urisdiction over some parts of the Turkish territories. His conduct had
recommended him to Innocent the XIth, and that pope had directed him to
visit the Protestant states in Germany, and inform him of their actual
dispositions in respect to the Church of Rome. In consequence of this
mission, he became known to the Emperor, who appointed him to the See of
Neustadt, in the neighbourhood of Vienna. Molanus, was Director of the
Protestant Churches and Consistories of Hanover. Both were admirably
calculated for the office intended them, on this occasion. Each
possessed the confidence of his own party, and was esteemed by the
other; each was profoundly versed in the matters in dispute; each
possessed good sense, moderation, and conciliating manners; and each had
the success of the business at heart, with a fixed purpose, that
nothing, but a real difference on some essential article of doctrine,
should frustrate the project.

The effect of the first conferences was so promising, that the Emperor
and the two Princes resolved, that they should be conducted in a manner
more regular, and more likely to bring the object of them to a
conclusion. With this view, the business was formally entrusted by both
the princes to Molanus alone, and the Emperor published a rescript,
dated the 20th March, 1691, by which he gave the Bishop of Neustadt full
authority to treat, on all matters of religion, with the states,
communities, and individuals of the empire, reserving to the
ecclesiastical and imperial powers, their right to confirm the acts of
the Bishop, as they should judge adviseable. Under these auspicious
circumstances, the conference between the Bishop of Neustadt and Molanus
began.

But, before the events which we have mentioned took place, a
correspondence on the subject of a general reunion between Catholics and
Protestants had been carried on for some time, between Pelisson and
Leibniz. The former held a considerable rank among the French writers,
who adorned the reign of Lewis the Fourteenth; the latter was eminently
distinguished in the literary world. In the exact sciences, he was
inferior to Newton alone; in metaphysics, he had no superior; in general
learning, he had scarcely a rival. He had recommended himself to the
Brunswick family, by three volumes, which he had recently published, on
the Antiquities of that illustrious House; and was then engaged in the
investigation of its Italian descent, and early German shoots. The