There are two old Arminian jokes: one can be recounted here, the other later. In the late seventeenth century, when English Arminianism was riding high, so the story goes, Bishop George Morley was asked: “What do the Arminians hold?” He replied: “All the best bishoprics and deaneries.”

The earliest extant sources of Syrian Christianity reveal a powerful spirit of self-consciousness for independence. This desire is imprinted on every page of the historical records. That which stands at the very forefront of Tatian's thought is profoundly instructive for our purposes: it is his dislike, nay more his hatred, fore everything bearing a Greek or Roman label. This spirit shows itself in whatever direction we look. Syrian gnosis is the least hellenized of all. The pattern of Christian life carries its own attributes of sovereignty in every respect. Autonomy is the hallmark of the early Syrian conception of the church. Theological thought travels along quite independent lines in accord with that genius—even in the works of Aphrahat written decades after the Council of Nicea.

That towns and townspeople played an important part in the Protestant Reformation of the sixteenth century is obvious even to those with a superficial knowledge of the movement. In the case of Scotland, however, this has not always been recognized as true since many writers on the subject have believed that the movement was primarily baronial in character. Yet as one looks closely into the Scottish Reformation the names of Aberdeen, Perth, Dundee and Edinburgh fill important places in the story of the rise of Scottish Protestantism. Edinburgh in particular held a strategic position as Knox, recently appointed minister of St. Giles, recognized in 1561. When Thomas Randolph reported to Sir William Cecil on the appointment of superintendents he stated: “Mr. Knox thinks his state honorable enough if God give him strength to persist in that vocation that he hath placed him in, and will receive no other.” To understand the Scottish Reformation, therefore, it is necessary to see what happened in the principal burgh of the country.

Traditionally, divisions among Protestant groups during the English Reformation have been examined as deep theological crises, simply written off as manifestations of economic or political struggles, or, more recently, treated as having roots in basic ideological commitments. One of the most important Protestant divisions, that between Anglicans and Puritans, has undoubtedly had a great impact on western history; however, it lacks full treatment from the point of view of its intellectual and social bases. One's attention is easily drawn to the Anglican-Puritan conflict of Queen Elizabeth's rule or to the seventeenth-century revolution in England; but earlier origins often receive only cursory treatment. Actually, the ideas, party divisions and social characteristics of the Anglican-Puritan division in the Elizabethan and Stuart eras have their roots and first appearance during the flight of Protestants from England after the reign of King Edward VI. It is to the ideological and social factors which appeared in the congregation of English exiles at Frankfurt-am-Main in 1554–55 that I should like to draw attention, for it was in the “Troubles at Frankfurt” that the historical pattern of the Anglican-Puritan division assumed a form which was to have such a great impact on western society.

Among the problems posed to one interested in Unitarianism is to explain why it was that Unitarianism evolved out of Presbyterianism in England while it emerged out of Congregationalism in the United States. The problem of the origins of Unitarianism is in this way fashioned into denominational questions. Why did English Presbyterianism become Unitarian? What explains the appearance of Unitarianism in New England Congregationalism? The purpose of this essay is to examine the denominational understanding of the genesis of English Unitarianism.

Historians of Italian Christian Democracy have traditionally paid rather scant attention to the period 1903–1914, the years of the papacy of Pius X. Their lack of interest in this era cannot fully be explained by the scarcity of available official documents. The archives of the Vatican also keep under lock and key the documents pertaining to Leo XIII, the predecessor of Pius X. Yet volume after recently published volume has dealt with the Leonine period of Italian history. Interest in the papacy of Leo XIII is understandable in view of the fact that intellectual ferment in that era produced many of the sustaining ideas of Italian Christian Democracy. The Leonine period also saw in action for the first time some of the future leaders of Italian Christian Democracy.

Lyman Beecher's approach to antislavery reform has received remarkably little attention from historians. No thorough study has been made of his attitudes toward chattel slavery, the methods he advanced to ameliorate or eradicate it, and his feelings toward free blacks and their future in America. The interpretations that have been proposed have been deficient in design, superficial in exposition and misleading in conclusion.

A review in the New York Times observed that “the church abandoned the Negro in the 19th century and took up Hugh Hefner in the 20th. Churchmen in America have always been followers instead of leaders.” While this wry comment is not entirely true, it has enough truth to keep clergymen from undue selfesteem. It is clear, on the other hand, that churchmen on occasion have been leaders as well as followers. An equally wry comment attributed to Lincoln Steffens provides a clue to the clergy's leadership role. Americans, Steffens remarked, never learned to do wrong knowingly. Whenever they compromised with principle, they had to find a pious justification for it. Clerical leadership was especially prominent in the period prior to World War I, since this was a time when the American public looked to the pulpit for its pious justifications.