Joseph Priestley Quotes
It is sufficiently evident from many circumstances, that the doctrine of the divinity of Christ did not establish itself without much opposition, especially from the unlearned among the Christians, who thought that it savoured of Polytheism , that it was introduced by those who had had a philosophical education, and was by degrees adopted by others, on account of its covering the great offence of the cross , by exalting the personal dignity of our Saviour.
Priestley, Joseph. An History of the Corruptions of Christianity. Vol. 1, J. Johnson, 1782, p. 33.
While moderate Muslims interpret this sura as meaning that theologically, a belief in the divinity of Christ is inconsistent to Islam, extreme fundamentalists take this to indicate that Christians are heretics and should be executed in accordance with Sharia – Islamic Law.
A century later, it would be very difficult if not impossible for anyone with these religious beliefs to obtain the Republican Presidential Nomination, as the Republican Party was controlled by conservatives and fundamentalist and evangelical Christians. However, in 1899, the fundamentalist Christians were aligned with the Democratic Party, and they referred to the Republicans as “Godless Republicans”. Taft belonged to the Unitarian Church and did attend church unlike the later President Eisenhower. See {626401}.
Joseph Priestley FRS was an English chemist, natural philosopher, separatist theologian, grammarian, multi-subject educator, and liberal political theorist who published over 150 works. He has historically been credited with the discovery of oxygen, having isolated it in its gaseous state, although Carl Wilhelm Scheele and Antoine Lavoisier also have strong claims to the discovery, Scheele having discovered it in 1772, two years before Priestley.
