This consecration is made, that all who administer in
the government of men, in which they stand in the person of God Himself,
should have high and worthy notions of their function and destination;
that their hope should be full of immortality; that they should not look
to the paltry pelf of the moment, nor to the temporary and transient
praise of the vulgar, but to a solid, permanent existence, in the
permanent part of their nature, and to a permanent fame and glory, in
the example they leave as a rich inheritance to the world.
Such sublime principles ought to be infused into persons of exalted
situations, and religious establishments provided that may continually
revive and enforce them. Every sort of moral, every sort of civil, every
sort of politic institution, aiding the rational and natural ties that
connect the human understanding and affections to the divine, are not
more than necessary, in order to build up that wonderful structure,
Man,--whose prerogative it is, to be in a great degree a creature of his
own making, and who, when made as he ought to be made, is destined to
hold no trivial place in the creation. But whenever man is put over men,
as the better nature ought ever to preside, in that case more
particularly he should as nearly as possible be approximated to his
perfection.
The consecration of the state by a state religious establishment is
necessary also to operate with a wholesome awe upon free citizens;
because, in order to secure their freedom, they must enjoy some
determinate portion of power.
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