The German and the French languages had been struggling for the supremacy of Europe.  As I foresaw events then, the two would first conquer Europe, and the stronger of the two would swallow the other.  Then the English language would devour that, and the world would have but one language.  Over a million people had already began the study of Volapuek, a new language composed of all languages.  This was an indication of world nationalisation.  Congresses of nations, meeting for various purposes, were establishing brotherhood.  It looked as though those who were telling us again in 1888 that the second coming of Christ was at hand were right.  The divine significance of things was greater than it had ever been.

There was some bigotry in religious affairs, of course.  In our religion we were as far from unity of feeling then as we had ever been.  The Presbyterian bigot could be recognised by his armful of Westminster catechisms.  The Methodist bigot could be easily identified by his declaration that unless a man had been converted by sitting on the anxious seat he was not eligible.  The way to the church militant, according to this bigot, was from the anxious seat, one of which he always carried with him.  The Episcopal bigot struggled under a great load of liturgies.  Without this man’s prayer-books no one could be saved, he said.  The Baptist bigot was bent double with the burden of his baptistry.

“It does not seem as if some of you had been properly washed,” he said, “and I shall proceed to put under the water all those who have neglected their ablutions.”  Religion was being served in a kind of ecclesiastical hash that, naturally enough, created controversy, as very properly it should.  In spite of these things, however, some creed of religious faith, whichever it might be, was universally needed.  I hope for a church unity in the future.  When all the branches in each denomination have united, then the great denominations nearest akin will unite, and this absorption will go on until there will be one great millennial Church, divided only for geographical convenience into sections as of old, when it was the Church of Laodicea, the Church of Philadelphia, the Church of Thyatira.  In the event of this religious evolution then there will be the Church of America, the Church of Europe, the Church of Asia, the Church of Africa, and the Church of Australia.

We are all builders, bigots, or master mechanics of the divine will.

The number of men who built Brooklyn, and who have gone into eternal industry, were increasing.  One day I paused a moment on the Brooklyn Bridge to read on a stone the names of those who had influenced the building of that span of steel, the wonder of the century.  They were the absent ones:  The president, Mr. Murphy, absent; the vice-president, Mr. Kingsley, absent; the treasurer, Mr. Prentice, absent; the engineer, Mr. Roebling, absent.  Our useful citizens were going or gone.  A few days