After laying out his plan for achieving unity through restoration cited above—that we should do and say as the first century church did and said—Campbell immediately writes: “But if after all, our brethren can point out a better way to regain and preserve that christian unity and charity expressly enjoined upon the church of God, we shall thank them for the discovery, and cheerfully embrace it.”
This comment indicates, first, the humility of Campbell in defining his vision for unity. ....
Second, Campbell’s remark shows explicitly which value he considers as the end and which value is the means. Unity is the conditio sine qua non, “expressly enjoined upon the church of God.” Restoration of first century practices is the means to that unity.
Third, and most noteworthy, Campbell regards the means, which in this case is patternistic restoration, to be potentially dispensable. By “dispensable,” I do not mean unimportant. Restoration is, to Campbell’s mind, the most effective way, “the only possible way, that [he] can perceive,” to achieve unity. He leaves the door open, however, in case there is, in his words, “a better way.”
Source: Thomas Campbell - Thomas Campbell, Declaration and Address, in The Quest for Christian Unity, Peace, and Purity in Thomas Campbell’s Declaration and Address, ed. Thomas H. Olbricht and
Hans Rollmann (Lanham, MD: Scarecrow, 2000), 37, as quoted in "The Restoration Movement, the Habit of Schism, and a Proposal for Unity", by Dr. Keith D. Stanglin, in Christian Studies, Volume 28, August 2016, http://austingrad.edu/Christian%20Studies/CS%2028/Proposal%20for%20Unity.pdf