State must, of course, follow its own conscience, just as it does when it hangs a murderer; and the individual who, on the score of his private conscience, gets in the way of the State conscience, must get out of the way or be crushed by it. He has no right to arrest or control the action of the State conscience with his private judgment, since the former is only exercising its legitimate powers and discharging its duty. It is a mere farce to talk about the rights of an individual and unofficial conscience against the operations of a government that is acting within the scope of its appropriate powers. There can be no such rights in consistency with the existence of government. Where a government has jurisdiction it must judge of its own duties. Grant that religion comes within this jurisdiction, and that is the end of the question. The procedures in asserting and exercising it follow as a matter of course.

Our great difficulty with the doctrine of those who demand that the State shall become a religious propagandist in its school system is with the principle that lies at its bottom, and not at all with the details of its execution, however stringent or seemingly severe, provided they are necessary to the end. Their doctrine logically commits them to the principle of State jurisdiction and State duties in respect to things spiritual; and if they refuse to accept the consequences, no matter whether they are Protestants or Catholics, then they are afraid

of their own creed. If, on the other hand, they carry out the principle and make it a living and operative power, and not a mere sham for the sake of appearances, then, alas! for the real rights of conscience and the liberties of men, they land us, body and soul, into the system of State religion— namely, religion defined by the State, taught by the State, supported as a charge upon its treasury, and if necessary, penally enforced by the State. This is all very well for them, since they always assume their religion and that of the State to be identical. How would it be if the fact were just the reverse? This question bigotry, whether in a Catholic or a Protestant bosom, seldom has time to consider. When Protestant and Puritan New England hung witches and persecuted Quakers, and when Roger Williams was banished from his home on pain of death, things moved along very finely for the religionists in power; but not as smoothly with the victims of their mistaken and maddened zeal. The principle upon which these religionists acted, being conceded and developed, with no limitations except those furnished by itself, sets the State to doing a thing which does not belong to it and which, if it be true to its own position, will be sure to make it a persecuting power.

Macaulay well says that "the many ages proves that men may be

to the death and to persecute without

experience of

ready to fight

pity for a re

ligion whose creed they do not understand, and

whose precepts they habitually disobey." Many a dark chapter in history confirms the truth of this remark. The moment religion is in any way armed with the civil power the fatal step is taken.

We deny the rightfulness of the power in this connection by entering a universal demurrer to its action. We deny that the State has the right to tax the Jew to propagate Christianity, or to make Infidels help to liquidate the expense account of a religion which they repudiate. We place this denial on the broad ground that religion in itself, in its very nature, in the processes of its culture and promotion, in its relations to God and the interests of another life, lies above and beyond the jurisdiction. of the State, unless God himself has constituted that State. The State is not an exhorter or a persuader or a debating club, but a positive law power for secular purposes; and, hence, when it attempts to administer religion it must of necessity give to it the law force, deciding what religion is true and by what methods it shall be promoted. There is no escape from this result if we admit the principle from which it springs; and, the principle being true, then the result. is right. If religious teaching is really one of the proper functions of the State, then all that is necessary to the end, of which the State itself must be the judge, is included therein. Moreover, the implications of the function need only to be fully drawn out to cover the whole ground of State religion, with all its ways and means.

To the authority of the State when acting within its appropriate sphere every citizen should cheerfully bow, supporting it, if necessary, by the sword. If it be a democratic State, the will of the majority, legally expressed, should be the rule for the whole. But when the State engages in the work of religious teaching, whether in the public school or elsewhere, and does the things which must be done to realize the end, then it not only disowns the elementary principles of a democratic government, but is guilty of a legal usurpation, against which every lover of liberty, be he saint or sinner, Protestant or Catholic, ought to protest in thunder-notes. Not a few Protestants in dealing with the School question, and es⚫pecially in their zeal to resist the demands of the Catholics, have reasoned as if our American State Governments were Protestant State Governments; as if Protestantism were a part of their public law; and, hence, as if Protestants had some rights which are not common to all the people. We entirely sympathize with them in their opposition to the Catholic demand; but we utterly dissent from the political heresies with which they seek to sustain it. We believe them to be radically wrong in asking the State to assign any religious work to the public school system. If it does not make a sham of the work by the manner of its performance, it will be sure to do injustice to somebody.

VII.

THE BIBLE IN THE PUBLIC SCHOOLS.

The question of the Bible in the public schools, in order to be properly understood and discussed, needs explanation. What are these schools? They are not at all private institutions; but wholly the creatures of State authority, and, as such, supported by general taxation. The property, including

school-houses and their sites and the fixtures and appurtenances thereof, is public property. Schoolboards and trustees and teachers are officers, provided for by law and subject to its regulations. The whole machinery, from beginning to end, is exclusively a system of State machinery for educational purposes; not the less so because local divisions of the State-as cities, villages, and school-districtsdirectly work it. These divisions are only parts of the State, acting by its authority and under its supervisory control. What they do the State does through them.

The term Bible, as used in connection with these schools, does not mean the Sacred Scriptures of the Old and New Testament in the form of Hebrew and Greek, since these languages are unintelligible to the great mass of the people. The Bible, or the book involved in this discussion, is