There is a moral virtue, a moral fidelity, ability and honesty, which other men, besides church members, are, by good nature and education, by good laws and good examples nourished and trained up in; so that civil places and trust and credit need not be monopolized into the hands of church members (who sometimes are not fitted for public office), while all others are deprived and despoiled of their natural and civil rights and liberties.
Roger WilliamsCivil government is an ordinance of God, to conserve the civil peace of a people, so far as concerns their bodies and goods.
Roger WilliamsAll who are entrusted with spiritual and temporal talents must lay them out for the Lord and Master's advantage.
Roger WilliamsI do not condone hostility toward any church simply to vent personal malice or umbrage.
Roger WilliamsWhile I deplored and denounced the incivilities of Quakerism in my day (such as the going naked in public by some at sundry times), my position regarding their religious views was, "They will answer to God, at their own peril, in the great day approaching [that is, the day of divine judgment]."
Roger Williams