And yet I hear of Northern
men, and women, and children, by families, buying a "life membership"
in such societies as these. A life-membership in the grave! You
can get buried cheaper than that.
Our foes are in our midst and all about us. There is hardly
a house but is divided against itself, for our foe is the all but
universal woodenness of both head and heart, the want of vitality
in man, which is the effect of our vice; and hence are begotten
fear, superstition, bigotry, persecution, and slavery of all kinds.
We are mere figureheads upon a hulk, with livers in the place of
hearts. The curse is the worship of idols, which at length changes
the worshipper into a stone image himself; and the New-Englander is
just as much an idolater as the Hindoo. This man was an exception,
for he did not set up even a political graven image between him
and his God.
A church that can never have done with excommunicating Christ while
it exists! Away with your broad and flat churches, and your narrow
and tall churches! Take a step forward, and invent a new style
of out-houses. Invent a salt that will save you, and defend our
nostrils.
The modern Christian is a man who has consented to say all the
prayers in the liturgy, provided you will let him go straight to
bed and sleep quietly afterward.
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