THE Constitution establishes nothing that interferes with equality or individuality. It knows nothing of differences by descent, or opinions, of favored classes, or legalized religion, or the political power of property. It leaves the individual alongside the individual. . . . Religion was become avowedly the attribute of man and not of a corporation. . . . Vindicating the right of individuality even in religion, and in religion above all, the new nation dared to set the example of accepting in its relations to God the principle first divinely ordained in Judea. It left the management of temporal things to the temporal power; but the American Constitution, in harmony with the people of the several states, withheld from the Federal Government the power to invade the home of reason, the citadel of conscience, the sanctuary of the soul; and, not from indifference, but that the infinite Spirit of eternal truth might move in its freedom and purity and power.—George Bancroft, "History of the Constitution," Book V, Chapter 1.
