even mingled in their general scheme of civil policy an ecclesiastical element sterner and more searching than that of the Church from which they dissented. The curious historian may analyze, if he will, the earnest puritanism of early New England, or even the sturdy bigotry of early New Netherland; it is enough for the Commonwealth of New York, "by the grace of God, free and independent," to know that its first written constitution, born in 1777, in the very depths of the Revolutionary struggle, extirpated from the body politic every lingering element of ecclesiastical cognizance or spiritual authority. On all its features it bears the unextinguishable love of religious freedom, brought to our shores by the refugees from ecclesiastical tyranny, not only in England, but in Holland and France. Its ever-memorable declaration of religious independence—offspring of the lofty intellect and noble heart of John Jay, and growing bright with his Huguenot blood—proclaims to the world the fundamental resolve, "not only to expel civil tyranny, but also to guard against that spiritual oppression and intolerance wherewith the bigotry and ambition of weak and wicked priests and princes have scourged mankind."
Following up this fixed determination, and yet with wise regard and unaffected reverence for the Christian Church in its purity, the illustrious authors of this Magna Charta of our religious liberty, prohibit any "minister of the gospel, or priest of any denomination," from holding any office, civil or military, within the State; inscribing in the organic law, thus unmistakably, their settled purpose to deliver both dead and living from ecclesiastical cognizance, to emancipate the courts of justice from every priestly and mediæval fetter, and to allow them to breathe, through all coming time, the invigorating air of ancient, Anglo-Saxon freedom.
It is a striking proof of the inveterate attachment, even of the most enlightened nations, to prescriptive authority, that the monkish idea of the church-yard as an engine of spiritual power not only lingers in England, but is boldly proclaimed in its very metropolis. Within the last two years, the Archdeacon of London, in an official address to the clergy of the Established Church within his district, openly complains of modern legislation in the British Parliament, in establishing extra-mural cemeteries around their crowded cities; for, says he, "the church and the church-yard of the parish have hitherto been one of the strongest ties, to bind the people at large to the communion of the Church." And again, "Burial bound, I say, the people, in the metropolis, to the Established Church."
It certainly is not for us to interfere with the ecclesiastical law of England, nor needlessly to criticise its claims to the respect of the people whom it binds. We only ask to banish its maxims, doctrines, and practices from our jurisprudence, and to prevent them from guiding, in any way, our judicial action. The fungous excrescence which required centuries for its growth may need an efflux of ages to re-
