The Key to Liberty

Pacific Press Publishing Company · Mountain View, California · Oct 18, 1905

FromSigns of the Times, Vol. 31, No. 42.

The Key to Liberty.

It is said of Thomas Jefferson that while he took just pride in being styled the author of the Declaration of Independence, he was still prouder of the fact that he was the author of the Virginia statute of religious freedom. It was this memory that he desired to have inscribed on his tombstone. It was a protest against religious proscription that inspired Mr. Jefferson's statesmanship. The key to all civil liberty is religious liberty. The former can not exist where the latter is not recognized. Christ said to the people, "If the Son shall make you free, ye shall be free indeed." In the new earth the regenerated

race will enjoy the full measure of civil and religious liberty as the result of the freedom from sin acquired through the sacrifice of the Son of God. Yet Christ never made any direct effort for the political freedom of the people. Religious intolerance and political tyranny are twin evils growing out of sin. They are chosen instrumentalities by which men are influenced to destroy one another. Given, a race without sin, and all manner of thralldom vanishes. "Where the Spirit of the Lord is, there is liberty."