I have thus shown, as fully as the time would permit, though far too briefly to do justice to the subject, the grounds on which we ought to obey God rather than men. These are to be found in the relation of the divine, and of human government respectively, to the ends of individual, and of social existence. But the occasion on which the text was uttered, a subject having directly refused obedience to rulers lawfully constituted, will lead us to consider the effects of the principle of the text when acted upon by men in those relations in which civil liberty is directly involved--in the relations of subjects and of rulers. What then will be the effect of an adherence to this principle on the part of subjects, as such? There is a tendency in irresponsible power to accumulate. It first gains control over property, and life, and every thing from which a motive to resistance based on the interests of the present life, could be drawn. But it is not satisfied with this. Nothing avails it so long as there is a Mordecai sitting at the King's gate that does not rise up and do it reverence. It must also control the conscience, and make the religious nature subservient to its purposes. Accordingly, the grand device of the enemies of civil liberty, has been so to incorporate religion with the government, that all those deep and ineradicable feelings which are associated with the one, should also be associated with the other, and that he who opposed the government should not only bring upon himself the arm of the civil power, but also the fury of religious zeal. The most melancholy and heart-sickening chapter in the history of man, is that in which are recorded the enormities committed by a lust of power, and by malignity, in alliance with a perverted religious sentiment. The light that was in men has become darkness, and that darkness has been great. The very instrument appointed by God for the deliverance and elevation of man, has been made to assist in his thraldom and degradation. When christianity appeared, the alliance of religion with oppressive power was universal. In such a state of things, there seemed no hope for civil liberty but in bringing the conscience out from this unholy alliance, and putting it in a position in which it must show its energies in opposition to power. This Christianity did. It brought the conscience to a point where it not only might resist human governments, but where, as they were then exercised, it was compelled to resist them. This appeared when the text was uttered, and there was then a rock raised in the ocean of tyranny which has not been overflowed to this day. The same qualities which make the conscience so potent an ally of power, must, when it is enlightened by a true knowledge of God and of duty, and when immortality is clearly set before the mind, make it the most formidable of all barriers to tyranny and oppression.