Girard, which tends to overturn as well as
oppose the public policy and laws of Pennsylvania, can also be set
aside?
Sir, there are many other American cases which I could cite to the court
in support of this point of the case. I will now only refer to 8
Johnson, page 291.
It is the same in Pennsylvania as elsewhere, the general principles and
public policy are sometimes established by constitutional provisions,
sometimes by legislative enactments, sometimes by judicial decisions,
and sometimes by general consent. But however they may be established,
there is nothing that we look for with more certainty than this general
principle, that Christianity is part of the law of the land. This was
the case among the Puritans of New England, the Episcopalians of the
Southern States, the Pennsylvania Quakers, the Baptists, the mass of the
followers of Whitefield and Wesley, and the Presbyterians; all brought
and all adopted this great truth, and all have sustained it. And where
there is any religious sentiment amongst men at all, this sentiment
incorporates itself with the law. _Every thing declares it._ The massive
cathedral of the Catholic; the Episcopalian church, with its lofty spire
pointing heavenward; the plain temple of the Quaker; the log church of
the hardy pioneer of the wilderness; the mementos and memorials around
and about us; the consecrated graveyards, their tombstones and epitaphs,
their silent vaults, their mouldering contents; all attest it.
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