Baptist History Homepage

Alexander Campbell's Comments on Baptist History
From Why Be A Baptist?
      Alexander Campbell, who traced a succession through the Baptists, says: "The disciples of Christ are the same race, call them Christians, Nazarenes, Galileans, Novatians, Donatists, Paulicians, Waldenses, Albigenses, Protestants, or what you please. A variety of designation affects not the fact which we allege; we find an unbroken series of Protestants -- a regular succession of those who protested against the corruptions of the Roman Church, and endeavored to hold fast the faith once delivered to the saints, from the first schism in the year 250 A.D. to the present day; and you may apply to them what description or designation you please." ("Campbell-Purcell Debate," 1837, page 77) Again Mr. Campbell says: "Hence it is that the Baptist denomination, in all ages and in all countries, has been, as a body, the constant asserters of the rights of man and of liberty of conscience." - Christian Baptist, page 409. Mr. Burnett, one of the leading editors of the Disciples of Mr. Campbell, said in "What and Where Is the Church?", page 73: "Christ founded His church upon a rock, and it has been there ever since. In the days of Alexander Campbell it was wearing the name 'Baptist Church.' With Alexander Campbell we say, the kingdom was with the Baptists before he and his coadjutors started the Reformation."

[From H. Boyce Taylor, Why Be A Baptist?, pages 45-46.



H. Boyce Taylor Index
More Baptist Biographies
Baptist History Homepage