Soul Liberty - A Baptist Distinctive

The 1677/89 London Baptist Confession of Faith

CHAP. IX.

Of Free Will.

1. God hath indued the Will of Man, with that natural liberty, and power of acting upon choice;
that it is = Mat. 17.12. Jam. 1 14. Deut. 30.19; neither forced, nor by any necessity of nature determined to do good or evil.

2. Man in his state of innocency, had freedom, and power, to will,
and to do that = Eccl. 7.29; which was good, and well-pleasing to God;
but yet = Gen. 3.6; was mutable, so that he might fall from it.

3. Man by his fall into a state of sin hath wholly lost = Rom. 5.6. ch. 8.7; all ability of Will,
to any spiritual good accompanying salvation; so as a natural man, being altogether averse from that good = Eph. 2.1.5;
and dead in Sin, is not able, by his own strength, to = Tit. 3 3,4,5. Joh. 6.44; convert himself;
or to prepare himself thereunto.

4. When God converts a sinner, and translates him into the state of Grace = Col. 1.13. Joh. 8.36;
he freeth him from his natural bondage under sin, and by his grace alone,

enables him = Phil. 2.13; freely to will, and to do that which is spiritually good;
yet so as that by reason of his = Rom. 7.15.18,19 21.23.; remaining corruptions he doth not perfectly
nor only will that which is good; but doth also will that which is evil.

5. The Will of Man is made = Eph. 4.13; perfectly, and immutably free to good alone, in the state of Glory only.

Baptist Principles, Practices and Polity
Their Soundness Vindicated by Their Natural
Results and Logical Consequences
By Rev. T. S. Dunaway, D. D., 1882

I. As a natural and logical consequence of the principles, practices, and polity of the Baptists, they have been the friends and champions of religious-freedom or soul liberty for all peoples in all ages.

Dr. Foote, the Presbyterian historian, very justly says,

"Religious liberty is not the offspring of mere greatness of mind or of political sagacity.
It was a child of principle, cradled in suffering and fed on tears."

By religious liberty is meant something more than, indeed something entirely different
from, religious toleration. Paine, in his "Rights of Man," says,

"Toleration is not the opposite of intolerance, but it is the counterfeit of it. Both are despotisms. The one assumes to itself the right of withholding liberty of conscience,
and the other of granting it."

Toleration is mere permission, sufferance, and endurance, and implies the right to withhold or grant, to control or regulate. Soul liberty is not mere permission to enjoy religious opinions, doctrines, and worship, but it is the right of conscience responsible only to God, and beyond the control or regulation of any human being or government. For this reason, the true friends of religious freedom for all peoples, as an inalienable right, have always repudiated religious toleration, and fought against it as a usurpation and despotism, enslaving, while it professes liberation.

That the Baptists have been the pioneers and peculiar champions of religious liberty is a fact admitted and established by historians of other denominations. Bancroft says (Vol. II, page 66),

"Freedom of conscience, unlimited freedom of mind was,
from the first, a trophy of the Baptists."

"And John Locke, to whom Lord Chancellor King attributes the doctrine of religious liberty,
says, in his "Essay on Toleration,"

"The Baptists were the first
and only propounders of absolute liberty,
just and true liberty, equal and impartial liberty."

"The first modern treatise ever written on the subject of religious liberty was by Leonard Busher, a Baptist, in 1614. It is entitled, "Religious Peace, or a Plea for Liberty of Conscience." It was no plea for mere toleration, but for liberty of conscience in matters of religion for every human being. Here are some of its words:

"That it may be lawful for every person or persons, yea, Jews and Turks, Pagans and Papists, to write, dispute, confer and reason, print and publish, any matter touching any religion, either for or against whomsoever."

"The Baptist "Confession of Faith," which was published in 1611 declared, "We believe the magistrate is not to meddle with religion or matters of conscience, nor compel men to this or
that form of religion, because Christ is the king and law-giver of the Churches and the conscience."

The first treatise written on this continent, claiming full religious freedom, was by Roger Williams, in 1644. Having been banished from Massachusetts, in the Spring of 1636, he founded the city of Providence, Rhode Island. Southey says:

"This was the first commonwealth and civil government in the world
that gave to all equal liberty of conscience."

"And Bancroft says:

"Roger Williams was the first in modern Christendom to assert,
in its plenitude, the doctrine of liberty of conscience."

He seized the first occasion offered, when Baptists could practice in this regard their principles, in giving to others soul liberty, while they claimed it for themselves. From the very first Rhode Island was free from all constraint of the religious conscience, and any man, with or without any religious belief, could come and remain in the colony without molestation for his religious views.

"But if we turn our thoughts particularly to Virginia, we shall see what a noble work our Baptist Fathers did, in securing for that State and the whole country religious liberty...."

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