History of the Puritans under Elizabeth I

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Puritans
The Puritan, an 1887 statue by Augustus Saint-Gaudens, in Springfield, Massachusetts
Background Christianity Protestantism Reformation English Reformation Calvinism Anglicanism Arminianism Arminianism in the Church of England English Dissenters Independents Nonconformism English Presbyterianism Ecclesiastical separatism 17th-century denominations in England
Crucial themes Definitions of Puritanism Impropriation Puritan Sabbatarianism Millennialism Puritan choir Puritan work ethic Merton thesis
History History under Queen Elizabeth I History under King James I History under King Charles I Cromwellian era and after History in North America
Confessions Westminster Confession of Faith Savoy Declaration Cambridge Platform
England Scrooby Congregation Trial of Archbishop Laud Marian exiles Vestments controversy Martin Marprelate Millenary Petition Grand Remonstrance English Civil War English Restoration Act of Uniformity 1662 Great Ejection Elizabethan Religious Settlement
America Providence Island Company Massachusetts Bay Colony Salem witch trials Immigration to New England Culture in New England Christmas prohibition Praying town Half-Way Covenant American exceptionalism
Elsewhere Troubles at Frankfurt
Notable individuals Peter Bulkley John Bunyan William Bradford Anne Bradstreet John Cotton Oliver Cromwell John Endecott Jonathan Edwards Anne Hutchinson Cotton Mather Increase Mather James Noyes Thomas Parker Roger Williams John Winthrop Robert Woodford
Works The Godly Man's Picture The Pilgrim's Progress Paradise Lost Foxe's Book of Martyrs
Continuing movements Congregational churches (U.S.) other Reformed churches
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The reign of Elizabeth I of England, from 1558 to 1603, saw the start of the Puritan movement in England, its clash with the authorities of the Church of England, and its temporarily effective suppression as a political movement in the 1590s by judicial means. This led to the further alienation of Anglicans and Puritans from one another in the 17th century during the reigns of King James and King Charles I, that eventually brought about the English Civil War, the brief rule of the Puritan Lord Protector of England Oliver Cromwell, the English Commonwealth, and as a result the political, religious, and civil liberty that is celebrated today in all English speaking countries.

The English Puritan movement in the reign of Elizabeth and beyond sought to further the work of reforming the Church of England, eradicate the influence of Roman Catholicism in the land, as well as promote the national interest of the English crown and the English people under a united Protestant confession that was in strict conformity to the Bible and Reformed theology. This Puritan vision that began in the Elizabethan era would eventually result in the Westminster Assembly and the Westminster Standards, including Westminster Confession of Faith, the Shorter Catechism, and Larger Catechism, and the Directory for Public Worship.