Religion has always been a potent element in American society, and it is to the conservative power of Christianity, that we owe our greatest blessings. But it does not remain for us to prove what history has decided, that religion may be abused and perverted. In such a case, it becomes important to distinguish between Christianity and religious excesses, or corruptions, and to rescue the former from a responsibility which would dishonor and injure it. When religion is profaned and degraded by extravagant modes of action; when it becomes rude and violent, instead of maintaining the genuine character of Christian suavity and mildness; when it assumes an overbearing and despotic dictation to private and public conscience, instead of the kind and winning arts of persuasion, which shine so conspicuously in the example of the Divine founder of Christianity, and of his Apostles;--and more especially, when it has leaped from its appropriate sphere of the moral, to the agitations of the political, world, seized on a stupendous political machinery in violation of the laws of the country, disturbed civil order to an alarming extent, threatened to overthrow the Government, and to deluge the land in the blood of a civil war--it is time to enquire into the causes of such a movement, how it originated, and how it may be checked, if checked it can be. These causes cannot be understood, without alluding to the facts and events of our religious history; for it is after all, and in truth, a religious movement, even by its own public and authoritative confession, as before seen. The Constitutional law of this land has carefully excluded religion from a participation in the authorities of State, and it cannot lawfully meddle with its affairs. It is a notable fact, however, notwithstanding these cautious provisions, that it has finally and suddenly overstepped these constitutional barriers, and usurped the most important and most momentous State questions, that could possibly be taken in hand.