as "the church," but only separate and independent organizations. Toleration is an important step from state-churchism to free-churchism. But it is only a step. There is a very great difference between toleration and liberty., Toleration is a concession, which may be withdrawn; it implies a preference for the ruling form of faith and worship, and a practical disapproval of all other forms., It may be coupled with many restrictions and disabilities. We tolerate what we dislike, but cannot alter; we tolerate even a nuisance if we must. Acts of toleration are wrung from a government by the force of circumstances and the power of a minority too influential to be disregarded. In this way even the most despotic governments, as those of Turkey and of Russia, are tolerant; the one toward Christians and Jews, the other toward Mohammedans and dissenters from the orthodox Greek Church; but both deny the right of self-extension and missionary operations except in favor of the state religion, and both forbid and punish apostasy from it. Prince Gortschakoff, the late chancellor of the Russian Empire, before an international deputation of the Evangelical Alliance, pleading for religious freedom in behalf of the persecuted Lutherans of the Baltic provinces in 1871, boldly declared, within my hearing, that Russia was the most tolerant country in the world, and pointed in proof to half a dozen churches of dif ferent denominations in the principal street of St. Petersburg, but protested at the same time against what he called propagandism. The great Russian statesman did not, or would not understand the vast difference between toleration and liberty. The English Lord Stanhope, in a speech in the House of Lords in 1827, on the Bill for the Repeal of the Test and Corporation Acts, said: "The time was, when toleration was craved by dissenters as a boon; it is now demanded as a right; but a time will come when it will be spurned as an insult." In our country we ask no toleration for religion and its free exercise, but we claim it as an inalienable right. "It is not toleration," says Judge Cooley, "which is established in [ our system, but religious equality." Freedom of religion is one of the greatest gifts of God to man, without distinction of race and color. He is the author and lord of conscience, and no power on earth has a right to stand between God and /// the conscience. A violation of this divine law written in the heart is an assault upon the majesty of God and the image of God in man. Granting the freedom of conscience, we must, by logical necessity, also grant the freedom of its manifestation and exercise in public worship. To concede the first and to deny the second, after the manner of despotic governments, is to imprison the conscience. To be just, the state must either support all or none of the religions of its citizens. Our government supports none, but protects all. 5. Finally—and this we would emphasize as especially important in our time,—the American system differs radically and fundamentally from the infidel and red-republican theory of religious freedom. The word freedom is one of the most abused words in the vocabulary. True liberty is a positive force, regulated by law; false liberty is a negative force, a release from restraint. True liberty is the moral power of self-government; the liberty of infidels and anarchists is carnal licentiousness. The American separation of church. and state rests on respect for the church; the infidel separation, on indifference and hatred of the church, and of religion itself. The infidel theory was tried and failed in the first Revolution of France. It began with toleration, and ended with the abolition of Christianity, and with the reign of terror, which in turn prepared the way for military despotism as the only means of saving society from anarchy and ruin. Our infidels and anarchists would re-enact this tragedy if they should ever get the power. They openly profess their hatred and contempt of our Sunday-laws, our Sabbaths, our churches, and all our religious institutions and societies. Let us beware of them! The American system grants freedom also to irreligion and infidelity, but only within the limits of the order and safety of society. The destruction of religion would be the destruction of morality and the ruin of the state. Civil liberty requires for its support religious liberty, "In der Beschränkung erst zeigt sich der Meister, Republican institutions in the hands of a virtuous and God-fearing nation are the very best in the world, but in the hands of a corrupt and irreligious people they are the very worst, and the most effective weapons of destruction. An indignant people may rise in rebellion against a cruel tyrant; but who will rise against the tyranny of the people in possession of the ballot-box and the whole machinery of government? Here lies our great danger, and it is increasing every year. Destroy our churches, close our Sunday-schools, abolish the Lord's Day, and our republic would become an empty shell, and our people would tend to heathenism and barbarism. Christianity is the most powerful factor in our society ~ and the pillar of our institutions. It regulates the family; it enjoins private and public virtue; it builds up moral character; it teaches us to love God supremely, and our neighbor as ourselves; it makes good men and useful citizens; it denounces every vice; it encourages every virtue; it promotes and serves the public welfare; it upholds peace and order. Christianity is the only possible religion for the American people, and with Christianity are bound up all our hopes for the future. This was strongly felt by Washington, the father of his country, "first in war, first in peace, and first in the hearts of his countrymen"; and no passage in his immortal farewell address is more truthful, wise, and worthy of constant remembrance by every American statesman and citizen than that in which he affirms the inseparable connection of religion with morality and national prosperity. THE CONSTITUTIONAL BASIS OF THE AMERICAN SYSTEM. The legal basis of American Christianity in its relation to the civil government is laid down in the Constitution of the United States, which this year enters upon its second centennial. This great document was framed after the achievement of national independence in a convention of delegates from twelve of the original States (all except Rhode Island), in the city of Philadelphia, between May 14th and September 17, 1787, by the combined wisdom of such statesmen as Hamilton, Madison, King, Morris, Sherman, Dickinson, Pinckney, Franklin, under the presiding genius of Washington. It was ratified by eleven States before the close of the year 1788, and went into operation in March, 1789.' It was materially improved by ten amendments, which were recommended by several States as a guarantee of fundamental rights, proposed by the first Congress in 1789-90, and adopted in 1791. To these were subsequently added five new amendments, namely: Article XI. in 1793; Article XII. in 1803; Article XIII. in 1865; Article XIV. in 1868; Article XV. in 1870. The last three are the result of the civil war, and forbid slavery, declare the citizenship of all persons born or naturalized in the United States, and secure the right of citizens to vote irrespective "of race, color, or previous condition of servitude." 1 Delaware (Dec. 7, 1787), New Jersey (Dec. 18, 1787), Georgia (Jan. 2, 1788), and Maryland (April 28, 1788) ratified the Constitution unanimously and unconditionally; Pennsylvania (Dec. 12, 1787), with a majority of 15 (45 out of 60); Connecticut (Jan. 9, 1788), with a majority of 88 (128 against 40); Massachusetts (Feb. 7, 1788), by a vote of 187 to 168; South Carolina (May 23, 1788), with three recommendations; Virginia (July 26, 1788), by a majority of 10 (89 to 79), and with a declaration of a bill of rights; New Hampshire (June 21, 1788), with twelve alterations and provisions; New York (July 26, 1788), with a majority of only three (30 to 27). The remaining two States adopted the Constitution afterward-North Carolina, November 21, 1789; Rhode Island, May 29, 1790. During the deliberations for its adoption, it was ably defended by Alexander Hamilton, of New York, James Madison, of Virginia, and John Jay, of New York, in The Federalist (1787 to 1788), against the attacks of the antiFederalists-newly edited by John C. Hamilton, Philadelphia (Lippincott & Co.), 1873, (659 pages). Another edition by Henry B. Dawson, New York, 1878 (615 pages). But The Federalist is silent on the subject of religion. This Constitution, including the fifteen amendments, is "the supreme law of the land,"—that is, of all the States and Territories belonging to the United States. It expresses the sovereign will and authority of the people, which, under God, is the source of civil power and legislation in a free country. It can only be altered and amended by the same authority. Experience has proved its wisdom and deepened the attachment to its provisions. And, having stood the fiery ordeal of a gigantic civil war, it may be considered safe and sound for generations to come. Although by no means perfect, it is the best that could be made for this western republic by its thirty-nine framers, whom Alexander Hamilton Stephens (the Vice-President of the late Southern Confederacy) calls "the ablest body of jurists, legislators, and statesmen that has ever assembled on the continent of America." Most of them were conspicuous for practical experience in statesmanship and for services to the cause of liberty; and they had the great advantage of drawing lessons of wisdom from the various State Constitutions, the Articles of Confederation, the British Constitution, the Swiss and Dutch Confederacies, as well as from ancient Greece and Rome. Their patriotism had been tried in the furnace of the War of Independence. James Madison, afterwards President of the United States, who preserved for posterity the debates of the Convention, gives it as his profound conviction, "that there never was an assembly of men, charged with a great and arduous trust, who were more pure in their motives, or more exclusively or anxiously devoted to the object committed to them, than were the members of the Federal Convention of 1787, to the object of devising and proposing a constitutional system which should best supply the defects of that which it was to replace, and best secure the permanent liberty and happiness of their country." " 2 'In Johnson's "Universal Cyclop.," revised edition, II. 243. In Jonathan Elliot's "Debates of the Several State Conventions on the Adoption of the Constitution," vol. V., p. 122. This and the following quotations are from the second and enlarged edition of this important work, published by Lippincott, Philadelphia, 1876, in 5 vols. The first edition, in 4 vols., |