AMERICAN LIBERTY | AdventAI

Pacific Press Publishing Company · Mountain View, Cal. · Jul 4, 1906

FromSigns of the Times, Vol. 32, No. 26.

AMERICAN LIBERTY.

Symbols, Principles, Facts.

THERE are principles and symbols of principles. Some hold to the principles, but pay little regard to the symbol. Many honor or worship the symbol, but forget and trample underfoot the principles. It is the principle itself which ought to be loved or hated, and not the symbol of the principle.

THERE are American symbols,—Independence Hall in Philadelphia, Liberty Bell, Fanueil Hall, Bunker Hill Monument, the Flag, and other things dear to the American heart. Independence Hall and Fanueil Hall are in themselves no more than many other old buildings; but they stand for principles, and those principles were at one time considered of vital worth to the people of this country. The flag of itself is of no more worth than any other tri-colored cloth; but the principle of freedom it stands for is of tremendous value. The old Liberty Bell in itself is worth only what it will sell for as bell metal, but the principle of liberty for which it once rung is of priceless worth.

THE great danger is in worshiping the symbol and forgetting the principle for which it stands. Independence Hall and Liberty Bell are sacred to the heart of many who trample their principles underfoot. Men will worship the flag, and liken its trinity of colors to the trinity of Deity; they will hail "Old Glory" as it is flung to the breeze as the aboriginal does his idol god, while the principles of true freedom, which in a measure gave birth to the flag, are set aside as out of date, and the flag is used to foster tyranny and slavery.

Lessons of History.

THERE are not wanting such lessons. Every decadent nation, every backslidden church, is an object-lesson. Here is one from the Book of God. As long as Israel was faithful to God, cherishing His holy law and rich mercy in their hearts, the ark of God, which contained the tables of the law and the cover of which was the mercy-seat, was a symbol of God's presence and strength to withstand all foes. Before that ark Jordan's rolling flood was stayed. In its presence, while shouting victory by faith, God's invisible army threw down the strong walls of Jericho. When Israel had forgotten God, when His presence in their life had departed, they worshiped the ark as a sort of charm or fetish. When they hoped it would get them victory, they met defeat, and the ark, captivity. The true condition of that nation then was written in one word, "Ich-abod," the glory is departed.

NEHUSHTAN.

When poor sinning Israel were bitten by the fiery serpents of the wilderness, fit symbols of sin, Moses was told to make a brazen serpent and put it on a pole so high that all afflicted ones who so desired could see it. Looking upon that symbol by faith in the power and love of God meant healing, and many were healed. Centuries after Israel forgot God's mercy and goodness, and worshiped the brazen serpent as though there were virtue in it. But Hezekiah, true reformer that he was, in breaking down the high places and images of the licentious sun-worship, also "broke in pieces the brazen serpent that Moses had made; for to those days the children of Israel did burn incense to it, and he [Hezekiah] called it Nehushtan," that is, "a piece of brass." It was only that when the faith, the character, the cleansing, for which it stood, were all gone.

IN many cases we may trace the images they now worship as having virtue in themselves, back to some good principle which the original image symbolized. But later generations forgot the principle and worshiped the image; and the more the principle was forgotten, the more elaborately was the image worshiped, and the more sacredly was it regarded, till it became a symbol of persecution against all who did not agree with its worshipers.

INDEPENDENCE HALL, Liberty Bell, and the old Flag stood for something in the days of 1776. They stood for two principles dear to the heart of every lover of humanity and liberty. These principles are the equality of man, and religious liberty. The former of these is embodied in the Declaration of Independence: "We hold these truths to be self-evident; that all men are created equal; that they are endowed by their Creator with certain unalienable rights; that among these are life, liberty, and the pursuit of happiness." This was the basic principle of that document to which the fathers of this country affixed their names July 4, 1776, in Independence Hall, Philadelphia: "To secure these rights governments are instituted among men, deriving their just powers from the consent of the governed." Man yields no unalienable right in being a subject of true civil government. A just government protects him in those rights and secures them to him. Another principle is involved in the Declaration of Independence; but it was thought necessary especially to emphasize it in the first amendment to the Constitution of the new nation; and that was the principle of religious liberty, the right to worship or not to worship, to believe or not to believe, to be wholly untrammeled in religious worship by human interference. Thus it is guarded in the Constitution: "Congress shall make no law respecting an establishment of religion, or prohibiting the free exercise thereof." And later on in Amendment XIV.: "No state shall make or enforce any law which shall abridge the privileges or immunities of citizens of the United States; nor shall any state deprive any person of life, liberty, or property without due process of law, nor deny to any person within its jurisdiction the equal protection of the laws."

CHRISTLIKE.—Both of these principles are Christian in their origin. Equality of man

without and within the church is expressed in such scriptures as these: "God is no respecter of persons;" "God . . . hath made of one blood all nations of men for to dwell on all the face of the earth;" "For one is your Master, even Christ, and all ye are brethren." And the second grand principle of religious or non-religious freedom is thus expressed by Jesus Christ and the apostle Paul: "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." "Knowing therefore the terror of the Lord, we persuade men." That these principles were what these symbols stood for in 1776, the founders of the nation speak abundantly.

ON the reverse side of the great seal of the United States is the Latin motto, "Novus ordo seclorum," "A new order of ages." And so began in the United States a new order of ages in government. Every man was the peer of his fellow. Here was a "state without a king and a church without a pope." Religion was free, to live or to die as its devotee willed. The government protected the man, not the religion. If worthy, if of God, the religion would stand of itself without the support of civil government. If unworthy, let it die. So the founders of this government considered, and so they expressed it in the charters of our liberty.

BUT "the new order of ages" is passing away, and the old order of the Dark Ages is reviving. He who has carefully read the history of the first five centuries of the Christian era may see Rome's life being lived over again in this country. The religious element of the country, having lost the Pentecostal power, is seeking affiliation with the state, and state aid to religious institutions. Not knowing the power of godliness, they are seeking the power of the civil arm. They are bringing strong pressure to bear upon politicians, municipal officers, state legislatures, the national Congress, the state, district, and federal courts. All these institutions have bent under the pressure.

THE fulcrum over which the strongest lifting has been done is the Sunday law in a hundred different phases. Judges in our state courts have yielded; the Supreme Court has yielded; Congress and the Chief Executive have yielded. Scores have been imprisoned in different states for the simple exercise of the unalienable rights vouchsafed of God to every human being, and supposed to have been secured by the Magna Charta of American liberty.

JUST now there is a lull in the persecution. But honest and misguided souls are working through our young people's societies, through law-and-order leagues, through so-called "Christian citizenship," through temperance organizations and church federations, to secure what will finally culminate in the fullest union of church and state in this country, and which will result in the utter ruin of both church and state.

NOW is the time for every lover of liberty to be alarmed and aroused. Now is the time for these religio-political reformers to examine anew the ground and motive of their work in the light of past history and in the blazing brightness of New Testament teaching. We can not afford to be mistaken. "Eternal vigilance is the price of liberty." Already the flag, which should be a symbol of liberty existing, is made an instrument of tyranny in some parts of our land in compelling its worship in public schools. So is every principle of right becoming perverted.

IT is the symbol and not the principle which is honored by the backslider in every true cause. It is the principle, the truth, God-given, which is honored by the true reformer in both church and state.