The Beginners of a Nation: A History of the Source and Rise of the Earliest English Settlements in America, with Special Reference to the Life and Character of the PeopleEggleston, Edward
History
The Beginners of a Nation: A History of the Source and Rise of the Earliest English Settlements in America, with Special Reference to the Life and Character of the People
Eggleston, Edward
United States -- History -- Colonial period, ca. 1600-1775
When the reformer has warmed to his work he looks about him for new
abuses to fall upon. The dominant discontent of any age is prone to
spread its wings over other grievances, and feebler movements seek
shelter from the strong. Puritanism no doubt gathered momentum from
the widespread agrarian and industrial disturbance in this and the
preceding reigns. The profit from sheep-raising had induced many manor
lords to inclose the wastes on which the peasants had pastured their
cattle for ages. The humble copy-hold tenant, having no longer grass
for his cows or mast for his pigs, was driven to distress by
agricultural progress. In some cases even the common fields,
cultivated in allotments from ancient times by the members of the
village communities, first as serfs and later as tenants, were turned
into sheepwalks, and hamlets of tenants' cottages were torn down to
make room for more profitable occupants of the soil. The worst
offenders were the greedy courtiers who had secured the estates of the
English monasteries. Workmen ruined by the dissolution of the guilds
were added to the ranks of the unhappy. All the discontent begotten of
these transitions from mediæval life tended to strengthen the leading
opposition--and that leading opposition was Puritanism.
VI.
[Sidenote: Widening the field of protest.]
Puritanism also progressively widened its field of protest. Beliefs
that Protestants rejected were symbolized by the vestments of bishop
and clergy. Advanced Protestants insisted that the shadows should be
banished with the substance, that the symbol should disappear with the
dogma. We have seen that in Frankfort the inchoate Puritan party
wished to abolish the litany and purge the service book of all the
remains of the old religion. This controversy raged in England, and
the Puritan side did not at first lack support even among the bishops.
But Elizabeth, the real founder of Anglicanism, molded the church to
her will, putting down Catholics and Puritans with a hard hand. The
more advanced of the party came at length to believe that all
"stinted" prayers "read out of a book" were contrary to the purity and
simplicity of Christian worship. The hostility of the bishops to that
which the Puritans believed to be the cause of God no doubt helped to
convince the persecuted party that the episcopal office itself was
contrary to Scripture.
[Sidenote: Puritanism becomes dogmatic.]
[Sidenote: Note 6.]
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