abstract: It is not requisite that a numerical majority should have and profess this true religion; but that the brain, the heart or the governing portion of the nation should be actuated by it.

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by R. Z. Wilson

Editor's Note: This article originally appeared in the Vol. 1, No. 22, July 15, 1868 issue of The Christian Statesman.

The mere reading of these words "National Religion," at once suggests to many a church establishment--the connection of the State with the Church as it is found in Spain or in Great Britain. And this is not the idea merely of those who have never thought of the matter, or whose notions regarding it have their origin merely in prejudice. The Premier of England in the great debate on the Irish church question said "But how can you connect Government with religion except through an established church." In deprecating the severance of the Union of Church and State as now existing in Ireland, the same able defender of the Irish church, as it is styled, said "You will then have Government in Ireland not connected with one religious principle." Indeed, the notion, that we mean a union of Church and State when we urge the essential necessity that the State should have a religion, is widely prevalent, and prejudices many against the reform which we advocate. It is important that we should have definite and clear ideas of the nature of National Religion and how it should and will be manifested. I speak not merely of the religion of the Government of the nation, but of that which the nation has and should exercise in and through its government.

1. The people that form the nation must have the Christian religion. I say the "Christian," for whatever other religions there may be in a loose sense of the word, that which has Christ for its center and sum is the only one that truly binds man to God, to truth and to duty. As a man cannot have a religious life unless he have religion within, unless his intellectual and moral powers are religious, so the nation organic neither has nor can it manifest true religion, unless the people who occupy the territory which God has given the nation, have and profess this religion. It is not requisite that every individual member of this providentially constituted nation should be truly religious in order that the State may rightfully possess religion and worship God.

A man is religious and may honestly profess to be so if the fear of God really rule within him, even though he have besetting sins, and his faculties are not yet fully sanctified. It is not requisite that a numerical majority should have and profess this true religion; but that the brain, the heart or the governing portion of the nation should be actuated by it.

This is illustrated by the condition of things in the family. A majority of the family may have no religion, or they may be even hostile to it, but if the parents, the governing part of the family be religious, then religion not only may but ought to be set up and practiced in all family religious ordinances. In this illustration the parents represent, not the officers who administer the government of the nation, but that part of the nation that sets up the government, and through whom the government obtains its authority and by whom it is maintained. Wherever this part of the nation is actuated by religious principles, the whole mass of the nation will be influenced by them. The social life of the nation will be molded by religion in such a case; the commercial, the legal, the educational, and the humanitarian aspects and interests of society will be largely influenced, and even, in measure, controlled by it. In one word, the civilization of the nation will be characterized by the religion thus held and professed by the governing classes of the nation. If this be so, their political action should also partake of the same character.

No doubt the more truly and fully the people are the subjects of religion, the more evidently and truly the life of the nation will be actuated by it. Hence the duty of doing all that can be done to evangelize the people; but it is not needful to wait till this is fully attained before the nation may and ought to proceed to embody fundamental religious principles in its Constitution, For--

2. Religion should be exhibited in the written constitution. Nothing can be more reasonable or suitable than that a people met in convention to establish a civil government, should give to the fundamental law of that government the character which they themselves possess. Even in nations where there is no written constitution, the nation impresses its character upon the constitution of government. No doubt there is a reflex action of the government upon the people, but still the nation really forms and modifies its own institutions of civil rule and the administration of these. This appears in the history of England, in the wresting of Magna Charta from King John, and the successive enlargement of the liberties and securing of the rights of the people, which is still going on in Great Britain, and seems now rapidly culminating. If the principles of liberty should be found in and characterize the constitution of a nation, much more should the principles of religion, for these latter are the true source and only security of the former.

This is the more necessary in a written constitution, for in this the will of the nation is more clearly expressed, and it lies at the very basis of the institution as set up, and is the fundamental law of its administration. How fit then is it, how necessary indeed, that the nation in framing this instrument should acknowledge God as the author of their providential constitution, and the ultimate source of that civil rule which they are now setting up; that they should formally express their allegiance to him who is the divinely appointed "Governor among the nations;" and that they should, in this document, profess their submission to his code of laws as laid down in the Scriptures. All this is the more necessary, because there may be incompetent or wicked administrators of the government, who may not be able to conduct it aright, or who may seek to subvert its principles. But the nation that has thus founded its government upon this firm basis, will always find it a defense and protection against evil, and a fulcrum for the lever with which to overthrow the wrong and restore the right to its lawful place.

Besides, such an acknowledgment of God, of Christ and of his law, is a formal act of homage to God, and is to be regarded as a continuous act of national worship offered to him whom nations as well as individuals are commanded to reverence and adore. We know also, how legislation moulds the character of a people, and especially how potent is the influence of the fundamental law of government upon the views and conduct of the people of any nation. This aspect of national religion, this primary outworking of the religious life of the nation is of fundamental importance. It cannot be omitted without great sin and great harm. We are a nation that has this Christian religious life working powerfully in many directions, and yet it has no place in our political system. We have already experienced largely the injury which this has wrought. God has thus attested the truth that he is the Governor, and that his law cannot be violated with impunity.

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