'Many Erasmuses for one Luther'

[TJ]

It appears then, that, in all the periods of antiquity, there were considerable numbers of Unitarians, either avowed or concealed; and very probably among the Albigenses, who bore so noble a testimony against the errors of the Church of Rome. Unitarians also appeared in great numbers about the time of the Reformation by Luther. But he and Calvin, not going so far, but retaining more fundamental corruptions of Christianity than any that they abolished, employed all their influence to bear down those who did not exactly agree with them, and stop where they did.

The truth has never, however, been without its witnesses, perhaps, even in no age or country; and Providence seems now to be opening a way for the much wider spread and the firmer establishment of the truth, especially in this country.

That it is not improbable but that, even in times of pretty great rigour, quiet people, who wrote nothing, and collected no disciples, would be permitted to continue in communion with the Catholic Church, notwithstanding their opinions were suspected or known to be heretical, may appear from the state of things at home, in the last and present age.

Is it not well known that there are both Arians and Socinians, members of the Church of England, and even among the clergy themselves, and yet, if they can reconcile it to their own minds to keep in communion with a Trinitarian Church, there are no attempts made to molest them? Zealous as the heads of the Church may be for the purity of its tenets, they think proper to connive at these things, and so they did in an age more zealous than this. The excellent Mr. Firmin was not only an avowed Socinian, and in communion with the Church of England, but in habits of intimacy with Tillotson, and some of the most distinguished Churchmen of his time.

At present there are Arian and Socinian writers within the pale of the Church, and yet they are not excommunicated. Such a thing as this might not have passed so easily in the time of Theodosius. But even then I make no doubt, but that persons who could content themselves without disturbing others, would not have been molested.

Persons who do not bona fide hold the acknowledged tenets of any church, (I mean such great and distinguished ones as those relating to the object of worship,) ought to withdraw themselves from it, and not, by continuing in communion with it, to countenance its errors. But how many are there who do not see the thing in this light, or whose habits and prejudices are such, that they cannot bring themselves to act as I think every principle of honour as well as of religion dictates! And yet I cannot call all such persons hypocrites, doing what they themselves know and feel to be wrong. They have excuses, which, I doubt not, satisfy their own minds, though they do not satisfy me. Great allowance is also to be made for the force of habit, and even for a natural timidity. There are many Erasmuses for one Luther; many Dr. Clarkes for one Whiston, a name which, notwithstanding the weakness of his judgment in some things, ought never to be mentioned without respect, on account of his almost singular and unparalleled uprightness.

As to the common people, the idiotæ of Tertullian, we generally see that, as they are not innovators in doctrine, they go to public worship where they have been used to do, without any nice discrimination of what is transacted there; and the observation will generally apply to the bulk of the inferior clergy. When Henry VII. reformed the Church of England, how many joined him in it, who would never have declared themselves Dissenters from the Established Church!

These considerations, which are founded on such a knowledge of human nature as we may learn from all history, and our own daily observation, may render it credible, that the majority of the common people might be Unitarians, and yet continue in communion with the Church, after its forms became Trinitarian, especially as they would not become so all at once. In the most ancient Liturgies there were no prayers addressed to Christ; and as the members of Christian societies were not required to subscribe to any thing, there was nothing that they were expected to bear a part in, concerning which they might not be able to satisfy themselves.

The case is the same, in a greater or less degree, at all times, and in all churches. Quiet people will generally be indulged in their own way of thinking, and they are only those who disturb others that are themselves disturbed.

Theological and Miscellaneous Works, by Joseph Priestley, pp.26-28. Source

[JimSpace]

Great quote:

Persons who do not bona fide hold the acknowledged tenets of any church, (I mean such great and distinguished ones as those relating to the object of worship,) ought to withdraw themselves from it, and not, by continuing in communion with it, to countenance its errors.