Dear friends:

Today I am reminded of some historical information I researched and recorded almost 20 years ago, and how timely it is today.

Jim
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In 1799, over 200 years ago,Dr. Jedediah Morse, made the following relevant and prophetic statement:

"To the kindly influence of Christianity we owe that degree of civil freedom, and political and social happiness which mankind now enjoys.  In proportion as the genuine effects of Christianity are diminished in any nation, either through unbelief, or the corruption of its doctrines, or the neglect of its institutions; in the same proportion will the people of that nation recede from the blessings of genuine freedom…. Whenever the pillars of Christianity shall be over thrown, our present republican forms of government, and all the blessings which flow from them, must fall with them."

Morse's observation is not a pious platitude but is based on a psychological fact.  Commitment to Christ and His rule in one's personal life brings self-restraint in human relationships.  A person must be ruled from within or from without, either through restraining self or being restrained.  Lack of self-restraint always results in either anarchy or repression.

In 1852, Robert C. Winthrop made an interesting comment on this principle:

"All societies must be governed in some way or other.  The less they may have of stringent state government, the more they must have of individual self-government.  The less they rely on public law or physical force, the more they must rely on private moral restraint.  Men, in a word, must necessarily be controlled, either by a power within them, or by a power without them; either by the Word of God, or by the strong arm of man; either by the Bible, or by the bayonet."

(Dr. Jedediah Morse 1761-1826, U.S. clergyman and geographer, father of Samuel Morse.  Robert C. Winthrop, 1809-1894, was an American statesman and member of the U.S. House and Senate from Massachusetts.)