Democratic providentialism feeds the illusion that America is the driver of world history.

Also, British politics at that stage was dominated by 'providentialism.'

The name for this idea is democratic providentialism.

As the foremost British expounder of providentialism, he argued for extensive civil rights, believing that individuals could bring about progress and eventually the Millennium.

The pessimists say democratic providentialism, having apparently squeaked by in Afghanistan, will meet its Waterloo in Iraq.

His pun also has a second, contradictory meaning-that his villainy is predestined-and the strong providentialism of the play ultimately endorses this meaning".

Another aspect of providentialism is the belief that God's plan is beyond the control of humans, and that sometimes this may be expressed in seemingly bad things happening to good people.

But while you may not like the providential aspect of democratic providentialism, it remains true that the promotion of democracy by the United States has proved to be a dependably good idea.

Priestley's lectures on history were particularly revolutionary; he narrated a providentialism and naturalist account of history, arguing that the study of history furthered the comprehension of God's natural laws.

Finally, Professor Guelzo argues, it was Lincoln's "peculiar providentialism" that steeled him to persist in the darkest days of the war and to yield, against his own reservations, to the moral imperative of emancipation.

In contrast to the providentialism and, in some cases, the Deism of the moderate, Newtonian Enlightenment, the radicals postulated pantheism - or another commonplace term, materialism - and it horrified the liberal exponents of the new science who invariably brought their influence to bear against them.