The American Sentinel, Vol. 7, No. 1
IN the published report of his campaign, for Sunday observance at the World's FaPage 1
IN the published report of his campaign, for Sunday observance at the World's Fair, in Iowa, M. A. Gault says: “We must be careful to avoid the Union of Church and State, but equally careful to prevent the State from antagonizing the Church. To open the Fair on Sabbath would necessarily shut out a large number of Sabbath-keeping Christians. It would be violating their civil liberty by putting them on an unequal footing before the law. The Government would thus put a premium on infidelity, and reserve for none but Sabbath breakers the employment in the Fair. It would seriously interfere with liberty, and violate the First Amendment of the National Constitution.” Analyze this. Outside of the first phrase there is not a sound statement in the paragraph. If the Church is the exponent of pure religion and the State of civil equity there can not be antagonism between them. If the Fair were open every day in the week no one would be shut out at any time. If closed one day all will be shut out on that day, most of them unwillingly. Absolute non-interference from the Government in this matter will alone bring perfect equality, anything else puts Christian believers on a different footing not only from unbelievers, but even among themselves. The Government would pay no premium, for as it has no proper authority it would have assumed no improper responsibilities. To avoid interference does not interfere; and to obey does not violate. This seems a very superficial way to make the worse appear the better reason, yet it is a fair sample of the methods used by the religious legislationists. The Situation as It Is To-day.
By A. T. J.
ANOTHER year has passed, and THE AMERICAN SENTINEL enters upon the seventh year of its publication. The evil work, to which it is THE SENTINEL’s business to call attention, has gone steadily and rapidly onward during the whole year. Although the year 1891 has not been one of so much legislative activity as have some of the years before it, yet the progress of the movement to join religion and the State, has been none the less rapid. In fact, as to real material progress, it is safe to say that the movement has gained almost as much in the past year as in any two years before. In addition to its general strength the movement has made several important accessions. At the beginning of the year the allied organizations stood: The National Reform Association; the Woman’s Christian Temperance Union; the Third-Party Prohibition Party; the American Sabbath Union; and the Catholic Church. There have been gained during the year, the Chautauqua Literary and Scientific Circle; and the Young People’s Society of Christian Endeavor. The latter numbering more than eight millions of members, though a large number of them may be, just now, too young to count in a political way, will in a very few years be able and ready to bear a full part in the grand scheme to make the religious element superior to the civil power in this Government. As for the Chautauqua Literary and Scientific Circle, its platform, throughout the whole United States, has furnished the freest channel and the widest open door for the propagation of the National Reform principles that has been found since the Woman’s Christian Temperance Union joined the movement in 1886. And the Young Men’s Christian Association, which has all along kept itself well aloof from the movement, is now becoming more and more a part of it. In years past influential members of the legislative department of the national Government have proved themselves anxious to perform a prominent part in the scheme to make religion an essential branch of politics, and in the past year a large number of members have shown themselves willing to do the same. The Independent, of this city, attempted a sort of census of the Sunday standing of members of the Fifty-first Congress. There was not a majority of the members who made answer, but a large majority of those who did reply, freely expressed themselves in favor of the government recognition of the sacredness of Sunday by declaring their readiness to favor congressional legislation closing the World’s Fair on Sunday. The Fifty-second Congress is largely Democratic, and its attitude is yet to be determined. Until the past year the legislative department was the only department of the national Government that had been called upon for the opportunity to express itself upon this subject. During 1891, the judicial department of the Government2was called upon to view the question. And so far as the question has yet been discussed, by this department, the very least that can be said of it is that the question has been dealt with in a manner that should thrill with joy the very hearts of the most rabid National Reformers and would-be-persecutors in all the land. If the Supreme Court of the United States should adopt the views and confirm the opinions of the decision referred to, then Heaven pity the individual who should ever venture to think or act for himself religiously in this country. As the victim of this particular piece of persecution is now dead, it is hardly likely that the Supreme Court will be called upon to notice the question as soon as was expected. And in view of the result, so far as the case did go, the people may count themselves fortunate that there is this prospective delay. Of the three departments of the national Government the executive only remains untouched by this specific movement for securing governmental sanction to religion by direct and positive legislation enforcing religious observances. But in view of the record made by the present chief Executive it would seem that even there the way is fully open to the National Reformers as soon as they can succeed in carrying any of their measures that far. For President Harrison, not only, like several of his predecessors, went beyond the Constitution and issued a religious proclamation appointing a day of religious thanksgiving, but went even beyond them, so far as our knowledge goes, and actually assumed the prerogative of deciding what were the “appropriate observances of the day,” one of which he declared to be “worship in the public congregation.” So far as our recollection goes, previous proclamations of this character only appointed the day and left the people free to decide for themselves what were the appropriate observances of the day. But President Harrison, not only appoints the day but, actually presumes to decide for the people what observances are “appropriate” and distinctly names “worship” as one of those things which are “appropriate.” This is all logical enough it is true; for if it be the prerogative of the President of the United States to appoint a day for religious exercises, it is only proper enough that he should define the religious exercises that are appropriate to the occasion. He who decides that a day shall be observed, is, as a matter of course, qualified to decide how it shall be observed. And it is but natural, too, that those who would recommend the appointment of a day of religious observance should look to the same source for directions as to how it should be observed. How much further will President Harrison or any other President ever have to go to assume entire control of religious exercises and worship of the people and proclaim himself Pontifex Maximus at once in full feather? No, no, such was not the view of the makers of the national Government. Madison, the chief worker in the cause, declared that “executive proclamations of fasts and festivals” are a “deviation from the strict principle of the immunity of religion from civil jurisdiction.” And Jefferson, Madison’s predecessor in the presidential chair, and his admirable colleague in the battle for religious freedom in Virginia, and in that for the Nation, declared that “No power to prescribe any religious exercise, or to assume authority in religious discipline, has been delegated to the general Government.” This ought to be apparent to every person who can read these words of the United States Constitution. “The powers not delegated to the United States by this Constitution, nor prohibited by it to the States, are reserved to the States respectively, or to the people.” Yet for more than a quarter of a century this plain provision has been habitually disregarded in this respect; and not only has the precedent distinctly supplanted the Constitution, but it grows more bold and advanced as time goes on. And the people, religious as well as otherwise, love to have it so. If not they would remember these weighty words of President Jefferson:— I do not believe it is for the interest of religion to invite the civil magistrate to direct its exercises, its discipline, or its doctrines; nor of the religious societies, that the general Government should be invested with the power of effecting any uniformity of time or matter among them. Fasting and prayer are religious exercises: the enjoining them an act of discipline. Every religious society has a right to determine for itself the time for these exercises, and the objects proper for them, according to their own particular tenets; and this right can never be safer than in their own hands, where the Constitution has deposited it.
But instead of respecting the Constitution, which both in its provisions and its intent, has left to the individual this whole matter of religion to be exercised or not as to him seems proper, the chief executives of the Nation, in disregard of their oath to maintain the Constitution, have taken from the people this inalienable right. And the people, instead of jealously guarding this right and being grateful that the Constitution recognizes and guarantees its free exercise, duly submit to it all, and rather caress the hand that is steadily filching from them this inalienable right and inestimable privilege, which have been bought with such torrents of blood and such untold suffering. In addition to all these things there has been in the past year a more rapid growth than ever before in the country, of the nefarious doctrine that the safety of the State and of Society as a whole is dependent upon the public and official recognition of religion, and that to deny it, is to commit a treason against the State and to strike at the very foundation of organized society. And, as THE SENTINEL has always pointed out, this point is made to turn entirely upon the Sunday institution. It is religion as signified by Sunday that is essential to the preservation of society and the State. It is the religion represented by Sunday that must be publicly recognized and established in order to preserve the State and save society. It is therefore held that to speak against Sunday, and above all to disregard it, is to commit treason against society and the State. Thus the disregard of Sunday is coming more and more to be recognized and declared to be the supreme offense against society and the State. Upon this point too, during 1891, the Pope has come to the support of this doctrine, with the renewed proclamation that “It is we who are the chief guardian of religion;” and therefore enjoins “the obligation of the cessation of work and labor on Sundays and certain festivals;” declares that this “should be rest from labor consecrated by religion;” and that the Church “acts upon the decided view that . . . recourse should be had, in due measure and degree, to the help of the law and of the State authority.” And even now as we enter upon the New Year everything possible is being done throughout the whole Nation, to secure the official recognition of Sunday and all that is involved in it, by congressional action. One of the very earliest bills introduced in the Fifty-second Congress, now in session, was one by Senator Paddock of Nebraska, to close the World’s Fair on Sunday. In view of all these things THE AMERICAN SENTINEL enters upon its seventh year with its original and abiding convictions deepened that the Government of the United States, as founded by our fathers will be subverted, and will be made subject to a religious power; and that there will be here a union of religion and the State, with all its attendant evils, after the perfect likeness of the Papacy. The accomplishment of this is as certain as that time shall continue. The thing is only a question of time; and the time is short; for all things are now ready. Will the people ever awake? A. T. J. VETERANS of twenty-five years or more in the Russian service, under the Emperors Nicholas and Alexander II., are entitled, by virtue of their military service, to live anywhere they choose within the confines of the Russian Empire, and this privilege applies to Jewish veterans as well as to others. In order to evade this, and lay the heavy hand of expulsion upon this class of Jews also, the Russian Government has, unmindful of the public services of these old soldiers, deprived them of the right of worship, by closing their synagogues, and, as it is a grave penal offense to even read Jewish prayers in any place other than a regularly licensed synagogue, the denial of the right of worship is complete. Such things as these are evidences of the lengths to which the promoters of national religion will go in striving by its enforcement to make theirs a “Christian Nation.” The Way of the Church with the State.
The editor of the Twentieth Century has found a fifth thing too wonderful for him, that is, the way of a clergyman with the relation of the Church to the State. This is what he says:— “One can not help wondering at the way some clergymen look at things. For example: In his Thanksgiving sermon as published in full, in the Mail and Express of Nov. 28, the Rev. Ezra Tinker, pastor of Peter Street Methodist Episcopal Church, N. Y., says:— Another feature of our Government system is the subordination of the Church to the State and the hearty recognition of the latter.3The recognized union between the Church and the State, in many European countries, is the source of continual discord, discontent, and great weakness. When the Church presumes to dictate in secular and governmental matters, as in some eastern countries, she transcends her God given functions. Also when she assumes the garb of a mendicant, to be patronized and fed by the bounties of the State, she degrades herself to the level of purely secular institutions. Thank God for a free Church in a free State. While the spirit of the Christian dispensation seems to be opposed to the union of Church and State, as especially detrimental to the interests of the former, facts go to prove that as a matter of worldly policy it is unwise. Go where you will and wherever you find a church in league with the State there you will find coldness, formality, and spiritual dearth.” “Is it possible that Mr. Tinker does not know that the Church in this country ‘presumes to dictate in secular and governmental matters’ as much as it can, or that ‘she assumes the garb of a mendicant, to be patronized and fed by the bounties of the State’ to the extent of millions of dollars in the form of exemption from taxation? It is not possible. The very church of which he is pastor is the willing recipient of State bounty to the extent perhaps of one or two thousand dollars a year and he must know it. How, then, shall we interpret the foregoing remarks? Is Mr. Tinker a fraud? Or does he take the rest of us for simpletons? The true strength of the Church can not be known until it ceases to be legally favored by the State.” John Cotton’s Idea of Liberty of Conscience.
By G. E. FIFIELD
THE SENTINEL has again and again asserted the fact, that there is, and can be, no real liberty of conscience unless men are allowed the same civil right to think, and speak, and act wrong religiously, as to think, and speak, and act right religiously, in purely religious matters as distinguished from those purely civil. This is the point that so many honest, well-meaning people fail to see. Why, say they, should I permit my brother to do wrong, when I might restrain him by law? Will he not be punished for the wrong? and will I too, not be guilty? These people forget, that God knew in the beginning that some people would do wrong, and that misery, pain, and death would be the result of that wrong; and that He, while knowing this, still made them as free to do wrong as to do right. God himself refused to use any compulsion, but even after men had sinned, in infinite love, he sent his own Son to win them to the right way. When men therefore attempt to use force in matters of conscience, even to restrain men from the wrong, they at once exalt themselves above God. The fact is no man, ever in any nation, sought to use force in religious matters, without thinking, and perhaps honestly, that he did it to restrain men from the wrong. Why did God make men free to do wrong in the beginning? Simply on account of this very truth so often stated by THE SENTINEL, because there can be no liberty and freedom in the choice of the right, unless that freedom also includes the choice of the wrong. The statement, that men may have perfect liberty of conscience to think and act right religiously, but they shall not have liberty to think and act wrong is contradictory, and self-destructive. It at once implies that some one besides the individual is to decide, with reference to every thought and act, whether it is right or wrong, and then give permission accordingly. But it was for this very purpose and only for this purpose, that conscience was given to the individual and if conscience is denied freedom of action in this sphere, and it has no other sphere of action, then the conscience is wholly and completely enslaved. There is no room left for any individual conscience, its duties and privileges being wholly usurped by the decisions of some dominant sect, in alliance with the civil power. Thus is proven the fact that there can be absolutely no liberty of conscience, unless there is as much liberty to do wrong as to do right. The discussion between Roger Williams and John Cotton turned on this very point. Failing to see this point John Cotton, perhaps honestly enough, justified the cruel banishment of Mr. Williams, and involved himself in a maze of contradiction. Roger Williams said:— Mr. Cotton expecteth farre greater light than yet shineth . . . and yet, expecting more light, he must (according to his way of persecution) persecute Christ Jesus if he brings it. To which John Cotton replies as follows:— Doth Mr. Williams hold me so farre forsaken of common sense as to frustrate and destroy mine own expectations? If I expect more light, must I, (according to mine own way) needs persecute him that brings it, yea persecute Christ himself, if he brings it? But thus when a man’s head runneth round, he thinketh all the house runneth round about him. But what is my way of persecution, according to which, I expecting more light must needs persecute him that brings it? 1. It is but a few days ago since there came to my hand a book published by Mr. Williams, and entitled “The Bludy Tenets,” in which Mr. Williams publishes a letter of mine, and therewith a confutation of it, touching Persecution for cause of Conscience. In my stating of the question, which he relateth on the seventh page of that book, he declareth my judgment to be so farre from persecuting any for cause of conscience, that he layeth it downe for my first conclusion; that it is not lawful to persecute any for conscience sake rightly informed (that is to say, bringing more and true light). 2. For an erroneous and blind conscience (even in fundamental and weighty points) it is not lawful to persecute any, till after admonition once or twice, according to the apostles direction. Titus 3: 10, 11. That so, such a man being convinced of the dangerous error of his way; if he still persist, it may appear that he is not persecuted for cause of conscience, but for sinning against his own conscience. 3. In things of less moment, whether point of doctrine, or worship, if a man hold them forth in a spirit of Christian meekness and love (though with zeal and constancy), he is not to be persecuted but tolerated till God may be pleased to manifest his truth to him. 4. But if a man hold forth or professe any error, or false way, with a boysterous and arrogant spirit, to the disturbance of civil peace, he may justly be punished according to the measure of the disturbance caused by him. It is perfectly plain to us that in all of these propositions Mr. Cotton makes himself, or the dominant sect in alliance with the civil power, the absolute judge of conscience, not only as regards the truth of the opinion entertained, but (what is far worse) as regards the sincerity of the person in entertaining it. If he regards the opinion false, or the person insincere, he justifies his persecution, and this is all that any persecutor ever did. Mr. Williams saw this, and from these very words proved that Mr. Cotton justified persecution for conscience sake. But Mr. Cotton was so far from seeing it that he proceeds as follows:— This is the way of persecution which Mr. Williams expresseth to be mine. In all which I durst appeal to Mr. Williams’s own conscience (were it not leavened with over deepe prejudice) whether in all this way there can be any crevice opening a dore for the persecution of Christ himself bringing further light? It may be added right here that the people who persecuted Christ to death for bringing more light, did enter through the very door which John Cotton left open, and which Roger Williams so clearly saw that he left open. They said that Christ’s light was darkness, that he was a Samaritan and had a devil, and that he persisted in his blasphemy to the disturbance of the civil peace. Mr. Cotton did not see this, however, for he continues with much warmth:— If extreme prejudice were not predominant in Mr. Williams’s mind, I should stand amazed how a man of understanding could, out of such conclusions, make up this inference, which he gives in the title of that chapter; page 7. “That I do professedly maintain persecution for cause of conscience.” I that do expressly, professedly, deny persecution of any, even of hereticks, unless it be when they come to persist in heresie after conviction against conscience; how can I be said to maintain persecution for cause of conscience? But oh, the perversity and blindness of a conscience when it is left of God to be so farre transported with prejudice, as to be able to judge a cause of conscience, and a cause against conscience, to be all one. After this need it be wondered that the National Reformers and others, while they are making themselves the judge of other peoples’ consciences, and clamoring for laws to persecute all whose consciences differ from theirs, should so deny the intent to persecute? How near Mr. Cotton came to see that his theory made him the judge of other peoples’ consciences, and thus invaded the rights of conscience, will appear from the following:— Mr. Williams saith, That I publickly taught body-killing, soul-killing, and State-killing doctrine of persecuting all other consciences and ways of worship but mine own, in the civill State, and consequently in the whole world, if the power or empire thereof were in mine own hand. Reply: Were it not that I have learned from the word of truth, that when men are cast out of the Church of4Christ they are delivered up to Satan, and so neither their wits nor their tongues are their own, I could not easily have believed that Mr. Williams would so confidently and openly have avouched such a notorious slander. Since the Lord taught me to know anything, what conscience or the worship of God meant, it hath been my constant judgment, and doctrine, and practice to the contrary. Besides to teach the killing of the bodies of all such consciences and ways of worship as are not mine own (italics his) is to make mine own conscience and way of worship the infallible rule and sovereign standard by which all consciences and ways of worship, throughout the world were to be regulated, yea, and as if this were a light measure of arrogance and usurpation, I make it a capital crime (a body-killing offense) for any man to swerve from my conscience and ways of worship. This is good sound truth, even if it comes from the pen of John Cotton, but he immediately contradicts it all, and makes himself, or some one else as human or as weak as he, the infallible judge of other peoples’ consciences by saying:— But I durst appeal even to the conscience of Mr. Williams himself (if it were now in the gracious keeping of Christ, or of himself as in former times) that himself knoweth, I doe not thinke it lawful to excommunicate an heretick, much less to persecute him with the civill sword till it may appear, even by just and full conviction, that he sinneth not out of conscience, but against the very light of his own conscience. From all this the conclusion stated at the beginning is evident. There can be no liberty of conscience unless it includes as much liberty to do wrong as to do right. These quotations are from the reply of John Cotton to Roger Williams. Quite Significant and Very Appropriate.
By R. C. PORTER
In the Christian Statesman of May 14, is given a copy of a petition that was to be presented to the representatives of a political party in convention assembled, which reads as follows:— As American citizens we respectfully ask you to place in your platform a clear full recognition of these two great truths, namely: that our Lord Jesus Christ is the sovereign Ruler of our Nation, and that the moral law is the rule of all our conduct in civil and political affairs. We do not ask this as a mere sentiment, or as a religious creed, but as the greatest of political principles. As the natural application of these principles to present issues in our national life, we ask you to declare also for - The American Sabbath.
- A uniform Christian marriage law.
- The right of the Bible in the public schools, and to declare against
- The American saloon.
We ask you to make your nominations and conduct the election in harmony with these great truths. It is stated in the comment accompanying the petition that “There should have been in the above petition after ‘religious creed,’ this additional statement, ‘nor as seeking a union of Church and State, which we abhor.’” When I had finished reading the above, my eye fell on the following words at the foot of the column: “The devil never asks anybody to go farther than the next corner to begin with.” To me this statement was quite significant, and very appropriate, in connection with such a petition. The petition asks that the State remove the one great corner-stone upon which depends the whole structure that separates between the Church and the State, by demanding religious legislation, and then fearing lest some cool, practical observer, seeing them thus endeavoring to undermine this God-given barrier that divides them, should think that they were trying to unite the two, they cry out almost indignantly “we abhor a union of Church and State.” The zealous demand for Sunday laws, that the laboring man may have opportunity to attend Church, is the same old trick which Satan played when, during the early centuries, he was working for a union of Church and State. He never asked them then “to go farther than the next corner to begin with.” Just to make Sunday laws to stop the theatres, and public shows and games on that day, so that the laboring men could attend to things divine. Is it not the same to-day with the so-called National Reform movement? Sunday Papers and Campaign Speeches.
By A. O. Tait
THE Atlanta Constitution is authority for the following statement from Mr. Small:— In a recent speech before the Sabbath Association, in Philadelphia, Rev. Sam Small, alluding to the agencies against the Sabbath, reckoned the press among the first. He thanked God he was out of that. Following the usual line of argument, he doubtless was led to make the above statement, because the press is quite generally in favor of the Sunday paper. And the Sunday paper gives the advocates of Sunday laws a great deal of trouble. This opposition from the press to the strict observance of Sunday, together with the example of so many editors who publish their papers on Sunday, is strongly denounced by Mr. Small. But how about his own example upon that point? The same paper makes the following mention of a campaign meeting held the Sunday previous to the date of its issue:— The anti-barroom movement gave a special Sunday matinee at the Edgewood Avenue theatre yesterday afternoon. Rev. Sam Small and Rev. R. E. Hart were the star performers. They had a good house, and never played to better advantage. It was Sunday, but that went for nothing. Two more ardent campaign speeches were never made. A well filled house faced the speakers, and cheered them frequently and loudly. It was a pretty scene, that which rested on the back of the stage. Painted in all the glowing colors of forest, field and sun and sky, with all the cunning of an artist's hand, it suggested strongly a stage drama. Then the footlights flared upon the scene and theatre goers involuntarily looked for the orchestra. Hart spoke first and delivered himself of a short speech. He was followed by Rev. Sam Small, who spoke on the usual line. It was Sunday, a holy calm reigned on the thoroughfares without, men, women, and children had forsaken the every-day duties to observe the day, and some reference to God and Christ and the holy Sabbath day was expected, but it was a campaign speech. Humorous references were made to the candidates on the citizens' ticket and funny mention made of the leaders of the citizens' movement. Now it is a fact that can not be denied that newspapers devote a large share of their space to the discussion of politics, and during campaign times they do but little else than discuss the political issues of the day. And when they carry this discussion over into a Sunday issue, is it in any sense different from Mr. Small's political speech on Sunday? Men who do not stand on sound principles are sure to make their inconsistencies manifest. Should Sabbath Observance be Enforced by Law?
By A. L. Russell
[Conclusion of the negative argument, delivered at the annual contest of the Philomath and Adelphia Literary Societies of Westminster College, New Wilmington, Pennsylvania, June 24, 1891, by A. L. Russell (Philo.), Bulger, Pa.] SABBATH desecration is the effect of a wayward heart. Christianity says: “The grace of God will cleanse your heart; come to the Fount of love.” Advocates of civil enforcement say: “Make men bow. As hypocrites or worshipers, let them bow or suffer.” History tells that men can not be bound or racked into, nor out of, Christianity. Much less can they be fined or imprisoned into it. The motive power of Christianity is love, and where force begins love ends. The only strength Christianity ever had, or ever can have, is the strength of Jesus Christ, and that is never made manifest politically. To enforce Sabbath observance where the heart rebels is to offer to God the essence of hypocrisy. The most scathing denunciation that ever fell from the lips of Christ was his condemnation of this contemptible sin. Two great evils must follow such an attempt:— First, The world will not believe there is such a thing as the power of the Holy Spirit, since the Church fails to use or value it. Second, Both world and Church will be plunged more deeply into sin; because, for help against an evil, the Church appeals to the very source of that evil. The world can not purify the world, nor a worldly Church become sanctified by the aid of the world. Therefore, “let this mind be in you, which was also in Christ Jesus;” and go with the Bible instead of the civil mace in your hand—that Bible which says, “Not by might, nor by power, but by my Spirit, saith the Lord5of hosts.” Speed on the work of the Master with half the power expended on the Sabbath-law work, and the world would stand aghast at the revival of the Church. Therefore, as the use of force is in direct opposition to the method and teaching of Christ, and the fundamental precepts of Christianity, Christianity repudiates the use of force in the observance of its institutions. The institutions of a religion are part of that religion, and to enforce a religious institution is to enforce part of a religion. But such enforcement involves a prior decision of the courts as to what religion is true and what false; and if law enforce what it deems the true religion, it must, as violation of law, suppress what it deems false religion. It would thus declare itself infallible, and its edicts would be the manifestoes of an inquisition. To enforce the observance of the Sabbath is to place a religious dogma in the statute law, and to discriminate against certain sects by establishing a tenet held by an opposing religion. To force the observance of a religious institution on a man whose conscience rebels, is religious persecution, and no sophistry can evade it. The profound and learned American jurist, Judge Cooley, says: “The law discriminates against the religion of the seventh-day observer by forcing him to keep a second Sabbath in each week, thus unjustly punishing him for his belief. The argument which he may make who has already observed the seventh day of the week is unanswerable.” Thus the learned judge declares that such enforcement punishes certain citizens for a religious belief. And such punishment is persecution. All history tells that pagan, Jew, and professed Christian have persecuted other religions because they thought them false. Yet, strong in our prejudice, we seem to think that men have changed; that we may enact such laws, and fan the smouldering embers, yet produce no flame. But we must admit what evidence proves true. Allow me to read but two of many letters received. The first is from Judge U. M. Rose, a member of the State Bar Association of Arkansas, and one of the leading lawyers of the State:— Dear Sir: Yours received. The law passed in this State in 1885, requiring all persons to keep Sunday as a day of rest, although they might religiously keep some other day of the week, has since been repealed. The act of 1885 was found to work oppressively on persons believing that Saturday is the Christian as well as the Jewish Sabbath; and hence its repeal. It was manifestly unjust to them as well as to the Jews. You ask me to express my opinion as to the propriety of such legislation as that contained in the repealed act. Nothing can exceed my abhorrence of any kind of legislation that has for its object the restraint of any class of men in the exercise of their religious opinions. It is the fundamental basis of our Government that every man shall be allowed to worship God according to the dictates of his own conscience. It was certainly not a little singular that while in our churches the command was regularly read at stated times requiring all men to keep the Sabbath, which amongst the Jews, to whom the command was addressed, was the seventh day of the week, men should be prosecuted and convicted in the courts for doing so. As a civil requirement, my opinion is that any legislation that attempts to control the conscience of men as to the discharge of religious duty, can only be the result of that ignorance and fanaticism which for centuries proved to be the worst curse that ever afflicted humanity. We, the undersigned, herewith testify that the recent prosecutions against the observers of the seventh-day Sabbath, in our vicinity, have brought to light a religious intolerance and a spirit of persecution, the existence whereof a great many imagined not to exist any more in our time. J. F. FAIRCHILD, M. D.
E. E. WOODCOCK. Potash Sulphur Springs, Arkansas. When religious opinions conflict, compulsory conformity to an institution in which the victim can not believe, it is religious persecution. Therefore, the institution of the Sabbath enforced by civil law is religious tyranny—religious persecution. What Do They Want?
By Roswell F. Cottrell
THE first number of a paper entitled, Political Dissenter, published at the office of the Christian Statesman, is before me. Its first page reveals the object to which it aims. It holds that “consistent followers of Christ must stand aloof from any association which . . . places itself . . . in antagonism to the law of Christ.” The writer refers to our Constitution as being antagonistic to the law of Christ; for he immediately adds, “Not until the loyal followers of the King of kings shall faithfully carry out this principle will they control the social and political life of the Nation.” This plainly reveals the fact that the party of which the Dissenter is spokesman, are aiming to get the control of the political life of the Nation. On the same page is a report of a sermon preached by Dr. R. M. Patterson, editor of the Presbyterian Journal, of Philadelphia, and indorsed by the editor of the Dissenter, in which it is said:— The preacher’s aim was to show that this Nation was designed of God in his providence to be a Protestant Christian nation; and that either secularism on the one hand, and Romanism on the other hand, if carried out in our national life, would revolutionize our political being. In stirring strains of eloquence the preacher called upon all loyal American citizens to resist the encroachments of both the secular and Roman Catholic theories of civil government, which are menacing what is dearest and best in our civil and political institutions.
From this representation it is clear that there are two rival bodies, each professing the Christian religion, who are striving to get the control of our civil Government. We ask, What difference will it make to dissenters which of the two succeeds? The aim of each is the same, to control the civil power for their own advancement above all rivals. And the history of the past proves what will be the result in either case—the persecution of those who dissent from them. If one is to lose his head for dissent, what odds does it make whether it is a Catholic or “Protestant Christian Nation” that takes it off? But though the preacher claimed that this Nation was designed of God to be a Protestant Christian Nation, the reporter affirms that according to the written Constitution of the United States, this is not a Christian Nation at all. Why? Because it places “Mohammedanism and infidelity, and even atheism, on a perfect equality at the national councils with Christianity itself.” Here is the rub: our Constitution, as well as the immortal Declaration, accords to all men equal rights. Like God it is no respecter of persons or of sects. This principle National Reformers are trying to subvert. They deplore the fact that it places others on a perfect equality at the national councils with themselves. They want the “Protestant Christian” religion elevated above all others in the national councils, and yet they don’t want a union of Church and State! Don’t they?