Abstract

From the days of discovery, when America was for Europeans more dream than reality, to our own days of disillusionment and faltering hope, poets, philosophers, historians, novelists, and theologians have drawn on religious themes and images to express the meaning of their encounter with America. Here, in more than one hundred selections, is the record of their quest for a New World metaphysics -- a spiritual vision or ultimate idea of order expressive of the American experience.