Welcome to a reading of Church of Christ, Volume 1, by James Bannerman. This Reformation MP3 audio resource is a production of Stillwater's Revival Books, many free Reformation resources, as well as our complete online catalogue containing classic and contemporary Puritan and Reformed books, the Puritan hard drive, digital downloads, MP3s, DVDs, and much more at great discounts are on the web at www.puretandownloads.com. Also please consider, pray and act upon the important truths found in the following quotation by Charles Spurgeon. As the apostle says to Timothy, so also he says to everyone, give yourself to reading. He who will not use the thoughts of other men's brains proves that he has no brains of his own. You need to read. Renounce, as much as you will, all light literature, but study as much as possible sound theological works, especially the puritanic writers, an exposition to the Bible. The best way for you to spend your leisure is to be either reading or praying. And now to SWRB's reading of James Bannerman's Church of Christ, Volume 1, which we hope you find to be a great blessing, and which we pray draws you nearer to the Lord Jesus Christ, for he is the way, the truth, and the life, and no man cometh unto the Father, but by him." John 14 verse 6. I'm reading from page 136. The argument to which we now propose now to address ourselves is that the ordinance of God for the temporal well-being of the community and the ordinance of God for the spiritual well-being of the community are from their essential character so related to each other that there must unavoidably be a connection either friendly or otherwise between them. That the civil element and the religious element are so interwoven in the very constitution of human society that they must necessarily tend either to establish or destroy each other and that unless the Church and the State are to be regarded as enemies, hostile to each other's existence, they must be united as friends, aiding and promoting each other's welfare. There can be no such thing as neutrality between the two. The Church, in its relation to the State, can be accounted in no other light than as an ally, leads with the State for its good, or as an aggressor, encroaching upon its rights, and dangerous to his supreme authority. The state in its relation to the church must be regarded either as the church's friend and protector or else as an adversary, secret or avowed. There can, from the very nature of the case, be no alternative. The two societies stand so intimately and vitally related to each other that the civil magistrate, if he does not ally himself to religion as a friend, will unavoidably be brought into conflict and collision with it as an enemy. He must account it the first and best of all the aids he has in securing the objects of his government, or if he views it otherwise, and treats it otherwise, he will be forced into the position of being a suppressor or its victim. In making these statements, I of course assume that the question of the connection of the church and state is not to be restricted to that of the endowment or non-endowment of a Christian society by a nation. The question is to be argued on the wider and more comprehensive footing of the duty of the state to recognize and acknowledge the true religion or not to recognize and acknowledge it, and viewed in its larger and juster sense. My argument, I repeat, is that from that from the very nature of the case there is a necessity laid upon the state to own and recognize the existence of religion in such a sense that, if it refused to do so, either the state itself or the church, or rather both at once, must fatally suffer. The civil element and the religious element are so bound together in the very constitution of human society that they may unite together within it as friends, but they cannot exist together within it as neutrals if within the borders of the same community they are not allied together in friendship to a certain extent they will be inevitably forced into the attitude of neutral antagonism the fundamental maxim of the voluntary theory that the state as a state has nothing to do with religion is a principle which, from the very necessity of the case, can never be realized. The state must have to do with religion, and then in a way, if not of friendly cooperation and consent, then of hostility and opposition. If it were possible for the state in any country to disown all connection of a friendly kind with a religion, natural and revealed, the inevitable tendency would be, either for the want of religion to destroy the state, or for the state to destroy religion. Let me endeavour, by pointing out certain matters with which both the civil and spiritual power are concerned, to demonstrate the necessity of a friendly and harmonious connection between religion and civil government. The necessity I mean in such a sense that the disowning of all such connection must inevitably lead to the injury or destruction of either the church or the state. 1. In the first place, let me refer to the case of an oath, which is the bond and seal of human society. An oath is more than a civil covenant or engagement. It is a religious one, superinduced upon the civil. It is the use of an oath, the parties who employ it call, in the aid of the solemnities and sacredness of religion, to give strength to the obligation of a promise. They ratify the promise by appeal to God to witness its terms and to judge the breach or fulfillment of it. The central truth of all religion, in which all professors of religion, whether natural or revealed, concur, the truth namely of the existence of a God, the omniscient witness and the almighty judge of men's conduct and words, is summoned to the aid of man when he would enter into any vital and important engagement with his fellow man. and an appeal to that great and mysterious being who is above is interposed and added as the seal and confirmation of the engagement. Now how stands a fundamental principle of the voluntary school in relation to the use of oaths in civil transactions? It is true, or can it be true in any sense, that the state has nothing to do with religion? and is debarred from making use of any manner of the truths and obligations of religion? Does the civil magistrate overstep the limits of his office and enter within as province forbidden to him when he calls to himself the aid of religion and makes an oath, sanctified and surrounded as it is by the solemnities of religion, to be the bond and guard of civil society? Or is it the very duty of the magistrate to disown all connection with any form or profession of faith, and to discharge from every transaction of civil life with which he stands officially connected, the use and obligation of religious oaths. The very attempt to do so would itself be an act of national suicide, a return from organized society to a state of nature, the establishment of misrule and anarchy by law. Deny or disown the religious obligation of an oath and you unloose the bond of civilized society and resolve it once more into its original elements the whole structure of human society in so far as it differs from the state of nature rests upon the foundation of an oath its every relation from the highest to the lowest is sealed with the seal of a religious vow in civilized life and in all its offices and transactions the last appeal that can be made is an appeal to God and short of the dissolution of human society, and resort once more to the law of brute force, an oath of confirmation is, with men, an end of all strife. The covenant between the monarch and the subject, because it can appeal to no higher law, appeals to an oath, and is ratified by the solemnity of religious vow, and the duty of the prince and the allegiance of the people are both confirmed by a reference to God. Those who administer and those who execute law are likely to charge the duties of their office under the obligation not merely of a civil but of a religious engagement. The judge and the magistrate equally sit in judgment under the responsibility of an appeal to God. The appeal to justice in matters of wrong done or injuries sustained between man and man is made ultimately to rest on the same solemn foundation. The evidence in witness-bearing is only evidence insofar as it is confirmed by an appeal to God as the witness and the judge, and the life and death of man, his property and his dearest civil rights are judged away or ratified to him in virtue of an oath. In short, the relation between the throne and the subject, the office of judge and magistrate, the award of law and justice, the right of life and property, the privilege of peace and order in human society, directly or indirectly rest upon the obligation of an oath, an appeal to God as sanctioning and sealing every other obligation. Confirmed and riveted by an oath, the relations of human society stand fast and sure. Without an oath, the bonds of life are unloosed and the fabric of national existence is unsettled to its foundations. And now then, shall we say that the civil magistrate has nothing to do with religion and that within the province of its doctrines and its institutions he is forbidden to enter? Or rather, shall we say, that for the state to disown all connection with religion is a thing impossible without once more returning to the state of savage nature and dissolving by law the compact of a civilized society? There can be no alternative in the matter. With a friendly alliance of religion, and more especially with the aid of an oath, as an appeal to God, binding together all its parts, the civil estate is strong. Without such alliance, and disowning the use and obligation of an oath, the civil estate is resolved into its original elements. The perilous experiment of a civil compact without the ratification of an oath has never yet been exhibited in the experience of the world. and on the evidence both of history and reason we are warranted to say that without an appeal to God in some shape or other the offices of civil society were impossible it would not do to allege against our argument that an oath is a matter not of revealed but of natural religion common to nature and not peculiar to Christianity this is true but the doctrines of natural religion as much as the truths of revealed religion are excluded from the office of the magistrate by the voluntary theory, and there are atheists in the world, as well as deists, who, on the voluntary hypothesis, are as much entitled to object against the recognition by the magistrates of the truth of natural religion as of the doctrines of revelation. Neither will it do to allege that an oath is a merely civil transaction, and that, as civil, the magistrate has a right to employ it. In so far it may be true that there stands connected with an oath a civil engagement as well as a religious but this is a solemn appeal to God as a present witness of the truth and the future avenger of falsehood or breach of engagement that forms the essence of an oath. And it is in this character that this is employed in the transactions of human society. It is the seal that God attached to the words of man a religious obligation superinduced upon the weakness or insufficiency of civil engagement. There is, in short, no possibility of evading the argument. The state may enter into friendly alliance with religion, and especially may call to its aid the solemnity of an oath, in order to give security and strength to the social fabric, and so save the commonwealth. Or the state may disown all connection with religion, and especially may dispense with the solemnity of an oath as a seal of civil engagements and so entail upon society the penalty of an insecure existence and speedy dissolution. But civil society and religion cannot exist together upon the principle of an absolute and total separation. The disavowal of all connection with religion by the civil magistrate and the carrying out of such a disavowal in practice would loosen the bonds of human society, and the penalty of religion denied and rejected by the state would be the distant destruction of the state that did so. Without the sanction of religion, natural or revealed, and more especially without the obligation of an oath to unite together the elements of civil life, the magistrate must abdicate his functions and declare his duties to be impossible. 2. In the second place, let us refer to the right inherent in the Church of Christ to propagate the Gospel and make disciples in every country and nation and the heaven. This right, claimed by the Church, and belonging to her in consequence of the duty enjoined by her head, is a right of such a nature that it cannot properly consist with a neutrality in the civil magistrate, or be recognized by any state constituted on the principle that it has nothing to do with religion. The full and free and unrestricted power to take possession of this world in the name of Christ to the exclusion of any other form of faith and worship is what Christianity demands. With less than this it cannot be satisfied. And yet it may well be doubted whether it be consistent with the principle and practice of absolute neutrality on the part of the state to concede this demand, or whether a toleration for the truth, founded on the theory of entire impartiality and indifference as regards truth and falsehood, is sufficient to protect the Church of Christ in its exclusive claims. The Gospel of Christ is not, like the systems of polytheism among which it was introduced at first, compatible with every other system of falsehood, it is exclusive in its character and pretensions and demands that it be received and owned and submitted to to the abandonment and rejection of every other faith Christ himself tells us that he came to send on the earth not peace, but a sword not ease, but a burning fire and like a sword his gospel divides us under the outward and formal union of human society and like a fire it kindles strife and division in the world. There is so much in the gospel fitted to awaken the hostility of the human heart, and standing in direct opposition to the principles and practices of the world, that it cannot but act as a firebrand wherever it enters. To introduce and propagate it, therefore, in any community tends not indirectly to excite the rage and outrage and violence of men, More than this, his first principle and first duty is that of aggression. The ministers of the gospel claim it as a right to go into every nation, however fenced around and guarded from intrusion, and to demand an entrance in the name of him who sent them, even although the magistrate should bid them depart from their coasts. Further still, the messengers of the cross arrogate to themselves the title to enter into every human dwelling where a sinner is to be found. seeking admittance in the name of the saviour of sinners, that they may negotiate with the inhabitant in behalf of their master, however sternly the door may be closed against them by jealousy of their errand, or hatred of their cause. It has been the eloquent boast of freedom in our country that every man's house is his castle, but a store-built shed, open to every breath of heaven, yet fenced about by the protection and sanction of law there even the king cannot and dare not enter but where the king cannot enter there the missionary of Christ claims to be admitted and with a higher warrant in his hand than that of human law bids the gates be lifted up that with the gospel he may enter in and can claims and pretensions so essentially exclusive and aggressive which belong from its very nature to Christianity be owned and conceded by a state constituted on the principle of entire and equal indifference to truth and falsehood. It is, in the nature of things, possible, in regard to such demands, to profess or carry out the theory of neutrality in civil legislation, granting a license free and full to Christianity, intolerant as it is of every other religion. Ask the Roman magistrates within whose jurisdiction the gospel was at first preached, or the magistrate of any country, not Christian, within whose rule Christianity is introduced at the present day. For the first 300 years of its existence, the religion of Christ was in almost perpetual collision with the state, just on the ground that it was essentially a missionary and an exclusive religion, that it would not and could not exist in peace alongside any other faith, that its temples must stand alone, and its deity find no place in the pantheon. Nor has the essential character of Christianity altered since the days of Nero and Diocletian. Upon the principle of complete indifference to truth and to falsehood, it were difficult to argue or assert that any government could or ought to protect, or give place by civil permission to, a religion framed upon principles so intolerant and proceeding in a manner so aggressive. with no other right to toleration than the right which falsehood equally has. It were a matter of question whether the preaching of the truth as it is in Jesus, and the full claims of an exclusive kind which it makes, ought to be granted by any state. At all events, weighing the question of right, we know that, in the history of the world, it has been found impossible to pinpoint a fact for any state not Christian to grant them. and that in the person of a magistrate not a friend to the gospel we have from the very necessity of the case to deal with an enemy and a persecutor whether that magistrate be a philosopher like Pliny or the father of his people like Marcus Antoninus judging from the nature of the gospel and of human society together or judging from the actual history of the facts we may lay it down as a position not to be controverted that when the civil magistrates does not own the truth and recognize it as a friend then he will view it and treat it as an enemy this faith cannot be neutral if it is not professedly Christian it will directly or indirectly be the persecutor of Christianity it is not enough to allege and reply that Christianity may claim and rightfully claim the same measure of protection as every other form of faith or belief, and that in the toleration granted equally to truth and to falsehood by the civil magistrate, who upon the voluntary theory is equally indifferent to both, the gospel is secure. It may be fairly questioned whether this measure of protection or toleration would cover and include all that Christianity, as the truth of God, has a right to demand even when it fully and equally carried out. At least this much is certain that our Lord never claimed toleration for his kingdom and truth upon the footing that it had an equal right, and no more than equal with falsehood, to be owned and protected by Caesar. Nay, our Lord never claimed toleration for his gospel upon any other ground than that it was the truth, and not falsehood, and had a right, which falsehood had not, to be not only tolerated, but also owned and recognized and submitted to by Caesar. But apart from this argument altogether, history teaches a lesson, but too plainly, from the record of the past, that where a civil magistrate does not recognize the gospel, there he never can even protect the profession and demands of the gospel. The theory of full toleration on the principle of absolute and even handed indifference on the part of the state alike to truth and falsehood is a mere theory and nothing more. It is impossible to carry it out fully and fairly into practice. The magistrate himself has a human heart within him, which if he does not own and love the truth of God, will assuredly deny it and hate it. And if not decidedly the friend, he will be decidedly the enemy of the gospel. 3. In the third place, I would refer to the law of marriage as another of those cases which illustrate the general position that the civil and religious elements are so connected together in human society that where they do not meet and unite in friendship and mutual cooperation they must inevitably tend to the serious or fatal injury of one or the other. Marriage is one of those institutions which, although not of grace but of nature, is yet adopted into the system of Christianity and regulated by the rules which Christianity has laid down. The law of marriage has its origin in nature, and not in revelation, and yet the duties and rights connected with it, together with their exact nature and limits, are matters with which revelation deals. Insofar as these involve moral or religious duties, we are to seek in the Bible for the code of law by which they are prescribed and determined. But marriage is, in another sense, a civil matter. coming under the province of the ordinary magistrate, and necessarily requiring to be dealt with in the way of civil enactment. There are civil rights intimately connected with it, in such a manner that the state cannot avoid the duty of legislating in regard to it, and regulating them by positive statutes and rules. In short, the institution of marriage is to be viewed in two lights, either as a moral observant falling to be regulated by the law of scripture, or as a civil observance, falling to be regulated by the law of the state. And with this twofold character which it sustains, and this twofold illustration to which in every civilized and constituted society professing Christianity it is subjected, how, it may be asked, is a collision between the spiritual and the civil enactments on the subject fraught, as it inevitably would be, with deadly consequences for peace, if not the existence of human society, to be avoided or prevented. If the state recognized the Bible as a word of God, and the law of the Bible as the law of God, then it will take that law as a guiding principle for its own legislation, and make the enactments of the magistrate in regard to marriage, co-incident with the enactments of Scripture. But if the state do not recognize the Bible as the Word of God, there can be no security that its regulations shall not come into conflict with the regulations of Scripture as regards the institution of marriage, in such a manner as to put in peril not only the peace and purity of domestic life, but also through these the highest and holiest interests of human society. The ordinance of the family lies at the very foundation of civil society. It is the unit of combination around which the wider and more public relations of civil life associate themselves, destroy or unhinge the domestic ordinances, and loose or unsettle the family bond, and no tie will be left wholly enough or strong enough to bind up the broken and disjointed elements of human life. And yet, unless there be on the part of the state a distinct acknowledgement of the Word of God, as a law to which its own laws must be conformed. There can be no security against the danger of the enactments of civil society on this vital point running counter to the appointment of God. The degrees of relationship or consanguinity within which marriage is valid or invalid, the terms on which it is to be contracted or dissolved, the rights which it confers on children, and the claims of succession All these are questions at all to be determined both by the law of scripture and the laws of the state, and any difference or conflict in regard to which must tend to unsettle the very foundation of human society. From the very nature and necessity of the case, if the state is not here at one with religion, it must be a difference deeply, if not fundamentally injurious to the one or the other. In the fourth place, I would refer to the case of the Sabbath. As another instance, illustrated of the general principle, that when religion and the civil government do not meet and act in harmony, the difference must be to the fatal injury of the one or other. Here too, the civil and spiritual element in society are so nearly and closely related that unless they unite, they cannot coexist with full and emphatic action on either side. In the case of the weekly rest of the Sabbath, as God imposes on every man the obligation to observe and sanctify it, so by that very obligation he confers on every man the right to demand at the hands of his fellow men the free and undisturbed use and enjoyment of the day, as a day to be exempted from the claims of human society, because already claimed by God, This is the warrant which every Christian has to ask that he shall have power and liberty given to him to use the day for the service of God. A power and liberty which, if they are not to be at the mercy of other men, must be guarded by the recognition and protection of law. The Sabbath in this respect differs from other duties appointed to the Christian. These are for the most part private and particular to the individual. and peculiar to the individual, the Sabbath is a social and public ordinance. The former may be observed by individuals as such, without regard to the observance of them by their fellow men. The Sabbath cannot be generally or completely observed without the concurrence and consent of others. It is well-known possible, therefore, for an individual to keep the Sabbath as it ought to be kept, without the aid and advantage of the state making at least outward observance of the Sabbath rest a national thing. No doubt it is possible, in one sense of the term, for every man not actually under physical restraint to cease from labour on the Sabbath while others persist in it, and sanctify the day while others devote it to their ordinary occupations or pleasures. But a keeping on the Sabbath like this involves such sacrifices to be made, and such obstacles to be overcome, and it would virtually and practically amount to a prohibition of keeping it at all. The Christian slave in the early age of the Gospel could not, generally speaking, have kept the Sabbath at all, unless in those rare cases where he was, like Onesimus with Philemon, not so much a slave as a brother beloved in the Gospel. And the Christian who in modern days is hardly less a slave, for the sake of his subsistence, through unremitting and constant toil from day to day, with an unprotected Sabbath, and the unprincipled competition of others willing to devote the Sabbath to labour and to gain, would feel themselves scarcely in better circumstances for observing its rest and its duties than the Greek or the Roman bondsmen in the days of Paul. Without the protection of law, enforcing the rest of one day in seven, the Sabbath in an irreligious society could hardly be kept even by Christians. Yet it is only because the civil government to that extent recognizes the law of scripture and throws around the Sabbath the fence of its authority that we have a day of weekly rest and sacredness secure to us at all. In itself it is no civil right but a religious one. The warrant for the weekly Sabbath is no human authority or human convenience but the express command of God. The state may recognize its authority and acting in concert with religion, may sanction the Sabbath by law, and in doing so be at one with religion, but instead acting on the principle of indifference and like to choose an error. To the religion of God and the falsehoods of man, man must necessarily disown any such appointment, and divorce from Christianity, or disapproving it, must afford another illustration of the general position that when religion and civil government do not cooperate and unite the separation must be fatal to the highest interest of the one or the other. What now is the conclusion of the whole argument? We reason at present with those who acknowledge the authority of God's word who confess that religion on the one hand and civil government on the other are alike and equally His ordinance and that as such they cannot rightfully be hostile or destructive of one another and the argument is that neutrality between the two is impossible declared and proved to be impossible both by reason and experience there is but a single alternative presented to us in the matter of the relation of the church and the state they cannot be neutral but they may be separated and by the separation they inevitably become hostile if not destructive to each other or they may be united and by the union they become the allies and friends of each other and with this as the only possible alternative the conclusion seems to be inevitable that since they are both ordinance of God and as such are not intended to injure or destroy each other they must have been designed to cooperate and unite. Section 5 the spiritual independence of the church, and the principles of toleration. We have now briefly gone over the main grounds, both in reason and scripture, on which the lawfulness, the duty, and the necessity of some friendly understanding and concert between the church and the state may be satisfactorily maintained. The principles laid down on this subject have been objected against from various quarters and for different reasons. But perhaps the chief objections that have been brought against the doctrine of the lawfulness and duty of civil establishments of religion may be as a result into these too. Namely that any connection between the church and the state is inconsistent with the spiritual independence of the church or inconsistent with the principles of toleration. It may be of some importance to consider the subject of the relation of the church to the state in reference more particularly to these two objections. It is true, on the one hand, that a connection between religion and civil government unavoidably leads to the sacrifice of the spiritual independence and power that belong to the Church of Christ as its free kingdom. Or is it true, on the other hand, that such a connection is inconsistent with the liberty of thought and belief, an action that properly appertained to every man as a member of the state? In other words, can the balance between the claims of the spiritual and civil society be, in any case, so equally adjusted and maintained as to avoid the sacrifice either of the freedom that belongs to the church or of the liberty that belongs to the state? The answer to that question will lead us to consider, in the first place, the bearing of civil establishments and religion on the spiritual independence of the church, and in the second place, their bearing on the principles of a toleration. 1. Are civil establishments of religion necessarily inconsistent with the spiritual independence of the church or state? That, in point of fact, the civil magistrate has often invaded the prerogatives of Christ and encroached upon the liberties of his church cannot be denied. The mere politician whose only aim has been the temporal aggrandisement of his office, has often succeeded in making the church the tool of his ambition, and in using it as the engine to promote his political ends. And the mere churchman, on the other hand, whose main desire has been civil honour or influence, has often consented to part away the spiritual character and freedom of the church in return for state endowment and support. But there is nothing in the nature of a friendly alliance between the church and state incompatible with the independence of either, any more than there is anything in a friendly alliance between two states incompatible with the independence of each other. There is nothing inconsistent with the spiritual freedom and independence of the church in its connection with the state. The state may indeed demand the sacrifice to a greater or less extent on the spiritual powers and liberty of the church at the price of its countenance and protection and in doing this the state trespasses into a province not lawfully or scripturally belonging to it but on the other hand the state may make no such demand but leaving the Christian church with its powers of a spiritual kind untouched and its freedom unfettered may add to these the benefit of civil recognition and endowment And in doing so, both the church and the state would be acting within their respective provinces and acting the right. Whatever historically may be the fact as to the frequent encroachment upon the civil power on the spiritual independence of the church when they have been connected, there is nothing in the connection itself that necessarily leads to it. And it's quite possible for a church to enter into alliance with the state without sacrificing one article in its confession of faith, or one jot or tittle of its spiritual prerogatives. The embedded action of a Christian church, in all its matters of doctrine and worship and discipline, is perfectly consistent with its recognition by the state, where the state recognizes not only the church itself, but also the freedom of the church in spiritual things. But the objection urged by the disciples of the voluntary principle is occasionally put in a somewhat different form. It is objected not that an alliance between church and state necessarily implies the surrender by the church of her spiritual powers and freedom in return for protection and empowerment, but that in setting up a church at all, the civil magistrate makes a church the mere creature of the state, dependent on his existence and broadest powers on his enactments. It is objected that in sanctioning a confession of faith or establishing a church by law, the civil magistrate is making both the faith and the church the mere product of civil law. Now such an objection obviously compounds together two authorities, the one of which is supreme and the other which is subordinate in the matter. When the subordinate authority lends its sanction to the appointments of the supreme, so far from superseding or denying the supreme authority, it expressly owns and does homage to it. It is for God to lay down the doctrines to be believed, the form of government to be adopted, the discipline to be maintained by the Christian Church. And when the state, in addition to this divine appointment, lends to them the sanction of civil appointment also, It is because of their previous divine authority and acknowledgement of it that the State does so. The recognition of the Church by the civil magistrate is not the creation of the Church by the civil magistrate. On the contrary, this recognition of it proceeds from the acknowledgement that it existed by divine authority and institution before. The sanction lent by the State to the doctrine which the Church holds and professes is not the same thing as a state dictating the doctrine which a church must hold and profess. On the contrary, it proceeds upon the principle that the doctrine has been previously appointed and dictated by God and is an express homage to it as such. In such a case, the appointment by God and the recognition of that appointment by man are two things not inconsistent with each other, but perfectly compatible. The recognition by the state is itself an explicit confession of the strongest kind that the church has been previously instituted and appointed by God, and that in consequence of the divine origin it is independent of the state. If then a friendly connection between the church and state is not incompatible with the spiritual freedom and independence of the former, There can be no reason on this account for repudiating such a connection. But more than this, the question may well arise whether the spiritual independence of the Church of Christ is not better secured upon the theory of an alliance between the Church and State than upon the voluntary principle. It may, I think, be safely argued that the State which recognizes the Church as an ordinance of God and enters into connection with it as such, is less likely to invade its freedom or independence than a state which, acting on the voluntary principle, refuses to recognise the Church's divine appointment, and regards it with a favour neither more nor less than what it shows to any other system of religious error or delusion. I do not speak, of course, at present, of any such connection between the Church and state, as involves the sacrifice to the smallest extent of our principles or independence in the very terms of it. I speak of an alliance that is gestured and formed upon principles that acknowledge the respective authority and essential independence of church and state. And the question comes to be whether the spiritual independence of the church is not better provided for and secured at the hands of a state which owns its authority and claims to be from God, and therefore enters into friendly alliance with it, then it would be at the hands of a state which knows no difference between what is human and what is divine in the matter, and therefore repudiates all such alliance. There is nothing in the mere fact of separation between the church and state that can secure the spiritual independence of the former against the invasion of the latter. The state whether allied to the church or disowning such alliance, must deal with religion and with the institutions of religion in so far as these bear on the interests of the commonwealth. The civil magistrate is thus unavoidably forced into a position in which, in the use or abuse of his authority, he may be oftentimes tempted to interfere with the spiritual freedom and rights of the church. History tells us that the separation of the church from the state is no barrier whatsoever against such encroachments and on the contrary that there have never been a wanting reasons of state policy or motives of political expediency for causing the civil magistrate to look with jealousy on the Church of Christ and to impose upon its freedom the restraints of the severities of law and on which of the two principles that of the civil establishment of the true religion or that of the indifference of the state to all regions, will the spiritual rights and independence of the Church of Christ be most likely to be practically acknowledged and secured? Will it be when the state holds the Church to be of God, and confesses its spiritual powers and prerogatives to be from Him, Or would it be when the state knows not whether the church be from God or from man, and is equally indifferent to whether its claims are of divine or human origin? The very acknowledgement by the state that the church is the institute of God must itself prove, in so far as the acknowledgement is sincere, a security against the unjust invasion of its prerogatives, and the confession implied in a civil recognition of it, that is more than a mere human or voluntary society, will protect it to the extent that that confession is practically carried out against wanton encroachment upon its independence. On the contrary, the denial by the state of the peculiar character of the Church as a divine authority or the entire indifference to its claims, though it were, the practical disavowal by the civil magistrate of all regard to the Church of Christ any more or further than to any other society, voluntary and human, to be found within the Commonwealth, must leave it exposed to be invaded and trampled upon in its dearest rights at the dictate of state policy or the temptation of political expediency. Let the civil magistrate be brought to acknowledge that the Church is the very Church of God, and this acknowledgement if honestly made and fairly acted on, will set bounds around its spiritual freedom, which he will feel it to be unlawful to break through. Let the civil magistrate, on the contrary, be brought to confess no difference between the Church of God and any human and voluntary society instituted for secular purposes, and all restraint will be taken away, whereby he might have been prevented from dealing with the Church of Christ as any other society and making its independence subordinate to reasons of state. So far it is from being true that the spiritual independence of the church is sacrificed from the necessity of the case into a state of alliance and its freedom secured by separation from the state that the very reverse is nearer to the truth. In so far as the church as a divine ordinance is owned and recognized by the civil magistrate, to that extent he has a reason, and a strong one, for respecting his spiritual independence. In so far as the church is regarded by the civil magistrate as merely on a level with any voluntary society, and to be tolerated and protected as far as, and no further than any such society, to that extent he is deprived of the strongest motive for respecting his rights. is tempted on every national emergency or party crisis that may occur to sacrifice those rights to considerations of state policy or interest. 2. Are civil establishments of religion necessarily inconsistent with the principles of toleration? The doctrine involved in such establishments according to the opinion of the disciples of the voluntary system implies or unavoidably leads to persecution for conscience sake if magistrates as such have a power to interfere about religion then it is objective they must have a right incompatible with the duty and privilege of a private judgment a right to impose a certain form of faith and worship by law on their subjects and to enforce under the sanction of civil pains and penalties. Now it is not true that there is anything of this kind involved in the principle that the state may justly recognize and establish and endow by law a particular profession of religion. There is a distinction, and a most important one, between the power of the civil magistrate, circa sacra, and his power in sacris. And this distinction is greatly overlooked by those who urge the objection that the principle of the connection between church and state necessarily involves what is inconsistent with toleration. It is readily granted that the power of the civil magistrate is in its proper character compulsory. It is further granted that this power is employed in connection with the civil establishment and endowment of religion by the state. But a compulsory power exercised about religion is a widely different thing from a compulsory power exercised in religion. One of these is incompatible with the principles of toleration. The other of these is not. To compel a man to believe or to profess his belief in a certain form of religion and to comply with a certain fashion of worship under the threatening of infliction of civil penalties if he refused, this is the exercise of a compulsory power in religion, and is inconsistent with the principles of toleration. But to compel a man to contribute of his property to the public treasury of the state, and to apply a portion of the tax, not upon his responsibility, but upon the responsibility of the state through the endowment of the church, This is the exercise of a compulsory power, not in religion, but about religion, and is no wise inconsistent with the principle of toleration. To oblige a man under civil pains to conform to the church by law established, or to punish him for dissenting from it, is without dispute a violation of the right that belongs to all to worship God according to their conscience. But to oblige a man under civil penalties to contribute his share of a general tax, part of which is appropriated by the state to the use of religion, is no violation of the rights of conscience, unless it can be held to be so for the state, in any given case, to tax an individual for an object of which his conscience does not approve. It is of no avail to plead that religion is a matter peculiar and separate from any other. and that for the state to make a man pay for the endowment of a religion of which he disapproves is worse than the tax to him for any other object of which he disapproves. It cannot be affirmed that the domain of conscience is limited to religion alone or in fact that conscience has less to do with other matters and it cannot be alleged therefore that conscience is violated in the case of a compulsory tax for the endowment of a religion which it cannot approve, and not violated in the case of a tax for any other purpose of which it cannot approve. The compulsory or coercive powers of the state may, in short, be employed in a variety of ways about religion. While it is not employed in religion, the state may give the sanction of civil authority to a particular confession of faith, while it inflicts no disabilities on those who reject that faith. the state may endow a particular church and impose a public tax for that purpose, while it imposes no penalty on those who dissent from the church thus endowed. In doing this it is arrogating to itself no power but what is complement to it in its place as a supreme civil authority, and above all it is arrogating no power in any respect inconsistent with the right of private judgment or the principles of toleration. While it is thus plain and undeniable that the doctrine of civil establishments of religion does not involve anything inconsistent with the principles of toleration or the right and duty of private judgment, the argument may be pushed a great deal further. It may fairly be argued that the voluntary principle consistently carried out subverts the very foundation on which alone the principles of toleration and the right of private judgment can be made properly and securely to rest, and that the opposite principle, which maintains the duty of the state to recognize religion, is the only one on which they can be fully and consistently defended. On what footing, let me ask, does the right and duty of private judgment rest? What is it that gives me the title which no man can often take from me, to think, and judge, and act, and above all to serve and worship God, as my own conscience, and not the conscience of another, shall dictate? What is it that confers on me the right to examine, and try, and prove all things for myself, with that being responsible to man, with opinion I may form, or the belief I may adopt? The reason why I am not responsible to man for my opinions and beliefs is because I am previously responsible to God. The cause why I am not accountable to my fellow in my search after truth and in the detriments of that form is just because I am before accountable to my Creator. This is the only sure foundation on which to rest the right of private judgment in a matter of faith and duty. so as that it shall be secure from the interference or tyranny of man. In such matters I cannot be the servant of man, because I am already the servant of God. My responsibility to God is too complete and sacred to admit of my being responsible in the same way to my fellow creature. For what I believe, for the opinions I have formed, for the conclusions to which I have come in my search and inquiry after truth, for all these I am accountable to God and for that very reason I cannot be called upon to adopt a belief or assume a conviction at the bidding of man in these matters I am the servant of another master and accountable only to him God claims the soul and supreme dominion over the conscience and therefore it is that conscience cannot be made the servant of man my right of private judgment in matters of belief rests upon the footing that there I am responsible to God, and that therefore with a responsibility due to Him, man cannot dare to interfere. The principle of universal toleration is founded on the principle of universal responsibility of men to their Maker. Resting upon this footing, toleration is the right of every man, too holy and divine for man to intermingle with, and to attempt to rob him of which is to interfere with the prerogative of God. Resting upon any other footing, toleration is a right, but of a secondary and insecure kind, to deprive a man of which is merely a bridge to his social or political privileges. And how does the voluntary theory stand in regard to the only foundation on which the principle of toleration can securely and truly rest. According to that theory, the state has nothing to do with God, or man's relation to God, in the way of duty or privilege. The magistrate, in his official character, can know nothing of my responsibility to God, nor stand in awe of the right which that responsibility secures to me. The right that, because accountable to him, I cannot, in the same way, be accountable to man. The state, as the state, has nothing to do with my relation to God, and cannot therefore regard, in the only true and proper light, my freedom from responsibility to man as the necessary result of my previous responsibility to God. The magistrate who, proceeding on the voluntary theory, disowns all reference to God and man's relation to God, may look on toleration as a social good or political advantage. But he cannot look upon it in its highest and truest aspect as a right due, not so much to man as to God, that the state be brought to regard man in his relation to God, and as in matters of conscience responsible to him, and it will regard the principle of toleration and the right to private judgment in the case of the humblest of its subjects, as a privilege fenced around with the authority and sacredness of God. Let the state disown such a view of it, and the principle of toleration will be deprived of very much both of its security and of its significance. Any defense of the right of private judgment in matters of conscience, short of the argument that it is a right resulting directly from man's responsibility to God, will, I am persuaded, be a weak and insecure one. The right to toleration in the case of every man results very immediately from the principle which is true in questions of conscience as in others, that a man cannot serve two masters in the same matter, and that if he is already the servant of God in matters of religious belief, he cannot, in the same sense, be the servant of his fellow. The principles of universal toleration have indeed been argued upon other grounds, but the effect has been to betray the cause and freedom and of truth. By one class of the defenders of the principle of free opinion and full toleration, it has been argued that the magistrate has no power to judge the truth or falsehood in religion, and that therefore he has no right to interfere with the opinions or convictions of his subjects. Such an argument is entirely fallacious. proceeding as it does upon the principle that the magistrate, because a magistrate, has ceased to be a man and is himself absolved from his responsibility to God in matters of faith and religion. By a second class of the unwise defenders of the principles of toleration it has been argued that truth and falsehood in matters of opinion are equally innocent when sincerely and conscientiously held and that no man therefore ought to be punished for his opinions, whatever they may be. Such an argument as this is no less unsound and mischievous than the former, founded as it is on the principle of the equal merit or demerit of truth and falsehood. By a third class of the advocates of toleration, it is argued that man is not responsible for his belief at all, and that therefore he cannot be a subject for praise or blame for any of his opinions. Such an argument as this is still more flagrantly opposed to truth than any of the others, denying, as it virtually does, the essential characteristic of man as a moral and accountable being. By another class, still of the advocates of toleration, it is argued that the magistrate has nothing to do with opinions in any sense. and that it is both incompetent and impossible for him to deal with them, since they lie beyond the proper province of his authority altogether. And to a certain extent this argument is true, although not true in the wide and unlimited sense in which it is often times urged. But all these defences of the right of private judgment and public toleration, whether partially true or wholly false, Agree in placing it on the footing directly calculated to lower its character and weaken its claims. As a social good, calculated to promote the welfare of society, toleration is a privilege of no ordinary value. As a political good, one of the blessings of civil freedom, it is greatly to be prized. But there is a higher and holier aspect in which it is to be viewed. It is not as a social boon or even as a political right, that it is principally to be regarded, nor is it on such a footing that its best defence is to be found. There is a higher character that it bears, and a more secure foundation on which it rests. The right of private judgment has a right with which the magistrate, in his public capacity, and my fellow man in his private capacity, cannot and dare not intermeddle, is a privilege that belongs to me in virtue of my responsibility to God. I must have freedom to obey Him, and a man, whether in his official character as a magistrate, or his private character as my fellow-creature, cannot take from me that freedom. Within the domain of conscience, God claims the sole and supreme authority, and with that claim man may not interfere. The principle of toleration ultimately rests on my right in matters of conscience to obey God rather than man. What then is the conclusion of the whole argument? Is the principle involved in a recognition by the state of God and man's responsibility to God, hostile to the principles of toleration and incompatible with the right of private judgment, The very reverse is the case. The right of toleration can never be placed on a secure foundation, such as that it shall appear a right too solemn and sacred to be intermeddled with by my fellow creature, until the state is brought to see that it is a right of God and not of man, a right flowing directly from the relation in which a man stands to his maker. It is the principle involved in the voluntary theory that the state has nothing to do with God, a man's duty to God, the only principle consistent with the rights of conscience and the claims of toleration. The very reverse is the case. By divorcing the principle of toleration from its direct relation to God, it robs it of half its authority, and more half of its sacredness, and degrades it from the level of a divine appointment to that of a mere political privilege, a civil claim to be owned or rejected according to considerations or notions of political expediency, and not a right as from God, never in any circumstances or any cretence to be denied or resisted. The principle involved in the voluntary theory is hostile equally to the true independence of the Church and the true claims of toleration. Let that principle be carried out to its legitimate issue, and let the state disown the Church as an ordinance of God, and regard it as merely human and a voluntary society, and almost the only security for its spiritual independence is removed, and its freedom, whether Christ made it free, is laid open to the encroachment and tyranny of Caesar. Once more, let that principle be carried out to its legitimate issue, and let the state divorce the claim of toleration from the sanction and authority given to it by God, and the very foundations of religious freedom are undermined and shaken, and the right of private judgment loses a great part of its security, because it loses all its sacredness." This recording ends on page 159. The Puritan Hard Drive and the free online Puritan Hard Drive videos are available at PuritanDownloads.com along with many other Puritan and Reformed books for as little as 99 cents each. Hello and welcome to this introductory video for the Puritan Hard Drive by Stillwater's Revival Books. You'll soon see why the Puritan Hard Drive is a technological revolution in Puritan, Reformation, and Covenanter studies. For over 25 years, Stillwater's Revival Books has provided the worldwide Christian community with the finest in Puritan and Reformation resources, including classic and contemporary printed works, inspirational sermons, audio books, and videos. In recent years, our collection of great Christian works has more than doubled, growing to a library that would occupy nearly 130 CDs. The Puritan hard drive is a tremendous library of over 12,500 Christian resources on an external hard drive that fits easily in your pocket or purse. It features the works of more than 800 classic and contemporary authors including John Bunyan, Matthew Henry, Jonathan Edwards, Thomas Manton, Samuel Rutherford, and Charles Spurgeon. timeless works like the English Hexapla, Fox's Book of Martyrs, Sketches of the Covenanters, and from the Puritan Divines, the complete 34 volume set of the Puritan Fast Sermons. Many of these books are rare and classic titles unavailable anywhere else. Over 25 years in the making, the Puritan hard drive is simply the most extensive Christian collection ever released. The Puritan hard drive comprises more than 12,500 Puritan and Reformation resources, over half a million pages of great Christian books, more than 10,000 sermons and audio books in mp3 format, providing years of listening enjoyment, over 70 videos, All in all, a library of thousands of exceptional works, accessible and affordable to everyone. Included on the Puritan hard drive is a custom search engine that makes it easy to find, browse, and organize the resources in your library. And much easier than trying to wade through a typical file directory on your computer. Connect the Puritan hard drive to any available USB port on your PC or Mac. The drive is self-contained, so there's no software to install or configure. Within moments, you can begin exploring the library by running the custom search interface. It's also a knowledge base with information about each work, including the author, title, description, keywords, and subject category. For you techies, this database contains over four and a half million records of information. For all of us, that means we have an extremely powerful search and study tool. A list of all resources on the Puritan hard drive is available for viewing at any time. Here we see that the list of print materials contains over 2,100 works. This view is ideal for browsing all documents or media files in alphabetical order. by title or by author. The list is rather long, so using the search function of the Knowledge Base is the easiest way of finding resources of interest to you. For example, let's say that my pastor recommended a book by James Henley Thornwell. I can search the Knowledge Base by author by typing his name in this field or by selecting it from the complete list of nearly 800 authors provided at the click of a button. Clicking the search button executes the search and immediately returns a list of all resources by this author. In this case, I've quickly found the book that was recommended to me. Clicking on the green icon opens the resource, allowing me to begin my reading. Further details about any resource can be found by clicking on the book cover icon, which opens the resource detail page. From here, I can browse the details of this work, I can add and save my own notes about it and open the resource for reading, listening, or viewing. Your search capabilities don't end there. The majority of the rare, classic works on the Puritan hard drive now contain an embedded index. This means that the actual text of these resources is now fully searchable for the first time in history. Enter a search term in Adobe Acrobat Reader. In this case, a search for the word scripture yields instant results. Having searchable text also makes it possible to highlight, copy, and paste the text into another document, such as a sermon, a lesson plan, or a school paper. Less time spent on research means more time for reading, studying, and appreciating the resources in your library. Just another reason why the Puritan hard drive is a technological revolution in Puritan, Reformation, and Covenanter studies. Thank you for watching this introduction to the Puritan hard drive by Stillwaters Revival Books, serving Christians worldwide for over 25 years. Join us in our other videos as we demonstrate even more features and functionality of the Puritan hard drive. For more information, visit us on the web at puritandownloads.com. Until then, be well and God bless.