Chapter I: Front Matter

Great Men as Prophets of a New Era

By Newell Dwight Hillis

REBUILDING EUROPE IN THE FACE OF WORLD-WIDE BOLSHEVISM

THE BLOT ON THE KAISER'S 'SCUTCHEON
Cloth,
GERMAN ATROCITIES
Cloth,
Each 12mo. cloth,

STUDIES OF THE GREAT WAR
What Each Nation Has at Stake

LECTURES AND ORATIONS BY HENRY WARD BEECHER
Collected by Newell Dwight Hillis

THE MESSAGE OF DAVID SWING TO HIS GENERATION
Compiled, with Introductory Memorial Address by Newell Dwight Hillis

ALL THE YEAR ROUND
Sermons for Church and Civic Celebrations

THE BATTLE OF PRINCIPLES
A Study of the Heroism and Eloquence of the Anti-Slavery Conflict

THE CONTAGION OF CHARACTER
Studies in Culture and Success

THE FORTUNE OF THE REPUBLIC
Studies, National and Patriotic, upon the America of To-day and
To-morrow

GREAT BOOKS AS LIFE-TEACHERS
Studies of Character, Real and Ideal

THE INVESTMENT OF INFLUENCE
A Study of Social Sympathy and Service

A MAN'S VALUE TO SOCIETY
Studies in Self-Culture and Character

FORETOKENS OF IMMORTALITY
12mo. cloth,

HOW THE INNER LIGHT FAILED
18mo. cloth,

RIGHT LIVING AS A FINE ART
A Study of Channing's Symphony
12mo. boards,

THE MASTER OF THE SCIENCE OF RIGHT LIVING
12mo. boards,

ACROSS THE CONTINENT OF THE YEARS
16mo. old English boards,

THE SCHOOL IN THE HOME

Great Men as Prophets
of a New Era

By
NEWELL DWIGHT HILLIS

_Author of "The Investment of Influence,"
"A Man's Value to Society," "Great
Books as Life Teachers"_

NEW YORK CHICAGO
Fleming H. Revell Company
LONDON AND EDINBURGH

Copyright, 1922, by
FLEMING H. REVELL COMPANY

New York: 158 Fifth Avenue
Chicago: 17 North Wabash Ave.
London: 21 Paternoster Square
Edinburgh: 75 Princes Street

Foreword

Great institutions are the shadows that great men cast across the centuries. A great law, a great liberty, a great art or tool or reform represents a great soul, organized, and made unconsciously immortal for all time. Explorers trace the Nile or Amazon back to the lake in which the river takes its rise. Historians trace institutions back to some hero from whose mind and heart the life-giving movement pours forth. When the scholar travels back to the far-off beginnings of jurisprudence, he comes to some Moses, toiling in Thebes, to some Solon in Athens, to some Justinian in Rome. Not otherwise the renaissance of painting, sculpture, and architecture begins with some Giotto, some Michael Angelo, some Christopher Wren. Scholars often speak of history as narratory or philosophical, but in the last analysis, history is biographical. These studies were prepared for the students of Plymouth Institute in the belief that biography is life's wisest teacher, and that the lives of great men are the most inspiring books to be found in our libraries.

N. D. H.

_Plymouth Institute,
Brooklyn, N. Y._

Contents

I. Dante, and the Dawn After the Dark
Ages 9
(1265-1321)

II. Savonarola, and the Renaissance of Conscience 34
(1452-1498)

III. William the Silent, and Brave Little
Holland 55
(1533-1584)

IV. Oliver Cromwell, and the Rise of Democracy
in England 84
(1599-1658)

V. John Milton, the Scholar in Politics 115
(1608-1674)

VI. John Wesley, and the Moral Awakening
of the Common People 143
(1703-1791)

VII. Garibaldi, the Idol of the New Italy 166
(1807-1882)

VIII. John Ruskin, and the Diffusion of the
Beautiful 190
(1819-1900)

Index 217