Daily union and American. [volume] (Nashville, Tenn.) 1865-1866, 1866-11-11

political and things ecclesiastical, may be
found enunciated by the MASSACHUSETTS faith
ers, in their mildest form, in the COnstitu-
tiOn Of MASSACHUSETTS of 1889, in substance
thus: Religion being necessary to morality,
and morality to liberty, therefore the State
should provide for the support and propaga-
tion Of pure religion" But while we ac-
cept the premises, we reason from it precise
/ ly the opposite conclusion. Our argument
IS: pure religion being necessary to pure
morality and pure morality to liberty, there
fore the State should keep its dirty hands
of religion that il may remain pure and un-
! spotted; for corrupt religion, a mere sham
religion, leads to corrup. and sham mo-
rality, which is worse for political purposes
than open immortality. Bad as a man with
no pretence 10 conscience is, he is yet not SO
dangerous a citizen as man with a fanati-
cal, perverse and devilish conscience. Bad
as the drunken, kind-hearted, natural man
may be, as a citizen, he is not 50 bad citi-
zen as the canting, hypocritical man. We
would rather have the kind, honest fellow,
hdg The time drunk, than the malignant hy-
pocrite, all he time sober.
speak it with no disrespect to the great
and honest men of the Mdyfouer but feel
bound to say the very point in the theory of
the Pilgrim Fathers most eulogized in all
the eulogies which have been said and sung
the point which they maintained in the
Westminster Assembly, and finally carried
by the bayonets of OLIVER CROMWELL,
against our Scottish forefathers-the point
which they undertook to embody in the
ciyilism Of the new nation in America, is a
heresy fatal TO the permanent purity of
Christian doctrine, and equally fatal TO the
permanence Of civil liberty. That pointisth |
assertion Of the reUed5ed Uord of the Lord |
Christ as the primary and fundamental law |
Of the civil commonwealth, instead of that |
natural law of reason written on the hearts |
of all men by GoD the Creator. 1t is the |
conioUnding of what GoD hath sundered, |
and tends to the corruption of all true re-
ligion." 1t is a heresy in Christian theology, |
as well as in natural ethics and common |
sense, to resolve, as their principle leads !
men 10 resolve-Frst, that none but The Qodiy |
shall rule Second, that lUe are the g0dly And /
the result of every practical attempt to en-
force the principles of the Gospel for sim |
neTs, by the authority vested in magistrates |
for the protection of citizens can only result
in making commonwealth of Journalists.
fanatics, or hypocrtes. GoD has not vested |
in men authority to tolegislate for and constrain /
the soul. 1t rises independent of them as /
GABRIEL on the walls of heaven. And the |
vain attempts could result in nothing else |
than system of laws, not inaptly repre-
sented in the story Of the ancient legislation |
10 enforce carrying lights in navigating the |
dark, crooked streets of Boston. One Le-
gislature, the story goes, passed an act re-
quirlng men to carry lanterns at night. They
obeyed to the letter. But the next Legisla-
ture had to pass " an act TO amend an act for
carrying lanterns, by requiring not only the
lanterns, but also candles IN their lanterns"
They obeyed again to the letter. But not
until third Legislature passed an "act to /
amend an act entitled an act to amend an
act," etc, and provide not only that the
lanterns should be carried, and candles in /
the lanterns, but that, furthermore, the can
dies should b. lighted, was the wise and pious
Legislature able to get thesimple duty done.
The error in principle in not recognizing
t,co governments--one under the law of ma
ture, and the other under the revealed
Word Of Jesus Christ the mediator, has
continued to permeate the views of the
wisest men of New England 10 the present
day, and is the source of most Of our present
troubles. Even Judge STORY, on the Con-
stitution, maintains it is an admitted prin-
ciple, that il is the duty of the State to pro-
mote Christianity. And Mr.. WEBSTER, in
his famous GIRARD will case speech, MAIN
tains that Christianity is part of the law of
the land" The correlative proposition of
the right Of the teachers of Christianity TO
instruct the law-making powers, is very
logical inference from this and no wonder.
therefore, that we have preachers haran-
guing the people as TO their duties at the
ballOt-box and church. courts assuming to
decide uponquestions of political allegiance,
and treason, and sympathy with rebellion,
and of voting for the wrong political candi-
date.
Thoughtful men must perceive that our
whole system of civilization has undergone
an entire revolution in its ideas; and we are
gradually supplanting the old, distinctive
ideas Of the Anglo.Saxon civilization-the
ideas of the individualism of the man, his
house as his castle, and the family as his lit
tie State, which he represents in the confed-
Grafton Of families in the State-by the Ja-
cobinical ideas Of the continental republi-
canism of men as herded into a State as the
individual unit, by the imperial spirit of the
} Justinian law in lieu Of the burly, popular
spirit Of the common law We have more
of the Jacobinical cry for free nation, and
less of the old Anglo-Saxon cry for q ration
of freemen. The continental republicanism
must have government whose omniscience
peers into mans kitchen to regulate the
number of potatoes and cabbages in his Dot.
The Anglo-Saxon, while he reyerences A
government of law, yet standing, in tatters
though he may be, in the door Of his tattered
hovel, says 30 his king, in the immortal
words OF CHATHAM, "The rains Of heaven
may pour in through the tattered thatch.
and the winds Of heaven NAV rush in through
the tattered sides, but the King Of England
dare not come in without warrant of law"
The continental republican theory contem-
plates the individual man as an atom Of the
great machine called the nation. The An
glo-SaXon considers every man a complete
with young steam engine to run
II besides. The continental republican must
have government that will find him work
and give him bread. The Anglo-Saxon
wants government only to keep loaiers Off
while every man finds his own work and
earns his own bread. The continental re-
publican glories in a nation which, as an in
Unite team-each man an ininitesimal part |
Of the unit team-drags the car Of some
powerful CESAR to victory and glory. The
Anglo-Saxon regards himself individually.
as JONATHAN hath il, "a hull team, with
cross dog under the wagon, to boot"
Now, nothing is palmer than that, either
from importation Of these ideas, with an i'm
mense foreign immigration, or from some
other cause, these continental ideas are TAX
ing root rapidly among US. And with these
Ideas must come the notion Of a religion
prescribed by the Government, after the
,frsN IL = a. I