SACRIFICED ON THE ALTAR OF LIBERTY
By Editor
The Great Commission above Every Human Law — Men Have Not the Right to Stand between Our Faith and God — The State Should Deal with Crime, but Not with Faith
LAST week Mr. Porter gave some of the illustrious examples in the old dispensation, of those who had done brave deeds in upholding the cause of soul liberty. This article, though independent of the one of last week, is supplemental to it, and shows the high, strong ground on which Christianity stands in respect to the rights of individual independence in matters of worship. THERE never lived a purer, truer citizen of earth than Jesus Christ. Yet the fawning Pilate, a presiding judge of the great Roman state, in the trial of Christ, while protesting the innocence of the accused, signed His death-warrant, to please despotic priests and tyrannical Pharisees. This noble Man of Calvary, with full knowledge of all the hypocrisy of creed-bound priests, who were His persecutors, and the parody on justice He had met before this earthly judgment-bar, still prayed, "Father, forgive them; for they know not what they do." O, the pity that such a citizen must be sacrificed for the sake of a creed! Creed-bound zealots and unfaithful judge must some day answer at God's judgment-bar for such crimes against individual rights. Wherever the cross of Christ is reared, it forever advocates religious freedom. In the words of Lowell: "Slavery, the earth-born Cyclops, fellest of the giant brood,
Sons of brutish Force and Darkness, who have drenched the earth with blood,
Famished in his self-made desert, blinded by our purer day,
Gropes in yet unblasted regions for his miserable prey,
Shall we guide his gory fingers where our helpless children play?
"Then to side with Truth is noble when we share her wretched crust,
Ere her cause bring fame and profit, and 'tis prosperous to be just.
Then it is the brave man chooses, while the coward stands aside,
Doubting in his abject spirit, till his Lord is crucified,
And the multitude make virtue of the faith they had denied.
"By the light of burning heretics, Christ's bleeding feet I track,
Toiling up new Calvaries ever with the cross that turns not back;
And those mounts of anguish number how each generation learned
One new word of that grand creed which in prophet-hearts hath burned
Since the first man stood God-conquered with his face to heaven upturned.
"For Humanity sweeps onward. Where to-day the martyr stands,
On the morrow crouches Judas with the silver in his hands.
Far in front the cross stands ready and the crackling fagots burn,
While the hooting mob of yesterday in silent awe return
To glean up the scattered ashes into History's golden urn." Christ's disciples were imprisoned, scourged, and maltreated by the state, because of the difference between their religious belief and that of the majority. Angels were sent to open prison doors and send those disciples forth with the gospel according to the314great commission, to every nation and every people. This commission is authoritative. It is from the King of kings and Lord of lords. By this commission the gospel has the right of way in every nation. The teacher of the gospel is authorized to teach in every nation "all things whatsoever I have commanded you." No state or nation can, therefore, rightly legislate upon any religious question. Christ, not the state, is the power of the gospel. WHY PROHIBIT MURDER AND THEFT ON SUNDAY ONLY?
The effort to suppress Sunday opening of bars and Sunday recreation is but a weak subterfuge, under cover of which Sunday may be made a day of enforced religious worship. If the business of the public house is a criminal business on Sunday, it is equally so on Monday or any other day of the week. If playing ball, attending races or theaters, or performing common labor, is criminal, it is equally so on all seven days in the week. Who would argue that theft, rape, murder, or any other crime, should be prohibited by law on Sunday only? If laws are to be enacted against such crimes, those crimes should be prohibited seven days in the week, and not merely on Sunday. The day upon which the act is committed does not affect the nature of the act. Legislation that tends toward changing the character of actions according to the day on which they are performed, is the result of religious preference for that day. CHRISTIANITY ASSERTS SOUL LIBERTY
When the Master declared, "God is a Spirit: and they that worship Him must worship Him in spirit and in truth," He raised Christianity to a position far above all earthly rule, and asserted its claim to soul liberty. It was this view of soul liberty that led the great Baptist, Roger Williams, to endure banishment from England, banishment from Salem, and banishment from Sekonk. His unqualified position was that soul liberty is man's inherent right. Others sought toleration. He demanded that all men should be left free to enjoy equally their God-given rights. BOTH CATHOLICS AND PROTESTANTS AS PERSECUTORS
England, whose religion was by force Catholic under the reign of Queen Mary, was by force Protestant under Elizabeth. This exposed first Protestants and then Catholics to severe persecution, according to the religious prejudices of the reigning sovereign. Wearied with this condition of things in Europe, and seeing no hope of reformation at hand, Roger Williams fled to the New World. Here he found Massachusetts Bay Colony, controlled by a great desire to establish an orthodox state—"a state where the same theology should be preached in all the pulpits and believed at all the firesides, and where, generation after generation, her citizens could become religious and virtuous according to state law." The people seemed to be blind to the fact that the same legislative power that could establish Christianity, could as easily change its mind and establish infidelity. The French Revolution is a clear demonstration of this fact. To claim that it is right to establish the orthodox faith by law, is to sanction the establishment of infidelity, and the enthronement of the goddess of reason in France. NOT TO BE CHEAPENED BY HUMAN LAW
The Author of Christianity will never enforce His teachings by civil enactments, and He demands that all people be left free to believe or disbelieve His gospel, with no state interference. The final Judgment will decide each man's destiny according to his acceptance or rejection of the gospel of Christ. It is a question of eternal damnation, and Christ demands that it be not cheapened by making it a question of human legislation. "And if any man hear My words, and believe not, I judge him not: for I came not to judge the world, but to save the world. He that rejecteth Me, and receiveth not My words, hath one that judgeth him: the word that I have spoken, the same shall judge him in the last day." John 12:47, 48. JUDGED BY MOTIVES OBTAINABLE ONLY BY ANGEL SECRETARIES
God is judge in the realm of religion, man in things civil. God alone punishes subjects of His moral government for transgression. He deals with sin, first by seeking to remove it by atonement and by inflicting penalties upon the finally impenitent only. Hence as Christ says, such judgment is impossible until the final Judgment-day. It must be based upon perfect records of moral conduct, including motives which are obtainable only of angel secretaries before the throne of God. Rev. 20:11, 12. For this reason Paul says, "Therefore judge nothing before the time, until the Lord come." 1 Cor. 4:5. The state deals with crime and incivility. In that realm it has freedom of judgment. Crime has to do alone with man's relation to his fellow men. The state has no right, therefore, to legislate upon the relations of man with God. The first four precepts of the divine law deal with that relation only. It is a purely religious realm. In it the state has no legitimate field of legislation. The last six precepts pertain to man's moral relations to his neighbor. As such the secret thoughts are involved. Matt. 5:21-28; Ex. 20:17. The state can not, therefore, deal with transgression of the last six precepts of the moral law. They relate to sin. The Inquisition of the Middle Ages is an example of an attempt to do so. MAY DEAL WITH CRIME AND INCIVILITY
The state may justly enact laws dealing with crime and incivility only. It has no more right to compel Buddhists in Christian lands to adopt the Christian forms of religion than Buddhists have in heathen lands to compel Christians to adopt the forms of Buddhism. The divine Lawgiver laid down the only infallible rule to safeguard the individual rights of Christian, Jew, infidel, and Confucianist alike, in the memorable statement, universally known as the "Golden Rule," of man's proper relation to his fellow men: "Therefore all things whatsoever ye would that men should do to you, do ye even so to them: for this is the law and the prophets." Matt. 7:12. R. C. P.