is but partially acquainted with their history. Infidels may laugh, and ascribe it to chance; but the " day of their calamity draweth nigh." They may in this life escape the judgments of heaven, for defying God and trampling on his authority; for this is not a state of retribution to individuals; but the day is coming, when their hands will not be strong, and their hearts will not endure.

INDIVIDUALS.

Cases of signal punishment for individual sins, in this world, additional to those recorded in the Bible, might be given. Nor is there any mystery at all about it. The natural tendency of breaking the Sabbath is downward; and the road is full of pitfalls and thorns, and frightful precipices. See some dozen or twenty cases recorded in proof of this position, in a little tract entitled "Sabbath Occupations," públished by the American Tract Society. We shall copy one or two of them:

"A number of persons appointed a certain Sabbath as a time to play at foot ball. And while two of them were tolling a bell to call the company together, they were struck with lightning and both died."

"A pious minister, in his sermon, once spoke of the man in the camp of Israel, who was stoned to death for gathering sticks upon the Sabbath. A thoughtless man present was offended; and to show his contempt, left the house, and began to gather up sticks. When the congregation came out, they found the man dead, with a bundle of sticks in his arms."

We add a word from a distinguished foreign writer:

"Let the degradation, the disgrace, and at last the expulsion of the race of Stuarts from the throne of Britain, serve as a public warning to all Britons. For who, in the least acquainted with the history of his country, knows not, that, from the time when James the sixth of Scotland and first of England set himself to establish iniquity by a law, by instituting the book of sports! in England, for the Lord's day, the judgments of heaven pursued that family with calamity upon calamity, till the line of princes in that house, to lay claim to the crown of Britain, is now no more ?"

Many deluded and wicked men, like those just referred to, while listening to the history of the punishment and death of the man who gathered sticks on the Sabbath, as recorded in Numb. xv. 32-36, have been roused to indignation and contempt, both toward the Lawgiver and Israel. They denounce the transaction as totally unjust, and deserving the unqualified reprobation of all good men. But look at the circumstances. God had separated Israel from the heathen, to train them up in a knowledge of himself. He had given them his law, with its awful penalties. Obedience to that law would qualify them for his service, in communicating to the rest of the world his mind and will, and the plan of salvation through Jesus Christ. Disobedience to that law, unpunished, would bring it, as well as its Author, into contempt; and a man might show his contempt of the Lawgiver as fully by killing one man, as by killing a thousand; and by picking up sticks, as by running boats and stages on the Sabbath.

God also well knew, that if his people would not religiously keep the Sabbath, as he had commanded, it would be impossible to preserve among them a knowledge of himself. The Sabbath, as an instrument in his hands to accomplish this object, was every thing. If he suffered one man to profane it, though in a very trifling matter, another would not only take the same, but greater liberties; and in a short time, as facts in other countries show, they would have had no Sabbath among them; or individuals, at least, would neither sanctify, nor care anything about it. Further, if this and other breaches of the Sabbath were to go unpunished, the whole people might become lawless, and God might give them up to be destroyed.

Under these circumstances, should the man be put to death, that the law might be honored, and the whole people saved, or should he go unpunished, the law be despised, and God compelled to give up the people to self-destruction? We should say, let the man be stoned to death; and let not only Israel, but all creation utter a loud amen to it. Men who will continue, contemptuously, impiously, and wantonly, to profane that day, for their own sakes, and the world's, had better be put away from society, every one of them, than be allowed to go on, filling up

the measure of their iniquities, until they shall have blotted out the institution among them, and thereby destroyed, not only themselves, but millions of others, in body and soul. So have thought all those wise men who have enacted laws touching Sabbath desecration. Then the Sabbath might be saved. Men would not, for their own gratification, continue to trample on the law of the Sabbath, if they knew, that, as the price of their temerity, confinement was soon to be inflicted upon them. They would then pause and tremble. We should then have a way of preventing those men from destroying themselves and the community, who fear not the divine threatenings. Men who disregard future retribution, would then fear present. It is on account of such men, that God has given us an example of the mode of governing a people by a code of civil laws. This declaration will doubtless startle many. But we take the life of the man who breaks the sixth commandment; and why not the liberty of the man who perseveres in breaking the fourth? God gave the example of taking life in both instances: and the Sabbath-breaker, wilfully and habitually so, is doing more injury to the morals of the community, than ten murderers; because we do not see, so clearly, the evil he is committing, and therefore make no provision to counteract it. As to the propriety of taking life, at the present day, for any crime, we say nothing. But of this we are confident: God has put into the hands of every nation, a rule by which wicked, infidel, deistical men, who disbelieve and contemn him, and disregard their laws, can be governed, and prevented from destroying the influence of the gospel and its institutions, which he has designed shall bless the world. Those nations which will not avail themselves of that rule, will be destroyed by these men who fear not God; and all together, will go to destruction.

There are ways enough to avail ourselves of this rule, without taking a man's life. If a man says, I fear not your God, neither will I obey his voice, nor your laws touching him and his word; but I will blaspheme his name, pollute his Sabbaths, and ridicule his word-shut him out from society, for he will assuredly corrupt and destroy it, unless you do.

Which is best, that this one member should suffer, or the whole

body? We only touch upon this point, not intending here to discuss it at length; but suspect that we have given up ground to the infidel and deist which must be retaken, or they will not only ruin themselves, but their families and the world. Man has no right to disobey God, to the injury of his fellow men. If we allow him to do it, we nourish in our bosom an asp which will sting us to death.

There are two ways ordained by God of governing moral agents in this world. One is moral suasion-not only to persuade men to do right, but to endeavor to prevent them from doing wrong. But this cannot prevent them from doing wrong. The other is, physical force. This is only for those who are determined, notwithstanding moral suasion, to do wrong. This physical force cannot, nor is it intended to make a man love God, and be religious; but it can keep him from doing wicked acts— those things which God has forbidden him to do; and this God intends to have done. In a philanthropic and political point of view merely, we have a right, admitted by all good citizens, to forbid the doing of those things which injure society; but we may not have a right to command the doing of all those things which might be beneficial to society. The man is to have his choice, whether he will go to heaven or to hell; but he cannot have his choice, whether he may or may not do those things which will drag others along with him-he may not have his choice, whether he will block up the way to heaven, and contemn God, and labor to make others contemn him.

God had a moral and a civil or judicial code. Both were necessary in Moses' time; and for the same reasons, both are necessary in these times.

We should like to explain this point farther, but have, perhaps, already digressed too far from the main subject.

OBJECTION XIII.—“ CHRISTIANS WISH TO UNITE CHURCH AND

STATE."

It has been alleged that deists secured to this nation its religious liberty; and it is also claimed by some, that liberty originated in the mind of a deist in this country.

Our belief has always been, that the first spark of religious

and republican liberty emanated from the Bible, and the influence of the Sabbath, and through the Puritans, before they left England. Some very important facts, on this point, may be gathered from the following extracts.

"In the days of the Commonwealth, * * * on which side was found the inextinguishable love of liberty, and the great weight of solid English character, and morality, and pure religion? In the camp of the republicans, beyond a doubt; among the Puritans and Whigs, where the Sabbath was held most sacred, and the ministry of Christ honored, and the pure gospel preached uniformly with divine success. And what a contrast did this present to the camp of Charles I. and the court of Charles II. The Scottish malignant, and the English cavalier, the favorites of the Stuarts, united in their characters the grossest flattery of absolute monarchy and spiritual tyranny, with the most revolting irreligion, blasphemy, Sabbath-breaking, intemperance, reveling, and an utter contempt of even common decency."Brownlee.

The following very pertinent remarks are from a sermon preached in New York city, in 1831, by Rev. HERMAN NORTON:

66 UNION OF CHURCH AND STATE."

"How this charge appears in this country at the present time. -It is brought more particularly against the Presbyterians. They are said to be engaged in a conspiracy against this great republic, or are attempting to subvert the liberties of the people.

"On the other side of the Atlantic, the Presbyterians have never been charged with uniting Church and State. They have no connection with the civil government; do not believe in a union between civil and religious affairs; and for this very reason, have always been opposed by the sovereigns of Europe.

"That you may see that this is not mere assertion, without proof, I will bring forward the testimony of one, on this subject, who will not be considered very partial towards the Presbyterians. I refer to Hume, that notorious infidel. He declares that Queen Elizabeth opposed the Presbyterians, or Puritans, (for the Presbyterians are their descendants,) because of their attachment to civil liberty.' 'By them alone,' Hume says, 'the