By Leon A. Smith
*Editor of the "Sentinel of Liberty."
In order to understand the significance of present tendencies in Church and State, it is necessary to note not only the positions occupied by Church and State to-day, but the positions they ought to occupy. To this end let us consider the nature of these two paramount institutions, and the ends they are respectively designed to serve.
The purpose of the State is to protect the individual in the enjoyment of his natural rights. Men are "endowed by their Creator with certain unalienable rights, among which are life, liberty, and the pursuit of happiness." The State compels each individual to respect the rights of all other individuals, and thus preserves to each individual liberty of action within the sphere of rights. Man must have liberty if he is to develop character.
The Church, on the other hand, deals with the obligations of religion. The Church takes cognizance not only of what man has a right to do, but the infinitely broader question of what is right for man to do. It is wrong for any man to disregard the rights of others, but the obligation to respect rights is only one of a myriad of duties which are laid upon man by religion, covering not only his relation to his fellow-men, but to his Creator. While the State guarantees to man the liberty to do wrong, the Church presents to him the obligation always to do right.
Considered as the exponent of Christianity, the Church occupies a sphere altogether distinct from that of the State. Not only the ends sought by each, but the agencies employed, are wholly dissimilar. Christianity operates by love; the State employs coercion. Christianity persuades and entreats, appealing to the heart and conscience; the State simply commands, appealing only to force. Christianity governs the thoughts and motives; the State deals only with outward conduct. Christianity liberates the sinner; the State shuts up the criminal. Christianity demands that punishment for transgression be deferred; the State demands that the transgressor be punished speedily. The power and wisdom of the State are human; Christianity is the power and wisdom of God.
Having these essential points of contrast, it is evident that only by keeping within wholly separate spheres can, Church and State avoid working at cross purposes. Love can not work with coercion; command nullifies entreaty; justice shuts out mercy; compulsion dispenses with conscience. When these agencies of the State are employed by the Church, the Church works not for Christianity, but directly against it. Abundant and melancholy evidence, alas! is furnished by Church history upon this point.
The Church, in her proper sphere, is the salt of the earth, the light of the world. Her wisdom is supplied by omniscience, her power is power from on high, her voice is the voice of God. Before her weapons of warfare the strongholds of evil and of error are thrown down, and the very thoughts of the heart are led captive. Like the warrior on the white horse, she goes forth "conquering and to conquer;" a vision "fair as the moon, clear as the sun, and terrible as an army with banners." But when she drops the sword of the Spirit to grasp the sword of temporal power; when she lets go the hand of Christ to take that of Caesar, at once all is changed. She has forsaken Him unto whom all power is given in heaven and in earth, and she is shorn of her strength and beauty. The source of her life even is cut off. Severed from her divine Head, spiritual death must swiftly follow. The semblance of worship may remain, but the glory and the spirit have fled; the form of godliness may be exhibited, but the power thereof8is denied. And to elect an earthly head in the place of her revered Lord, only completes the ghastly counterfeit. Henceforth she wears religion not as an armor, but as a cloak; and in the name of Christ, she follows the lead of Satan. Instead of shepherding the sheep, she fleeces and scatters them; instead of the strongholds of evil, she tears down the temples of God. Her appeal is not to the consciences of men, but to their cupidity; not to the love of God, but to the love of power and worldly advantage. Shorn of strength from above, she grasps at the power from beneath, wielded by earthly governments. She descends into the arena of politics. Her fold is opened to take in every hypocritical self-server seeking worldly emolument in the name of piety. She becomes, finally, "the hold of every foul spirit, and a cage of every unclean and hateful bird."
What illustrations of these truths do we discover in the world's present outlook? The question is a most pertinent one; and the answer, to the candid investigator, is startling. The fact appears, and too plainly to be mistaken, that the Church-and-State outlook to-day constitutes one of the great signs of the times. There is visible everywhere a tendency of these two to join hands—a movement to re-establish between them the old medieval relation. History, if these indications speak the truth, is about to repeat one of its darkest chapters. We stand within the shadow of an approaching eclipse of the bright sun of civil and religious freedom. And that event, in the very nature of things, must mark the close of the present epoch of time, which has been characterized by separation of Church and State and the world-wide proclamation of liberty as the inalienable right of each person among all people.
This epoch began with the Reformation. Then was proclaimed to mankind the old but long-hidden truth of salvation by faith, which meant the right of every man to think for himself, and for himself to accept or reject the doctrines of Christianity. The voice of the Reformation, sounding throughout Europe, called men to throw off a despotism that enslaved the mind, and millions responded to the call. But the process of emancipation did not stop there. It was seen that the right to think meant nothing without the right to act, and that in religion man must not only be free from the dictates of pope and priest, but from the decrees of civil rulers as well. This meant that the spheres of religion and the civil government were separate, and that not only the system of religious government bequeathed from the Dark Ages, but the prevailing systems of civil government, also, must be reconstructed. It was not, as had been believed, the duty of mankind to rest their religious belief upon the word of popes and prelates; neither was it, as had been taught, the right of the civil ruler to prescribe religious duties by law, and punish the dissenter by the infliction of legal penalties. The right to prescribe and enforce religious duties could inhere in no power not also possessed of infallibility, and the papal claim of infallibility was a logical necessity of the papal scheme of religion. Such a claim was characteristic of the papal system, and it came to be recognized that the exercise of civil authority in the field of religion involved a claim by the civil ruler to infallibility, which led back to the Church of Rome.
For this new governmental system, dispensing alike with pope and king, the Creator had prepared a home in a new quarter of the earth, where it might spring up and become the foundation principle of national life, unimpeded by the principles and institutions of despotism that had become so firmly rooted in the Old World. And from this new land, where the new nation that was to be, had come to the birth, the just and right system of civil government was proclaimed to the world in the Declaration of Independence.
What, then, is the cause of the drawing together again of Church and State to-day? What is the center about which this baneful movement is taking shape? For answer we have but to note the legislation that is enacted and enforced to-day to promote the observance of Sunday, and to remember that every exercise of the civil authority in the sphere of religion is a step toward the Church of Rome. The essential feature of the Papacy is the union of Church and State, and the essential sign of papal authority is her claim to have changed the Sabbath from the seventh to the first day of the week. This fact is fully set forth in standard Catholic works. Two things so essential to the same system are closely related to each other.
The separation from Rome caused by the great wave of religious reform which swept over Europe and brought forth the institutions of modern liberty, stopped short of the practise of Sunday observance. This essential element of union with Rome was still preserved by the Reformers. One strong cord which bound them to the old religious system remained uncut. The badge of the Church-and-State system was still worn, though unconsciously, by those who repudiated the system itself. The leaven of the old order of things was taken into the new, there to lie dormant for a time, but finally to begin its fatal work of leavening the whole lump. This leaven of the old despotism was chiefly embodied in the Sunday laws.
Within recent times an agitation for the enforcement of Sunday has arisen and has spread to all parts of the civilized world. In this country, Congress and the State Legislatures have been repeatedly, and at times successfully, importuned for Sunday legislation; and the movement gathers force from new organizations that are continually springing up. In Canada a decision is pending in the higher courts which is to settle the validity of Sunday legislation in the provinces; and the "Lord's Day Alliance" is bent on securing Sunday legislation from the Dominion Parliament. In Europe there is a growing tendency to legislation curtailing the hours of Sunday work. The influence of the Sunday-rest Congress held recently in Brussels has been powerful in this direction. In Protestant Germany the tendency toward prohibition of Sunday labor is especially marked. In Protestant Switzerland observers of the seventh-day Sabbath have been rigorously prosecuted and their publishing house closed by law. If we take up papers published in England, in South Africa, in Australia, or in India, we may read the same accounts of agitation and appeals for Sunday legislation. A simultaneous movement of this character is in progress throughout the Protestant world.
On the one point of Sunday observance we find Protestants and Catholics in agreement to-day. And this point of harmony is being magnified, this bond of union is being sedulously strengthened. Protestant organizations in this country have been speaking very strongly in behalf of Sunday, and courting an alliance with Rome for Sunday enforcement; and recently Roman Catholic leaders have been taking up the same cry. Rome is ready to join fully in the movement when the opportune hour arrives. But hitherto it has been her wisdom to let Protestants alone in the work—they were doing so well in her behalf. Had Rome shown an eagerness to help the movement along, the Protestant forces behind it might have taken the alarm, and retired from its support.
The conclusion to be drawn from the facts and principles before us is a momentous one. The sure result of this Protestant movement in behalf of the Sunday sabbath, if it continues to grow, must be reunion with Rome. No other result is logically possible. To enforce Sunday observance Protestants must adopt papal principles and go over to the papal camp. The reunion takes place on Rome's own ground. Sunday as a sabbath is a papal institution, resting upon tradition and the decrees of church councils. The early Catholic Church declared it to be the Christian sabbath, and this was the origin of its claim to such distinction. If Protestants take the word of Rome upon this point, they can not logically refuse to accept her word upon another point. If they accept the authority of tradition for Sunday observance, they can not reject the same authority speaking for the system she represents. Rome declares that the Church is the rightful ruler of the world, and that the head of the Church, the pope, is the rightful sovereign of kings and emperors. If her word is good for the claims of Sunday, it is equally good for the union of Church and State. The claim of the authority to settle questions of religion is a papal claim. The claim of Sunday to the allegiance of mankind is one concerning which the religious bodies are not agreed; and "it is impossible for the magistrate to adjudge the right of preference among the various sects that profess the Christian faith, without erecting a claim to infallibility, which would lead us back to the Church of Rome."
And this reunion upon the ground of Sunday observance, when it is accomplished, must, as before stated, mark the end of the age. It must do this because it completely reverses and repudiates all that has characterized this age as the age of civil and religious freedom. The dark shadows of despotism will then once more cover the earth; depraved human nature, in conjunction with the enemy of righteousness, both the same in all ages, will cause history to repeat itself in evil; a lost world, circling upon its track, will plunge again into the obscurity of the Dark Ages, from which it had once hopefully emerged.
And what then? What and when is to be the outcome? A momentous question this for every person, and to it the sure word of prophecy makes answer, the nature of which is set before the reader elsewhere. The God of liberty is not dead, and His purposes are not to be defeated. He is prepared for the emergency, and when He shall have performed that which He has prophetically spoken of this time, all the world will know that the cause of human liberty has been finally and eternally vindicated.
L. A. SMITH.
THE PAPAL OUTLOOK
By Prof. Percy T. Magan
By Prof. Percy T. Magan
Of Battle Creek College.
THE Papal Church, during the latter days of the eighteenth century, still calling herself the body of the Lord, sat in solitary sadness. Her form was wrapped in the weeds of widowhood, and her soul enshrouded in the deepest gloom.
Rome had warred as a principal in tremendous issues. She had done battle to the sword with blood to the hilt. Everywhere the day had gone against her even more decisively than when the ruddy hand of the Reformation had shaken the pillars of her power.
That Rome toward the end of the eighteenth century would come to such a state, had been predicted long time before on the pages of the Scriptures. Subsequent history had faithfully proved the divinity of the wonderful Word. That Rome should sit as a widow and see sorrow, had been foretold by the pencil of the Holy Ghost; and the seer had also said that she should be wounded as to death.
The closing years of the eighteenth century appear to our perspective now like one great day of carnage and of strife. The red spark of revolution once kindled in France had ignited combustible material all over Europe, and every nation was involved in hideous war.
Blood flowed in torrents. Crowned heads, dynasties, and nations had gone down in the fray. It is all over now. The gentle moon of time has risen, and shed the pallid light of her beams over the sickening, ghastly scene. And there one sees that wondrous “woman,” who was once arrayed in purple and scarlet color, and decked with gold, and precious stones, and pearls, but now lying desperately wounded, amidst the corpses of her royal lovers, so thickly strewn upon that bloody battle land. Yes, and she was one of the only ones to arise from her fallen posture. The Scripture had said that her “deadly wound” should be healed. In the nineteenth century, now closing, she has arisen; she has, in a measure at least, recuperated her shattered fortunes, and regained her lost influence. Well did the great Lord Macaulay say:—
When we reflect on the tremendous assaults which she has survived, we find it difficult to conceive in what way she is to perish.
A Cause of the Struggle.
The terrific struggles which mantled the autumnal years of the last century in the russet habiliments of blood were all fought over a proposition which was succinctly stated by one of the greatest of these governmental reformers, in the following words:—
We hold these truths to be self-evident, that all men are created equal; that they are endowed by their Creator with certain unalienable rights; that among these are life, liberty, and the pursuit of happiness; that to secure these rights, governments are instituted among men, deriving their just powers from the consent of the governed.
The principles embodied in this proposition were the all-absorbing theme of controversy in the days whereof I speak, not simply in America, but in all the civilized world. On the one side stood the plain people demanding the right to rule themselves. On the other stood prince, potentate, pope, and Papacy, tenaciously clinging to the doctrine of the divine right of kings, and maintaining that it was their prerogative to rule the people without their consent.
This epidemic of government by the consent of the governed may be said to have first broken out in England. The people demanded a redistribution of seats in Parliament. The aristocrats had things so arranged that they could return themselves at every election. Under the old law, defunct towns, such as Old Sarum, which did not have a single inhabitant, were entitled to representation. The lord of the neighboring manor had easy work to send himself to the Parliament, there to represent his own interests. Great manufacturing towns, like Birmingham and Manchester, were at the same time unable to exercise the imperial franchise. Hence they demanded a change. The king and his nobles were unwilling to grant it.
A crisis was imminent. To avert it the royal party transferred the struggle to England’s colonies in America. This was a shrewd move. It was wisely thought that it would be easier to turn the people of England against the colonies than against themselves. If they fought the principle of representation in the case of the colonists, their hands would be tied and their mouths stopped should they attempt to further contend for it for themselves.
A Successful Issue.
The American colonists, however, carried the consent-of-the-governed principle to a successful issue. As a result of this in due process of time the principle triumphed in England.
The movement in America was distasteful to the Papacy; but as it tended to cripple the power of England, and as England was a heretical nation, she did not say very much.
In 1798 the new government of the United States under the present Constitution was launched. On April 30, in the city of New York, George Washington was inaugurated as the first President of the republic. Five days later the States-General was opened in France, and the French Revolution was begun. On the 4th of July the Americans celebrated their liberty, and on the 14th the French people, in a10frenzy of passion, tore down the hated Bastile. To this day the 14th of July is the day celebrated as the birthday of liberty in France.
From the beginning the Papacy was opposed to the French Revolution. Pius VI., being pope, took the side of Louis XVI. against the people of France. He denounced the Legislative Assembly, and issued an encyclical proclamation, in which he condemned the efforts of the French people to establish a republic. Here are his words: “That assembly, after abolishing monarchy, which is the most natural form of government, had attributed almost all power to the populace, who follow no wisdom and no counsel, and have no understanding of things.” He further instructed the bishops that all “poisoned books” should be removed “from the hands of the faithful by force and stratagem.” He denounced the liberty after which France was striving, in imitation of the American example. He declared it had a tendency to “corrupt minds, pervert morals, and overthrow all order in affairs and laws.” He asserted in bold terms that the doctrine of the equality of man leads to “anarchy” and the “speedy dissolution” of society.
Thus did the Church of Rome pit herself against the movement for popular government. But the French Revolution was not confined to France. It advanced all over Europe like a great tidal wave. Wherever the arms of the republic were victorious, monarchical forms of government fell, and government of the people was instituted in its stead. Italy was no exception to the general rule. When Napoleon led his troops across the Alps, kingdoms and duchies were overthrown, and the Cisalpine and Transpadane republics appeared in their stead.
The pope thundered anathemas against the advancing French. His own temporal power shook like an aspen leaf. At last, in 1798, on the tenth day of February, Berthier, the French general, came in sight of the ancient capital of the world. The democrats, at the summit of their wishes, assembled in the Campo Vaccino, in sight of the remains of the ancient forum, and proclaimed the Roman Republic. The pope was stripped of his power, conveyed into Tuscany, and thence to Valence, France, where he died attended by a solitary ecclesiastic, and for two years there was no pope.
Ultimately, however, temporal power was restored to the pope, and he ruled as a king over the papal States. With almost the very beginning of the present century, the people of Italy began to plead for constitutional government. This the pope was determined not to grant. True, he offered to reform some abuses; “but,” says his own biographer, these had only “an irritating effect on the public, especially when the leaders of public opinion had determined beforehand that nothing short of a constitutional and parliamentary government, administered by laymen, should satisfy them, or be accepted by the people of the Roman States.”
Once, in 1848, in the month of November, the pope weakened. This was when a deputation from the people bore an ultimatum to the pontiff. In it they stated that they would “allow his holiness one hour to consider; after which, if not adopted, they announced their firm purpose to break into the Quirinal, and put to death every inmate thereof, with the sole and single exception of his holiness himself.” Then Pius IX. gave way, and announced his submission. “The sovereign has given us a REPUBLIC!” spread from rank to rank, and shouts of joy rent the air.
The Overthrow of the Temporal Power.
But the joy of the people was short-lived. Things did not improve as they had hoped; the promised reforms were not granted. The end came in 1870. In that year the plebiscite in the papal territories voted to throw off the yoke of the temporal sovereignty of the pope, and unite with the kingdom of Italy. There were 167,548 voters. Of these 133,681 voted in favor of the union, only 1,507 voting against it. On Sept. 20, 1870, the army of Italy entered Rome. The temporal power of the pope was at an end. His persistent refusals to grant popular government were the cause. The Papacy stood opposed to republics on principle, and held to the divine right of kings. It was the movement in favor of popular government which dethroned the pope.
Republican government drew its first full breath on American soil. From the United States the precious light had gone forth to all the world, and almost every government on earth had been influenced by it. In resisting this light, the Papacy had fallen.
The Declaration of Independence has done much to secure the liberty and happiness of mankind. It was not a local document, intended only for the benefit of the American colonists. Indeed, it is an interesting fact that its original title was not “The Declaration of Independence.” This title does not appear in the original. It was then called “The Unanimous Declaration of the Thirteen United States of America.” It was not thought that it would assist the colonists in gaining their independence. It was an enunciation of grand principles of true government, good for all mankind. These were the principles which the Papacy fought, and before which she fell.
God gave freedom to the people of the United States. He gave it to them because of the principles of civil and religious liberty which they cherished and nourished as a sacred trust from Him. The fathers were sensible of the importance of their work. This is wonderfully told in Washington’s first inaugural:—
The preservation of the sacred fire of liberty and the DESTINY OF THE REPUBLICAN MODEL OF GOVERNMENT are justly considered, perhaps, as deeply, as finally, STAKED ON THE EXPERIMENT INTRUSTED TO THE HANDS OF THE AMERICAN PEOPLE.
In other words, the fathers realized that what they had done would have an influence on all the world. They also knew that if they ever apostatized from the principles of republican government, that model of government would come to an end in the world as it now is. They believed this “as deeply as finally.” These words are italicized in the original draft made by Washington himself.
What Is the Outlook?
And now I am ready to answer the question as to what is the outlook for the Papacy in the coming century. It is in its immediate aspects very flattering. The principle against which she struggled, and before which she fell, is now being repudiated by the government which gave it birth. Government by the consent of the governed is now being declared by the United States as not good for all mankind. In other words, it is being pronounced a failure. The “destiny of the republican model of government, . . . staked on the experiment intrusted to the American people,” is now being sealed. “The republican model” is being abandoned and declared of no account.
This move on the part of the United States means much to the Papacy. It means everything to her. With great éclat the champion of the principles against which she stood is now surrendering these principles. There can be but one ending to this,—the restoration of the old order of things the world over, and the triumph in this earth as it now is of the old Roman Catholic doctrine of the divine right of kings. This is what the events of the last two years spell for the Church of Rome. A writer of many religious works has truthfully said:
The Roman Church is far-reaching in her plans and modes of operation. She is employing every device to extend her influence and increase her power in preparation for a fierce and determined conflict to REGAIN CONTROL OF THE WORLD. . . . Marvelous in her shrewdness and cunning is the Romish Church. She can read what is to be. She bides her time.
Added to this, other things have been working in her favor. The Church of England has been steadily falling into her hands. In 1844 began the so-called Tractarian, or Oxford, movement. Its real animus was to bring the Church of England back to Rome. Dr. John Henry Newman was its most remarkable man. He ultimately became a Roman Catholic, and was made cardinal. His friend, Dr. Pusey, “began to incorporate the mysticism and the symbols of Rome with the ritual of the English Protestant Church.” In 1851 a great stir was occasioned in England by the pope’s issuing a papal bull, “given at St. Peters, Rome, under the seal of the fisherman,” and directing the establishment in England “of a hierarchy of bishops deriving their titles from their own sees.” This called out Lord John Russell’s famous Durham letter, and a new “no popery” agitation. Nevertheless, the Ecclesiastical Titles Bill, designed to make void the pope’s bull, wrecked the government which endeavored to pass it. It ultimately, after a most painful journey through the House of Commons, was passed by the Lords and received the royal assent. But it never was anything but a dead letter. It was never enforced. Protestants had enjoyed a barren and very nominal victory. The pope had gained his point and got a lot of free advertising. The Catholic prelates made a point of using their territorial titles in letters addressed to the ministers of state themselves. Many years afterwards, in 1871, the bill was quietly repealed. “It died in such obscurity that the outer public hardly knew whether it was above ground or below.”
Meantime the forward movement in the Church of England toward Rome grew in volume and strength.
Clergymen and congregations loved to have their churches adorned like those of the Catholics; they delighted in the sweet and noble music, the incense, the painted windows, the devotional effigies and symbols, the impressive and gorgeous ritual. . . . There was the High Church priest setting up his altar, swinging his censor, making his genuflexions, and even establishing his confessional. . . . The law, which was invoked, proved impotent to deal with the difficulty.11
In the United States also things have gone well for Rome. A spirit of persecution for religious views has been rising. Protestants have sought to enforce Sunday-keeping by civil statute. Keepers of another day—the seventh-day Sabbath—have been cast into prison, and put to work in chain-gangs. In this, Protestant America has been abandoning principles of religious freedom, which were the cornerstone of her structure, and advancing along the road to Rome.
Catholic schools among the Indians have received large gifts of money from the United States Government. Papal delegates have been harkened to in the White House. In the treaty with Spain the rights of Rome in church properties were guaranteed. As these rights in the Philippines had long formed a bone of contention between the natives and the Spanish Government, a substantial gain was made by the church on this count. That the Vatican recognizes this is made clear in an audience granted Archbishop Ireland by the pope. He said: “We are well pleased with the relations of the American Government to the church in Cuba and the Philippines. The American Government gives proof of good-will, and exhibits a spirit of justice and respect for the rights and liberties of the church. You will thank in my name the President of the republic for what he has done.” Of course the pope feels to thank the President of the United States for what he has done. The President, jointly with the pope, it is asserted, appointed Monsignor Chapelle “to restore the friars to their parishes and to the power from which they had been driven by the Catholics themselves. Charges of immorality and extortion against the friars were said to be one chief cause of the insurrection of 1896. . . . Apparently the root of the difficulty in the Philippines is a claim of the monastic orders to certain properties and revenues. The eighth article of the Treaty of Paris provides that the relinquishment of power by Spain “can not in any respect impair the property or rights which by law belong to the peaceful possession of property of all kinds of . . . ecclesiastical or civil bodies.”
Again, President Schurman, head of the Philippine Commission, sent out by the United States Government, has said that missionaries “are needed in the islands, and I hope they will be sent there in large numbers. . . . It would be highly impolitic to send missionaries of different denominations to confuse the minds of the people. I do hope that when we send the missionaries, we will decide beforehand on one form of Protestant Christianity. Send only one type of missionaries. . . . I do hope that before sending missionaries to the Philippines, the different denominations will unite on some common platform.”
All of this must be exceedingly gratifying to Rome. To have Protestants make a creed, and unite on one common platform, is her idea precisely, because such a course can only lead the Protestant sects back to the arms of Rome.
In closing I can only say that the fruit of the latter years of this century is distinctly favorable to the Roman Church; that the principles for which she fought, and before which she fell toward the close of the last century, are now being conceded to her by her former antagonists, who, in doing this, are practically marching to her fold again.
PERCY T. MAGAN.
