What Is Religious Liberty?
By C. M. Snow
LIBERTY in temporal matters is the right to think, to speak, and to act as having the ownership over one's own powers of thought and speech and action, untrammeled by the ownership or interference of others; and this liberty properly exercised recognizes and respects the same rights in others that it claims for itself. So long as one man has a legal right, in his own interest and for the accomplishment of his own purposes, to compel another to act or to refrain from acting contrary to his own legitimate wishes, that individual so compelled is a slave to him who has the right of legal compulsion. That individual is not free, and that is not liberty. The free man has the right to go where and when he may chose; to buy and sell and get gain for the maintenance of himself and those dependent upon him; to have and to hold that for which he barters his labor or the product thereof; to preserve inviolate the family ties which he may see fit to assume; to step out from under his own roof and say, “I am my own, under God.” No man can tell him what he shall or shall not do, and so long as he does not interfere with this freedom in others, none other can interfere with his. None can hold over him the lash of ownership. If, then, he is a slave whose actions in temporal things are not subject to his own direction, what is he whose actions in religious matters—matters of conscience—are performed at the direction of others, or in a manner prescribed by others? If he is a slave who is not permitted the privilege of carrying out the legitimate dictates of his own will, I ask what is he whose acts of worship are prescribed or disallowed by others? If that condition which robs men of their inherent right to think and act for themselves in temporal matters is slavery, what do you call that condition which robs men of their right to worship God according to the dictates of their own consciences? If a man is a slave in the one case, what name have you for him in the other? If he is a slave in the other case, too, then the condition which makes the second contingency possible is slavery. The slave did not have the free exercise of the inherent rights of mankind, because he was not his own—he was owned by another. It was that ownership which gave the master the legal right to direct the actions of his human chattel. If, then, that be the case, what is it that gives to a set of men, or to a government, the legal right to say where, when, or in what manner you shall or shall not perform your acts of religious worship? I answer, It is an ownership over you, implied, if not expressed. It is implied in the action itself, tho it is not, of course, expressed in the causes or the arguments which bring about the action. If by right you are another's, that other has the right to direct your actions. If you are not another's, then no such right exists; and any attempt at coercion, whether in the temporal or spiritual sphere, is an unwarranted attempt to enslave him whom God has manumitted. But are we another's?—Yes, by all means, yes. We have been bought with a price, and the price has been paid, and we are not our own; but, thank God! we know who our Owner is, and we know the price He paid for us; and He has not left us in darkness as to what He requires of us; and until He releases us from His ownership we have no right to serve another. The bondman could not serve another master contrary to the command of his7own master. No master could compel the servants of another to serve him. So we can not serve men contrary to God's will or command, and no earthly master has a right to expect us to yield obedience to him contrary to the commands of the heavenly Master, whose we are, and whose love is the chain that binds us to him. If we allow that others have a right to command us in matters of faith and worship, telling us how or when our religious duties must be performed, then we are bowing our necks to human masters, deserting Him who holds the only legitimate ownership over us; and the government that would thus compel us is putting itself in the place of God, and demanding of us that which God alone has the right to require. In matters of religion, we worship that power which we obey. When the State commands obedience in matters of faith, and we obey the State's command as coming from the State, whether that command be in accordance with the outward form of God's law or in opposition to it, we are worshiping the State; and obedience yielded in that way—obedience to the State in matters of religion—is an obedience which makes of us idolaters instead of worshipers of the true God. The principles of religious liberty could be well expressed in this way. Do not compel others in matters of religion, to do what you would not like to have them compel you to do. It is the principle of the Golden Rule applied to the practising of one's religious convictions. It is the right to “worship God according to the dictates of our own consciences.” Religious liberty implies the separation of Church and State; for wherever the two have been united the church has become the dominating power, religious persecution has resulted, and the boiling caldrons of an Inquisition have sent up their pestiferous stench to heaven. The civil power can not meddle with the ecclesiastical and retain its individuality. The union of the two renders both incapable of accomplishing the objects for which they were designed. The church was instituted as a teacher of the way of salvation; the “powers that be” were instituted as a terror to evil-doers. The work of the one is eternal, and its weapons spiritual; the work of the other is temporal, and its weapons carnal. The work of one ends with mortals and time, the other only with immortals and eternity; and none but the spiritually blind could ever think of uniting two such dissimilar powers for the accomplishment of one object, and that object the salvation of man. Christ gave to the world a new doctrine—the separation of Church and State—and that doctrine carried out will give to all men everywhere religious liberty. C. M. Snow.