THANKSGIVING SERMON. 37 sought in the law of God. The protest of the minority of the last General Assembly against the scriptural action of that body upon this subject is before the world; and, notwithstanding the authority of the source from which it proceeded, its sophistry and weakness are by this time sufficiently apparent. When loyalty to our country is acknowledged to be “a moral and religious duty,” and when the “ right of the Assembly to enjoin this duty on the ministers and churches under its care” is unequivocally avowed, it appears to us that the Protestants themselves decide this great moral question; and it is but miserable quibbling by which they would traverse their own declaration, I crave to know if the Church of God has no right to her deliverance of the truth as it is in Jesus on such a question as this. We desire no stronger language than the words of this protest itself. “If the state pass any laws contrary to the law of God, then it is the duty of the Church, to whom God has committed the great work of asserting and maintaining his truth and will, to protest and remonstrate.” The simple question is, Is this secession of the South morally right ? If not, it is an egregious wrong; and that
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