is present views and to express these clearly in a
preface. With the completion of this task, however, he took a long leave
from the "ice-cold giants of the North" that had so long engrossed his
attention.

After his brief visit with the heroes of the past, Grundtvig again turned
his attention to their descendants in the present. And the contrast was
almost startling. The war still was dragging on and the country sinking
deeper and deeper into the morass of political, commercial and economic
difficulties. But the majority of the people seemed completely
indifferent to her plight. "They talked of nothing," Grundtvig says, "but
of what they had eaten, worn and amused themselves with yesterday, or
what they would eat, wear and amuse themselves with tomorrow." Was it
possible that these people could be descendants of the giants whose valor
and aggressive spirit had once challenged the greater part of Europe?

Grundtvig was convinced that the spiritual apathy of his people resulted
from the failure of their spiritual leaders to uphold the Evangelical
faith, and that the salvation of the nation depended on a true revival of
Evangelical Christianity. For this reason he now exerted every means at
his command to induce the people and, especially, their leaders to return
to the old paths. In numerous works, both in verse and in prose, he urged
the people to renew the faith of their fathers and challenged their
leaders to take a definite stand for Biblical Christianity. He became the
lonely defender of the Bible.

Among outstanding personalities of that day, there were especially two
that attracted widespread attention: J. P. Mynster, assistant pastor at
the Church of Our Lady in Copenhagen, and Adam Gottlieb Oehlenschlaeger,
the dramatic poet, then at the height of his fame. With their influence
these men, as Grundtvig saw it, might give a strong impetus to the much
needed awakening; and, he therefore, approached them personally.

Rev. Mynster, a stepson of Grundtvig's maternal uncle, after a period of
rationalism, had experienced a quiet conversion to Evangelical faith and
won a respected name as a faithful and gifted preacher of the Gospel, a
name which he retained throughout his conspicuous career as pastor of the
Church of Our Lady in Copenhagen and, later, as Bishop of Sjaelland. He
and Grundtvig, working to the same purpose, ought to have united with
another, but they were both too individualistic in temperament and views