of History 
 
 ical connections, are several well-marked examples. 
 A General Council at Pisa, in A.D. 1409, attempted 
 to heal the long-continued schism of the West, and 
 when, several years afterward, the immediate object 
 was attained, the eftbrt was made to so reform the 
 Church as to provide against the recurrence of sim- 
 ilar evils in future. For this purpose the Council 
 of Basle was summoned, and labored several years 
 with great success; but being opposed by the skill- 
 ful and obstinate Eugenius IV., and misled by their 
 imprudent advisers, they lost public confidence, and 
 their failure caused another schism under Felix V. ; 
 but after several years the milder polic}^ of Nicholas 
 v., and his high character, produced a reconcilia- 
 tion ; so that the great movement to restore unity 
 and reform the Church, commenced in 1409, came 
 to an end A.D. 1449, with a united but unreformed 
 Church. 
 
 The Council of the Lateran, which authorized the 
 sale of Indulgences to replenish the treasury of Leo 
 X., adjourned in A.D. 1515. The too zealous exe- 
 cution of this atrocious scheme by the impudent 
 Tetzel, a year or two afterward, kindled the fire of 
 reforming zeal in the heart of Luther and the peo- 
 ple of Germany. The political controversy it raised 
 was a tremendous one; it was long and fiercely con- 
 tested, and with alternating fortune; but in A.D. 
 1555 the Peace of Augsburg secured to the brave 
 opponents of the great evil full religious protection 
 and liberty. 
 
 The seeds of the Reformation were early sown in 
 France, but were sternly repressed by the cruelty of 
 
On an Evangelical Basis. 51 
 
 Francis I. ; but in A.D. 1557-61 the French Protest- 
 ants, encouraged by the recent success of the Ger- 
 mans, by the accession of the Protestant Queen 
 Elizabeth, and by the military disasters of their 
 own king, making him temporarily unpopular, bold- 
 ly avowed their principles, even in Paris itself, and 
 by a judicious policy secured concessions from 
 Catherine de Medici. This was the beginning of 
 the Huguenots as a political party in France. The 
 civil wars, intrigues, betrayals, and varying fort- 
 unes which befell the cause afterward, cannot here 
 be detailed; but in A.D. 1597-1601 they saw their 
 chosen leader securely seated on the throne, a nom- 
 inal Catholic now indeed, but a true friend and pro- 
 tector of his old comrades, as was shown by the 
 Edict of Nantes. In forty years they had risen from 
 a despised rabble to become the dominant power 
 in the kingdom. 
 
 After the adjournment of the Council of Trent 
 the policy of the popes was steadily and energetic- 
 ally directed to the extermination of the Reforma- 
 tion in Europe by force. But this required the 
 political cooperation of the submissive States. Sev- 
 eral years w^ere necessary before this could be inau- 
 gurated. One of the first steps in this system was 
 to introduce the Inquisition in the Netherlands, and 
 by Spanish cooperation convert the people with 
 fire and sword. This was bafiled at its commence- 
 ment. The Dutch, under William I., rebelled about 
 1568, and after forty years compelled Spain to agree 
 to a truce in A.D. 1609, and forty years afterward 
 to acknowledge their independence, A.D. 1647-9. 
 
52 The Science of History 
 
 At the same time similar attempts were made in 
 Scotland, England, and France. Everywhere the 
 Pope failed. The papal Mary Qaeen of Scots was 
 dethroned, Protestant Elizabeth was sustained. 
 The Huguenot leader became Henry IV. of France, 
 and Dutch independence was practically gained; 
 while Spain, the great engine of papal warfare, was 
 so exhausted b}^ her protracted and perverted efforts 
 that she has never regained her ancient position in 
 Europe. 
 
 VI. The primary movements of the so-called thir- 
 ty-years' war in Germany began in A.D. 1609, ten 
 years before the actual outbreak of hostilities. At 
 that time the rival societies, the Evangelical Union 
 and the Catholic League, were organized, and be- 
 came the nuclei and promoters of a belligerent spirit 
 on either side ; so that from its first movements, in 
 A.D. 1609, to its close, in A.D. 1649, it was more 
 truly a forty-years' war than one of thirty years' 
 duration. 
 
 VII. The downfall and restoration of the Jesuits 
 occupy a forty-years' cycle. The opposition to them 
 among the Catholic powers of Europe was political 
 in its character. It began in Portugal in 1759, de- 
 veloped in France in 1762-^64, in Spain in 1767, and 
 they were finally suppressed in 1773 by the Pope. 
 The new Pope in 1774 indorsing the action, it be- 
 came apparently permanent. France took the lead 
 in this movement. But in 1799 the Duke of Par- 
 ma openly authorized their reorganization, in 1801 
 the Pope allowed their reorganization in Lithuania 
 and White Russia, in 1804 they reappeared in Sic- 
 
On an Evangelical Basis. 53 
 
 ily, and finally, Napoleon Laving been crushed at 
 Leipzig in 1813, tbey were formally restored by the 
 Pope in 1814. The great object of their restoration 
 was to counteract the theories of political reforma- 
 tion that had been propagated in the world by the 
 French Revolution. The successive periods of its 
 decline and of its restoration are separated by forty 
 
 years. 
 
 VIII. In English Political History the French 
 invasion and the War of the Roses, in the fifteenth 
 century, were both movements of forty years' dura- 
 tion. Henry IV. sent his first detachment of sol- 
 diers to aid the parties then at civil war in France 
 in A.D. 1412. This opened the way for a more 
 ambitious interference in the internal aflairs of tliat 
 kingdom; and the enterprising Henry V., following 
 in his father's steps, attempted to obtain the crown. 
 He was prevented by death. Under the regency of 
 Henry VI. the English were gradually driven back, 
 and finally expelled from all France, except Calais, 
 in A.D. 1453, forty years after their first unright- 
 eous interference with that kingdom. 
 
 Before this invasion reached its final stage of dis- 
 graceful failure it had planted the seeds of another 
 forty years of war and commotion; for the first 
 cause of the War of the Roses was the intense mor- 
 tification of the English nation at the disadvanta- 
 geous truce made with France in 1445, when a 
 strong-minded French Queen was imposed upon 
 the imbecile Henry VI., at a loss too of extensive 
 territories. The imprudent conduct of the Queen 
 
 id her favorite in removing by violence the best 
 
 an* 
 
54 The Science of Mistory 
 
 and most popular leaders of the nation, in A.I), 
 1447, alienated the affections of all. Then many 
 trained soldiers returned in idleness to England, 
 during the truce, to stir up additional trouble. 
 The insurrection of Jack Cade, and impeachment 
 of Suffolk, A.D. 1450, shows the progress of disaf- 
 fection. This state of things encouraged the Duke 
 of York, rightful claimant of the throne, to come 
 forward as the advocate of popular rights. This 
 melancholy story reached an end only when Henry 
 VII. came into power in 1485, and by marriage with 
 the female heir of the opposing line in 1487, closes 
 the breach in the royal succession, beating down 
 the last native insurrection in A.D. 1489. 
 
 IX. The great revolutions under the House of 
 Stuart, in the seventeenth centur3^, were culmina- 
 tions of principles and forces that had been forty 
 years at work. James I. early adopted the belief 
 that the Episcopal form of Church polity was much 
 more favorable to absolute monarchy than the Pres- 
 byterian or Puritan ; it therefore became the cardi- 
 nal point of his narrov/ and selfish policy to replace 
 Presbytery with Episcopacy. His maxim was, "^o 
 Bishop, no King." He began his active and perse- 
 vering policy by persuading the General Assembly 
 to acknowledge the civil rights of bishops, and he 
 then restored the Scottish Episcopacy in 1610; ten 
 years later he obtained great concessions to his Epis- 
 copacy, thereby the five Articles of Perth. Charles 
 I. pressed on in his father's tracks, and his High- 
 Church dogmas and innovations stirred up the first 
 fires of revolution in Scotland in A.D. 1637-40 — a 
 
On an Edanyelical Basis, 65 
 
 flame that ceased not till it had consumed the mon- 
 archy of England. To strengthen the monarchy 
 James hegan his proselyting scheme in 1610; it 
 reached its sad culmination in the establishment of 
 the Commonwealth, A.D. 1649-50. The great mis- 
 take made by the English leaders at this moment- 
 ous epoch was the highly impolitic and cruel death 
 of Charles I., A.D. 1649. It alienated Scotland, it 
 disaffected the Presbyterian leaders, it enraged the 
 original royalists, it was procured by high-handed 
 military violence, and it had a very disastrous effect 
 upon the expiring eftbrts of the Liberals of France 
 during the Fronde. This last v/as a serious evil. 
 The sentiment in Paris against this event was suffi- 
 cient of itself to defeat this last efibrt to liberalize 
 France; and upon the ruins of that attempt the 
 absolute monarchy of Louis XIV. was built. Thus 
 the personal government of the grand monarch was 
 partly the result of French reaction against the 
 high-handed course of Republicans in England. A 
 Kepublic claiming to be specially representative of 
 Christian principles, starting out with such a record, 
 was predestined to failure. N"othing but the won- 
 derful genius of Cromwell delayed the catastrophe 
 for eleven vears. But the struo^scle of the same old 
 principles went ceaselessly on under Charles II. 
 and James II., until, just at a time when monarchy 
 and High-Churchism seemed impregnably fortified, 
 the Revolution of 1688 came on. The radical mis- 
 take of the first revolutionists was made when they 
 w^ere in the flush of success and power, in 1648-9. 
 By it their triumphant party was gradually brought 
 
56 The Science of History 
 
 low, until it appeared in turn hopelessly lost, when 
 their powerful opponents made the same mistake 
 they had been guilty of forty years before, and the 
 Giishap brought William and Mary to the throne, 
 .\.D. 1688-9, and restored liberty to England. 
 
 X. The recent liberal movements in European 
 politics exhibit the workings of this principle. The 
 French Revolution of 1789-93 had an influence in 
 all parts of Europe. It desolated the world with 
 war for twenty years, then a great collapse seemed 
 to come on ; but it was found impossible to restore 
 the old order of politics. Even the States that 
 overwhelmed France, at last had been compelled to 
 adopt reformed methods, in order to rally the peo- 
 ple to their aid; and after the Restoration, the same 
 contest went on between freedom and tyranny, till 
 1829, the Polignac Ministry of France, appointed 
 by the reckless and incompetent Charles X., caused 
 the commotions of 1830 to break out. France be- 
 came once more free; Belgium revolted and asserted 
 popular rights; reform swept the field in England; 
 Italy and Poland were convulsed. The diflerence 
 between 1789^93 and 1829-33 was, that the first in- 
 augurated an era of war, and the second was so 
 universally successful that it commanded the peace 
 by innate power. 
 
 Two facts will show the connections between 
 these two crises. It was Charles X., then Duke 
 d'Artois, that gave Louis XVI. the evil advice to 
 dismiss N"ecker, which caused the popular outbreak 
 that captured the Bastile and unchained the demon 
 of mobocracy A.D. 1789. It was this same man, as 
 
On an Eijangelkal Basis. 57 
 
 Charles X., who in 1829 appointed Polignac Prime 
 Minister of France— an act which precipitated the 
 revolutions of ISSQ. In May and June, 1792, 
 Charles Gre}^ pressed a Reform Bill in the English 
 Parliament, which aimed to apply some principles 
 of the French Revolution to English politics ; it 
 was defeated. In 1832, however. Earl Grey, the 
 same individual, forced a more sweeping Reform 
 Bill through Parliament. 
 
 Again, the liberal movements which developed 
 success in so many European countries in 1869-73, 
 is another instance. At this latter date England 
 was instituting reforms surpassing any thing known 
 for forty years; Spain was proclaimed a Republic; 
 France became again republican ; Italy was freed 
 and liberalized; Germany was united, and its gov- 
 ernment based on universal suffrage; Austria was 
 remodeled, with a free constitution. 
 
 XL The period extending from the autumn of 
 1812 to that of 1815— that which broke down the 
 empire of the first T^apoleon — is recognized by all as 
 a great epoch in Modern History. England, Russia, 
 and Austria, were the leading parties to that alli- 
 ance against France. Forty years after this the 
 third Napoleon was Just rising to imperial power, 
 and the prestige of his dynasty was established by 
 the success of the Crimean war, A..D. 1852-55, in 
 which England and Austria were now allies of 
 France against Russia, exactly reversing the polit- 
 ical situation of the former cycle. The Crimean 
 war was an epoch scarcely less important than the 
 fall of the first Napoleon itself In A.D. 1796 Na- 
 
68 The Science 'of Mishry 
 
 poleoti I. startled Europe and electrified France 
 with his first brilliant exploits. The fame thus ac- 
 quired opened his Vv^ay to chief executive power 
 three years aftefward. His position at the head of 
 national affairs was secured to him by the decisive 
 victory of Marengo, A.D. 1800. Thus 1796 and 
 1800 are strongly-marked periods in the develop^ 
 ment of the Napoleonic dynasty^ Forty years after 
 each of these years, historical incidents connected 
 with the Bonaparte family show the complete con- 
 trasts which one political cycle produces. In 1836 
 Kapoleon III., then a private citizen, but heir to 
 Kapoleon I., excited the laughter and ridicule of 
 the world by his miserable fiasco of an attempt to 
 seize Strasbourg, and thus raise a revolution in 
 France. And not content with this exhibition of 
 what the world called silly weakness, in 1840 he 
 incurred contempt and indignation by a renewed 
 efibrt on the coast of France opposite England, in 
 consequence of which he was imprisoned for six 
 years. But Napoleon I. lost his throne in spite of 
 his early victories, and Napoleon III. regained the 
 throne in spite of his early failures. The parallel- 
 ism is heightened by the fact that they were nearly 
 the same age at these respective dates, having been 
 born nearly forty years apart. 
 
 XII. Even in its brief career, the United States 
 affords many illustrations of this political law. The 
 Articles of Confederation agreed upon during the 
 Revolutionary War were not fully ratified and put 
 in practice till March, 1781. Daring the remainder 
 of that year the executive departments were organ- 
 
On an Edangelicd Bads. 59 
 
 i^ed by electing a Secretary of Finance, Secretary 
 of State, and one of War ; a bank also was author- 
 ized in December^ This was the lirst actual and 
 permanent union of all the colonies in one duly^ 
 organized, coherent government. After the war^ 
 its weaknesses and errors were seen, and it was 
 revised and changed in the present Constitution of 
 the United States. Under the new form great par- 
 ties grew up and struggled for mastery ; but nothing 
 arose to endanger the continuance of the Constitu- 
 tion itself till the Missouri Question came up^ which 
 w^as finally settled by compromise, March, 1821, and 
 the State actually received into the Union by proc- 
 lamation in August of that year. 
 
 The Missouri Compromise effectually settled the 
 slavery question in its territorial relations for a time ; 
 but its establishment of a sectional line was omi- 
 nous. The controversies of succeeding years need 
 not be described here* Suflice it to say, that in 
 1860, as in 1820, the absorbing political issue was 
 slavery in its territorial relations— precisely a rep- 
 etition of the question whose determination was 
 dodged by compromise forty years before. When 
 Congress adjourned March, 1861, without achieving 
 a satisfactory compromise, the country stood on the 
 brink of civil war to decide what was the true 
 meaning of the Constitution adopted in primitive 
 form eighty years before, and to end a controversy 
 started forty 3^ears before. 
 
 XIIl. But going back to an older date, and fol- 
 lowing up a different line of development, the law 
 is still seen. The first attempt to unite the colo- 
 
60 The Science of History 
 
 nies in one government was by the Convention at 
 Albany, in A.D. 1754, which was inspired by the ap- 
 proach of the old French war in A.D. 1753. The 
 pilan then recommended by the delegates was object- 
 ed to in England, as savoring too much of independ- 
 ence, and in America, as giving too much power to 
 the Crown. Four years afterward Pitt's able man- 
 agement secured effective cooperation between the 
 colonies, without a regular union. This first showed 
 America the value of political unity. Ten years aft- 
 erward, w4ien the Stamp Act passed, the colonies 
 enthusiastically united for the single purpose of 
 obtaining its repeah A Congress assembled, and 
 it succeeded. Then came the Non - importation 
 Leagues, and Committees of Correspondence bound 
 the parts together for a time, and for a single pur-" 
 2D0se. Afterward the Revolutionary War secured 
 the ratification of a formal act of union ; and lastly, 
 the necessity of a vigorous foreign policy to pre- 
 serve the independence so hardly won, led to the 
 perfecting of the present Constitution. Thus the 
 centralizing tendencies were continually on the in- 
 crease from 1753 to 1793, when it had triumphed 
 over every obstacle. But then came a new era — 
 one of reaction. The States-rights principles were 
 coeval with the formation of the Constitution. Its 
 adoption was earnestly contested in many States by 
 large parties, who feared it would destroy the local 
 powers of the States. AVhen the centralizing in- 
 fluences seemed to be gaining ascendency in Wash- 
 ington's first administration, the first national or- 
 ganization of its opponents took place in the Dem- 
 
On an Eoangelical Basis. 61 
 
 ocratic Clubs of 1798. The Whisky Insurrection 
 of the next year showed also the current of public 
 opinion ripening for rebellion in some quarters. 
 Under Jefferson's able leadership this party obtained 
 control of the Government in 1801, and immedi- 
 ately proceeded to alter the policy of the adminis- 
 tration so as to coincide with Democratic States- 
 rights principles. But long possession of power 
 will demoralize almost any party, and a man who 
 has the military instinct powerfully developed is 
 always unfit for President in a nicely-balanced con- 
 stitutional system such as ours. These two things 
 ran the Democratic party off the track of original 
 States-rights, upon which it was placed by Jefferson. 
 In 1833 the party, under the military spirit of Jack- 
 son, having been demoralized by continued power 
 for thirty-two years, attempted to inaugurate the 
 policy of military coercion of one of the original 
 States during the JSTullification crisis. The state 
 of public opinion compelled a compromise instead 
 of coercion ; but the germ of that policy was depos- 
 ited by Jackson, in 1833, just forty years after the 
 Democratic party had arisen upon a foundation 
 of totally different principles. A¥hat Jackson de- 
 signed to do in 1833, but was prevented by the 
 constitutional conservatism of Congress, Grant 
 ingrafted into American politics as an ordinary 
 factor in 1873. The successive steps which led 
 to this need not be detailed; it is sufficient to point 
 to the fact that at no period of our history was 
 military power made to bear upon the ordinary 
 course of politics in time of peace more effectively, 
 
62 The Science of History 
 
 more dangerously, than in 1873, forty years after 
 Jackson's frustrated attempt at the same achieve- 
 ment. 
 
 XIY. Since 1773 the United States has waged 
 three great wars, which taxed her resources, skill, 
 and courage, to the utmost — viz., the Revolution, 
 the second war with Eno-land, and the war of seces- 
 sion. The Mexican War is not included here, be- 
 cause it did not test the power of the country as 
 the others did ; it was a holiday parade from victory 
 to victory, compared with the others. Each of these 
 wars developed a typical soldier from the ranks of 
 the common people — Washington, Jackson, Grant ; 
 each of these became President, and continued so 
 for two terms ; each impressed his soldierly charac- 
 ter, more or less, on the constitutional politics of 
 the time, and inaugurated epochs in the executive 
 history of the country. They followed each other 
 at intervals of exactly forty years — viz., 1789, 1829, 
 1869. In 1774 the Revolutionary War was just 
 opening ; in 1814 the second war with England was 
 just closing ; in 1854 the Kansas and Nebraska con- 
 troversy was stirring up the passions of the people 
 for the great civil war that resulted. 
 
 XV. Our financial history may be cited here also. 
 In 1791 the first national bank was chartered. Its 
 successful inauguration and working gave great 
 impetus to business in the succeeding years. In 
 1832 a chief element in the political discussion was 
 the rechartering of the second bank of the United 
 States. Jackson's determined course defeated it. 
 His removal of deposits, in October, 1833, and the 
 
On an Evangelical Basis. 63 
 
 specie circular, in 1836, are believed by many to 
 have been the direct cause of the great panic of 
 1837, from which the country did not recover till 
 1841-2, and which hurled the Democratic party 
 from a forty-years' lease of power. Contrast with 
 this the panic of 1873, forty years after the first 
 movement under Jackson, which prepared that of 
 1837, from which the country began to recover in 
 1877-8, and had completely emerged only in 1881. 
 XVI. Diplomatic History appends its testimony 
 to the same effect. From 1753 to 1761 France and 
 England were carrying on a great war for mastery 
 in America, during which the former were expelled 
 entirely. The English misusing their consolidated 
 power, the Revolution was brought on, 1773-1781, 
 during which France obtained through diplomacy 
 the good-will and alliance of America against En- 
 fi^land. And as^ain in the third s^reat stru£:o:le be- 
 tween these nations, from 1793 to 1801, the alliance 
 and influence of America was an object of chief 
 attention. We w^ere nearly precipitated into war 
 with England at the beginning, because she pre- 
 sumed we were allies of France, and began to 
 treat us as such — when this was with difficulty 
 prevented b}^ Washington's tact and prudence. 
 France, on the other hand, was enraged that we 
 should remain at peace with England without her 
 consent. War actually commenced between us, 
 but was soon put an end to. Thus, the nations 
 who went to war in 1753-61 to decide which should 
 own America, found out at last (1793-1801) that 
 America had made up her mind to belong to neither. 
 
64 The Seienee of History 
 
 It took forty years to develop the fact. Again, in 
 1834-6 our diplomatic relations were suddenly ren- 
 dered critical with France in reference to American 
 claims for compensation. England mediated, and 
 peace was preserved ; and almost immediately after 
 our relations with England were made sensitive by 
 reason of the sympathy of many l^orthern people 
 w^ith the rebellious Canadians ; and not till 1842 
 had this danger passed away. So that, from 1833 
 to 1841, we again had alternate troubles to settle 
 wnth both our ancient co-negotiators. In 1805 the 
 United States was involved in disputes with Spain 
 with reference to South-western border affairs. This 
 complication gave rise to Aaron Burr's famous Mex- 
 ican enterprise, and led to his trial for treason. 
 These events made a great figure in the politics of 
 the time, and did not end till 1808. So forty years 
 afterward — in 1845 — the United States was in- 
 volved in disputes with Mexico — the historic suc- 
 cessor of Spain — concerning our South-western bor- 
 der. This complication brought on war, which 
 ended in 1848. This latter crisis ended with a dis- 
 integration of Mexican territory, in exact fulfillment 
 of the alleged designs of Burr forty years before. 
 Burr was tried for treason, and disgraced for life; 
 while Taylor, the popular hero of the latter crisis, 
 was promoted to the Presidency. 
 
 The Monroe doctrine was first announced by the 
 President in a message to Congress December, 1823, 
 and, indorsed by the public sentiment of America, 
 it at once became a cardinal principle of foreign 
 policy with us. l^o serious attempt to overthrow it 
 
On an Evangelical Basis. 65 
 
 was made till the French Emperor in 1863 obtained 
 possession of the greater part of Mexico, and invited 
 the Austrian Prince to establish his foreign empire 
 on free American soil. The civil war in the United 
 States encouraged and promised success to this dar- 
 ing movement to subvert this principle which had 
 been proclaimed and" submitted to for forty years. 
 The collapse of the Confederacy was the resurrec- 
 tion of .the Monroe doctrine. 
 
 XVII. Even while this treatise is being written, 
 the absorbing political event of our national affairs — 
 the accession of Vice-president Arthur to the chief- 
 magistracy — shows the predominance of cyclical 
 crises. In 1801 the Vice-president's office suddenly 
 and temporarily assumed preeminent importance, 
 when the defeated Federalists in Congress hoped 
 to put Burr, whom the people designed for Vice- 
 president, into the Presidency. They failed ; but, 
 whether failing or succeeding, they intended to sow 
 dissensions between the leaders, and thus break up 
 the Democratic party. Dissensions did result ; for 
 Jefferson resented Burr's connivance in the iniqui- 
 tous plot to defeat the popular will. But indigna- 
 tion against intrigue, and Jefferson's amendment to 
 the Constitution, preventing such trickery in fut- 
 ure, strengthened the party more than Burr's defec- 
 tion injured it. This amendment shows how im- 
 portant this episode of Vice-presidential politics was 
 considered at the time. Had it not been a most 
 important crisis, no such fundamental law would 
 have been sought to prevent it in future. In 1841, 
 when the Democratic party fell before the Whigs — 
 5 
 
6Q The Science of History 
 
 successors of the Federalists — the whole policy of 
 the Whig party was frustrated by the providential 
 death of President Harrison, and the accession of 
 Vice - loresident Tyler, who held entirely different 
 views on the most important points of party policy. 
 The opponents of Democracy had unjustly sought 
 to defeat Democratic policy in its first triumph by 
 elevating the Vice-president in opposition to the 
 party will. When the opponents of Democracy at 
 last triumphed over it before the people, their own 
 policy was defeated by act of Providence in elevat- 
 ing the Vice-iJresident in opposition to their party 
 will. Does not this read like retribution ? It came 
 exactly forty years after the first-mentioned event. 
 When Tyler, having been known to hold independ- 
 ent views, thus came in conflict with his party by 
 joint act of their election and providential promo- 
 tion, he was stigmatized and repudiated because he 
 dared discharge his high duties according to his own 
 judgment, and refused to be dictated to in matters 
 where his opinions were known at the time of his 
 election. Dissensions resulting went a great way 
 toward destroying the Whig party in the hour of 
 its first triumph. 
 
 Forty years after Tyler, the Republican party — 
 the historical successor of the Whigs — finds its 
 chosen policy again reversed, prospectively, by the 
 elevation of a Vice-president, representing one wing 
 of the party, to supersede a deceased President, who 
 represented the predominant part. The difference 
 between Tyler and his party was in full blow Sept. 
 13, 1841, when his Cabinet resigned. The change 
 
On an Evangelical Basis. 67 
 
 from conservative to stalwart Republican came with 
 Arthur's accession Sept. 20, 1881. The progress of 
 liberalism in politics is seen, however, in the marked 
 increase of deference toward Arthur's right of per- 
 sonal judgment to retain and be guided b}^ his for- 
 mer well-known principles in his new office. Yet, 
 every practical statesman knows that there is immi- 
 nent danger that the rock which was designed to 
 wreck the Democratic party in 1801, and which did 
 wreck the Whigs in 1841, may prove a fatal breaker 
 to the Republican ship also in 1881. 
 
 XViri. The history of religious sects, which has 
 its political as well as its ecclesiastical bearings, 
 shows the marks of forty-years' periods in their de- 
 velopment. John Wesley, to whose personal work 
 and character the history of Methodism ow^es its 
 origin, was ordained deacon in 1725, thus fixing his 
 choice on theology rather than literature. In 1729 
 his peculiar genius and experience as a preacher 
 first began to show themselves, when he organized 
 what was derided as the "Holy Club," in the Uni- 
 versity of Oxford. These are germinal dates in 
 Methodist History. True to its nature, it began to 
 grow, slowly at first, with constant acceleration after 
 some years — finally with triumphant power. By 
 1765-69 it had spread the leaven of zeal throughout 
 the three kingdoms, and began its new cycle by 
 depositing the germ of Methodism in America. 
 About 1765 Philip Embury, Barbara Heck, and Rob- 
 ert Strawbridge, were ready to start the work in 
 JN'ew York and Maryland. In 1769 it had pro- 
 gressed so well that Wesley took the work under his 
 
68 The Scieyiee of History 
 
 personal care, and sent some experienced preachers 
 to its aid, thus securing a strong and stable foun- 
 dation to build on afterward. Methodism in Amer- 
 ica flourished with wonderful rapidity — so much so 
 that in forty years from its origin its old plans of 
 government had to be thoroughly revised. This 
 was the formation of the Delegated General Confer- 
 ence, which was provided for in 1808, and accepted 
 on all hands in 1809. Under this new plan — which 
 was only adopted, however, under threat of disrup- 
 tion — the work went on spreading as before. Sev- 
 eral great controversies arose, and one or two small 
 schisms occurred ; but nothing involving the fun- 
 damental powers of the Constitution till 1844-48, 
 when the disruption of the Northern and Southern 
 sections occurred. The Delegated Conference was 
 adopted only under pressure, a disruption being 
 feared if it failed in 1808. The disruption was onl}^ 
 delayed by its adoption, for it did come forty years 
 afterward. In 1849 the opposing parties appealed 
 to the secular courts to decide difi:erences of con- 
 struing the Constitution adopted forty years before. 
 Going back to English Methodism, 1769, witness 
 the beginning of the great Arminian controversy. 
 From 1729 this question had been shunned. The 
 doctrinal combat was waged with great bitterness, 
 and unquestionably did much to retard the growth 
 of Methodism in England. The original unity be- 
 tween these spiritual reformers was broken ; their 
 mutual abuse and railing put them in a sorry plight 
 before the irreligious world, and destroyed much of 
 their former influence over the worldly. In 1810 a 
 
On an Evangelical Basis. 69 
 
 separation occurred which gave rise to the Primi- 
 tive Wesleyans, a strong and vigorous body. Their 
 origin marks an era. And again in 1849 there was 
 another considerable separation from the original 
 body. These facts show that both in America and 
 England the forty-years' periods prevail in Method- 
 ist History. 
 
 But two other instances may be mentioned. 
 O'Kelly led a party in the American Methodist 
 Church in 1790-92 who were clamorous for a more 
 liberal form of Church government; it became a 
 separate sect in 1792. In 1830 there was a similar 
 separation by the Methodist Protestants on sub- 
 stantially the same principles. And in 1870-72 
 these liberal principles were adopted by the Method- 
 ist Episcopal Church and the Methodist Episcopal 
 Church, South, which had, when united, opposed 
 them in 1830. Alex. Kilham led a liberal party 
 in English Methodism in 1795. In 1835, forty years 
 after, there was a similar schism in the "Wesley an 
 body. 
 
 XIX. The Scottish Church shows this. Presby- 
 terians were securely predominant in Scotland not 
 till 1668 - 72, when Mary, the Papal Queen, was 
 driven into exile and a reformed regency sustained. 
 It remained predominant almost without opposition 
 till James L, in 1608-12, began his insidious attempt 
 to reestablish Episcopacy. This was defeated by the 
 first Revolution, and in turn Presbytery became 
 predominant for awhile in England as well as Scot- 
 land ; but in 1648-52 Independency suddenly sprung 
 into power, and eclipsed Presbytery in England. 
 
70 The Science of History 
 
 The Presbyterians became more favorable to the 
 Stuarts, and attempted in vain to restore them. 
 After some ^-ears they were restored, but with it the 
 old policy of James I. was resumed. It came to a 
 second defeat at the second Revolution, 1688-92, 
 when Episcopacy was abolished and Presbytery re- 
 established. But the long supremacy of Episcopacy 
 under the later Stuarts had affected the tone of Pres- 
 bytery; henceforth there was a hybrid element 
 which depraved for many years the Scottish Church. 
 This is shown by the restoration of the right of pat- 
 ronage in 1712, and the high-handed course pursued 
 against Erskine and his sturdy coadjutors. It cul- 
 minated, in 1728-32, in bringing on the secession 
 movement — a movement which, after more than a 
 hundred years' labor, with many discouragements 
 and fluctuations, has at last nearly effected a purifi- 
 cation of the Scottish Establishment; for patronage 
 was abolished in 1874, and disestablishment is a cer- 
 tainty of the near future. 
 
 The first Presbytery in the United States was or- 
 ganized in 1705. In 1745 the body was divided into 
 two rival and opposing Presbyteries. The division 
 took place in 1741, but it was rendered complete by 
 the organization of the Evangelical Presbytery of 
 New York in 1745. They came together happily 
 again in 1758, and in 1785 had prospered so greatly 
 that they began to prepare for a more elaborate sys- 
 tem of government, called for by their extensive 
 body. So in 1788 the General Assembly was formed. 
 1705, 1745, and 1785, are thus shown to have been 
 epochal dates in its history. 
 
On an Evangelical Basis. "^^ 
 
 XX. The tragic history of Poland adds its sor- 
 rowful corroboration to the evidence of her happier 
 sisters. Active foreign intervention in her aftairs 
 took place in 1733, when Russia and Austria eject- 
 ed Ledc.inski because of his French connections 
 By that interference Augustus III. was secured to 
 the throne. Forty years afterward these kingdoms, 
 with Prussia, having seen how easily the Poles sub- 
 mitted to foreign influence before, were encouraged 
 To "roject the'iniquitous scheme of the partition 
 Torn by dissensions, the Poles were overcome for a 
 time ; but they watched aud waited for a favorable 
 opportunity to'retrieve the past. They attempted 
 H in 1T94, but failed. Again, when Napoleon mar- 
 shaled his mighty hosts against R"^«'^';"J^^-' 
 they were elated with hope; but when he meanly 
 disappointed and betrayed them, the cause became 
 almost hopeless. He was doubtless induced to fo - 
 sake them by fear of offending Austria and Pruss a 
 When these both openly declared against 1"^- ^nd 
 he won the battle of Dresden, in August, 1813, in 
 spite of the united arms, a momentary l^ope sprang 
 np again. For what more probable than that, when 
 he should conquer now, he would restore Poland o 
 as to keep both these States in subjection ? When 
 he was cr'ished at Leipzig, October, 1813, the cause 
 ofPoland was lost. 1738, 1773, and 1813 were years 
 of increasing sorrow and despair for Poland. 
 
 XXI. Austro-Italian History bears the same tes- 
 timony In 1780 the Emperor Joseph II. projected 
 a very liberal scheme of political reforms in Austria. 
 The papal establishment in Italy made strong oppo- 
 sition to the Emperor's policy ; the Pope even jour- 
 
72 The Science of History 
 
 neyed to Vienna to induce its abandonment. Jo- 
 seph was firm, but the persistent opposition of the 
 Church blocked the way of progress so much that 
 he and his successors were obliged to ultimately 
 abandon much of the system. Forty years after- 
 ward there was a revolution in Italy, to secure 
 something of the same reforms that Joseph had 
 projected for Austria. But now the Austrian pol- 
 icy had so radically changed that Austrian soldiers 
 were sent to Italy to quell the disorder. Truly it 
 was a magnanimous service thus to return the com- 
 pliment the Pope had paid Austria in 1781. But 
 again in 1861 the last remnant of Austria's power 
 in Italy was destroyed by popular vengeance and 
 French aid, when his ally and Jesuitical brother, 
 the l^eapolitan King, evacuated Gaeta, and left Vic- 
 tor Emanuel in possession of free Italy. 
 
 XXII. The "Young Italy" movement, which ul- 
 timately secured Italian unity and freedom, began 
 with a letter of Joseph Mazzini to the King of Sar- 
 dinia, in A.D. 1831, exhorting the King to put him- 
 self at the head of a popular movement for consti- 
 tutional liberty and unity, assuring him that the 
 progressive party in every State would cooperate 
 with him. It was thus an outgrowth of the French 
 Revolution of 1830. The immediate hopes and de- 
 signs of the patriots were disappointed, but they 
 struggled on in a righteous cause, keeping the eye 
 always fixed on the desired end. In A.D. 1871, 
 when the former Kins: of Sardinia became Kins: of 
 Italy, with his capital at Rome, the policy marked 
 out by Mazzini forty years before was triumph- 
 antlv successful. 
 
On an Evangelical Basis. 73 
 
 CHAPTER Y. 
 
 SOME of the greatest wars and revolutions of 
 History have been accomplished in a single 
 cycle of four years, because of peculiar conditions 
 of society ; and where this has not been the case, 
 they occupy a time-multiple of four years, and easily 
 divisible into subordinate periods of that duration. 
 
 I. Thus, the conquest of Persia, by Alexander, 
 beginning with the campaign of the Granicus, 334 
 B.C., and ending with the death of Darius, 330 
 B.C., occupied four years. By that conquest the 
 whole face of civilized history was changed ; the 
 social structure of the Persian Empire was honey- 
 combed with corruption, hence the speedy collapse. 
 
 The third Punic war, which finally destroyed Car- 
 thage, the most formidable rival of Rome, lasted, 
 from its inception, four years — from 150 to 146 B.C. 
 
 The personal ministry of Jesus is traditionally said 
 to have been three and a-half years in length ; but 
 it was preceded by six months of preparatory work 
 of John the Baptist; hence, the whole movement 
 for the religious and social renovation of the world 
 was completed in four years. It has influenced the 
 course of History as nothing else ever has. 
 
 The war between the Jews and Romans, in which 
 Jerusalem was destroyed, which was the beginning 
 of the great contest between revealed religion and 
 Western idolatry, began A.D. 06, and ended A.D. 70. 
 
74 The Scicntc of History 
 
 The civil war between Caesar and the Roman 
 Senate — represented at first by Pompey, afterward 
 by others — -began 49 B.C., when Cresar overran Italy 
 and subdued Spain ; it ended 45 B.C., when he put 
 down the last armed opposition, which appeared in 
 the rebellion of Spain, at Munda. 
 
 The first crusade, which has exerted such a pro- 
 digious influence on Modern History, began with 
 the Councils of Placentia and Clermont, A.D. 1095, 
 and attained its object in the capture of Jerusalem, 
 A.D. 1099. 
 
 The movements which secured religious tolera- 
 tion to the Lutherans in Germany occupied four 
 years in evolution. In 1547 Charles V. obtained a 
 triumph over the Lutherans by gaining over to his 
 side Maurice, Duke of Saxony. Having obtained 
 the victory, he was not careful to observe the terms 
 by which it had been secured ; hence Maurice, 
 whose aid had secured his triumph in 1547, set 
 about a counter-alliance with the King of France 
 in 1551 ; and such was its success, that while Charles 
 had assumed to dictate terms to all parties in 1548, 
 by the Interim Scheme, in 1552 he was compelled 
 to concede the most liberal terms to the Lutherans. 
 
 The invasion of Italy by Charles VIII. of France, 
 which inaugurated the present system of balance 
 of power in Europe, and is universally regarded as 
 a great epoch in Modern History, occupied four 
 years from its preparatory negotiations in 1493 to 
 its complete collapse in 1497. 
 
 The wars of the Fronde, in France, lasted just 
 four years to a day. This commotion marks the 
 
On an Evangelical Basis. 75 
 
 last effort of political liberty under the Bourbon 
 regime. Upon its reaction Louis XIV. consolidated 
 his absolute system of government, which in its 
 turn provoked the terrible revolution of the follow- 
 ing century. Louis never coukl have been the au- 
 tocrat he became but for the fact that his generation 
 was disgusted, by the miserable failures of the 
 Fronde, with popular coagency in politics. On the 
 22d of October, 1648, the declaration of reform had 
 been proclaimed and upheld by insurrection ; Oct. 
 22d, 1652, the King reestablished royal authority 
 upon a basis that proved permanent. 
 
 The first part of the English Kevolution under 
 Charles I. was of exactly four years' duration. The 
 Irish Rebellion, in 1641, caused Charles's sincerity 
 to be suspected by his opposing Parliament. His 
 own subsequent conduct, in Januar}^ 1642, height- 
 ened this impression, and in August, 1642, civil 
 war commenced. Four years from this time the 
 end of the struggle rolled around gradually, as its 
 opening had done. In the autumn of 1645 the 
 battle of JSTaseby rendered Charles's cause hope- 
 less; in the winter of 1645-6 he was reduced to 
 extremity; in the summer of 1646 he had fled in 
 disguise to the Scots, and was detained by them as 
 a helpless prisoner. 
 
 Going back again to Ecclesiastical History, w^e 
 find another w^ell-marked example of this law. We 
 have already said that the contest between Pope 
 Martin I. and the Emperor Constantine was a great 
 epoch in ecclesiastical cycles. Its social side is 
 equally well marked. Martin began his active op- 
 
76 The Science of History 
 
 position to the Emperor in the summer of A.D. 649. 
 The Emperor immediately desired to arrest and re- 
 press him, but the Eoman populace defended him 
 so enthusiastically that the imperial officer feared 
 to attempt it. It was not until A.D. 653 that this 
 course of the Emperor was successful, when Martin 
 was. borne a prisoner to Constantinople, and exiled. 
 The great War of Secession, which rent the 
 United States for a time in twain as by an earth- 
 quake of fire and blood, moved, in opening and in 
 ending, in most exact fulfillment of this law. Nov. 
 
 13, 1860, the Legislature of South Carolina called 
 a convention of the people of the State to consid- 
 er the subject of secession. Meeting on Dec. 17, 
 the Convention passed the ordinance of secession 
 Dec. 20. The movement thus incipient not being 
 arrested by compromise, as many hoped and labored 
 for, the Federal reenforcement for, and consequent 
 attack on. Fort Sumter took place April 4-13, 1861. 
 The war-proclamation of Lincoln, drawn up April 
 
 14, was published April 15 in the morning papers; 
 April 19 the blockade — a most invaluable war- 
 measure of the Federals — was proclaimed; and 
 May 24 the first invasion of Virginia, by the occu- 
 pation of Alexandria. These several dates show in 
 brief outline the succession of some of the leading 
 facts in the development of the war. The same 
 dates, four years later, show in outline the leading 
 facts bringing about the close of the war. Nov. 14, 
 1864, Sherman left Atlanta for his march to the sea. 
 Completing the investment of Savannah Dec. 17, 
 he demanded its surrender, and opened fire. It was 
 
Oil an Evangelical Basis. 77 
 
 evacuated Dec. 20. It was this march of Sherman 
 that first demonstrated the exhaustion of the Con- 
 federacy to her own people and to those ahroad ; 
 and it bears the same relation to the close that the 
 South Carolina secession did to the beginning of 
 the war. April 3-13 includes the evacuation of 
 Richmond, Lee's disastrous retreat of six days, and 
 the last parade of his army for laying down arms, 
 on April 12. Lincoln's assassination took place on 
 the evening of April 14— four years, to the hour, 
 from the time the telegraph had spread the news 
 of his forthcoming war- proclamation through the 
 Union ; and his death occurred early next morning, 
 also four years, to the hour, from the time the morn- 
 ing papers confirmed and published that historic 
 document. April 18 Johnston's first agreement to 
 surrender to Sherman was made, and the last sur- 
 render of Confederates took place May 24, four 
 years also from the first land invasion of a sover- 
 eign State by the Federals. 
 
 The Mexican Expedition of Napoleon IIL was a 
 most important undertaking, since it certainly, by 
 its humiliating failure, paved the way for the fall of 
 the second Empire in France ; it was the Moscow 
 of the later Napoleon, as Justin McCarthy well re- 
 marks. Its inception was October and November, 
 1861— the Secession War having just developed— 
 w^hen France, England, and Spain, agreed upon a 
 joint intervention to protect their interest. In the 
 spring of 1862— the other States, having been satis- 
 fied, withdraw— the French Emperor declared his 
 purpose of restoring monarchical government there. 
 
78 The Science of History 
 
 His troops were repulsed in 1862, but reenforcecl, 
 they pressed their way to the capital, and proceeded 
 to reorganize the Government on a monarchical ba- 
 sis in the summer of 1863. The failure of the ex- 
 pedition, and the Empire of Maximilian it set up, 
 came from the diplomatic intervention of the 
 United States. In October, 1865, Maximilian pro- 
 ceeded to execute all prisoners falling into his hands 
 from the feeble Republican armies, upon the plea 
 that thev were banditti rather than bellio^erents. In 
 the United States public opinion was aroused, and 
 the Government felt itself strong enough to remon- 
 strate with France against the continued presence 
 of foreign soldiers in America. In 1866 the French 
 were thus constrained, by diplomatic pressure, to 
 leave gradually, and hope sprang up in the expiring 
 Republican armies. In 1867 the evacuation of the 
 French was complete, and soon Maximilian fell a 
 victim to that bloody policy which he had been the 
 first to initiate. Thus, the rise and fall of this Mex- 
 ican experiment, through its several critical stages, 
 are separated by exactly four years. 
 
 The unification of the German people under the 
 lead of Prussia has been one of the greatest devel- 
 opments of modern times. It loomed unexpected 
 upon the European horizon with the astonishing 
 success of Prussia over Austria in 1866. But the 
 imperious Napoleon III., the self-appointed arbiter 
 of Europe, put his veto upon its immediate comple- 
 tion ; and the strongly Catholic South Germany drew 
 back from political embrace with the Protestant 
 North; so that it was not till France was crushed, 
 
On an Evangelical Basis. 79 
 
 and the wild tide of war-excited patriotism had re- 
 moved the latter obstacle, that the goal was reached 
 in 1870. This was just four years after the move- 
 ment began in 1866. Even in the strange regions 
 of Afghanistan this law is clearly seen to direct the 
 course of historic movements. In October, 1838, the 
 British Government interfered in the local affairs of 
 that far-away land. They w^ere successful at first, 
 but the terrible massacre of almost the entire o-arri- 
 son left there to hold up English prestige showed in 
 a year or two the ferocious character of the people 
 with which England had to deal. The cry for ven- 
 geance compelled a new invasion of that savage 
 race to punish their diabolical treachery and cruelty. 
 It succeeded, but the land was evacuated after its 
 mission was fallilled. " On the 1st October, 1842, 
 exactly four years after Lord Auckland's proclama- 
 tion justifying the intervention, Lord Ellenborough 
 issued another proclamation revoking the policy of 
 his predecessor." But, notwithstanding this, forty 
 years after the first attempt the British Government 
 made a similar attempt in 1878, which identically 
 repeated the experience of the former period, except 
 that the massacre (of the embassador's suit) was not 
 so extensive as before. This latter intervention was 
 provoked by Russian intrigue carried on in 1877. 
 British evacuation v/as complete in 1881. 
 
 11. Returning now to consider the instances 
 where the great movements are not completed in a 
 single cycle, but in several connected cycles, we 
 consider first the second Punic w^ar — the greatest 
 struo:o:le in which ancient Rome ever eno^asred. An 
 
80 The Science of History 
 
 early collision with Rome became inevitable when 
 Hannibal was appointed Carthaginian commander 
 in Spain. He immediately began to prepare for it 
 by establishing himself well in that province. He 
 became General in 220 B.C.; in 218 he assumed the 
 offensive by besieging Saguntim. In 217 he forced 
 his w^ay to Italy, and in 216, after the battle of Can- 
 nee, he had the great prize almost in his grasp. This 
 w^as a turning-point to his fortune, just four years 
 after his entrance upon his paternally-bequeathed 
 work. Rome now adopted the Fabian policy. She 
 had found, to her imminent peril, that Hannibal 
 was too great a genius to be crushed with one blow, 
 or a series of blows in close succession. Ceasing to 
 expose her armies, Hannibal's troops had not the 
 opportunities and incentive to maintain the high 
 state of discipline that had distinguished them ; and 
 himself seemed to lose vigor for the proper field for 
 his genius — an open field fight — was wanting. At 
 last, after four years more, in 212 B.C., the tide of 
 fortune turned perceptibly in favor of Rome, but 
 chiefly in the provinces. Syracuse was taken, l^ova 
 Carthage fell, and Spain almost recovered, until 
 Hannibal, himself besieged by emboldened enemies, 
 called Astrubal to his aid in 208 B.C. It was a des- 
 perate move. It failed, and left him helpless, except 
 by the resource of his great genius. But adverse 
 fortune put him more and more at disadvantage, for 
 soon Spain was wholly lost to him, and the ardent 
 Scipio boldly inaugurated the last cycle in the event- 
 ful drama by carrying war into Africa 204 B.C. 
 Hannibal was recalled soon after, and on the field 
 
On an Evangelical Basis. 81 
 
 of Zama, 202, made a last effort to save his country 
 ill that fierce contest which he had awakened. He 
 failed, peace w\as agreed upon the year after, and in 
 200 B.C. Rome and Carthage enter upon new scenes 
 of peace to which both had long been strangers. 
 Thus the fluctuations of success are seen to have 
 been moved in accordance with this law. 
 
 III. In the history of Alexander the Great this 
 law is shown in its connected series as well as in 
 isolated cycles. The Greek invasion of Persia be- 
 gan to assume tangible probability when Philip of 
 Macedon w^as chosen Captain-general of the Greek 
 armies 338 B.C. The next year the project was 
 openly arranged and provided for, but it was tem- 
 porarily stopped by Philip's assassination 336. Al- 
 exander, for nearly two years, had to make war at 
 home to secure himself on his father's throne, so 
 that it was not till 334 B.C. that the movement 
 which potentially originated in 338 could be put in 
 action. From that year till 330 B.C. Alexander 
 was occupied with the Persian conquest. When 
 Alexander had thus achieved the great work to 
 which he had given himself, it only stimulated his 
 inflated ambition to still greater conquests. He 
 desired now to rank in history with the legendary 
 Bacchus and Hercules. Hence a new cancer opened 
 before him which led him from victory to victory 
 on the very confines of civilization, for four years, 
 until he reached and conquered a portion of India 
 226 B.C. Here his army refused to follow him 
 farther in his crazy career, and he was compelled to 
 enter a new cycle by returning to Persia; and he 
 6 
 
82 The Science of History 
 
 set about consolidating his huge domain. He was 
 cut off before this necessary work was done, in 223 
 B.C. Whereupon the Athenians immediately be- 
 gan to concert a revolt, and the next year, by their 
 success at Lamia against Antipater and Leontius, 
 they put in the entering wedge to the disintegration 
 of Alexander's empire. This was 222 B.C. Their 
 success was short-lived, but military disorder, once 
 introduced into an extensive and unsolidified em- 
 pire, could not be exorcised. The result was that 
 when 218 B.C. brought a new crisis, it brought also 
 the hopeless defeat of Eumenes, the only noble- 
 minded, disinterested survivor of the great Mace- 
 donian. From the first infraction by the Athenians, 
 in 222 B.C., to the crisis of disintegration, in 218 
 B.C., the disorder went on increasing until, at the 
 latter date, it was well-nigh irretrievable. Thus the 
 great historical tide upon which Alexander floated 
 to preeminent fame, and which also undermined the 
 irorireous fiibric he reared, rose and fell in fluctuat- 
 ing ebb and flow of four years in each cycle. 
 
 These two extended examples from the most con- 
 spicuous parts of Roman and Grecian History are 
 sufiicient to show the prevalence of the principles 
 in ancient as well as modern times. The more nu- 
 merous instances will be taken from Modern History, 
 because this is better known and more entertaining 
 to most readers. 
 
 IV. It has already been shown that the civil war 
 in England under Charles I. occupied one cycle of 
 four years. It will now be shown that the historical 
 antecedents and consequents of that war follow the 
 
On an Evangelical Basis. 83 
 
 same rale. The High-Church policy of Archbishop 
 Laud, which sought to force Episcopacy upon Scot- 
 land, was the immediate cause of bringing Charles 
 and Parliament in opposition, and of placing the 
 King in such an attitude that Parliament had every 
 advantage in the controversy. This policy was urged 
 forward with unwonted vigor in 1637-38 ; it stirred 
 up rebellion which compelled Charles to summon 
 Parliament, and with resources so reduced that he 
 was helpless in their hands. He was unwilling to 
 submit to their wishes, and lost their confidence 
 entirely in 1641; and in a few months after war 
 began. 
 
 Parliament was victorious in the autumn of 1645, 
 and Charles was their prisoner in 1646. The subse- 
 quent eflbrts of the Scots to interfere failed in 1648, 
 and Charles, who had stirred it up by intrigue, paid 
 the penalty of failure on the scaffold, January, 1649. 
 The Commonwealth was proclaimed at once, and 
 by autumn of 1649 was supreme in England and 
 Ireland, through Cromwell's efforts. In 1645, when 
 Parliament triumphed over Charles, there was little 
 thought of a Commonwealth ; but his double-deal- 
 ing and mismanagement precipitated it ; and hav- 
 ing taken one step in 1645, by humbling the mon- 
 archy. Parliament felt forced, in self-defense, to 
 take another, four years later, and set up a Com- 
 monwealth, But the Scots dissented in the most 
 part from the murder of Charles I., and declared for 
 his son as rightful sovereign. This action of theirs 
 took place in 1650, and opened the war anew. Crom- 
 well defeated them in 1651, but almost immediately 
 
84 The Science of History 
 
 the Commonwealth was involved in war with the 
 Dutch, whose Stacltholder had been allied by mar- 
 riage with Charles. The success of this war in 
 1653, and peace established next year, confirmed 
 the Commonwealth four years after its proclamation. 
 Cromwell now becomes the single figure of the 
 State. In the crisis of 1645 he, as colonel of cav- 
 alry, did the fighting that decided the day at i^ase- 
 by; in 1649 he was the first man in his party, the 
 ablest general of the army, and in command in Ire- 
 land. In the arduous war for the Commonwealth 
 against Scotland and the Dutch, he was almost dic- 
 tator in military affairs, and now as they close suc- 
 cessfully he becomes supreme over Parliament also. 
 In four years the Puritans have found that a Com- 
 monwealth would not run itself — it needed some 
 one to preside over and defend it. This is a step 
 toward reaction, but only a step. Again, in 1657, 
 afiFairs came to a crisis in the almost successful proj- 
 ect of making Cromwell King. The determined 
 opposition of the army ofiicers, and the violent 
 pamphleteers teaching that in some cases " killing is 
 no murder," defeated the scheme. The next year 
 Cromwell died. 1659 was a year of disorder, un- 
 certainty, and reaction. In 1660 Charles 11. returned 
 as King, and in 1661 the regicides were tried and 
 executed. This fact marks the complete change 
 that intervened in four years. In 1657 Cromwell, 
 the chief of the regicides, was within only a step of 
 the murdered King's throne, while in 1661 the in- 
 ferior actors in the bloody drama were executed for 
 a subordinate part performed. Thus, from 1637-41 
 
On an Evangelical Basis. 85 
 
 to 1657-61, the four -years' cycle is seen in well- 
 marked force. 
 
 V. The wild tumults and chaotic disorders of the 
 French Revolution obeyed the same law. From 
 July to December, 1789, the spirit of the French 
 Revolution of 1789 was well disclosed. The people 
 then had supreme control, but desired ardently only 
 a constitutional monarchy ; but the emigrating no- 
 bles and the absolute monarchs of Prussia and Aus- 
 tria stirred up w\ar. The work of the Reformation 
 was just completed with w^onderful success in 1791, 
 when foreign invasion of France was organized to 
 force upon her a despotic monarchy. Enraged at 
 the insolent and iniquitous attempt, and maddened 
 to desperation by the unfortunate success which at 
 first attended the scheme, the French, with passion- 
 ate ardor, rushed through mere defiance into the 
 most violent Republicanism. Monarchy was abol- 
 ished, king and nobles guillotined — even conserva- 
 tive Republicans were driven to revolt at Lyons, 
 Marseilles, and Lavender. Confronted with united 
 Europe in arms on the frontiers, the Convention 
 found itself divided with formidable civil wars at 
 home in the summer of 1793. For a time it seemed 
 impossible to sustain the movement begun in 1789 
 against such strong and manifold enemies. But 
 nothing could resist the enthusiasm of that mad- 
 dened Republican spirit. From July to December, 
 1793, it crushed opposition at home, and put to flight 
 allied armies on the frontier — thus averting the 
 fate which so greatly threatened it with immediate 
 destruction. Thus the movement, begun to reform 
 
80 The Science of History 
 
 France in 1789, became extreme and successful 
 revolution in 1793. 
 
 Reaction from such a high tension of public ex- 
 citement was inevitable, while great military success 
 among undisciplined armies was sure to cause ela- 
 tion that would lead in turn to reverses. Not long 
 after the crisis of 1793 reaction began. Eobespierre 
 was displaced, the Directory instituted, the sections 
 were defeated in 1795, and some stability secured. 
 But the military reverses in Italy threatened France 
 with a great danger. This was averted by Napo- 
 leon's genius, and by his matchless exploits. Peace 
 was restored with Austria, the last important Con- 
 tinental State then at war with France, in October, 
 1797. At the same time the Bourbon reaction was 
 crushed by the troops of Bonaparte under Auge- 
 reau. From 1793 to 1797 France had passed from 
 wild internal disorder to the far more stable Direc- 
 tory, and from armed conflict with united Europe 
 to highly-honorable peace with all nations except 
 England, and that was defeated only by the unrea- 
 sonable exactions of the Directory. This single 
 mistake of the Directory in 1797 was the cause of 
 renewed wars and internal commotions which were 
 not pacificated till 1801. The Egyptian expedition 
 of Napoleon followed; then the second coalition of 
 Europe against France renewed the continental war 
 with much success. This led to the overthrow of 
 the Directory and the establishment of the Consu- 
 late, with Napoleon chief executive oflicer of France. 
 In 1800 the victories of Marengo and Hohenlinden 
 compelled Austria to seek peace; Russia had with- 
 
On an Evangelical Basis. 87 
 
 drawn, and the capture of the French in Egypt led 
 to peace being arranged with England in 1801. 
 Thus 1801 saw peace once again descending upon 
 the whole European family of nations. But the 
 elements of war were soon ready to break loose 
 again. In 1803 France and England were again in 
 conflict. At first it was a single-handed and desul- 
 tory contest, but its development was such that in 
 the autumn of 1805 nearly all Europe was again 
 arrayed against France. Thus the flames of a gen- 
 eral European war, which had been happily sup- 
 pressed in 1801, were renewed in 1805. Here begins 
 IS'apoleon's career as the Arbiter of Europe. In 
 1805 the capture of Ttlm and the victory of Auster- 
 lit25 prostrated Austria before him. The next year 
 Prussia was crushed at Jena and Auerstadt ; the 
 year following Kussia was brought to terms, and 
 Portugal seized ; in 1808 Spain was overran ; and 
 in 1809 Austria, seeking to take advantage of the 
 Spanish war to recover her former position, was 
 defeated and brought to terms in October, 1808. So 
 that Napoleon, beginning his European career by 
 the victories of Ulm, in October, and Austerlitz, in 
 December, 1805, had completely established himself 
 as the Arbiter of the Continental Nations, by the 
 peace with Austria in October, 1809, and his enforced 
 espousal of a Ilapsburg bride in December, 1809. 
 This last fact was a humiliation to which nothing 
 but the sternest necessity could have driven the 
 Austrian Emperor — it well marks therefore the 
 completeness of Napoleon's power at that time. 
 But even in his highest glory many things pre- 
 
88 The Science of History 
 
 saged the downfall of ISTapoleoii. If he had a prov- 
 idential mission in the world, it certainly was as 
 an uncompromising opponent and reformer of the 
 political and international methods that had cor- 
 ruptly ruled so long in Europe. The tide of Kepub- 
 hcan principles upon which he rode to power was 
 irreconcilably opposed to these old and mischievous 
 institutions. But at the very height of his triumphs 
 over them, Napoleon radically changed the whole 
 spirit of the new^ imperial regime by the Austrian 
 alliance. He fell into the errors of ancient heroes, 
 and bowed down to w^orship the gods of the people 
 he had been providentially raised up to exterminate. 
 Since 1805 Napoleon had been alienating the French 
 national feeling from himself — lirst by the restora- 
 tion of empire, then by nobility; and when he 
 joined himself to the house of Austria, it was only 
 a reproduction of the reign of Louis XVI., for Louis 
 had contracted a similar marriage exactly forty years 
 before, and the feeling of devotion was chilled. 
 Then repeated reverses had compelled the kingdoms 
 of Europe to seek recuperation and popular sympa- 
 thy by reforming many abuses. In a few years 
 these wholesome changes more than doubled their 
 power to resist foreign aggression, while Napoleon, 
 inflated by his continued success, ran at an ever- 
 increasing rate of arrogance, stirring up all the 
 hatred of united Europe against him and France. 
 All these forces were in full development, and pro- 
 ducing their inevitable result, when the cycle came 
 to a close upon the fated field of Leipzig, October, 
 1813, exactly four years after the peace with Aus- 
 
On an Ecangelical Basis. 89 
 
 tria. The attitude of Austria was the decisive fac- 
 tor in that historic campaign. After Leipzig, Na- 
 poleon went surelj^ and steadily down. In June, 
 1815, the last hope was extinguished— France was 
 consigned to foreign occupation, which Tvas grad- 
 ually removed from October, 1817, to October, 1818. 
 Thus the great periods in which such master-spirits 
 as Cromwell and Napoleon figured, as well as those 
 in which Alexander and Hannibal moved, are guided 
 in their development by the law of four-years' cy- 
 cles. 
 
 VI. The great movement by which the United 
 States was developed as an independent member in 
 the family of nations proceeded in exact accordance 
 with the same law. In 1749 the F'rench possessed 
 Canada in the north, and Louisiana in the south, 
 and they were pressing forward to establish overland 
 connections between the two possessions, thus cut- 
 ting off the English colonies on the Atlantic coast 
 from any extensive development to the westward. 
 In 1749 the grant of a large tract of land by the 
 English King to the Ohio Company, intended to 
 encourage westward movements of the colonies, 
 became the occasion of a collision between these 
 natives and their colonies. In 1751-52 violence to 
 individual traders brought matters to a diplomatic 
 crisis, which occurred when Washington was sent, 
 October, 1753, on the celebrated mission to the 
 Erench commandant, St. Pierre. The mission led 
 to war in 1754, in which Washington was driven 
 back by superior force; to Braddock's defeat in 
 1755; to continued French successes throughout 
 
90 Th^ Science of Hisiofy 
 
 1756--5T. tip to that time there were four years of 
 disaster, but in October, iToT, the prospect changes. 
 The elder Pitt became Prime Minister in June, 1T57, 
 but his way to perfectly control War affairs was not 
 opened till the resignation of the incapable Duke 
 of Cumberland from the chief command of the 
 English armies in October, 1757. Bringing his 
 splendid genius and popular methods to bear upon 
 the American disasters, thej^ were immediately re- 
 trie ved. In 1758 Louisburg and B^ort Duquesue 
 were captured ; in 1759 Quebec and Prouinac were 
 taken; in 1760 all Canada was conquered; and in 
 1761 the Soutliern Indians, stirred up by French 
 influence, were crushed. Pour years of such victo- 
 ries as marked the genius of Alexander, C-^esar, and 
 I^apoleon, had sprung up under Pitt's administra- 
 tion, when a gloomy shadow came over the bright 
 prospect. Thwarted by a headstrong boy of a king, 
 George IIL, the high-spirited Pitt resigned October, 
 1761. His resignation was an irreparable loss to 
 America and Pngland— -it is not too much to say 
 that it has most decisively affected the history of 
 the world. Had he remained in ofSce, the stupid 
 and guilty scheme to tax A.merica without her con- 
 sent would never have been engaged in; hence, the 
 American Revolution, the French Revolution, and 
 the Napoleonic wars, might never have taken place. ' 
 Of course, the work of popular progress would not 
 have been arrested, but it would never have taken 
 the bloody form it did. Four years after the resig- 
 nation of her great benefactor, America was almost 
 in the attitude of rebellion against England. The 
 
0)1 an Evangelical Basis, 91 
 
 first Continental Congress met in October, 1765, to 
 remonstrate against the Stamp Act. The repeal 
 took place the next year, and comparative qniet 
 was restored; but in 1767 an attempt was made to 
 renew the tax in another form. Severe repressive 
 measures were passed the next year in Parliament, 
 tending to destroy liberty of speech and trial by 
 jurj^ in America, and again the Vvdiole of the colo- 
 nies were agitated with tremendous excitement. In 
 October, 1769, the non-importation leagues had been 
 universally established, Georgia and Rhode Island 
 adhering in September and October of that year. 
 Kon-importation gained a colonial triumph over 
 Parliament then, as the Congress had done in 1765, 
 and in 1770 the tax was abolished except on tea, 
 which W%a3 retained as a pledge that Parliament 
 w^ould not give up its alleged right to levy tax. It 
 was a mistake fatal to the future peace and union 
 of the British Empire, and it produced its legitimate 
 results four years afterward. Kot admonished by 
 its repeated failures to force America to terms, the 
 Parliament tried the mingled measure of bribery 
 and tax in the Tea Importation Act of 1773. There 
 was a strange calmness in the way it was received 
 in America —» there was no Congress called — no 
 renewal of non- importation leagues. The peo[»le 
 seemed to have realized that an armed contest over 
 principle must come, and they awaited its natural 
 development. The key-note of popular feeling was 
 sounded in a public meeting in Philadelphia, Octo- 
 ber 16-18, 1773, at which the address adopted de- 
 clared all who aided this scheme of taxation iJuhlic 
 
92 The Science of History 
 
 enemies. The first act of riotous resistance to the 
 law took place in Boston, December 16, 1773, but 
 the Boston public meeting had adopted the Phila- 
 delphia confession, and it excited disorder there 
 only because the popular will was more obstinately 
 resisted. The policy originated at Philadelphia, 
 October 16-18, 1773. 
 
 We need not give even an outline of Revolution- 
 ary History. Suffice it to say that it consists of two 
 well-marked cycles — the first, a strictly colonial 
 struggle, indexed by the public declaration at Phil- 
 adelphia, Oct. 16-18, 1773, and terminating at the 
 surrender of Burgoyne, Oct. 17, 1777 ; the second, 
 an international w*ar, drawing in France, Spain, and 
 Holland, as active participators, and all the ISTorth of 
 Europe as armed neutrals. The surrender of Bur- 
 goyne determined France to intervene, and thus 
 opened the second cycle; the surrender of Corn- 
 wallis, Oct. 19, 1781, closed this cycle by showing 
 that America could not be subdued, and hence in- 
 clining England to peace as soon as honorable terras 
 could be arranged. The permanence of the United 
 States, under the Articles of Confederation, was thus 
 secured ; but in four years it was seen that the Gov- 
 ernment was sadly inadequate to the demands of the 
 emergency. In October, 1785, the first movements 
 to amend and perfect the United States Government 
 were made in some almost private and informal dis- 
 cussions of some of the leading statesmen of Vir- 
 ginia, among whom was Washington. In 1789 the 
 great revision and reorganization was just completed 
 by the session of the First Congress, ending Sept. 
 
On an EiHtngeliccd Basis. 93 
 
 26, 1789, and the organization of Washington's Cab- 
 inet. Washington began his career in connection 
 with the affairs of the Ohio Company, whose insti- 
 tution in 1749 had put in motion the causes leading 
 to the independence of the United States, and now, 
 forty years afterward, he is the guide and stay of 
 the nation thus brought forth. 
 
 VII. In the recent history of the United States 
 this is again seen in the development of the anti- 
 slavery movement. Beginning in germ 1832 with 
 a single society, it developed rapidly toward the 
 close of 1833, and became, from its wide-spread and 
 influential organization, a national movement in 
 1834. This mushroom vigor of the early growth 
 was not altogether normal, but was unduly stimu- 
 lated by the contemporary action of Great Britain 
 in abolishing slavery in the West Indies in 1833-34. 
 It was energetically opposed, and met its first decided 
 reverse in the debates of the United States Senate 
 in 1838, in which States-rights doctrines were ad- 
 mitted as a fundamental and coordinate power in 
 our system of government. In 1842 the antislavery 
 movement advanced in several important ways: 
 First, under Webster's negotiation the right of search 
 was admitted to England to aid in the suppression 
 of the slave-trade, and the cooperation of the United 
 States secured to that movement. Second, it pro- 
 duced a division in the Methodist Church under the 
 lead of Orange Scott. This was small numerically, 
 but its influence was prodigious in bringing about 
 the greater division of that wide-spread body two 
 years later. In 1846 the famous Wllmot Proviso 
 
94 The Science of History 
 
 agitated the political parties of the Union ; in 1850 
 the California question turned upon the question of 
 slavery; in 1854 the Kansas-I^ebraska Bill, and in 
 1858 the Kansas admission question, were all inti- 
 mately connected with this question. In 1862 slav- 
 ery was forbidden in the Territories, and several in- 
 cipient measures taken for general and immediate 
 emancipation, which was formally declared Jan. 
 1, 1863. This w^as fully established in 1865, and 
 another advance made in 1866 in the civil-rights' 
 legislation of Congress. Finall}^, the constitutional 
 amendment securing to former slaves the right to 
 vote equally with all other classes of population was 
 adopted in 1870. Thus the critical stages of this 
 great movement conformed to the cyclical law of 
 four years. 
 
 VIII. The current political cycle of European 
 affairs illustrates this law. The present liberal move- 
 ment o^rew out of the German Catholic reformation 
 of Rouge and Czerski in 1845. It was a popular 
 protest against relic-worship, as upheld by Arnoldi, 
 Bishop of Treves, in the pilgrimage to the so-called 
 ''Holy Coat" of Treves in 1844. At first it was 
 purely religious, and in 1845 was enthusiastically 
 welcomed by all classes in Germany ; but the polit- 
 ical authorities began to interfere to arrest its prog- 
 ress, and with some success. Meantime the Jesuit- 
 ical Pope Gregory XVI. died, and was succeeded by 
 Pope Pius IX. in 1846. Well understanding that the 
 spirit of this age was against mediaeval papacy, he 
 tried to turn aside the rising tide of religious ref- 
 ormation by political liberalism. The idea of a Pope 
 
On an Uvanffelical Basis. 95 
 
 playing this strange ro^e was electrical: it inspired 
 Italy with new life; it stirred France so deeply that 
 Louis Philippe, attempting to repress it, it broke 
 forth in revolution in 1848. Austria and Prussia 
 caught the infection, and were convulsed with pop- 
 ular commotion. The Pope hesitated, and attempted 
 to reverse his policy at a critical period, and was 
 driven from Rome, and a Republic declared there. 
 But a reaction set in in 1849, when Louis Kapoleon, 
 President of the French Republic, suppressed the 
 Roman Republic, Russia joined with Austria to sup- 
 press the Hungarian Republic, and Prussia, the rep- 
 resentative of national ideas, declined to act against 
 Austria. In 1850 the prospect rendered so bright 
 by the liberal policy of Pius in 1846 was completely 
 overcast. Louis Napoleon was preparing to rees- 
 tablish the Empire in France; the Pope, entirely 
 changed in principles by his experience, returned 
 to Rome ; Prussia retired from her rivalry of Aus- 
 tria, and Hungary was under military rule of the 
 most rigid nature. The progress of Jesuitical reac- 
 tion is seen in the dogma of the Immaculate Con- 
 ception, declared in 1854; it showed that the Pope 
 had given himself completely to the medieov^al spirit 
 he protested against in 1846, but by which he had 
 been restored in 1850. But in the darkness, one 
 incident that led afterward to a new flood of liberal 
 light was the splendid diplomacy of Cavour, which 
 availed itself of the exigency of the Crimean War, 
 in 1854, to bring Napoleon III. in debt to Sardinia, 
 and commit him to the liberation of Italy from 
 Austria. This alliance with England and France 
 
96 The Science of History 
 
 did not begin to yield its intended fruit until four 
 years afterward. In 1858 the alliance to deliver 
 Italy was ready to engage in the work at once. In 
 1859 Austria was defeated, and ^N'orthern Italy partly 
 redeemed ; in 1860 Southern Italy was added also 
 to Sardinia. In 1861 the Kingdom of Italy was 
 proclaimed, and the capital set up at Florence. In 
 1862 another attempt was made by Garabaldi to 
 complete the work of deliverance and unification 
 for Italy. But now Kapoleon, the man who aided 
 the beginning of the work in 1858, put himself in 
 decided opposition to it, and its completion was ar- 
 rested for exactly four years. In this very year 1862 
 Bismarck was appointed Prime Minister of Prussia, 
 and immediately began that thorough organization, 
 that vigorous administration, which four years after- 
 ward enabled him to crush Austria and aid Italy so 
 effectively. Thus, the very year that Napoleon drew 
 back from his providential mission (to reform the 
 Papacy), a man was raised up who, four years after- 
 ward, took his first step in this his great life-work. 
 Italy was aided, and Austria liberalized, by this great 
 movement in 1866. In 1870 Italy was completely 
 united, and France became Republican. In 1874 the 
 German Empire and the Papacy were drawn into an 
 open conflict, which gave no sign of relenting till 
 the death of Pius IX. in 1878, and the election of 
 a liberal Pope in his stead. There has been steady 
 progress toward accommodation since. But as the 
 breach is closed toward Germany, it has opened 
 toward France ; so that as Prussia was raised up in 
 1862 and 1866 to complete the work which Imperial 
 
On an Evangelical Basis. 97 
 
 France had fViiled to do, the indications of Provi- 
 dence are that Republican France will be called to 
 carry on the contest of liberal governments against 
 Jesuitical Rome when Germany retires from the 
 contest, as she now seems preparing to do. Thus 
 for nearly forty years the liberal movement has gone 
 on in Europe, developing some new crisis each cycle 
 of four 3^ears' progress. 
 
 Analmost innumerable array of instances and illus- 
 trations of these truths might be produced, but the 
 foregoing are sufficient for the purposes of this brief 
 treatise. If these are not sufficient to convince one of 
 the fact that the great historical movements of the 
 past and present are regulated and directed in the 
 most minute details and precise manner by systemat- 
 ic and discernible laws of Providence, then a fuller 
 array of similar testimony would fail also to accom- 
 plish that result. These principles, however, it must 
 be remarked, will never appear in their own clear 
 light and force until all the details of History are so 
 arranged as to exhibit them in their true and natural 
 connections. The art of writing History so as to 
 display the designs and laws of Providence therein 
 has not yet been acquired ; when it shall be attained, 
 men will be astonished at the revelations it will dis- 
 close. 
 7 
 
98 The Science of History 
 
 CHAPTER VI. 
 
 AS a corollary to the proposition at the begin- 
 ning of this treatise, the following subordinate 
 aw is maintained: Upon a closer study of the sev- 
 eral cycles of History, it wmII appear that a secondary 
 crisis occurs in each cycle exactly at its middle point 
 of time. Thus Abraham, in the twenty-first cent- 
 ury of the world's history, is a middle point both in 
 time and in spiritual development between Adam 
 and Jesus. Thus too tlie wide-spread Roman Re- 
 public, about B.C., with its liberal system of law 
 and cultured civilization, came nearer delivering: 
 the world from irresponsible absolutism, desolating 
 wars, and national isolation, than any subsequent or 
 preceding age; hence, it was a middle point in spir- 
 itual progress as well as in time between the golden 
 age of patriarchal peace and liberty, in Noah's time, 
 and that golden age of progress and freedom to 
 which Christianity is now conducting the world. 
 
 Again, in Ecclesiastical History: Joseph's career 
 in Egypt, 1731 B.C., is exactly mediate between 
 Abraham in 1931 and Moses in 1531. (These dates 
 are not given precisely, but to indicate the connec- 
 tions of events.) Again, Elijah's career, about 911 
 B.C., was a similar stage between Samuel, about 
 1111, and Isaiah, 711 B.C. The virtual toleration 
 of Christianity in the second century, under Aure- 
 lius and Antoninus, was a preliminary and medium 
 
On an Evangelical Basis. 99 
 
 step to its complete triumph in the fourth century. 
 The ao:iyressive movement of the Crusades besfan 
 with Peter the Hermit in 1093; the last foothold 
 on Palestine was lost in 1291 — ;just about two hun- 
 dred years. The celebrated contest of the popes 
 with the house of Hohenstaufen began almost at the 
 time of the accession of Gregory VIL, A.D. 1073 ; 
 the last male heir was murdered by the popes' con- 
 trivance in 1268, and the reorganization of the Ger- 
 man Empire followed under papal auspices in A.D. 
 1273. 
 
 So also in political cycles: In 1640 Charles I. of 
 Englatid was reduced to the necessity, by the suc- 
 cess of the Scotch rebellion, to summon Parliament 
 under such conditions as rendered him helpless 
 in their hands. The revolution thus inaugurated 
 reached a second crisis in 1660, when Charles TI. 
 was restored, through the agency of Monk, com- 
 mander of the army from Scotland. 
 
 Tlie wild extreme of the French Republican era 
 was successfully developed in opposition to foreign 
 invasion in 1793; its course could not be curbed 
 till 1813, at Leipzig. From 1761, when the English 
 gained entire control of the North American conti- 
 nent, to 1781, when they lost it again, was a twenty- 
 years' half-cycle. The reactionary policy of Louis 
 Napoleon began in 1849-50, when he repressed the 
 Roman Republic, and restored the Pope. He col- 
 lapsed in twenty years' time — 1869-70. 
 
 In the social cycles a similar principle prevails. 
 The revolutionary contest began virtually October, 
 1773, when the policy upon which America spouta- 
 
100 The. Science of History. 
 
 neously acted was first publicly and solemnly pro- 
 claimed; but the breach was not considered irrev- 
 ocable till the King rejected the last overture for 
 peace in October, 1775. Again, in the cooperation 
 of French and American forces, which the surrren- 
 der ot Burgoyne brought about, and the siege of 
 Savannah, October, 1779, were exactly intermediate 
 between the triumph of Saratoga and that of York- 
 town, October, 1781. 
 
 In the war of secession, the decisive campaigns 
 of Gettysburg and Vicksburg began in April, 1863, 
 at the middle point between the opening of the w^ar, 
 April, 1861, and its close, April, 186e5. Its fortune 
 foreshadowed the complete collapse which came two 
 years later. 
 
 If it be conceded that these cited examples give 
 a fair showing of demonstration to tlie theory of 
 cyclical epochs we have advanced, the way is there- 
 by opened to study the development and propaga- 
 tion of true religion, government, and society on 
 the earth, under these providential laws. Thus the 
 Moral History of mankind, under the infallible tu- 
 torship of an ever-present and perfect Providence, 
 becomes a possibility of the near future. The bear- 
 ing of this theory upon the miracles of propliecy 
 among the Hebrew^s is of the utmost importance, 
 and its explanations of the oracles of paganism are 
 equally satisfactory. If the reception of this trea- 
 tise by the public encourages to a continuance of 
 these studies, these topics ma}^ be treated in a sub- 
 sequent publication. 
 
"%M 
 
LIBRARY OF CONGRESS 
 
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