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Note and Comment

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Review and Herald Publishing Association · Takoma Park Station, Washington, D. C. · Dec 5, 1912

FromReview and Herald, Vol. 89, No. 49.

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Note and Comment

By Editor

Governor Wilson on Religion and the State

In an address delivered at the First Presbyterian Church of Trenton, N. J., just before his election to the presidency, Gov. Woodrow Wilson made the following statements, which we wish might be called to the attention of those who are seeking to express religion through the government, and also to the attention of those who are boldly proclaiming the principles of intolerance and declaring the necessity of carrying them into practise in our day. He said:—
The church represents that spiritual part of humanity which does not seek expression in the form of government, or even in the forms of society, but seeks expression in its search for God, in its search for the ultimate fountains of the human spirit. . . .
Those old martyrs who went to the stake smiling and singing songs of praise were terrible fellows; terrible because their very gaiety in going to the stake was evidence of the fact that this was an incident, not an end, and their ashes would seem to speak the condemnation of those who put them to the stake, and stand up and condemn the generation that dared interfere with the processes of divine providence.
Governor Wilson's words are true. The church which does seek expression through forms of government is not the true church, the bride, the Lamb's wife; and as the ashes of the martyrs condemned the generation which drove men and women to the stake for cause of conscience, so will those same ashes condemn this generation when it shall yield to the demands of religio-political organizations in this country and persecute men and women for following the dictates of conscience in matters of faith.
It is greatly to be hoped that, for the good of the nation and its influence abroad, and for the good of the individual souls who make up the nation, the president-elect may carry into practise the principles above expressed, and may use his influence to hold in check the mobilization of the forces of oppression now so actively proceeding.