In a work entitled, “The Beginners of a Nation,” by Edward Eggleston, occurs an expression which explains the reason for the inconsistent and unchristian acts of all false theocratic governments. He says: “When once the civil government weights itself with spiritual considerations, its whole equilibrium is disturbed.” It is just as true that when once the church of Christ weights itself with civil considerations, affairs of state, its whole equilibrium is disturbed. “Liberty and justice,” says the same author, “seem insignificant by the side of the immensities.” And yet, says the Word, “Justice and judgment are the habitation of his throne.”
The results of a union of religion and the state, as seen in the injustice which it works to the citizens of a country, stamp the system at once as opposed to the principles of the gospel of Christ, and utterly antagonistic to the purpose of God regarding man. That fact alone is able to account for the cruel treatment accorded to dissenters in New England by the established church and the ingratitude of the Massachusetts and Connecticut governments toward Roger Williams and the Narragansett settlements after the invaluable services rendered.
One of the most persistent antagonists of Roger Williams and his followers was Rev. John Cotton, a former friend and associate of Williams, but “whose moral intuitions were fairly suffocated by logic.” There was considerable correspondence carried on between Cotton and Williams over this very matter of persecution. Such suffocation of morals by “logic” is well illustrated in the reply of Cotton to the following words of Roger Williams:—
“It is a monstrous paradox that God’s children should persecute God’s children, and that they that hope to live eternally together with Christ Jesus in the heavens, should not suffer each other to live in this common air together. I am informed it was the speech of an honorable knight of the Parliament: “What! Christ persecute Christ in New England?”
Mr. Cotton’s reply:—
Though God’s children may not persecute God’s children, nor wicked men either, for well-doing; yet if they be found to walk in the way of the wicked, their brethren may justly deprive them in some cases not only of the common air of the country, by banishment, but even of the common air of the world by death, and yet hope to live eternally with them in the heavens.
The sophistry of such “logic” needs not to be pointed out to him whose heart is enlightened by the light and love of Christ; but let men adopt the idea that it is the business of the church to meddle in civil government, and that it is the business of the state to interfere in matters of conscience, and such a statement as the above seems not only logical but necessary. From such a view-point the advocates of theocratic government in New England guided their course of conduct in whipping Baptists, imprisoning, whipping, and hanging Quakers, exiling members of the established church who had opinions of their own, and finally attempting to rob the Providence Plantations of their colonial autonomy, as pointed out last week.
Mr. Cotton’s reply above quoted is in perfect harmony with the doctrine enunciated by Augustine in the fifth century, that “many must often be brought back to their Lord, like wicked servants, by the rod of temporal suffering, before they attain the highest grade of religious development.” The carrying out of that doctrine brought the martyrdoms of the Dark Ages; and the propounding of such doctrine by Rev. John Cotton and the clergy of his day shows the papal origin of the church-and-state doctrine, while the result of the effort to carry it out in New England likewise puts upon the system the stamp of the papacy.
The patent for the Providence Plantations, which was secured by Roger Williams in 1643, protected the Rhode Island settlers against absorption by Massachusetts, and insured a republican form of government, but said nothing in reference to matters of faith or religion. Some have wondered at this omission; but the silence is eloquent. The one who was instrumental in procuring that patent recognized the faith and the religion of the inhabitants as being entirely outside the jurisdiction of the state, and therefore it was unnecessary for the state to5make any provision with reference thereto. In the matter of government, however, the patent is sufficiently explicit. It gave them “full power and authority to rule themselves and such others as shall hereafter inhabit within any part of the said tract of land, by such a form of civil government as by voluntary consent of all, or the greater part of them, they shall find most suitable to their estate and condition. . . . Provided, nevertheless, that the said laws, constitutions, and punishments, for the civil government of the said Plantations, be conformable to the laws of England, so far as the nature and constitution of the place will admit.”
In the above, emphasis seems to be laid upon the fact that this instrument is for the “civil” government of that colony, and the absence of any word about religion confirms the inference. That republicanism was also guaranteed by that patent is seen in the provision that they were to have authority to govern themselves and those who came among them by such a form of civil government “as by voluntary consent of all, or the greater part of them, they shall find most suitable to their estate and condition.” That was government by the consent of the governed, one of the first principles of the Declaration of Independence—a Rhode Island doctrine for more than a hundred years before the drafting of the Declaration of Independence. It is not to be supposed, either, that such a doctrine in that patent was a product of the English thought and teachings of the time; for never before was there anything like it under England’s jurisdiction. There is no question but that he who took the long journey to England for the protection of the rights of his followers had much to do with wording the provisions of that instrument which was to guarantee those rights.
Upon the basis of that patent the code of laws for the Providence Plantations (Rhode Island) was framed. The closing sentence of that early code runs thus:—
These are the laws that concern all men, and these are the penalties for the transgression thereof, which, by common consent, are ratified and established throughout the whole colony; and, otherwise than what is thus therein forbidden, all men may walk as their consciences persuade them, every one in the name of his God.
After the overthrow of the Oliver Cromwell régime in England, the Rhode Islanders began to fear that their patent might not be honored by King Charles, or that the enemies of their political entity might in some way rob them of the rights which they had attained through so much toil and opposition. Events proved that they had good reason to fear for their liberties. It was as true then as it is now that “eternal vigilance is the price of liberty.”
Mr. John Clarke, a resident of Rhode Island, was in England at the time, acting as agent for the colony; and to him was entrusted the task of securing for the colony a new charter. Application for this charter was made in 1661, but it was not granted until 1663. In the second application for the patent occurs this memorable sentence:—
Your petitioners have it much on their hearts (if they may be permitted) to hold forth a livelie experiment, that a flourishing civill state may stand, yea, and best be maintained, and that among English subjects, with a full liberty in religious concernments.
The language of the second petition seems to have had a favorable effect upon the king, for the very wording of the above quotation is woven into the charter granted at that time. It will be of interest in this connection to quote the following portion of that charter:—
Whereas, in their humble addresse, they have freely declared, that it is much on their hearts (if they may be permitted), to hold forth a livelie experiment, that a most flourishing civill state may stand and best be maintained, and that among our English subjects, with a full libertie in religious concernments; and that true pietye rightly grounded upon gospell principles, will give the best and greatest security to sovereignetye, and will lay in the hearts of men the strongest obligations to true loyaltye: Now know yee, that wee beings willinge to encourage the hopefull undertakinge of oure sayd loyall and loveinge subjects, and to secure them in the free exercise and enjoyment of all theire civill and religious rights, appertaining to them, as our loveing subjects; and to preserve unto them that libertye, in the true Christian ffaith and worship of God, which they have sought with soe much travaill, and with peaceable myndes, and loyall subjectione to our royall progenitors and ourselves, to enjoye; and because some of the people and inhabitants of the same colonie can not, in theire private opinions, conforme to the publique exercise of religion, according to the litturgy, formes, and ceremonies of the Church of England, or take or subscribe the oaths and articles made and established in that behalf; and for that the same, by reason of the remote distances of these places, will (as wee hope) bee noe breach of the unitie and uniformitie established in this nation: Have therefore thought ffit, and doe hereby publish, graunt, ordeyn, and declare, That our royall will and pleasure is, that noe person within the sayd colonye, at any tyme hereafter, shall bee any wise molested, punished, disquieted, or called in question, for any differences in opinione in matters of religion, and doe not actually disturb the civill peace of our sayd colony; but that all and everye person and persons may, from tyme to tyme, and at all tymes hereafter, freelye and fullye have and enjoye his and theire owne judgments and consciences, in matters of religious concernments, throughout the tract of lande hereafter mentioned; they behaving themselves peaceablie and quietlie, and not useing this libertie to lycentiousnesse and profanenesse, nor to the civill injurye or outward disturbance of others; and lawe, statute, or clause, therein contayned, or to bee contayned, usage or custome of this realme, to the contrary hereof, in any wise, notwithstanding.
That “livelie experiment” in the separation of church and state has come down to us as the most precious heirloom of early colonial days. Like every good thing that has come to this world, it came into being through travail and perplexity and pain. As the “dragon” of Revelation stood ready to devour the “child” Jesus as soon as it should be born, so stood the New England hierarchy on three sides of Rhode Island to snuff out its life in the days of its infancy.
Massachusetts had endeavored to blot the colony out of existence as an independent colony in 1643, and Connecticut attempted practically the same thing in 1661-63. Connecticut was endeavoring at that time to secure a patent, or charter, from King Charles, covering the whole of the present territory of Rhode Island with the exception of the town sites of Providence, Newport, Portsmouth, and Warwick. Through the interposition of divine Providence, the undertaking of Connecticut was thwarted, and that little beacon of religious liberty among the colonies was not suffered to be extinguished. Rhode Island became a State among the States, holding aloft to the world as well as to the States among which she was planted the gospel of the only freedom worthy of the name.
We can not pass from a consideration of the charter of Rhode Island without mentioning another fact which shows that when God has a truth for the world, he will permit nothing to stand in the way of having that truth made known. The gospel of soul liberty was due. The only political organization that professed to stand upon that principle was the infant colony of Rhode Island. That colony, in pleading for a charter from the crown of England that would guarantee soul liberty to the inhabitants was appealing for England to repeal her own laws so far as Rhode Island was concerned. The laws of England rigidly required uniformity in religious belief. In its view, as expressed in its fundamental law, church and state were essential portions of each other. But the charter granted to Rhode Island in 1663 exempted Rhode Island from operation of those laws, and by its provisions did literally disestablish the church so far as it affected the colony. It is a significant fact that in that royal charter were summed up, as the basis of Rhode Island’s government, the very principles which characterized the American6nation as expressed in the Declaration of Independence and the Constitution of the United States—that is to say, republicanism and religious liberty.
For one hundred seventy-eight years that royal charter remained the fundamental law of Rhode Island, and every vital principle of the charter was incorporated into the State constitution when adopted in 1842. The opening sentence of that constitution reads as follows:—
We, the people of the State of Rhode Island and Providence Plantations, grateful to Almighty God for the civil and religious liberty which he hath so long permitted us to enjoy, and looking to him for a blessing upon our endeavors to secure and to transmit the same, unimpaired, to succeeding generations, do ordain and establish this constitution of government.
One of the chief articles of that constitution is Article 3, as strong and forceful a declaration upon the matter of religious freedom as man could devise. It reads:—
SECTION 3. Whereas, Almighty God hath created the mind free, and all attempts to influence it by temporal punishment, or burdens, or by civil incapacitations, 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 expressed it, to hold forth a lively experiment that a flourishing civil state may stand and be best maintained with full liberty in religious concernments; we therefore declare, that no man shall be compelled to frequent or to support any religious worship, place, or ministry whatever, except in fulfilment of his own voluntary contract; nor enforced, restrained, molested, or burdened in his body or goods; nor disqualified from holding any office; nor otherwise suffer on account of his religious belief; and that every man shall be free to worship God according to the dictates of his own conscience, and to profess, and by argument to maintain, his opinion in matters of religion; and that the same shall in no wise diminish, enlarge, or affect his civil capacity.
In that constitution we find the church disestablished, we find the principles of republicanism, we find the equality of man, and we find the prohibition of religious tests as a qualification for holding public office. All of these principles we find later incorporated into the Constitution of the United States; but none of them were to be found in any of the charters of those colonies where church and state were united. It is easy to determine, then, the germinant source of those principles which have made America great, and a refuge for the oppressed of every land. The nation’s debt to Roger Williams is a debt that can never be canceled.
We have now shown the evil results that followed the establishment of the church in the different colonies and the reaction for soul liberty in Rhode Island. We will seek in following articles to show the growth of the principles of religious liberty in the nation, and the later abandonment of those principles and the retrogression toward the evils of church and state union.