Congress shall make no law respecting the establishment of religion, or prohibiting the free exercise thereof.

... [E]xperience witnesseth that ecclesiastical establishments, instead of maintaining the purity and efficacy of Religion, have had a contrary operation. During almost fifteen centuries has the legal establishment of Christianity been on trial. What have been its fruits? More or less in all places, pride and indolence in the Clergy, ignorance and servility in the laity, in both, superstition, bigotry and persecution.

Religious bondage shackles and debilitates the mind and unfits it for every noble enterprise, every expanded prospect

Religion flourishes in greater purity, without than with the aid of Government

Union of religious sentiments begets a surprising confidence

The number, the industry, and the morality of the priesthood, and the devotion of the people have been manifestly increased by the total separation of the church from the state