ABSTRACT
Doctors, lawyers, tavern philosophers, soldiers and young rakes were reported to make remarks critical of Christianity, there was never any deist social movement and it may be more accurate to think in terms of a diffusion of critical attitudes. The scale of controversy was reduced, but there were further erosions of Christianity's claims and a significant diffusion of disbelief in particular theological points to extensive audiences in England and America. Christianity was part of the common law of England, the established Church was, on some accounts, vibrant, and public manifestations of disbelief were repressed. Thomas Morgan represented the debate as one between a 'Christian Deist', who identified Christianity with the Religion of Nature without any need for positive external religion, and a Christian Jew, who insisted that positive external religion was essential to Christianity. True Christianity was identical with natural religion, and depended entirely on internal evidence.
