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Protestantism in Sweden and Denmark - James Aitken Wylie

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<strong>and</strong> strifes that agitated the nations around her, or<br />

to separate herself from them <strong>and</strong> st<strong>and</strong> aloof. The<br />

reception she might give to <strong>Protestantism</strong> would, it<br />

might have been foreseen, be determ<strong>in</strong>ed to a large<br />

extent by considerations <strong>and</strong> <strong>in</strong>fluences of a home<br />

k<strong>in</strong>d, more so than <strong>in</strong> the case of the nations which<br />

we have already passed <strong>in</strong> review.<br />

Providence had reserved a great place for<br />

Brita<strong>in</strong> <strong>in</strong> the drama of <strong>Protestantism</strong>. Long before<br />

the sixteenth century it had given significant<br />

pledges of the part it would play <strong>in</strong> the com<strong>in</strong>g<br />

movement. In truth the first of all the nations to<br />

enter on the path of Reform was Engl<strong>and</strong>.<br />

When the time drew nigh for the Master, who<br />

was gone fourteen hundred years before <strong>in</strong>to a far<br />

country, to return, <strong>and</strong> call His servants to account<br />

previously to receiv<strong>in</strong>g the k<strong>in</strong>gdom, He sent a<br />

messenger before Him to prepare men for the<br />

com<strong>in</strong>g of that "great <strong>and</strong> terrible day." That<br />

messenger was John Wicliffe. In many po<strong>in</strong>ts<br />

Wicliffe bore a strik<strong>in</strong>g resemblance to the Elijah<br />

of the Old Dispensation, <strong>and</strong> John the Baptist of<br />

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