Political Science Of The State

THE STATE'S RELATIONS TO RELIGION. 497

the best church and the most Apostolic, when standing alone,
had the best prospects of success in the long run, and was
eminently under the divine protection.

The subject then becomes a practical one exclusively. Of
the subjects which meet us at this stage, such as the evidence
from opinion in the past, both Christian and other, the evils
of establishments from persecution and exclusion of dissidents,
the evils of the voluntary principle, when it is exclusive, Mr.
Gladstone treats in the subsequent chapters, but we have no
time to follow him further. One remark only we make in
leaving this and other works on church and state from the
English point of view. It is, that the practical good sense of
the nation has decided two points in the course of time: the
first, that two establishments may coexist in two countries
under one sovereign, both of them sustained and protected
by parliament, which cannot be both right on the theory of
the jw divinum of church government, if there be any jits
divinum ; and the second, that when an establishment like
that in Ireland has ceased to be needed, it maybe suppressed
and pass out of the state's control. Thus it is shown that
while the dissenting churches on the voluntary system are
permanent, as far as public law is concerned, the great Eng-
lish church may be overthrown by parliament, or be subjected
to such legislation that its best friends may wish for it a per-
manent separation from the state.

261.
It has appeared from the foregoing statements, that all states
until quite recent times have provided for the
religious wants of the communities included in
them, and that lawgivers have felt this to be a part of their
office when called upon to construct or reconstruct plans of
government. It has appeared that Christian thinkers have
shared this opinion with the philosophers and sages of the
heathen, that it has been felt to be not only a functicn which
the state might perform, but which it ought to perform, and
that the religious wants of the poor call for this state issis-
VOL. n. — 32