Now let all people clearly understand, and settle it in their hearts,
that no change in Church or in State can change in the least their duty
to God and to man. If the world were turned upside down, God would still
be where He is, and we where we are--in His presence. Right would still
be right, my friends, and wrong wrong, though all the loud voices in the
world shouted that wrong is right and right wrong. No change of time,
place, society, government, circumstance of any kind, can alter our duty
to God, and our power of doing that duty. Whatever the Caesar of the
hour may require us to render to him, what we are bound to render to God
remains the same. The two things are different IN KIND, so different,
that they never need interfere with each other.
Even if, which God forbid, the connection between Church and State were
dissolved; even if, which God forbid, the Church of England were
destroyed for a while--if all Churches were destroyed--yea, if not a
place of worship were left for a while in this or any other land; yet
even then, I say, we could still render to God the things which are
God's, and offer to Him spiritual sacrifices, more pleasing to Him than
the most gorgeous ceremonies which the devotion, and art, and wealth of
man ever devised--sacrifices, by virtue of which the Church would arise
out of her ruins, like the Jewish Church after the captivity, more pure,
more glorious, and more triumphant than ever.
Pages:
466
467
468
469
470
471
472
473
474
475
476
477
478
479
480
481
482
483
484
485
486
487
488
489
490