ordinances, but only as
they are administered by the Holy Spirit.

Civil government is for the protection of virtue and for the removal of
vice. Obedience should be paid to all its laws, where the conscience is
not violated in doing it. To defraud it in any manner of its revenues,
or to take up arms on any consideration against it, is unlawful. But if
men cannot conscientiously submit to any one or more of its ordinances,
they are not to temporize, but to obey Jesus Christ rather than their
own governors in this particular case. They are, however, to be willing
to submit to all the penalties which the latter may inflict upon them
for so doing. And as no Christian ought to temporize in the case of any
laws enjoined him by the government under which he lives, so neither
ought he to do it in the case of any of the customs or fashions, which
may be enjoined him by the world.

All civil oaths are forbidden in Christianity. The word of every
Christian should be equivalent to his oath.

It is not lawful to return evil for evil, nor to shed the blood of man.
All wars are forbidden.

It is more honourable, and more consistent with the genius and spirit of
Christianity, and the practice of Jesus Christ and of his Apostles, and
of the primitive Christians, that men should preach the Gospel freely,
than that they should live by it, as by a profession or by a trade.

All men are brethren by creation. Christianity makes no difference in
this respect between Jew and Gentile, Greek and Barbarian, bond and
free. No geographical boundaries, nor colour of the skin or person, nor
difference of religious sentiment, can dissolve this relationship
between them.

All men are born equal with respect to privileges. But as they fall into
different situations and ranks of life, they become distinguished. In
Christianity, however, there is no respect of persons, or no distinction
of them, but by their virtue. Nobility and riches can never confer
worth, nor can poverty screen from a just appropriation of disgrace.

Man is a temple in which the Divinity may reside. He is therefore to be
looked upon and treated with due respect. No Christian ought to lower
his dignity, or to suffer him, if he can help it, to become the
instrument of his own degradation.

Man is a being, for whose spiritual welfare every Christian should be
solicitous, and a creature therefore worthy of all the pains that can be
bestowed upon him for the preservation of his m