No more paying your notes on Saturday when they fall due on Sunday; no more closing your business places on Sunday; no more of Sunday stillness in the marts of trade; no more exemption of Sunday from common-school time by the authorities of public instruction; no more closing of theatres, lecture halls, art galleries and public libraries on Sunday with any reference to its uses as a day of Christian worship; and all this to secure harmony with the Constitution. "8. We demand that all laws looking to the enforcement of 'Christian' morality shall be abrogated, and that all laws shall be conformed to the requirements of natural morality," [whatever that may mean], “equal rights, and impartial liberty." When these demands shall have been secured, we shall have sunk again to the morality of Pagan times. The mercy which now tempers our criminal laws will have given place to the savageness of barbarian lands. Where then shall we look for those "equal rights,” and that "impartial liberty" which never ripened except under a Christian sun ? "9. We demand that not only in the Constitutions of the United States and of the several States, but also in the practical administration of the same, no privilege or advantage shall be conceded to Christianity or any other special religion; that our entire political system shall be founded and administered on a purely secular basis; and that, whatever changes shall prove necessary to this end shall be consistently, unflinchingly, and promptly made.” And That is, in short, we demand that this Government shall be “unflinchingly and promptly" reduced to the nihilism of Atheism. Rather a big job. when accomplished, what next? Will it rest there? The human constitution makes man a religious being just as it makes him a social being. Eliminate the Christian religion, and you but clear the field for something else. Heathenism will take its place, and all the superstitions and corruptions of heathenism will abound. The truth is, there can be no morality, natural or special, that has not God in it. All genuine moral laws have man at one end and God at the other. We have heard so much about development these later years, that not a few suppose that God has been developed out of the Universe, and morality developed into it; while the most conspicuous of all our modern developments is the egotism of boastful learning. These being the modest demands of Liberalism, let us inquire how much it has really accomplished. It has, as we have seen, demanded the elimination of all mention of God and Christianity from the State Constitutions in order to bring them into harmony with the United States Constitution. I have before me no data upon this subject; but from the nature of the problem I judge very little has been attained. The occasions for a modification of State Constitutions are few; and where they arise the appeal to a central board is inadequate, usually, to the end at which it aims. In some other particulars its success has been more flattering. The Bible has been ejected from the public schools in various quarters and for various ostensible reasons, among which, strange to say, we sometimes find the very reverence in which it is professedly held-a reason akin to that which would exclude religion from polities, lest it should be contaminated. As the States move forward in the work of compulsory education, they will find themselves confronted with the grave alternative of teaching Christian morality as a part of that education, or of turning annually upon the community an increasing number of keen-sighted enemies of public order. Another work in which the enemies of Christianity are meeting with some success is the opening of public libraries on Sunday. The significance of this measure is appreciated by relatively few. The reasons urged are plausible, and to a certain extent true; but they will commonly apply to art galleries, lecture halls, and even our public schools, with equal force. It is said, men and women had better loiter in public libraries than in the streets or drinking saloons. The same may be said of our children and the public schools. It is claimed that our libraries benefit the Sunday because they are public charities. In itself considered, were that the whole problem, men, women and children had better be found on Sunday in any of these places-public schools, lecture halls, art galleries, or even theatres, than in the grosser haunts of vice. But that is no part of the problem. To assume that they must be in the one class of places or the other is wholly gratuitous. The closing of the library does not necessitate the opening of the dram shop; and, if it did, it would still, possibly, be better that some persons should visit places of vice under their own and the public condemnation, than that the Sunday of quiet worship should be lost to the whole community. It becomes us well to consider whether the canting plea for the opening of our libraries is not the thin end of the wedge, whose full proportions are seen in the extraordinary demands above mentioned. A philosopher, who detects the subtle influences which temper civil life and business honor, will be likely to conclude that a far deeper mischief than the foregoing has already been wrought by the assumption that our government rests on a purely secular basis, and ought to rest there. We know the engrossing and even debasing influence of secular affairs when one surrenders himself to them. Who of you has not, after a week of jading toil, come to your Sunday worship and found inspiration, renovation, and a nobler ambition for future endeavor? Better still has been the experience of those who have borne constantly in their souls a quickening sense of God's presence and authority. Things secular become sacred; and work becomes divine. Who can say to what extent we owe our recent great national scandal (Credit Mobilier) which mantles our cheek with shame and disgraces us in the eyes of the nations, to the prevailing secular theories of government? Who can say to what extent such influences operate to corrupt our politicians and poison the foundations of civil life? Another pernicious result of the silence of our fundamental law in regard to Christianity is the inability of the Government consistently to deal with that foulest blot upon our modern civilization, the 'polygamy of Mormonism. Our President has recently indicated his purpose to take this matter in hand. Congress and the country appear to assent thereto. But with Christianity eliminated from every department of the Government, what warrant would there be for such proceedings? Do not Christianity and Mormonism stand on precisely equal grounds before our National Constitution? Must not Mormonism, if condemned at all, be condemned outside of the Constitution? Would not the philosophy we are opposing paralyze the nation in the direction of its noblest endeavors? Can there be freedom without law; and would not the elimination of Christianity, which is in reality our highest and our fundamental law, make noblest freedom impossible to us? Is this the road our fathers intended to travel? Is it the road we, their sons, are willing to travel? Has this nation ever undertaken the dubious business of eliminating all differences of opinion? Does this noble theory of toleration even imply the opposite philosophy-the duty of suppressing, in all its laws and in the expression of its varied functions, whatever is in conflict with any man's conscience? Christianity infringes the Atheist's conscience no more than does Atheism the Christian's conscience. It is as far from his house to ours as it is from ours to his. Recognize Christianity as our fundamental law, and we change this vantage ground. The recognition should, of course, be in fitting terms; not in terms that can be defended merely, but in terms that in their clearness and freedom from ambiguity need no defense. Such an amendment would work no miracle. By influence, not magic, would it bless the nation. It would furnish anchorage for the national faith; it would legitimate the influence of Christian morality in modifying criminal law; it would legitimate the spirit of Christianity in all law. But it is said persecution will follow. How? It is not a union of Church and State. It is a recognition of no church, but of that which lies behind all churches-Christianity itself. It is proposed to base no legislation upon it; and it can, therefore, stretch out no hand to oppress any man or tyrannize over him. Most of our State Constitutions have similar provisions. These are much nearer to the people than the United States Constitution, and yet no tendencies to persecution have been exhibited. Educating influence, not restraining power, is the sole agency it could wield. That agency, from the high places of the nation, it would wield with power and efficiency. Whatever others may do, I wish to record my voice in its favor. When the serried ranks of infidelity shall demand the suppression of the name of God and of the mention of Christianity, I wish to stand among those who will say them Nay-among those who rejoice in the purpose, promise, efficiency, and glory of Christ's kingdom among men. The Rev. Dr. Geo. P. Hays, President of Washington and Jefferson College, Pa., being introduced by the President, delivered the following address on the "Influence and Education of Public Sentiment: "" ADDRESS OF PRESIDENT HAYS. It is true of other forms of government, but preeminently true of Republics, that no law can be enforced which is not supported by the sentiments of the people. Temperance legislation is good, but it has never been enforced against the wishes of the mass. Usury laws were thought to be good, and at one time were enforced with severe penalties, but so soon as the people came to look on the use of money as a commodity like wheat or iron, interest rose and fell like other prices, and usury laws became a dead letter on the statute book. With this in mind, many are puzzled to understand why, when the sentiment of the revolutionary fathers was so unquestionably Christian, the fact does not show itself in the Constitution. But we shall not be surprised at this if we remember that they had been accustomed to the whole system of common law prevalent in England; and if we compare our constitutional history and the tendencies of our legal practice with that of England, we shall see that, while this amendment was not so essential then, it is now becoming increasingly important every day. In England there is no written Constitution. Immemorial custom there is law, and is so enforced by the courts. Even the most important regulations of their administration of government are often unwritten. No written enactment ever declared, that, when a vote of want of confidence in the ministry passed the House of Commons, the ministry must either resign or appeal to the people by dissolving Parliament, and calling a new election. And yet should the British Queen and her ministry refuse to abide by that regulation, and submit to the voice of the people, so declared, a revolution would be precipitated as certainly as if the President here should undertake to perpetuate his power after his term had expired, and another had been elected to fill his place. A capital illustration of what is meant by common law is found in our war of 1812. Every one knows that the last war with England sprang up almost solely upon England's claim to the right to take American seamen from American vessels and impress them into the English service, because they had formerly been Englishmen. Over that question these two countries fought persistently and bravely. By-and-bye the ambassadors of the two nations met to make a treaty of peace, and in that treaty not one word is said of the impressment of seamen. not even the most distant, can be detected. surely settled by the war, and finally settled. enforce impressment since, and, so far as I know, has never asserted the claim, and if to-day she was to try to enforce it, although we have no treaty stipulation to refer to in justification of our resistance, it would be resisted to the bitter end. It is common law between the nations. No allusion to that subject, Now, in England a very large part of their practice is common law practice, and in arguing it, all past historical facts are of the utmost importance; and in its decisions the courts will have high regard for the sentiments of the people, the public welfare, and past history. So in the beginning of the history of this country, English common law was common law here. A man was, I believe, once punished for gross blasphemy in New York under an indictment at common law. But the genius of our institutions has steadily drifted us away from common law practice to statute law. We began by having, first, Articles of Confederation, and then a written Constitution, in which it was distinctly provided that the powers not given to the Federal Government are reserved by the people; and then, to still further magnify statute law and diminish common law, we have Congress meeting in protracted annual sessions, legislating on all conceivable subjects, and discussing many inconceivable ones, and the State Legislatures racking their wits to find subjects whereon to legislate. Nothing but the dexterity of the criminal population can invent a subject not yet definitely mapped out, with its right and wrong all laid down in the law books. Go into the courts, and almost always in civil suits, and always in criminal suits, the prosecution opens his case by citing the law under which the suit is brought. You do know that here in New York are villains running unwhipped of justice because their crimes are not defined, with penalties attached, in the statute book. All the time our ignorant villains in the rural districts are swindled out of large sums of money, sent to bogus firms in New York for counterfeit National Bank notes, instead of which they only get sawdust; and when they come on here, they can do nothing in the New York courts, because the New York Legislature has not passed an act prohibiting lumber mills from furnishing sawdust for such purposes. (Laughter.) The President of our local Association was not long since on a jury, where the testimony proved that a farm was sold, and a large part of the purchase money paid. Shortly after the sale the seller died, and his widow married again before the deed was made out, when her second husband suggested that she had not, in full legal form, given her consent to the act of her first husband; and that jury, reluctant as they were, by the explicit charge of the court, were compelled to bring in a verdict by which that purchaser was required to pay the second time for what he had already paid. The justice and the right went for nothing when the letter of the law stood in the way. Just so now, it is capable of the most positive proof, on any platform, that Christianity was at the first, and ever since has been, an essential part of the political life of this nation; and if common law was the governing practice of this nation, the record of the past would be conclusive for the future, just so long as the churches kept up the religious sentiments of the citizens; but since more and more we are drifting away from common to statute law, what will all these avail in the presence of a specific enactment? In England the courts may condemn that which is against public morality, but here no moral evil can be a civil wrong until the Legislatures have passed upon it. Driven thus by the very nature and genius of our American political institutions away from common law to specific legislation, we are compelled to have a standard fixed and settled, to which all can appeal, by which virtue and vice is to be tested. A criminal code is impossible without a standard, and there never was a more impossible fancy than laws, courts and penalties indifferent among deities. Jupiter justified wife murder and robbery; Moloch required the sacrifice of children; Boodh is pleased with the burning of widows; Joe Smith's Mormon god inculcates polygamy; the Mohammedans get from the harem to Heaven by the battle-field, as the shortest route; Compte, while scouting everything Christian in constructing his positive politics, deified collective humanity; and France, in her baldest atheism, worshipped a strumpet as the Goddess of Liberty; while Jehovah would have us do justly, love mercy and walk humbly. When now you deal with crimes and civil rights, you must decide among these. Non-committalism is impossible. But some say there is no need of deciding, for the voice of the people is the law of the land. If that is true, polygamy is right in Utah; and a vote of the people and the Legislature can make it right to refuse to pay debts. Has the civil government the right thus to legalize fraud and cheating? We are now in a transition state in regard to the standard of weights and measures. It is to be hoped we shall soon come to use the decimal system there, as we now do in our money. Beyond doubt the law-makers can legislate the old cumbrous system out of existence, and the new in. Is the standard of crimes of the same character, so that it is only a matter of convenience whether crimes are voted up or down? Can the marriage tie and the sanctity of the household be |