these two schools, unable to decide finally to accept the control of the one or the other.

As for Protestantism, it appears nowhere as a power to be taken seriously into account. In countries where it is looked upon as dominant, it finds itself paralyzed for want of intelligence to draw boldly the logical consequences of its principles.

The national churches, which have suffered the peoples to slip from under their influence, have not now the power to reconquer them; the free churches are as yet too feeble and too few to exert a deep and general influence. Hence the inability of evangelical Protestantism to aspire to take the lead of European society. It is paralyzed; it hesitates between going back to the ecclesiastical and theological past of the sixteenth century, which is unquestionably on the decline, and an unknown future that would enable it to realize its principles in a consistent manner if it would only assume the championship of a Christian spiritualism.

1

that the separation of Church and State, destined to put an end to the distinction between the free congregations and the official establishments, will be instigated by the general movement of the faithful, desirous to give the Church a truly Christian and spiritual constitution. The need of effecting financial economies, the desire to escape from the inconveniences which result from the struggle between Romanism and infidelity, the revolutionary spirit hostile to the Gospel-these are the great auxiliaries on which the Church seems to be able to depend in order to become strong enough some day to reconquer her position as a spiritual society. A great social crisis alone will be able to place infidelity, Romanism, and evangelical Protestantism in a position to show what they can do for the salvation of the individual and of society. Pending this solemn hour, men of conviction must do their duty, and emphatically say to themselves that that coming crisis will be but the beginning of sorrow. We shall then If we had a few millions of the stamp of behold re-enacted a great struggle that will your Pilgrim Fathers, or of our old Hugue- recall the first centuries of our era, when nots, we would speedily come out of our Paganism had to acknowledge that it ran false position. The question would be to the risk of being supplanted by that obtake personal religion in earnest, and the scure sect which it had begun by despising. true Church idea that flows from it. It Only in our day the parts will be changed; would have to be admitted that those only Paganism will take the offensive. Relig are true Christians who enter into living ion will have to wrestle with the numerous and personal communion with God through host of infidelity, having for its vanguard Jesus Christ; that there is no Church wor- Socialism eager for prey. Religion will find thy the name but a society of men laboring itself represented by a Catholicism treachto realize these principles. Mere preten-erous to Christianity, since in setting up its sions and divisions would then disappear as idol at the Vatican it has, in a manner, alby enchantment. Either Christians would succeed in transforming the national churches, not in appearance only, but in reality, into churches consisting of professors of religion; and then, the free churches having fulfilled their mission, there would no longer be any reason for their existence; all evangelical Christians would once more be united; or, what is more probable, I must even say certain, governments would never allow national churches to be transformed into churches of professing Christians the moment they found the great mass of the population excluded from them. In that case, evangelical Christians, faithful to the ideal which they had in vain tried to real-who, relying on the precepts of the Gosize, would be forced to go and swell the free churches already existing, and which would then be put to the test to show what they could do for the salvation of society. In either case, the true believers would be once more united to work in common.

ready passed over to the enemy, and by an undecided and inconsistent Protestantism. We must hope it is true that, under the pressure of circumstances so grave, evangelical Christians will not fail to unite. But it must be plainly avowed, even united, they will not be numerous. For any one who knows the religious state of the European continent, no kind of illusion is possible. When ecclesiastical fictions have disappeared; when the Church is divested of the prestige of tradition and of official forms; when religion is deprived of all external help, when called upon to rely exclusively on herself, the number of those will be small

pel, and determined to gain victories only through the intrinsic power of the truth, will be ready to march on to a second conquest of our old European society.

IV. And here, gentlemen, allow me to express all our gratitude to the generous and noth-enterprising minds who have had the happy idea to invite so many Christians from Europe to see what can be accomplished in America, by a Church free from any connection with the State, and moving in the vanguard of every progress.

But this is only a beautiful dream; ing justifies us in reckoning on a solution of this kind. Let us say it with a deep humility; in this case, as in many others in the course of history, truth will owe its triumphs rather to its adversaries than to its friends. Nothing authorizes us to believe

We tender you our thanks, gentlemen, and

quences from which the best Christians and the most spiritual churches never complete

dear brethren, for the offer of so precious an opportunity to see for ourselves that, if the representatives of our principles are in Eu-ly escape, but that they must be interpreted rope but an unknown and uninfluential minority, here they form a respectable majority. We were quite decided to go forward by faith; but, considering the weakness of human nature, it is not superfluous that we should for a few days have the opportunity to walk by sight.

We trust that when we shall return, to be merged again in the dense ranks of the Old World's populations, hostile or indifferent to our principles, we shall carry back with us something of that confidence and cheerfulness with which you carry forward so triumphantly this beautiful motto: "The Gospel and Liberty, inseparably united." And who knows? Some of your guests who have landed on your shores still doubting, full of prejudices, wishing to see for themselves these American churches, so different from those of Europe, may return convinced, and resolved to join those who labor to secure in the Old World the triumphs of the principles which prevail in the New. What you have already done for us makes us bold to ask for

more.

as the legitimate results of the separation of Church and State. If slavery existed too long, it was owing to the fact that the churches separate from the State were neither independent enough in the face of public opinion, nor powerful enough to demand and obtain the abolition of that iniquity. If you had failed in your great enterprise of emancipation, the want of success would have been attributed to the same cause. As to the good you accomplish, and that can not be denied, it is attributed to Christianity in general — your particular forms of piety and of churches must not be taken into account.

You see, gentlemen, great is your responsibility. We run the risk of suffering from your defects without benefiting by your victories. Make these victories so manifest that no one may be able to call them in question, and that all will be obliged to attribute them to an intimate and sincere alliance of a decided and positive Christianity with a frank and open freedom. A fatal divorce between liberty and religion is to be found at the very bottom of the antagonism which so deeply shakes European society. The most effectual means to come to our help is to show that it is wholly otherwise with you.

We rely on a still more efficacious and general co-operation. When the great conflict that shall decide the religious future of Europe breaks forth, the eyes of many Christians will naturally look toward young America. Our expectation will certainly not be disappointed; and your numerous home In Europe the Church is the natural proand foreign missionary societies will doubt-tectress of abuses, of privileges. The Gosless be disposed to add a new institution destined to aid those who in Europe consecrate themselves to the cause and triumph of Christianity and liberty. You will extend to us a helping hand to prevent us from falling to a level with those Oriental countries whose decayed churches your missionaries are now trying to raise.

pel is too often held out as a kind of indemnification, of consolation for the use of men who, on account of social inequalities, can not have their share of culture and well-being. That sincere Christians may at times have been led to present religious truths in this light is provoking enough; but what shall we say when men who no longer beThus it is that, in spite of distances, the lieve in the Gospel persist in representing it strongest bond of solidarity binds us to you. as the resource of the lowly and the porAt the end of the last century, when your tionless of this world? In the name of a soRepublic was still in the cradle, the German cial hierarchy revived from the feudalism philosopher Kant followed its first steps with of the Middle Ages, M. Réuan lately dethe most lively sympathy; he was in the hab-clared that it is not possible for all men to it of saying that your fathers were venturing have enjoyments, for all to be well brought upon an experiment on the success of which up, to be delicate, virtuous. He looks back the salvation of mankind was depending. Thanks be to God, the hopes of the great thinker have been realized, the experiment is a success. The whole world must now profit by it. In the day of peril you will certainly not abandon those who elsewhere defend your principles.

While waiting for that day, do not remain idle; say to yourselves that all the victories you gain will turn to our profit, and that all your defeats would be infinitely hurtful to us. Indeed it obtains in Europe, even among religious men, that the imperfections of your piety and national character must not be attributed to the inevitable conse

with regret to the good old time "when the poor enjoyed the wealth of the rich, the monk the enjoyments of worldly men, and worldly men the prayers of the monk,...... It belongs to religion," he adds, "to explain those mysteries, and to present in the ideal world superabundant consolations to all those who are called upon to live a life of sacrifices here below. Do not, then, say to the poor that he is poor through his own fault; do not entreat him to get rid of his poverty as of a shameful thing; make him love poverty; show him the ease, the charm, and the beauty and the sweetness of it. Such is the crowning work of Jesus ('Là

est le chef-d'œuvre de Jésus'). The exalta- | gnawing us in Europe. It is claimed for retion of poverty is his master-stroke."

ligion that it shall remain a social force when it has ceased to be for the individual a regenerating power. Every body wishes to have an official religion for the people; nobody wishes a personal religion for his own use. It is because they react against this evil that the free churches, in spite of their weakness, have a high historical import.

Congratulate yourselves, gentlemen, that in America you know nothing of a state of things in which the greatest inequalities of human fortune receive the sanction of religion. Away from us the boasted conception of a system, so-called religious, that would grant to the rich infidel all the enjoyments of this world, while reserving eternal blessings for the abandoned of the earth! The consequences of a wild and irreligious individualism are doubtless very great; but can they be compared to those of a social hierarchy that would cover the same selfish

In the name of free and Christian America, we can repel such a charge as a crime of high treason against humanity and against the Christian religion. Thanks be to God that in your happy country, where Protestant civilization is in a fair way to bear all its legitimate fruits, you are not dreaming of the fantastic restoration of the Middle Ages. Your ideal of society is ahead, and not behind; it is for you to be nobly bold, sublimely daring. Under the great sun of American liberty there is room for the poor emigrant of Europe, and for the negro of Africa, and very soon for the native of the Far East. To all you offer the same rights and the same chances. Very far from preaching to them the great falsehood of the exaltation of poverty by the Lord Jesus Christ, you generously admit all to the advantages of your civilization; you offer them the means to recover for themselves in ev-schemes with the varnish of an arrant hyery respect the obliterated features of God's pocrisy? Bless God that, in the American image. While Infidelity is inhuman, and civilization, religion is not a mere police conapologizes for social sufferings of which she trivance, but an honored and respected powmakes little account, because she feels her- er-a power from on high-having laws to self powerless to heal them, you show suc- dictate to the rich as well as to the poor. cessfully that Christianity is eminently hu- To the happy man of this selfish world, who man, the friend of all kinds of progress, and has no feelings of sympathy for the unhapthe dispenser of temporal and spiritual bless-py, she has the right, and is bound to say as ings for the benefit of all the children of Adam. In order that the Gospel may remain a social and a civilizing power, it must, in the first place, be a truth on which the individual man must live. It must not be debased to the rank of a mere instrumentality, of a restraint destined to insure the rest and the enjoyment of the great and the happy, by keeping the small and the disinherited in resignation, in suffering and superstition. To point those "who are called upon to live a life of sacrifices here below" to heaven and to eternal hopes for their portion, lest men should be disturbed in the epicurean enjoyment of the good things of this world, scarcely hiding, meanwhile, the smile of transcendental disdain that curls their lips, this is to mock God, and mankind, and themselves. To pretend to commend the Gospel by such considerations is not only to be guilty of a cruel irony, but it is to justify the heart-burnings of all the wretched and forsaken of this world. Indeed, one of their great grievances against the churches is that these would fain persuade them to waive their legitimate portion of this world's enjoyment, by promising them spiritual and eternal treasures no longer believed in by those who commend them.

Gentlemen, such is the leprosy which is

* "Préface de la Vie de Jésus," Edit. illustrée, Le Temps, 20 Février, 1870; "De la Monarchie Constitutionelle en France depuis la révolution de Février," Revue des Deux Mondes, 1 Nov., 1869.

to Cain, "What hast thou done? The voice of thy brother's blood crieth unto me from the ground." It is forbidden a Christian to make up his mind to ignore the suffering and the misery of his brethren, however inevitable they may appear, for he believes in the power of the Redeemer to destroy here below the consequences of sin, and to make all things new.

Such, gentlemen, and dear brethren, are the principles which you have embraced and carried out in this land with success, with éclat. First of all, we are full of gratitude to God, and we are proud of your work, for the credit of humanity, and of the Protestant Churches of the sixteenth century, of which you are still the most faithful exponents. A thought is here pressing upon my mind for utterance; I must not silence it: Will the future be worthy of the past? I must confess that your best friends in Europe are not always without anxiety concerning you; they understand the greatness, the immensity of your task; they ask themselves whether, in the United States as elsewhere, evil will not finally succeed in gaining the mastery over the good. But this must re-assure us in the days of faintheartedness: In our Christian world progress is not a vain word, but a reality; in our day we can not go forward but by frankly accepting all the consequences of a democracy made moral by Christianity. Were the ideal that you pursue unattainable, we should still say to ourselves that in this world nothing

but the impossible is worth striving after. | lic. May he preserve her from the dangers Do not soon forget the traditions of your that might threaten her. By increasingly glorious past; remain ever faithful to them. blending the cause of Christianity with that Pursue your work-a work as noble as it is of liberty, may she utter the most earnest difficult―convinced that you have the sym- and most timely of all preaching; remain as pathies and the best wishes of all intelligent a city set upon a hill, and promoting in the hearts which place the claims of humanity world the kingdom of Him who hath said, above those of private nationalities. "If the Son shall make you free, ye shall be free indeed."

May God bless this great Christian Repub

SECOND SECTION.-CHRISTIANITY AND LIBERTY.

THE INFLUENCE OF CHRISTIANITY ON CIVIL AND

RELIGIOUS LIBERTY.

BY THE REV. W. H. CAMPBELL, D.D.,

President of Rutger's College, New Brunswick, New Jersey.

CHRISTIANITY is the power of God abiding | no giving him room and help for his goodin his Word, in his people, and in his super-ness. natural Providence, in order to save men. The Christian, however, will have no quarIts central truth is the worth of a human soul, and the purpose of God to save it. The human soul is the lost sheep, the lost piece of silver, the lost son of the parables; and God and the good angels rejoice when the lost is found, and the dead son is alive again. And to save a lost soul is to free it from the guilt and degradation of sin. From the guilt of sin at once, and upon believing. From the degradation of sin little by little, pedetentim et gradatim, step by step, yet surely; for God is engaged in it, and it must go on. Salvation from this degradation is, furthermore, a progress in which the lost one is made able and willing to do the will of God. His capacities and susceptibilities of doing and delighting in the true, the just, and the good steadily enlarge, and at length he shall attain to the measure of the stature of the fullness of Christ.

rel with the historian, who, in tracing the progress of the peoples, enumerates the power of the sword, the power of wealth, the power of learning, and the power of adventitious circumstances, and so forth, as conducing to this progress. It may all so be. But if this progress has in it any of the elements of civil and religious liberty, that is, a caring for the individual man, it will be difficult to remove the strong conviction of the Christian that behind the sword, and the wealth, and the learning there is a higher power which gives these all their force. And that is the truth which lies imbedded in Christianity, and nowhere else, of the worth of the individual soul, which God loved, and Christ died to save, on which when saved the lesson of love was written by the Holy Spirit, "Thou shalt love thy neighbor as thyself." And there, too, he finds imbedded that other truth, that God takes care of his rescued, lost ones, who seek to do his will.

other, from one kingdom to another people, he suffered no man to do them wrong; yea, he reproved kings for their sakes, saying, Touch not mine anointed, and do my prophets no harm."

And so, too, behind those things which the historian calls adventitious circumstances the Christian will discover an overruling Providence, which takes off the chariot wheels of the enemies, and makes them drive heavily when God's time of overwhelming comes round, and he is about to remove the outward degradation of his recovered lost ones.

Now just in proportion as this gradual work advances, the man will crave the right and the room to enjoy all that may be help-"When they went from one nation to anful to his highest well-being, and to be freed from all without which may hinder it. And perfect civil and religious liberty is that state of society in which each one is allowed to seek, and is helped to seeking, his own highest good. We are very far, as yet, from having attained this perfection. As to the imperfect manifestations of liberty which we do see, the conviction is strong that they are due directly to Christianity, and our confident expectation of far better things in the future rests upon the promise and power of God alone; for we can not find elsewhere the factors capable of producing the desired result. The selfish heart of the You remember what Bishop Butler, in his natural man says: "It is not from me. "It is not from me. "Analogy of Religion," says about the tendFrom me comes the despot and the iron-ency of reason to prevail over brute force heeled oligarchy, and the murderous army when time and place for counsel and conbearing fire and sword." No, no! From certed action have been afforded. Now, the selfish, unrenewed heart, uninfluenced Christianity is the reason that is in this by Christianity, comes no lifting up of the world, and its contest is with all else here down-trodden, no caring for the individual, which is just unreason in opposition to all