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 The Way of the Lord in the Discovery of America 
 
 A SERMON 
 
 PREACHED BEFORE THE EASTERN SYNOD OE THE REFORMED CHURCH 
 
 IN THE UNITED STATES, AND THE PROFESSORS AND 
 
 STUDENTS OF FRANKIvIN AND MARSHAIvI, COL- 
 
 I^EGE AND THEOI.OGICA1, SEMINARY, 
 
 FIRST REFORMED CHURCH, 
 
 LANCASTER, PENNSYLVANIA, 
 
 '^Columbus Day," October 21, 1892, 
 
 Rev. JOSEPH HENRY DUBBS, D. D. 
 
 PUBLISHED BY REQUEST. 
 
"he Way of the Lord in the Discovery of America. 
 
 A SERMON 
 
 PREACHED BEFORE THE EASTERN SYNOD OF THE REFORMED CHURCH 
 
 IN THE UNITED STATES, AND THE PROFESSORS AND 
 
 STUDENTS OF FRANKLIN AND MARSHAIvI, COI,- 
 
 1,EGE AND THEOI^OGICAI, SEMINARY, 
 
 FIRST REFORMED CHURCH, 
 
 LANCASTER, PENNSYLVANIA, 
 
 — ON — 
 
 ''Columbus Day," October 21, 1892, 
 
 BY THE 
 
 Rev. JOSEPH HKNRY DUBBS, D. D. 
 
 PUBLISHED BY REQUEST. 
 
 Lancaster, Pa.: 
 Intelligencer Printing House. 
 
 1892. 
 

 O 
 3 
 
 PRINTED BY THE 
 
 LECTURE PRINTING SOCIETY OF THE THEOLOGICAL SEMINARY 
 
 OF THE REFORMED CHURCH, 
 
 LANCASTER, PA. 
 
 
serm:on. 
 
 PSAivM Ixxvii : 19. — "Thy way is in the sea and thy path is in the great 
 waters. ' ' 
 
 In the text the Psalmist, in strains of exalted poetry, praises the 
 inscrutable power of God. The direct allusion is, of course, to the 
 deliverance of Israel from Egypt, when it could be literally said that 
 the way of Jehovah, as the deliverer and conductor of His people, 
 was in the sea and his path was in the deep waters. But the eye 
 of the sacred poet takes in a wider range, and he recognizes the 
 fact that the deliverances of the Almighty are constant and His 
 power supreme. To him the wonders of nature, no less than the 
 revealings of history are one glorious theophany. From the 
 mountains of Palestine, we may suppose, he beholds the sailing of 
 the treasure-ships to Ophir and Tarshish — he sees the white sails 
 of Phoenician fleets on their way to lands mysterious and unknown 
 — and to his enlightened vision all this is no less miraculous than 
 the grand revelations of the hand of the lyord in the land of Egypt. 
 As he says elsewhere : " Thej^ that go down to the sea in ships, 
 these see the works of the Lord and his wonders in the deep." 
 It is God who holds the tiller ; it is God who reefs the sails. The 
 sailor to distant lands is as certainly guided by Divine power as 
 was Moses when, with Israel's hosts, he passed through the depths 
 of the sea. 
 
 To some minds all this may appear to have been mere supersti- 
 tion, intensified by fear of the unfamiliar, but it is otherwise with 
 the soul that is not only poetic but religious. The sacred poet 
 did not comprehend all that his utterances involved. He could 
 have no idea that what he saw was but the beginning of the 
 wonders of the I^ord ; yet who caia doubt that if with prophetic 
 vision he had beheld the future history of maritime invention and 
 discover}^ — culminating in the wonderful event which the world 
 celebrates to-day — he would even more distinctly have seen the way 
 
of the Lord in the sea — His wonderful path in the great waters. 
 Of all this, it maybe said, the text contains but slight indications; 
 but the germinal truth is there, from which all the rest is develop- 
 ed, "Let it teach us," says an eminent commentator, "that 
 through all the changes of the world's history Jehovah is still the 
 same ; and that when His people pass through the deep waters he 
 guides them safely to the farther side. ' ' 
 
 History is the development of the divine purpose All its re- 
 vealings to the eye of faith are but illustrations of this fundament- 
 al truth. On an occasion like the present it might be vain to 
 attempt a minute recital of events with which all may be presumed 
 to be familiar; but to look upward with believing eye — to behold the 
 hand of the Lord in the greatest event of modern times — to con- 
 sider, in brief, The way of the Lord iji the Discovery of America — 
 this is a privilage which as Christians we cannot too highly esteem. 
 
 I. 
 
 IN EVERY GREAT HISTORICAL MOVEMENT IT IS GOD WHO PRE- 
 PARES THE WAY. 
 
 He never allows a great work to be begun and ended by a single 
 man. He often chooses the humblest instruments to be the ad- 
 vance-couriers of His glory. 
 
 In the discovery of this western continent these truths are 
 abundantly illustrated. For ages there had been vague notions 
 of the existence of western lands ; there were traditions of fleets 
 that had sailed to unknown regions. We do not contest the 
 claims that have been made in behalf of the Northmen, the Zeno 
 brothers, and other voyagers, when we assert that theirs were dis- 
 coveries which did not discover. Their results were known but to a 
 little company that failed to appreciate their value, and soon they 
 were almost forgotten. Surely, it is not through such narrow 
 channels that the stream of history can be made to flow. 
 
 Instead of believing that the way of the Lord in the discovery 
 of America was prepared bj^ a few obscure voyagers, we would rather 
 believe that there were thousands and tens of thousands who 
 were called to this glorious work. Of what u.se could the dis- 
 covery have been in the darkest ages, when Europe was overrun 
 by barbarous tribes, whose only purpose was to destroy ? But 
 now the long winter of mediaeval darkness was passing away, and 
 
the veins of the nations were throbbing with a new life. The 
 nationalities of Europe had already been formed, and were becom- 
 ing more and more commensurate with the regions in which cer- 
 tain languages were spoken. Ital}^ had already produced its most 
 celebrated poets ; and the three great inventions, printing, gun- 
 powder and the mariner's compass, had changed the character of 
 war and peace. Most wonderful of all was the deathless thirst for 
 knowledge that induced men of the most diverse nationalities to 
 sacrifice ever}^ comfort, and even life itself, for the recovery of some 
 fragment of ancient art, or the discovery of something that men 
 had not known before. It was a wonderful age, and in its won- 
 ders expectant thousands beheld the coming of the great and glo- 
 rious da}' of the Lord. It is in these intelligent multitudes of the 
 renaissance, that we recognize the true precursors of the great dis- 
 covery. 
 
 It has been usual to regard the Church of the Fifteenth Century 
 as utterly sunken and degraded. Would it not be better to con- 
 sider that century a period of preparation for her great awaken- 
 ing ? In many countries men were calling for a reformation in 
 capite et ineinbris. In Spain itself the Christian consciousness was 
 clearer than it had been for ages. Mohammedanism had been driven 
 out, and for the first time in eight centuries the destinies of the 
 world appeared to be in the hands of servants of the Lord Jesus 
 Christ. 
 
 Is there au)^ reason why we should utterly repudiate the period 
 from which many of our greatest privileges are historically de- 
 rived ? If it was a dark age, we cannot deny that light was strug- 
 gling with the darkness. Let us open our eyes and be thankful 
 for the light. We refuse to renounce our patrimony in English 
 literature ; we boast that Chaucer and Shakespeare are ours, though 
 they sleep in a foreign land ; can we fail to see how the hand of 
 the Lord was mighty in preparing a path for our feet ? If the 
 church of more modern times has taken up, as we believe, the best 
 life of the period which preceded it, may we not with sympathetic 
 throbbings feel the power of that life, as it beat in the hearts of 
 the men who lived four hundred years ago ? Is it not well to ap- 
 preciate the continuity of Christ's promise, and when histor}- re- 
 calls the learning, the piety, the self-sacrifice of the past, to ex- 
 claim with rapturous devotion: "This too, thank God, is 
 mine !" 
 
 Thus from many sources flowed the streams that together 
 
formed a current whose force was irresistible. Great discoveries 
 followed each other in rapid succession and the greatest of them 
 all could no longer be dela5^ed. Every great event in the history 
 of the world resembles the central mystery of the incarnation in 
 that it can appear only when the fullness of time has come. The 
 legends of the past had all been told ; Vinland was forgotten ; 
 the tales of the voyages of Buddhist priests had never been related 
 in Europe ; but in a vastly more general way the human race de- 
 manded a broader field for its development. The time had come, 
 and with it came the man. 
 
 II. 
 
 IN BVERY GENUINE HISTORIC ADVANCE IT IS GOD WHO SEI^ECTS 
 
 THE LEADER, 
 
 Often it seems as if He chose the mean things of this world on 
 purpose to confound the wise. It has been so in all ages of the 
 world's history. The founder of the grandest Assyrian dynasty 
 was a vine-dresser ; one of the most brilliant of the mediaeval popes 
 had been a keeper of swine. When the man is needed it matters 
 not how humble have been his beginnings ; he will rise when he 
 is called ; he will triumph over unnumbered difficulties, and accom- 
 plish the mission to which he has been anointed. Of this general 
 truth the career of the discoverer of America is a perfect illustra- 
 tion. In anticipation of the present anniversary ancient records 
 have been searched as was never done before, and facts have been 
 established which had previously been called in question ; but the 
 obscurity which attends the early years of Columbus has not been 
 entirely removed. For our present purpose, however, it matters 
 little whether he was born in Genoa or in the neighboring city of 
 Savona ; it is certain that he did not belong to the classes from 
 which in those days great things were expected. His father was 
 a weaver and wool-comber, and the son learned his trade. The 
 family frequently changed its residence, and left no deep impres- 
 sion in the places where it dwelt. It is known that Columbus made 
 voyages in his early youth, and thus acquired the experience 
 which was afterwards so precious ; but this was not remarkable in 
 a city where every one was interested in navigation, and where he 
 who was a tradesman to-day might become the captain of a ship 
 to-morrow. 
 
 With reference to the early education of Columbus the obscurity- 
 
is even greater, but it is certain that he was not in later daj's a 
 rude, ignorant seaman. It ma}^ or may not be true that he had 
 studied for some time at the University of Pavia; but he knew Latin 
 well enough to write it ; and Humboldt assures us that he was 
 profoundly versed in theology and patristic literature, and knew 
 all of science that the age could teach him. The same distin- 
 guished scholar enumerates thirty ancient and mediaeval authors 
 from whose writings Columbus quoted with intelligence and ac- 
 curacy. Will it be denied that in later years he held his own in 
 lengthy discussions with the professors of the University of Sala- 
 manca ? Has it ever been doubted that he had sufficient culture 
 to win golden opinions at the court of Ferdinand and Isabella — 
 that in the royal presence he conducted himself, as if he had been 
 born on the steps of a throne ? How Columbus became learned is 
 a mystery that will never be revealed ; but it is the mystery of 
 genius. It is the mystery which confronts mankind whenever 
 God calls the Mumble to the high places of the earth. " It is the 
 Lord's doing and it is marvelous in our eyes." 
 
 To delineate the character of a great man is one of the most dif- 
 ficult tasks that can possibly be attempted. The picture, even 
 when drawn by the ablest hand, will represent no more than the 
 standpoint of the observer. The leader of a grand historic move- 
 ment is in a certain sense its representative and exponent ; he does 
 not stand for himself alone ; he is the incarnation of the spirit of 
 thousands. Modern art has produced a composite picture, in 
 which the features of many persons are cast upon a single photo- 
 graphic plate, until at last there appears a countenance, strange but 
 familiar, that combines the peculiarities of them all. In a some- 
 what similar way the great man is many-sided. He has some of 
 the weaknesses of his age, or he would not be in sympathy with 
 it ; but he also embodies its noblest aspirations, its grandest ideals, 
 and in his efforts to actualize them he is sustained by a strength 
 that is as the strength of thousands. 
 
 In our estimate of Christopher Columbus we are not inclined to 
 accept without question the eulogies of Irving and Prescott, and 
 least of all the ecstatic rhapsodies of the French school, under the 
 lead of Roselly de Lorgues, which ascribe to Columbus all the 
 virtues of a saint. On the other hand we are not ready to follow 
 the lead of the modern iconoclasts, who judge the past exclusively 
 by the standards of the present, and have hardly left us an ideal 
 in secular history that can be confidently held up for the imita- 
 
tion of youth. We cannot go wrong when we, at least, acknowl- 
 edge, with Humboldt, that the discoverer of America was a 
 grand, impressive personage. 
 
 " Columbus," says Irving, "had the faults of his age, especially 
 those of the Romanic nations. He was irritable and impetuous ; 
 and seems to have believed that none but Christ's people had 
 rights which were worthy of consideration." We might add that 
 at times he manifested the pride of a Spaniard and the passionate 
 nature of an Italian ; that at sea, like many an other naval com- 
 mander, he regarded his commission as his highest law, so that 
 in seeking to obey the unreasonable demands of an avaricious 
 king he was guilty of t5'ranny and oppression. It could hardly 
 have been otherwise with the servants of the monarch who had 
 just expelled the Moors from their beautiful home in Grenada. 
 We have no desire to apologize for the treatment of the Caribs, 
 which began with an attempt at conversion and ended with their 
 enslavement. It was shameful conduct — whenever and wherever 
 practiced — but before we join in the merciless condemnation which 
 has been visited on Columbus by certain recent historians, it may 
 be well to remember that centuries had to pass before Christian 
 nations learned their duty to the oppressed ; and that in so far as 
 the treatment of the Indians is concerned, our nation has also had 
 its " century of dishonor." 
 
 Columbus was certainly no saint — whatever Rome may say — 
 but we are ready to confess, with a Spanish writer, that " he had 
 a soul which was superior to the age in which he lived." Bur- 
 dened with mediaeval superstition, often misled by false science, 
 he was yet the embodiment of the ripened aspirations of his time. 
 With all his imperfections there are in his personality certain 
 characteristics which are absolutely splendid ; which shine with 
 undimmed glory as he stands unrivalled on the pinnacle of the 
 ages. 
 
 Among these characteristics we are inclined to give the fore- 
 most place to his unwavering consciousness that he had been 
 called to the accomplishment of a mighty work. Not Abraham, 
 when he went forth from his kindred and his father's house to 
 seek an unknown country in the west, was more thoroughly 
 assured of his mission than was Columbus when he believed him- 
 self called to follow the path which the Lord had shown him in 
 the deep waters. When and how the call came to him no one 
 can tell ; but there can be no doubt that at all times he conceived 
 
himself an agent of the Deity, bound at the peril of his soul to 
 accomplish his appointed work. Though in accordance with the 
 crude geographical notions of his time, he naturally supposed that 
 his first purpose must be to find a western route to India, he never 
 doubted that he would discover many islands by the way ; and 
 that, as his name — Christopher — indicated, he should " bear 
 Christ" to regions yet unknown. It was this unfailing con- 
 sciousness that caused him to study the geographical questions 
 of the age as none had done before ; that sent him on distant voy- 
 ages, even beyond ulihna Thide, possibly to gather information 
 concerning earlier navigators ; that sustained him wandering 
 from one court to another, seeking aid to carry out a plan which 
 the learned declared to be vain and chimerical. Was the call a 
 mere hallucination, as some have ventured to assert ? It ma}^ be 
 quite in accordance with the spirit of the present age to speak of 
 self-deception — perhaps of incipient insanity ; but if the call of 
 Columbus was "mere monomania" it were to be wished that 
 such delusions might become more general. It would be a grand 
 thing if, by any means, such a call could be made to resound in 
 the ears of the sleepers of the age, a call that would induce them 
 to go forth, if not to the discovery of new worlds, at least to the 
 realization of the hope of Columbus — to the glorious work of bear- 
 ing the Gospel to the most distant lands. Shall those of us who 
 are ministers of the Gospel, who in the solemn hour of our ordi- 
 nation professed on bended knee that we were ' ' fully persuaded 
 in our hearts that we had been called of God to the Holy Ministry," 
 shall we deny the reality of the call which led an obscure voyager 
 to the accomplishment of the greatest work in the history of the 
 ages? 
 
 O, for the faith — the grand, the glorious faith — of the great 
 discoverer ! It was a faith like that of Noah, by which he " con- 
 demned the world." Without this precious gift he might have 
 despaired a hundred times ; he would have turned to commerce 
 and escaped the misery of begging for bread at the gates of La 
 Rabida ; but he had the faith that can remove mountains, and thus 
 he became, as truly as the grand examples of ancient times, ' ' an 
 heir of the righteousness which is by faith." 
 
 That the life of Columbus was profoundly religious, according 
 to the standards of his time, will hardly be denied. One of his 
 recent biographers, it is true, professes to be "disgusted with his 
 cant," but the man who could use such language would be 
 
lO 
 
 equally offended b}^ the songs of Zion — by the sacrifices of devo- 
 tion which are offered up to-day in thousands of churches. 
 Washington Irving suras up the whole matter when he says, on 
 excellent authority : " His religion was fervent and devout ; reli- 
 gion mingled with the whole of his thoughts, and shone forth in 
 his most private and unstudied writings. Whenever he made a 
 discovery he devoutly gave thanks to God. The voice of prayer 
 and the melody of praise rose from his ships on discovering the 
 new world, and his first act on landing was to prostrate himself 
 upon the earth and offer up thanksgivings. All his great enter- 
 prises were undertaken in the name of the Holy Trinity and he 
 partook of the holy sacrament prior to his embarkation. The 
 religion thus deeply seated in his soul diffused a sober dignity 
 and a benign composure over his whole deportment ; his language 
 was pure and guarded, and free from all gross and irreverent sur- 
 prises." 
 
 The imagination of Columbus was unusually active ; but this 
 was not an unmingled blessing. While it assured him of the 
 realization of his grandest ideals, it sometimes brought him 
 visions that were unreal and deceptive, and the thoughts that 
 rose unbidden in his soul amid the afflictions of Hispaniola and 
 Veragua appeared as audible voices. The conflict was intense, 
 and poor, weak human nature was at times unable to withstand 
 the strain ; but though we appreciate all this as we look back 
 through the ages, we cannot fail to recognize the mighty arm and 
 the loving heart. 
 
 III. 
 
 IT BECOMES EVIDENT AS WE TRACE THIS REMARKABl^E HIS- 
 TORY THAT GOD WONDERFULLY PROTECTED THE 
 MAN WHOM HE HAD CHOSEN. 
 
 On the extraordinary voyage which has been so often described 
 Columbus kept a daily record, which within the past year has been 
 minutely examined. It is now possible to follow his course with 
 sufficient accuracy ; and the Royal Geographical Society declares 
 that, in consequence chiefly of the researches of I^ieutenant Mur- 
 doch, of the U. S. Navy, we can point out the spot on Watling's 
 Island, where his keel first struck the sand. But what appears 
 most wonderful in this strange recital is the enumeration of the 
 Divine Providences which accompanied the voyager on his un- 
 tried way. The breezes blew gently to the west, and every ocean 
 
II 
 
 current helped him onward. The mutinous sailors, who expected 
 to enter a sea of darkness, were every morning surprised to behold 
 an unclouded sky. If some of them imagined that by following 
 the curve of the earth they would finally reach a region whence 
 they could never return — where their heads would hang down- 
 ward and they might possibly fall into the vast abyss of space- 
 smooth seas and unclouded skies constantly invited them to sail a 
 little further. Every day during the latter part of the voyage had 
 its sign to beckon them onward ; and it seemed as if Providence 
 had directed nature to woo the voyagers to the promised land — 
 for, indeed, the time had come. 
 
 When we join in spirit in the hymns sung by Columbus and 
 his little company as they stood for the first time on the shore of 
 Guanahani, we feel that our task, so far as the present festival is 
 concerned, is almost completed. We need not follow the great 
 discoverer to Cuba and Hispaniola, and back to Spain, to behold 
 the meretricious greeting which an ungrateful king accorded him. 
 Still less need we speak of the succeeding voyages, which to their 
 commander were but occasions for disappointment and despondency. 
 What cared the Spanish court for the discovery of lands inhabited 
 by naked savages ? It was gold that they sought, and unless he 
 brought it, and brought it abundantly, his work was regarded as 
 a failure. Is there anything in this eventful history more lamen- 
 table than the ingratitude which pursued the great commander ? 
 That after the discover}^ had been made, as he himself said, " every 
 tailor in Spain pretended that he could have done it just as well;" 
 that the continent which he discovered was named after a man 
 whom history does not praise and who would otherwise be forgot- 
 ten ; that as the crowning act of infancy, Columbus was removed 
 from the colony which he had founded, and taken home in chains. 
 Can there be anything which is more sorrowful than this ? Yes ! 
 there is a view which is even more depressing. It is to see the 
 greatest man of his age degrading himself to be the instrument of 
 an avaricious king in his unhallowed search for gold ; to see him 
 spending his later years, until he died in obscurity, in a fruitless 
 struggle to obtain the territorial possessions which that king had 
 promised him. What does it matter that he vowed to devote the 
 wealth he hoped to gain to a new crusade for the recovery of the 
 Holy L,and ? Would it not have been better if he could have risen 
 superior to his age, anticipating the grand revelations of the 
 future? — if he had welcomed the higher light that was even then 
 
12 
 
 beginning to break upon the world, standing forth as a hero for 
 humanity, and truth, and righteousness? In that dark and 
 gloomy age it might have been his fate to perish at the stake ; but 
 he would have become, if not a saint, at least a blessed martyr. 
 
 Columbus died in ignorance of the extent of his discovery. 
 In all secular history there was no event which for profound 
 significance could be compared with it ; but, as he himself said, he 
 had but opened the gates ' ' for others more fortunate than him- 
 self. He supposed to the last that he had touched the coasts of 
 India, imagining that possibly Hispaniola w^as Ophir, from which 
 Solomon brought his gold. ' ' What visions of glory, ' ' says one of 
 his biographers, " would have burst upon his mind if he had known 
 that he had discovered a new continent, equal to the old in mag- 
 nitude, and separated by two vast oceans from all the land hitherto 
 occupied by civilized men!" But are there not grander things 
 which his prophetic eye might have discovered ? Is it not true 
 that we now enjoy, as the results of that momentous epoch, bless- 
 ings of which the great discoverer in the wildest flights of his 
 fancy had never dreamed ? 
 
 IIII. 
 
 WE, SEE HOW THE PATH OF THE LORD IN THE GREAT WATERS 
 
 LED TO THE GRANDEST DEVELOPMENTS OF THE LIFE 
 
 OF CHRIST IN THE WORLD. 
 
 In the days of Columbus civil liberty was a thing unknown. 
 Kings were supposed to reign by divine right, and feudalism had 
 chained the people to the soil. No Philosopher had imagined 
 that a frame of government would ever be devised whose chief 
 purpose it would be to "establish justice, insure domestic 
 tranquillity, provide for the common defense, promote the general 
 welfare, and secure the blessings of liberty to its people and their 
 posterity." Old Europe had no room for such a man as Wash- 
 ington. A new world was needed, and it came. 
 
 Religious liberty, if such a thing had been suggested, would in 
 those days have been regarded as a vain chimera, a dream of insan- 
 ity which even the persecuted heretic could hardly have ventured to 
 entertain. Yet what is civil oppression compared with the cru- 
 cifixion of the soul that is involved in religious tyranny ? Strong 
 men had already striven with their chains, but they had been 
 more firmlv riveted. Wickliflfe's dust had been scattered on the 
 
13 
 
 waters ; John Huss had perished at thestake. But the day of eman- 
 cipation was at hand. On the day when Columbus sailed across 
 the ocean two little boys were playing at their mother's knee in 
 humble homes in Germany and Switzerland, to whom it was to be 
 given to lead the vanguard in the coming contest for the deliver- 
 ance of man. Their names were Martin Luther and Ulric Zwingli. 
 Just twenty-five years after the discovery of America the Reforma- 
 tion began. Was this a mere coincidence ? Or were not the two 
 events connected in true historic sequence ? Were they not both 
 of them included in the same grand historic movement — the same 
 revelation of the divine life — that was to bear humanity forward 
 and upward, so that both revealed their highest significance in 
 distant ages ? 
 
 Spain, beautiful Spain — -the land of poetry and song — failed to 
 know the time of her visitation. In her love of gold she found no 
 room for higher aspirations ; in her pride she refused to learn, least 
 of all, from nations which she despised Ere long the empire in 
 which she rejoiced slipped from her grasp, and the sceptre was 
 given to the nations of the north. Looking back to the period of 
 the discovery, and remembering the subsequent history of Spain, 
 we may rejoice that Columbus — grand and glorious pioneer as he 
 undoubtedly was — did not turn his prow northward and discover 
 the North American continent. In the development of civil lib- 
 erty ; in the achievement of religious freedom ; in the innumer- 
 able discoveries and advances which have lessened the woes of 
 humanity and brought it nearer to the realization of its grand ideal, 
 there is nothing that more clearly reveals the way of the Lord 
 than the fact that the portion of the continent which is broadest 
 and best was reserved for the development of a free Germanic 
 people. 
 
 From the discovery of America, through the Reformation, to 
 modern culture and freedom, we trace the central stream of his- 
 tory. Without Columbus and the Reformation we should hardly 
 have had a Newton or a Leibnitz, a Franklin or a Fulton, a Dar- 
 win or an Edison. 
 
 The century now drawing to a close has in some respects been 
 not unlike the age in which Columbus lived. It has been a period 
 of great discoveries — not geographical, indeed, but scientific and 
 practical. In no period in the world's history have there been so 
 many wonderful changes — so many triumphs of man-over nature — 
 and yet we are assured that the revelation has hardly begun. We 
 
H 
 
 bave but discovered a few outlying islands that indicate the con- 
 tinent which lies beyond. May we venture to add that many of 
 our captains appear to be still in the dark with regard to the course 
 in which they are sailing ? That in matters of supreme import- 
 ance they may be as far out of the way as was Columbus when he 
 believed that he had reached the coast of India ? O, that they had 
 the faith of that great man, purified and exalted, that they might 
 feel the hand that guides them and behold the lands that lie be- 
 yond. For of one thing we may be certain, whatever else may fail, 
 that the ship which bears humanity will never drift beyond God's 
 love and protection, and He will guide it safely to its destined 
 haven. 
 
 On this great international festival — an occasion which for com- 
 prehensive meaning is hardly equalled in modern history — we 
 have sought to behold the way of the Lord rather than the ways 
 of men. "It is better" says the Psalmist, " to trust in the Lord 
 than to put confidence in man. It is better to trust in the Lord 
 than to put confidence in princes. " It is well to remember the 
 heroes of the past ; and among them all, for commanding intellect, 
 unwavering faith, and self-sacrificing devotion, there was none 
 greater than Christopher Columbus. But all that is human is 
 weak and all that is historical is transitory. To God alone belongs 
 the Glory.