Paul Best and the Limits of Toleration in Civil War England

The attempt during the English Civil War to execute Paul Best for denying in private correspondence the orthodox doctrine of the Trinity fuelled the debate on religious freedom begun by John Milton and Roger Williams in 1644. The Best case was more pragmatically concerned with the question of whether a godly society should tolerate a degree of religious dissent in order to maintain political unity. Best's status as a scholar and gentleman challenged the theocratic intolerance of the English Presbyterians who failed either to secure Best's death or to reverse the longer term trend to secularize blasphemy as an aspect of popular disorder.