Introduction

In 1694 the Quaker Benjamin Furly declared in a letter to John Locke that the word “heretic” was one of “the most pernicious words that have for 1000 years obtaind amongst mankind,” as it was used to “render odious … all honest … generous spirited men, that dare be so bold as to profess, and practise what they Judge to be their duty … how contrary … it be to … church slaves and all their enslaved followers, who would make free men … bow their necks to their doctrines, decrees, orders, injunctions, and constitutions.” For Furly, “The Bugbear of authority, Tradition, and the name of the Church is so sacred … That few people dare call in question the Doctrines which the holy church has taught for so many hundred years, or which their Learned and godly ministers have all along taught since the Reformation.” Furly called for people instead to examine theological doctrines for themselves with eyes which “should be opened to see,” declaring that the Reformation had thrown off “the Intollerable yoake of Romish slavery” because the “first reformers” had been willing to be “counted Hereticks” and had made “no bones of Trampling all under foot … [doctrines] which they found to be unreasonable and unscripturall.”