I. From the earliest history of the world there seems to have been an

effort on the part of those who pretended to control the consciences and religious views of others to preserve in their own hands, the predominant _political_ power. 1. The first government recorded is that of Nimrod. He discarded patriarchal instruction; united tribes in cities; and formed their combination into an empire. The Magi controlled him, and, at his death, under the pretence of his deification, preserved his power in the priesthood. 2. In the extension of the Magi, every great leader, or king, was one of them; and obedient to the rules and instructions of their general, the Hierophant. 3. When, in the assertion of popular right, Pythagoras was driven away by Cylon, the then imperfect effort of self-government fell through. But little understood, its then dim light faded. 4. The society of the _Kabbalistae_, part of whom {108} were afterward known as the _Pythagorean league_, as the _Collegio fabrorum_ of Numa Pompilius, as the _Liberi Architectonici_ of the middle ages, and as the _Free-Masons_ of the present day; this society, I repeat, never interfered in politics. 5. The Christian church was tempted to forget, that Christ's kingdom was not of this world. And its two great branches, that of Rome and England, were seduced into the error of seeking to obtain power through public policy. Rome exerted her influences through her praetorian cohorts, the confraternities of mendicants and of Jesus--the Jesuits. Unknown, and in silence, they were domiciliated in courts and in families, throughout all nations; and some roamed as itinerants. The will of their general, on their unconditional subserviency to his behest, seemed to create an almost omnipresent power to be controlled by Rome alone. Has not the exercise of it been exemplified in the inquisition? Was it not felt in the massacre of St. Bartholomew? I will not stop to ask the power and control of a Madame Maintenon, or Du Barry: nor whose influences controlled them. Does not all history portray their one effort? But has not the Church of England endeavored to obtain temporal power, also, by interference in the affairs of this world, politically? Shame! shame!! If the priesthood are honest in giving an undivided allegiance to HIM, whom they {109} have taken an oath _only_ to serve; and yet, whose "kingdom is not of this world;" how dare they violate that obligation? "_Ne sutor ultra crepidam,_" &c. But we in the United States are not better than our neighbors. Man is the same everywhere, but for education. And this brings us to the great, practical lesson, to which end all that has thus far been detailed has been directed. Americans! no matter of what nation you came, consider this lesson. We have ignored and thrown aside the priestly fable of an anointment by a man conferring an hereditary right to rule his brother man, by any family. This _jus divinum regum_ is an absurdity, practically discarded by those who assert it. What divine right has been granted either to Napoleon the Great, or to Napoleon the little? Whence came it? By whose hands? How is it preserved? Is not the same religious power ready to crown a Bourbon one day, and, in spite of the hereditary _jus divinum_ already granted, crown a Corsican (who has waded through blood to his throne) the next day; over the very rights of the Bourbon, who relies on that _jus divinum_ as his title? A divine right (if any) is here granted to both--to the Bourbon, and to the Corsican. Can truth contradict itself? If there be a contradiction must there not be error somewhere? {110} This _jus divinum_ that began with the deification of Nimrod, is still perpetuated though in other hands. But we must look into this a little further.