Page:The World's Famous Orations Volume 7.djvu/163



law in a declaration of right; the right of freedom of worship, a sacred right, will be protected by your laws, which being in harmony with its principles shall have no other object than to guarantee it. Human reason can not retrograde. We have advanced too far for the people to believe that freedom of worship is not theirs, tho they may not see the principle of this liberty graven on the table of your laws.

If superstition seems still to have some share in the disturbances of the Republic, it is because it has been the policy of our enemies always to employ it; but mark: everywhere the people, freed from malevolent instigation, recognize that any one who would interpose between them and their God is an impostor. Everywhere the deportation of fanatical and rebellious priests is demanded. Beware of misconjecturing national opinion; beware of inserting a clause which should contain this unjust presumption; in passing to the order of the day adopt a sort of "previous question" upon the priests, which will do you honor in the eyes of your fellow citizens and of posterity.