Another and most dangerous principle which was advocated in the "Social Contract" was that religion has nothing to do with the affairs of civil and political life; that religious obligations do not bind a citizen; that Christianity, in fact, ignores all the great relations of man in society. This is distinct from the Puritan doctrine of the separation of the Church from the State, by which is simply meant that priests ought not to interfere in matters purely political, nor the government meddle with religious affairs,--a prime doctrine in a free State. But no body of men were ever more ardent defenders of the doctrine that all religious ideas ought to bear on the social and political fabric than the Puritans, They would break up slavery, if it derogated from the doctrine of the common brotherhood of man as declared by Christ; they would use their influence as Christians to root out all evil institutions and laws, and bring the sublime truths of the Master to bear on all the relations of life,--on citizens at the ballot-box, at the helm of power, and in legislative bodies. Christianity was to them the supreme law, with which all human laws must harmonize. But Rousseau would throw out Christianity altogether, as foreign to the duties and relations of both citizens and rulers, pretending that it ignored all connection with mundane affairs and had reference only to the salvation of the soul,--as if all Christ's teachings were not regulative of the springs of conduct between man and man, as indicative of the relations between man and God! Like Voltaire, Rousseau had the excuse of a corrupt ecclesiasticism to be broken into; but the Church and Christianity are two different things. This he did not see. No one was more impatient of all restraints than Rousseau; yet he maintained that men, if calling themselves Christians, must submit to every wrong and injustice, looking for a remedy in the future world,--thus pouring contempt on those who had no right, according to his view of their system, to complain of injustice or strive to rise above temporal evils. Christianity, he said, inculcates servitude and dependence; its spirit is favorable to tyrants; true Christians are formed to be slaves, and they know it, and never trouble themselves about conspiracies and insurrections, since this transitory world has no value in their eyes. He denied that Christians could be good soldiers,--a falsehood rebuked for us by the wars of the Reformation, by the troops of Cromwell and Gustavus Adolphus, by our American soldiers in the late Civil War. Thus he would throw away the greatest stimulus to heroism,--even the consciousness of duty, and devotion to great truths and interests.