Earlier text: The American Sentinel and the Prohibition PartyThe Pope and the Clergy.
By James S. Bell
DURING the winter of 1853-54, the Senate of the United States was discussing the Nebraska Bill. A protest against the passage of that bill was sent to the Senate, signed by three thousand and fifty “clergymen” of New England. This memorial called out an earnest and curious debate, as the Senators felt the full force of the “astounding fact” that here was a body of men, in this age and country, claiming that they “were authorized by the Almighty, and in his name, to pronounce an authoritative judgment upon a political question pending before the Congress of the United States.” This debate on the clergymen’s memorial provoked the wrath of the entire fraternity. A public meeting of twenty-five clergymen of the city of Chicago was soon held to discuss the Senate debate. This body of clergy also sent in a protest “in the name of Almighty God,” and signed it “as ministers of the gospel of Jesus Christ,” and accompanied the protest with four resolutions. This second clergyman’s protest and resolutions were sent to Senator S. A. Douglas, whom these clergymen boldly accused of “want of courtesy and reverence toward man and God,” in his speeches on the first memorial. This was a grave charge for clergymen to prefer against Douglas, and it aroused the Little Giant. He replied to this charge and reviewed the debate on the memorial of the three thousand and fifty, and then paid his best respects to the protest and resolutions of the twenty-five Chicago clergymen. In pamphlet form I have his letter, dated Washington, April 6, 1854. Since reading many comments on the Pope’s late rescript on the political affairs of Ireland, I have re-read the letter of Senator Douglas to Protestant clergymen in this country, who tried to dictate to the Senators of the United States how they should vote on a political question. The claims of Leo XIII. are not any more extravagant or startling than the claims of Protestant clergy in this age and country. Have the clergy of to-day repudiated the high claim of “speaking in the name and by the authority of Almighty God”? This year there have been several great assemblies of “ministers” in New York and in Philadelphia, and I have carefully read the reports of their proceedings, but have failed to discern that the assumption of the divine prerogative of speaking by the authority of Almighty God, has been denied. Without this sweeping prerogative, the clergy know that their words are wicked. The Chicago clergy charged that “the whole tone and spirit of the debate” on the New England clergy’s memorial, was “an outrage upon the privileges of a large and respectable body of citizens,” and “upon the claims of the divine name, word, and institution.” They insisted on being recognized in their “office as ministers,” who had lost none of their prerogatives as citizens when “called of God” to be his vice-regents. But neither the New England three thousand and fifty, nor the Chicago twenty-five clergymen, approached the Senate of the United States in their capacity as citizens, whose right to petition either or both houses upon any subject of public interest pending before that body, never should be denied. They declared that they came before Congress as ministers, in the name of Almighty God, to pronounce “his will upon all points of moral and religious truth.” In this high character, the Government does not know them. Those New England clergymen, of different religious denominations, in “their official characters as ministers of Almighty God, and in his name, protested against the passage of the Nebraska Bill” as a “great moral wrong;” as a matter “exposing us to righteous judgment of the Almighty. The Senators who objected to this protest urged that the protest was not presented in the name of citizens, or human beings, nor in the name of any human authority or civil right. Its obnoxious feature was, the signers “assumed the divine prerogative and spoke to the Senate in the name of Almighty God.” This conduct was understood by Douglas and other Senators as “asserting a divine power in the clergy of this country higher than the obligations of the Constitution, and above the sovereignty of the people and of the States,” and, in virtue of this “divine power,” to command Senators how to vote on any question. In the eyes of Douglas, this assertion of a divine power in the clergy, when adopted and repeated by the Chicago clergymen in their protest and resolutions on behalf of their New England brethren, looked as if it was the “fixed and deliberate purpose” of all the clergy of different religious denominations, to “force an issue upon this point [divine authority] with the civil and political authorities of the republic.” The Chicago clergymen “removed all obscurity and avowed the purpose distinctly and boldly” in this resolution, sent up to the Senate of the United States:—
Resolved, That the ministry is the divinely appointed institution for the declaration and enforcement of God’s will upon all points of moral and religious truth; and that, as such, it is their duty to reprove, rebuke, and exhort, with all authority and doctrine.” Has the leopard changed his spots?78 Let the reader note that this bold resolution, so sweeping in its claim of authority, was adopted by a council of twenty-five Protestant clergymen of different denominations, assembled in Chicago in 1854. . . . Pius IX. had then been nearly eight years on his pontifical throne, reared upon the ruins of the throne of the Cæsars. That proud, shrewd, and power-grasping old monk must have been pleased at what he also considered a daring invasion of his prerogatives, when he read this resolution of the Chicago clergymen. And their sincerity in the reality of their “divine appointment” was revealed to the astonished old man, in the sending of this resolution to the Senate of the United States. . . . Cardinal Manning boldly asserted in the name of the Pope: “I am the sole, last, supreme judge of what is right and wrong.” Not much bolder than the resolution of the Chicago “divines.” The Pope interferes on the “moral bearings” of the affairs in Ireland now. Our Chicago “divinely appointed ministry” asserted before the Senate of the United States that “it is our duty to recognize the moral bearings of the conflicts of political parties, and to proclaim, in reference thereunto, the principle of inspired truth and obligation.” Whew! Whenever these “divinely appointed ministers” please to “declare in the name of Almighty God,” that a measure, passed by Congress, signed by the President, interpreted and sanctioned as constitutional by the Supreme Court, is, in their judgment, “immoral and unrighteous,” those who obey Congress expose themselves to the wrath of the Almighty. If this is not equal, in haughty arrogance, to any assumption of the divine prerogative ever uttered by any Pope of Rome, I know not how to distinguish between the pretensions of these divine functionaries. What say the present “ministry”? As an organized, “divinely appointed” body, those clergymen spoke “in the name of Almighty God,” to the constituted authorities of this young, free nation! Thirty-four years have passed away since Senator Douglas informed the clergy that “your claims for the supremacy of this divinely appointed institution are subversive of the fundamental principles upon which our whole republican system rests.” This clerical presumption makes its existence known in various ways, even in these days. As a “divinely appointed institution,” even this present year, it will propose to apply the test of inspired truth to each of the political contests, “and presume, in the name of God, “to exhort and rebuke with all authority.” With Douglas, I say: “I cannot, shall not, recognize in your divinely-appointed institution, the power either of prophecy or of revelation.” Douglas wrote his reply to the protest and resolution of the Chicago clergymen, in April, 1854. I can well remember his canvass of 1856, seeking the Democratic nomination for President. How much his bold repudiation of the arrogant claims of the “divinely appointed institution of the ministry,” as the one only competent tribunal to both “declare and enforce God’s will on all points of faith and morals,” had to do with the fierce opposition which Douglas had to endure until his death, June, 1861, cannot be estimated. The clergymen never forgave the man who questioned their assumption of the “divine prerogative of the Almighty God.” Senator Mason, of Virginia, in the debate on the New England Memorial, said that when men came before Congress as vice-regents of the Almighty, they came “as a class unknown to the Government—a class whom the Government does not mean to know in any form or shape.” Both Douglas and Mason have joined the “silent majority,” but their earnest, outspoken warnings remain on the national records for the instruction of other “constituted authorities.” The “Government does not mean to know” any class of men as the “vice-regents of the Almighty.” Has the “Government” changed its intentions? The other day, after the laying of the corner-stone of the great Papal university, with a great parade, in Washington, Mr. James Gibbons, not as a citizen, but as a prime minister of the Pope of Rome, decked out in gorgeous robes of red, as cardinal, head of the church in the United States, went to the White House to introduce his obedient servants, the bishops, to the President. After this service was performed, so great was the crowd, and so strong the desire to behold a live cardinal, that the said Gibbons was forced to hold a kind of informal reception in the famous east room. Senator Butler, of South Carolina, was right when he, in that public debate, charged those clergymen with assuming “to be the foremen of the jury which is to pronounce the verdict and judgment of God upon earth.” He saw their true disposition, their best-liked avocation, when he said they “would convert the lamb into the lion, going about in the form of agitators seeking whom they might devour,” hiding in their dark or red robes of hypocrisy. The Government cannot afford to know these men claiming to exercise the divine prerogative in any form or in any shape. Various are the forms or shapes of this “arrogant and insatiable priestcraft.”—James S. Bell, in Christian Leader. Americans and Public Affairs
AMERICA is a country where politics is brought to the attention of every man, but Americans know less about public affairs than almost any other nation. The English read all the debates in Parliament, and carefully study all questions. They know all their Ministers by name, and feel almost personally acquainted with the leaders in the House of Commons. Every four years the American is aroused by the excitement of the presidential campaign, but during the intervening period he pays little attention to public affairs, and leaves all questions to the politicians. In England the papers contain extensive accounts of all the proceedings of Parliament, while in this country the reports of the actions of Congress are condensed, and in many papers are banished to the supplements, while base-ball and divorces are described in every detail. We do not study sufficiently the questions of the day, and are not sufficiently cognizant of the actions of our Representatives. How many Americans can name twenty-five United States Senators, with the States they represent? How many know, by name, the Cabinet officers, or the Justices of the Supreme Court? We like to hurrah for someone during the campaign, but we do not sufficiently weigh the question as to whom we shall hurrah for.—America. The Sentinel and the Woman’s Christian Temperance Union.
By A. T. J.
The following letter is from a thorough-going National Reformer. We willingly give it space. EDITORS AMERICAN SENTINEL: Your last month’s article, under the head of “The AMERICAN SENTINEL and the Woman’s Christian Temperance Union,” and signed “A. T. J.,” will bear criticism; and I hope you will permit a friend of the Woman’s Union to write a word in their defense. 1. Your assertion that the W. C. T. U. is in favor of using the civil power to compel people to favor or to practice Christian temperance, or to compel people to conform to the principles of temperance, is unfair because it is untrue. No temperance society known to the writer is “in favor of using the civil power to compel anybody either to favor or to practice” temperance. Yet all agree that no license should be granted to sell liquor to common drinkers. But there is a vast difference between “compelling people to favor or practice temperance” and compelling men to desist from selling poison to people who wish to poison themselves. 3. You err when you say that “Christian principle knows no power but the power of God as manifested in the gospel of the Lord Jesus Christ.” This is a grave error. There is a divine power in law as well as in the gospel. God is the Author of both. “The powers that be are ordained of God.” That means civil powers. “There is no power but of God.” This, too, includes civil power. “He beareth not the sword in vain.” This means the civil men; and he who “resisteth the power resisteth the ordinance of God.” If civil government has not the power to pass civil law to prohibit the liquor traffic, then it bears the sword in vain. “The law was made for man-stealers.” This means civil law. And there is power as well as majesty in law, because all righteous law is from God, the source of all power. And “rulers,” civil rulers, legislators, governments, “are not a terror to good works, but to the evil.” The SENTINEL knows very well what kind of works, whether good or evil, are perpetrated by saloonists. The women are worthy of commendation, not of censure, for endeavoring to bring the power of civil law to bear against saloons. Your charge against the W. C. T. U. is unjust. All temperance prohibitionists wish the power of law to be brought to bear against the ruinous traffic. And why should not Christian women, as well as Christian men, desire civil prohibition? Why are you so “decidedly opposed” to such “political aspirations of the Woman’s Christian Temperance Union”? That I may not occupy too much of your space, what I wish to say further in defense79 of the women must be deferred until your next number. Mr. Johnston’s denial on behalf of the Woman’s Christian Temperance Union will not answer. It is not sound. The National Woman’s Christian Temperance Union Convention of 1887 declared “Christ and his law to be the supreme authority in National as in individual life,” and in other places it is added, “to whose laws all human laws should conform.” Human laws are made to be enforced; if not enforced they are a nullity. If therefore the law of Christ is of supreme authority in National life, and human laws are to conform to it, then the enforcement of such laws can be nothing else than to compel men to practice Christian duties, whether of temperance or any other. Our assertion is only the logic of the Woman’s Christian Temperance Union premises. It is therefore neither unfair nor untrue. We know full well that “the powers that be are ordained of God,” we also know that though they are ordained of God, they are not ordained to exercise any authority in things which pertain to God. The civil powers are ordained only to the exercise of power in civil things, and not at all in moral or religious things. “Christian women as well as Christian men” should “desire civil prohibition;” but it is essentially religious prohibition that is desired by both the W. C. T. U. and the Prohibition party, and not the religious prohibition of the liquor traffic alone, but the religious prohibition of things that are not irreligious nor even uncivil. And that is why we are “so ‘decidedly opposed’ ” to the political aspirations of the W. C. T. U., and the religious aspirations of the Prohibition party.
A. T. J. Sound Sentiments.
By Editor
THE following preamble and resolutions were sent to us by the organizations named. They have our hearty endorsement:— WHEREAS, The Board of Education of the city of Boston has recently discarded a text-book from use in the public schools of the city, through the influence of a Roman Catholic priest, because the said text-book contains a historical statement with reference to the abuses of the Papal church at the time of the rise of Protestantism in Europe. (The book is Swinton's “Outlines of the World's History,” a standard text-book, and the objectionable language used by the author is as follows:— “There was complaint of many practical abuses of the church, and of the claims of the Popes to interfere in the affairs of nations; and there was also a growing feeling among many, that not a few of the doctrines which were believed, and of the ceremonies which were practiced, in church were contrary to Scripture. “It was in this state of affairs that there arose a dispute, trivial, indeed, in its nature, but which kindled a flame that quickly spread over most of Western Europe. When Leo X. came to the Papal chair, he found the treasury of the church exhausted by the ambitious projects of his predecessors. He therefore had recourse to every means which ingenuity could devise for recruiting his exhausted finances, and among these he adopted an extensive sale of indulgences, which in former ages had been a source of large profits to the church. The Dominican friars, having obtained the monopoly of the sale in Germany, employed as their agent Tetzel, one of their own order, who carried on the traffic in a manner that was very offensive, and especially so to the Augustinian friars.” And for this historical fact, stated in the mildest language possible, this text-book is excluded from the free schools of Boston, the honorable Board of Education bowing in meek submission to the arbitrary mandate of this hierarchy; therefore, Resolved, By Camp 22 of the Patriotic Order Sons of America, of Leadville, Colorado, that we do most earnestly protest against this arbitrary ecclesiastical interference with the literature of the free schools of our land. At this rate it is but reasonable to expect the next scene in the drama will be the expulsion of “Froude's History of England” as a text-book in our common schools, because the author states the truth respecting the bloody persecution of the Roman Catholics by the Church of England at the time of the execution of Mary Stuart by the rapacious Protestant, Queen Elizabeth. Or, through the influence of some religious fanatic, some standard History of the United States will be discarded from use in our public schools, because the author records the abuses and prejudices of the early Puritans in their bitter persecutions of other denominations in New England; and in condemning to death poor old innocent women supposed to be possessed of witchcraft. In passing this resolution of censure it is with no malice to the Catholic Church; but we would raise our voice equally strong against the interference of any Protestant Church in the dictation of the literature of the free schools of our common country. Had this ecclesiastical edict have been prescribed for any parochial school, it would have been none of our business. But that such an outrage should have been perpetrated upon the public schools of the very city where the first battles were fought to free the American Colonies from British tyranny, beneath the shadow of Bunker Hill and old Faneuil Hall, the “cradle of American liberty,” the city where once lived the Adamses, Franklin, Parker, and Wendell Phillips, it is enough to make these illustrious patriots return from the tomb and with sepulchral voices rebuke the pusillanimous cowards who compose the Board of Education in the so-called “Athens of America.” Resolved, That a copy of these expressions of our sentiments be forwarded to the Board of Education of Boston, and for publication in the Boston Herald and the AMERICAN SENTINEL. Respectfully submitted,
T. H. BAKER,
W. H. VAN-BUREN,
A. C. WILSON,
} Com. These resolutions were unanimously adopted by Camp 22, at their session July 16, 1888. W. M. VAN BUREN, Rec. Sec. And I certify that these resolutions were unanimously indorsed by Camps 5 and 13, at their session July 18 and 21, respectively. WILLIAM P. HAYHURST, District Pres. Bound Volumes of the Pacific Health Journal.
VOLUMES 1 and 2 of the Pacific Health Journal, from June, 1885, to November, 1887, inclusive, have been bound up in one neat volume, leather back and corners, cloth sides. It contains over 400 large octavo pages of very useful and instructive reading. Every family should possess a copy of this book. Price, post-paid, $2.25. Address, Pacific Health Journal and Temperance Advocate, Oakland, Cal. The American Sentinel.
By Editor
The demand for extra copies of the July, August, and September AMERICAN SENTINEL is so great that we have had to print a second edition of those three numbers. The July SENTINEL contains: “A Sensible Letter,” “The Entering Wedge,” “The Church and State Bill,” “The Presbyterian Cardinal,” “Religion in Japan,” “A Word of Warning,” “Woman Suffrage,” etc. The August number contains: “A Calm View of National Reform,” “Rome’s Influence,” “The National Reform Vice-Presidency,” “Russia and Religion,” “Let There Be No Alliance with Rome,” “That Sunday Commandment,” “National Reform in the South,” “A Congressman’s Opinion,” etc. And the September issue has been pronounced the best number of them all. It contains: “The AMERICAN SENTINEL and the Woman’s Christian Temperance Union,” “What Constitutes a Catholic School?” “Religious Wickedness,” “The Savor of Tyranny,” “Bad Institutions and Good Men,” “The National Establishment of the Christian Religion,” “The Political Value of Religion,” “Comments on National Sunday-law Petitions,” etc. One copy of each of the above three numbers of the AMERICAN SENTINEL will be sent post-paid to any address for 10 cents. Sixty assorted back numbers of the SENTINEL (four different dates), post-paid, for $1. One hundred back numbers, for $1.50; or $15 per 1,000 copies. Address, AMERICAN SENTINEL, 1059 Castro Street, Oakland, Cal. OUR COUNTRY—THE MARVEL OF NATIONS.
By Uriah Smith
ITS PAST, PRESENT, AND FUTURE, AND WHAT THE SCRIPTURES SAY OF IT.
AUTHOR OF “SMITH'S PARLIAMENTARY RULES,” ETC., ETC. This is a new and popular work on a subject of the deepest interest to all American citizens. It takes a brief but comprehensive view of our Government from a Historical, Political, and Religious Standpoint. The Sunday Question,
Modern Spiritualism, and
National Reform ARE PROMINENT AMONG THE TOPICS ABLY DISCUSSED IN THIS WORK. THE MARVEL OF NATIONS is a work of 200 pages. It contains a steel plate of the author, and over forty illustrations. It is printed in clear type, and bound in cloth; price, $1.00. Address, AMERICAN SENTINEL, Oakland, Cal A THIRTY-TWO PAGE MONTHLY MAGAZINE, devoted to the dissemination of true temperance principles, and instruction in the art of preserving health. It is emphatically A JOURNAL FOR THE PEOPLE,
Containing what everybody wants to know, and is thoroughly practical. Its range of subjects is unlimited, embracing everything that in any way affects the health. Its articles being short and pointed, it is specially adapted to farmers, mechanics, and housekeepers, who have but little leisure for reading. It is just the journal that every family needs, and may be read with profit by all. Price, $1.00 per year, or with the 300-page premium book—“Practical Manual of Hygiene and Temperance,” containing household and cooking recipes—post-paid for $1.40. Address, PACIFIC PRESS, Publishers, Oakland, Cal. Strikes Driving Industry Abroad
THE newspapers report the proposed removal of a prominent chimney glass manufactory from Pittsburgh to Belgium. One of the reasons given for removal is the continual recurrence of strikes among the men employed here. A member of the manufacturing firm is reported as saying: “Just at the present time our works are lying idle and the men are sitting around and taking it easy. We want to be at work, and so do at least three-quarters of the men, but on account of the union not a single man dare go to work, nor do we dare to start up. It is just this condition of affairs that has almost decided us to pull up stakes and leave.” We shall not be surprised to hear of more of these removals in the near future. It must come to this or something worse if the business of “striking” is not brought to an end. It is a humiliating state of affairs outlined in the statement that three-fourths of the men in the glass manufactory desire to go to work, “but on account of the union not a single man dare go to work, nor do we dare to start up.” Is there any tyranny in the land like this “union” tyranny? How can any industry succeed that is subject to it?—New York Observer. PROTESTANT theocratical ideas, or ideas favoring the union of Religion and the State, are gaining ground in this nation with dangerous rapidity. The bold encroachments of the Catholic Church, and the hardly less bold encroachments of the Protestant churches, upon the civil power in this country, are both movements which deserve the most careful watching. Books which throw light upon these questions make most important reading just now. It is therefore with pleasure that we call special attention to three books which should be diligently studied by all. The first is, “THE PAPACY AND THE CIVIL POWER.”
This is a book written by Hon. R. W. Thompson, Secretary of the Navy under President Hayes’ administration. It consists of twenty-three chapters, on the claims, the teachings, and the history of the Papacy in its relation to the civil power, with an appendix containing “The Bishop’s Oath,” “The Third Article of the Pastoral Letter of the Second National Council of Baltimore,” “The Encyclical Letter of Pope Pius IX.,” and “The Syllabus of Pope Pius IX.” We have not space now for extracts; we can only say here that it is a perfect mine of invaluable information in regard to the meddling of the Papacy with the civil power, from the time of Constantine to this day, both in Europe and our own country. It has 750 well-printed pages, and is sold for $3.00, post-paid. Not a family in the land should be without it. Send for a copy, and read it, and you will say so too. “THE EMANCIPATION OF MASSACHUSETTS.”
This is a sketch of the establishment and working of the Puritan theocracy in Massachusetts, and her emancipation from it. It gives some—enough certainly—of the naked facts in regard to the cruel oppressions practiced by those who, to use Doctor Schaff’s expression, “came from Europe to seek freedom for themselves, and then inconsistently denied it to others, from fear of losing the monopoly.” Here, from original documents, is set down the record of some of the hideous enormities inflicted upon the Baptists, the Quakers, the witches, and other dissenters from the established religion, by the ruling preachers, to whom, says Bancroft, “in their self-righteousness, it never occurred that vanity and love of power had blinded their judgment.” From two or three statements it would seem that the author of the book is a skeptic, but that does not lessen the value of the facts which he sets forth. And just now, when the National Reform Association, aided by the Prohibition party and the Woman’s Christian Temperance Union, is about to restore such a rule and make it national, and while a constitutional amendment to that effect is pending in the national Legislature, the important lesson to be derived from these facts should be fastened upon the mind of every person in the nation—the lesson that no ecclesiastics can ever safely be intrusted with the control of the civil power. The book has 382 pages, and will be sent post-paid for $1.50. The third of these books is, “CHURCH AND STATE IN THE UNITED STATES.”
This book is an enlargement of the inaugural address delivered by Philip Schaff at his induction into the professorship of church history in Union Theological Seminary, New York City. It states sound principles in regard to religious liberty, and the rights of conscience. It gives much valuable information upon the subject of the national and the State constitutions, and upon religious liberty in the countries of modern Europe. In discussing “The Nation and Christianity,” and “The Connecting Links between Church and State,” the author is inconsistent with the genuine principles which he lays down in the beginning of the book. Here he inculcates the idea that there is already in this nation a union of Church and State, while the object of the book at the beginning is to maintain the propriety of a separation between the Church and the State. The doctor, like thousands of others, is led into this inconsistency by the demand for Sunday laws. Anybody who studies the first parts of the book will have no difficulty in detecting the inconsistency of this part, nor will he find any difficulty in relegating it to that “limbo large and broad” to which it belongs. Yet even this part, inconsistent as it is, is not wholly without value, for it, with the judicial decisions accompanying it, serves most admirably to display the miserable sophistry under which even State Supreme Courts are willing to cloak Church and State ideas, and give Papal principles the sanction of the final judicial decisions in the highest courts of States, particularly New York and Pennsylvania. The book has 161 large pages, and will be sent post-paid for $1.50. All these books are for sale by Pacific Press, Oakland, California. Address accordingly. Christ as President of the United States
An ardent State-religionist sends us the information all the way from Connecticut, that “Christ himself is to be the President of the United States . . . before long.” Petitions for the Blair Amendment
THE National Reform Association is circulating for signatures petitions to Congress asking that Senator Blair’s proposed religious amendment to the Constitution may be passed by Congress and submitted to the States for their approval. One of these petitions was presented to the Prohibition County Convention of Wood County, Ohio, August 8. It was unanimously indorsed, and a copy of a resolution to that effect was sent to Senator Blair, together with the respects of the convention. National Reform’s Petition Campaign
JOHN ALEXANDER, of Philadelphia, is the father of the National Reform Association, as such, and in the Christian Statesman of September 6 he congratulates the association on the introduction of the Blair religious amendment to the Constitution; declares “the National Reform Association ought to spare no pains and omit no effort which may promise to secure its adoption;” and further says:— “Let us begin without delay the circulation of petitions (to be furnished in proper form by the Association), and let an opportunity be given to all parts of the country to make up a roll of petitions so great that it will require a procession of wheelbarrows to trundle the mighty mass into the presence of the representatives of the nation in the houses of Congress.” And “let a mass convention of the friends of the cause be held in Washington, when the Blair resolution shall be under discussion, to accompany with its influence the presentation of the petitions, and to take such other action as may be deemed best to arouse the nation to a genuine enthusiasm in behalf of our national Christianity.” Isn’t it about time that somebody was arousing to a genuine sense of the danger to civil and religious liberty, that inheres in this scheme?