to their cause; and after the Restoration to recover its character, and promote its progress. Puritanism, when once more separated from the State, returned to the old and better paths of confessorship and humiliation; and thrown back upon itself and upon God, it became, as of yore, a spiritual agency of the most potent kind. The theological books it produced, the devoted characters it formed, and the pious memories it handed to posterity, have created an influence embracing within its reach both England and America. The effect of its works, examples, and traditions have never perished in Dissenting Churches and families; but beyond these circles, it has manifestly told upon the Christian world. It contributed to the great revival of religion which arose within the pale of the Establishment during the last century; and from an earlier period than that, down to the present day, its perpetuated spiritual power has been deeply felt, and gratefully acknowledged on the other side of the Atlantic. Such was the system of Puritanism--politically, ecclesiastically, spiritually; such were some of the causes which produced changes in it at the era of the Restoration. What it was, and what it did at that period and afterwards, remains to be related. We are to consider what, in its Presbyterian, Congregational, and other forms, it became; what it endured of direct persecution and of indirect social wrong; and what it achieved in works of faith, and love, and zeal. We are to trace its social influence in the retirements of English life; its new political influence on the side of liberty; the germs of after-thought which it planted; the stones of reform and improvement which it laid. Also, and this will occupy a still wider space, we are to mark how the Episcopal Church of England rose out of her ruins, and the Establishment became once more Anglican. All this, in the minute grades of the process, together with the form of the re-edification; the policy of its new builders; their relations and conduct towards their Nonconformist brethren; the intermingling of ecclesiastical and political events; the Church developments; the theological controversies; and the spiritual life of the period, amongst Conformists and Nonconformists--much of it, on each side, beautiful, some of it, on both sides, marred--it is my arduous task faithfully to unfold. CHAPTER I.