"Ideas control the world."
James Garfield, 20th president of the USA

Already in the midst of the benighted centuries when Europe was still groaning under plagues, wars and the Inquisition, the idea of a better world took shape in the realms of inspiration. This was the night in which the seed began to sprout. Nevertheless, another hundred years had to pass before the golden age foreseen only by the wisest could start to dawn - but the seed was sown, and the idea was germinating. Thomas More wrote his Utopia, Tommaso Campanella his City of the Sun, Francis Bacon his New Atlantis, and all of them were inspired by Plato, the greatest spirit of antiquity. Trajano Boccalini had to pay for his Rosicrucian vision of the ideal state ('A General Reformation of the World', in the Ragguagli di Parnaso) with his life. Another Rosicrucian named Johann Valentin Andreae (identified as the author of the book The Chymical Marriage of Christian Rosencreutz) wrote a tract about the ideal city - Christianopolis, the 'City of the Christ'. This was a Christian version of the ideal city described by Plotinus, who called it Platonopolis. What was the hope of all these thinkers who had been receptive to those fragile ideas of a future ideal society? People should live in liberty, equality and fraternity, free from poverty and ruled by the wisest among them. Their laws should follow the examples given by nature, every man should have equal rights and be supported in his striving for perfection in the arts and sciences. Above all, the people should have a shining example, a vision - because just as hunger wastes the body, spiritual hunger degenerates the soul.

"I cannot conceive of a wholesome social order or a sound economic system that does not have its roots in religious faith."
Herbert Hoover, 31st president of the USA

Every idea which is cherished long enough becomes manifest one day. The early American settlers were led by the dream of a better world. Undoubtedly there were also profiteers and those who only left their country because it had become too hot for them. And even before the slave trade stained the pure shores of America with the stigma of cruelty, by 1627 at least 1,500 children had been brought into the colony as cheap labour. But the early emigrants had been attracted by the vision of a promised land after being expelled by church and state. In the year 1694, Joshua Scottow wrote in his Narrative of the Planting of the Massachusetts Colony that the main motive of the colonization had been to 'set up the kingdom of God'.
In 1702, New England Puritan Cotton Mather wrote that the colonists had "flown" to America's shores because they wanted to live like the first Christians in harmony with the original teachings of Christ. In the distant regions of the new continent, they lived like strangers in this world, far away from the "plunderers, murderers and bandits" of European history.
So the pure primal Christian doctrine appears twice in the history of early America: first there were the Albigensian Cathars who pulled the strings behind the 'discovery' of the New World, and then there were the Puritans und others persecuted by the European Churches. They all took the risk of a journey across the sea into the unknown in order to live their pure faith without menace.
Soon the American east was covered by a multicoloured carpet of various scattered communities: the Puritans who had fled the Anglican Church settled in Massachusetts, Maine, New Hampshire and Vermont; the Episcopalians, who were banished by Cromwell, settled in the southern colonies; the Baptists in Rhode Island, South Carolina und scattered across New England. Quakers, Lutherans and Moravians settled mainly in Pennsylvania, members of the Dutch Reformed Church in the province of New York, Catholics in Maryland, German Mennonites around Philadelphia, Scots-Irish Presbyterians in Virginia, Pennsylvania and the frontier regions, while the Jews, who had already been in the country since 1621, had chosen the cities of Newport, New York, Philadelphia and Charleston as a new home. How dominant faith was in early America is shown by the fact that all the schools had been started by religious communities, that every clergyman received the then large sum of ten pounds for a religious library and the Bay Psalm Book printed in1640 became the first bestseller in the colonies. Already de Tocqueville had noticed that there was no other country in which the Christian faith had more influence on the inner life than in America.

"I believe God had a divine purpose in placing this land between two great oceans to be found by those who had a special love of freedom and courage."
Ronald Reagan, 40th president of the USA

On Saturday, the 9th of November 1620 at Cape Cod, a ship was washed ashore which had planned to land further south in Virginia: the Mayflower. A second attempt to sail further south failed due to stormy winds. Of the 149 passengers and crew aboard, four had died during the journey and half the others would not survive their first severe winter in the New World. Still God seemed to have held a protecting hand over the new settlers. For they had settled in the region of Plymouth, Massachusetts, where up to three years before their arrival the fierce Indian tribe of the Patuxet had lived. In 1617, an epidemic had completely wiped out this tribe - except for one man, who had only survived because he was abroad. His name was Squanto, and his story is unique and seems to be providential. A certain Captain Weymouth kidnapped him in 1605 and brought him to England, where he learned to speak English. Squanto returned to New England in 1614 on one of the ships of the famous John Smith. Although Smith wanted to return him to his tribe, this seemed not to be in accordance with the will of providence. Squanto was immediately kidnapped again, this time by Captain Thomas Hunt, who wanted to sell him, along with 24 other Indians, as slaves in Spain.

History does not relate the details: however, Squanto did not become a slave in Spain, but rather a servant of a merchant in England. In 1618, another captain took him on an expedition to New England, most probably as an interpreter, but as his ship neared Plymouth, Squanto jumped overboard and swam ashore, where he assumed his tribe lived. As he could not find his tribe (which had in the meantime been wiped out by an epidemic), Squanto found refuge with the neighbouring Wampanoag tribe. And now he proved himself to be the link between the new settlers and the native Indians. How otherwise could they have communicated with each other, if - miraculously - there had not been this Indian who spoke English fluently. The early American historian Bradford says that Squanto was a "special God-sent instrument" to their inestimable benefit. Without Squanto's assistance, the settlers would probably not have survived, because it was the Indians who taught them how to cultivate maize and to use fish as fertilizer. Thanks to his knowledge of English, the settlers signed a peace treaty with Massasoit, chief of the Wampanoag, which endured fifty years.
The element of fate, of divine providence, runs through the whole of early American history. We encounter this element when a French fleet set sail in 1746 to conquer Newfoundland and New England - and was prevented by the force of the elements from fulfilling their plan. After a lull and when several ships had been sunk by terrible storms and lightning, an epidemic struck down some of the crew. Barely arrived in Halifax, the fleet commander committed suicide out of despair, as did his successor. The third commander then decided to attack Annapolis in Maryland with the pitiful remainder of his fleet - and again the plague struck the crews and killed two to three thousand men. As soon as the French had set sail to mount their attack, the terrified Newfoundlanders declared a day of fasting and prayer - and lo and behold, the following night the French fleet was ripped apart by unprecedented horrifying storms. Many drowned, some saved their lives by scrambling ashore, and the very few seaworthy ships left scuttled back to France…

"Discipline is the soul of an army. It makes small numbers formidable , procures success to the weak, and esteem to all."
George Washington, 1st president of the USA

From the start, the American War of Independence looked like a hopeless cause, because an army inferior in numbers and weapons challenged the most powerful empire in the world. Without many lucky coincidences and some help from the elements, the Americans would probably have been unable to shake off the English yoke.
In the winter of 1781, the Americans under the command of George Morgan defeated a part of the British Army fighting under Colonel Tarleton. When Lord Cornwallis heard about this, he got in a rage and sped with his troops to counter the retreating small American army, planning to cut it off at the Catawba river. Cornwallis reached the river two hours after the American troops had crossed it and, sure of victory, set up camp on the bank with the intention of crossing the following morning. But during the night a storm caused the river to rise so high that the British were delayed. Twice more Cornwallis failed to defeat the American army by a mere hair's breadth. His troops had just reached the Yadkin when the Americans were landing on the opposite bank of the river, but before they could cross over, a sudden flood made the crossing impossible. On another day, the British chased the Americans across the river Dan into the friendly territory of Virginia, and when Cornwallis reached the riverbank a short time later, rising waters again prevented him from defeating the Americans. Even Clinton, Cornwallis' second-in-command, admitted that divine providence had a hand in it. He wrote that the royal army was stopped once again by rising waters, which had miraculously receded shortly before, just to let the enemy cross the river. Otherwise, they would not have escaped the grasp of Lord Cornwallis, who was hard on their heels.
Divine providence thus saved the American army on several occasions so it could attack General Cornwallis again and drive him back into the sea. The British were finally defeated in Yorktown in 1781.
The incident in Brooklyn Heights, Long Island, was particularly remarkable. It happened in the early days of the revolution when British General Howe besieged the eight-thousand strong troops of General Washington. The Americans' situation appeared hopeless: from inland the British had surrounded them in a semicircle and they had built a blockade at sea. Washington saw his only chance in a daring plan: he secretly gathered all the boats he could get hold of - from rowing boats to sloops. During the night, he wanted to smuggle all his soldiers including weapons and provisions past the British warships to safety. This was basically a hopeless venture, for how could he possibly get past the British without being heard or seen in the moonlight. Miraculously, a heavy fog came down that night from the East River - and when the British awoke next morning the American army had completely vanished and gone with the wind! Never again were the British so close to victory as they were before this mysterious escape, said historian John Fiske later.
There was another reason for Washington's success: his senior officers stood firm because they were all Freemasons like himself - initiated in the craft, which at that time was noble and honest. They shared a common vision and trust, so that even in their darkest and most hopeless moments no officer deserted nor defected to the enemy.
And so Great Britain, whose destiny it was to become the motherland of many nations, had to learn for the first time that a good mother has to let her children go when they are grown up.

(…)

"I believe that our Great Maker is preparing the world, in His own good time, to become one nation, speaking one language."
Grover Cleveland, 22nd president of the USA

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