142 church unity 



hundredth anniversary, to bring together 

 the two churches. On the 2d of May, 

 1817, he addressed a letter to Bishop Sack 

 and Provost Hanstein, in which he said, 

 " I expect from you propositions for the 

 easiest and most appropriate manner of unit- 

 ing the two slightly divergent confessions." 

 But it was easier to say this than it was 

 to bring about a union. However, after 

 many conferences and concessions it was 

 brought about in 1821 — its outward sym- 

 bol being a new liturgy in the preparation 

 of which the pious king himself took part; 

 but which many, both Lutherans and Re- 

 formed, thought too Catholicizing in its 

 tendencies. This objection, however, was 

 partially obviated in a revised edition in 

 1829. The result of the union was that 

 there existed in Prussia, Nassau, Baden, 

 Rhenish Bavaria, Anhalt, and Hesse the 

 United Evangelical State Church, with a 

 common government and liturgy in which 

 these parties abode peaceably together, 

 namely, the Lutherans, and the Reformed — 

 both parties holding to their peculiar doc- 

 trines, but not considering these as points 

 of division and strife — and a real union 

 party, which had abandoned in reality or 



