"Yet the article commonly talked about as 'love,' is not the apostolic article. The popular article consists of an emasculated mind, and honeyed words uttered in a silly tone. The apostolic 'knitting together in love' is on the goodly foundation of 'all riches of the full assurance of UNDERSTANDING.' It is a love springing from identical convictions -- a common love resulting from a common enlightenment; a mutual affection spontaneously generated by unity of knowledge and judgment, and this not in the scanty form of 'opinion' or the cold uncertainty of 'views' but in the richness of a positive and pronounced 'assurance of understanding;' enthusiastic convictions if you will, without which there can be no true discipleship of Christ." (The Christadelphian, 1873, p. 116)
"Where men's faith is weak, and their minds are full of uncertainty, and they are conscious that their own deeds will not bear the light, you find them full of 'charity,' and sensitively fearful of the truth being too plainly spoken. All their sympathies are with the feelings of the corrupters, and transgressors of the word. They don't want the truth too plainly demonstrated, lest it should make them unpopular; or they should be themselves obliged to defend that of which they were not fully assured. There is always some screw loose in these mealy-mouthed and syren apologists of truth. The spirit of the flesh (which they mistake for the Holy Spirit) works in them a fellow-feeling with the children of disobedience; not that they really sympathize with them-- they are too selfish for that: but in uttering this hard doctrine of their iniquity, 'thou condemnest us also'. This is the secret of their whining about 'bitterness and severity;' they are themselves convicted of treachery to the truth." (Dr. John Thomas, The Herald)
The religious world is as little inclined as the political to believe that there is any infidelity in it. Hence arises its danger; when they are crying 'Peace and safety,' then sudden destruction overtakes them. Neither will they ever believe it until some great cause arises to make it manifest to their senses. No human being would have credited it, had he been told in 1788, that within five years the royal family of France would be put to death by public execution, the whole popish priesthood extirpated, and Romish religion abolished; nor would this have taken place unless infidelity of that system had been universally diffused through the mass of the people. Infidelity is in full triumph under the name of Liberalism. The very term ought to open men's eyes to its true character. Religion is a system of bindings; whether to God as supreme, or to our neighbors, in all the various relationships of life. It inculcates control of ourselves, and the submission of the will and inclination of the individual to the well-being of another. Liberalism is the very opposite to all this. It is a system of unbindings, of setting free from all ties. It inculcates that religion is only an affair between each man and his Maker; that we should not disturb the creed of another. It teaches its disciples to say "Let me do as I like, and you shall do as you like." Self is its idol, whose dictates alone it is to follow. Thus it is the very essence of selfishness; self its motive; self its end; self all. Pursuing its own power for its own solitary advantage, and drawing all its motives of action from the confined and this delusion of liberalism has seized upon many who flatter themselves that they are God's servants. May they be delivered from the pit into which they have fallen. But to this end nothing can avail, but the study of God's prophetic word. This alone can save a man from this specious error of a spurious philanthropy." (Dr. John Thomas, The Herald, 1858)
"This Charity! It is the corrupting mildew that blights every Christian principle. It has obliterated the ancient lines, removed the landmarks, and broken down the partition wall between the Church of Christ, and the dominions of the god of this world. Charity! In all the charity of this benighted and apostate age, I find no charity to God, no jealousy for His honor, no zeal for the rights of Jesus and his Apostles, -- no none! That horrible, soul-withering, false-hearted, sickening charity, has regard only to the sincerity of opinion as the ground of acceptance with God; as if the great I AM would contemplate the transmutation of his laws and ordinances into the trumpery of opinions of men with complacency, and accept their sincerity as a substitute for His requirements! Preposterous!" (Dr. John Thomas, The Apostolic Advocate, 1835)
"I would endeavor to show them what love consists in. It is one of the fruits of the Holy Spirit, and consists in action not in word. The Holy Spirit testifies that 'God so loved the world as to give his only begotten Son, that whosoever believes on him may not perish, but obtain eternal life;' and again --'We love God because he first loved us,' and by Jesus, the Holy Spirit also says, 'If ye love me keep my commandments,' and 'love is the fulfilling of the law.' These are the premises, the inference is as follows -- that love comprehends the fulfillment of our relations to God and our neighbor; and that these relations consist in obedience to the laws of God, and in doing to others as we would they should do to us. Love to God, therefore, is but another term for obedience to His commands. Obedience is the manifestation of love and the only way in which we can show our love to God." (Dr. John Thomas, The Apostolic Advocate, 1835)
"The sealed servants of the Deity are always exclusive; for, being enlightened by the word and ruled by its principles, their liberality, toleration, and charity, transcend not the line which they describe - "to the law and the testimony, if they speak not according to this word, it is because there is no light in them." Tried by this rule, they found the whole world condemned except themselves, and boldly and bravely proclaimed the truth." (Eureka, Vol 2., Logos Ed., p. 344)