Tombstone epitaph., 1890-02-01
The State and Religion.

ulai ~ oCilHCS ltS POWCi HUH tue IOL- sent of man. It IS government with which God has nothing whatever to do
 with the fundamental fact that the peo- pie are the source of authority should be abandoned" If there was no other source of information concerning our government than that of the lives ot certain persons receiving federal favor, and the workings of certain political | rings, we would surely agree in saying that this is a government "with which Gcd has nothing whatever to do." No one will question the statement that in the United States the government is by the consent of man. True, indeed, it is government for and by the people. But we trust that the typical American will not consent to the idea that in power and judgment man is alone supreme The earth is not the creation of human hands, and man, however he has skill fully planned, has often been defeated. The forced obedience of man continu- ing, occurring through the centuries, has tended to impress upon his mind the conviction that he was in the grasp of a current that he would never be able suc- cessfully to resist. This impression, ts- gether with the cry of his own nature for a final anchorage in the eternal and un- changeable, has ever been felt in civil channels.
 Every state has had its religion. The ancient Plutarch, the purest and the noblest of the Platonists, gives this re- markable testimony: "There never was state of atheists. You may travel all over the world, and you may find cities without walls, without kings, without mint, without theater or gymnasium; but you will nowhere find a city without God, without prayer, without oracle, without sacrifice. Sooner may city stand without foundation than a state without belief in the gods. This is the bond of all society and the pillar of all legislation"
 This is statement worthy the chief tain of more enlightened age. The state cannot be divorced from some sys- tenn of morals, and such a system has ever been connected with religion. The best example of what state would be without belief may be found in France just preceding the French revolution and the reign of terror. The result was the destroying of law and the wreck of the state. If the position of the Secular ists" is the true one let us turn civil affairs over to the anarchists, who are continually crying down with religion the claims of the anarchists, we must admit that they are consistent. If relig ion is to be expelled from the state, to become an exile, let IS also expel her legitimate children; let us free ourselves from the shackles of all restraint and feed the fires of passion and self in- dulgence until we are consumed.
 The magnitude of the revolution in public sentiment before such will occur in America is indicated both by our his tory, and our present moral status. Be cause church and state are separate in form, because religious tests have never been required, because free speech and liberty of thought are here, it Tn no wise follows that this is an atheistic nation. No one familiar with the early history of this country can fail to discern the intense religious spirit of our Saxon fathers, and no one thus seeing this spirit can doubt but that the very foun- dation of this new republic was cemented by the prayers of these early workmen. The voice of christianity has blended with the shout of every national tri-
 
 been continually gilded by a golden shaft of religious light as they have grown and ripened. with the years. Washington felt the warmth of this light when in his farewell address he affIrms the inseperable connection of religion with morality and national prosperity. Abraham Lincoln also felt 1t when, under the weight of official burdens, he coun- seled with his God in prayer; and the late and lamented Henry w. Grady felt it as he labored to realize the hope of new South-a hope which was beginning to fringe with gold the horizon of the future. Although the name of God is not mentioned in the national constitu- tion, it is, nevertheless, thoroughly Christian document, and was framed by men believing in Divine Providence. Our law is everywhere permeated with religious sentiment. The Supreme Court of Pennsylvania, in the case of Upde- graph against the Commonwealth, de cided in 1922 that Christianity is, and always has been, part of the common law of Pennsylvania, and that mali ciously to vilify the Christian religion is an indictable offense." In this opinion the judge did not mean Christianity as held accordine to any creed and accom=