Civil government is a state of society in which men are reduced to order;
it is a government in which every citizen has full power over his own
rights, but is not at liberty to infringe upon the rights of others. The
deepest thought in the word _civil_ is the idea of being hedged around by
restraints, so as to be shut in from all privilege, or right, of meddling
with the rights of others. The Welsh use the word “cau,” to shut, inclose,
fence, hedge.
Civil liberty is liberty modified by the rights of others. No man has a
right, by any Divine warrant, to infringe upon the rights of another; and
cannot do it without forfeiting more or less of his own. This thought,
that a man may forfeit his rights, is as essential to proper conceptions
of civil government, and civil liberty, as the thought that a man has
rights; for if there be no forfeiture of rights through crime, then all
legal punishments are without foundation in justice; even the right of
self-defense, individually and nationally, ceases to exist. And if this be
taken away, all support and strength in civil government is gone; anarchy
and ruin only may remain. In all civilized nations a man is regarded as
forfeiting his right, _even to life_, by trampling upon the _life-right_
of another, and, while the danger lasts, the assailed may defend his life,
in the absence of any other defense, even at the expense of the life of
the assailant. To deny this doctrine of the right of self-defense, it is
only necessary that we deny that a man can forfeit the right of life. To
do this is equal to the affirmation that God is the author of coexisting
and conflicting rights. Such rights can exist only at the expense of the
destruction of all governments, both human and Divine, as well as all
healthy influences of social institutions. It is essential to civil
liberty to restrain men from all interference with the rights of others.
The greatest degree of civil liberty is enjoyed where men are successfully
restrained from such officious interposition. A people may enjoy civil
liberty without extending the right of suffrage to all ages and to both
sexes; without making all eligible to office; without abolishing paternal
authority over minors; without abolishing the punishment of criminals, or
the right of the State to the service of its citizens when the public good
requires it.
The word _civil_ also signifies courteous, complaisant, gentle and
obliging, well-bred, affable, kind. From this it will be seen that civil
government depends upon the intelligence and righteousness of the people.
The absence of all legal demands and all legal restraints would be the
absence of all government. It would be libertinism or lawlessness. The
great majority of men, from the earliest ages of the world to the present
time, have been under the control of tyrants, and have known little
exemption from despotic rule. There is not a single Pagan, Mahomedan, or
anti-Christian country to-day in which the spirit of liberty has an
abiding place. She may have brooded over them at intervals, but, like
Noah’s bird, found no resting place.
The influence of the Bible preventing the young, the mature, and the aged
from crime, causing men and women to love and respect our humanity, is of
necessity _to the same extent_ the very life of civil government, and
consequently the life of civil liberty. It has been said the Bible is the
great protector and guardian of the liberties of men. It was an axiom in
an apostate church, that ignorance is the mother of devotion; but the true
origin of this axiom is that ignorance which fastens the chains of civil
and ecclesiastic despotism.
It is not possible for a people thoroughly under the influence of the
teachings of the religion of Christ to be ignorant of their own rights and
the responsibility of their rulers. Where the teachings of Christ and the
Bible form public opinion the people must be free. No such tyrant as
Caligula or Nero would be tolerated in Protestant Christendom. The
necessary effect of Christianity upon an abused people is to make them
restless under a tyrant’s yoke. The author of Travels in England, France,
Spain and the Barbary States, although an enemy to the Bible, said, after
leaving the Barbary States and arriving in France, I could breathe more
freely. I no longer looked upon my fellow men with distrust, and I thanked
God that I was once more in a Christian land. When we survey the history
of past events and kingdoms we, too, find good reasons to thank the Lord
for a Christian land. The only authoritative history of remote events and
kingdoms is in the writings of Moses and the Prophets. In the times of
Moses there were no historical records in Greece, Chaldea, Phoenicia,
Egypt or Assyria. No other historian lived so remote as Moses. He was five
hundred years before Sanconiathan, and more than a thousand years before
Manetho. He has been called the _father of history_. Men have claimed that
astronomical calculations carry us farther back, but this claim has been
successfully refuted by the calculations of Bedford. There is a fact upon
record in Gillie’s history of Greece that confirms Bedford’s calculations.
This man says: After Alexander conquered Babylon he eagerly demanded the
astronomical calculations that had been preserved in that ancient capital
about nineteen centuries, and ordered them faithfully transcribed and
handed to Aristotle, who was the preceptor of this prince. They extended
back twenty two hundred and thirty-four years behind the Christian era.
There is no reliable history so ancient as the writings of Moses. All the
efforts between Moses and David are without regular form—a mass of
rearranged tradition, both fabulous and corrupt; long after the times of
David the pages of writers regarded authentic, are loaded with absurd and
disgusting fictions.
Nimrod’s kingdom was Babel, and he was a tyrant, instigating war and
bloodshed everywhere, laying the nations under tribute and transmitting
his tyrannical spirit and powers from son to son, until the Egyptians
drove his descendants into Canaan and Joshua drove them into Greece. Ninus
inherited the spirit of his father, and the history of his empire, until
it was overthrown by the Babylonians and Medes, is a history of absolute
Assyrian despotism.
The Babylonian Empire was no better from the revolt of Nebopolassar to its
destruction by Cyrus. Egypt and Persia were also equally deprived of the
blessings of civil liberty. Greece and Rome were in no better condition
with the exceptions of a few restrictions consequent upon Greece being
controlled by established customs and Rome by the Senate. These nations
were comparatively free, but their freedom did not grow out of a
comprehension of the rights of their citizens.
The Jewish Republic is the first ancient government where the people
exerted any proper influence in state affairs. It is worthy of special
consideration that the Jewish laws were adapted to civil liberty in an age
when human rights were so little understood. There is no one work so full
of the great principles of civil wisdom as the Pentateuch and the history
of Judah and Israel. They were free in choosing their form of government;
free in the establishment of their laws; free in the fact that their laws
governed and not men. Their form of government was republican, with
healthy limitations. Twelve tribes were united in one great republic like
so many confederated states bound together for purposes of defence. At
first God was their king. After awhile they desired another king, and
their form of government was changed to a limited monarchy upon their own
request. Their kings did not enter upon their duties until they were
accepted and crowned by the people, and then they were restricted in their
power by sworn stipulations.
Bad men do not make good citizens. There never was a nation of infidels or
idolaters, existing as such, in the enjoyment of freedom. Holland was free
as long as she was virtuous. She flourished as a republic, produced great
and learned statesmen; she became corrupt, and infidelity banished her
glory.
When Perrier, of France, the successor of Lafayette in the office of Prime
Minister to Louis Phillipe, was on his death bed he exclaimed, with much
emphasis and zeal, “France must have religion”—man must be governed by
moral truth or by despotic power. Liberty does not flourish without
morality, nor morality without the religion of the Bible. The love of law,
the love of wisdom, the love of benevolent institutions, and the love of
virtue makes a people free. When these are absent tyrants are present.
When a nation becomes corrupt, liberty degenerates into parties and
factions until the stubborn necessity of the strong arm of despotism makes
its appearance to control the passions of men. If pride, selfishness, love
of gold, thirst for power and licentiousness, are not controlled liberty
will die. It may be truthfully said that the high-toned principles of
Bible morality are necessary to the good of all classes. These, and only
these, will unite a people in one grand national brotherhood, wiping out
its factions and hatred, extinguishing party spirit and bringing all the
parts into one great whole. Many minds are so opposed to the Bible that
they _are_ inclined to oppose any government based upon its contents. This
is a fearful current, and we should always watch against being carried
away upon its turbid waters. Ours is a Christian land, and we shall be a
free people as long as we remain a Christian people. While the Bible is
loved and honored our freedom will continue; beyond this there is nothing
to hinder us from _degenerating into slavery_. All great struggles in
Christian lands have been great _moral_ and political struggles.