The activity of the State is, as the Apostle explicitly stated (Romans 13:4, 6), a form of divine service. As such it can be perverted just as the divine service of the Church itself is not exempt from the possibility of perversion. The State can assume the face and character of Pilate. Even then, however, it still acts in the power which God has given it (“Thou couldest have no power at all against me, except it were given thee from above”: John 19:11). Even in its perversion it cannot escape from