THE 
 
 ») P0l#'ION OF CHRISTIANITY 
 
 ( 
 
 UNITED S"-..TES, 
 
 IV ITS rtiJCAIl < • l!H OUR 
 
 POLITICAL INSTITUTIONS, 
 
 ?EnFNTE TO 
 
 RBLiGIOUS INSTRUCTION I:. lYJ. PI'^LIC SCHOOLS. 
 
 BY 
 
 STEPHEN COLT^'ELL 
 
 HI : ADKLPHIA: 
 OTT, Gi.AMBO & CO. 
 
 1854. 
 
J' 
 
 ^WAh 
 
THE 
 
 
 POSITION OF CHRISTIANITY 
 
 UNITED STATES, 
 
 IN ITS RELATIONS WITH OUR 
 
 POLITICAL INSTITUTIONS, 
 
 AND SPECIALLY WITH KEFERENCE TO 
 
 RELIGIOUS INSTRUCTION IN THE PUBLIC SCHOOLS. 
 
 STEPHEN 'COLWELL 
 
 PHILADELPHIA: 
 
 LIPPING OTT, GRAM BO k CO. 
 
 1854. 
 

 Entered, according to Act of Congress, in the year 1854, by 
 
 LIPPINCOTT, GEAMBO & CO., 
 
 in the Clerk's Office of the District Court of the United States for the 
 Eastern District of Pennsylvania. 
 
 BIEREOirPED BY J. FAO.\N. PKINTED BY T. K. AXD P. G. C0LUS3. 
 
PREFACE. 
 
 Every year of our national existence brings in- 
 creasing proof of the importance of the relations of 
 Christianity with our political institutions. We began 
 our history by extending Christian toleration to 
 all : the value of that principle was evinced in our 
 Colonial period. Such toleration as our fathers incor- 
 porated in our laws and constitutions having never 
 before been tried, every year of experience under its 
 operation becomes fraught with instruction to the 
 philosopher, statesman, and Christian. It was, per- 
 haps, difficult in the origin and outset of this experi- 
 ment, to determine the exact bearings of such a policy 
 on Christianity itself. Up to this time, our experience 
 has shown not only the safety, but the wisdom of 
 religious toleration. The whole Christian population 
 of the country admire and approve it. It was not 
 intended, however, in the establishment of this prin- 
 ciple, that toleration should be an active policy, and ^ 
 
 Christianity a mere negative power. Christianity 
 
 (iii) 
 
iv PREFACE. 
 
 was not to be weakened, but made stronger by this 
 proper exercise of its true spirit. It became im- 
 portant therefore from the beginning, and urgent that 
 the true position of Christianity in the United States 
 should be defined with that precision which, while it 
 would, on the one hand, enlarge the scope of toleration 
 and define its limits, would, on the other, clearly re- 
 veal the great highway of Christian efibrt and useful- 
 ness. This has never been adequately performed ; 
 and of late years the neglect has caused great embar- 
 rassment in many public functions, and great con- 
 fusion of ideas among men of every class of opinion. 
 Truth has lost ground, and is losing ground, for want 
 of light on this subject. 
 
 Believing, as we do, that this is a Christian country, 
 inhabited by a Christian people, that our political 
 institutions are the work of a Christian people, de- 
 signed to be administered in a Christian spirit, we 
 hold that Christianity, instead of being stripped of 
 its just power and influence in this land of toleration, 
 imposes upon its friends the heaviest responsibilities, 
 and expects to witness its greatest triumphs. Chris- 
 tianity here is not a negative, but a positive power. 
 The problem is the starting point, and the path. 
 Christianity, by toleration opened a door for all peo- 
 ple to make their abode here : it is its function now 
 
PREFACE. V 
 
 to promote, by all the means within its compass, their 
 highest interests here and hereafter. 
 
 We furnish the following pages with a view to 
 dispel some of the doubts which hang over the sub- 
 ject, and with a hope of inviting others into a field 
 of politico-religious literature which cannot be ade- 
 quately explored but by many minds in many years. 
 
 We have endeavored to make it plain that the reli- 
 gious system of the United States is virtually Pro- 
 testant : that the Christianity woven into the texture 
 of our laws and political institutions cannot be other 
 than Protestant. The Papal system, which holds 
 that there can be no Christianity, no Christian wor- 
 ship, and no salvation, out of the Komish Church, 
 regards our State constitutions as so many warrants 
 for heresy, because they secure to every man the reli- 
 gious right to worship God as he pleases. The system 
 of the United States recognizes one Christianity ema- 
 nating from the Bible, but admits a diversity of wor- 
 ship and opinion if need be, to every individual man. 
 Which of these irreconcilable systems shall constitute 
 our permanent policy ? The present system of Chris- 
 tianity for all, with liberty for all — unity of aim, with 
 diversity of action — can only be maintained by a 
 wise use of our present power and advantages. This 
 Christian system, with its grand principle of toleration, 
 must be maintained when needful at the polls, and 
 vigilantly inculcated in the public schools. 
 Philadelphia, March Ibth, 1854. 
 
7 
 
CONTENTS. 
 
 SECTION I. 
 
 Keferenee to the position of Christianity before and during our 
 Revolutionary period — Formation of our Political institu- 
 tions. Religious liberty, toleration offered to all — Christian 
 toleration — not merely toleration to Christians and others 9 
 
 SECTION 11. 
 
 Constitution of the United States — Its relations with Christian- 
 ity. Oaths of Office — Religious tests and establishments.... 17 
 
 SECTION III. 
 
 Citations from Story's Commentaries on the Constitution of the 
 United States. Chaplains for Army and Navy — De Tocque- 
 ville, Alex. Hamilton 24 
 
 SECTION IV. 
 
 The early Constitutions of the American States on the subject 
 of Christianity and Religious liberty 32 
 
 SECTION V. 
 The existing Constitutions of the several States 37 
 
 SECTION VI. 
 
 Remarks on the Constitutional Provisions cited in the preceding 
 Section 52 
 
 SECTION VII. 
 Judicial Decisions touching Christianity 55 
 
 (vii) 
 
Vlll CONTENTS. 
 
 SECTION VIII. 
 The Social Bearings of Christianity, and the Civil Duties incum- 
 bent on Christians 67 
 
 SECTION IX. 
 Denominational Differences 77 
 
 SECTION X. 
 Special Questions for the Consideration of Christians in the 
 United States 87 
 
 SECTION XI. 
 Public Education in the United States, considered in its Civil 
 and Religious Aspects. Religious Instruction in the Public 
 Schools 89 
 
 SECTION XII. 
 The kind of Education necessary, &.c. — The Objections of the 
 Hierarchy 97 
 
 SECTION XIII. 
 The Policy of Public Schools adopted in the United States. — 
 The Necessity of Religious Instruction. — Denominational 
 DiflQculties. — The Nature of the Religious Instruction to be 
 given in them 114 
 
 SECTION XIV. 
 Professor Stowe's Report on Public Schools, made to the Gov- 
 ernor of the State of Ohio. ^' Thoughts on Popular Educa- 
 ' tion." 121 
 
 SECTION XV. 
 
 The Responsibility of devising and carrying out the Policy of 
 Religious Education in American Schools lies upon Christians. 125 
 
 SECTION XVI. 
 
 Facilities enjoyed by Christians. — The Doctrine of Christian 
 Philanthroj^y. — Future Triumphs of Christianity, where to 
 be found 130 
 
 Appendix A 137 
 
 Appendix B 170 
 
THE POSITION OP CHRISTIANITY 
 IN THE UNITED STATES. 
 
 SECTION I. 
 
 Reference to the position of Christianity before and during our Revolu- 
 tionary period — Formation of our Political institutions. Religious 
 liberty, toleration offered to all — Christian toleration — not merely 
 toleration to Christians and others. 
 
 Whatever of religious intolerance survived our 
 Colonial history was nearly worn out during the 
 period of our struggle for independence. That was 
 the united effort of men of various Christian denomi- 
 nations, all of whom appealed to God for the justice 
 of their common cause and for that assistance which 
 only Divine wisdom could give, and all of whom were 
 grateful for that Divine favor which was so manifestly 
 accorded. Their gratitude to the Great Giver of every 
 good gift for the success of the effort was shown in 
 very many unequivocal acts of thankfulness and 
 praise. They felt that their success had imposed upon 
 them not only cause of gratitude for the past, but 
 heavy responsibilities for the future. They could not 
 Ijut realize that God in giving them the victory had 
 made no distinction of persons nor of denominations. 
 The blessing was common to all ; it was becoming in 
 
 (9) 
 
10 THE POSITION OF CHRISTIANITY 
 
 all that their thanksgiving should be in unison and 
 that the performance of the accruing duties of their 
 position should be harmonious. It was in this spirit 
 that our Eevolutionary Fathers addressed themselves 
 to the groat task which lay before them. That task 
 was to frame such political institutions as might secure 
 to them, their posterity and the strangers from all the 
 world who should seek a home in this favored land, 
 all the liberty, comfort and happiness which indivi- 
 duals can enjoy consistently with the peace, welfare 
 and order of an entire nation. What they had won 
 together they meant to enjoy in common ; they sup- 
 posed that the exercise of the same virtues of self- 
 denial, patience and trust in God which had given 
 them victory in a struggle for existence, would secure 
 to them all the blessings of peace, liberty and industry. 
 They intended that the soil their efforts had redeemed 
 should be a home to all the pilgrims of earth, driven 
 by what cause soever from their native lands. None 
 were excluded from the enjoj^ment of the benefits 
 offered in a residence here, whatever their political or 
 religious opinions, provided they submitted themselves 
 to the few restraints of our laws and demeaned them- 
 selves in the spirit of our institutions. It was an 
 asylum for the world which they established ; it was 
 a benevolent institution which they constructed and 
 in which they offered to receive every human being 
 who would enter and conform to its regulations. In 
 proportion as these regulations were few in number 
 and liberal in terms, was it necessary also tliat 
 they should be firmly enforced. There could be no 
 national liberty without law, and no peace without 
 order. In offering a refuge to the suffering and to 
 
IN THE UNITED STATES. 11 
 
 the discontented of all nations, they did not mean 
 to surrender any of the advantages they had secured, 
 nor to sacrifice any of the vital piinciples for which 
 they had contended. They offered political liberty, 
 but it was a liberty to be enjoyed under and in 
 consistency with our legislation. They had no 
 intention of surrendering their political institutions, 
 in their form or spirit, to those who might prefer a 
 despotic or monarchical form of government. There 
 was a plain and necessary limit to their liberality ; 
 neither they nor their descendants nor successors 
 were to be deprived of the benefits they had ofiered 
 to others, under any pretence, or through any abuse 
 of the privileges thus conferred. This reservation 
 was no more than the right of self-preservation. 
 They offered political freedom to all who might need 
 the boon ; but they did not offer the subversion of 
 the very fabric they had reared for their own comfort 
 and as an asylum to all others. 
 
 There was another hmitation of their generosity 
 equally vital. They were men of a Christian country ; 
 they reverenced the God of Christians ; they acknow- 
 ledged the revelation of his will contained in the Holy 
 Scriptures ; they derived the sanctions of their insti- 
 tutions, and the morality of their legislation and of 
 their whole social system, from these Scriptures. They 
 took themselves, and offered to all who came, religious 
 liberty; they neither bound themselves nor others 
 to any religious observance of the injunctions of 
 God's word ; but they neither permitted these Scrip- 
 tures nor their Author to be blasphemed nor openly 
 contemned, nor his worship to be disturbed. They 
 neither estabHshed nor imposed any religious formality 
 
12 THE POSITION OF CHRISTIANITY 
 
 or doctrine as such, but tliey did not permit nor con- 
 template the substitution of any other code of morality 
 than that which the Scriptures teach. They were 
 fully aware of the debt which they owed to Chris- 
 tianity, and of the vital importance of its influence 
 paid teachings to modern civilization, and the}" could 
 not abate one jot from the advantages thus to be 
 gained. They constrained no man to be a Christian, 
 nor to pretend to be one; but they held every 
 citizen to acquiesce in the fact that Christianity was 
 paramount to all other religions in the land, — that 
 its morality was their morality, that its God was 
 their God, and that it pervaded, controlled, and 
 shaped, more or less, all their institutions and legis- 
 lation. 
 
 It was in the very spirit of true Christianity that 
 the hospitality and blessings of the United States 
 were offered to all the world ; all were invited to 
 enjoy, and not to subvert. The Christian men of 
 that day did not intend, in yielding to others political 
 and religious freedom, to lessen their own privileges, 
 nor to diminish the proper authority of Christianity 
 in the land; they intended that the nation should 
 continue to be a Christian nation, — that Christian 
 morality should still pervade its legislation and social 
 system, and that Christianity should continue to have 
 a home here, at least, during the life of the nation. 
 They did not place Christianity beneath nor over 
 their political institutions : it w^as rather to be the 
 atmosj)liere which they breathed who administered 
 them ; it was to be the source of their inspiration 
 who sought to make them available for human 
 advantasre. These institutions and laws were to be 
 
IN THE UNITED STATES. 13 
 
 the instruments of Christian men, for the good of the 
 whole human family. The toleration, which was 
 extended to all who chose to come within our bor- 
 ders, was Christian toleration. The Christianity of 
 that day did not disfranchise itself; it did not admit 
 that it was inferior to any other form of religion, nor 
 did .it concede that any other was its equal; it 
 accepted no control from any other, nor placed itself 
 under any dominion. It was no creature of the law, 
 nor of our constitutions ; it acknowledged them, and 
 they acknowledged it. No other religion could, by 
 any possibility, occupy the same relations to the 
 jDCople and their government as Christianity. It did 
 not, therefore, accept toleration at the hands of the 
 men who framed our system ; they would have 
 blushed at such a sentiment. Christianity was not 
 a supplicant for their favor, and for a residence 
 among them ; they were Christian men, exercising 
 Christian toleration towards others, and preparing for 
 its continuance in all time to come. They could not, 
 therefore, intend, in any degree, to lessen the benefits 
 to be derived from this association with Christianity ; 
 they regarded it, indeed, as the very bulwark of their 
 labors, and they believed that the blessings which 
 would flow from them would be due more to the 
 infusion of Christian sentiments than to any wisdom 
 of their own. 
 
 The days of Church Establishments, or the union 
 of Church and State, were then nearly numbered in 
 this country. It was clearly perceived that Chris- 
 tianity claimed no secular office nor power. Its mo- 
 rality, as tlie morality of a Christian peojDle, being 
 already an ingredient of their common law, was to be 
 
r 
 
 14 THE POSITION OF CHRISTIANITY 
 
 carried by them still deeper into their legal and social 
 systems. The government and laws were to be ad- 
 ministered by Christian people : not by Christianity, 
 not by a Church, nor by any Ecclesiastical authority 
 of any kind. The only Christian control contemplated, 
 was, the control of Christian men exercising that tole- 
 ration which Christianity teaches. It was felt from 
 the beginning that such institutions as were prepared 
 for the United States would scarcely be safe in other 
 than Christian hands, or in hands mainly controlled 
 by Christian influences. 
 
 It could not have been otherwise than the intention 
 of the founders of our Republic to perpetuate the 
 Christianity to which they felt so deeply indebted and 
 to the influences of which they chiefly looked for the 
 continuance of the political institutions they had es- 
 tablished. They could not but anticipate that any 
 other than Christian hands would abuse the ample 
 powers they had conferred upon officers and legisla- 
 tors, and they must have ardently desired that Chris- 
 tian activity and purity should keep pace with the 
 growth and development of our population and mate- 
 rial prosperity. These desires could not And any 
 shape in the legal enactments of that period. They 
 had launched the Republic and committed her to the 
 Christian virtue and skill of those who were to be the 
 navigators in after time. Much was to be done and 
 learned in reference to the wise management of the 
 great structure. The entire subject, if not wholly 
 new, was presented in an entirely new aspect. One 
 of the first charts demanded on this voyage is one 
 which to this day has never been adequately sketched : 
 that is, the precise potion of Christianity in our po- 
 
IN THE UNITED STATES. 15 
 
 litical institutions. This subject should have been 
 studied and carefully developed from the very origin 
 of our system. The neglect has been so great and 
 culpable, that errors in relation to it have taken deep 
 hold of many truth-loving minds. It is now held by 
 many such, though they may not actually so express 
 their opinion, that Christianity js. mexely tolerated by "^ 
 our laws, and that it has no more connection with 
 them than any other form of religion. It so happens, 
 according to this opinion, that the people of this 
 country are Christians, but their political institutions, 
 they say, have nothing to do with that fact — being 
 equally applicable to the government of Hindoos or 
 Parsees. They exalt the idea of religious liberty into an 
 absolute absurdity; and hold that a plea of the rights 
 of conscience takes precedence of every other conside- 
 ration. If this plea had any such interpretation in 
 our system, it would overturn it when carried rigidly 
 to its logical results. If a man can be protected in 
 any opinion or any religious belief simply because it 
 is the dictate of his conscience, he may set up doc-1 
 trines subversive alike of government and of Chris-' 
 tianity, and claim exemption from all accountability 
 under the plea of religious liberty. Such is neither 
 the spirit nor the fact of our institutions, which accord 
 without limit or restraint neither political nor religious 
 liberty. 
 
 Ours, from the beginning, was eminently a land of ^ 
 law. Just and necessary restraints are placed on 
 every hand ; no man is permitted to fix for himself 
 the limits of his religious or of his political rights. 
 All these are to a necessary extent subjects of law 
 and public control. The utmost liberty is allowed 
 
16 THE POSITION OF CHRISTIANITY 
 
 which is consistent with pubKc harmony and the good 
 of the whole community. 
 
 No rednciio ad ahsurdum can be more complete 
 than that to which this claim of unlimited religious 
 liberty is reducible ; and the only reason it has not 
 been long since driven from the minds of fair men, is 
 because the topic being regarded as one of great deli- 
 cacy is not often mentioned; and the argument is 
 seldom pushed far enough to betray its utter weakness. 
 The Christians of this country really tolerate only 
 what is not inconsistent with their morality. They 
 could not inhabit a country in which any obscene, 
 profane, murderous or idolatrous rites might be 
 practiced under their eyes in the name of any religion. 
 As it is of the very spirit of our people to resist such 
 an aggression as this upon their religious position, so 
 it is of the very essence of our legislation to forbid it. 
 *",We are a Christian people: our code of morals is 
 /Christian, our social system is Christian, and our 
 vcivilization is Christian. This is our privilege and 
 our pride. Shall we then directly or indirectly admit 
 a principle, which, carried out, would prevent any 
 national acknowledgment of God, and sever every re- 
 lation between us as a people and Christianity ? 
 
 Such an act of national skepticism or impiety was 
 
 never for an instant contemplated by the founders of 
 
 these republics. Any open, undisguised proposition 
 
 to establish such a principle would now send a thrill 
 
 of horror through the whole land, and bring upon its 
 
 proposers the indignation of an entire population. 
 
 r We are not a nation of Christians ; but this is a 
 
 j Christian nation. Christianity has all the authority 
 
 ( and control over our legislation, our institutions and 
 
IN THE UNITED STATES. 17 
 
 their administrations, which, according to its true 
 spirit, it can or ever will claim, — that which is 
 exercised through the wisdom, energy, and influence 
 of individual Christians. Will the Christians of this 
 country abdicate this right, and concede the principle^;, 
 that heathens, idolaters, or Buddhists are entitled I 
 to an equal participation in all the benefits of oury 
 government ? 
 
 SECTION n. 
 
 Constitution of the United States — Its relations -with Christianity. 
 Oaths of Office — Religious tests and establishments. 
 
 Certain provisions of the Constitution of the 
 United States are sometimes cited in support of 
 the position that the instrument itself does not, in 
 any manner, recognize Christianity, and that the 
 sjDirit of our political institutions is adverse to any 
 such recognition. Let us examine whether these 
 provisions are not, in fact, in perfect harmony with 
 the principles for which we contend. The clause 
 to which we shall first refer is that which requires 
 that all the officers, " both of the United States and 
 of the several States, shall be bound by oath or 
 affirmation to support this constitution. But no reli- 
 gious test shall ever be required, as a qualification to 
 any office or public trust under the United States." 
 
 The nature of official and judicial oaths and af- 
 firmations in this country is so well known that we 
 need only say that such oaths and affirmations are 
 directly or impliedly, an appeal to the Supreme 
 Being, or an invocation of God to be witness of our 
 2 
 
18 THE POSITION OF CHRISTIANITY 
 
 sincerity, or of the truth of our averments. AYe 
 need not argue or prove that this Gocl, to whom all 
 our public officers appeal, or whom they solemnly 
 invoke, is the God of Christianity. No man, so far 
 as we know, has been hardy enough to deny this ; 
 such a denial would shock the moral sense of the 
 whole country. What, then, is the purport of this 
 clause ? It is simply this, that this very Constitution, 
 Avhich has been supposed by some to repudiate Chris- 
 tianity, doeg not commit itself, either for the inter- 
 pretation of its intent, or the administration of its 
 provisions, to any officers, judicial, legislative, or ex- 
 ecutive, unjil tliey have first sworn or promised 
 before God to support it. 
 
 So far, therefore, from discarding Christianity and 
 disowning God, the framers of this great Charter 
 made an appeal to the Christian's ^od, an indispen- 
 sable preliminary to exercising any high office in a 
 State or in the nation. Before taking this oath no 
 man could assume authority under this Constitu- 
 tion; it w^as the bond of fidelity, it was made a 
 public security for tlie faithful discharge of official 
 duties, and for the proper administration of the 
 Constitution itself Upon this bond, placed among 
 the provisions of the Constitution by men represent- 
 ing a Christian community, the life and working of 
 the instrument was rested. They committed it to 
 the charge of posterity only on condition of their 
 solemnly declaring before God that they would sup- 
 port it. When the true nature of an oath or an 
 affirmation before God is considered, this clause of the 
 Constitution is fraught with a significancy so preg- 
 nant that we can well understand why it wns thought 
 
IN THE UNITED STATES. 19 
 
 needful to restrict its meaning by the provision whicli 
 follows. 
 
 The restriction, however important, and w^e add 
 proper, leaves a force and meaning to the clause large 
 and strong enough to cover every Christian claim. It 
 leaves the administration of the Constitution only to 
 those who shall promise before God to maintain it 
 inviolate. As members of a Christian community 
 they no doubt felt they could not do less, and they 
 knew they could not do more. They exacted the 
 highest obligation of fidelity known to Christians. 
 They put the Christian seal upon the Instrument, that 
 it might never be violated so long as Christian obliga- 
 tions should be the highest known to the people. 
 
 But these were men of toleration. They had seen 
 and heard and known enough of religious tests and 
 establishments to make them irreconcilable enemies 
 of all intolerance and religious tyranny. They were 
 framing political institutions intended to afford the 
 largest civil and religious liberty consistent wdth public 
 order and good government. They prescribed to all 
 an oath — a promise before God, to every man, before 
 he could lay an official hand upon the Constitution ; 
 but they forbade any "religious test to be required as 
 a qualification to office." If this provision had stood 
 alone in the Instrument, no oath could have been 
 imposed upon those accepting office : but coming as a 
 limitation of the previous clause, its import is not only 
 clear, but in perfect consistency with the whole spirit 
 of the Constitution and its authors. No man was 
 permitted to accept of an office without a virtual ac- 
 knowledgment of God, but no religious test was ever ^, 
 to be required; that is, among the numberless and 
 
20 THE POSITION OF CHRISTIANITY 
 
 conflicting religious opinions no distinction was ever 
 to be made. The officer is required to make the oath 
 or affirmation, but in no other respect is his religious 
 behef to be brought in question. It was needful that 
 this restriction should be broad enough to shut out all 
 possibility of its being evaded by sectarian ascendency. 
 The Constitution makes therefore no distinction, 
 except that between those who are willing before God 
 to swear or affirm, and those who may, from religious 
 scruples, refuse either to swear or affirm. Such as 
 thus refuse cannot take office under it. All others, 
 whatsoever their religious opinions, may take official 
 station, without inquiry into their sincerity or consis- 
 tency in assuming this solemn engagement. The 
 framers of the Constitution gave it therefore the 
 broadest possible basis consistent with the fact, that it 
 recognized the Christian's God, and was thereafter to 
 be ever administered by men acknowledging Him as 
 the Supreme Being. 
 
 • The Christian nation which adopted this Consti- 
 f tution invited the people of every country to come 
 r and live under it ; but in so doing they did not abdi- 
 cate their Christian ascendency nor proclaim that 
 their institutions were purged of the Christian element. 
 They avowed toleration, and not infidelity, as their 
 great principle. They said to all the persecuted and 
 suffi3ring throughout the world, Come and dwell with 
 us and you may enjoy manifold advantages and immu- 
 nities. We are a Christian people, our institutions 
 are constructed with reference to Christianity, and 
 are intended to be administered under its light and 
 influences ; it teaches us to offer you the largest 
 Christian liberty ever enjoyed by a civilized people — 
 
IN THE UNITED STATES. ^1 
 
 the largest possible consistent with the existence of 
 Christianity itself. It is the light of Christianity 
 which enables us to offer this boon to all people, but 
 while we make the boon great we can never permit 
 the light to be extinguished which disposes and 
 enables us to confer this signal favor. The right of 
 private judgment will be accorded to all who come to 
 our shores to the utmost extent consistent with the 
 continued existence and comfortable enjoyment of our 
 present Christianity. In offering these advantages 
 of civil and religious liberty to the people of every 
 creed and nation, they, our ancestors, did not concede 
 any principle of the great work they had just finished; 
 they did not propose to take down their fabric or 
 fashion it to the taste of all who might take refuge 
 within its walls ; they did not propose to place the 
 existence of Christianity and Christian civilization in 
 our land at the mercy of those wdio should make their 
 abode with us ; they intended to extend a real Chris- 
 tian toleration to all people, but they did not mean 
 that the idolators or pagans who might come among 
 us should be regarded in their turn as tolerating 
 Christians. They intended that it should remain a 
 Christian land, and that the glory of its toleration 
 should continue to be ascribed to its true origin, 
 Christianity. 
 
 In his Commentaries on the Constitution, Judge 
 Story (vol. 3. § 1841), speaking of this clause, re- 
 marks, "It is not introduced merely for the purpose 
 of satisfying the scruples of many respectable persons" 
 wdio feel an invincible repugnance to any religious 
 test or affirmation. It had a higher object : to cut 
 off forever every pretence of any alliance between 
 
22 TUE POSITIOX OF CHRISTIANITY 
 
 Church and State in the National Government." It 
 Avas not intended to cut off or put any slight upon 
 Christianity. It was the deliberate severance of 
 Church and State, and a declaration, that according to 
 their views, there neither was nor should be any such 
 alliance. They admitted no other connection between 
 Church and State than Avhat existed betvreen the 
 people and their government. The Constitution was 
 to be maintained, upheld and administered by, as its 
 makers trusted, a Christian people. They did not 
 commit the perpetuation of Christianity to the Con- 
 stitution, but they committed the Constitution, as a 
 sacred trust, to the Christian people who were to be 
 its protectors and administrators; and having provided 
 against sectarian partialities, they never believed it 
 would be safe in any other hands than those under 
 Christian influences. This is plain from innumerable 
 facts and considerations which appear in all our 
 history as a people. 
 
 It would have been easy to declare, in so many 
 words, that Christianity should have no precedence 
 in our system over any other religion ; to have abol- 
 ished official and judicial oaths, to have repealed all 
 enactments in reference to the Lord's day, to have 
 prohibited the appointment of Chaplains or the pro- 
 clamation of Thanksgivings; and finally, by one 
 sweeping statute, to have severed the existing con- 
 nection between our common law and Christianity, 
 thus legalizing blasphemy and abolishing our code 
 of morals, the basis of Christian civilization. So flir 
 from this, whatever be our short-comings as a religious 
 people, every page of our history reveals the great 
 
IN THE UNITED STATES. 23 
 
 fact that as a nation we acknowledge the God of the 
 Bible and no other. 
 
 We revert again to the Constitution of the United 
 States. The first article of the amendments provides 
 that, " Congress shall make no law respecting an es- 
 tablishment of religion, or prohibiting the free exercise 
 thereof." This is an explicit prohibition of any union 
 of Church and State. The theory of the framers of 
 this Instrument was, that there need not be and 
 should not be any union of our ecclesiastical with our 
 political institutions; that the relations of Government 
 with Christianity should be through individuals and 
 not through Churches ; and that the bearings of 
 Christianity on the legislation and administration of 
 Government should be that which is effected by the 
 influences and efforts of Christian citizens. They not 
 only offered religious toleration to all who differed 
 from them in opinion, but they gave them a voice and 
 a vote in reference to the mode in which that Christian 
 toleration should be exercised. They not only extended 
 toleration to those of different faith, but they gave 
 these securities to those who might avail themselves 
 of it, providing however, that if the tolerated party 
 should become dominant, no law should ever be made 
 prohibiting the free exercise of religion. They agree 
 not to establish Christianity as a religion, but ex- 
 pressly provide that no law shall ever prohibit its 
 free exercise. Any other religion inconsistent with 
 Christianity may be prohibited, but the Christion reli- 
 gion is declared to be out of the reach of Congres- 
 sional interference. Legislation may promote the 
 interests of religion by any measures not inconsistent 
 with toleration, but it cannot destroj^ them. Congress 
 
24 THE POSITION OF CHRISTIANITY 
 
 has power, and with that power devolves the duty to 
 provide for the general welfare of the United States ; 
 so far as it can, it should promote the interests of 
 religion as one of the most efficient means of promo- 
 ting the general welfare : its powers in this respect 
 are only limited by what is due to the right of private 
 judgment by the provisions of the Constitution itself 
 and by what is due to that Christian toleration which 
 is of the essence of our institutions. 
 
 sectio:n" m. 
 
 Citations from Story's Commentaries on the Constitution of the United 
 States. Chaplains for Army and Navy, — De Tocqueville, Alex. 
 Hamilton. 
 
 This subject is discussed at some length in his 
 Commentaries on the Constitution by Judge Story, 
 one of the ablest of our writers on jurisprudence and 
 constitutional law, long a judge of the Supreme Court 
 of the United States, of high repute for learning and 
 sound opinions. We take from his remarks on the 
 clause of the Constitution just quoted, a few passages 
 which sustain our views. 
 
 " It is impossible for those who believe in the truth 
 of Christianity as a divine revelation to doubt that it 
 is the especial duty of government to foster and en- 
 courage it among all the citizens and subjects. This 
 is a point wholly distinct from that of the right of 
 private judgment in matters of religion and of the 
 freedom of public worship according to the dictates 
 of one's conscience." (vol. 3, page 723, § 18G5.) 
 
IN THE UNITED STATES. 25 
 
 ''' Now there will probably be found few persons in 
 this or any other Christian country who would delibe- 
 rately contend that it was unreasonable or unjust to 
 foster and encourage the Christian religion generally 
 as a matter of sound policy as well as of revealed j 
 truth. In fact, every American colony, from its 
 foundation down to the Revolution, with the exception 
 of Rhode Island (if indeed that State be an exception), 
 did openly by the whole course of its laws and insti- 
 tutions, sustain in some form the Christian religion ; 
 and almost invariably gave a peculiar sanction to 
 some of its fundamental doctrines. And this has i 
 continued to be the case in some of the States down 
 to the present period, without the slightest suspicion 
 that it was against the principles of public law or re- 
 publican liberty. Indeed, in a republic there would 
 seem to be a peculiar propriety in viewing the Chris- 
 tian religion as the great basis on which it must rest 
 for its support and permanence, if it be what it has 
 ever been deemed by its truest friends to be, the reli- 
 gion of liberty." {Ibid page 724, § 1867.) 
 
 " Probably at the time of the adoption of the 
 Constitution, and of the amendment to it now under 
 consideration, the general, if not the universal senti-y 
 ment in America was, that Christianity ought to> 
 receive encouragement from the State, so far as was > 
 not incompatible with the rights of conscience and 
 the freedom of religious worship. An attempt to 
 level all religions, and to make it a matter of State 
 policy to hold all in utter indifference, would have 
 created universal disapprobation, if not universal 
 indignation."* (Ibid. 726, § 1868.) 
 
 * Lloyd's Debates, 195, 19G. 
 
J*©- THE POSITION OF CHRISTIANITY 
 
 " It yet remains a problem to be solved in human 
 affairs, whether any free government can be perma- 
 nent, Avhere the public worship of God and the sup- 
 port of religion constitute no part of the policy or 
 duty of the State, in any assignable shape. Th^ 
 future experience of Christendom, and chiefly of the 
 American States, must settle this problem, as yet 
 new" in the history of the world, abundant as it has 
 been in experiments in the theory of government." 
 {Ihid. § 1869.) 
 
 / " But the duty of supporting religion, and especially 
 
 <the Christian religion, is very different from the right 
 
 /to force the conscience of other men, or to punish 
 
 Hhem for w^orshipping God in the manner which they 
 
 believe their accountability to him requires." '•' ^ 
 
 " The rights of conscience are indeed beyond the just 
 
 reach of any human powder. They are given by 
 
 God, and cannot be encroached upon by human 
 
 authority without a criminal disobedience of the pre- 
 
 ■ cepts of natural as well as of revealed religion." 
 
 {Ihid. § 1870.) 
 
 / " The real object of the amendment was not to 
 /countenance, much less to advance Mahometanism, 
 or Judaism, or infidelity, by prostrating Christianity ; 
 NDut to exclude all rivalry among Christian sects, and 
 to prevent any national ecclesiastical establishment 
 wdiich should give to an hierarchy the exclusive 
 patronage of the national governnlent. It thus cut 
 off the means of religious persecution (the vice and 
 pest of former ages), and of the subversion of the 
 rights of conscience in matters of religion, which had 
 been trampled upon almost from the days of the 
 Apostles to the present age." [Ihid. § 1871.) 
 
IN THE UNITED STATES. 
 
 " It was under a solemn consciousness of the clan- 
 gers from ecclesiastical ambition, the bigotry of 
 spiritual pride, and the intolerance of sects, thus 
 exemplified in our domestic as well as in foreign 
 annals, that it was deemed advisable to exclude from 
 the national government all power to act upon the 
 
 subject." " Thus the whole power over 
 
 the subject of religion is left exclusively to the State 
 governments, to be acted on according to their own 
 sense of justice and the State Constitutions ; and the 
 Catholic and the Protestant, the Calvinist and the 
 Arminian, the Jew and the Infidel, may sit down at 
 the common table of the national councils without 
 any inquisition into their faith or mode of worship." 
 {Ihid. p. 730, § 1873.) 
 
 It must be remarked, that the last paragraph refers 
 to the dangers of " ecclesiastical ambition," and of 
 course to churches or bodies of men organized as such. 
 The only power which Congress has over the subject 
 is that which relates to the welfare of the country in 
 its moral and religious aspects, and that under the 
 limitations we have already mentioned. Congress 
 has no power over the subject as it relates to any 
 church or ecclesiastical body. It can recognize the 
 fact that this is a Christian country, it can promote 
 the welfare of its Christian citizens as such, it can 
 impose no form of worship, it can force no man's con- 
 science, but it can seize many occasions of favoring 
 the interests of Christianity ; it can, so long as a ma- 
 jority desire it, by its own Chaplain, ask the blessing J 
 of God upon its deliberations, but it could not enforce \ 
 the presence of any member who objected to this act - 
 
2% THE POSITION" OF CHRISTIANITY 
 
 of worship. In fact, the members of Congress have 
 only such powers in relation to religion as belong to 
 them individually and such as have not been excluded 
 from their consideration by the Constitution itself. 
 The power thus left to Congress, though exceedingly 
 restricted, would be large if exercised for the good of 
 the whole nation in the enlarged sjDirit of that Chris- 
 tianity which requires men to love others as they love 
 themselves. Under this great law the Congress of 
 the United States has power to promote the general 
 welfare to the full extent of all their wisdom and skill 
 without trenching on any religious dogma in a way to 
 excite jealousy or apprehension even in the most sen- 
 sitive. 
 
 The labor of the country, and of course the destiny 
 and welfare of laborers, is obviously within the reach 
 of the national legislature. Christianity teaches that 
 the laborer is worthy of his hire, and it imposes upon 
 those who have the power, the duty of not only 
 shielding them from harm and imposition, but of pro- 
 moting their interests in every way which may be 
 consistent with justice and mercy and not inconsistent 
 with the interests of society at large. So Congress 
 can promote the interests of Christianity as a means 
 of ensuring national well-being, provided the prin- 
 ciple of toleration be not violated. It would undoubt- 
 edly be right in Congress to view the whole subject 
 of the welfare of the people for whcfm it legislates in 
 the light of Christianity. It may not take any notice") 
 of the homage which men owe to God, but it cannot^ 
 wholly overlook the duties which men owe to one 
 another. It may restrain selfishness and promote 
 within the range of its action, general well-being, 
 
'^ 
 
 IN THE UNITED STATES. 29 
 
 though it cannot enforce any reUgious tenet or form 
 of doctrine. 
 
 The disposition of the National Legislature to act 
 in accordance with these principles was shown from 
 the earliest period of their action. A Chaplain was 
 chosen to open their meetings with prayer and to 
 preach on the Lord's day. Chaplains were by law 
 provided for in the Army and Navy. In the Act for 
 the better government of the Navy of the United 
 States, is the following clause : " The commanders of i 
 all ships and vessels in the Navy having a Chaplain 
 on board, shall take care that Divine service be per-- 
 formed in a solemn and reverent manner twice a day, \ 
 a sermon preached on Sunday, unless bad weather or 
 other extraordinary accidents jDrevent it ; and that \ 
 they cause as many of the ship's company as can be 
 spared from duty, to attend every performance of the 
 worship of Almighty God." (1 Story's Laws U. S. / 
 761.) 
 
 In the Act establishing rules and regulations for 
 the Army of the United States, is the following 
 clause : " It is earnestly recommended to all officers 
 and soldiers diligently to attend Divine service." 
 This is followed by severe penalties for improper 
 behavior at any place of Divine worship; and by 
 another clause visiting with penalties any officer or 
 soldier " who shall use any profane oath or execra- 
 tion;" and by another, providing penalties against 
 "every Chaplain commissioned in the Army or 
 Armies of the United States, who shall absent himself 
 from the duties assigned him." (2 Story's Laws 
 U. S. 992.) 
 
 We might add to these many other proofs of Con- 
 
3f) 
 
 THE POSITION OF CHRISTIANITY 
 
 (gressional acknowledgment of Christianity, but we 
 /shall advert further only to a joint resolution of 
 both Houses on the occasion of the War of 1812. 
 "It being a duty j^eculiarly incumbent in a time of 
 public calamity humbly and devoutly to acknowledge 
 our dependence on Almighty God and to imjolore His 
 aid and j)rotection, therefore resolved, that a joint, 
 committee of both Houses w^ait on the President andv 
 request him to recommend a day of j^ublic humiliation j 
 and prayer, to be observed by the people of the United 
 States with religious solemnity and the offering of 
 fervent supplications to Almighty God for the safety 
 of these States and the s^Dcedy restoration of peace." 
 Upon occasion of the restoration of peace in 1815, 
 Congress again united in recommending the appoint- 
 ment of a day of Thanksgiving. President Madison 
 acceded to both these legislative requests, and the 
 days were appointed and observed. Various Presi- 
 dents have since then made similar appointments. It 
 is therefore abundantly evident, that this Nation, both 
 in its Legislative and Executive capacity, acknow- ^ 
 ledges God and the Revelation of His wall in Chris- \ 
 tianity. 
 
 This national homage to God has not failed to strike 
 the notice of observing strangers, who attentively 
 regard the working of our political institutions. One 
 of the most profound Statesmen who has visited our 
 country, remarks : " There is no country in the whole 
 world in which the Christian religion retains a greater -^ 
 influence over the souls of men than in America ; 
 and there can be no greater proof of its utility and »/ 
 conformity to human nature, than that its influence - 
 is most powerfully exercised over the most enlightened 
 
IN" THE UNITED STATES. oi 
 
 and free nation of the earth." "In the 
 
 United States rehgion exercises but little influence 
 upon the laws, and upon the details of public opinion ; 
 but it directs the manners of the community, and by 
 regulating domestic life it regulates the Sjjite." . . . 
 " Christianity, therefore, reigns without any obstacle, 
 by universal consent ; the consequence is, that every 
 principle of the moral world is fixed and determinate, 
 although the political world is abandoned to the 
 
 debates and experiments of men." "I 
 
 cannot say that all Americans have a sincere faith in 
 their religion, for who can search the human heart ? 
 but I am certain that they hold it to be indispensable 
 to the maintenance of republican institutions. This 
 opinion is not peculiar to a class of citizens or a party, 
 but it belongs to the whole nation and to every rank 
 
 of society." " The Americans combine 
 
 the notion of Christianity and of liberty, so intimately, 
 in their minds, that it is impossible to make them 
 conceive the one without the other." .... '' Such' 
 are the opinions of Americans ; and if any hold that 
 the religious spirit which I admire is the thing most 
 amiss in America, and that the only element wanting 
 to the freedom and happiness of the human race is to 
 believe in some blind cosmogony, &c., I can only 
 reply that those who hold this language have never v-' 
 been in America, and that they have never seen a re- 
 ligious or free nation." (De Tocqueville, American 
 Institutions, chap, xvii.) 
 
 We might readily multiply such testimonies to thev- 
 Christian character of our institutions. We might 
 also have quoted largely from the v/ritings and 
 speeches of the very Fathers of our country, the 
 
oZ THE POSITION OF CHRISTIANITY 
 
 authors of these institutions; but this would have 
 carried us into a field far too wide for the limits of 
 this essay. It is worthy of mention, however, that 
 when the infidelity which characterized the French 
 Revolution of the last century had spread its poisonous 
 influences even to our shores, it became a source of 
 serious disquietude to the good men of that day, and 
 especially to our Revolutionar}' Fathers then survi- 
 ving. Hamilton, in a letter to Bayard, dated in 1802, ^ 
 proposes the formation of a National Societj', under 
 the title of " Christian Constitutional Society," having 
 for its object, " 1st, The support of the Christian reli- 
 gion ;" " 2nd, The support of the Constitution of the 
 United States." (Hamilton's Works, vol. vi. p. 542.) 
 
 SECTION rv^ 
 
 The early Constitutions of the American States on the subject of Chris- 
 tianity and Eeligious liberty. 
 
 The Constitutions of many of the original thirteen 
 States contained a very marked acknowledgment of 
 Christianity. Connecticut and Rhode Island con- 
 tinued under the government of the ancient Charters, 
 of Puritan origin and founded on Christian principles. 
 The States of New Hampshire, Massachusetts, and 
 New Jersey, by their Constitutions, expressly recog- 
 nized Protestant Christianity, whilst they expressly 
 provide for the privilege of worshipping God according 
 to the dictates of conscience. That of New Hamp- 
 shire had these provisions, " That morality and piety 
 rightly grounded on evangelical principles would give 
 
Ttf 
 
 IN THE UNITED STATES. 33 
 
 the best and greatest security to government, and 
 would lay on the hearts of men the strongest obliga- 
 tions to due subjection." 
 
 The Constitution of Massachusetts has the follow- 
 ing : " That as the happiness of a people, and the 
 good order and preservation of civil government, essen- 
 tially depend upon piety, religion, and morality ; and 
 as these cannot be generally diffused through a com- 
 munity but by the institution of the public worship 
 of God and of public instruction in piety, religion and 
 morality, therefore" &c. Then follows a provision 
 for the establishment and maintenance of public wor- 
 ship, and for the maintenance of " public Protestant . 
 teachers of piety, religion and morality." It prescribes 
 also that the person chosen Governor, Lieutenant 
 Governor, Senator or Representative, shall subscribe 
 a solemn profession, " that he believes the Christian 
 religion, and has a firm persuasion of its truth." 
 
 The first Constitution of New York is dated in 1777. 
 It strongly guarded the rights of conscience and reli- 
 gious worship. It excluded the Clergy from public 
 offices of a secular nature, on the express ground, that 
 by their profession they were dedicated to the service 
 of God and to the cure of souls, and ought not to be 
 diverted from the great duties of their functions. 
 
 The first Constitution of New Jersey is dated in 
 1776. The ISth section provides, " That no person 
 shall ever within this colony be deprived of the ines- 
 timable privilege of worshipping God in a manner 
 agreeable to the dictates of his own conscience ; nor 
 be compelled to attend any place of worship, nor to 
 pay tithes, taxes, &c., to build churches or maintain 
 ministers — also, that there shall be no establishment 
 3 
 
34, THE POSITION or CHRISTIANITY 
 
 of any one religious sect — -that no Protestant shall be 
 denied any civil right." 
 
 The first Constitution of Pennsylvania, made in 
 the year 1776, requires each member of the Legisla- 
 ture to make this solemn declaration : " I do believe 
 in one God, the Creator and Governor of the Universe, 
 the Kewarder of the good and the Punisher of the 
 wicked, and I do acknowledge the Scriptures of the 
 Old and New Testament to be given by Divine 
 inspiration." 
 
 The Constitution of Delaware, made in 177G, re- 
 quires all officers and members of the Legislature to 
 subscribe the following declaration : " I do profess 
 faith in God the Father and in Jesus Christ his only 
 Son and the Holy Ghost, one God, blessed forever- 
 more ; and I do acknowledge the Holy Scriptures of 
 the Old and New Testament to be given by Divine 
 insj)iration." 
 
 The Constitution of Maryland, made in 1776, em- 
 powers the Legislature to lay a general tax for the 
 support of the Christian religion. No tests are per- 
 mitted, except, an oath of office, an oath of allegiance, 
 and " a declaration of belief in the Christian religion." 
 
 In Virginia, previous to our National Independence, 
 religion was established by law. No mention was 
 made of the subject in a Constitution drawn up under 
 the influence of, if not by, Jefferson himself 
 
 The Constitution of North Carolina, adopted in 
 1776, provides, "That no person Avho should deny 
 the being of a God, or the truth of the Protestant reli- 
 gion, or the Divine authority of either the Old or the 
 New Testament, or who should hold religious principles 
 incompatible with the freedom or safety of the State, 
 
IN THE UNITED STATES. 35 
 
 should be capable of holding any office or place of 
 trust in the civil government of the State." 
 
 The Constitution of South Carolina, made in 1788, 
 expressly ordains, that " the Christian religion be 
 deemed and is hereby constituted and declared to be, 
 the established religion of the land." It excludes 
 from the Legislature, and from the office of Governor 
 and Lieutenant Governor, and from the privy council, 
 V all who are not Protestants. It provides for Pro- 
 testant religious worship and the incorporation of 
 congregations under the description of " Societies of 
 Christian Protestants," prescribing a strictly orthodox 
 formula as the condition of mcorporation. It contains 
 also the form of a declaration of very stringent 
 nature to be made and subscribed by every Minister 
 before he can enter upon the pastoral office. 
 
 The Constitution of Georgia, made in 1777, pre- 
 scribes that " all members of the House of Assembly 
 shall be of the Protestant religion." 
 
 These State Constitutions were formed before the 
 Constitution of the United States. The principles of 
 toleration were at work, but had not sufficiently 
 liberalized the minds of the Statesmen who drew up 
 these early Charters. It was not until after the 
 termination of the War and the formation of the 
 National Constitution, that the subject of toleration 
 began to be understood. But even then there was a 
 confusion of ideas on the whole subject of the relation 
 of our political institutions with Christianity, which 
 made it a desideratum that some competent hand 
 should draw up a bold outUne of these relations, 
 which could be readily comprehended and made the 
 basis thereafter of Constitutional and Legislative 
 
36 THE POSITION OF CHRISTIANITY 
 
 action. This has never yet been done, and the cause 
 of truth and Christianity has suffered by the omission y 
 more than can be easily estimated. Not so much, 
 however, in reference to the duty of toleration, as in 
 a clear perception of the position and bearings of 
 Christianity after full toleration had been accorded. 
 
 In all the States, we believe, the distinctions made 
 in favor of Protestantism have been removed and the 
 rights of conscience expressly acknowledged and 
 secured. That is, the right to worship God according 
 to his own tenets or views is guaranteed to every 
 citizen. No rights are by these provisions guaranteed 
 to infidels or unbelievers ; they have other rights as 
 citizens which are secured by Constitutions and laws, 
 but they can claim no privileges of any kind under a 
 guarantee of religions liberty. They are in fact fully 
 tolerated by the spirit of our institutions so long as 
 their unbelief is not in any manner exerted against 
 Christianity, either by profanity, blasphemy or by 
 writing or speaking maliciously against religion. 
 
 " Rights of conscience are religious rights, that is, 
 the right to entertain and utter religious opinions, and 
 to enjoy public religious worship. This expression, 
 in its widest acceptation, cannot include irreligion, — 
 opinions contrary to the nature of religion, subversive 
 of the reverence, love and service due to God, of 
 virtue, morality and good manners." (Dr. Baird's 
 Religions in America, book iii. chap. 9.) 
 
IN THE UNITED STATES. 37 
 
 SECTION V. 
 
 the existing constitutions of the several states. 
 
 Maine. 
 To save the trouble of reference, we proceed to give 
 some of the leading provisions of the existing State 
 Constitutions in regard to religion. Art. I. sect. 3. 
 '• All men have a natural and inalienable right to 
 worship Almighty God according to the dictates of 
 their own consciences, and no one shall be hurt, mo- 
 lested or restrained in his person, liberty or estate, 
 for worshipping God in the manner and season most p^x.t<^^^\ 
 agreeable to the dictates of his own conscience, nor for 
 his religious professions or sentiments, provided he does 
 not disturb the public peace, nor obstruct others in 
 their religious worship; and all persons demeaning 
 themselves peaceably, as good members of the State, 
 shall be equally under the protection of the laws, and 
 no subordination nor preference of any one sect or 
 denomination to another shall ever be established by 
 law, nor shall any religious test be required as a 
 qualification of any office under this State." 
 
 New Hampshire. 
 After a provision nearly in the same words as that 
 of Maine, the Constitution of New Hampshire has in 
 Part I. sect. G, this clause : '*' As morality and piety, 
 rightly grounded on evangelical principles, will give 
 the best and greatest security to government, and will 
 lay in the hearts of men the strongest obligations to 
 due subjection," &c. : then follows a provision to f 
 encourage the public worship of God and authority to 
 the Legislature to incorporate religious societies, &c. 
 
38 the position of christianity 
 
 Vermont. 
 To a provision nearly identical with that of Maine, 
 Vermont adds, " Nevertheless, every sect or denomi- 
 nation of Christians ought to observe the Sabbath or 
 Lord's day, and keep up some sort of religious worship 
 which to them shall seem most agreeable to the re- 
 vealed will of God." (Chap. I. sect. 3.) 
 
 Massachusetts. 
 
 Part I. sect. 2. "It is the right as well as the duty 
 of all men in society publicly and at stated seasons to 
 worship the Supreme Being, the Great Creator and 
 Preserver of the Universe. And no subject shall be 
 hurt, molested or restrained in his person, liberty or 
 estate, for worshipping God in the manner and 
 seasons most agreeable to the dictates of his con- 
 science ; or for his religious profession or sentiments, 
 provided he does not disturb the public peace or 
 obstruct others in their religious worship." 
 
 3. "As the happiness of a people and the good 
 order and preservation of civil government, essentially 
 depend upon piety, religion and morality, and as 
 these cannot be generally diffused throughout the 
 community but by the institution of a public worship 
 of God and of public institutions of piety, religion 
 and morality, therefore to promote their happiness 
 and to secure the good order and preservation of their 
 government," the Legislature is authorized to make 
 provision " for such public worship and such institu- 
 tions," &c., " in all cases where such provision shall 
 not be made voluntarily." It is provided that every 
 man who contributes under a law of the State to the 
 support of religion, " may designate to what denomi- 
 nation his tax shall be applied." 
 
in the united states. 39 
 
 Rhode Island. 
 
 "We, the people of Rhode Island, grateful to 
 Almighty God for the civil and religious liberty He 
 hath so long permitted us to enjoy, and looking to 
 Him for a blessing upon our endeavors to secure and 
 transmit the same unimpaired to succeeding genera- 
 tions, do ordain," &c. 
 
 Art. I. sect. 3. "Whereas, Almighty God hath 
 created the mind free, and all attempts to influence 
 by temporal punishment or burthens, or by civil in- 
 capacitation, tend to beget habits of hypocrisy and 
 meanness ; and whereas, a principal object of our 
 venerated ancestors in their migration to this country 
 and their settlement of this State, was, as they ex- 
 pressed it, to hold forth a lively experiment, that a 
 flourishing civil State may stand and be best main- 
 tained with full liberty in religious concernments; 
 we therefore," &c. Then follows a clause similar to 
 that of Maine. 
 
 Connecticut. 
 
 The Preamble to the Constitution begins with, 
 " acknowledging with gratitude the good Providence 
 of God in having permitted them" (the people) " to 
 enjoy a free government," &c. 
 
 Art. I. sect. 3. " The exercise and enjoyment of 
 religious profession and worship, without discrimina- 
 tion, shall forever be free to all persons in this State : 
 provided, that the right hereby declared and estab- 
 lished shall not be so construed as to excuse acts of 
 licentiousness or to justify practices inconsistent with 
 the peace and safety of the State." 
 
 Sect. 4. "No prefei^ence shall be given by law to 
 any Christian sect, or mode of worship." 
 
40 the position of christianity 
 
 New York. 
 
 Preamhle. " We, the people of the State of New 
 York, grateful to Almighty God for our freedom," &c. 
 
 Art. I. sect. 3. " The free exercise and enjoyment 
 of religious profession and worship, without discrimi- 
 nation or preference, shall forever.be allowed in this 
 State to all mankind; and no person shall be rendered 
 incompetent to be a witness on account of his opinions 
 in matters of religious belief: but the liberty of con- 
 science, hereby secured, shall not be so construed as 
 to excuse acts of licentiousness or justify practices 
 inconsistent with the peace or safety of this State." 
 
 New Jersey. 
 
 The Preamble of the Constitution is identical with 
 that of Rhode Island, given above. 
 
 Art. I. sect. 3. "No person shall be deprived of 
 the inestimable privilege of worshipping Almighty 
 God in a manner agreeable to the dictates of his own 
 conscience." Then follows the provision, that no 
 person shall be compelled to attend upon any worship 
 or pay any tithes or taxes for support of any church 
 or ministry. "There shall be no establishment of 
 one religious sect in preference to another : no religious 
 test shall be required as a qualification for any office 
 or public trust, and no person shall be denied the 
 exercise of any civil right, merely on account of his 
 religious principles." 
 
 Pennsylvania. 
 Art. IX. sect. 3. " That all men have a natural 
 and indefeasible right to worship Almighty God ac- 
 cording to the dictates of their own consciences ; that 
 no man can of right, be compelled to attend, erect or 
 
IN THE UNITED STATES. 41 
 
 support any place of worship, or to maintain any 
 ministry against his own consent; that no human 
 authority can, in any case whatever, control or inter- 
 fere with the rights of conscience ; and that no prefe- 
 rence shall ever be given by law to any religious 
 establishment or modes of worship." 
 
 Sect 4. " That no person acknowledging the Being 
 of a God and a future state of rewards and punish- 
 ments, shall, on account of his religious sentiments, 
 be disqualified to hold any office or place of trust or 
 profit under this Commonwealth." 
 
 Delaware. 
 The Constitution begins, " Through Divine goodness 
 all men have, by nature, the rights of worshipping 
 and serving their Creator according to the dictates of 
 their consciences," &c. " Although it is the duty of 
 all men frequently to assemble together for the public 
 w^orship of the Author of the Universe; and piety 
 and morality, on which the prosperity of communities 
 depends, are thereby promoted, yet no man can or 
 ought to be compelled to attend any religious worship, 
 or to contribute to the erection or support of any 
 place of worship, or to the maintenance of any 
 ministry, against his own free will and consent ; and 
 no power shall or ought to be vested in or assumed 
 by any magistrate, that shall in any case interfere 
 with or in any manner control, the rights of conscience 
 in the free exercise of religious worship : nor shall a 
 preference be given by law to any religious societies, 
 denomination or modes of worship. No religious test 
 shall be required as a qualification to any office or 
 trust under this State." 
 
42 the position of christianity 
 
 Maryland. 
 The thirty-third section of the Declaration of 
 Eights, prefixed to the Constitution, reads : " That as 
 it is the duty of every man to worship God in such 
 manner as he thinks most acceptable to Him, all 
 persons are equally entitled to protection in their 
 religious liberty : wherefore, no person ought, by any 
 law, to be molested in his person or estate on account 
 of his religious persuasion or profession, or for his 
 religious practice : unless, under color of religion, any 
 man shall disturb the good order, peace or safety of 
 the State, or shall infringe the laws of morality, or 
 injure others in their natural, civil or religious rights; 
 nor ought any person to be compelled to frequent or 
 maintain, or contribute, unless on contract, to maintain 
 any place of worship or any ministry ; nor shall any 
 person be deemed incompetent as a witness or juror 
 who believes in the existence of a God, and that 
 under His dispensation such person will be held 
 morally accountable for his acts and be rewarded or 
 punished therefor, either in this world or the world 
 to come." " That no other test or qualification ought 
 to be required on admission to any office of trust or 
 profit, than such oath of office as may be prescribed, 
 &c., and a declaration of belief in the Christian reli- 
 gion ; and if the party shall profess to be a Jew, the 
 declaration shall be of his belief in a future state of 
 rewards and jDunishments." 
 
 Virginia. 
 The sixteenth section of the Bill of Rights, prefixed 
 to the Constitution of Virginia, reads : " That religion 
 or the duty which we owe to our Creator, and the 
 
IN" THE UNITED STATES. 48 
 
 manner of discharging it, can be directed only by 
 reason and conviction, and not by force and violence ; 
 and therefore, all men are equally entitled to the 
 free exercise of religion, according to the dictates of 
 conscience ; and that it is the mutual duty of all to 
 practise Christian forbearance, love and charity, 
 towards each other." 
 
 North Carolina. 
 Art. ly. sect. 2. " No person who shall deny the 
 being of a God, or the truth of the Christian religion, 
 or the Divine authority of the Old and New Testa- 
 ment, or who shall hold religious principles incom- 
 patible with the freedom or safety of the State, shall 
 be capable of holding any office or place of trust or 
 profit in the civil department within this State." 
 
 South Carolina. 
 
 Art. VIII. sect. 1. "The free exercise and enjoy- 
 ment of religious profession and worship, without dis- 
 crimination or preference, shall forever hereafter be 
 allowed, within this State, to all mankind ; provided, 
 that the liberty of conscience thereby declared, shall 
 not be so construed as to excuse acts of licentiousness, 
 or justify practices inconsistent with the peace and 
 safety of this State." 
 
 In the twenty-third section of the first article, 
 " Ministers of the Gospel" are rendered ineligible to 
 the office of Governor or Lieutenant-Governor, or to a 
 seat in the Senate or House of Representatives, on 
 the ground that they are, '• by their profession, dedi- 
 cated to the service of God and the care of souls, and 
 ought not to be diverted from the great duty of their 
 functions." 
 
44 the position of christianity 
 
 Georgia. 
 Art. IV. sect. 10. "No person within this State 
 shall, upon any pretence, be deprived of the inesti- 
 mable privilege of worshipping God in a manner 
 agreeable to his own conscience, nor be compelled to 
 attend any place of worship contrary to his own faith 
 and judgment; nor shall he ever be obliged to j)ay 
 tithes, taxes, or any other rate, for the building or 
 repairing any place of worshij), or for the maintenance 
 of any Minister, contrary to what he believes to be 
 right, or hath voluntarily engaged to do. No one 
 religious society shall ever be established in this State 
 in preference to any other, nor shall any person be 
 denied the enjoyment of any civil right, merely on 
 account of his religious principles." 
 
 Florida. 
 Section 3d of the Declaration of Rights, prefixed to 
 the Constitution, is, " That all men have a natural 
 and inalienable right to worship Almighty God ac- 
 cording to the dictates of their own conscience ; and 
 that no preference shall ever be given by law to any 
 religious establishment, or mode of worship, in this 
 
 State." 
 
 Alabama. 
 
 Art. I. sect. 3. of the Declaration of Rights, pre- 
 fixed to the Constitution, is, " No person within this 
 State shall, upon any pretence, be deprived of the 
 inestimable privilege of worshipping God in the 
 manner most agreeable to his own conscience, nor be 
 compelled to attend any place of worship ; nor shall 
 any one ever be obliged to pny any tithes, taxes, or 
 other rate, for the building or repairing any place of 
 
^ 
 
 IN THE UNITED STATES. 45 
 
 worship, or for the maintenance of any Minister or 
 ministry." 
 
 Sect. 4. "No human authority ought, in any case 
 whatever, to control or interfere with the right of 
 conscience." 
 
 Sect. 5. "No person shall be hurt, molested, or 
 restrained in his religious professions, sentiments, or 
 persuasions, provided he does not disturb others in 
 their religious worship." 
 
 Sect. 6. " The civil rights, privileges, or capacities, 
 of any citizen shall in no way be diminished or en- 
 larged on account of his religious principles." 
 
 Sect. 7. " There shall be no establishment of reli- 
 gion by law ; no preference shall ever be given by law 
 to any religious sect, society, denomination, or mode 
 of worship ; and no religious test shall ever be required 
 as a qualification to any office or public trust under 
 
 this State." 
 
 Mississippi. 
 
 Art. I. sect. 3, 4, 5. " The exercise and enjoyment 
 of religious profession and worship, without discrimi- 
 nation, shall forever be free to all persons in this 
 State ; provided, that the right hereby declared and 
 established shall not be so construed as to excuse acts 
 of licentiousness, or justify practices inconsistent with 
 the peace and safety of the State." 
 
 Sect. 4. " No preference shall ever be given by law 
 to any rehgious sect or mode of worship." 
 
 Sect. 5. " That no person shall be molested for his 
 opinions on any subject whatever, nor suffer any civil 
 or political incapacity, or acquire any civil or political 
 advantages, in consequence of such opinions, except 
 in cases provided in this Constitution." (The excep- 
 
46 THE POSITION OF CHRISTIANITY 
 
 tion relates to a provision against duelling. See Art. 
 VII. sect. 1, 2.) 
 
 Art. VII. sect. 14. " Religion, morality and know- 
 ledge being necessary to good government^ the pre- 
 servation of liberty, and the happiness of mankind, 
 schools, and the means of education, shall forever be 
 encouraged in this State." 
 
 Tennessee. 
 
 Section 3, article I., is nearly identical with section 
 3, of article IX., of that of Pennsylvania, which is 
 cited above. Section 4 reads, " That no religious test 
 shall ever be required as a qualification to any office 
 or public trust under this state." Section 3, of article 
 VIII., empowers the Legislature to pass laws exempt- 
 ing from attendance upon private and general musters 
 citizens belonging to any denomination known to be 
 opposed to bearing arms. Section 1, of article IX., 
 excludes Ministers of the gospel from a seat in the 
 Legislature in nearly the same terms as are employed 
 in the Constitution of South Carolina. Section 2, of 
 article IX., reads, " No person who denies the being 
 of a God, or a future state of rewards or punishments, 
 shall hold any office in the civil department of this 
 
 State." 
 
 Kentucky. 
 
 Section 5, of article XIII., of the Constitution, is 
 identical with the 3d section of the 9th article of that 
 of Pennsylvania, cited above. The 6th section is, 
 " That the civil rights, privileges, or capacities of any 
 citizen shall in no wise be diminished or enlarged on 
 account of his religion." 
 
in the united states. 47 
 
 Ohio. 
 The Constitution begins, " We, the people of the 
 State of Ohio, grateful to Almighty God for our free- 
 dom, to secure its blessings, and promote our common 
 welfare, do establish this Constitution." The seventh 
 section of the first article is, in its first portion, nearly 
 identical with the third section of the ninth article of 
 that of Pennsylvania. The remainder is thus : " No 
 religious test shall be required as a qualification for 
 office, nor shall any person be incompetent to be a 
 witness on account of his religious belief; but nothing 
 herein shall be construed to dispense with oaths and 
 affirmations. Religion, morality, and knoT^ledge, 
 however, being essential to good government, it shall 
 be the duty of the General Assembly to pass suitable 
 laws to protect every religious denomination in the 
 peaceable enjoyment of its own mode of public wor- 
 ship, and to encourage schools and the means of 
 instruction." 
 
 Indiana. 
 
 The preamble has these words : " We, the people 
 of the State of Indiana, grateful to Almighty God for 
 the free exercise of the right to choose our own form 
 of government, do ordain this Constitution." 
 
 Art. I. sect. 1. "We declare that all men are cre- 
 ated equal ; that they are endowed by their Creator 
 with certain inalienable rights," &c. 
 
 Sect. 2. "All men shall be secured in the natural 
 right to worship Almighty God according to the dic- 
 tates of their own consciences." 
 
 Sect. 3. " No law shall, in any case what- 
 ever, control the free exercise and enjoyment of 
 
48 THE POSITION OF CHRISTIANITY 
 
 religious opinion, or interfere with the rights of 
 conscience." 
 
 Sect. 4. "No preference shall be given by law 
 to any creed, religious society or mode of worship; 
 and no man shall be compelled to attend, erect or 
 support any place of worship, or to maintain any 
 ministry, against his consent." 
 
 Sect. 5. " No religious test shall be required as a 
 qualification for any office of trust or profit." 
 
 Sect. 6. " No money shall be drawn from the trea- 
 sury for any religious or theological institution." 
 
 Sect. 7. " No person shall be rendered incompetent 
 as a witness, in consequence of his opinions on matters 
 of religion." 
 
 Illinois. 
 
 The Preamble contains the same words we have 
 already cited from the Preamble to that of Rhode 
 Island. The third section of the thirteenth article 
 contains the same provision as that in the third 
 section of the ninth article of that of Pennsylvania. 
 The fourth section is, " That no religious test shall 
 ever be required as a qualification to any office of 
 public trust under this State." 
 
 Michigan. 
 
 The twenty-fourth section of the fourth article of 
 the Constitution, reads, '' The Legislature may autho- 
 rize the employment of a Chaplain for the State 
 Prison ; but no money shall be ajDpropriated for the 
 payment of any religious services in either House of 
 the Legislature." 
 
 Art. IV. sect. 39. " The Legislature shall pass no 
 law to prevent any person from worshiping Almighty 
 
IN THE UNITED STATES. 49 
 
 God according to the dictates of his conscience, or to 
 compel any person to attend, erect or sujjport any 
 place of religious worship, or to ]3ay tithes, taxes or 
 other rates, for the support of any minister of the 
 gospel or teacher of religion." 
 
 Sect. 40. " No money shall be appropriated or 
 drawn from the treasury for the benefit of any reli- 
 gious sect or society, theological or religious seminary, 
 nor shall property belonging to the State be appro- 
 priated for any such purposes." 
 
 Sect. 41. "The Legislature shall not diminish or 
 enlarge the civil or political rights, privileges and 
 capacities of any person, on account of his opinion or 
 belief concerning matters of religion." 
 
 Missouri. 
 
 The fourth section of the eleventh article of the 
 Constitution, is the same in substance, and nearly in 
 words, as the third section of the ninth article of that 
 of Pennsylvania. 
 
 The 5th section provides, " That no person, on 
 account of his religious opinions, can be rendered 
 ineligible to any office of trust or profit under this 
 State : that no preference can ever be given by law 
 to any sect or mode of worship, and no religious cor- 
 poration can ever be established in this State. No 
 religious sect or society should be permitted to accu- 
 mulate or hold in mortmain, large bodies of land or 
 other property, and all extensive ecclesiastical perpe- 
 tuities are dangerous to liberty : Provided, that any 
 religious society may hold, in any assumed name, so 
 much land as may be necessary for a house and build- 
 ings for public worship — for a parsonage and for a 
 4 
 
50 THE POSITION OF CHRISTIANITY 
 
 burying ground, and for no other purpose whatever ; 
 but no congregation shall own for such purposes more 
 than one acre of land in a town, nor more than ten 
 acres in the country." 
 
 Arkansas. 
 The third section of the second article of the Con- 
 stitution is the same as the third section of the ninth 
 article of that of Pennsylvania ; and the fourth section 
 of the second article of that of Arkansas is, in sub- 
 stance, the same as the forty-first section of the fourth 
 article of that of Michigan, cited above. 
 
 Texas. 
 
 The Constitution begins thus : " We, the people 
 of Texas, acknowledging with gratitude the grace and 
 beneficence of God in permitting us to make a choice 
 of our form of government, do," &c. &c. 
 
 The fourth section of article first of the Constitution 
 of Texas, is the same with the third section of the 
 ninth article of that of Pennsylvania, the following 
 sentence being added : " But it shall be the duty of 
 the Legislature to pass such laws as shall be neces- 
 sary to protect every religious denomination in the 
 peaceable enjoyment of their own mode of public 
 worship." The previous section prohibits religious 
 tests as a qualification for office. 
 
 Iowa. 
 
 The Constitution commences, " We, the people of 
 Iowa, grateful to the Supreme Being for the blessings 
 hitherto enjoyed, and feeling our dependence on Him 
 for a continuation of these blessings, do ordain," &c. 
 
 Art. II. sect. 3. " The General Assembly shall 
 make no law respecting an establishment of religion, 
 
IN THE UNITED STATES. 51 
 
 or prohibiting the free exercise thereof, nor shall any 
 person be compelled to attend any place of worship, 
 pay tithes, taxes, or other rates, for building or re- 
 pairing places of worship, or for the maintenance of 
 any minister or ministry." 
 
 Sect. 4. ^' No religious test shall be required as a 
 qualification for any office or public trust, and no 
 person shall be deprived of any of his rights, privileges 
 or capacities, or disqualified from the performance of 
 any of his public or private duties, or rendered incom- 
 petent to give evidence in any court of law or equity, 
 in consequence of his opinions on the subject of 
 religion." 
 
 Wisconsin. 
 
 The Preamble begins, '-- \Ye, the people of Wis- 
 consin, grateful to Almighty God for our freedom," &c. 
 
 Art. I. sect. 18. "The right of every man to 
 worship Almighty God according to the dictates of 
 his own conscience shall never be infringed." This 
 section proceeds nearly in the words of section third 
 in the ninth article of that of Pennsylvania, and 
 concludes in these words : " Nor shall any money be 
 drawn from the treasury for the benefit of any reli- 
 gious societies, or religious or theological seminaries." 
 
 Section nineteen is in substance the same as section 
 four of article second of that of Iowa, cited above. 
 
 California. 
 Art. I. sect. 4. " The free exercise and enjoyment 
 of religious profession and worship, without discrimi- 
 nation or preference, shall forever be allowed in this 
 State ; and no person shall be rendered incompetent 
 to be a witness on account of his opinions on matters 
 
52 THE POSITION OF CHRISTIANITY 
 
 of religious belief, but the liberty of conscience hereby 
 secured shall not be so construed as to excuse acts of 
 licentiousness or justify practices inconsistent with the 
 peace or safety of this State." 
 
 SECTION VI. 
 
 Remarks on the Constitutional Provisions cited in the Preceding 
 
 Section. 
 
 These Constitutions of the several States are com- 
 pacts between the people of a State collectively and 
 each individual of the State. The citizens of each 
 State are a Christian people, but opposed to Church 
 establishments in connection with the State, and op- 
 posed to all spiritual domination. Being chiefly 
 Protestants and entertaining a great diversity of 
 views on the subject of religion, as is inevitable where 
 men think and interpret for themselves, they felt the 
 necessity of mutual forbearance and toleration ; they 
 perceived that whilst Christianity was an indispen- 
 sable element of our free institutions, it was needful 
 that it also should be free and untrammeled. These 
 Constitutions then, emanating from Christian people, 
 guarantee to each individual now living or hereafter 
 to live under them, that he shall enjoy the right of 
 worshipping God according to the dictates of his con- 
 science, without restraint or molestation ; that he shall 
 not be compelled to attend, build or repair any church, 
 or for that end pay tax, tithe or rate ; that his civil 
 rights shall not be abridged on account of his religious 
 
IN THE UNITED STATES. 53 
 
 opinions ; that no religious test shall be interposed to 
 disqualify him for office, and that he shall not be in- 
 competent as a witness by reason of his religious 
 opinions ; but they provide that the privileges thus 
 granted shall not be abused by any immoral or licen- 
 tious act, or any attack upon Christianity or any dis- 
 turbance of its worship, or any act against the peace 
 or safety of the State. Under these constitutional 
 guarantees which a Christian people provide for their 
 own security and peace, they invite all who are in- 
 clined, to come, subject only to the disabilities in 
 which they acquiesce themselves. 
 
 These Constitutions make religion free by making 
 its professors, its profession, and its worship free. 
 Christianity claims no special establishment and no 
 special power, civil or spiritual, under these instru- 
 ments. Its security is higher than the Constitution 
 itself: it is in the hearts and minds of the people who 
 framed the Constitution. With certain qualifications, 
 but in a very important sense, it is an element of our 
 common or unwritten law. This, as we shall pre- 
 sently see, has been solemnly decided by many of our 
 highest courts and ablest jurists. 
 
 As a Christian j)eople, we lay one hand upon the 
 Bible and say, " This is the Testament from which 
 we derive our religion :" and the other upon the Con- 
 stitution, and say, " This is our Social Compact, by 
 which we mutually guarantee religious liberty." 
 
 Each Constitution exists as the work of a Chris- 
 tian people : it neither alters, modifies, enlarges 
 nor abridges Christianity. It provides against all 
 spiritual domination and secures full personal reli- 
 gious liberty. The liberty of worship so fully 
 
54 THE POSITION OF CHRISTIANITY 
 
 accorded, is the liberty to worship God, the God of 
 Christianity, and not any other being real or imagi- 
 nary. Christianity is not displaced but expressly 
 recognized, though not defined. Its exercise is left 
 with the people, its liberty is secured by the Consti- 
 tution. 
 
 If no such constitutional provisions had been 
 made, our judicial tribunals must have developed the 
 common law doctrine of Christianity to the same 
 effect, for our civil liberty would necessarily demand 
 religious liberty and obtain it, where the people were 
 the fountains of power. Our written Constitutions, 
 our unwritten common law, public sentiment and the 
 deep convictions of the people, are in perfect accord, 
 that Christianity is the religion of the country and 
 that religious liberty is the law of the country. All 
 connection between Church and State is cut off here 
 forever, all sectarian preferences are precluded, all 
 spiritual domination is absolutely forbidden, as alike 
 contrary to the spirit of true religion and dangerous 
 to free institutions. 
 
 The benefits of Christianity accrue to the people 
 j individually through their individual piety, and to 
 the State only through the ^Diety and morality of 
 the whole people. The only power of a church here, 
 is the action of the people upon the government within 
 the limits prescribed by the Constitution. The only 
 expression Christianity can make of her wishes, is 
 through the people upon their Legislatures and their 
 laws, and upon their governments. There is a wide 
 field here for Christian influence and action, without 
 trenching on Constitutional limits. 
 
 We have yet to notice, before proceeding with our 
 
IN THE UNITED STATES. 55 
 
 remarks, a few of the decisions of our Courts upon the 
 subject of Christianity. They shed a flood of light 
 upon this neglected subject. 
 
 SECTION vn. 
 
 Judicial Decisions touching Christianity. 
 
 In 1822, a man was indicted in Pennsylvania for 
 blasphemy, under an act of Assembly dated in 1700. 
 He was convicted, and the case was carried to the 
 Supreme Court, in which it was contended that the 
 act of 1700, punishing blasphemy, was repugnant to 
 the Constitution of 1787-1790, and therefore virtually 
 repealed; and, moreover, that it was repugnant to 
 our republican institutions, and to the rights of con- 
 science. The opinion was delivered by Judge Duncan, 
 from whose decision we make the following extracts : 
 
 " We will first dispose of what is considered the 
 grand objection — the constitutionality of Christianity ; 
 for, in effect, that is the question." 
 
 "Christianity — general Christianity — is, and always 
 has been, a part of the common law of Pennsylvania ; 
 Christianity without the spiritual artillery of Euro- 
 pean countries ; for this Christianity was one of the 
 considerations of the Royal Charter, and the very 
 basis laid by its great founder, William Penn. Not 
 Christianity founded on any particular religious 
 tenets ; not Christianity with an established church, 
 and tithes, and spiritual courts, but Christianity with 
 liberty of conscience to all men. William Penn and 
 
56 THE POSITION OF CHRISTIANITY 
 
 Lord Baltimore were the first Legislators who passed 
 laws in favor of liberty of conscience ; for before that 
 period, liberty of conscience appeared in the laws of 
 no people, in the axiom of no government, in the insti- 
 tutes of no society ; and scarcelj^ in the temper of any 
 man. Even the reformers were as furious against 
 contumacious errors as they were loud in asserting 
 the liberty of conscience. And to the wilds of Ame- 
 rica, peopled by a stock cut off by persecution from a 
 Christian society, does Christianity owe, here, freedom 
 of religious opinion and religious worship." 
 
 Judge Duncan then examines the English decisions 
 in reference to Christianity, and shows that a man 
 is not punished in England for holding erroneous 
 opinions, but for so uttering them as to insult or 
 attack Christianity. He quotes the words of Lord 
 Mansfield, in Evans vs, the Chamberlain of London : 
 
 " The true principles of natural religion are part 
 of the common law; the essential principles of re- 
 vealed religion are part of the common law ; so that 
 a person subverting, vihfying, or ridiculing them, 
 may be prosecuted at common law; but temporal 
 punishment ought not to be inflicted for mere 
 opinions." 
 
 Judge Duncan proceeds to quote, at some length, 
 from the great statute of toleration, passed in Penn- 
 sylvania in the days of William Penn, in which it is 
 provided that men shall not be compelled to conform 
 to any religious observances but their own ; but which 
 also expressly provides against the creeping in of any 
 looseness, irreligion, and atheism, under the pretence 
 of rights of conscience. "And thus it is irrefragably 
 proved," he remarks, " that the laws and institutions 
 
IN THE UNITED STATES. 57 
 
 of this State are built on the foundation of reverence 
 for Christianity." 
 
 He cites Judge Swift, of Connecticut : — "To pro- 
 hibit the open, public, and explicit denial of the 
 popular religion of a country, is a necessary measure 
 to preserve the tranquillity of a government. Of this 
 no person in a Christian country can complain ; for, 
 admitting him to be an infidel, he must acknowledge 
 that no benefit can be derived from the subversion of 
 a religion which enforces the purest morality." He 
 cites, also, a decision in the Supreme Court of New 
 York, in which it "was solemnly determined that 
 Christianity was a part of the law of the land, and 
 that to revile the Holy Scriptures was an indictable 
 offence."* An attempt to overrule the law of this 
 case was made in a subsequent Convention in New 
 York, for the formation of a new Constitution, but it 
 was repelled by a vote of 74 to 41. 
 
 Judge Duncan proceeds to say : — " No society can 
 tolerate a wilful and despiteful attempt to subvert its 
 religion no more than it would to break down its 
 laws — a general, malicious and deliberate attempt to 
 overthrow Christianity — general Christianity. This 
 is the line of indication, where crime commences, and 
 the offence becomes the subject of penal visitation. 
 These offences may be classed under the following 
 heads: — 1; Denying the being and providence of 
 God. 2. Contumelious reproaches of Jesus Christ ; 
 profane and malevolent scoffing at the Scriptures, or 
 exposing any part of them to ridicule. 3. Certain 
 immoralities, tending to subvert all religion and mo- 
 rality, which are the foundation of all governments. 
 
 * For this opinion of Chief Justice Kent, see infra. 
 
58 THE POSITION" OF CHRISTIANITY 
 
 Without these restramts, no free government could 
 long exist." 
 
 " It is impossible to administer the laws ■without 
 taking the religion which the defendant in error has 
 scoffed at; that Scripture which he has reviled, as 
 their basis. To lay this aside is, at least, to weaken 
 the confidence in human veracity, so essential to the 
 purposes of society, and without which no question 
 of property could be decided, and no criminal brought 
 to justice. An oath in the common form, on a dis- 
 credited book, would be a most idle ceremon}^" 
 
 " No preference is given, by law, to any particular 
 religious persuasion. Protection is given to all by 
 our laws. It is only the malicious reviler of Chris- 
 tianity who is punished. By general Christianity is 
 not intended the doctrine of worship of any particular 
 sect." 
 
 " While our own free Constitution secures liberty 
 of conscience and freedom of religious worship to all, 
 it is not necessary to maintain that any man should 
 have the right, publicly, to vilify the religion of his 
 neighbors and of the country. These two privileges 
 are directly opposed. It is open, public vilification 
 of the religion of the country that is punished, not 
 to force conscience by punishment, but to preserve 
 the peace of the country by an outward respect to 
 the religion of the country." 
 
 " This is the Christianity, which is the law of our 
 land, and I do not think it will be an invasion of any 
 man's right of private judgment, or of the most ex- 
 tended privileges of propagating his sentiments with 
 regard to reli2;ion in the manner he thinks most con- 
 elusive. If from a regard to decency and the good 
 
IN THE UNITED STATES. 59 
 
 order of society, j)rofane swearing, breach of the 
 Sabbath, and blasphemy, are punishable by civil 
 magistrates, these are not punished as sins or offences 
 against God, but as crimes injurious to and having a 
 malignant influence on society ; for it is certain, that 
 by these practices, no one pretends to prove any sup- 
 posed truths, detect any supposed error, or advance 
 any sentiment whatever." (Updegraff ^'5. The Com- 
 monwealth, 11 Sergeant and Rawles' Reports, pp. 
 391-410.) 
 
 This point was commented upon freely in the great 
 case in the Supreme Court of the United States, 
 arising upon Stephen Girard's Will. {Vidal et al. vs. 
 The City of Philadelphia. 2 Howard, 127.) It was 
 admitted by Mr. Binney, against whom it was cited 
 by Mr. Webster, to be the law, in these words : 
 " Christianity is a part of the law of Pennsylvania, it 
 is true : but what Christianity and to what intent ? 
 It is Christianity without particular tenets ; Chris- 
 tianity with liberty of conscience to all, and to the 
 intent that it shall not be vilified, profaned or exposed 
 to ridicule. It is Christianity for the defence and 
 protection of those who believe, not for the persecution 
 of those who do not. This is the utmost reach of the 
 Commonwealth vs. Updegraff, 11 Ser. and R. 400. 
 (Argument of Defendant's Counsel, 103.)' 
 
 Mr. Webster in connection with his reference to 
 this leading case, has the following remarks. Re- 
 ferring to certain great features in the Constitution 
 and laws of Pennsylvania, he says : " These great 
 jDrinciples have always been recognized ; and they are 
 no more part and parcel of the public law of Pennsyl- 
 vania, than is the Christian religion. We have in 
 
60 THE POSITION OF CHRISTIANITY 
 
 the Charter of Pennsylvania, as prepared by its great 
 founder, WilUam Penn, we have in his " great law," 
 as it was called, that the preservation of Christianity 
 is one of .the great and leading ends of government. 
 This is declared in the Charter of the State. Then 
 the laws of Pennsylvania, the statutes against blas- 
 phemy, the violation of the Lord's day, and others to 
 the same effect, proceed on this great broad principle, 
 that the preservation of Christianity is one of the 
 main ends of government. This is the general public 
 policy of Pennsylvania. On this head we have the 
 case of the Commonwealth vs. Updegraff, in which a 
 decision, in accordance with this whole doctrine, was 
 given by the Supreme Court of Pennsylvania. The 
 solemn opinion pronounced by that tribunal, begins 
 by a general declaration, that Christianity is and 
 always has been part of the common law of Penn- 
 sylvania." 
 
 " There is nothing that we look for with more cer- 
 tainty than this general principle, that Christianity 
 is part of the law of the land. This was the case 
 among the Puritans of New England, the Episcopa- 
 lians of the Southern States, the Pennsylvania 
 Quakers, the Baptists, the mass of the followers of 
 Whitfield and Wesley and the Presbyterians, all 
 brought and all adopted this great truth, and all have 
 sustained it. And where there is any religious senti- 
 ment among men at all, this sentiment incorporates 
 itself with the law. Ever?/ thing declares it. 
 
 " The generations that are gone before speak to it 
 and pronounce it from the tomb. We feel it. All, 
 all proclaim that Christianity, general, tolerant Chris- 
 tianity^, Christianity independent of sects and parties, 
 
IN THE UNITED STATES. 61 
 
 that Christianity to which the sword and fagot are 
 unknown, general tolerant Christianity, is the law of 
 the land." (Webster's Works, Vol. VI. pp. 175-176.) 
 
 Justice Story, in the course of the opinion delivered 
 on behalf of the Supreme Court in this case upon 
 Girard's Will, remarks : " It is also said, and said 
 truly, that the Christian religion is a part of the 
 common law of Pennsylvania ; but this proposition is 
 to be received with its appropriate qualifications and 
 in connection with the provisions of the Constitution 
 of that State." 
 
 " So that we are compelled to admit, that although 
 Christianity be a part of the common law of the 
 State, yet it is so in this qualified sense, that its 
 divine origin and truth are admitted, and therefore it 
 is not to be maliciously and openly reviled and blas- 
 phemed against, to the annoyance of believers or the 
 injury of the public. Such was the doctrine of the 
 Supreme Court of Pennsylvania in the Commonwealth 
 vs. Updegraff." (2 Howard, 127.) 
 
 A man was indicted in Washington County, New 
 York, in 1810, for blasphemy against the name of 
 Christ. The ofience was charged as against the 
 common law, which is derived from England. The 
 prisoner was found guilty, and sentenced to pay a 
 fine of five hundred dollars and to be imprisoned for 
 three months. The case was removed to the Supreme 
 Court, the opinion of which was delivered by Chief 
 Justice Kent, among the first, if not the very first 
 jurist, which this country has produced. Judge Kent, 
 after having noticed that the jury had decided the 
 evil intent with which the w^ords were spoken, pro- 
 ceeds to state the law on this subject in England, and 
 
62 THE POSITION OF CHRISTIANITY 
 
 quotes the Court of King's Bench, as saying in one 
 case, ^' that Christianity was parcel of the law, and to 
 cast contumelious reproaches upon it tended to 
 weaken the foundation of moral obligation and the 
 efficacy of oaths." And in another case, as saying, 
 " they would not suffer it to be debated whether de- 
 faming Christianity in general was not an offence at 
 common law, for whatever strikes at the root of 
 Christianity, tends manifestly to the dissolution of 
 civil government. But the Court were careful to say, 
 they did not include disputes among learned men 
 upon particular controverted points." 
 
 " Such offences have always been considered inde- 
 pendent of any religious establishment or the rights 
 of the Church. They are treated as affecting the es- 
 sential interests of civil society." 
 
 Chief Justice Kent then proceeds to remark : — 
 " And why should not the language contained in this 
 indictment be still an offence with us? There is 
 nothing in our manners or institutions which has pre- 
 vented the application or the necessity of this part 
 of the common law. We stand equally in need now, 
 as formerly, of all that moral discipline and those 
 principles of virtue which help to bind society 
 together. The people of this State, in common with 
 the people of this country, profess the general doctrines 
 of Christianity as the rule of their faith and practice, 
 and to scandalize the Author of these doctrines, is not 
 only in a religious point of view, extremely impious, 
 but even in respect to the obligations due to society, 
 is a gross violation of decency and good order. 
 Nothing could be more offensive to the virtuous part 
 of the community, or more injurious to the tender 
 
IN THE UNITED STATES. 63 
 
 morals of the young, than to declare such profanity 
 lawful. It would go to confound all distinction be- 
 tween things sacred and profane." 
 
 " No government among any of the polished nations 
 of antiquity, and none of the institutions of modern 
 Europe (a single monitory case excepted), ever 
 hazarded such a bold experiment upon the solidity 
 of public morals, as to permit with impunity and 
 under the sanction of their tribunals, the general 
 religion of the community to be openly insulted and 
 defamed. The very idea of jurisprudence with the 
 ancient law-givers and philosophers, embraced the 
 religion of the country. Jurisprudentia est divinarum 
 atqiiG Jiumanarum 7'eru7n notitia. (Dig. b. 1. 10. 2. 
 Cic. de legibus. b. 2. ijclsswi.)" 
 
 "The free, equal and undisturbed enjoyment of 
 religious opinion, w^hatever it may be, and free and 
 decent discussions on any religious subject, is granted 
 and secured ; but to revile, with malicious and blas- 
 phemous contempt, the religion professed by almost 
 the whole community, is an abuse of that right. Nor 
 are we bound by any expressions in the Constitution, 
 as some have strangely supposed, either not to punish 
 at all, or to punish indiscriminately, the like attacks 
 upon the religion of Mahomet or of the Grande Lama; 
 and for this plain reason, that we are a Christian 
 people, and the morality of the country is drawn from 
 Christianity, and not from the doctrines or worship 
 of those impostors." 
 
 " Though the Constitution has discarded religious 
 establishments, it does not forbid judicial cognizance 
 of those offences against religion and morality which 
 have no reference to any such establishment, or to 
 
64 THE POSITION OF CHRISTIANITY 
 
 any particular form of government, but are punish- 
 able because they strike at the root of moral obliga- 
 tions, and weaken the security of the social ties. 
 The object of the thirty-eighth article of the Consti- 
 tution was to ' guard against spiritual oppression and 
 intolerance/ by declaring that ^ the free exercise and 
 enjoyment of religious profession and worship, with- 
 out discrimination or preference, should forever there- 
 after be allow^ed within this State to all mankind.' 
 This declaration (noble and magnanimous as it is 
 when fully understood) never meant to withdraw 
 religion in general, and with it the best sanctions of 
 moral and social obligation, from all consideration and 
 notice of the law. It will be fully satisfied by a free 
 and universal toleration, without any of the tests, 
 disabilities, or discriminations, incident to a religious 
 establishment. To construe it as breaking down the 
 common law barrier against licentious, wanton, and 
 impious attacks upon Christianity itself, would be an 
 enormous perversion of its meaning." 
 
 " The Legislative exposition of the Constitution is 
 conformable to this view of it. Christianity in its 
 enlarged sense, as a religion revealed and taught in 
 the Bible, is not unknown to our law. The statute 
 for preventing immorality consecrates the first day of 
 the week as holy time, and considers the violation of 
 it immoral. This was only the continuation, in sub- 
 stance, of a law of the Colony, which declared that 
 the profanation of the Lord's Day was ' the great 
 scandal of the Christian faith,' The act concerning 
 oaths recognizes the common law mode of adminis- 
 tering an oath, ' by laying the hand on and kissing 
 the Gospels.' Surely, then, we are bound to conclude 
 
IN THE UNITED STATES. 65 
 
 that wicked and malicious words, writings, and 
 actions, which go to vilify those Gospels, continue, as 
 at common law, to be an offence against the public 
 peace and safety. They are inconsistent with the 
 reverence due to the administration of an oath ; and, 
 among their other evil consequences, they tend to 
 lessen, in the public mind, its religious sanction." "=' 
 (The People vs. Ruggles, 8 Johnson's Reports, 290.) 
 
 A tradesman was prosecuted in Charleston, South 
 Carolina, for selling goods on the Lord's day. In 
 deciding against him. Judge O'Neal held the following 
 language : — 
 
 " Crimes are classed into mala in se and mala pro- 
 Jiibita. What gives them that character ? We cannot 
 answer as the Israelites would do, by pointing to 
 Mount Sinai, and say the Lord God commanded us, 
 saying, ' Thou shalt not kill,' ' thou shalt not steal.' 
 The authority of these precepts comes to us through 
 Christianity. . . . And hence the law delivered at 
 Mount Sinai may be, by us, appealed to as pointing 
 out that which is ' evil in itself.' 
 
 " Again, our law declares all contracts contra honos 
 mores as illegal and void. What constitutes the 
 standard of good morals? Is it not Christianity? 
 There certainly is none other. Say that cannot be 
 appealed to, and I do not know what would be good 
 morals. The day of moral virtue in which we live 
 would, in an instant, if that standard were abolished, 
 lapse into the dark and murky night of Pagan immo- 
 rality. In this State, the marriage tie is indissoluble. 
 
 * An attempt was made, in the Convention of 1822, to overrule 
 the law in this case, but it failed by a vote of 74 to 41. 
 5 
 
66 THE POSITION OF CHRISTIANITY 
 
 Whence do we take that maxim? It is from the 
 teaching of the New Testament alone. 
 
 "In the courts over which we preside, we daily 
 acknowledge Christianity as the most solemn part of 
 our administration. A Christian witness, having no 
 religious scruples against placing his hand upon the 
 book, is sworn upon the Holy Evangelists, the books 
 of the New Testament, which testify of our Saviour's 
 birth, life, death, and resurrection. This is so common 
 a matter, that it is little thought of as affording any 
 evidence of the part which Christianity has in the 
 common law. 
 
 " All blasphemous publications, carrying upon their 
 face that irreverent rejection of God and His holy 
 religion, which makes them dangerous to the commu- 
 nity, have always been held to be indictable and 
 punishable at common law. Here they would also be 
 plain acts of licentiousness, having no warrant of pro- 
 tection whatever in our Constitution. This, however, 
 never could extend to free and manly discussion on 
 those holy subjects. For I agree with Mr. Jefferson 
 (Notes on Virginia, p. 235) : — ' Our rulers can have 
 authority over such natural rights only as we have sub- 
 mitted to them. The rights of conscience we never 
 submitted, we never could submit. We are answer- 
 able for them to our God ! ' But I should hesitate 
 long in pushing the argument as far as he does, by 
 saying that, in its exercise, ' It does me no injury for 
 my neighbor to say there are twenty Gods, or no 
 God.' While the argument rests only in words, it 
 would be so evanescent that it might be no injury. 
 But when it comes to be put in print, to be read like 
 Paine's Age of Reason, by the young and unwary, 
 
IN THE UNITED STATES. 67 
 
 where is the parent who would say, ^ It does me no 
 mjury' I agree fully to what is said by Judge Dun- 
 can, in the Commonwealth vs. Updegraff (11 Ser. & 
 R. 394), ^Christianity — general Christianity, is, and 
 always has been, part of the common law ; not Chris- 
 tianity founded on any particular religious tenets ; 
 not Christianity Avith an established church, and 
 tithes, and spiritual courts; but Christianity with 
 liberty of conscience to all men.' 
 
 " What I have said was not necessary for the de- 
 cision of this case. It has only been said to prevent 
 silence from being interpreted into a want of confi- 
 dence in the proposition, that Christianity may be 
 justly appealed to as a part of the common law." 
 (From the Appendix to Matthews on the Bible and 
 Civil Government, p. 248.) 
 
 SECTION" VIII. 
 
 The social bearings of Christianity and the civil duties incumbent on 
 
 Christians. 
 
 It is apparent, then, from our statutory and our 
 common law, from our constitutions and our social 
 institutions, that Christianity is legally recognized as 
 the popular religion of this country. It is the very 
 atmosphere in which our institutions exist ; it is the 
 cement by which they are bound together ; it is the 
 sanction of our penal laws ; it is, in most cases, the 
 security to which appeal is made by oath for official 
 faithfulness ; it is the guardian of judicial evidence ; it is 
 
68 THE POSITION OF CHRISTIANITY 
 
 the basis of our morality, and the mould in which our 
 civilization has been cast. The refuge we offer to 
 men of all the world from intolerance, oppression and 
 persecution, for opinion's sake, is offered under the 
 influences of Christianity and according to its princi- 
 ples. We do not strike the Christian flag when we 
 thus open wide our doors to the world, announcing 
 that here is liberty of worship for all — Christian 
 toleration for all : we rather invite men to come be- 
 neath its folds and under its protection. We spread 
 over all that Christian vesture which is without seam 
 or line of division, the broad mantle of Christian 
 charity. We ask only obedience to such laws as are 
 necessary to the preservation of such institutions — 
 institutions which can only subsist and thrive under 
 the Christian flag and on the broad ground of Chris- 
 tian charity. 
 
 Christianity asks no aid, and will receive none, 
 from the State, to enforce its precepts or its worship. 
 Its only power is moral, not physical. It seeks to 
 govern men by the intrinsic excellence of its precepts, 
 and by presenting to them the moral and religious 
 claims of the Creator upon all His creatures. It 
 seeks the extension of Christian civilization and the 
 amelioration of human condition, the amendment 
 of legislation and the wholesome reform of our social 
 institutions, for the good of men as well as for the 
 glory of God ; but it expects to accomplish this good 
 only by its moral and enlightening influence upon 
 the minds and consciences of Christian men and those 
 who lend themselves to Christian influences. 
 
 Christianity enjoys advantages here never before 
 accorded to it by accident or by power. It wields no 
 
IN THE UNITED STATES. 69 
 
 temporal power to make it feared ; it wants no aid 
 but that from its own friends. It enjoys for its 
 generous toleration the heartfelt respect of all the 
 intelligent and ardent friends of humanity. It only 
 needs that the faults of its friends should be separated 
 from the purity of its requirements ; or that its friends 
 should illustrate the purity of its doctrines by the 
 purity of their lives, to give it a higher moral power 
 and greater influence for good than in any position it 
 has heretofore occupied. 
 
 The Christians of the United States have received 
 from their Fathers the most important trust ever 
 committed to men. The political institutions of this 
 country, springing from Christian liberality, Christian 
 civilization and intelligence, designed solely to promote 
 human well-being, are placed in their hands as im- 
 plements to be employed for human welfare. They 
 contain powers safe only in the hands of those who 
 are under Christian influences — powers fraught in 
 their proper or improper exercise, with more of good 
 or evil for the human family, than were ever before 
 entrusted to Christian hands. The Evangelical 
 Christians of the United States can sway this power 
 at their pleasure, for they have heretofore been and 
 still are, largely in the majority. There has undoubt- 
 edly been undue delicacy and forbearance shown in 
 the exercise of this power. Such has been this for- 
 bearance, indeed, that the question now is rather of 
 the neglect than of the abuse of power. 
 
 The principles of toleration and freedom of worship 
 arc so thoroughly interwoven into our State Constitu- 
 tions, that Christian citizens who are the devoted 
 friends of religious liberty, could not, without doing 
 
70 THE POSITION OF CHRISTIANITY 
 
 violence to their own feelings, infringe them ; but a 
 wide field for Christian enterprise and human advan- 
 tage invited strongly their attention and their labors, 
 without risk of transcending the limits of toleration 
 or violating the rights of conscience. 
 
 Christianity is no mere negation in this country ; 
 it commands, or should command, the moral and po- 
 litical power of the Christians who dwell in it, exer- 
 cised in accordance with the spirit of our institutions 
 and with a view to the highest interests of men, tem- 
 poral and eternal. The projDer exercise of these 
 functions of Christian freemen involves a wide scope 
 of political and social knowledge. Have the Chris- 
 tians of the United States studied and comprehended 
 as they ought, their position : and the problems which 
 duty and opportunity have placed before them in 
 that position ? 
 
 The object to be accomplished by them was 
 not the conversion of our tolerant into intolerant 
 institutions ; not to use their power to enforce Chris- 
 tian tenets ; but to carry out, in a charitable spirit, 
 that amelioration of the human condition which 
 Christianity contemplates. Since the advent of our 
 Saviour there has never been, on a national scale, so 
 beautiful an exemplification of one of His two great 
 fundamental precepts as that which is exhibited in 
 the toleration of our Revolutionary Fathers, and in 
 their offering to the poor outcasts of every clime a 
 home so inviting, and institutions so liberal, as those 
 of the United States. In fulfilling this duty, they 
 but performed what Christianity made incumbent; 
 they were the first body of Christian men to whom 
 
IN THE UNITED STATES. 71 
 
 such an opportunity had been offered. They felt the 
 obligation, and met it. 
 
 Can this be said of those Christian citizens to 
 whom, in continuance, these important trusts were 
 committed ? What is the evidence that the Christian 
 citizens of the United States have, since the era of 
 our adoption of the Constitution, realized their respon- 
 sibilities? Have they reflected that this national 
 Constitution, and these constitutions of the States, are 
 sacred trusts, for the due execution of which those 
 who have the power and the intelligence to administer 
 them aright are answerable ? That they are talents 
 committed to the servants of a Master who will 
 require an account ? " The powers that be are 
 ordained of God," and obedience to such is the rule 
 of the Gospel : in this country the responsibility of 
 governing is added to that of obedience. It is a duty 
 here to look to the powers which are to be executed, 
 as well as to the powers who are to execute. The 
 American Christian is entrusted with powers never 
 before enjoyed by Christian citizens ; — the power of 
 naming those who are to be the " ordained of God." 
 It has been the duty of Christians in times past, and 
 is now in other countries, to suffer and obey; here it 
 is our duty to designate those we are bound to obey. 
 Obedience to the laws of the land, within right limits, 
 is a Christian duty; but here Christians have the 
 power of framing the laws to which they owe 
 obedience. 
 
 It would be a mortifying task to inquire in what 
 manner the Christians of the United States have ful- 
 filled the unusual responsibilities thus placed upon 
 them. The trust reposed in the people by the provi- 
 
72 THE POSITION OF CHRISTIANITY 
 
 dence of God, was to administer the powers conferred 
 by the Constitutions, State and National ; the objects 
 of the trust, and its hmits, are indicated in these 
 Constitutions ; the majority of the trustees are Chris- 
 tians, or men professing to be swayed by Christian 
 motives or preferences ; — how have they discharged 
 the duties of this trust ? Taking into view the mil- 
 hons who inhabit this country, and their rapid in- 
 crease; the multitudes who are hastening yearly to 
 our shores ; the power for good or evil of our institu- 
 tions ; the mighty influence of our example upon the 
 rest of the world, it can hardly be conceived what 
 higher duty any human being could have, excepting, 
 only, the securing of his own salvation, than that 
 which devolved, and still devolves upon Christians 
 here to make American institutions as available as 
 possible for human advantage. We do not allege that 
 this duty has been wholly neglected ; but how does 
 the performance compare with the breadth of the 
 obligation and with the facility of action ? Christians 
 here are sufficient in number to sway the whole policy 
 of the country ; but where do we mark their influence 
 or their acts in the policj^ of the country ? Have we 
 not, alas ! either to admit that Christians have failed 
 to make their influence and their principles properly 
 operative, or to confess that their influence and their 
 principles are not Christian ? 
 
 If we look into the party movements of the day, 
 we encounter a scene of matchless wrangling, con- 
 tention, and low intrigue, the object of which is, 
 mainly, to get possession of the offices of the country 
 and the salaries. There is scarcely an imaginable 
 meanness to which party men do not descend — we 
 
IN THE UNITED STATES. 73 
 
 may as well say there is scarcely a degree of moral 
 degradation to which they do not descend — in pursuit 
 of office. The manly independence which teaches 
 men to seek a livelihood in some honest calling, is 
 undermined, and large numbers of our people are 
 trained to act as if no mode of living were so desirable 
 as to be a feeder at the public crib, and nothing more 
 praiseworthy than to be a constant beggar at the door 
 of public patronage. The sentence which binds all 
 men " to eat their bread in the sweat of their brows " 
 is commuted, for them, into eating their bread by the 
 sale of their honor, their hpnesty, or their indepen- 
 dence. They abandon every thing honest in life to 
 pursue every thing that is loathsome in party. How 
 far Christian hands are soiled in such pursuits, let 
 every one answer for himself. But it may be aptly 
 inquired, could the machinery of party have fallen 
 into such a shape, and could political degradation 
 have descended so low, had the vigilance of the Chris- 
 tian citizens been in any degree proportioned to the 
 interests involved ? 
 
 If we look to the public elections of the country, 
 shall we find in them, and in the events and processes 
 connected with them, any marks of Christian influence 
 or intervention ? Our elections are, in too many 
 instances, but the concentrated dregs of partizan 
 intrigue and beggarly office-seeking. We know no- 
 thing more shameful, nothing more dangerous to our 
 institutions, than the culpable neglect of duty on the 
 part of good men, and the unrestrained sway of bad 
 men, in the matter of our public elections. If 
 Christian men have any share in this prostitution of 
 public interests and private honesty, our elections 
 
74 THE POSITION OF CHRISTIANITY 
 
 reflect digrace not only upon the country, but upon 
 Christianity. 
 
 Do we find any consolatory evidence of Christian 
 influences in our Legislatures, State or National? 
 Alas ! they have become a bye-word of venality. We 
 are far from saying there are no good men in these 
 bodies ; we do not even say that bad men could be kept 
 out of them; but we do say that there are honest 
 men enough — Christian men enough — to send a large 
 majority of good, firm, and intelligent men into every 
 Legislative Assembly in the nation ; such men as 
 would effectually resist the power of corruption, and 
 consult only the highest interests of their constituents. 
 That such men are not sent is fairly imputable to 
 those who know it to be their duty, and having the 
 power, yet wholly fail to fulfil their obligations. 
 
 If the legislation of this country in its two great 
 aspects. State and National, be carefully regarded, it 
 is chiefly difficult to say which is the most culpable, 
 the defects of omission or those of commission. The 
 guilt of omission appears to us far the greatest. Let 
 us suppose that for the period of three score years and 
 ten of our national existence, our Congress had been 
 composed of such men as the people could have 
 elected, what would have been the position of the 
 country compared with what it is now, great and 
 prosperous as is our actual position? So with the 
 Legislatures of our original thirteen States and the 
 eighteen which have been added. There has been, 
 and is now, an attainable superiority to our past and 
 present circumstances, which it is impossible to define, 
 but which is appreciated by every honest and re- 
 flecting mind in the country. What has not been 
 
IN THE UNITED STATES. 75 
 
 done for the population of this vast country, which 
 might have been done, to promote the moral and 
 material interests of the people, lies at the door of the 
 Christians of this country, for they have most palpably 
 neglected the political duties committed to them. 
 The responsibility which rests upon a multitude, is, 
 we know, seldom realized in its full force; but we 
 fear the retribution which awaits the guilty, will be 
 in some way individually realized, however large the 
 multitude. 
 
 It is not safe then for Christians to infer, that 
 Christianity and Politics have no mutual relations. 
 Ours are Christian political institutions ; they are not 
 merely intended as convenient safe-guards, under 
 which Christians may dwell in peace and quietness ; 
 they are not designed merely for the negative object 
 of administering justice and protecting person and 
 property : They are powers designed to be exercised 
 for human advantage ; they are facilities for com- 
 plying with the great command, to love our neighbors 
 as ourselves. We repeat it, they are talents com- 
 mitted to the hands of American Christians, the value 
 and moment of which they have very imperfectly 
 realized. * 
 
 * " Whence, save from the American Church, can go forth the 
 light of a redeeming gospel to the dark places of the earth ? If 
 there be any philosophic reading of an historic Providence, then from 
 God's jicist and present dealings with us as a i^ccidiar 'people, and 
 from the evident signs of the times, as displaying the powerlessness 
 of all other nations for evangelizing a world ; from these, I say, is 
 the truth as apparent as an oracle of Revelation, that unto us, as 
 stewards of the grace of God, is awarded the magnificent service of 
 sending forth a full and free gospel over all the benighted continents 
 of our globe — that from our beloved land, glorious in its scenery, and 
 
76 THE POSITION" OF CHRISTIANITY 
 
 That this responsibility is not realized by American 
 Christians, is a fact they will not deny. The chief 
 reason for this is not frequently assigned, but it should 
 be not the less frequently sought ; it is, perhaps, 
 much more frequently felt than acknowledged. 
 
 its broad boundaries, and its new growth of civilization, and its 
 loftier type of civil and religious manhood, the Angel that hath the 
 everlasting gospel to preach, is already pluming the wing for flight 
 over the nations; and that the hopes of the race, therefore, are not 
 merely for Time, but for Eterniti/ ! " 
 
 " For we most frankly admit, that a religion that remains shut 
 away from the common business of life, into the pure regions of 
 spiritualism, as a thing of ecstacies, and sentiment, and psalm- 
 singing: appearing statedly on Sabbath days, and in sanctuaries, and 
 seen no more abroad during the six days of the secular and the 
 social — We confess, I say, that such a religion, be it Christian or 
 Pagan, is altogether out of place, and imbecile amid the restless and 
 earnest tides of an age and a life like our own." 
 
 " But then quite as confident I am, that if Christianity have not 
 Mtherto acquitted herself to the full of all her secular and social 
 duties ; the secret lies not in her inadequacy to the work ; but in 
 the smallness of the sphere which Christians themselves have assigned 
 her, and the class and kind of labor they have committed to her 
 hands. Sure I am, at least, that as an intellectual and moral system, 
 Christianity was designed for all nations and generations ; and is 
 divinely adapted to the exigencies of all nations and generations." 
 
 "Embodying, as Christianity does within itself, the mightiest and 
 most practical moral influences to be found in God's universe ; and 
 revealed as the master contrivance of Infinite Wisdom, to restore 
 man from his ruins, and bring back a wandering world to the 
 light and the liberty of God's own children; it has only to be 
 inaugurated in its place of rightful authority — only to be brought 
 forth from the cloisters of contemplation, and the chairs of academic 
 speculation — only to take hold in its strength, on the great practical 
 questions of the race and the age, — and the scoffing world will ac- 
 knowledge as they see, that an influence so long despised as a thing 
 only busy with creeds, and ceremonies, and sacraments, can yet work 
 gloriously and with a strong arm, as man's practical benefactor — 
 
IN THE UNITED STATES. 77 
 
 SECTIOISr IX. 
 
 Denominational Differences. 
 
 That there should be diiFerences of opinion in 
 regard to many rehgious tenets, we regard as inevi- 
 table, where the mind is free to draw its own conclu- 
 sions ; and it is of the very essence of true Christianity 
 that the mind should be thus free, that it may of its 
 own motion, so far as human influences are concerned, 
 and of its own comprehension, adopt the tenets which 
 make up the sum of its religious belief. There is no 
 excuse for men who profess to be followers of Christ, 
 if, because they differ in some points of their religious 
 belief, they should refuse to co-operate earnestly and 
 efficiently together for the accomplishment of any 
 
 that its fostering is of every influence which makes up civilization — 
 that its calling is unto the patronage of the arts, and sciences, and 
 literature, and commerce, and trade — that its place is as truly in the 
 cabinet as in the conventicle, in the senate-chamber, as at a sacra- 
 ment — that it can acquit itself vigorously of all Social and Civil, in 
 a word, of every secular duty; and is gloriously equal to all the 
 exigencies of the times, and every possible emergency of the day and 
 the generation." 
 
 " And we say, such an inauguration to a high sway over things 
 merely temporal, Christianity deserves to-day, at the hands of its 
 disciples. It deserves to be justified openly from the suspicions of 
 the world, that it is after all, but a low, and paltry, and drivelling 
 fanaticism. It deserves to be brought abroad from the closet and 
 cloister, to enter as a living power into the philosophy, and specula- 
 tion, and the earnest life, and all the high enterprise of an uprising 
 Humanity." — Rev. C. Wadsivoi^h's Sermon on Religion and 
 Politics, pp. 21—26. 
 
78 THE rosiTiON of Christianity 
 
 good result with which their rehgious differences have 
 no connection. They are not less bound to notice the 
 points in which they agree than those in which they 
 differ. The good they can accomplish in concert 
 should not remain unperformed because there may be 
 differences of opinion upon matters which have 
 nothing to do with the work which is to be done. 
 It cannot be concealed that sectarianism has been 
 the main barrier which has kept Christians from 
 uniting their efforts for the common good, in the ad- 
 ministration of public affairs.* 
 
 * We cannot deny ourselves or our readers, the pleasure of producing 
 here the following passages, from the recent address of Dr. Duff, 
 upon the occasion of his public reception in Concert Hall, Philadel- 
 phia, February 21, 1854 :/— 
 
 " We have hitherto been accustomed, on both sides of the Atlantic, 
 to look at each other's differences, rather than our agreements in the 
 faith. It is in the very nature of division to scatter and sever, while 
 it is in the very nature of coincidence to bind and cement. The 
 former sows the seeds of discord, while the latter is the source of 
 harmony. Why, then, should we not look rather at the points about 
 which we are thoroughly agreed, and which are the great fundamental 
 doctrines of Christianity — those grand transcendent verities which 
 constitute the foundation of all felicity on earth, and the earnest of 
 all real blessedness in heaven ! And why should we not rejoice in 
 the privilege of casting those comparatively minor points in the shade, 
 in order that we may enjoy the full effulgence and beautitude of the 
 latter ? 
 
 "Let us cherish this ^ unity of spirit' more and more, and then 
 we shall not be exhibited to the world as Christians throughout 
 Christendom have been in times past, in an antagonism and turbulent 
 collision, like the discrepant atoms of Miltonic chaos ; but we shall 
 be exhibited as bright celestial orbs, revolving in a grand and solemn 
 procession of harmony and good-will, round the grand central sun, 
 even Jesus Christ, the King of glory, and the King of saints. 
 Doubtless, in the minds of many, minor differences will arise, for all 
 
IN THE UNITED STATES. 79 
 
 Sectarian differences have nothing in common with 
 those which are political, and the men who differ 
 
 are not capacitated alike, or circumstanced alike, or educated alike ; 
 and wherever there is freedom of thought there must be freedom of 
 speech ; but if we cherish this spirit of unity, then will the strong 
 learn to deal tenderly with the infirmities of the weak ; and then will 
 the weak be no longer disposed to quarrel with the (to them) unin- 
 telligible speculations or positions of the strong. Let us cherish this 
 spirit of unity and brotherly love, and then, whatever difi'erences 
 may arise, we shall be all right in the main. From the very finitude 
 of human nature there will be partialities, which will draw us nearer 
 to one portion of the truth than to another; and from the very in- 
 firmity of our nature we are often led to dwell too exclusively upon one 
 point, until it grows into disproportionate magnitude before our eyes, 
 and we forget the points of higher importance — even as a pin-head, 
 when brought into contact with the pupil of the eye, by gazing at it, 
 it will render invisible the most beautiful landscape, or eclipse the 
 very sun in the firmament of heaven. 
 
 " In this way too, we shall be enabled to remove a foul blot on 
 Christianity. We shall dissipate the weakness of disunion, and, by 
 gathering our scattered forces, we shall be enabled successfully to 
 carry on the war of truth against error, into the very centre of the 
 enemy's dominions. We shall be able to wipe away the bitter 
 sarcasm that has been hurled by infidelity against the religion of 
 Christ. Even while we all profess to be inhabiting a region so ra- 
 diant with light and so exuberant with the bounties of a gracious 
 God, that its marvellous history stands unparalleled in the archives 
 of eternity, we all show our unbounded gratitude to the Author of 
 such ineSable blessings, by cherishing an irreconcilable hatred to one 
 another; while all are, by creation, the servants of one sovereign 
 Lord; and may, by adoption, be called into his family to become 
 princes of the blood-royal in heaven. In order to this, let us pray 
 that our men of intellect may be men of seraphic fire — even the fire 
 of Divine love, which alone can melt and fuse all into oneness of 
 spirit; let us pray that all our sinfulness, all partiality, all envy, and 
 all sinister motives, may be forever eradicated from amongst us, and 
 that nothing may be allowed to interfere with the realizing of so 
 glorious a consummation, short of the dereliction of some vital prin- 
 ciple, or a base compromise of some divine prerogative." 
 
80 THE POSITION OF CHRISTIANITY 
 
 widely upon religious questions might harmonize 
 well upon the public interests of the country. It is 
 seen every day that men of all denominations mingle, 
 without difficulty, in public aJBfairs. What we urge 
 as the omission of Christians, is, that they should not, 
 as a body, have studied the institutions and interests 
 of the country, from the point of view which Chris- 
 tianity affords, and thus prepared themselves to carry 
 the benign principles of their religion, so far as they 
 were applicable, into public affairs, in the spirit of 
 that Christian toleration which reigns throughout our 
 whole political system. It is not intended that Chris- 
 tians should unite their influence or intelligence or 
 their power, for any ecclesiastical advantage, or for 
 the purpose of weakening the principle of toleration, 
 but solely for the purpose of making our institutions 
 as efficient as possible for good to our own population 
 and to all men within the reach of their influence. 
 It is not desirable that Christians should unite to 
 exalt the power of the church or churches, or any 
 mere religious power, but to do that good to men 
 which Christianity dictates. It is, that Christians 
 may not only show they are such, by doing good to 
 their fellow-men as they have individual opportunity, 
 but that they may vindicate their title to be the 
 friends of Christ, by uniting to promote human 
 welfare, through wise legislation, by discreet adminis- 
 tration of the laws, and a just apportionment of na- 
 tional benefits. 
 
 Now, if never before. Christians should demonstrate, 
 that the love they bear their fellow-men is as ready 
 to act for their advantage through the medium of 
 national powers as of private opportunities. If the 
 
IN THE UNITED STATES. 81 
 
 Legislative, Judicial and Executive powers vested in 
 the public officers of our national government are ca- 
 pable of being so directed and administered as to 
 confer extraordinary benefits, moral and material, 
 upon the whole people, and through them upon others, 
 it would be difficult to conjecture upon what grounds 
 any excuse could be framed for those who have 
 learned the bearing in these respects of Christian 
 obligations, and who make no attempt to discharge 
 them where the results would be so important. 
 
 It is an undeniable fact, that the Christians of the 
 United States expend their chief efforts, we may well 
 say nearly their whole efforts, for the welfare of men 
 and the glory of their Blaster, in the direction of de- 
 nominational advancement. That this effort has not 
 gone unblessed, that it has borne abundant and rich 
 fruits, we are happy to say. But, however blest these 
 labors in their several narrow channels, they not only 
 leave a wide scope of humanity uncared for and not 
 reached, but they leave undone much that might be 
 achieved by a union of Christians for great objects as 
 to which they do not differ. These sectarian families 
 may and should take care of themselves, but they 
 should not forget that they too are members of a 
 community larger than all of them united. As de- 
 nominations, we cannot enforce our special tenets, 
 our political institutions being constructed upon a 
 more liberal principle ; our duty as Christians is not 
 limited by our power as denominations, but by the 
 nature of the obligation itself and those whom it 
 concerns. 
 
 We have many among us, very many, who keep 
 out of the reach of denominational influence. Is 
 6 
 
82 THE POSITIOjST of CHRISTIANITY 
 
 there no larger platform on which these might be 
 saved ? Can no plan be devised for them ? Is there 
 no salvation out of the great denominations into 
 which these can be inducted ? We admit and admire 
 what has been done by the Bible Society, the Tract 
 Society, the American Board of Foreign Missions, and 
 last, but chiefly, the American Sunday School Union. 
 These efforts, however, instead of exhibiting what can 
 be done by joint effort for the cause of Christ, only 
 show what might be done. All these, and many 
 more, might be sustained, without weakening denomi- 
 national effort."=^ 
 
 * The following remarks are from the Sunday School Journal, of 
 the 1st of March, 1854. They are sufficiently to the point to induce 
 their insertion here. 
 
 " It has been said, not unfrequently, concerning eiforts to propagate 
 the Christian faith by a union of its professors, -without respect to 
 its denominational relations, that the truth must suiFer severe wrong. 
 In other words, that the various communities whhich are known by 
 sectarian names owe it to themselves and to the cause of truth, to 
 act separately in promoting the spread of religion, and by no means 
 to consent to, or co-operate in, any scheme of Christian benevolence 
 which constrains them to keep out of view their distinctive doctrines 
 or usages. If they cannot be allowed to introduce those peculiarities 
 of belief which distinguish them from the rest of the family of Christ, 
 those who hold sucb opinions decline to countenance or further any 
 plan of Christian effort which involves religious instruction. 
 
 "It is not our purpose, just now, to controvert this view. Its 
 soundness is likely to be tested in good earnest, and it will not take 
 many years to determine whether the sectarian phases of Christianity 
 commend it most favorably to the consideration of those whom it is 
 intended to bless and save. The experiment will be a costly one, 
 however. If the perpetual or prominent exhibition of the contro- 
 verted points of faith, and the discussion of them among those who 
 hold in common what are known as the doctrines of the Evangelical 
 church in its various branches, shall be the means of increasing the 
 
IN THE UNITED STATES. 83 
 
 The very spirit of our civil institutions seems to 
 demand the construction, for a special purpose, of a 
 wider platform. "We offer a home to all, whatever 
 their opinions; if they decline coming within the 
 range of denominational effort, should not the Chris- 
 tians of the United States be able to offer them such 
 religious instruction as, though it may not be Ar- 
 minian, or Calvinistic, shall be strictly Evangelical? 
 In a certain sense, as we have seen, Christianity is 
 the law of the country ; in that sense it is the very 
 foundation on which our civil institutions are con- 
 structed, and, to that extent, instruction in it is not 
 only essential, in reference to the eternal welfare of 
 individuals, but to the permanence and continued im- 
 
 power of a corrupt but imposing hierarchy, or of multiplying recruits 
 for the army of aliens and infidels, it 'will be no easy matter for the 
 truth, as all our Evangelical churches hold it, to regain its present 
 position, or to retain the means of diffusing itself which it now 
 possesses. 
 
 " It is a question not unworthy of thought, whether the chief 
 advantages supposed to be derived from sect-organization might not 
 be retained consistently with a much more liberal course towards 
 methods of propagating a^common faith. Instead of an effort to make 
 the peculiar doctrines or usages of a denomination of equal importance 
 with the common faith, or even greater, let its advocates be satisfied 
 with elevating them above the sect-doctrines or usages of other deno- 
 minations, allowing to the common faith a superiority above them 
 all. We are persuaded that if the voice of all who profess and call 
 themselves Christians could be uttered this day, uninfluenced by party 
 leaders and champions, it would be given, like the voice of many 
 waters, for relaxing the cords which bind Christians in separate com- 
 munities as sects, and for giving new strength and increased pressure 
 to those which unite them as followers of Christ. The sentiment 
 OF THE Church, at this moment, is for Union — and the war- 
 fare of sects, like the warfare of states and nations, is waged by the 
 will of the few at the cost of the many.'' 
 
84 THE POSITION OF CHRISTIANITY 
 
 i:)rovenient of our institutions. The indisposition to 
 any such union of effort among those of differing 
 religious persuasions, is a positive dereUction of Cliris- 
 tian obhgation. Whilst Christians keep faithfully 
 with all the world their compact of religious toleration, 
 not violating it in letter or in spirit, let them never- 
 theless pay all their Christian duty to the whole 
 population abiding under that compact. The security 
 for permanence to this toleration lies in the con- 
 tinuance of an enlarged comprehension of Christianity. 
 Toleration so comj^lete exists in no other country, and 
 can only be sustained here by the- moral force of these 
 enlarged views. There is no denomination now in 
 the United States which would, if completely in the 
 ascendant, grant a toleration so large as that we now 
 enjoy. This religious liberty, then, is a more enlarged 
 conception than that of any one church. It is the 
 spirit of Christianity which reigns over all of them 
 v/hich dictates it. Should not this spirit, this ''ge- 
 neral Christianity," as it is termed by Judge Duncan, 
 be cherished, taught, and inculcated ujDon the people, 
 and upon their children, as an essential feature of our 
 civil polity, and necessary to its continuance ? It is 
 needful, even in the estimation of the unbeliever ; for 
 he has no security for his freedom of opinion and of 
 speech, but in that generous toleration which springs 
 from enlarged Christian views ? 
 
 If souls are saved in the Methodist Church, in the 
 Baptist, in the Episcopalian, in the Presbyterian 
 Churches, are they saved in each Church by those 
 doctrines which are regarded as peculiar to each? 
 Or are they saved by that faith which is common to 
 them all ? If the latter, what must be said of those 
 
IN" THE UNITED STATES. 85 
 
 who are greater sticklers for the differences — the pe 
 cuUarities — than they are for the saving truths upon 
 which all are agreed ? If men will only take care of 
 the great outer boundaries of their lands, they may 
 remove their division fences without any injury to 
 the fertility or productiveness of the soil ; indeed, the 
 land of any district might be worked with greater 
 advantage without the usual lines of separation, if 
 the owners could only agree. In matters of property 
 this divisional selfishness may be excusable, but 
 should the same spirit pervade the churches ? Is the 
 grace of God and the word of God to be hedged in by 
 such lines ? Should we be unwilling to save souls, 
 unless they are first made Baptists or Presbyterians ? 
 After the great denominations have done all they can, 
 in their separate churches, can they not unite to oc- 
 cupy that vast region which lies outside of all ? If 
 they refuse or neglect, on the ground of their differ- 
 ences, then they exalt their differences above that 
 simple faith in Christ which enures to eternal life. 
 
 The Siniday School Union might, by a generous 
 support from the principal Churches of the country, 
 be placed in a position of vast power to do good. We 
 have seen, however, within a few years, many proofs 
 of a disposition to withhold from it all help and all 
 countenance. The tendency recently has been visibly 
 and unduly to separate action. 
 
 We are, however, not the advocate of any joarticular 
 institution or any particular plan ; our position is, 
 that the Christianity which is common to the Evan- 
 gelical denominations, is immeasurably more important 
 than that which is in dispute between them. It is. 
 
86 THE POSITION OF CHRISTIANITY 
 
 therefore, the duty of Christians in the United States, 
 to teach this common Christianity to the youth of the 
 country and to all those whom the ordinary range of 
 denominational effort cannot reach. And should not 
 all Churches unite in this effort, by sustaining amply 
 every institution and enterprise having this object in 
 view ? Christianity is of so liberal and expansive a 
 nature, that judged by its true spirit, intense denomi- 
 nationalism, to which there is so strong an inclination 
 and of which so many examples are multiplying before 
 our eyes, is little less sinful than intense selfishness. 
 They spring from a common source and may possibly 
 incur a common condemnation. We doubt not, how- 
 ever, that the motive is often better than the deed. 
 
 If Christianity in a certain sense is the law of the 
 land, and if in that sense it must be sustained and 
 taught as a part of our civil polity, it becomes an im- 
 perative Christian, as well as civil duty, to define in 
 what sense it is the law of the land and how it is to 
 be inculcated. This duty cannot be ascertained nor 
 fulfilled through any denominational agency. It is a 
 duty which belongs to the community of Christian 
 citizens and not to any family or denomination. No 
 intelligent Christian need be asked whether our 
 present civil polity would be safe if Christianity were 
 banished from the land ; and we may add, if human 
 nature remains the same, it would scarcely be safer 
 under the domination of any single sect. Power and 
 wealth are too corrupting not to exhibit their effects 
 rapidly in any community where they are exercised 
 without sufficient restraint. The purity of our na- 
 tional character and of our profession of Christianity, 
 
IN THE UNITED STATES. 87 
 
 is secured mainly under Providence by our manifold 
 divisions — territorial, legislative, administrative, civil 
 and religious. All these form so many mutual barriers 
 and restraints, so many limitations of power, so many 
 safe-guards of our liberties and of our national virtue. 
 
 SECTION X. 
 
 Special questions for the consideration of Christians in the United 
 
 States. 
 
 TnEEE are great public duties then incumbent on 
 the Christians of the United States and upon such 
 citizens as acknowledge Christian obligations. They 
 cannot, without a grave dereliction of Christian duty, 
 confine all their love of country, all their zeal for 
 humanity, all their efforts for the extension of the 
 Eedeemer's Kingdom, to the narrow sphere of denomi- 
 national action; they must turn their eyes to the 
 whole country and to its whole population, to ascer- 
 tain what additional obligations lie upon them in 
 reference to the entire social domain, in its civil as 
 well as in its religious aspects. We have already in- 
 timated, that one duty of this kind met our fathers i"n 
 their first steps under our present institutions — that 
 of ascertaining and defining the legal and social posi- 
 tion of Christianity. This subject has received so 
 little attention, compared with its importance, that it 
 may be regarded as yet to be performed. It is true, 
 
88 THE POSITION OF CHRISTIANITY 
 
 great light has occasionally been shed upon it and 
 well defined opinions upon it have from time to time 
 emanated from our judiciary, the j)urest of our civil 
 institutions ; but this light has not been concentrated, 
 and these opinions have not yet been arranged and 
 examined, with a view to determine their bearing 
 and to ascertain how much of the field is explored, 
 and how much and what joortions remain to be sur- 
 veyed. The work has been long delayed, and whilst 
 the field has been unoccupied the unfriendly and the 
 thoughtless have entered and sown broadcast the 
 seeds of error. The delay has, however, furnished 
 some valuable material and a large fund of observation 
 and experience. If our fathers had, at the first, en- 
 gaged earnestly in the adjustment of this question, 
 they would have saved much mischief and forestalled 
 many wrong conclusions, though they had lacked 
 many materials for safe and wise determination. It 
 has been regarded as a dehcate subject ; politicians 
 were afraid of it, sectarians felt no concern in it, and 
 the judges alone have brought to it any degree of 
 courage and intelligence. 
 
 Without pretending to point out even the main 
 duties which press most strongly on the Christian 
 citizens of the United States, we indicate three as of 
 urgent importance. 
 
 First : To discuss, define and settle the true position 
 of Christianity in the United States, thereby showing 
 what Christians may and should do here for the 
 benefit of men, without departing from the principles 
 of toleration which pervade all our institutions. 
 
 /Second : To determine, prescribe and carry into 
 operation that system of public education, including 
 
IN THE UNITED STATES. 89 
 
 ample religious iDstruction, which is best fitted to 
 prepare the rising generation for the discharge of all 
 the social duties which are to devolve upon them, for 
 the wisest and most efficient administration of our 
 free institutions, for human advantage, and for that 
 perpetuation and improvement of them which is so 
 important to the future destinies of the human family. 
 
 Third : To consider, understand and establish the 
 claims of labor. The masses of men here, as else- 
 where, are laborers, working out the sentence which 
 dooms man to eat his bread in the sweat of his brow. 
 Vast multitudes are poor, and are often in danger of 
 not finding the labor which will enable them to earn 
 any bread. These men and their families, and their 
 cause, should be one of the chief objects of considera- 
 tion for the Christian citizens of the United States. 
 
 The first of these topics has been the chief subject 
 of the foregoing pages : the last we reserve for a future 
 paper. Our remaining remarks wilt be upon the 
 subject of Public Education. 
 
 SECTION XI. 
 
 Public Education ia the United States considered in its civil and 
 religious aspects. Religious instruction in the Public Schools. 
 
 It would be strange indeed if special responsibilities 
 Avere not entailed upon the Christian citizens of the 
 United States on the subject of public education. 
 Christian parents are always and every where under 
 heavy obligations to train their chiklren properly. 
 
90 THE POSITION OF CHRISTIANITY 
 
 Not only the same obligations which press upon all 
 Christian parents, rest upon them here, but many that 
 are entirely new and peculiar to the position of Chris- 
 tianity in this country. There is, indeed, a training 
 of the young in Christian families which is indis^Den- 
 sable, as far as it can be secured, and is the same 
 every where. Then there is that training for active 
 and useful life which is equally indispensable, and not 
 merely a private but a public consideration. 
 
 The nation which makes the welfare of its citizens 
 a primary object, is just as much bound to care for 
 the education of the young, as are the respective 
 parents of the children. The duty of the joarent 
 stands first ; if that is neglected, the State is in loco 
 ■jparentis. As one generation passes away, the whole 
 concerns of a peo23le are to be committed to the gene- 
 ration that follows. In proportion to the importance 
 of the concerns to be thus committed to a coming 
 generation should their preparation be, who are 
 to assume these responsibilities. If our civil and 
 social institutions have such a value as we have as- 
 sumed them to have, and as they are expected to 
 have ; if our liberty, civil and religious, is worth pre- 
 serving ; if the highest hopes for human destiny are 
 wrapped up in our republican governments ; if Chris- 
 tianity itself is deeply interested in our national virtue 
 and in our national prosperity, for the lessons we may 
 give and the good we may do to the rest of the world, 
 then surely the preparation of our children — all our 
 children — the adequate public^ as well as private 
 training which each succeeding generation should re- 
 ceive, should not fall short of what the whole power 
 and wisdom of the State and the parents can bestow. 
 
IN THE UNITED STATES. 91 
 
 It is a preparation which cannot be left to the action 
 of parents alone, not onlj because it would be 
 unequally and inadequately accomplished, but because 
 to a very large extent it would not be done at all. 
 The State must at least furnish the means and facili- 
 ties which a portion of the parents neglect to supply. 
 
 If education in a country should be at public ex- 
 pense as the most important concern of a state, it 
 should be of universal application and as complete as 
 possible in itself, because the public good dictates it, 
 public safety requires it, and because the Christian 
 principle is that we must love and care for others as 
 well as for ourselves, and of course not deny to the 
 children of others, the benefits we give our own, and 
 least of all, deny to them the message of eternal life, 
 and the benefits of Christian morality. To leave the 
 children committed by their parents to the state, or 
 those wholly neglected by their parents to the chance 
 and motley education, especially in reference to 
 their knowledge of Christianity, which they might or 
 might not receive from their parents or under their 
 direction, would l^e to abandon more than one-half 
 the children of the nation to practical heathenism, to 
 no education or a very imjDcrfect one. The obliga- 
 tions of public and universal education are so gene- 
 rally admitted, that it is scarcely needful to press 
 them. 
 
 In the present state of civilization and national intel- 
 ligence, the question of national instruction for chil- 
 dren cannot be left to the action of parents ; it must 
 be regarded at this day, and probably for a long time 
 to come, as the most indispensable feature of wise 
 national policy in a Christian country, to give all the 
 
92 THE POSITION OF CHRISTIANITY 
 
 children of the nation that trainins; which will fit 
 them for Christian citizenship.* The main problem 
 
 * The following decision of the Supreme Court of Pennsylvania, 
 made at their December term, 1838, in the case of a Habeas Corpus 
 to remove a child from the House of Refuge in Philadelphia, indi- 
 cates very clearly the law of Pennsylvania, in the last resort on this 
 subject of preventive education. 
 
 " To this end, may not the natural parents, when unequal to the 
 task of education, or unworthy of it, be superseded by the parens 
 patrise, or common guardian of the community? It is to be re- 
 membered that the public has a paramount interest in the virtue 
 and knowledge of its members, and that, of strict right, the business 
 of education belongs to it. That parents are ordinarily intrusted 
 with it, is because it can seldom be put into better hands : but where 
 they are incompetent or corrupt, what is there to prevent the public 
 from withdrawing their faculties, held, as they obviously are, at 
 its suffering ? The right of parental control is a natural but not an 
 unalienable one. It is not excepted hi/ the Declaration of Rights 
 out of the suhjects of ordinary legislation ; and it consequently re- 
 mains subject to the ordinary legislative power, ichich, if wantonly 
 or inconveniently itsed, would soon he constitutionally restricted, hut 
 the competency of ichich, as the government is constituted, cannot he 
 douhfed. As to abridgment of indefeasible rights by confinement of 
 the person, it is no more than what is borne, to a greater or less 
 extent, in every school ; and wc know of no natural right to exemp- 
 tion fi-om restraints which conduce to an infant's welfare. Nor is 
 there a doubt of the propriety of their application in the particular 
 instance. The infant has been snatched from a course which must 
 have ended in confirmed depravity ; and, not only is the restraint of 
 her person lawful, but it would be an act of extreme cruelty to re- 
 lease her from it." 
 
 In a similar case, the Chief Justice of another state, holds this 
 language : 
 
 " How deeply does it concern the community, to take these little 
 creatures by the hand, when they shall have committed the first 
 oiTence — withdraw them from contamination and guilt — provide the 
 means of industry and education — soften their minds to the recep- 
 tion of moral and religious truth — and gradually, by gentle treat- 
 
IN THE UNITED STATES. 93 
 
 is to deteraiine what is to be the nature of this edu- 
 cation, and how it is to be administered. 
 
 The highest wisdom of the country, the utmost 
 Christian penetration is little enough to prescribe the 
 course of instruction which should be given to our 
 youth. They grow up together in the midst of the 
 same social advantages and liberties, to administer 
 and obey the same laws, to use aright or abuse the 
 powers entrusted to them, to fulfil the social duties 
 which Providence and their position has imposed 
 upon them, or to fail at once in their duty to Heaven, 
 to themselves, and to their fellow-men, disappointing 
 the fondest hopes of the friends of humanity through- 
 out the world. If we are right in our estimate of the 
 responsible position of the citizens of the United 
 States, we cannot be mistaken in taking a high 
 standard for the education due to their children. 
 
 ment and wholesome discipline, lure them into the habits of order, 
 truth, and honesty. Is there any greater duty in a Christian country 
 than this ? Is it not plucking brands from the burning, and saving 
 souls from death ? Is it not the cheapest and the best way of pre- 
 serving the peace and tranquillity of the community, and guarding 
 the fruits of industry ?" 
 
 If the duty of the State to pluck these little brands from the burn- 
 ing be so strong and apparent, is it not equally its duty to search for 
 the origin of the evil, and endeavor to sweeten the fountain of these 
 bitter waters ? Can it be, as some have asserted who ought to know 
 better, that the duty of the State is simply the administration of 
 justice, — to punish offenders but not to hinder the offence, — to stand 
 immovable while the murder is in progress and then hang the mur- 
 derer ? Such doctrines flatly contravene the theory of our govern- 
 ment, the spirit of our institutions, social and political, and the whole 
 policy of our legislation. Government in the United States is no 
 mere negation. It is still the depository of vast powers unexercised ; 
 it is for the people to call them into exercise whenever it can be done 
 for public benefit. 
 
94 THE POSITION OF CHRISTIANITY 
 
 Our fathers were trained in a severe school, in 
 which with minds chastened by hardship they be- 
 came rich in experience, both civil and religious. 
 They have bequeathed to us our present position 
 in the world and our social institutions, — the admi- 
 ration of all people ; their preparation for a task so 
 successfully performed, was providential; our training 
 or preparation for carrying on the great work of 
 human amelioration which they began, should be 
 specially designed and wisely adapted to the great 
 objects in view. We can scarcely imagine any 
 human position in which a whole generation of the 
 young, upon whom the highest qualifications which 
 a proper training can bestow had been conferred, 
 could render such real service to the whole human 
 family, as in the United States. There is here, then, 
 every inducement which the world can afford, for 
 conferring upon the young all the qualifications and 
 fitness which education can give. The same reasons 
 which evince its importance, prove that this education 
 should be provided for all the children. 
 
 It is well kno^vn that the opinions of a large pro- 
 portion of our intelligent people are in favor of a high 
 grade of education; few schools have, in fact, yet 
 reached the results which this large majority regard 
 as desirable and attainable. It is very clear, indeed, 
 that the desired result, for the entire population, can 
 never be reached by any power, or any means, short 
 of those only which can be employed by the State. 
 The disjointed and unequal efforts, and the differing 
 opinions of parents and Christian denominations, will 
 ever stand in the way of any thorough and effective 
 
IN THE UNITED STATES. 95 
 
 system of education independent of the State; the 
 public at large, for there can be no other, is the 
 proper umpire of these differences, the proper medium 
 of concerted action, and the only adequate repository 
 of power. There is no other resort in cases where 
 the parents refuse or are unable to educate their 
 children, or where they are disposed to educate them 
 in a manner wholly inconsistent with our institutions. 
 There may be some disposed to question the 
 Legislative power of our States to enforce the edu- 
 cation of children. A little consideration will con- 
 vince any one that there is no lack of power, when 
 the people desire their representatives to employ it.* 
 It may be a question of expediency whether a com- 
 pulsory system should not be adopted, applicable to 
 all who neglect to educate or to send their children 
 to public schools. In one aspect, compulsory attend- 
 ance upon schools may seem repugnant to our national 
 prejudices. We know not whether any such system 
 exists in the United States; that generally adopted 
 leaves to parents the option of sending their children 
 to the public schools, private schools of their own 
 selection, or to no schools at all. It is evident that 
 this is but the first step in a system of public instruc- 
 tion. It is perhaps safest, as well as most expedient, 
 at present, in this country, to leave the parents to a 
 choice between the public schools and those of their 
 own selection. It cannot be admitted here as either 
 sound or safe doctrine, that children may go wholly 
 uneducated, if their parents neglect to avail them- 
 selves of the public schools. If the government of a 
 
 * As to the Legislative power over children, and the right of 
 instruction, see note, ante, p. 92. 
 
96 THE POSITION OF CHRISTIANITY 
 
 State lias the power to prevent crime as well as punish 
 it ; if it has the power to check youthful delinquency 
 as well as punish it, then the question being in what 
 circumstances and at what age the neglected child 
 shall come under supervision of public authority, it 
 cannot be difficult to decide that the State may place 
 the child at a public school before it becomes necessary 
 to place it in a prison, house of refuge, or house of 
 correction or detention. A shrewd Scotsman advises 
 his countrymen rather to pay £30 to educate a child 
 than <£oOO to try, imprison, punish, or transport a 
 criminal offender. 
 
 Crime will ever be encountered, in every system of 
 society, amongst the educated as well as the ignorant; 
 but that a proper education is a preventive is as sus- 
 ceptible of proof as any other fact. It is well known, 
 too, that it is far more economical to prevent crime 
 than to punish it ; but, if not more economical, what 
 considerations, or what obstacles, should stand in the 
 way of the preventive process, as a public measure, 
 compared with the punishing process ? On the one 
 hand, we have all the advantage of making indus- 
 trious and virtuous citizens, and on the other, all the 
 disadvantages of having a horde of idle and crimmal 
 vagabonds, to grow up and crowd our prisons and 
 penitentiaries for offences against life and property. 
 No one can estimate the real evil to a country of such 
 a population ; and certainly no one should object to 
 nipping such an evil in the bud, if needful, by a com- 
 pulsory attendance upon the public schools. There 
 should be no hesitation between a prison and a school ; 
 ignorance is crime enough to justify puljlic interven- 
 tion and an enforced education. 
 
IN THE UNITED STATES. 97 
 
 SECTION" XII. 
 
 The kind of Education necessary, &c. — The Objections of the Hierarchy. 
 
 It may be said however, after all, that the sound- 
 ness of these conclusions depends on the kind of 
 education which is contemplated; and it may be 
 inquired whether any adequate education can be 
 imparted in a public school. These considerations 
 are certainly met by the fact that, in very many 
 respects, the best schools in the United States are 
 public schools. This superiority extends to many 
 departments of public education, and furnishes abun- 
 dant reason to believe that these schools may, by 
 proper effort of proper persons, be raised to a degree 
 of perfection and efficiency scarcely conceived at the 
 present time. 
 
 The objection that education in the public schools 
 must always be defective because there can be in them 
 no religious instruction is simply begging a great 
 question. Our first reply to it is, that the Christian 
 instruction imparted there must be exactly that which 
 the Christian citizens of the United States determine 
 it shall be ; neither more nor less ; for, within certain 
 limits, they have power over the whole subject. As 
 great misconception prevails on this subject, and as it 
 requires, perhaps, some reflection to place it in its 
 true light, we shall devote to it a few remarks, in the 
 hope of provoking abler pens to the task of vindi- 
 cating the Christian character of our public schools. 
 
 We deny emphatically that instruction in Chris- 
 tianity should be excluded from our public schools. 
 7 
 
98 THE POSITION" OF CHRISTIANITY 
 
 We aver with confidence, that there is a pecuUar pro- 
 priety and necessity that the scliools of a Christian 
 people should be Christian schools. We have shown 
 ^ by the highest authority, that Christianity is an ele- 
 ment in the law of the country ; that our civilization 
 is Christian civilization ; that the morality which is 
 the basis of our legislation, and of our whole social 
 system, is Christian morality; that the toleration 
 which we have established among ourselves, and 
 extend to all who come among us, is Christian tolera- 
 tion ; that the oath or affirmation which is the security 
 for all official faithfulness, from the highest office in 
 the land to the lowest, and the guarantee of truthful- 
 ness for all judicial evidence, is an appeal to the 
 Christian's God ; that the days of fasting and prayer, 
 and the days of thanksgiving, which are from time to 
 time appointed by our rulers, are acts of national 
 homage to the God of Christians ; that the Chaplains 
 appointed for our Legislative bodies and for the Army 
 and Navy, and the compulsory attendance of soldiers 
 and sailors upon public worship, required by law, are 
 a national acknowledgment of God. With these facts 
 in view, is it not a monstrous act of national impiety 
 to deny all this knowledge to the children in the 
 public schools, and all the reasons for this national 
 ^ homage to Christianity ? 
 
 There has never been a more suicidal position taken 
 by the most unwise of our politicians or statesmen, or 
 the worst of our internal foes, than this exclusion of 
 Christianity from public education. The worst enemy 
 of humanity could not have devised a doctrine more 
 dangerous to our republican institutions. It is fortu- 
 nately too absurd, too monstrous, too unthankful, to 
 
IN" THE UNITED STATES. 99 
 
 take deep and lasting root in American soil. On a 
 subject of such moment, frankness is, indeed, a posi- 
 tive Christian duty. It is not of American origin. It 
 is the Papal doctrine of education for the United 
 States ; though not the Papal doctrine in Papal coun- 
 tries. Where Papal doctrine is complete or greatly 
 preponderates, the education of the children is claimed 
 by the Church as her prerogative, and she gives them 
 a training strictly religious, according to the tenets 
 of the Papal Church. In the United States this 
 Church is the first and chief, if not the only objector, 
 to religious instruction in our public schools. 
 
 This is the asjDect of the subject which has perhaps 
 most deterred inquirers from engaging in it. But the 
 subject is of such importance, and freedom of speech 
 is so indispensable to its proper treatment, that it 
 argues want of manliness to yield a truth vital to our 
 religious and political system, for want of courage to 
 assert it. We are by no means insensible to the 
 many faults of Protestantism, taken collectively ; we 
 have dwelt upon these faults with sorrow, if not with 
 indignation ; yet we feel bound to affirm, that the 
 toleration of which we have spoken as so remarkable 
 a characteristic of our civil institutions, is Protestant 
 toleration, an emanation of Protestant Christianity. 
 We cheerfully concede, that the Catholic laymen of 
 this country are as truly patriotic and faithful to the 
 country as other citizens ; but the constitution of that 
 Church did not grow up in our free atmosphere. It 
 is the product of ecclesiastical and aristocratic power ; 
 it is still oristocratic in its government and irrecon- 
 cilable with the theory of our civil polity in many 
 important respects. The Church of Rome holds all 
 
100 THE POSITION OF CHRISTIANITY 
 
 without its pale to be heretics ; and under its present 
 constitution it neither can nor ever will, adopt or 
 concede the principle of toleration ; it may practise 
 toleration from expediency, it may accept and use it 
 as a boon or a stepping-stone to power; it cannot 
 yield it as a principle. 
 
 Let it be mentioned to the honor of a noble 
 Catholic, Lord Baltimore, that he was the first upon 
 this continent to set the example of toleration ; but 
 he was not an Ecclesiastic, and did not, in so doing, 
 represent the spirit or laws of his Church, or even 
 secure its approbation. '•"■ There are thousands, nay 
 millions, of intelligent Catholic laymen who would at 
 this day, if free from Ecclesiastical influence, be as 
 ready to promote toleration and freedom of religious 
 worship as those of any Protestant denomination. 
 
 The position we take is, that the Papal Church 
 is in its very essence, as its organs sometimes frankly 
 avow, adverse to all religious toleration. In this 
 respect it is, by its very constitution, adverse to our 
 political institutions. The Christianity which, in a 
 certain limited sense, is the law of the laud, is Pro- 
 testant Christianity : because, in its main feature, its 
 chief characteristic, it is directly opposed to a leading 
 doctrine of the Catholic Church. 
 
 Our State Constitutions are so many legal warrants 
 for heresy; they expressly declare that men may 
 worship God as they please, and guarantee to them 
 this right. In doing this, no Protestant principle is 
 violated, but one of the most binding laws of the 
 Papal Church is flatly contravened. So strongly does 
 this Church condemn heresy, that is, dissent from 
 * See Brownson's Review, October 1852, p. 453. 
 
IN THE UNITED STATES. 101 
 
 Papal practices and doctrines, that the oath prescribed 
 to its Bishops on their ordination, contains a clause 
 enjoining persecution. : " Hceretlcos schismaticos et 
 rehelles eidem Domino nostro vel successorihus pi'cedictis 
 pro posse persequar et impugnabo!^ Heretics, schis- 
 matics, and rehels to our lord (the Pope) and his 
 successors I icill as far as I am able, persecute and 
 attack. There is, consequently, no country in which, 
 the Catholic Church is in full power, where men are 
 permitted to worship God according to the dictates of 
 their consciences ; and few, if any, where they are 
 not at this day persecuted and refused even the right 
 of sepulture in a Catholic cemetery. AVe are sensible 
 that there is much intolerance among Protestants, 
 and there is no Protestant denomination which could 
 be safely trusted with the power wielded in a manner 
 so unchristian by the Papal Hierarchy. 
 
 It is a significant fact, that the only State in our 
 Union which has neither granted nor guaranteed 
 liberty of worship to all its citizens, is Louisiana. 
 How far that remarkable omission is due to Papal 
 influences in a State in which the Catholic Church is 
 so influential, it should not be difficult to ascertain. 
 It is desirable to know whether it be due to Hierar- 
 chical influence, to party truckling, or to recreant 
 Protestantism. 
 
 The Papal Hierarchy then holds a principle, which 
 when carried out, comes directly in conflict with one 
 of the grandest features of our civil polity. It is 
 necessary not to overlook this, because the Papacy goes 
 steadil}^, by a determination which never varies, and 
 a perseverance which never flags, to the establish- 
 ment of her dominion over all other authority. In 
 
102 THE POSITION OF CHRISTIANITY 
 
 doing so, her Ecclesiastics are but pursuing the spirit 
 and laws of her system ; she claims to have an infal- 
 lible Head, and may therefore very consistently claim 
 precedence over all other authorities. Infallibility 
 itself, as a claim upon the part of a church, is opposed 
 to the spirit of our political system, which necessarily 
 submits very many questions of Christian import, as 
 that of toleration, for instance, to the decision of the 
 people or their representatives. These two great 
 features of the Papacy are inconsistent with our re- 
 publicanism, and this truth should be looked in the 
 face, not because that church menaces our national 
 existence, but because the collision of these opposing 
 principles must soon or late occur, and we should not 
 only prepare for the contest, but we should, by way 
 of prevention, let our position be understood. 
 
 There is, however, another reason for taking this 
 view ; it enables us to comprehend what is not gene- 
 rally understood, that the freedom of worship and 
 the rights of conscience do not and cannot exist with- 
 out limitation. The Papal claims of ascendencj', 
 persecution and infallibility, cannot be allowed under 
 any claim of conscience or liberty of worship, for they 
 are dangerous to the peace and safety of the state. 
 The principle of limiting religious rights to those 
 which are consistent with our national policy, is the 
 more needful to be understood and insisted upon, be- 
 cause it may be necessary to apply it against religious 
 usurpations by Protestants and others, as well as 
 Romanists. It is necessarj^ to the existence of our 
 national and state governments, that they should be 
 as fully endowed with the power of self-preservation 
 on the side of religion, as upon any other side. Self- 
 
IN THE UNITED STATES. 103 
 
 preservation is as much a law of national as of indi- 
 vidual life ; and danger to national existence may 
 come in the shape of Ecclesiastical usurpation, Pro- 
 testant as well as Papal. 
 
 When we speak of the Papal Church, we mean 
 the Catholic Hierarchy, and not the religion of 
 the Catliolic people of the United States; for this 
 Hierarchy claims power and maintains principles 
 which have nothing in common with the religion of 
 the laity. The property of the Church is held by 
 this Hierarchy, and though many attempts have been 
 made by the Catholic congregations of this country, 
 to keep in their own hands and manage their own 
 real estate, their claim has been steadfastly resisted 
 and overruled; a virtual admission that their laymen 
 cannot be relied upon for implicit obedience to the 
 Hierarchy, or that the claims of the Hierarchy to 
 absolute control are not to be modified, even in com- 
 pliment to American institutions. Its selfish policy 
 is unchanging; because it is ihe fiat of infallibility, 
 it looks, as the proper result of its labors, to the con- 
 quest and absorption of all other authority, and to 
 the conversion to that Church of all now devoted to 
 other forms of Christianity, or to their extirpation as 
 heretics, or to their complete subjugation as rebels 
 against that Church. 
 
 The Christianity which is acknowledged by the 
 United States as a nation, is that of the Old and New 
 Testament, — the Bible. All denominations of Pro- 
 testants receive this Bible as the rule of their faith ; 
 they do not coincide in all points in its interpretation, 
 but by a generous concession among themselves, and 
 by a generous offer to all who desire to live among 
 
104 THE POSITION OF CHRISTIANITY 
 
 them, they agree to establish a religious toleration 
 so liberal and so ample, that men of every faith, and 
 even no faith may live under it unmolested. This tole- 
 ration, we repeat, so far from being an abandonment, 
 is an exercise of one of the noblest traits of Chris- 
 tianity. Protestants, differing widely on many par- 
 ticulars, make this concession to religious differences, 
 as they compromised also their political differences, 
 and they offer the advantage of this wise concession 
 to all the world beside. The Papal Hierarchy ac- 
 cepts this toleration, flourishes and grows under it, 
 but it makes no concession, and yields not a particle 
 of its enormous claims. It pushes forward with an 
 unswerving pace to that full domination which, ac- 
 cording to its principles, is its rightful destiny. It is 
 contrary to its nature to make a compromise ; it may 
 submit to necessity or yield to a power it cannot con- 
 quer, but it steadfastly refuses any compromise, and 
 will not abate one iota of its infallibility. It cannot, 
 therefore, adopt the very first and most important 
 principle of our institutions in the United States. 
 
 Offensive as are these principles, they are not too 
 odious for our national toleration, so long as they are 
 not manifested in overt acts, dangerous to the peace 
 and safety of the state. We can look upon our 
 Catholic fellow-citizens with the same friendly feeling 
 that we look upon other denominations; tliey are 
 Americanized, and partake of the spirit of our social 
 system with its mutual concessions and compromises ; 
 we can extend to the Hierarchy, very few of whom 
 are really citizens of the United States, and all of 
 whom owe special and higher allegiance to the Pope, 
 than they owe to this country, the same toleration 
 
IN THE UNITED STATES. 105 
 
 we extend to others. Our national — our Christian 
 duty, forbids the extension of that toleration one 
 point beyond where the interests of the country and 
 of Christianity require us to stop. 
 
 If we have succeeded in conveying to our readers, 
 our own conviction of what is due to the present and 
 coming generations of children in our republics, of 
 the civil and rehgious obligations which will rest 
 upon these children when they arrive at maturity, 
 and of the facilities for doing good then to be enjoyed, 
 they cannot fail to see that the church or denomina- 
 tion, which opposes religious instruction in the public 
 schools, is at war with our institutions, with our civili- 
 zation, and with the public peace and safety. That 
 Bible, upon which the largest portion of the judicial 
 oaths of the United States are administered, that 
 Bible, which is the fountain of our Christianity, and 
 which our whole system, civil and religious, assumes 
 to be the Word of God, is the Bible which should be 
 held up to the children in our public schools, an- 
 nounced to be a Revelation from the Most High, the 
 will of God, the Old and New Testament of Chris- 
 tianity. It should be taught to the children to that 
 extent, and in that way, which an enlightened and 
 liberal piety would dictate. 
 
 The Bible is not a sectarian book in the eyes of 
 Protestants, all their differences arise in its interpre- 
 tation ; it is not sectarian in the estimation of that 
 Christianity which is an element of our national and 
 social and legal systems. There must be a knowledge 
 of the contents of the Bible which is not sectarian. 
 Such is plainly the opinion of the Supreme Court of 
 the United States in the case on Girard's Will, above 
 
106 THE POSITION OF CHRISTIANITY 
 
 referred to. Justice Story, admitting that sectarian 
 religious instruction cannot be given in Girard College, 
 proceeds thus : " Why may not the Bible, and espe- 
 cially the New Testament, without note or comment, 
 be read and taught as a divine revelation, in the Col- 
 lege — its general precepts expounded, its evidences 
 exjjlained, and its glorious principles of morality incul- 
 cated ? What is there to prevent a work not sectarian 
 upon the general evidences of Christianity, from being 
 read and taught in the College by its lay-teachers ?" 
 
 All Protestants unite in the circulation of the Bible 
 without note or comment, because in their view, it 
 contains the whole message of salvation to men, in the 
 hope that the reading of God's word may alone lead 
 men to consider what belongs to their eternal interests 
 and to make their peace with Heaven. No de- 
 nominational jealousy is exhibited among Protestants 
 when men read the Bible without a clerical expositor 
 at their side ; neither can they feel an}^ when it is 
 read to, or by the children, in the public school ; nor 
 when its contents are explained without any view to 
 those special theological distinctions which mark the 
 lines of separation between Churches. 
 
 The Protestant denominations do not hold that 
 there is no salvation except within the pale of some 
 one of their various Churches ; they do not deny that 
 a man may attain, by the knowledge of the Bible 
 alone, to the hope of a happy eternity, although he 
 may know nothing of the lines of demarcation between 
 the various Churches. Without undervaluing theology 
 or denominational distinctions, which bespeak higher 
 attainments in, or minuter knowledge of the Scrip- 
 tures ; there is then a knowledge, a saving knowledge, 
 
IN THE UNITED STATES. 107 
 
 ■whicli may not partake of a sectarian cliaracter. It 
 is in this very simple but comprehensive sense that 
 Christianity is the rehgion of the country, that it is 
 an element of our common law, that it speaks in the 
 various Constitutions of the States, declaring religious 
 liberty and securing freedom of worship and the rights 
 of conscience. Whatever value denominations may 
 attach to their exclusive tenets, and whatever force 
 may be given to truth from their respective points of 
 view, and whatever vigor of action may be attainable 
 by such special associations of Christians holding the 
 same doctrines, there is nevertheless what Judge 
 Duncan calls a "general Christianity," derived from 
 the Scriptures, under the light of which men may be 
 saved. All truly good men of every Church, whilst 
 they look upon their own system as the safest and 
 best, yet rejoice as much over the sinner who repents 
 with a knowledge of the Bible only, as if he repent 
 with the aid of the catechism and the creed and clerical 
 teaching. How unbecoming, how unchristian ! to 
 sneer, as some do, at any form of Christianity by 
 whicli men may be saved; to scorn the only form 
 of Christianity which the free circulation of the Bible 
 can produce among those who have no access to de- 
 nominational teaching. 
 
 We have been minute upon this point, to bring 
 out more clearly the distinction between our Pro- 
 testant, or American system of Christianity, and that 
 avowed by the Papal Hierarchy. It is of vital con- 
 sequence to our political system that this distinction 
 be understood and its bearings comprehended. The 
 Papal system denies that men can be saved out of the 
 pale of that Church ; it denies the principle of tolera- 
 
108 THE POSITION OF CHRISTIANITY 
 
 tion ; it acknowledges no other Church ; it makes no 
 concession nor compromise ; it claims to have an in- 
 fallible head, in the Pope, and not only refuses to 
 accept the Bible as the chief expositor of Christianity, 
 but objects to its circulation and perusal among its 
 own people, and strenuously resists its introduction 
 into the public schools. This issue between the 
 country and the Papacy has long since been made up; 
 it should long since have been decided. The hesita- 
 tion and the ignorance displayed upon this question 
 are equally disgraceful to us. 
 
 Oar republican system demands intelligence, with 
 moral and religious training, to fit citizens for the dis- 
 charge of their responsible duties ; it demands an open 
 Bible, a "general Christianity," freedom of opinion 
 and liberty of worship ; it demands what the Papacy 
 regards and denounces as heresies, and what its prin- 
 ciples and laws require it to punish as such where it 
 has the power, and what it does punish as such where 
 it has the power. We cannot avoid, and should not 
 postpone, the great questions now pending between 
 our national system and the Papacy. The latter is a 
 positive, active, jDcrvading s^-stem ; if we retreat, it 
 pursues and occupies our position ; if we neglect to go 
 forward, it blocks our way. Ours may be a positive, 
 pervading system, if we make it so. We have not 
 the advantage of that singleness of purpose and s^DCcial 
 energy which belongs to the action of a single body 
 or church ; but we should have the advantage of 
 larger and more liberal views, greater intelligence 
 and greater moral power, from acting in harmony 
 witli our own institutions, if our various Churches 
 were to unite their wisdom and eneroies for national 
 
IN THE UNITED STATES. 109 
 
 purposes, as they might do, without any sacrifice of 
 denominational usefuhiess or success. 
 
 Our American system requires the contents of the 
 Bible to be taught in the public schools, for the reason 
 that Christianity is an element of our political system, 
 and the Bible is the source of Christianity. The Papal 
 system rejects the Bible and its teachings from the 
 public schools, because the Bible endangers their reli- 
 gious system. Shall we carry out our system, or 
 yield and permit the Hierarchy to carry out theirs ? 
 Upon this subject the whole people of this country 
 is arrayed against the Papal Church. If we yield 
 this point, we surrender the principle of toleration 
 and the right of private judgment, and virtually 
 violate a provision contained in the Constitution of 
 nearly every State in the Union — that there shall 
 be no preference given to any church or denomination ; 
 for, by excluding the Bible from the school, at the 
 histance of the Papacy, we give the Papal Church a 
 direct preference, by adopting its system and rejecting 
 our own. 
 
 If we construe the rights of conscience in that un- 
 limited sense which some think the term implies, the 
 Papal system wdll alone sever every bond of union — 
 every obligation of our governments and Constitu- 
 tions, civil and religious. Christianity, as incorpo- 
 rated into our American system, regards the Bible as 
 the only revelation of God's will, and the only mes- 
 sage of eternal lifcj our laws recognize no other 
 Christianity than that of the Bible ; the Papal Church 
 professes to be of equal authority with the Bible, 
 which it regards as only a portion of the direct 
 teaching of God ; the Papacy claims now, and at all 
 
110 THE POSITION OF CHRISTIANITY 
 
 times, to be the hand and the voice of God upon the 
 earth. Our American system not only permits, but 
 secures the right of all men to worship God as they 
 severally prefer ; and this is the American idea of the 
 right of conscience. The Papacy pronounces this to 
 be the right of heresy, as directly in opposition to 
 their religious system, and to their rights of con- 
 science. These contradictions cannot be reconciled. 
 Our American system refers all questions of authority 
 to the people, as the fountain of all our political 
 power ; the Papal system refers all questions of power 
 ultimately to the Church, or its infallible head, by 
 which it professes to decide upon the validity of every 
 power, and upon the validity of every exercise of 
 authority. According to the Papal interpretation of 
 the right of conscience, it is the right to carry out 
 their religious system in all its parts, one chief part 
 of which is to recognize no other Church, and permit 
 no other, for the very good reason, in their view, that 
 no soul can be saved in any other. Christianity, as 
 incorporated in our institutions, involves rights of con- 
 science also, and these involve conscientious obliga- 
 tions to sustain and carry out the only system which 
 gives and secures religious freedom. 
 
 The question then recurs, shall the advocates of 
 religious freedom in the United States insist upon 
 their rights of conscience, or shall they 3'ield and 
 allow the Papal right of conscience to prevail ? We 
 know that many entertain the view which it is one 
 of our chief objects to controvert, that there is 
 no particle of Christianity in our political system, 
 and that, therefore, the right of conscience does not 
 permit us to advance positive claims in behalf of 
 
IN THE UNITED STATES. Ill 
 
 Christianity, but only requires us not to do any thing 
 in the name of Christianity to which any one objects 
 on the score of conscience. Our system is no such 
 absurdity as to be reducible to zero by the conflicting 
 pretensions of either Papal or infidel objectors ; it 
 is a grand, original, expansive, and positive system 
 of Christian toleration, with civil and religious liberty. 
 We are religiously bound to maintain it at every 
 hazard. We cannot retreat and leave a territory 
 occupied by neither party ; we must not proclaim this 
 nation to be Godless ; we cannot say this is no longer 
 a Christian nation ; besides, whatever inch of ground 
 w^e yield will be at once in Papal possession. Their 
 claim already covers all : when we retreat, they are 
 in possession. When their power is great enough to 
 enforce their doctrines, toleration and religious liberty 
 and rights of conscience are at an end. The 
 Papacy tenders no consoling substitute ; not even a 
 modification, or amendment, or counterpart of our 
 American system, civil or religious, but simj^ly the 
 Papal System, of which the world has had, and is now 
 having, such experience as can leave us in no doubt 
 of its qualities. 
 
 In one view there is no discrepancy between the 
 Catholic religion and the Christianity of the United 
 States. The laity of that church can enjoy their 
 rights of conscience, and liberty of worshiji, in perfect 
 harmony with other Christians. It is witli the Eccle- 
 siastical government of that Church that the difficulty 
 began, and that government is wholly in the hands 
 of Ecclesiastics ; their people have no authority nor 
 function in the government of their church. There 
 is, then, no obstacle in the way of Catholic piety or 
 
112 THE POSITION OF CHRISTIANITY 
 
 Catholic worship ; it is the law of the Romish Eccle- 
 siastical government which is at absolute war with 
 our whole system, civil and religious. At present, 
 our system is the strongest and ought to be carried 
 faithfully into effect as the only means of preventing 
 theirs from becoming the strongest, for when it does 
 become the strongest, it will he enforced. Our delicacy 
 forbids us to enforce our rights ; their doctrine and 
 duty commands them to enforce their system. But 
 this is not the chief reason why ours should be carried 
 into effect; if the Christian element be withdrawn, 
 or, what is the same thing, if it is not taught, our 
 social system has no bond ; it becomes subject to the 
 very reproaches which the Papacy fling at us, that we 
 are verging to Paganism, that we have no unity, that 
 we have no common faith. This will, indeed, be our 
 case if we yield before the rights of conscience asserted 
 by others without setting up and maintaining our 
 own — if our devotion to religion is in going back- 
 ward, and not in pressing forward ; if we restrict our- 
 selves to punishing men for blasphemy, for offences 
 against good morals, for vilifying Christianity, and 
 take no note of the spirit of a whole Priesthood which 
 dooms every man professing this religion, which our 
 law protects, to eternal damnation ; which pronounces 
 the Protestants of the United States, constituting 
 nine-tenths of the inhabitants, heretics and schis- 
 matics, undeserving even of Christian burial. The 
 law of Christian toleration requires us, and Christian 
 charitj^ requires us, to give these men a home among 
 us ; but they do not require us to shut our ej-es to 
 these facts ; they do not require us to omit the vindi- 
 cation and teaching of that Christianity which is the 
 
IN THE UNITED STATES. 113 
 
 basis of our whole civil and religious system. If we 
 may punish a man for vilifying Christianity — our 
 Christianity — should we not regard that as an offence 
 in the Hierarchy, when they proclaim that ours is no 
 Christianity at all, and that no soul can, by any pos- 
 sibility, be saved by it ? Which should be the most 
 offensive in our view, the miserable blasphemy, or the 
 priestly denunciation ? 
 
 We do not make such remarks to raise a clamor 
 against the Romish Priesthood, or to call down upon 
 them popular vengeance. Heaven forbid ! Every 
 attack upon the property and lives of Catholics dis- 
 graces and violates our system, and strengthens theirs. 
 Let them have toleration and liberty of worship, with 
 all the civil rights we have to give ; that is our com- 
 pact : but let us be true to ourselves and to the 
 world — true to God ; let us uphold and assert that 
 Ghristianiti/ ivliicli teaches toleration, and secwes liberty 
 of worship. And if we have in the midst of us a 
 powerful and ambitious band of Ecclesiastics, who 
 condemn the system which is our boast, and regard 
 ours as no Christianity ; who would put an end to 
 religious freedom and the right of private judgment, 
 let us meet this formidable enemy only by a more 
 firm and constant vindication of that religious system 
 which we regard as the safest for all men, as well 
 Catholics as Protestants, and which, at any rate, is 
 indispensable to the continuance of our national 
 institutions. 
 
 Let not our friends become more dangerous than 
 our enemies. Let us not betray Protestant Chris- 
 tianity, for upon it depends the validity of the prin- 
 ciples of religious toleration, the rights of conscience, 
 
114 THE POSITION OF CHRISTIANITY 
 
 the right of private judgment, and liberty of worship. 
 If we have no punishment for a s^^stem which denies 
 all these princijDles — and we need none, for these 
 principles imply none — let us at least more faithfully 
 and vigorously propagate that new system of Chris- 
 tianity from which these principles spring, and over- 
 come our enemy by heaping coals of fire upon his 
 head/^ 
 
 SECTION" xm. 
 
 The Policy of Public Schools adopted in the United States. — The 
 necessity of Religious Instruction. — Denominational difficulties. — 
 The Nature of the Religious Instruction to be given in them. 
 
 Public Schools are already the policy of the people 
 of the United States. More than two-thirds of the 
 States have already such schools in operation. Con- 
 gress has provided an ample fund for their sustenance 
 in all the States in which there is public land. Ame- 
 rican schools are spoken of throughout the world, 
 where there is question of public education, as among 
 the best in existence. The adoption of this system 
 of public education by the governments of so many 
 States, and the liberal provision made by Congress, 
 indicate that the sentiments of the people in those 
 States are favorable to the system. We run no risk 
 in saying that the intelligent and evangelical portion 
 of the people have brought about this decision. In 
 point of fact, it is well known that these have been 
 the active friends of the public school system. The 
 
 * See Appendix A. 
 
IN THE UNITED STATES. 115 
 
 people are committed to it; their chief duty, after 
 adopting it, is to make it efficient, and to make it 
 adequate. It is well known that these schools have 
 been improving in every State, and that they are the 
 subject of anxious attention and effort on the part of 
 the various public authorities and Legislatures of the 
 States in which they are in operation. 
 
 Whilst the sentiment of the country has been in 
 favor of public schools offering the advantage of the 
 same education to all, it has also frequently been 
 clearly expressed in various ways, in favor of reli- 
 gious instruction in these schools ; but this has not 
 been carried out as generally and as firmly as its im- 
 portance demanded. Another obstacle kept in the 
 back-ground, has had its influence in retarding the 
 adjustment of this subject of religious education in 
 the public schools. A considerable number of good 
 people, in every denomination of Christians, are afraid 
 to countenance any religious instruction which is not 
 denominational. They hold, that the distinctive fea- 
 tures of their several churches, should be so early 
 graven upon the tender minds of the children, as to 
 be ever after ineffaceable. If their doctrines are 
 sound, and they only adhere to them because they 
 regard them as sound, they cannot be too early, nor 
 too effectually, as they contend, impressed upon the 
 minds of the children. They perceive the difficulty 
 as among themselves, of carrying out such views in 
 the public schools, and they stand aloof from the 
 question of public religious instruction. They desire 
 to see children religiously educated, and earnestly 
 insist upon it, but between their devotion to the prin- 
 ciple of Christian toleration, which they are afraid of 
 
116 THE POSITION OF CHRISTIANITY 
 
 violating, and their devotion to doctrinal distinctions, 
 they stand paralyzed, and permit truth to be sacri- 
 ficed, and the public interests to suffer, and children 
 to go without religious instruction. 
 
 We think that all these difficulties, great as they 
 appear, in a cause involving so many considerations 
 vital to the welfare of our whole country, and indeed 
 of the whole human family, can be surmounted, and 
 should be surmounted. The sj^irit of concession, 
 upon which our institutions are founded, is not yet 
 exhausted; it is just as necessary in the progress of 
 our history, as in its origin. When, as a people, we 
 cease to act in the spirit of our institutions, they will 
 come rapidly to an end. In one sense, it is true there 
 can be no compromise in religious matters; that 
 which is vital to Christianity cannot be surrendered, 
 nor even kept out of view. The Bible cannot be sa- 
 crificed, nor kept out of view, to conciliate prejudices 
 of any, whether priest or infidel. It is the manual of 
 Christianity. We cannot concede that the Bible is a 
 mere human production, because it is of the very 
 essence of Christianity, that the Bible is a revelation 
 from God. Christian toleration, however liberal it 
 may be, assumes and reserves these truths ; it is be- 
 cause the Bible teaches it, that toleration exists. He 
 who commands us to love our neighbor as ourselves, 
 countenances no intolerance, but releases us from no 
 portion of our religious duty. When we come to 
 the interpretation of the Bible, human fallibility in- 
 tervenes, and differences arise. We would not under- 
 value doctrinal distinctions and denominational dif- 
 ferences: they are inevitable, and inseparable from 
 true religious liberty. They are, therefore, in the 
 
IN THE UNITED STATES. 117 
 
 order of Providence, and it is easy to see, that many 
 good results may flow from them, in giving variety 
 and energy to Christian life, and in promoting a spirit 
 of inquiry, with habits of deeper thinking and 
 sharper discrimination. 
 
 But these higher ultimate attainments, though ne- 
 cessary to denominational strength and success, are 
 not indispensable to salvation ; sound theology is re- 
 quisite to those who make any progress in theology : 
 it is necessary for those, whose taste or position leads 
 them to a prolonged study of the Bible, or to deep 
 study in religious subjects. 
 
 How large a majority of our community, and of 
 every other Christian community, stop short of any 
 jDrogress in theology, or any prolonged study of the 
 Bible ! Happily for such, though ignorance is no 
 excuse in our land, the way to salvation is so simple, 
 that he that runs may read, and " wayfaring men, 
 though fools, shall not err therein." Upon how little 
 theological knowledge, after all, throughout the mem- 
 bership of our most intelligent churches, is the faith 
 and hope of many true Christians founded ! Perhaps 
 some of the purest and humblest Christians in the 
 whole country, some, whose faith is the most immov- 
 ably steadfast, are those who know scarce anything 
 but Christ, and Him crucified. It was not among the 
 wise and learned, that Christ found his first and most 
 ardent disciples, and it is evident, that the compre- 
 hension of the Apostles themselves, up to the time 
 of the resurrection of our Lord, was very limited as 
 to many of the truths their Master had inculcated 
 upon them. It is still true, that salvation is possible, 
 and not unfrequent, without knowledge of theology 
 
118 THE POSITION OF CHRISTIANITY 
 
 as a science, and with a very limited knowledge of 
 the contents of the Bible itself j it is still true and 
 proper to say, " Believe on the Lord Jesus Christ, and 
 thou shalt he saved, and thj house," and to this belief 
 it is possible some might attain, whose whole religious 
 instruction has been confined to the four Evangelists. 
 We are not excusing ignorance, nor pleading for it, 
 nor recommending it. We desire an admission of the 
 fact, that remission of sins and the hope of a happy 
 eternity, may be secured even by tliose whose attain- 
 ments are thus limited. If this be so, there is a 
 "general Christianity" in which men may be saved, 
 who belong to no particular denomination, and are 
 instructed in no peculiar tenets. 
 
 We are aware, that earnest and well-informed men 
 of the various churches, regard this idea of general 
 Christian knowledge, as compared with their special 
 views, with a sort of contempt, if not of abhorrence, 
 though they not unfrequently seem to hope, that in- 
 dividuals who have departed this life with no other 
 knowledge, have secured their eternal peace. We 
 think that this contempt or abhorrence, though natu- 
 ral to those whose whole life is spent in defending 
 and teaching peculiar tenets, is highly censurable, if 
 not very sinful. Whilst we may, and should do all 
 we can to propagate our special tenets, if we believe 
 them to be most sound, we should be none the less 
 anxious that men should make their peace with God, 
 even without embracing the minutia) of our own 
 creeds. Whilst we strengthen and defend our own 
 more specific and narrow platform, and induce as 
 many as we can to come upon it, we must neither 
 frown upon, nor discourage those, who are standing 
 
IN THE UNITED STATES. 119 
 
 upon a broader platform, whose lines are less specific, 
 if upon that they can make their peace with Heaven. 
 The simple fact that Protestants admit, that men may 
 be saved in any Christian community in which the 
 essential truths of Christianity are professed, proves 
 that there is a common ground on which all might 
 meet if they would. They may defend their peculiar 
 views with all the pertinacity which they believe to 
 be due to truth, but they should prize far the highest, 
 those truths which are held in common by all true 
 Christians, for such truths must, of necessity, be vital 
 and important. How often, and alas ! how much in 
 vain are Christians exhorted to dwell more upon the 
 points of their agreement, and less upon their differ- 
 ences! We suffer the strictness and exclusiveness 
 of denominational teaching to harden our hearts,'-' and 
 check that union and co-operation of different churches, 
 upon which depends absolutely the success of many 
 of our greatest Christian enterprises. 
 
 '•' I must say, that I consider it infinitely more cha-- 
 racteristic of the religion we profess — the religion of 
 peace and charity — that instead of each denomina- 
 tion sitting aloft and apart on its own hill, and frown- 
 ing upon each other from their respective orbits, they 
 should hold kindly and mutual converse, and see each 
 other eye to eye, while they will discern to their 
 mutual astonishment, if not how thoroughly, at least 
 how substantially, they are at one. Now is the time 
 to rally about the common standard of all that is 
 pure and vital in Protestanism."f We regard the 
 " common standard " here spoken of, as denoting the 
 
 * " Is Christ divided ?" nothing else, is the reply we make, 
 •j" Dr. Chalmers's address to General Assembly of 1843. 
 
120 THE POSITION OF CHRISTIANITY 
 
 same thing which Judge Duncan calls " general Chris- 
 tianity ;" and the same which is intended by Chief 
 Justice Kent, and the same which dictates toleration 
 and liberty of worship, in our various State institu- 
 tions. It has not been defined, vindicated and pro- 
 claimed, because Christians have spent their strength 
 upon these differences, and not upon their agreement. 
 The question then returns, shall not the Chris- 
 tianity of the broader platform by which men may 
 secure remission of sins and peace with God, this gene- 
 ral Christianity which Judges Kent, Duncan and 
 Story, pronounce to be part of the common law of 
 the country, this "common standard" about which 
 Dr. Chalmers called upon his countrymen to rally, 
 this beneficent Christianity which speaks toleration in 
 the constitutions of our States, and invites men of 
 every creed and clime to our shores, our hospitality, 
 and our protection, that Christianity which is the 
 basis of our civilization, the fountain of our morality, 
 the sanction of our official and judicial oaths, that re- 
 ligion which is preached by Chaplains to our various 
 Legislative bodies, and to our Army and Navy, be 
 taught in our schools, and be made known to our chil- 
 dren ? And if not, shall the reason be given that we 
 insist more strenuously upon the points of difference, 
 than upon the points of agreement ; that we are more 
 bent upon the teaching of our peculiarities, than upon 
 the teaching of our essentials ? Shall it be said, to 
 the injury of Christianitj-, that we prefer to have 
 children go without religious instruction, rather than 
 have them instructed in the "common standard?" 
 This spirit, which is a reproach to Christians, is fatally 
 indulcred at this moment throuo;hout this coun- 
 
IN THE UNITED STATES. 121 
 
 try ; let every man who entertains it, examine him- 
 self anew, to see whether he is not forgetting Him, 
 who said, "Suffer little children to come unto me, 
 and forbid them not." This voice should be heard 
 in every school in the land, as it repeats, " Suffer 
 little children to come unto me ;" and no child should 
 grow up w^ithout being taught from whom this invita- 
 tion comes and how deeply he is interested in it. 
 
 SECTION XIV. 
 
 Professor Stowe's Report on Public Schools, made to the Governor of 
 the State of Ohio. "Thoughts on Popular Education." 
 
 We gladly call to our aid a witness who has bestowed 
 the most earnest and enlightened attention upon this 
 subject. Professor C. E. Stowe was appointed by the 
 Governor of the State of Ohio, in 1836, to visit the 
 educational institutions of Europe, and make report 
 of such matters as might appear to him worthy of 
 their attention in Ohio. In speaking of the system 
 of Prussia, which, in his opinion, combined more ad- 
 vantages than any other, he says, among other things, 
 " In regard to the necessity of moral instruction, and 
 the beneficial influence of the Bible in schools, I in- 
 quired of all classes of teachers and men, of every 
 grade of religious faith, instructors in common schools, 
 high schools and schools of art, of professors in col- 
 leges, universities and professional seminaries, in cities 
 and in the country, in places where there was a uni- 
 
122 THE POSITION OF CHRISTIANITY 
 
 formity. and in places where there was a diversity of 
 creeds, of believers and unbelievers, of rationalists 
 and enthusiasts, of Catholics and of Protestants ; and 
 I never found but one reply, and that was, that to 
 leave the moral faculty uninstructed was to leave the 
 most important power of the human mind unde- 
 veloped, and to strip education of almost every thing 
 that can make it valuable ; and that the Bible, inde- 
 pendently of the interest attending it, as containing 
 the most ancient and influential writings ever recorded 
 by human hands, and comprising the religious system 
 of almost the whole of the civilized world, is in itself 
 the best book that can be put into the hands of chil- 
 dren, to interest, to exercise, and to unfold their intel- 
 lectual and moral powers. Every teacher whom I 
 consulted, repelled with indignation, the idea that 
 moral instruction is not proper for schools; and 
 spurned with contempt the allegation, that the Bible 
 cannot be introduced into common schools without 
 encouraging a sectarian bias in the matter of teach- 
 ing; an indignation and contempt which, I believe, 
 will be participated in by every high-minded teacher 
 in Christendom." 
 
 After describing with some particularity, the mode 
 of religious instruction adopted, which embraced a 
 pretty thorough knowledge of the great moral and 
 religious truths of the Bible, its didactic lessons, and 
 its important narratives; the Professor remarks of 
 the system, that " Its morality pure and elevated, its 
 religion entirely removed from the narrowness of sec- 
 tarian bigotry, what parent is there, loving his chil- 
 dren, and wishing to have them respected and haj^py, 
 who would not desire that they should be educated 
 
IN THE UNITED STATES. 123 
 
 under such a kind of moral and religious influence as 
 has been described ? Whether a believer in revela- 
 tion or not, does he not know that without sound 
 morals, there can be no happiness, and that there is 
 no morality like the morality of the New Testament? 
 Does he not know that without religion, the human 
 heart can never be at rest, and that there is no reli- 
 gion like the religion of the Bible ? Every well-in- 
 formed man knows, that as a general fact, it is im- 
 possible to impress the obligations of morality w^ith 
 any efficiency on the heart of a child, or even on that 
 of an adult, without an appeal to some mode which 
 is sustained by the authority of God ; and for what 
 code will it be possible to claim this authority, if not 
 for the code of the Bible ?" 
 
 To very special inquiries addressed to him by Pro- 
 fessor Stow, a distinguished Prussian teacher replied, 
 " In Prussia, we have tried all sorts of ways ; by 
 extracts, by new translations, by commentaries written 
 expressly for schools ; but, after all these trials, there 
 is now but one opinion among all acquainted with the 
 subject, and that is, that the whole Bible, just as it 
 stands in the translations in common use, should be a 
 reading and recitation book in all the schools." 
 
 In regard to the relative importance of public 
 teaching in the European monarchies and our re- 
 publics, the Professor expresses his opinion thus : — 
 " Republicanism can be maintained only by universal 
 intelligence and virtue among the people, and disin- 
 terestedness and fidelity in the rulers. Republics are 
 considered the natural foes to monarchies ; and, when 
 both start up side by side, it is taken for granted that 
 one must supplant the other. Hence their watchful 
 
124 THE POSITION OF CHRISTIANITY 
 
 jealousy of each other. Now. when we see monar- 
 chies strengthening themselves hy such a thorough 
 system of education, secular and religious, as that we 
 have described, are not republics warned to consider 
 whether they are not exposed to double danger from 
 vice and neglected education ? And do not patriotism 
 and the necessity of self-preservation call upon us to 
 do more and better for the education of our whole 
 people than any despotic sovereign can do for his ? 
 Did we stand alone — were there no rival governments 
 on earth — or if we w^ere surrounded by despotisms 
 of degraded and ignorant slaves, like those of the 
 ancient Oriental world — even then, without intelli- 
 gence and religion in the great mass of the people, 
 our liberties would soon be lost. How emphatically 
 must this be the case qioio, when the whole aspect of 
 things is changed, and monarchies have actually 
 stolen a march upon republics in the promotio]i of 
 sound education ?" * 
 
 From " Thoughts on Popular Education in the 
 United States," by a citizen of Pennsylvania, jDub- 
 lished in 1836, we take the following: — "Our object 
 has been to show that all the children in our land 
 deserve to be well and seasonably educated — they 
 have a right to expect this at the hands of the 
 governments under which they live, if they are to be 
 held responsible for the discharge of duties of citizen- 
 ship. No man can escape from responsibility in this 
 matter. Under such institutions as ours, we stand 
 
 * Report of Professor E. C. Stow, to the General Assembly of 
 Ohio, on " Elementary Public Instruction in Europe," made in 1837. 
 Reprinted by order of the Legislature of Massachusetts, in 1838. 
 Pages 9, 19, 53, 64. 
 
IN THE UNITED STATES. 125 
 
 too near to be indeiDendent of each other, or to be 
 indifferent to each other's interests. Not a chiki can 
 come to years of maturity, uneducated, without harm 
 to us — to you — to the whole repubhc. The interest 
 of each is the interest of all ; and hence we argue 
 the obvious and indispensable duty of every good 
 man in the land to look narrowly into our institutions 
 of public education, from the lowest to the highest, 
 and do his full share of the labor of raising them to a 
 proper elevation, and sustaining them there upon the 
 pledge of fortune, honor, and even life itself." '=' 
 
 SECTIOISr XV. 
 
 The responsibility of devising and carrying out the Policy of Religious 
 Education in American Schools lies upon Christians. 
 
 The policy of the people of the United States be- 
 ing, then, public education — universal education — 
 Cliristian education — upon whom devolves the respon- 
 sibility of carrying it into execution? We say it 
 devolves upon the Christians of the United States. 
 To whom else do multitudes, especially of the poor, 
 look for the religious instruction of their children? 
 Let the myriads of children in our Sunday schools 
 answer. How many, who neglect all religious services 
 themselves, gladly send their children to receive 
 instruction which is exclusively religious? Would 
 these people object to having their children instructed 
 
 * Frederick A. Packard. 
 
126 THE POSITION OF CHRISTIANITY 
 
 in Christianity in the public schools ? Would they 
 not readily believe that the same religious zeal which 
 sustained Sunday schools would be directed to the 
 object of Christian instruction in the public schools, 
 and would they not as readily approve it in one as 
 the other? We believe the peojDle of the United 
 States are quite willing to entrust the religious instruc- 
 tion of their children to the Christians of the United 
 States. We believe, further, that the duty of guiding, 
 controlling, and enforcing this Christian instruction in 
 • our public schools, is one of the most important reli- 
 gious duties incumbent on the Christians of this 
 country. It is a religious duty pressing upon Chris- 
 tians, not as Episcopalians, Methodists, Baptists, Con- 
 gregationalists, or Presbyterians, but upon them as 
 Christian citizens of the United States. 
 
 The character of the nation as a Christian country, 
 is not derived from any one denomination of Chris- 
 tians, but from all ; not from any feature which is 
 peculiar to one, but from those great characteristics 
 which distinguish them as a mass. It is this Chris- 
 tianity which is common to the prevailing denomina- 
 tions, which is to be communicated to and impressed 
 upon the children of the United States in the public 
 schools. The distinctive features of each denomina- 
 tion will grow soon enough and fast enough upon that 
 soil which is common to all, under the s^^ecial instruc- 
 tions of the family, the Sunday school, and the 
 Church ; and where these are wanting, as to a very 
 large extent they are, it must be a consoling reflection 
 to all true Christians, that no portion of the children 
 of the country leave the public schools, without being 
 made familiar with the Bible and its saving truths. 
 
IN THE UNITED STATES. 127 
 
 If Christians here do not choose to incur the respon- 
 sibiHty of having Christ denied to the children in the 
 public schools, they must overcome all denominational 
 reluctance and engage heartily in this, the grandest 
 duty of their position as republican Christians. Can 
 any opportunity of preaching the gospel — ^of making ,..^,,. . -f^ 
 known the way of life, be compared with that which % 
 
 is afforded by the public schools of the United States ? 
 And when we take into account the power which soon . 
 devolves upon the children, can any teaching be more 
 influential than that which is aptly bestowed upon 
 the advancing millions of our children? If, then, 
 there is no legal, no constitutional obstacle in the 
 way — as we trust we have shown there is not — of 
 maintaining our character as a Christian peojDle, by 
 teaching Christianity in our national schools, can that 
 denominational feeling which keeps Christians from 
 this work have any affinity with Christianity? Can 
 it be right for the men of any Church to say, if we 
 cannot clothe the children with our uniform, we care 
 not for their being clothed at all ? Is it Christian- 
 like to feed no lambs but those of our own fold, when 
 all alike are His, who said, " Feed my lambs ?" Nor 
 is it any more excusable in a Church to withdraw 
 wholly her countenance and co-oj)eration from this 
 work, in a vain effort to give a strictly denominational 
 training to her own children. The narrowness of this 
 view stands so strongly in contrast with the expansive 
 scope of Christian love, that it needs only to be looked 
 at to ensure condemnation. It can have its counter- 
 part only, in the determination of the missionary to 
 educate his own children and leave uncared for those 
 
128 THE POSITION OF CHRISTIANITY 
 
 of the heathen around him. The unchristian aspect 
 of this policy is not its only unhappy feature. No large 
 denomination of Christians can, by any organization 
 in their power, accomplish the education of the whole 
 number of children which would fall to their share. 
 They could not probably reach more than a fifth of 
 their OAvn children, or at most a third.* 
 
 The remainder of the denominational lambs, and 
 those especially w^ho were children of the poor, must 
 be left to run into the common fold : one portion of 
 the children of a Church being .educated upon one 
 sj^stem and the residue upon another system. Now, 
 if all received in the public schools the same course 
 of religious instruction, each Church could readily 
 make arrangements to furnish to its own children, 
 upon some regular system, that special instruction 
 deemed by it to be essential to complete the course 
 of the pu1)lic schools. 
 
 But if every separate denomination could reach the 
 children of all its congregations and furnish them a 
 good religious education, a vast multitude, exceeding 
 probably two millions of children, would remain 
 untaught, or taught in public schools over which, if 
 they did not dwindle into utter inefficiency, little 
 Christian sympathy would watch and no Christian 
 wisdom would preside. Whilst, therefore, we would 
 detract nothing from what can be done in the family, 
 
 * The Presbyterian Church has made efforts for several years to 
 get up a general system of denominational education, with only about 
 success enough to show the utter hopelessness of the attempt. The 
 great mass of their own people cannot be reached by any denomina- 
 tion, however vigorous the attempt. — (^Appendix B.) 
 
IN THE UNITED STATES. 129 
 
 in the Sunday school, in the Church, and in the 
 numerous vohnitary schools which special circum- 
 stances and feelings must ever create, we again aver 
 that the great work of educating the millions remains 
 to be accomplished by public means and public 
 authority. And if a knowledge of Christianity is to 
 be imparted to these millions, it can only be ade- 
 quately done by the united, strenuous, intelligent and 
 christian-like efforts of the chief religious denomina- 
 tions of the whole country. To stand aloof as a 
 Church from this duty, involves a serious responsi- 
 bility; to stand aloof from it as an individual, may 
 involve not only a serious but a fatal responsibility. 
 No thoughtful Christian can turn his back, upon the 
 religious welfare of the millions of children in the 
 schools of this country, without hardening his heart 
 and denying to his Christian affections and graces 
 their proper scope and exercise. 
 
 We believe that the outward manifestations of Chris- 
 tianity do not keep up with the circumstances of the 
 age in which we live, nor with its intelligence ; and 
 above all, they do not correspond to the opportunities 
 and privileges of the land in which we live. In every 
 age since the Christian era, and in every country, 
 there have been circumstances, external or internal, 
 in the condition of the people, which have prevented 
 the free expansion and proper growth of Christianity. 
 Sometimes it has been a defective ecclesiastical system, 
 sometimes the repressive character of the temporal 
 governments and the superstition or improper educa- 
 tion of the people, but now at this day and in this 
 country, the Christian — whether statesman, man of 
 9 
 
130 THE POSITION OF CHRISTIANITY 
 
 science or philosopher — may look in what direction 
 and pursue what line of inquiry, religious or social, 
 he pleases, when he is considering how he can most 
 promote the interests of Christianity and the temporal 
 well-being of his fellow-men. 
 
 SECTION XVL 
 
 Facilities enjoyed by Christians. — The doctrine of Christian PhilaU' 
 thropy. — Future triumphs of Christianity, where to be found. 
 
 At this day, then, and in this country, all pressure 
 being taken from the mind and all undue restraint 
 being removed from the tongue and pen — a favoring 
 Providence having banished all obstacles to liberty of 
 worship and the amelioration of human condition — 
 we might hope for the most expansive and glorious 
 exhibition of Christianity. A new development and 
 a more rapid growth might be expected, where so 
 much light is shed abroad and so many restrictions 
 are removed. When we consider the summary of 
 Christian duty, given by our Lord Himself — '• Thou 
 shalt love the Lord thy God with all thy heart and 
 wdth all thy soul and with all thy mind," and " Thou 
 shalt love thy neighbor as thyself" — we can readily 
 comprehend, that in the past condition of Innnanit}^, 
 the development of Christianity should rather be upon 
 the first and great commandment than upon the 
 second, which is like unto it. These commands being 
 fundamental principles, any system built upon either 
 
ap^'" 
 
 IN THE UNITED STATES. 131 
 
 must prove defective, as embracing one element when 
 two were necessary. The obstacles to the expansion 
 of Christian doctrine and the performance of Christian 
 duty, lay chiefly in the way of the fulfilment of the 
 second command. God, who is a spirit, and is not to 
 be worshipped in this mountain or in that, nor yet at 
 Jerusalem, could be worshipped in spirit and in truth 
 in any circumstances and in every place ; because this 
 devotion could ascend from palace or from prison, and 
 no human agency could wholly repress or stifle it. 
 There has been, however, in all ages of Christianity, 
 independent of the external difficulties in the way of 
 a proper fulfilment of the second great commandment, 
 a strong tendency to let religion run chiefly in the 
 channel of the public service of God. We see this in 
 grand and imposing rituals, in gorgeous Churches, 
 in monkish seclusion on the one hand and in eccle- 
 siastical magnificence on the other; we see many 
 similar tendencies in the midst of Protestantism, Ijut 
 more especially in the vast fabric of theological 
 science, the erection of which continues in our day. 
 
 In Papal countries the chief development of Chris- 
 tianity under this commandment to love our neighbor, 
 was in the way of alms-giving \ under Protestant rule 
 it has been directed chiefly to the conversion of men, 
 and to their spiritual welfare. It is now beginning ,^{.u 
 to be understood, that mere alms-giving cannot be an 
 adequate fulfilment of the love and duty we owe to 
 our neighbor, not only because we owe this love and 
 duty to those who do not require alms, but because 
 that view does not cover the ground of our obligation ; 
 it is also plainly seen that mere efforts for the conver- 
 sion of men, and for their spiritual welflire, however 
 
132 THE POSITION OF CHRISTIANITY 
 
 zealous and praiseworthy, do not comply with the 
 whole scope and requirements of the command to 
 love our neighbor as ourselves. 
 
 Protestants have failed hitherto in giving Chris- 
 tianity its due expansion on the side of philanthropy. 
 No injunctions of the Bible are more urgent, and none 
 are more frequently repeated, than those which relate 
 to the duty of kindness to our fellow-men ; t]ie ex- 
 ample of our Saviour, and his earnest exhortation to 
 this duty, leave no room to evade the truth that hu- 
 manity itself, in its broadest acceptation, is an essen- 
 tial and indispensable feature of Christianity^ All 
 religion is a mockery of God, if it does not include, in 
 its scope and teaching, the well-being of men in this 
 world, as well as the salvation of men in the world to 
 come. Whatever advantage we seek for ourselves, 
 whether it be of food or raiment, or good government 
 or good education, w^e must be willing to impart to 
 others according to our ability and opportunity. To 
 be an intelligent Christian citizen of the United 
 States, involves a consideration of every subject 
 which concerns human advantage in this world, as 
 well as what concerns the interests of men in the 
 eternal world. By nothing less than this wide sweep 
 of observation, can Christian men determine what is 
 best for themselves, and best for their fellow-men; 
 and by nothing less can their obligations be dis- 
 charged. Where then we may again ask, for we have 
 asked this question before, shall we find adequately 
 developed the doctrine of Christian philanthropy? 
 Where is the due application of Christianity to poli- 
 tical economy to be found ? Where the full bearing 
 of Christianity upon social philosophy ? We believe 
 
IN THE UNITED STATES. 133 
 
 there is here then a whole department of Christian 
 literature almost untouched, and certainly not begun 
 to be elaborated as it deserves, and as the wants of 
 the age urgently demand. The subject of Christian 
 education in the public schools would, of course, fall 
 within the scope of this elaboration of the social duties 
 devolving upon citizens who are free to carry out the 
 principles they profess. In that path of inquiry with 
 the light of Divine Revelation upon every step, it 
 would be very clearly seen what the Christian citizens 
 of the United States owe to the children of the 
 United States. In the proportion that Christianity 
 is important to the temporal and eternal interests of 
 these cliildren, in that proportion is the obligation of 
 those wdio have the power to impart it to them ; in 
 proportion as the fulfilment of this obligation is im- 
 portant to our national and State institutions, and 
 through them to the cause of good government and 
 human well-being throughout the world, in that pro- 
 portion the Christians of this country by all means 
 not inconsistent with our great law of toleration, are 
 under obligation to imbue the rising generation with 
 the great leading truths of Christianity. This is, per- 
 haps, their greatest external duty, because it is preg- 
 nant with the richest results for Christianity and for 
 human welfare in every aspect. 
 
 Hereafter the triumphs of Christianity should not 
 be found or looked for in great hierarchies, or powerful 
 ecclesiastical establishments, in grand cathedrals, in 
 costly churches, in expensive and splendid rituals, in 
 church blazonry, or even in denominational vastness ; 
 let us rather look for these triumphs, though the lines 
 of differing opinions may never be obliterated, in the 
 
134 THE POSITION OF CHRISTIANITY 
 
 united efforts of Christians rising above their differ- 
 ences, and acting upon the common ground of their 
 agreement, for the common good of the whole human 
 family. When Christianity takes this aspect, and 
 begins to work in this channel, the whole world 
 will soon begin to admire ; and all men will hasten 
 to worship and adore Him who is the Author of such 
 a system. Let us rather, hereafter, look for proofs 
 of the spread of genuine Christianity, not to tall 
 steeples and imposing architectural structures, but to 
 the visible workings of sanctified human affections; 
 which, being won over to Christ, are being exerted in 
 every practicable direction, for the earthly and the 
 heavenly interests of all that human family for which 
 Christ suffered. Let us look for it in a system of reli- 
 gious training for the young, in Sunday schools and 
 in public schools, which shall transcend all denomina- 
 tional limits as far as it surpasses all denominational 
 power; let us look to see the visible influences of Chris- 
 tianity in every government where Christians can 
 exercise a direct or indirect control ; let us hope that 
 these influences shall be so visible that they cannot be 
 mistaken in the legislation and in the social institu- 
 tions of every Christian nation ; let us look to see the 
 amelioration of human condition spreading co-exten- 
 sively with the love and the light of the Gospel, that 
 men may feel the warmth of Christian love in their 
 bodies, while its light penetrates their souls. When 
 Christianity has made this progress towards her per- 
 fect work, the rich will reaHze more clearly that they 
 are stewards of Christ ; the men of intellectual power 
 and scientific acquisitions will realize better that they 
 are responsible for these talents ; the masses will be 
 
IN THE UNITED STATES. 135 
 
 content, under such a system, to eat tlieir bread in 
 the sweat of their brows ; the poor will feel assured 
 that they are the chosen objects of Christian care, 
 and the whole community will feel that one of the 
 most pressing duties which rests upon them is to 
 make sure that the laborer is not only hired, but that 
 he receives a full reward of his labor. 
 
 All this, and far more, is within the scope of Chris- 
 tian love, acting under, and within the political institu- 
 tions of the United States. All this mighty machinery 
 of free government is but a combination of so many 
 implements for the promotion of human welfare, 
 placed under Christian influences, if not actually in 
 Christian hands. The Christian men of this country 
 may recoil and shrink from this responsibility, as 
 unhappily they have been doing; but so long as they 
 occupy their present position, they cannot escape 
 them. It devolves upon them emphatically to main- 
 tain and improve our Constitutions, our laws, our 
 social institutions ; to sustain our great principles of 
 Christian toleration and political compromise; to 
 rectify and perfect our representative system; to 
 purge and purify our elections ; to banish corruption 
 and ignorance from our Legislative bodies, and fill 
 them with wiser, honester, and more patriotic men; 
 to difiuse industry and secure its reward; to make 
 Christian provision for the poor; and, finally, to 
 devise and carry out that constantly-improving system 
 of education by Sunday schools and public schools 
 for the whole mass of our youth, which will fit them 
 for the increasing responsibilities of those who are 
 hereafter to determine the policy, and wield the des- 
 tinies, of our constellation of republics. 
 
APPENDIX A. 
 
 Unwilling to distract the reader's attention by a longer digres- 
 sion on the Papacy, we resort for this purpose to the Appendix. Every 
 man of letters, if not every man of reading, knows something of 
 the Reverend Orestes A. Brownson, now simple 0. A. Brownson, 
 LL.D. His writings long since attracted our attention, for the sym- 
 pathy displayed in them for the laboring classes. He has long en- 
 joyed high repute as a scholar, and a man of ability. For a time he 
 was charged with want of firmness of purpose and steadiness in bis 
 religious views. He has redeemed his character in that respect, for 
 after changing his creed several times, he took refuge from his sea 
 of doubts and turmoil of uncertainties, in the bosom of the Holy 
 Roman Church, where he has been a fixture for some ten years. He 
 possesses a high order of talent, but it consists chiefly in logical 
 power. He grasps rapidly and firmly the relations of principles and 
 ideas; his perceptions of these relations are clear, and his mode of 
 expression is so transparent, that he can seldom be misunderstood. 
 His attainments are large and varied; his memory is well stored with 
 systems of faith and philosophy. His, however, is not the spirit nor 
 the mind to grapple with the stern and ever-changing realities of this 
 life. He does not like facts, they are too complicated and too stub- 
 born for him, he can neither arrange nor manage them ; he can nei- 
 ther detect nor expose their bearings nor relations. He does not 
 judge the world nor its inhabitants by what it exhibits or what they 
 do in any detail. One or two great facts at most are enough for his 
 purpose, whilst he can swallow or emit any quantity of specula- 
 tion. "What his mind most craves is food for logic. The faith of 
 Archimedes in the power of the lever, was not greater than that of 
 0. A. Brownson in the power of logic. His good fortune, however, 
 far exceeds that of the Syracusan mathematician, for the latter never 
 found a place for his fulcrum, whilst the logician has discovered at 
 
 (137) 
 
138 APPENDIX A. 
 
 length an illimitable field for his logic. He has found the Papacy — 
 the Church of Rome, " the Holy Catholic Church, the Church of 
 God, the Kingdom of Christ, the Immaculate Spouse of the Lamb, 
 divinely commissioned and supernaturally assisted by the Holy 
 Ghost, to teach and judge the law of God," "the Church a king- 
 dom, the Kingdom of kingdoms, and Principality of principalities," 
 God's vice-gerent on earth holding the keys of Heaven and Hell. 
 Here are premises enough in this one idea of the Church, to satisfy 
 the mind of the most morbidly gluttonous logician that ever wielded 
 a pen. All that God can govern on earth, the Church can govern ; 
 the Church is supreme in spirituals, but as men must do all they do 
 to the glory of God, as they must in all things yield implicit obe- 
 dience to their spiritual superiors ; therefore, the Church must take 
 cognizance of all that is done under the sun. The Church must, in 
 fact, take cognizance of all questions in morals and in politics, be- 
 cause there is no other infallible guide or criterion. The sweep of 
 Mr. Brownson's logic covers the whole compass of God's wisdom, 
 and the whole scope of his government on earth, for these are embraced 
 in the theocracy of the Holy Catholic Church. 
 
 Allow Mr. Brownson this one stand-point of a divinely instituted 
 Church as God's vice-gerent on earth, and then stand clear, or he 
 will sweep you from your feet and carry you to heights and depths, 
 only short, to use his own strong expression, '' of nowhere." There 
 certainly can be no imaginable thing done or conceived or expressed 
 in this world, which Mr. Brownson cannot, from his point of view, 
 prove to be religiously, temporally, properly and mentally, under the 
 jurisdiction of the Holy Roman Church. If you attempt by any 
 doubt, or caution or cavil to insinuate an objection, he will prostrate 
 you as a profane person, an infidel denying all that is holy and pure 
 and divine — as denying God himself in his Immaculate Spouse the 
 Church. 
 
 With ]Mr. Brownson's really clear perceptions, with his skill in 
 logical fence, he stands impregnable in his present position ; and 
 considering the character of his mind we see no way of dislodging 
 him, for you might knock him heels over head a hundred times, and 
 he would rise each time with not another idea in his head but Holy 
 Roman Church. We see no method of meeting him, unless some 
 crafty opponent should steal near enough to whisper in his eai", '' God 
 is great, and Mahomet is his Prophet." This fruitful idea, in its 
 
APPENDIX A. 139 
 
 simple grandeur might be a sop for the most logical giant, or a tub 
 for the hugest whale. For exhaustless as is his present theme, he 
 has repeated some of his great lines of argument many times. On 
 this new text he would enjoy not only as wide a scope, but he would 
 be without a rival, past or present, for we much doubt if all the 
 Muftis since the advent of Mahomet have, in their happiest and most 
 ambitious moments, conceived what conclusions the logic of Mr. 
 Brownson could draw from this pregnant phrase. He could on 
 that simple expression build up a literature at once imposing, grand 
 and comprehensive. Indeed, much of what he has written, would 
 only need to be transferred into the language of the Turk or the 
 Arab ; for whatever may be predicated of the Holy Roman Church 
 as in God's place on earth, might logically be predicated of Mahomet 
 as the Prophet of Grod. The lack of infallibility might make a 
 sad diiference, for though there is scarcely any need, that is a strong- 
 hold to which Mr. Brownson often resorts, rioting as he does in his 
 strength. 
 
 If Mr. Brownson cannot be coaxed down from his high position, 
 we know not what better can be done, than to let him run his course 
 until his breath fails him. No knight of the vizor and helmet was 
 ever more rampant, more confident, or more proud ; yet more dis- 
 criminating than he of La Mancha, who would fight any thing on 
 earth from a ghost to a wind-mill, he refuses the foemen that he 
 deems not worthy of his steel. To a challenge for a discussion of 
 the points between Protestants and the Hierarchy, given him at St. 
 Louis recently, he replied : — 
 
 " I could not, permit me to say, consent to meet your chosen 
 champion, in the way you propose, without in some measure compro- 
 mising the rights of my religion, conceding that the question between 
 Catholics and Protestants is a, dehatahle question^ and granting that 
 Catholicity and Protestantism in some sense stand on the same level — 
 a concession to heresy and error, and an indignity to truth, of which, 
 I trust in God, I shall never be guilty." * 
 
 * And yet Mr. Brownson, in 1845, uttered this accusation: "Protests 
 autism, afraid to meet tlie cliampions of the Cross in fair and open debate, 
 conscious of her weakness and unskilfulness in argument, resorts to the 
 civil arm to maintain her predominance." — Broivnson's Essays and Re- 
 views, 441. 
 
140 APPENDIX A. 
 
 This puts an end to this troublesome controversy without striking 
 a blow. 
 
 There is another point of view from which the Papal career of Mr. 
 Brownson may be regarded. Suspicious individuals have entertained 
 the notion, that there were Jesuits and Priests in Protestant guise, 
 in our highest places, making extraordinary pretensions of Protestant 
 zeal and orthodoxy. We have never heard it suggested, that in 
 return for these spies in our camp we have any in the conclaves of 
 the Hierarchy. If there be any such, we might on strong grounds 
 claim Mr. Brownson as our friend, and the most dangerous foe the 
 Hierarchy has ever encountered. Until his advent as a defender 
 of the Papacy and an expositor of its claims, a prudent, nay cautious 
 reserve, was rigidly maintained. It seemed that the Papacy was 
 really becoming Americanized ; its odious features and inadmissible 
 claims were kept very much out of sight ; it appeared as if the 
 Hierarchy were planting congregations here to fraternize as Christians 
 with the Protestants around them. The Catholic people of this 
 country have from the beginning shown this tendency. There has 
 been no religious controversy here between Catholic people and 
 Protestant people. Intelligent Protestants knew the spirit and 
 ultimate designs of the Papacy, but the mass of the people, Catholic 
 and Protestant, entertained no suspicion of the real nature and objects 
 of the Hierarchy. 
 
 Such was the state of things when Mr. Brownson appeared on this 
 stage. He changed the whole system of Papal tactics in this country, 
 abandoning caution and throwing reserve to the winds. Clothed in 
 the whole panoply of the Hierarchy, traditional, doctrinal, ritual, 
 spiritual, temporal, he goes boldly before the public, announcing 
 without hesitation and without disguise, plans, opinions and secrets 
 hitherto buried deep among the mysteries of the priesthood. He 
 virtually declares to the Hierarchy, if you hold the truth be not 
 afraid of the light ; if your Church is all it purports and claims to be, 
 it cannot be known too soon ; if there is no salvation out of your 
 pale, let us call and force all men into it with the least delay possible ; 
 if no people, no government is safe, in any other than Papal hands, 
 let us say so, that people may know it, and let us enter upon our 
 dominion as soon as we can. Proceeding on these principles, he has 
 opened up the councils of the Hierarchy with a boldness only to be 
 matched by the disclosures he has made. No man in this country 
 
APPENDIX A. 141 
 
 need now be ignorant of the claims or of the nature of the Papal 
 Church. It is saying little for this exposition, that it surpasses 
 any thing of the kind in the English language for clearness and 
 frankness. There it is in Mr. Brownson's Review : the humblest 
 reader can understand ', let those whom it concerns profit by it ! 
 
 But we must not indulge the idea that this exposition of Romanism 
 is not the work of a sincere and an earnest, as well as able man. 
 Educated in the American feeling of independence and openness, he 
 carried these qualities into the Papal Church. He soon perceived 
 they were hiding their light under a bushel ; he brought it forth 
 with an unfaltering hand, and placed it on a candlestick. He an- 
 nounced to his new friends, that they were too low and humble, 
 living far below their privileges and position ; that they were insen- 
 sible to their present respectability and future destiny ; that they 
 had in the scheme of their Church a power which nothing could 
 resist — a power embracing all terrestrial concerns, the title to which 
 was indisputable, it being only a matter of time when it was to 
 come into full exercise. He held up to their view the titles to this 
 power, couched in such bold and commanding terms and set forth 
 with such transcendent ability, that he carried the whole Hierarchy 
 with him. His logical ability overcame all fear of consequences. 
 They saw him take up their idea of the Church as the sole agent of 
 God on the earth, and wielding it right and left, prostrate every 
 opposing power, spiritual and temporal — crushing with equal ease 
 republics and monarchies, sects and systems, literature and philosophy. 
 With such a champion they adventured into the open field ; it remains 
 to be seen with what result. 
 
 The time is coming, and may not be very remote, when the pages 
 of Brownson's Review shall be called as chief witnesses against the 
 Hierarchy, when on trial at the bar of public opinion, for treason 
 against the institutions of this country. 
 
 The Review can never be disowned by the Papal Priesthood, for it 
 bears on its cover the imprimatur of two Arch-Bishops and twenty- 
 three Bishops of the Romish Church in the United States. This is 
 dated in May, 1849, at which time the character of the Review had 
 fully developed itself; and after the Hierarchy had for several years 
 watched the operation of the bolder policy upon which their neophyte 
 had adventured. These ecclesiastics, knowing all this, felt " the 
 propriety of encouraging him by their approbation and influence, to 
 
142 APPENDIX A. 
 
 continue bis literary labors in defence of tbc faitb of wbicb be bas 
 proved an able and intrepid advocate." 
 
 But tbis is not all. Mr. Brownson's name and works bave tra- 
 velled to tbe Spiritual Capital of tbe world. A Papal periodical, tbe 
 Corresjiondence de Rome, gives a special notice of tbis Review. It 
 regards tbe approval of tbe two Arcbbisbops and twenty-tbree 
 Bisbops as " surpassing all eulogium." It notices " an extraordinary 
 dissertation on tbe temporal power of tbe Cburcb. We frankly con- 
 fess tbat, to tbe best of our knowledge, no European writer bas treated 
 tbis question witb more freedom and ability." 
 
 It is plain tbat tbe Hierarcby tbemselves did not fully appreciate 
 tbe value of tbat vast Spiritual Corporation, of wbicb tbey are tbe 
 proprietors and managers, until tbe magnifying power of Mr. Brown- 
 son's logic was brougbt to bear upon it. Under tbe ligbt of tbat 
 instrument, it continues to swell in size, and develop in power, until 
 all tbe world may soon be small enougb, in comparison, to take 
 refuge under its sbadow. 
 
 Tbere is abundant evidence in tbe pages of tbis Review, tbat its 
 tone and doctrines are far from being so satisfactory to tbe Catbolic 
 laity. Some of tbese will be seen in tbe extracts wbicb are to follow. 
 On the occasion of commencing a new series of tbe Review, and on 
 tbe last page of tbe number for January, 1853, be indulges in tbe 
 following remarks and retrospection : — 
 
 "We bave now, going on nine years, conducted tbis journal as a 
 Catholic Review, and done so almost single-banded. We bave spoken 
 freely, frankly, boldly, we would hope not rashly, on all topics tbat 
 have come up ; and our aim bas been to encourage a free, bold, and 
 manly tone in our Catbolic literature ; to make Catholics feel tbat 
 they are at home in this country, and need but courage in avowing, 
 and fidelity in practising their religion, to malce tlie coinitry Ca- 
 tholic. . . . That we bave disturbed many prejudices, trodden on a 
 good many corns, and vexed not a few good souls, who would never 
 have Catholicity speak above her breath, or in any but apologetic 
 tones, is very likely. ... As long as we can secure the approbation, 
 and lose not tbe confidence of tbe jjastors of tbe Church, we are 
 content." — p. 136. 
 
 But wc must not detain the reader longer from the following 
 extracts from Mr. Brownson's Review. We bave made our chief 
 
APPENDIX A. 143 
 
 citations from the later numbers, supposing these to contain the 
 best and most concentrated expression of the writer's views. We 
 have made them longer than may appear needful, but we feared to 
 do injustice by cutting them shorter. Long as they are, they convey 
 but an imperfect presentation of the Reviewer's opinions, and very 
 inadequate evidence of his ability. We heartily commend all who 
 feel interested in the subject to the pages of the Review, in which 
 they will find food for their profoundest reflections for many a day 
 to come. 
 
 " They (the Protestants) cannot open our Review without finding 
 something therein which shocks their sensibilities. Eternal damna- 
 tion, with all its attendant and unnameable horrors, is forced upon 
 their unwilling attention, as a thing which may be predicated of 
 them, in sensu con?jwsi'to" (as a fixed fact), "with the same certainty 
 which enables the by-stander to say of a man who has swallowed 
 deadly poison, and who will not eject it, that he will surely die." — 
 April, 1852, p. 166. 
 
 " The people have become either sovereign, or are aspiring after 
 the sovereignty, and one sure sign that this new sovereign will fall 
 into the pit into which kings and nobles fell is, that the people treat 
 the Church as the kinfrs and nobles treated her. Like the kings and 
 the nobles in the ages of their revolt, the people are very tolerant 
 of dead creeds, very intolerant of living Popes, practical Catholicity, 
 and thronged confessionals. In speaking of the interference of 
 ecclesiastics with secular affairs, as they call it, they use the same 
 proud language which the sovereigns, their predecessors, the kings 
 and nobles, once used. Poor people ! They have mounted their 
 tower, they have fixed their throne above the stars, they will be like 
 the Most High ! Poor people ! they will fall, — they are falling ; 
 their i<jnh fatuus has led them to the precipice over which royalty 
 and aristocracy fell. Ecclesiastical, regal, aristocratic, popular sove- 
 reignty, — the cycle is completed ; will it begin again, or are we near 
 the day of wrath which is to usher in the visible sovereignty of God 
 over all flesh that has corrupted its way?" — Ju^>/, 1852, pp. 405-6. 
 
 '' So long as the free exercise of the Catholic religion meets with 
 any obstacles, or finds any let or hindrance in any country, however 
 free may be the sects or unbelievers, freedom of conscience is not 
 
144 APPENDIX A. 
 
 secured, and the liberty of religion is not recognized and main- 
 tained." — Number 24, October, 1852, p. 445. 
 
 "No doubt, Mr. Bancroft understands by religious liberty, not 
 the liberty of religion, freedom to believe what religion teaches and 
 to practise what she commands, but the liberty of heresy and un- 
 belief, the liberty to deny and blaspheme religion. But if he does, 
 that is no reason why we should. The age in which we live no 
 doubt agrees with him, but we are not obliged to err because the age 
 errs. TVe do not consult the age in which we live in order to learn 
 what is or is not truth. The freedom of religion is one thing, the 
 freedom of heresy and unbelief is another, and we cannot fall into 
 the gross folly of confounding the one with the other, because an 
 heretical and unbelieving age, or an heretical or unbelieving histo- 
 rian, does. The two liberties are essentially distinct, and rest on 
 very different grounds, and should never be confounded one with the 
 other, or called by one and the same name. It is their confusion 
 that creates the mischief, and gives to heretics the effrontery to call 
 themselves the friends of religious liberty, and to pretend that the 
 Church is a spiritual despotism. Religious liberty is the natural 
 and inherent right of every man, for both by the natural and divine 
 laws man has the right to render unto God what God requires of 
 him, — the right to do his duty; but the liberty of heresy and un- 
 belief is not a natural right, for by the law of nature, as well as the 
 divine law, every man is bound to be of the true religion, and has no 
 right to be of any other. All the rights the sects have or can have 
 are derived from the state, and rest on expediency. As they have, 
 in their character of sects hostile to true religion, no rights under the 
 law of nature or the law of God, they are neither wronged nor 
 deprived of liberty if the state refuses to grant them any rights at 
 all ; for wrong is done, liberty is taken away by the state, only when 
 it violates rights which are held under the law of nature or the law 
 of God, independent of the state, and which it is instituted not to 
 concede, but to protect. The protection of the sects in the practice 
 of their heresies is never on their side a question of right, or of what 
 they may claim as a right, but is always a question of simple expe- 
 diency ; and so it must be, till you can obliterate all distinction be- 
 tween right and wrong, and establish the indififcrcncy of truth and 
 error. Heresy and unbelief, if really heresy and unbelief, are con- 
 trary to the law of God, and therefore have and can have no rights 
 
APPENDIX A. 145 
 
 of their own, and then none that the state is, for their sake, bound 
 to concede or to protect." — Ihid, pp. 455-6. 
 
 " We yield to no man in our devotion to religious liberty, but we 
 have yet to learn that, in order to defend the liberty of religion, we 
 must defend the equal liberty of heresy and unbelief, and maintain 
 that the state is bound in all cases to place error and blasphemy on 
 an equal footing with truth and piety." — Hid, p. 457. 
 
 In arguing against the position of the Gallican Church, in which 
 by agreement the Church and the State hold their power directly 
 from God, the Reviewer sums up his argument thus : 
 
 " If in spirituals Peter could say to Csesar, ' I am your master,' 
 in temporals Caesar could say to Peter, ' I am your lord, and you are 
 my subject.' To this specious theory, which is still popular even 
 with many Catholics, there are one or two rather grave objections. 
 In the first place, the normal relation of the two orders is not, and 
 cannot be, that of equality or mutual independence, because the tem- 
 poral order, as we have heretofore shown, exists for the spiritual, not 
 for itself, and is therefore subordinate to the spiritual, and conse- 
 quently subject to the spiritual sovereign, in obedience to whose au- 
 thority the temporal sovereign must govern. This lies in the nature 
 of the case, and cannot be denied, if we concede any spiritual order 
 at ^\\."—Juhj, 1853, p. 290. 
 
 "• There is always, even in the most Catholic times and in the 
 most Catholic states, a party, more or less numerous, who have no 
 conception of religion as law, or of the Church as a kingdom, with a 
 constitution, laws, and chiefs of her own, set up on the earth with 
 plenary authority, under God, over states and individuals, — a party 
 who never think of the Church as a divinely constituted govern- 
 ment, even in spirituals, and count for nothing her external organi- 
 tion, her mission, or her discipline. The Creed, the Sacraments, 
 and the Ritual compromise, for them, the whole of religion, and they 
 never can or never will understand why these may not be just as 
 salutary when held out of unity as when held in it." — Hid, p. 299. 
 
 There is, indeed, a large party in the bosom of the Catholic 
 
 Church, who believe that Protestants will not all perish forever. 
 
 Just as Protestants believe that every truly pious person in the 
 
 Catholic Church will be saved, in spite of the sins of the Hierarchy. 
 
 10 
 
146 APPENDIX A. 
 
 "In these revolutionary times the great point to be specially in- 
 sisted on, it seems to us, is, that the Church is a government, a king- 
 dom, the Kingdom of kingdoms and Principality of principalities. 
 What is most important is, to understand that she is a power, an or- 
 ganized power, divinely constituted, assisted, and protected, repre- 
 senting the Divine authority on earth, and as such universal and 
 supreme. How the state is organized, or by whom administered, is 
 a matter of comparative indifference. The state may be monarchi- 
 cal or republican, aristocratic or democratic, if it only be understood 
 and conceded that over it, as over every individual, there is a spirit- 
 ual kingdom, a spiritual authority, commissioned by God himself, to 
 interpret and apply his law to every department of human life, indi- 
 vidual or social, public or private ; for if such authority be recog- 
 nized and submitted to, no interest, temporal or spiritual, can fail to 
 be protected and promoted. Undoubtedly, the assertion of this au- 
 thority is a delicate matter, owing to the utter confusion which 
 obtains in men's minds respecting it; but we pray such of our read- 
 ers as have some little candor and good-will to bear in mind that to 
 assert this authority is by no means to merge the state in the Church, 
 or to claim for the Church direct temporal authority, although even 
 to claim for her direct temporal authority is not, to say the least, for- 
 bidden to the Catholic. What we here assert is, that the spiritual 
 authority, in the nature of the case and by the express appointment 
 of Grod, extends beyond what are ordinarily called spirituals, — to 
 all matters which do or can interest conscience, or concerning which 
 there can arise any question of right or wrong, true or false. The 
 Church, we grant, nay, maintain, is spiritual, and governs in refer- 
 ence, and only in reference, to a spiritual end ; but as the temporal 
 order subsists only by and for the spiritual, she, though not it any 
 more than God is the world, nor the temporal authority itself, has, 
 as the God whose representative on earth she is, supreme authoi'ity 
 over it, and the full right, under God, to prescribe to it the law it is 
 bound in all things and at all times to consult and obey." — 
 Ihid, p. 300. 
 
 " There is a point beyond which submission to the temporal au- 
 thority, whether monarchical or republican, aristocratic or demo- 
 cratic, is apostasy, and can in no sense whatever be tolerated. We 
 must say all this, and our enemies know it; and they know that the 
 
APPENDIX A. 147 
 
 great body of the faithful will place that point where it is declared 
 to be by the Sovereign PontifiF." — Rid, p. 314. 
 
 " The leading political doctrine of the day, democracy itself as 
 DOW generally understood, is only the political phase of Calvinism, 
 and it wants little of being pure socialism, for it excludes God, and 
 renders society supreme. In fact socialism is nothing but Protest- 
 antism gone to seed, and no man can be a consistent Protestant with- 
 out holding all the principles necessary to serve as the logical basis 
 socialism. None, therefore, but a Catholic, as we so often repeat, can 
 either consistently or successfully attack the socialistic tendencies of 
 the country." — Ibid, p. 415. 
 
 "It is a grave mistake to suppose that all is Catholic in Catholic 
 countries, and that the Church there has every thing her own way. 
 Scarcely a professedly Catholic government, from the first Christian 
 Emperor down to the last of the German Kaisers, or to the present 
 Emperor of the French, has left the Church perfectly free to enforce 
 in her own way her own discipline, and has been ready in all things 
 to lend her, when requisite, the support, for that purpose, of the 
 secular arm. As a general thing, professedly Catholic governments, 
 as well as others, have shown themselves at all times jealous of the 
 ecclesiastical authority, and sought to treat ecclesiastics officiating in 
 their respective dominions as subject to their jurisdiction. They 
 never willingly recognize the Church as the kingdom of God on 
 earth, independent of all earthly kingdoms, and above them all, in- 
 stituted for the express purpose of making the kingdoms of this world 
 the kingdoms of God and of his Christ, — of teaching and directing 
 all men and nations in the way of holiness. Even when they cheer- 
 fully admit her as doctrine and as worship, they only reluctantly 
 recognize her as a kingdom, as government, as law. They claim to 
 be themselves, each in its own dominions, the supreme and only 
 government, and hence, when the Church presents herself in the 
 aspect of a government, and of a government that claims to govern 
 not only abstractions, rites, and ceremonies, but men, and men, too, 
 in every department of life, in their souls as well as their bodies, in 
 their relations to earth as well as to heaven, to their temporal rulers 
 as well as to their spiritual chiefs, she seems to them a dangerous 
 rival, and they place themselves on their guard against her, and seek 
 
148 APPENDIX A. 
 
 to deprive her of her governing power, and to confine her action to a 
 subordinate sphere. This would be well enough, if the secular 
 government were, as it assumes to be, the supreme and only govern- 
 ment, if God had nothing to do with the temporal order, or if it had 
 pleased him to intervene in the government of mankind only through 
 the medium of the state; that is, if the state, and not the Cliurch, 
 were the kingdom of God on earth. It would also be well enough, 
 if the Church were a mere human institution, and not, as she is, the 
 Church of God, divinely constituted and commissioned for the very 
 purpose of teaching and applying to sovereigns as well as to subjects, 
 and to sovereigns in their public and official capacity as well as in 
 their private capacity, the supreme law, the law which all alike, and 
 in all things, are bound to obey."] — April, 1853, p. 152. 
 
 "We cannot name a single professedly Catholic state, that has 
 afforded, for these three hundred years, more than a momentary con- 
 solation to the Holy Father. The bitterest enemies of the Holy 
 Father have been of his own household, and the only sovereigns in 
 the eighteenth century, and the first half of the nineteenth, that 
 treated him with respect, were, we grieve to say it, sovereigns sepa- 
 rated from his communion. Pius the Seventh was indebted to Great 
 Britain, Russia, and Prussia, for the restoration of the temporal pos- 
 sessions of the Holy See, usurped by one Catholic Emperor and 
 retained by another. How absurd, then, to suppose that all in 
 Catholic states is Catholic, that even professedly Catholic sovereigns 
 are always, or even ordinaril}', the obedient sons of the Church, and 
 that she is responsible for all that is done in countries where she is 
 legally recognized ! 
 
 " ^Ye have, as Catholics, not a few grievances to complain of in 
 this country, but there is no Catholic country in the world where the 
 Church is as free and as independent as she is here, none where the 
 Pope is so truly Pope, and finds, so far as Catholics are concerned, 
 so little resistance to the full exercise of his authority as visible 
 Head of the Church. The reason is, not that the government here 
 favors or protects the Church, but that it lets her alone."] — Ibid. 
 p. 154-5. 
 
 These two passages furnish evidence of the breadth of the Papal 
 claims for secular power, and prove also that even where the popula- 
 
APPENDIX A. 149 
 
 tion and rulers were Catholic, there has been a constant resistance to 
 this claim. Eels do not always become so used to skinning that they 
 do not occasionally squirm under the process. 
 
 " Discipline belongs to the Church as much as doctrine, and she 
 bears the keys as well as the word, and her liberty is as much in- 
 fringed when she is denied the liberty of exercising the power of the 
 keys, as when she is denied the liberty of teaching, or of celebrating 
 Mass. She has authority over all persons, whatever their state or 
 dignity, to bind and loose, and God assures her that whatever she 
 binds or looses on earth, shall be bound and loosed in heaven. This 
 power is that which constitutes her a kingdom, and gives her the 
 faculty to govern. Without it she might teach and pray, and advise, 
 but could have no power to make her doctrines observed or her pre- 
 cepts obeyed. To deprive her of this power, to prohibit her from 
 fulminating spiritual censures, and binding the violator of God's law, 
 whoever he may be, would be to reduce hea* to the level of a sect or 
 of a school of philosophy; and to resist the exercise of this terrible 
 power is no less sinful than to deny the truth she teaches. It is by 
 this power especially that she is able to enforce the obedience of sub- 
 jects to their sovereigns, and the practice of justice by sovereigns to 
 their subjects, and therefore it is only by recognizing this power, and 
 allowing her free scope for its effectual assertion, that she can exer- 
 cise that guardian care of the state, and have that conservative 
 influence in society, which late events have proved to be so indis- 
 pensable. 
 
 "This granted, it is easy to see the wisdom and necessity of the 
 Papal constitution of the Church. The Church is a kingdom, a 
 powei", and as such must have, if she is to exercise her authority, a 
 supreme chief. This authority is to be exercised over states as well 
 as over individuals ; therefore the Church as a government must be 
 Catholic, for otherwise it could not govern all nations ; it must be 
 one and Catholic, otherwise it would be subjected by each sovereign 
 iu his own dominions. And this unity and Catholicity are impossible 
 without the monarchical constitution, without its subjection to a single 
 head, with supreme authority over the whole body, prepared at any 
 moment to exercise that authority on any point and against any 
 enemy that may be necessary. This is the point towards which we 
 
150 APPENDIX A. 
 
 have been looting from the first, and contains the practical lesson 
 which we wish to impress on the minds of our readers. The Church 
 is built on Peter, and its defence is all included in the defence of 
 Peter, as the state is defended in defending its sovereign. Vbi 
 Fetrus, ihi Ecdesia. But though we have reached the point at 
 which we have been aiming, we must reserve its development and 
 defence to a future number." — Ihid. p. 162-3. 
 
 ''Protestantism, and through it its father, the Devil, gains so^lh. 
 Provided he gains these, think you he cares whether they come to 
 him by formal apostacy, or by the breach of a commandment, be it 
 the fourth or the sixth ? He gets them at any rate." — Ihid. p. 248. 
 
 " It is not our purpose, in this article, to argue the point between 
 radicalism and Christian politics. We have often discussed it, and 
 shall often discuss it again in our pages. Our present purpose is to 
 cite decisions of positive law, and to put two or three questions. 
 One is, whether there is any divine law which convicts modern de- 
 mocracy of sin. Another is, what sort of a sin is it ? Finally, 
 whether Catholics in our country have been, are, or may be tempted 
 to commit it. It is clear enough, if religion be supreme over politics, 
 as it certainly is, — if modern radical doctrines be at variance with 
 the fourth commandment, as they certainly are, — if this fourth com- 
 mandment be yet binding upon the conscience of men, as nobody 
 can deny, and if its breach incurs the penalty of eternal damnation, 
 as it certainly does, — that notwithstanding the outcry of baptized 
 and unbaptized radicals, the sin must be placed in the same category 
 with murder, theft, and lust." — Ihid. p. 252. 
 
 If the writer has any antipathy stronger than that against Pro- 
 testantism, it is his hatred of Democracy. 
 
 '"' It is quite the fashion even for Catholic politicians to assert 
 that, though the Church is supreme in spirituals, the State in tem- 
 porals is absolutely independent of her authority. ' Render unto 
 Cajsar the things that are Cajsar's. As long as the Church keeps 
 within her own province, and confines herself to spirituals, we respect 
 her, and submit to her authority ; in spirituals, we even recognize 
 the authority of the Pope, and allow that in them he may do what 
 he pleases ; but he has no authority in temporals, and in them we 
 
APPENDIX A. 151 
 
 will do as we please.' Such is the popular doctrine of the day, and 
 of not a few who would take it as a gross affront and as downright 
 injustice were we to insinuate that they are but sorry Catholics. 
 Scarcely a Catholic amongst us engaged in politics can open his 
 mouth without uttering this doctrine, and uttering it as if it were an 
 incontestable truth and a maxim of divine wisdom. It has become 
 the commonplace of the whole political world, and is rung out upon 
 us from thrones and the cabinets of ministers, the halls of justice and 
 legislation, and from the hustings and the caucus. Whoso ventures 
 to question it, is stared at as the ghost of some old dreamy monk of 
 the Dark Ages. Let us, then, be allowed to examine it." — January^ 
 1853, p. 34. 
 
 The reviewer proceeds to the examination. He allows no distinc- 
 tion between a monarchy and a democracy. " You only crown the 
 people instead of one man." His conclusion is thus stated : 
 
 " We wish the people free, — free from their own passions, and 
 from yours and mine, — alike free from despots and from demagogues ; 
 and we know there is and can be no freedom for them, either in spi- 
 rituals or temporals, except in so far as they are subjected to the law 
 of God, as interpreted and applied by his Church.'' — Ibid. p. 37. 
 
 *< No man, unless a downright atheist, dares, in just so many 
 words, to assert the monstrous proposition, that the temporal order is 
 not subjected to the law of God." — Ibid. p. 38. 
 
 '' This established, we demand to whom, under God, it belongs to 
 keep, interpret, and declare the law of Christ ? Whom hath our Lord 
 constituted the depositary, the guardian, and the judge of his law? 
 Certainly the Holy Roman Catholic and Apostolic Church, and the 
 successor of Peter as visible head or supreme chief of that Church. 
 .... The commission is to the Church, not to the State, and no- 
 where can it be found that our Lord has made princes, as such, 
 guardians and judges of his law, even in the temporal order. He 
 only gives them authority to execute it when declared to them. Be- 
 sides, to keep, teach, and declare the law of Christ, whether in spi- 
 rituals or temporals, is manifestly a spiritual function, and temporal 
 sovereigns, it is confessed in the very doctrine we oppose, have no 
 spiritual functions." — Ibid. 41. 
 
152 APPENDIX A. 
 
 ''All things are ordered in reference to her (the Church). Her 
 Maker is her Husband, and he will own none as his children who 
 have not been carried in her womb and nursed at her breasts. Such 
 is his will, eternal as his own being, and which is without variable- 
 ness or shadow of turning, immutable and immovable as his own 
 nature. She has been instituted expressly to guide, assist, and con- 
 duct us to God. For this end she has been made the depository of 
 the law of Christ, authorized to keep, to teach, to interpret and apply 
 it, — to teach, feed, rule, and defend all men and nations, in reference 
 to their final and only end. How, then, say she has no authority 
 over temporals? How can she have authority to judge the only end 
 for w^hich temporals exist, or have any right to exist, if she have not 
 the right to judge them, and to approve or condemn them as they do 
 or do not subserve this end. How can she have charge of the end 
 without also having charge of the means, since the means are neces- 
 sarily subordinated to the end, and controlled by it ? As she has 
 charge of the end, that is, of gaining the end, she must have charge 
 of the means, and as the temporal exists only as a means to man's 
 final end, she must, by virtue of the very spiritual authority which 
 she confessedly is, have supreme power over the temporal, and 
 plenary authority to govern it according to the demands or the utility 
 of the end, and therefore in all respects whatever." — Ibid. 46. 
 
 " Now, although we do not say that the Church commissions the 
 State, or imposes the conditions on which it holds its right to govern, 
 yet as it holds under the law of Christ, and on conditions imposed 
 by that law, we do say that she, as the guardian and judge of that 
 law, must have the power to take cognizance of the State, and to 
 judge whether it does or does not conform to the conditions of its 
 trust, and to pronounce sentence accordingly; which sentence ought 
 to have immediate practical execution in the temporal order, and the 
 temporal power that resists it is not only faithless to its trust, but 
 guilty of direct rebellion against God, the only real Sovereign, 
 Fountain of all law, and Source of all rights, in the temporal order 
 as in the spiritual." — Ibid. 47. 
 
 " The Pope, then, even by virtue of his spiritual authority, has 
 the power to judge all temporal questions, if not precisely as tem- 
 poral, yet as spiritual, — for all temporal questions are to be decided 
 by their relation to the spiritual, — and therefore has the right to pro- 
 
APPENDIX A. 153 
 
 nounce sentence of deposition against any sovereign when required 
 by the good of the spiritual order." — Ihid. 48. 
 
 "If the Church is the spiritual power, with the right to declare 
 the law of Christ for all men and nations, can any act of the State 
 in contravention of her canons be regarded as a law? The most 
 vulgar common sense answers that it cannot. Tell us then, even 
 supposing the Church to have only spiritual power, what question 
 can come up between man and man, between sovereign and sovereign, 
 between subject and sovereign, or sovereign and subject, that does 
 not come within the legitimate jurisdiction of the Church, and on 
 which she has not by divine right the power to pronounce a judicial 
 sentence ? None ? Then the power she exercised over sovereigns in 
 the Middle Ages was not a usurpation, was not derived from the con- 
 cession of princes or the consent of the people, but was and is hers 
 by divine right; and whoso resists it rebels against the King of 
 kings and Lord of lords. This is the ground on which we defend 
 the power exercised over sovereigns by Popes and Councils in the 
 Middle Ages. 
 
 " We know this ground is not acceptable to sovereigns, to courtiers, 
 or to demagogues. But is that our fault ? Who has made it our 
 duty to please them ? Are we not bound to please God, and to 
 adhere to the truth, let it offend whom it may?" — Ibid. 49. 
 
 We have in the United States a vast body of Constitutional and 
 Legislative enactments which are in flat contravention of the Canon 
 Law. " The most vulgar (Papal) common sense " pronounces all 
 these to be void. The Papal ecclesiastic laughs in his sleeve, and 
 says "wait a little," and we will show you what such nonsense is 
 worth ! 
 
 " The modern demagogue does for the people what the German 
 lawyer did for the German Kaiser. He does not say the people are 
 sovereign under the law of God interpreted by the Church ; but he 
 says the people are the living law, the fountain of all rights, and 
 from them emanates all just authority, both civil and ecclesiastical. 
 Therefore he makes the people emperor, sovereign pontiff, god. 
 Hence he actually uses the strange terms people-king, people-pontiff, 
 people-god. Read Pierre Leroux, read Giuseppe Mazzini, and you 
 will find these barbarous epithets, or their equivalents, used in sober 
 
154 APPENDIX A. 
 
 earnestness, and the last-mentioned of these worthies is the recog- 
 nized chief of the whole European democracy, and commands the 
 sympathy of constitutional England and democratic America. The 
 people are crowned and deified in opposition to kings and emperors, 
 but it is still the assertion of the independence, nay, the supremacy, 
 of the temporal order, and the denial of its subordination to the law 
 of God. The people are king, pope, god, and may do what they 
 will, and hence for the despotism of kings we have the despotism of 
 the mass, social despotism, or rather the despotism of the demagogues 
 who control the people. 
 
 '^ But some revolt, again, at this, and will no more submit to king- 
 people than to any other king. They see in the people only a col- 
 lection of individuals, and will not admit of the whole collectively 
 any more than is true of each individual taken separately. Hence 
 we actually hear individuals, not in a mad-house, not looked upon as 
 out of their senses, but honored and held up as the great lights of 
 their age, claim for each individual what the lawyers claimed for 
 Kaiser, what the demagogue claims for the people e?i masse, and 
 assert, each for himself, I am emperor, sovereign pontiff, and god. 
 It is only the logical consequence of the Protestant doctrine of pri- 
 vate judgment, only Protestantism consistently developed. But with 
 this monstrous claim of the individual, no law, no government, no 
 society, nothing but anarchy, is possible. Here is where the move- 
 ment against the absolutism of kings does and must end. Asserting 
 the independence of the temporal order, it passed on to the abso- 
 lutism of the mass, and from that it passes on to the absolutism of 
 the individual, the Free Trade of the late "William Leggett, and 
 would pass further, only there is no further; sink to a lower deep, 
 only a lower deep there is not. 
 
 " Would you have us follow in this track, assert people-king, 
 people-pontiff, people-god, or declare each individual emperor, supreme 
 pontiff, god? Would you have us, in order not to incur the censure 
 of our age, or offend the god of our demagogues, so belie our common 
 sense, so stultify ourselves, as to accept such arrant nonsense, or 
 rather such horrid blasphemy, which the fools of the day boast as a 
 proof of the light and progress of this nineteenth century ] But 
 we must do it, or reassert the Catholic doctrine of the supremacy of 
 the spiritual order, and maintain that the whole temporal order in 
 all things is subordinated to the law of God as interpreted by the 
 Roman Catholic Church." — Ibid., pp. 56, 57. 
 
APPENDIX A. 155 
 
 '' The Church any day is as sovereign as Casar, and as safe a de- 
 pository of power, and the insolence and encroachments of Church- 
 men, suppose them to be as great as the most shameless courtier or 
 politician ever pretended, are less intolerable than the insolence and 
 encroachments of Caesar and his satellites. Any day the mitre is 
 above the crown, and the priest above the demagogue. But after all, 
 we have a tolerable pledge of the good behavior, of the justice and 
 discretion, of the Church in the fact that she is the Holy Catholic 
 Church, the Church of God, the Kingdom of Christ, the immaculate 
 Spouse of the Lamb, divinely commissioned and supernaturally 
 assisted by the Holy Ghost to teach and judge the law of God, and 
 to conduct individuals and nations in the way of truth and holiness. 
 We trust her in all that concerns the soul, and it would be a hard 
 case if we could not trust her also in all that concerns the body." — 
 Hid. pp. 58, 59. 
 
 '^ When, then, we find a sovereign pontiff judging, condemning, 
 and deposing a secular prince, releasing his subjects from their obli- 
 gation to obey him, and authorizing them to choose them another 
 king, we may regret the necessity for such extreme measures on the 
 part of the Pontiff, but we see in them only the bold and decided 
 exercise of the legitimate authority of the spiritual power over the 
 temporal ; and instead of blushing for the chief of our religion, or 
 joining our voice to swell the clamor against him, we thank him with 
 our whole heart for his fidelity to Christ, and we give him the highest 
 honor that we can give to a true servant of God and benefactor of 
 mankind." — Ibid. 61. 
 
 '' Sovereign Pontiff, Successor of the Prince of the Apostles, 
 Vicar of God on earth, if ever through love of the world, or through 
 fear of the secular power, whether royal or popular in its constitution, 
 I forget to assert thy rights as supreme chief under Christ, my Sa- 
 viour, of the whole spiritual order, and as such supreme alike in 
 spirituals and in temporals, let my right hand forget her cunning, 
 and my tongue cleave to the roof of my mouth ! 
 
 " We yield to none in our loyalty to civil government, and we are 
 loyal to it because we are loyal to the successor of Peter. Keligion 
 with us governs politics, and the Pope is lord of Caesar. "W^ithout 
 the Pope, the Church would break into fragments, and dwindle into 
 puny and contemptible Protestant sects; without the Church, reli- 
 
156 APPENDIX A. 
 
 gion would become an idle speculation, a maudlin sentimentj or a 
 loathsome superstition." — Ibid. 62. 
 
 " No matter what may be the self-complacency of Protestants, the 
 lofty airs they assume, the great, swelling words they use, or the 
 grave tones in which they speak of their pure, unadulterated evan- 
 gelical religion, the fact is. Protestantism, considered in itself, is not 
 and never was a religion, true or false, never had a single religious 
 element, never was sought and has never been upheld from any 
 strictly religious motives." — Ibid. p. 89. 
 
 This is endorsed by two xirch-Bishops and twenty-two Bishops, 
 for their imjjrimatur is on the cover of the Review which contains 
 the above. Let it not excite the ire of any thin-skinned Protestant. 
 It is a regular step in a process of sound logic, in which the only 
 error is in the premises. Let any man but admit the Catholic idea 
 of the Church, and he will find himself drawn, by the power of 
 logic, to the same conclusion. It is only because some who use this 
 phrase do not ride their logic so hard, that they are not carried at 
 once to the repose of the Church of Borne. 
 
 " The men who adhere to Protestantism, if they ever investigate 
 their own motives, know perfectly well that they adhere to it only 
 because it emancipates them from all religion, by subjecting religion 
 now to the State and now to the individual judgment or caprice. 
 
 . . . . ^' The Beformation in principle was not an attempt, though 
 a mistaken or an unlawful attempt, to get a purer and better religion 
 than the Catholic ; it was simply a rebellion against God, prompted 
 by the flesh, incited by the Devil. It was born of hell, and hence 
 
 it is that we seldom affect or disturb it by refuting its heresies 
 
 We must oppose Protestantism, not as a false theology, but as a revolt 
 of the flesh against God, — as the mad attempt of men to set them- 
 selves up above their Maker, and to live as they list. 
 
 '' No doubt many Catholics will think this too severe, but it is be- 
 cause we apprehend that there are some who will so think that we 
 say it. We wish our friends to be fully aware of the enormity of 
 Protestantism. We are not wholly ignorant of the infinite tenderness 
 of the Gospel, and we can admire, as well as others, the beauty of 
 Christian charity. We know, too, that many, very many, Pro- 
 testants are amiable fn their social relations, are faithful to their 
 
APPENDIX A. 157 
 
 engagements, and honest in their dealings, and so far very superior 
 to- their Protestantism itself; but not therefore are we to confound 
 their purely human or Gentile virtues with the supernatural virtues 
 of the true Christian. We know what allowances also to make for 
 ignorance and for prejudices early instilled in the minds of Pro- 
 testants ; but we are speaking to Catholics, who are always in danger 
 of thinking too favorably of those who are involved in the Protestant 
 rebellion against God. We have no wish to be severe ; we speak 
 not in wrath ; we would willingly lay down our life to bring Pro- 
 testants into the Church of God ; but we believe it true kindness, 
 true charity, to strip oif the mask from Protestantism, to expose its 
 real features, and to compel it to bear its own appropriate name, so 
 that all the world may see that there is no medium between Catho- 
 licity and no religion, any more than there is between virtue and 
 vice, truth and falsehood, Christ and the Devil. If this offends, 
 then let it offend ; if it do not offend God, we shall remain at our 
 ease."— Ibid. pp. 110, 111. 
 
 On the same page from which the last passage is taken we have 
 the quotation, " Quern Dms vult perdere, j^'ius demcntat." This 
 furnishes the key to the extraordinary frankness of this American 
 Romanist. It is scarcely possible to draw any other inference than 
 that he wishes to precipitate conclusions with Protestants. Goliah 
 himself could not be bolder, nor provoke a combat in more stinging 
 taunts or denunciations. 
 
 " Written Constitutions, parliamentary bodies, all the contrivances 
 of human wit and wisdom to restrict the power of the ruler, or to 
 bind the subject to obedience, are of themselves insufficient to main- 
 tain authority against anarchy, or liberty against despotism. The 
 legitimate authority of the prince, and the just liberty of the subject, 
 wrangle as you will, are practicable only under the supremacy of a 
 divinely instituted and supcrnaturally assisted and protected Church. 
 To enslave this Church, or not to recognize her authority and secure 
 her freedom and independence of action, is at once to destroy the 
 authority of the prince and the liberty of the subject, or to convert 
 authority into despotism and liberty into license." — Ibid. p. 132. 
 
 We subjoin some shorter but not less significant passages, from 
 the pages of a volume of " Reviews and Essays," published by Mr. 
 
158 APPENDIX A. 
 
 Brownson, in 1852. There are selections by himself from his previous 
 productions of such articles as he deemed most important, and such 
 as he desired most to keep before the public. We commend this 
 volume to Protestant readers. It is not soporific, but contains 
 enough to keep the faculty of wonder awake in those who have not, 
 as Mr. Webster once alleged to be his case, had it worn out by too 
 constant use. 
 
 " The Professor contends that the Church is hostile to civil govern- 
 ment ; we would respectfully ask him if he has reflected, that, with- 
 out her, civil government becomes impracticable. How, without her 
 as umpire between government and government, and between prince 
 and subject, and without her as a spiritual authority to command the 
 obedience of the subject and the justice of the prince, will he be 
 able to secure the independence of nations, and wise and just govern- 
 ment." — Broicnson's Essays and Reviews, p. 207. 
 
 '' Our own government is sustained solely by the accidental advan- 
 tages of the country, consisting chiefly in our vast quantities of un- 
 occupied fertile lands, which absorb our rapidly increasing population, 
 and form a sort of safety-valve for its superfluous energy. Strip us 
 of these lands, or let them be filled up so that our expanding popu- 
 lation should find its limit, and be compelled to recoil upon itself, 
 our institutions would not stand a week." — Ibid. p. 208. 
 
 " In submitting to her (the Church of Rome) we are free, because 
 we are submitting to God, who is our rightful sovereign, to whom we 
 belong, all that we have, and all that we are. Freedom is not in 
 being held to no obedience, but in being held to obey only the legal 
 sovereign ; and the more unqualified the obedience, the freer we are. 
 Perfect freedom is in having no will of our own, in willing only what 
 our sovereign wills, and because he wills it. If the Church, as we 
 cannot doubt, be really commissioned by God, the more absolute her 
 authority, the more unqualified our submission, the more perfect is 
 our liberty, as every man knows, who knows any thing at all of that 
 freedom wherewith the Son makes us free. But in yielding obe- 
 dience to a Protestant sect, it is not the same. When any one of 
 our sects undertakes to dictate to conscience, it is tyranny ; because, 
 by its own confession, it has received no authority from God. It is 
 tyranny, even though what it attempts to enforce be really God's 
 
APPENDIX A. 159 
 
 word ; for it attempts to enforce it by a human, and not by a divine 
 authority. It would still tyrannize, because it has no right to en- 
 force any thing at all. It may say, as our sects do say, it has the 
 Bible, that the Bible is God's word, and that it only exacts the obe- 
 dience to God's commands which no man has the right to withhold. 
 Be it so. But who has made it the keeper and executor of God's 
 laws? Where is its commission under the hand and seal of the 
 Almighty?"— itif?. pp. 220-1. 
 
 " We, as Catholics, are taught by a divinely authorized Teacher, 
 that government is the ordinance of God, and that we are to respect 
 and obey it as such in all things not repugnant to the law of God; 
 and we have an authority higher than its, higher than our own, to 
 tell us, without error, or the possibility of error, — because by 
 Divine assistance and protection rendered infallible, — when the acts 
 of government conflict with the law of God, and it becomes our duty 
 to resist the former in obedience to the latter." — Ihid. p, 361. 
 
 " We have always a public authority, which, as it is inerrable, can 
 never be oppressive, to guide and direct us, and if we resist the 
 civil law, it is only in obedience to a higher law, clearly and dis- 
 tinctly declared by a public authority higher than the individual, and 
 higher than the state." — Ihid. p. 362. 
 
 " We have spoken of the tendency, under the name of liberty, to 
 anarchy and license ; but there is another tendency, under the pre- 
 text of authority, to civil despotism, or what has been very properly 
 denominated Statolatry, or the worship of the state, that is, elevating 
 the state above the Church, and putting it in the place of God. Both 
 tendencies have the same origin, that is, in the Protestant rejection 
 of the spiritual authority of the Church on the one hand, and the 
 assertion of private judgment on the other; and in fact, both are but 
 the opposite phases or poles of one and the same principle." — 
 Ihid. p. 363. 
 
 " She (the Papal Church) is an integral, an essential element in 
 the constitution of society, and it is madness and folly to think of 
 managing it and securing its well-being without her. She is the so- 
 lution of all difficulties, and without her none are solvable." — 
 Ihkl p. 365. 
 
160 APPENDIX A. 
 
 "For on the Catholic population, under God, depend the future 
 destinies of these United States. The principles of our holy reli- 
 gion, the prayers of our Church, and the fidelity to their trusts of 
 the Catholic portion of the people, are the only sure reliance left 
 ns."— Ibid. p. 367. 
 
 " It is evident, from these considerations, that Protestantism is not 
 and cannot be the religion to sustain democracy ; because, take it in 
 •which stage you will, it, like democracy itself, is subject to the con- 
 trol of the people, and must command and teach what they say, and 
 of course must follow, instead of controlling, their passions, interests, 
 and caprices." — Ibid. 375, 376. 
 
 " The Constitution, as a restraint on the will of the people or the 
 governing majority, is already a dead letter. It answers to talk 
 about, to declaim about, in electioneering speeches, and even as a 
 theme of newspaper leaders, and political essays in reviews ; but its 
 effective power is a morning vapor after the sun is well uj)." — 
 Ibid. 377. 
 
 " The Constitution is practically abolished, and our government is 
 virtually, to all intents and purposes, as we have said, a pure demo- 
 cracy, with nothing to prevent it from obeying the interest or inte- 
 rests which for the time being can succeed in commanding it." — 
 Ibid. p. 378. 
 
 "And this is good proof of our position, that Protestantism cannot 
 govern the people, — for they govern it, — and therefore that Pro- 
 testantism is not the religion wanted ; for it is precisely a religion 
 that can and will govern the people, — be their master, — that we need. 
 
 " If Protestantism will not answer the purpose, what religion will ? 
 The Koman Catholic, or none. The Roman Catholic religion 
 assumes, as its point of departure, that it is instituted, not to be 
 taken care of by the people, but to take care of the people ; not to 
 be governed by them, but to govern them. The word is harsh in 
 democratic ears, we admit; but it is not the ofBce of religion to say 
 soft or pleasing words. It must speak the truth even in unwilling 
 ears, and it has few truths that are not harsh and grating to the 
 worldly-minded or the depraved heart. The people need governing, 
 and must be governed, or nothing but anarchy and destruction await 
 them. They must have a master." — Ibid. pp. 379, 380. 
 
APPENDIX A. 161 
 
 " But it needs no very sharp observation to perceive that our 
 Republic has virtually failed to accomplish the hopes of its founders, 
 and that it is, without some notable change in the people, destined 
 either to a speedy dissolution, or to sink into a miserable timocracy, 
 infinitely worse than the most absolute despotism. Protestantism, 
 if it could originate, has not proved itself able to sustain it." — 
 Ihid. 433. 
 
 '' Here is our hope for our Republic. We look for our safety to 
 the spread of Catholicity. We render solid and imperishable our 
 free institutions just in proportion as we extend the kingdom of God 
 among our people, and establish in their hearts the reign of justice 
 and charity. And here, then, is our answer to those who tell us 
 Catholicity is incompatible with free institutions. We tell them that 
 tliey cannot maintain free 'institutions without it. It is not a free 
 government that makes a free people, but a free people that makes a 
 free government; and we know no freedom but that wherewith the 
 Son makes free." — Ihid. 441. 
 
 We are certainly under no small obligations to Mr. Brownson, for 
 the very thorough and effective manner in which he has stripped the 
 Papacy of the many disguises it has worn, not only here, but else- 
 where. We mistake very much if his revelations do not gain him 
 more credit among the public authorities of Europe than among those 
 of the United States. No ecclesiastic in this country has had the 
 frankness, much less the courage, to do what he has done. lie has pre- 
 sented the Romish system, in all its magnitude, as a veritable rival 
 to our own. He is thoroughly satisfied that our systems of govern- 
 ment have failed, root and branch. He tells us that, but for our 
 vast fund of public lands, "our institutions would not last a week;" 
 " that we want the moral elements, without which a republic cannot 
 stand;" that we- "have really no social bond, no true patriotism;" 
 "that there can be no common moral culture in the country, — no 
 true religious training;" that some already pronounce "this republi- 
 canism a mere delusion ;" and he avers that, " if the country remains 
 Protestant fifty years longer, facts will prove it ;" he tells us that 
 " Protestantism never has produced, and never can produce, the vir- 
 tues, without which a republican government can have no solid foun- 
 dation;" "that the tendency of Protestantism is to reproduce 
 heathen antiquity, with all its cant, hollowness, hypocrisy, slavery, 
 11 
 
162 APPENDIX A. 
 
 and wretchedness;" that "Protestantism may seem, by its principle 
 of private judgment, to favor civil freedom; it often attempts to 
 establish free popular institutions, but it vrants virtue to sustain 
 them;" that you may "turn Protestantism over, and analyze it as 
 you will, you can make nothing of it but vulgar pride;" "a moral 
 disease, rather than an intellectual aberration ;" " the wrongness of 
 the head being the cause of the rottenness of the heart;" "that 
 human pride, just now, takes the form of Socialism, and Socialism 
 is the Protestantism of our times ;" and that, for all this, the only 
 remedy is in the Papal Church. We cannot wonder that men who 
 entertain such views as the above extracts exhibit, should be in a 
 haste to extirpate so poisonous a pestilence as Protestantism. Let it 
 not be said that these two great religious parties are merely abusing 
 each other, and that it is of little consequence what they say. If it 
 were a mere question of hard names, or severe speeches, it wculd, 
 indeed, be of little import, except for the disgrace of the strife. The 
 dispute is, however, to be ultimately one of vital moment to the peace 
 of the country, and perhaps to its prolonged existence as a republic. 
 The great question now presented to the people of the United States, 
 and, thanks to Mr. Brownson, presented without disguise, is this : — 
 Shall we persist in carrying on our present republican institutions, 
 with liberty of worship and the right of private judgment, or shall 
 we confess that our experiment has failed, and stand ready to accept 
 the protection and guidance of the infallible Church? — That is the 
 important question now pending — if not extremely pressing at this 
 moment, it is becoming more so every day, by our neglect. 
 
 It is not a contest afar off — it is now going on. It is no mere 
 war of words — it is a war of principles — it is a war between civil 
 and religious liberty and the Papal Hierarchy ; in which, if we but 
 maintain our principles, we are certain of victory ; but in which, if 
 we yield any ground, we shall be defeated. What, then, is to be our 
 attitude ? That Christianity which presided over the framing of 
 our political institutions, which accorded Christian toleration to all 
 men, with the right of private judgment, in the very teeth of Papal 
 dogmas; that Christianity which pervaded and still pervades our 
 common law and our legislation, must be upheld, defended, propa- 
 gated, taught to the old and to the young. If that Christianity which 
 our fathers received, and under the light of which they framed our 
 laws and institutions, is not to be an active, positive, pervading reli- 
 
APPENDIX A. 163 
 
 gion, then it must perish, and toleration with it. It is our system 
 of Christianity which enjoins toleration; Papal Christianity forbids 
 it, and brands it as the right of heresy. Can ours, as some contend, 
 be a negative system, retreating before every claim of a right of con- 
 science ? The other, it is now seen, is an active, progressive system, 
 using its right of conscience as a weapon to secure its advancing 
 movements There is then a clear duty resting upon all that host 
 of Americans who hold the great American principle of Christian 
 toleration, and that is, to continue their system of Christianity as 
 the one appropriate to the country and its institutions, and as the 
 only system in which civil and religious liberty can long survive. 
 
 Protestantism does not lack vigor in its members ; but here an 
 occasion arises in which it must exercise some energy both in brain 
 and body. It must move in solid mass against the enemy of Chris- 
 tian toleration. It cannot shrink from the struggle without betraying 
 its dearest interests and ultimate safety. Energy and firmness will 
 ensure a quiet and long reign — a permanent conquest. One false 
 step now, may never be retrieved. Let those who would sustain our 
 tolerant system of Christianity, feel that conscience compels them to 
 sustain it; that they must sustain it, or prove recreant to their own 
 convictions of duty. Let them advance the claims of their system 
 of Christianity with as much confidence and as much perseverance as 
 they would their own personal rights. Let them study well the 
 wide scope of constitutional limits within which these claims can be 
 put forward. And having once ascertained their true path, let them 
 maintain it, advancing with the progress of the age, and adhering 
 firmly to American principles, civil and religious. 
 
 The mass of the Catholics in the United States neither entertain 
 such views, nor suppose that their Priests entertain them. The mass 
 of Protestants are as little aware that such odious principles are held 
 by Romish ecclesiastics. If they were made sure of this, it would 
 be difficult for the whole power of the public authorities to prevent 
 their being driven from the country as its worst enemies. 
 
 There may be many Papal ecclesiasties in this country, as the mass 
 of the laymen undoubtedly do, who regard these anti-American fea- 
 tures of their system with distrust, if not aversion. There are 
 many of whom we should have hoped bettei-, had their names not 
 been appended to the tmj)rlmahir ; and especially is it hard to 
 credit that the Bishop of New York holds any such doctrines as those 
 
164 APPENDIX A. 
 
 so boldly advanced by Mr. Brownson : we think they are inconsistent 
 with much that he has said and written. The sentiments and spirit 
 of the author of '^A Lecture on the importance of a Christian Basis 
 for the Science of Political Economy," and of another on "■ The mixture 
 of Civil and Ecclesiastical Power in the Government of the Middle 
 Ages/' seem of a very different tenor and spirit from those which 
 pervade the pages of the Review and several other leading Papal 
 periodicals. But whilst there may be many Romish Priests not 
 holding opinions so inconsistent with our American institutions, it 
 must be remembered that such individuals do not govern the Papal 
 Church. It holds no such liberal opinions; it makes no compro- 
 mises; its object is ever the same, the absorption of all power, tem- 
 poral and spiritual ; and its general policy, however it may vary, is 
 ever directed towards that end. There may be every variety of 
 ambition among these ecclesiastics, from that which is not censurable, 
 to that which pursues, with untiring eagerness, the grand object; yet 
 there can be no general deviation from this one design. This is no 
 harsh judgment, though it may appear so to such of the Papal Eccle- 
 siastics as are not conscious of such claims on the part of their 
 Church. The great features of the Papacy are, its claim to be 
 The Church, out of whose pale, no salvation is possible. The 
 claim of an infallible Pope carries Papal Ecclesiastics, by a direct 
 path, into the policy we have ascribed to them. If they believe men 
 can only be saved but in their Church, it ceases to be violence, it is 
 charity, to " compel them to come " within her communion : if men 
 refuse to accept the Papal offer of salvation, and resist her violent 
 measures or ridicule her pretensions, it is a mercy to persecute and 
 destroy them, that others may be deterred from following the dan- 
 gerous example. It is impossible for men holding such a doctrine, 
 to refrain from employing every practicable means to enlarge their 
 authority. They have the double inducement — the love of power 
 natural to all men, and the belief that they are doing God service. 
 They aim at dominion, not only for dominion's sake, but to increase 
 the number of saints. It is but justice to say, however, that the 
 present race of Romish ecclesiastics are not responsible for the mon- 
 strous system of spiritual domination which they uphold. They 
 have been trained from their earliest youth to the positions they now 
 occupy. It would be contrary to any just estimate of human nature, 
 to expect them to see clearly, or reject its enormities. Their con- 
 
APPENDIX A. 165 
 
 duct is just what we might expect from men thus educated. Our 
 quarrel is not with the men, but with the system. 
 
 There may be Bishops and Priests who suppose that the spiritual 
 and temporal power towards which their Church proceeds with such 
 a determined step, would not be abused ; they commit the mistake 
 of not seeing that all power in human hands is certain to be abused, 
 but most of all, that which has no assignable limit; and that is the 
 nature of the power which their Church claims. She claims it 
 because she is infallible, and does not fear to wield it because she is 
 infallible. But man is fallible, and all the agents of the Church 
 are fallible, and the greater power she wields, the more mischief is 
 committed. The Church of Rome has always abused her power, 
 and so has every other church. If any lesson is plainly taught in 
 history, it is that power temporal or spiritual is no proper accom- 
 paniment of Christianity, which needs no other than the power of 
 truth and persuasion. 
 
 This grasping for power is not confined to the Papal Church, 
 though displayed most conspicuously there. The history of Protes- 
 tantism furnishes striking examples. It is seen in all the established 
 churches, and can be detected in every denomination. It is to be re- 
 marked that it is not always the intelligence or piety of a church which 
 determines or shapes its policy, but the active intervention of men 
 who attempt to distinguish themselves by peculiar zeal, to pro- 
 cure place, or patronage, or notoriety, by pushing themselves into 
 conspicuous positions, by assuming superiority, by advancing new 
 claims vipon denominational loyalty, and by intensifying every ex- 
 pression and every feature of their denomination. 
 
 The more inactive members of a church cannot afford to be out- 
 done by these special zealots, and so they suffer themselves to be 
 carried wherever the more active and zealous ride the denominational 
 hobby. They may disapprove, but they either lack courage or energy 
 to say so, and the reins are thus surrendered to interested, unworthy, 
 mistaken, or unskilful hands. It is power abused. The only safety 
 for the Church of Christ is, to assume no powers, and then none will 
 be abused. In every large denomination of Christians there will be 
 found strong tendencies towards the formation of governing cliques, 
 and towards the centralization of power : a few men in central posi- 
 tions often make their influence felt to the circumference, and mould 
 measures and men to their liking. As soon as this power is seen to 
 
166 APPENDIX A. 
 
 be concentrated in a few liands, a host, wbo hope to avail themselves 
 of it in some way, show ready court, and hasten to propitiate and 
 strengthen a power which may either render them a service, or do 
 them an injury. Power, both civil and religious, always struggles 
 to enlarge itself, and often from motives wholly unexceptionable. 
 There is no doubt that power, both in Church and State, increases 
 the opportunities of doing good ; but let it be remembered, power 
 corrupts the heart and increases the facilities of committing evil. 
 The Papacy, then, is built upon a system destined to certain corrup- 
 tion, and to the commission of vast mischief. It is a system of cen- 
 tralization : it is a system which, in its nature, begets ambition, lust 
 of power, and usurpation, and these bring forth those vices of deeper 
 dye which blacken the calender of human crime. 
 
 The finger of history has written this upon every century of 
 the Papal Hierarchy, in terms to which no denial can be offered, and 
 which shows, that whatever may have been the piety of the people, 
 scarcely a semblance of Christianity existed among the leaders of 
 those who professed to be the lineal successors of the Apostles. It 
 seems almost impossible for the thoughtful Christian, whether 
 Catholic or Protestant, not to see that the Papal Hierarchy is a system 
 at war with Christianity, and with every form of authority and every 
 kind of government that does not bow to its wishes. It undermines 
 and weakens every other form of power, and then sinks by its own 
 corruptions. It is purer and more unexceptionable in its manifesta- 
 tions here than elsewhere, only because it has not yet obtained power 
 enough to work its own ruin. The separation between Catho- 
 lics and their spiritual governors is not wider than facts warrant. 
 There is very little in common between the Catholics of this country 
 and their Priests and Bishops. The latter being placed over them, 
 and removed from them without their consent, real sympathy be- 
 tween pastor and people is seldom maintained. All other Christians 
 in this country select their own spiritual teachers. This is not only 
 denied to Catholics, but they are not even permitted to own or manage 
 their own churches, church-yards, or cemeteries. They are denied 
 all participation in the councils of the Church; they are neither 
 represented nor heard in the assemblies in which questions of grave 
 import to their religious welfare are decided. Submission is their 
 chief duty; submission of mind, of body, and of purse. When 
 the head is infallible, the other members must obey. 
 
APPENDIX A. 167 
 
 It is very visible, even on the surface, that there is a struggle 
 going on between the free spirit engendered among the Catholics by 
 our American institutions and the Hierarchy of Rome. There has, 
 for years, been an effort on the part of the people to retain the 
 management of their own church property. Their claim has never 
 received the least favor. The indignity put upon our Catholic fellow- 
 citizens is doubtless more felt and talked of, than has yet been made 
 public. The Hierarchy believe that their system is strong enough 
 to overcome this disposition, and to struggle successfully with Amer- 
 ican freedom. That will prove a fatal mistake. In other things, 
 the Hierarchy show themselves unequal to the new position in which 
 they are placed here j they should comprehend it better before adopt- 
 ing their final policy. The Papacy of Europe cannot succeed here. It 
 has had a continual struggle for existence there ; the attempt to 
 carry out its principles has been steadily resisted. It is hastening to 
 a collision with our free institutions which cannot be very remote ; 
 concealing within its bosom discontent and a sense of wrong, in 
 the day of struggle between toleration and liberty on the one hand, 
 and spiritual domination on the other, these will burst forth to the confu- 
 sion and defeat of the power which has so long smothered them. It 
 strikes us forcibly, that a profound knowledge of human nature, in 
 which the members of the Hierarchy, above all other men, ought to 
 be versed, should teach them that their system cannot eventually 
 triumph in the United States. They should be able to see that 
 either the American system of civil and religious liberty must be 
 modified, or their system, opposed in its theory and results to both, 
 must undergo change. They can move in harmony only whilst the 
 Hierarchy is too weak to inflict injury. Its success heretofore is 
 owing to its inability to betray itself. Its inherent power of j^rogress 
 is very great, whilst under wholesome restraint, and whilst prevented 
 from exhibiting its despotic character. "We regard a collision be- 
 tween the free institutions of this country and the Papal Hierarchy 
 to be as certain, as that liberty to worship God accordiug to the dic- 
 tates of each man's conscience, the main religious feature of these 
 free institutions, is opposed to the Papal dogma that there is, and 
 can be, no true worship of God out of that church ; to be just as 
 certain, as that religious toleration and religious intolerance are irre- 
 concilable. The ultimate result of this struggle need not be feared; 
 though deplorable events might be apprehended in its progress, if 
 
168 APPENDIX A. 
 
 the Catholic laity were disposed to sustain the Priesthood. This 
 they will never do, when the designs of the Hierarchy are laid bare, 
 for they are really Americans, and neither seek nor desire any radical 
 change in our political system. 
 
 The worldly wisdom of the Hierarchy fails in the circumstances 
 in which it is placed here. It does not appreciate its position nor its 
 difficulties, and, unless checked, it is pushing on to the greatest dis- 
 asters it has encountered since the Reformation, the most damaging 
 exposures, and the most signal defeat. The history of Catholicism 
 in this counti-y reveals some facts which many Protestants did not 
 anticipate. The Catholic religion can live and flourish in the face 
 of an open Bible, free institutions, general intelligence, and general 
 education. This result no doubt surprises the Hierarchy as much 
 as it does many Protestants ; but this result is pregnant with lessons 
 which the Hierarchy is slow to learn. Their minds are moulded after 
 the Italian or Old World fashion ; they know that an open Bible and 
 liberty of worship would drive all the Priests out of the Papal domin- 
 ions in a fortnight, and they cannot understand why it is not so here. 
 That is a problem demanding their profoundest study. Why do they 
 discourage the reading of the Bible here, when their very opposition 
 induces many to read it who would not otherwise think of it? Why 
 do they prohibit it to the children in the schools, when these children 
 mingle freely with others who are familiar with it, and grow up with 
 them in terms of intimacy; when Bibles are met at every turn — in 
 every hotel, in every vessel, and when, to a curiosity piqued by pro- 
 hibition, men add the striking results produced upon Protes^nts by 
 their devotion to it? That the more active and energetic minds 
 among the Catholics read the Bible, cannot be doubted, and the 
 reading has not produced any general defection from Catholic ranks. 
 Many persons, in fact, perfectly familiar with the Bible, trained to 
 its study from infancy, have left Protestantism and become Catholics, 
 and many of these are the men who now place the claims of the 
 Hierarchy on the highest ground. It is perfectly plain then, for 
 facts have demonstrated it, that the Catholic religion can live and 
 prosper with free schools and the Bible in them. 
 
 This fact, and numberless others which must, at times, attract their 
 notice, should suggest to the Hierarchy the propriety and necessity 
 of establishing an American Church — the Catholic Church of the 
 United States. There have been many organizations of portions 
 
APPENDIX A. 169 
 
 of the Catholic Church in a greater or less degree of dependence on 
 the Holy See. The Papal Church has always been in hot water 
 between her attempts to take care of nations, kings, emperors, and 
 people, and the foolish aversion of these to acknowledge the rights of 
 the Church, and to submit their affairs to the control of the Papacy. 
 Mr. Brownson complains of this European stubbornness which every 
 where, in times past, and every where now, resists this maternal 
 authority, and prevents the whole world from being happy and peace- 
 ful in the bosom of the Church. There is not a country in the 
 •world more quiet at this moment under Papal drilling than our own. 
 It is, therefore, a fit time to form a Catholic Church for this country, 
 in harmony with its principles and its institutions. In no other way 
 can ultimate collision be escaped. The two great systems cannot 
 prosper long side by side. The older having come to dwell with the 
 younger, must make the needful concession. The Galilean Church 
 was a concession. But something better than that is required here. 
 It is but simple good policy to give the management of all church 
 property to the people of each congregation : there must be some 
 among them sufficiently faithful and sufficiently intelligent. It is 
 but like good policy to let the people have some voice in the choice 
 and dismissal of their pastors, and so much is required to place Ca- 
 tholics on an equality with the freemen around them. The subordi- 
 nation to Rome has been, in most European countries, for several 
 centuries, very slight indeed : in this country it should be less than 
 in the least, and be confined, of course, to questions purely theologi- 
 cal, and be only exercised when invoked by American ecclesiastics. 
 
 But above all, and in this lies the chief argument for the change 
 from the European to the American system, the Catholic Priesthood 
 should unite in some great public act, framed in open assembly, 
 avowing their hearty adoption of the principle of religious toleration, 
 as announced in the constitutions of the various States of the Union, 
 and admitting that all truly pious persons may be saved, by what- 
 ever name they may be called. Measures like these would give 
 the Catholic Church a security in this country equal to the stability 
 of the country itself, and insure it a higher destiny than its warmest 
 friends should hope for at present. Its struggle then with other 
 churches would be a struggle for truth, not for power. In our view, 
 this would save the people of the United States from one of the 
 most troublesome convulsions which now threatens their future peace. 
 
170 APPENDIX B. 
 
 Advice is always esteemed a cheap commodity, though it may cost 
 the adviser very dear. In the present case it is not intended to be 
 insulting. The truth is, the very great frankness of Mr. Brownson 
 is infectious, and the openness of his heart requires something equally 
 frank in return. 
 
 We confess ourselves indebted to him in many respects, and we 
 heartily wish that his bold denunciations of Protestantism were 
 read by all in the United States who are capable of profiting by such 
 lessons. His sketch is a broad caricature, but he puts in at times a 
 lineament so true that it must bring a tinge of shame on every 
 Protestant face that sees it. He draws a picture of the Papacy so 
 ideal, so purely imaginative, so grand, so unlike any thing above, or 
 below, or on the earth, that he may safely be left to worship it as 
 the image of " nothing in Heaven above or on the earth beneath, or 
 in the waters under the earth." 
 
 APPENDIX B. 
 
 We transfer from the Appendix of " Politics for American Chris- 
 tians," the following remarks, which appear appropriate to the topic 
 we have been considering. 
 
 " It is a sad mistake to assume that the field of humanity has all 
 been explored, or that the heights or the depths of Christianity have 
 been reached as yet by any human eye. The landscape in each 
 widens as we advance, and no human glance can ever cover the whole. 
 But no eye should be satisfied while more remains to be seen. It 
 requires no small effort to detach one's self from the busy turmoil 
 and exciting scenes of social and religious life, and to withdraw so 
 far as to look from a place apart at the drama enacted upon the stage 
 of life. The spectacle thus obtained is worthy the highest intellec- 
 tual effort; it is instructive beyond all definite estimation. 
 
 Let any one who would find this point of view, ascertain what all 
 of Protestantism is doing in the cause of humanity; how it is pro- 
 moting the progress of social amelioration; and the position it occu- 
 pies on all the great questions which most concern the peace, and 
 
APPENDIX B. 171 
 
 happiness, and well-being of men in this life. It may cost many 
 years of effort and inquiry to occupy a position which will afford a 
 full view of the subject, the complications of which are enough to 
 deter any but the most resolute. It cannot be done without severe 
 mental discipline and painful struggles; for many things have to be 
 unlearned. But it costs no sacrifice of orthodoxy. On the contrary, 
 it would vindicate orthodoxy from much for which it should never 
 have been responsible ; it will afford a clearer view of the elementary 
 doctrines of Christianity than can be had in any other way. This 
 view must be obtained with one hand toward Divinity, the other 
 toward Humanity, an open Bible before the eyes, a heart raised to 
 God for the enlightening influences of his Holy Spirit, and with a 
 devout looking, not only to Christ our atoning Saviour, but to Christ 
 our Lawgiver, our Teacher, our Great Examplar, not less to be 
 heeded and obeyed than to be accepted and worshipped. This method 
 of inquiry will exalt Christianity above all former estimation, by 
 exhibiting its fitness and applicability, not only to save men in eter- 
 nity, but to save them from a vast sum of misery, wickedness, and 
 oppression in this world; thus increasing their grounds for gratitude 
 to God, and leaving them time and opportunity to prepare for Heaven. 
 Has collective Protestantism no grave faults to answer for ? Does 
 it claim infallibility ? If not, if it be conceded that Protestantism 
 has failings, then what are they ? Are they sins of omission or 
 commission, or both? Let a deep search be made into the grand 
 household and conscience of Protestantism. Let there be no flinch- 
 ing, and no sparing ; let neither spiritual pride nor false shame pre- 
 vent a full discovery and an honest confession. Whilst Protestantism 
 is dear to all for the good done under its banners, and for that which 
 is still doing, let no one identify it with Christianity, and thus make 
 the latter responsible for all that passes under the name of the for- 
 mer. The sins of the purest Christian are still sins, and make no 
 part of his Christianity ; they arc to be sought for, and repented of, 
 and avoided. So neither should the sins of Protestantism be ex- 
 cused or covered, much less should they be allowed to bring reproach 
 upon the cause of Christ. One of the great sins of Protestantism 
 is, the refusal to co-operate — to be, even for the advancement of 
 the Redeemer's kingdom, a unit; even for the common defence 
 against a common enemy. Christianity has one voice, and utters 
 simply the teachings of the Holy Scriptures; Protestantism has 
 
172 APPENDIX B. 
 
 many tongues, and utters, in the interpretation of the Scriptures, a 
 variety of voices, and these very far from being in harmony. Yet 
 let the inquiry be made, if there be not points of concord, and those 
 of vital import to the highest interests of Christianity and humanity, 
 on which Protestantism can speak with one voice, and work with 
 undivided energies. If there be such points of concord, admitting 
 unity of voice and action, and no advantage taken of them, then 
 Protestantism is guilty of a great and deadly oifence against Christi- 
 anity. 
 
 Let any Christian man, any real friend of humanity, carefully and 
 continuously survey the actual condition of the human family, in 
 its various phases of barbarism and civilization ; in its aspects of 
 happiness and suffering ; in its social and political institutions ; in 
 its relations with labor, with capital, with commerce ; let him con- 
 sider the nature of the progress which he observes, and the tenden- 
 cies which are at work ; let him note all the hopes and promises 
 which can be gathered from every form of monarchy, aristocracy, 
 and democracy, and from every conceivable combination of them 
 which human ingenuity can devise ; and from every form of philoso- 
 sophy, and every project of reform; let him superadd, from the page 
 of history, all that man has done for man in the most favorable cir- 
 cumstances, and finally, let him sum up that which is hopeful in 
 human prospects, not forgetting that some of the most boasted human 
 triumphs have been purchased by the direst human calamities, that 
 the tendencies to evil do not lessen in proportion to the increase of 
 intelligence, while the power of mischief enlarges ; and he must be 
 convinced that there is no inherent virtue, no moral power, no good 
 inclinations in man, adequate to such a social and political regenera- 
 tion of society as appears to be attainable by a creature of his facul- 
 ties and endowments. Such a survey must convince the observer 
 that no such moral power exists, except in the influences of Christi- 
 anity, to which he is forced to attribute the largest share of the 
 actual progress made in human welfare since the Christian era. In 
 this survey, the first great feature is, that, during the early ages of 
 Christianity, its moral power to renovate human society and promote 
 human happiness was plainiy demonstrated to the world ; the highest 
 earthly hopes of man were placed within the reach of Christian 
 effort. The early history of Christianity appeared to promise a 
 bright day for the human family; but human depravity and perver- 
 
APPENDIX B. 173 
 
 sity triumphed ia that struggle ; Christianity degenerated into Ro- 
 manism, and the evening of that bright dawn ended in the long 
 night of the Middle Ages. Thus the first experiment of Christian- 
 ity, regarded as the only power adequate to secure the highest 
 earthly happiness, failed signally in Papal hands. The Reformation 
 was the era of another experiment, which has now been three cen- 
 turies in progress. This time, the administration of Christianity 
 is divided between Romanism, whose evil tendencies are as great as 
 heretofore, and Protestantism, which has assumed a position of 
 scarcely less power, and perhaps greater influence. Protestantism is 
 now, and has, during its whole history, been regarded as the wor- 
 thiest representative of Christianity. The purest individual Christian 
 laments his insuflSciency and utter unworthiness, and yet how far is 
 such an one above the collective piety of Protestantism, split, as it 
 is, into shapeless and countless fragments, hostile factions swelling 
 with incessant intestinal broils and explosions. How imperfect a 
 representation of the holy cause it impersonates ! It presents 
 a foundation of heaving, shifting sands, upon which to build the 
 fabric of human welfare, rather than one " of rock which cannot be 
 shaken." Must this experiment fail, and prove that Protestantism 
 is also unequal to the task of applying Christianity to the earthly 
 exigencies of humanity? For anything that the collective power 
 and influence of Protestantism is now doing to promote national wel- 
 fare or social reform, it may be apprehended that, at no distant 
 period, the Protestant administration of Christianity will be sub- 
 jected, not to a deep night of ignorance — that is no longer possible 
 — but to a long day of superlative intelligence, crime, and misery. 
 
 Christianity is a system of man's duty to God and to his fellow- 
 men. It enjoins all that is included in love to God, and all that is 
 included in kindness to men. Its administration is, however, com- 
 mitted to men, and partakes in its every manifestation of human 
 infirmity. And while it offers much that is beautiful, it reveals 
 more that is grievous and shocking. Christianity involves, wherever 
 there is liberty of speech and action, a variety of opinions and inter- 
 pretations, and consequently a variety of churches or sects, various 
 organizations and forms of ecclesiastical government; also creeds, 
 confessions, articles, liturgies, forms of worship, a ministry — di- 
 vinely appointed, or religiously instituted ; assemblies for worship, 
 houses or churches in which to worship, and church architecture. 
 
174 APPENDIX B. 
 
 Upon all these, and many more like things, there prevails, among even 
 Protestant Christians, wide and apparently irreconcilable differences 
 of opinion. These differences naturally magnify the objects to which 
 they relate, in the minds of those who permit themselves to dwell 
 upon them, and thus men's minds are seduced into merely collateral 
 channels. Their whole time and their whole minds become absorbed 
 in minor matters, while they suffer the substance to slip from their 
 attention and sink from their sight. It is not necessary to weigh the 
 exact value of these externals of Christianity, in their true place, 
 and order, and use, but it is easy to say that they are of no use if 
 abused or misapplied, and that they become a positive evil when they 
 are substituted for Christianity itself, as is largely the case. None 
 of these things, at the best, are to be received as Christianity, neither 
 is it to be held responsible for any abuse of them. It is as high 
 above all these externals as heaven is above the earth. If our faith 
 be too weak, and our energies insufficient to exemplify Christianity 
 in our lives, we should not permit our conception to fall as low as 
 our practice. We can never rise in our exemplification, if our con- 
 ception be inadequate and unworthy. If men find it hard to act 
 beyond the line of denominational boundaries, let not their faith 
 suffer by assuming a narrower scope for Christianity itself than ^'tig.. 
 most enlarged views their minds are capable of grasping. Its grandest- 
 aspect is that in which it not only offers eternal life and happiness to 
 lost men, but wins their consent to the message of mercy by offering 
 all that man can do and feel for man, as earnest of the authenticity 
 and verity of the message. It is that in which, while it points to 
 men the way to Heaven, smooths their path through this world to 
 the utmost extent which human love and sympathy can go, thus 
 furnishing the nearest approximation which can be made in this 
 world, to the life of love in the world to come. It is a grand fea- 
 ture in Christianity, that its simple but comprehensive principles and 
 injunctions involve the very elements of social life, the utmost duty 
 of man to man. " Thou shalt love thy neighbour as thyself," is a 
 command which reaches to the whole compass of human duty; we 
 owe to our neighbor not merely alms, when he is poor; we ought to 
 save him from becoming poor. \Ye owe him a better position in 
 society; we owe him every social advantage — good laws, good insti- 
 tutions, a good government, a happy and prosperous country. What 
 we owe to one we owe to all, and all in like manner owe to us. 
 
APPENDIX B. 175 
 
 These obligations no human being can fulfil, under the requirements 
 of the gospel, short of expending his whole energies and his whole 
 opportunities. But the advantage of our neighbor is not to be found 
 only in, the bounds of his own country; it must be sought in the 
 happiest relations of his own country with all the nations of the 
 world ; peace with all nations, and interchange of every good office 
 with all. This vast scope of human duty involves necessarily the 
 study of all the themes involved in so wide a compass of human 
 action — it involves the consideration of all that concerns human 
 welfare in this world, in connection with its highest destiny in the 
 next world. While, therefore, nothing is omitted in the sphere of 
 immediate duties, there should be no failure to follow out all obliga- 
 tions to their largest consequences, and to widen the range of duty 
 to the utmost range of mental power • extending the range of action 
 and influence in proportion as the field of vision is enlarged. Very 
 many, it is well known, have no faith in moral or social progress ; 
 they regard all speculations in reference to social amelioration, as, at 
 the best, mere visionary dreams, if not what is far worse, downright 
 socialism. But let no friend of the human family be deterred from 
 any research, or inquiry, or speculation, looking to human advantage, 
 ^?Buch narrowness of mind. Let him take the Gospels in his 
 Band, and the light of all the other Scriptures, and he may go as 
 far as his intelligence and knowledge of the world will carry him ; 
 and if he cannot secure the co-operation or approval of the Christian 
 men of the present day, he will have the full sympathy of those 
 who, having gone before, are observing the world from a point of 
 view where nothing clouds their vision." 
 
 THE END. 
 
iE IMlIilMATUR OP EROWNSON^S 
 QUAHTEEIY REVIEW. ' 
 
 Doubts having been expresseJ about the facts stated w^in, at 
 page 141, that tjie extracts taken from Brownson's Preview h.a^ the 
 sanction of the Catholic Church, we now subjoin the letter of thf>higli 
 Papal clergy, which has a standing place on the covers of Bro J.^r? 
 Quarterly Review since 1849. Any one can verify this by iookitg at 
 the cover of the Review, which is to be^found at all the chief Cutholic 
 bookstores in the United States. 
 
 „ „ "I^ALTIMORE, ISthMav. I84i^'-«a 
 
 After the dose of our Council, I suggested to our venerable n,ctropolitan 
 the propnety of encouraging you by our approbation and inauenoe t. cont 
 your literary labors in defence of the faith, of whicTi yon have proved an 
 and intrepid advocate. He received the suggestion mo.t ea, ily, and I 
 the liberty of communicating the fact to you, as a mark of mv «:„,ere e^ 
 and of the <leep interest I feel in your excellent Review. I .bail bej: o" 
 ana of other prelates who entertain the same views, to sub-.u!; ^ th.ir 
 Ml confirmation of my statement. Four very devoted friend, 
 
 ,, , ^ FiiAjjcis pATBicr: Kenukk, t 
 
 U. A. JiROw; SOS, I]sa. t>- u ^ ^. .. ^ 
 
 ' ^^ Bishop of Philadelph 
 
 . '_ IT .innn Hrr/^»ir,n t>: .1. .. i- 
 
 Loiiis. 
 t MrcHAEL, iilshop of Mobile, 
 t A.N i HON y. Bishop of New Orleans 
 f Joiiy JosE'Tf, liixhoj^ oi Natchez. 
 
 ; -Ma 
 t Jo 
 t Ma. 
 
 J K 
 
 t M. ,/ 
 
 fTVi,, 
 
 t John Hughes, Bish-'p of .\,.w fork 
 
 t RiCH.IRD VlSCKNT, Blshop of lifh- 
 
 t James Otiver, Bish ;p of Chicago! 
 t Ton., U. Hkssi, Bi«hon of Mi 
 
 waukee. 
 t John, liishop of Albanv. 
 
 .l!«v r, r.f r i t ^"^"Evs, Bishop of Cleveland. « 
 
 Bisl. .0 of Lengone, f Pkter Paul, Bishop Zela r^oau'i^ 
 'M ...uisvil.e.. ! AdniinLstrator of Detroit. 
 
 lop of Btiffalo. 
 1 ..v.::;, Bishop cf Pittsburg. 
 ■s, r<;sliof of Dn'ouque. 
 : A' ! 'i.r-. i'.i.slu- .-,f Galveston 
 
 , 'Ush.p of Vin- , f Ignatius Al. 'REys^Ln^'BisL 
 ,, .... I Charleston. 
 
 IvLEv 1 oporaartfovd.,tAxDRrw Byrne. Bisho; 
 ^ a^ui. ■j^ih-r fBoston. I Rocls.," 
 
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