In Jesus this expanded into the Kingdom of God among men,—that is, the perfect reign of goodness, love, and the human-divine relation of son and father. He looked for its realization by miracle, and when that failed said, "Thy will be done," and died, trusting all to the Father.
His followers, at first under the dream of his second coming, settled into a society bound together by common rules and ideals. The Catholic church was born and grew. Mixed with all human elements of imperfection, it advanced a long way toward the goal, then divided its sway with new energies.
In the political and social life of Europe, and especially of England, there slowly grew up a population fit for self-government in place of government by the few.
Thomas More foresaw prophetically a community which should realize the loftiest vision, and whose bond should be human and social, not theologic.
The Puritan tried to enforce the will of God, as he understood it, by authority,—to build a commonwealth on Hebrew lines. He failed, in England and America, but stamped his character on both peoples.
Then came the essay of the Quaker toward a reign of peace.
Next, the Wesleyan movement, quickening the English heart and conscience, and sending the wave which did in a degree for the West of America what Puritanism and Quakerism did for the East.
Then the uprising in France,—the passionate aspiration for "liberty, equality, fraternity,"—at war with Christianity, instead of at one with it like English freedom, and working great and mixed results.
We see the American republic, founded by a blending of hard common sense, experience, devotion, and widening purpose, and best typified in Washington.
In Lincoln the problem of the American commonwealth—to maintain unity, yet purify itself—and the problem of a human life are both solved by the old virtues, honesty, self-rule, self-devotion.