Patrick Collinson writes:

One very significant difference between the Muggletonians and the Quakers was that Muggleton and his followers did not actively proselytise. For those who knocked on the door, there was free admission, provided that the authority of the Witnesses was acknowledged. But for the Muggletonians there was no compelle intrare, no mission. They believed that non-Muggletonians could be saved, though they lacked the firm assurance of salvation available to those who had accepted the authority of the Witnesses. That is why there were never more than a few hundred Muggletonians. Why that handful should have survived for three centuries is a question that still needs to be answered. As Lamont remarks: ‘The wonder of the Muggletonian history is not that there were so few Muggletonians but that a non-evangelising sect could last so long.’

(LRB 5 June 2008)

Ashgate | hardback 267 pp. |ISBN: 9780754655329