Providential epochs

Preface

T^HE contents of this book first took form in a series of lectures on Providential Epochs, intended for Christian young people, who were presumably taking up certain courses of reading along historical lines. The author's aim was simply to furnish an incentive to the more thorough study of those events which had ever seemed to him demonstrative of the historyshaping activity of Divine Providence. The limitations of a lecture precluded the possibility of exhaustive treatment. The author claims originality in nothing. He hopes for nothing more important to come of his book than a desire on the reader's part to know more of these great epochs by the study of the recognized authorities. It will be most gratifying

4 Preface.

to hope that such study may promote a belief

in the Providence of history, a confidence in

the world's perpetual advancement and a growth

of pure and lofty patriotism in the hearts of our

American youth.

F. M. B.

EVANSTON, 1894.

The Discovery of America, 155